[f. prec. sb.] To treat, imbue or mix with quicksilver; esp. to coat (the back of glass) with an amalgam of tin in order to give a reflecting power.
1704. Newton, Optics (1721), 94. Metal … reflects not so much Light as Glass quick-silver’d over does.
1799. G. Smith, Laboratory, I. 178. How to Quicksilver the inside of Glass Globes, so as to make them look like Looking-glass.
1831. Brewster, Optics, i. 4. The glass is always quicksilvered on the back, to make it reflect more light.
Hence Quicksilvered ppl. a. (in early quots. fig.). Quicksilvering vbl. sb., the action or process of coating, etc., with quicksilver; also concr. a coating of quicksilver or amalgam.
1599. E. Sandys, Europæ Spec. (1632), 80. Those nimble and quicksilverd braines which itch after change.
c. 1645. Howell, Lett. (1650), I. iv. 21. The Leaden-heeld pace of the one, and the Quick-silver’d motions of the other.
1753. Parsons, in Phil. Trans., XLVIII. 380. I took a quicksilver’d glass.
1825. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 728. The quicksilvered in-foil adheres … firmly to the glass.
