A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume I (of 2)

224

Goguet. i. p. 326.

225

Plin. lib. xvi. c. 38, p. 32.

226

Septalii Comm. in Aristotelis Problem. Lugd. 1632, fol. p. 206. There is also a passage to the same purpose in Seneca, Epist. 108.

227

See Anciennes Relations des Indes et de la Chine, de deux voyageurs Mahometans, qui y allèrent dans le neuvième siècle. Par Renaudot. Paris, 1718, 8vo, p. 25.

228

Ars magna lucis et umbræ. Amst. 1671, fol. p. 102. Kircher repeats this account with some new circumstances in his Phonurgia, p. 132.

229

Morhofii Diss. de vitro per vocis sonum rupto, in Dissertationibus Academicis. Hamburgi 1669, 4to, p. 381.

230

Morhof quotes the following passage: – “With this brazen horn, constructed with wonderful art, Alexander the Great called together his army at the distance of sixty miles. On account of its inestimable workmanship and monstrous size, it was under the management of sixty men. Many kinds of sonorous metals were combined in the composition of it.”

231

“Among many things which the celebrated D’Alance caused to be made for this purpose, the trumpet ascribed to Alexander, and with which he called together his army, ought not to be omitted. As the figure of it was represented in an old manuscript in the Vatican library, and had been described by Bettini, that learned man was desirous of trying whether it could be proved by experience, and the attempt succeeded; for that kind of trumpet, if it does not excel, seems undoubtedly to equal the other instruments constructed for that end.”

232

Bettini Apiaria univ. Philosophiæ Mathemat. Bonon. 1642, fol. p. 38.

233

Magia Natural. lib. xx. c. 5.

234

“To communicate anything to one’s friends by means of a tube. This can be done with a tube made of earthenware, though one of lead is better, or of any other substance, but very close, that the voice may not be weakened; for whatever you speak at the one end, the words issue perfect and entire as from the mouth of the speaker, and are conveyed to the ears of the other, which, in my opinion, may be done for some miles. The voice, neither broken nor dispersed, is carried entire to the greatest distance. We tried it at the distance of two hundred paces, not having convenience for a greater, and the words were heard as clearly and distinctly as if they had come from the mouth of the speaker.” – Lib. xvi. c. 12.

235

Mathematische Erquickstunden, i. p. 243.

236

An Account of the Speaking-trumpet, as it hath been contrived and published by Sir Samuel Morland, knight and baronet, together with its use both at sea and land. London, 1671. An extract from it may be seen in the Phil. Trans., No. 78, p. 3056.

237

Among the antiquities of Syracuse in Sicily, one beholds with wonder chambers and galleries which are hewn out in the solid rock, and particularly a grotto, from which arises a winding passage, that becomes upwards still narrower. Ancient tradition says that this was a prison, which the celebrated tyrant Dionysius caused to be built for state prisoners, that in an apartment of his palace, which stood over the narrow end of the passage, he might hear everything the prisoners said, or what plots they formed against him. This grotto therefore is called Orechio di Dionysio, or la grotta della favella; auris Dionysii, the ear of Dionysius. Many travellers and others formerly imagined that this passage was an ingenious imitation of that part of the human ear called the helix, which was first remarked by Alcmaon the Pythagorean. This is the account given by Kircher, who was there in the year 1638. See his Phonurgia (published 1673), p. 82, where there is a figure of it. In later times, however, this grotto has been examined with more skill and acuteness by people less subject to prejudice, and since that period the supposed wonder has been lessened. The rock consists of limestone, at least I conclude so from what is said by Brydone, who found it everywhere full of cracks and fissures. The stones of which Syracuse was built were hewn from the rock; and hence have been formed these chambers or openings, like those found in the neighbourhood of other ancient and modern cities, such as Rome, Naples, and Maestricht. Many of these, in the course of time, have been employed as prisons, or used as burying-vaults. The above-mentioned passage, which has excited so much wonder, is not properly spiral, and is of such a figure that it may have been produced either by accident or through the whim of the workmen employed to hew out the stones. The double echo which Kircher assures us he heard in the grotto was not remarked by Schott, who was there in 1646, as he expressly says, in opposition to his brother jesuit, in his Magia Naturalis. In the accounts still remaining of Dionysius we find mention of an astonishing prison, which is well described by Cicero in his fifth oration against Verres: “You have all heard of,” says he, “and most of you know the prison (lautumias) of Syracuse. It is an immense and magnificent work, executed by kings and tyrants; the whole is sunk to a wonderful depth in the rock, and has been entirely cut out by the labour of many hands. No place so secured against an escape; no place so enclosed on all sides; no place so safe for confining prisoners can be either planned out or constructed.” But it cannot be proved, and according to D’Orville’s opinion it is improbable, that this grotto was the work of that tyrant, who, as Plutarch tells us in his Life of Dion, employed very different means to learn the intention of dangerous persons. “The common people attacked the tyrant’s friends, and seized those whom they called his emissaries (προσαγώγιδας), worthless men, detested by the gods. These went about the city, mixed with the citizens, and, prying into everything, gave an account to the tyrant of what they thought and what expressions they made use of.” It was merely for its strength, and the labour employed in building it, and not on account of its ingenious construction, that the ancients admired the prison of the tyrant. At present the upper end of the winding passage is closed up; and it is so narrow, that some years ago the captain of an English vessel found great difficulty to clamber up it. It cannot, however, be denied that this grotto may have been used for the service ascribed to it; and I can readily believe that it may have led Kircher to the invention of the ear-trumpet. See the Travels of P. de la Valle, Ray, and Brydone; Delle antiche Siracuse, da G. Bonanni, &c., 2 vols. fol. Palermo 1717. Dan. Bartolo del suono e de’ tremori harmonici, Bonon. 1680, who examined this grotto as a naturalist. D’Orville, Sicula. Amst. 1764, pp. 182, 194.

