Turning Mercury Into Gold

An atom of mercury contains eighty positive charges (PROTONS) in its nucleus, and eighty negative outlying charges (ELECTRONS). If the chemist were to expel two of its PROTONS it would instantly become the metal known as platinum. If the chemist could then go a step further and take from it a negative ("planetary") electron, the mercury atom would then have lost two positive electrons and
one negative; that is, one positive charge on the whole; hence it would retain seventy-nine positive charges in the nucleus and seventy-nine outlying negative electrons, thereby becoming GOLD