Tin-mining. Also 9 toas (erron. toss). [Possibly the same word as prec.; but connection of sense is not certain.
(The spelling toss seems due to a bad etymological guess (see quot. 1839) which has passed into dictionaries.)]
trans. To separate tin ore from the gangue or rough ore by stirring the slimes in a kieve, and allowing the heavier particles to settle.
1758. Borlase, Nat. Hist. Cornw., 180. The coffer is then emptied the second time, the tin carried again to the keeve, there tozed, skimmed, and packed.
1839. De la Beche, Rep. Geol. Cornw., etc., xv. 577. Another let the tin ore fall into it [sc. the water] by degrees at the side of the keeve, where it was tozed (tossed), or stirred by the other until the vat was almost full.
1882. Jago, Cornw. Gloss, Toas, or Toze, to shake or toss the wet tin to and fro in a kieve or vat, with water, to cleanse and dress it.
Hence Tozing vbl. sb., the action of thus cleaning the ore; also in comb., as tozing-tub, the tub or kieve in which tin ore is tozed. Also Tozer: see quot. 1885; (also a Cornish surname).
[1758. Borlase, Nat. Hist. Cornw., 179. The tin-ore is then sifted in a sieve purposely constructed, and if it needs must be sent to be buddled again, then returned to the keeve and worked as before with a shovel, which they call tozing the tin.]
1789. J. Williams, Min. Kingd., II. 210. They are obliged to take another method to clean it, which is called turloobing, or tozing. Ibid., 212. The tozing operation.
1839. Ure, Dict. Arts, 1244. The rough is washed in buddles, and in tossing tubs.
1877. Knight, Dict. Mech., 2603/2. Tossing, or Tozing, the operation of agitating ore in a kieve; a tub in which it is rotated in water by a stirrer on a vertical axis.
1885. Black’s Guide to Cornw. (ed. 13), 54. Tozer, the man who tozes, stirs, or washes the crop-tin.