238

This machine was invented by Kircher, in imitation of the ear of Dionysius; nor is it a vain and empty speculation, for the machine produces an infallible effect. Kircher caused to be made at Rome, of tin plate, a very large and straight tube, like a funnel, and placed it in an apartment next to his chamber, in such a manner that the large end projected into the garden of the college, and the less entered his chamber. When the porter of the college had occasion to call him to the gate, that he might not be obliged always to go up stairs, or to bawl out, he went to the broad end of the funnel, and communicated what he wished to Kircher. – Schotti Magia Universalis, ii. p. 156.

239

Eschinardi Discursus de Sono Pneumatico, p. 10.

240

Physico-theology.

241

Our Kircher, in his Phonurgia, justly claims that invention, as it was several years ago exhibited by him in the Jesuits’ college at Rome, and an account of it printed. That this is true I myself was an eye-witness; though I must acknowledge that no one before the above-mentioned Englishman ever applied this speaking instrument, at least in so perfect a manner, to that use for which it was afterwards employed. – Magisterium Naturæ et Artis. Brixiæ, 1684–92, fol. ii. p. 436.

242

Journal des Sçavans, tome iii.

243

Ibid. p. 131.

244

J. A. Sturm, Collegium Experimentale, ii. p. 146.

245

Philosophical Transactions.

246

Mémoires de l’Acad. des Sciences à Berlin, 1763, p. 97.

247

Experimental Inquiry into the Nature, &c. of Heat, p. 225.

248

La Historia General de las Indias. Sevilla, 1535, fol. lib. xvii. c. 13. [An earlier notice of the pine-apple had been given by Andræa Navagero in his letter to Rannusio, dated from Seville, May 12, 1526. He says, “I have also seen a most beautiful fruit, the name of which I do not recollect: I have eaten of it, for it was imported fresh. It has the taste of the quince, together with that of the peach, with some resemblance also of the melon: it is fragrant, and is truly of most delicious flavour.” – Lettere di xiii Huomini Illustri.]

249

Les Singularitez de la France Antarctique, autrement nommée Amerique. Par André Thevet. Anvers, 1558.

250

Voyage faict en la terre du Brésil, autrement dite Amerique. Par J. de Lery. Genève, 1580, 8vo, p. 188.

251

Rerum Med. novæ Hispaniæ Thesaurus. Rome, 1651. fol.

252

The accounts given by Acosta and Linschotten may be seen in Bauhini Histor. Plantarum, iii. p. 95. Kircher in his China Illustrata says, “That fruit which the Americans and people of the East Indies, among whom it is common, call the ananas, and which grows also in great abundance in the provinces of Quantung, Chiamsi, and Fokien, is supposed to have been brought from Peru to China.”

253

See Leibnitz, Nouveaux Essais sur l’Entendement Humain (Œuv. Phil.), p. 256, Amst. 1765, 4to.

254

Lersner, Chronik, ii. p. 824.

255

Miller’s Gardener’s Dictionary, i. p. 132. Lueder, Wartung der Küchengewächse. Lubeck, 1780, 8vo, p. 248.

256

Miller, ii. p. 824. Lueder, p. 39. That putrid bark forms an excellent manure, had been before remarked by Lauremberg, in Horticultura, p. 52.

257

Nova Plantarum Americanarum Genera. Parisiis 1708, 4to, p. 46.

258

[The plants producing the pine-apple have been separated by Prof. Lindley under the name Ananassa from the allied genus Bromelia, after which the Natural Order Bromeliaceæ takes its name.]

259

Halleri Bibl. Botan. i. p. 640.

260

De Arte Amandi, lib. iii. v. 629.

261

Ausonii Epist. xxiii. v. 21. The poet afterwards teaches other methods of secret writing, and Gellius, lib. xvii. cap. 9, mentions the like.

262

Colum. De Re Rust. x. 354. and xi. 3, 60.

263

Plin. lib. xxvi. cap. 8. p. 400.

264

The sixth observation of the second century is as follows: Magnetic waters which act at a distance. An astonishing effect, indeed, is produced by the contest of the following waters, which are thus made. Let quick-lime be quenched in common water, and while quenching, let some orpiment be added to it (this however ought to be done by placing warm ashes under it for a whole day), and let the liquor be filtered, and preserved in a glass bottle well corked. Then boil litharge of gold well pounded, for half an hour with vinegar in a brass vessel, and filter the whole through paper, and preserve it also in a bottle closely corked. If you write any thing with this last water with a clean pen, the writing will be invisible when dry; but if it be washed over with the first water it will become instantly black. In this, however, there is nothing astonishing; but this is wonderful, that though sheets of paper without number, and even a board be placed between the invisible writing and the second liquid, it will have the same effect, and turn the writing black, penetrating the wood and paper without leaving any traces of its action, which is certainly surprising; but a fetid smell, occasioned by the mutual action of the liquids, deters many from making the experiment. I am, however, of opinion, that I could improve this secret by a more refined chemical preparation, so that it should perform its effect through a wall. This secret I received, in exchange for others, from J. Brosson, a learned and ingenious apothecary of Montpelier.

265

Tachenii Hippocraticæ Medicinæ Clavis, p. 236. 1669.

266

Collectanea Chymica Leydensia, edidit Morley. Lugd. Bat. 1684, 4to, p. 97.

267

For an account of various kinds of secret writing see Halle, Magie oder Zauberkräfte der Natur. Berlin, 1783, 8vo, v. i. p. 138.

268

Hist. et Mém. de l’Acad. des Sciences à Paris, 1737, pp. 101 and 228.

269

Historia Cadmiæ fossilis, sive Cobalti. Berl. 1744.

270

This account, together with Teichmeyer’s receipt for preparing it, may be found in Commercium Litterarium Norimbergense, 1737, p. 91.

271

“Copiosius minera bismuthi tam ab aqua forti quam ab aqua regia dissolvitur, restante pulvere albo corroso; solutio in aqua forti roseum colorem sistit, quæ si sali in aqua soluto, secundum præscriptum D. J. W. in clave, affundatur, abstrahatur, ex residuo extrahitur sal roseum, quod pulverisari et cum spiritu vini extrahi potest: adeoque hæc autrix jam anno 1705 publice totum processum et fundamentum sic dicti atramenti sympathetici, quod a calore viridescit, evulgavit.” – Pot, Observ. Chym. collectio prima. Berolini, 1739, p. 163.

272

So thinks Gesner in Selecta Physico-œconomica, or Sammlung von allerhand zur Naturgeschichte gehörigen Begebenheiten. Stutgard, vii. p. 22.

273

274

Instances of the dexterity of the savages in diving and swimming may be seen in J. Kraft, Sitten der Wilden, Kopenhagen, 1766, 8vo, p. 39. To which may be added the account given by Maffæus of the Brasilians: “They are,” says he, “wonderfully skilled in the art of diving, and can remain sometimes for hours under water, with their eyes open, in order to search for any thing at the bottom.” – Hist. Indic. lib. ii.

275

Lucanus, iii. 697.

276

Livius, xliv. c. 10. Manilii Astronom. v. 449.

277

A Latin translation of these laws may be found in Marquard de Jure Mercatorum, p. 338. “If gold or silver, or any other article be brought up from the depth of eight cubits, the person who saves it shall receive one-third. If from fifteen cubits, the person who saves it shall, on account of the danger of the depth, receive one-half. If goods are cast up by the waves towards the shore, and found sunk at the depth of one cubit, the person who carries them out safe shall receive a tenth part.” See also Scheffer De Militia Navali, Upsaliæ, 1654, 4to, p. 110.

278

Q. Curtius, iv. c. 3. The same account is given by Arrian, De Expedit. Alexandri, lib. ii. p. 138. We are told by Thucydides, in his seventh book, that the Syracusans did the same thing.

279

Boerhaave, Prælectiones Academicæ, edit. Halleri, Göttingæ, 1774. 8vo, v. ii. p. 472–474. Halleri Elementa Physiologiæ, iii. p. 252, and viii. 2, p. 14.

280

“The divers of Astracan stepped from the warm bath into the water, in which they could not continue above seven minutes, and were brought back from the water, cold and benumbed, to the warm bath, from which they were obliged to return to the water again. This change from heat to cold they repeat five times a day, until at length the blood flows from their nose and ears, and they are carried back quite senseless.” – Gmelin’s Reise durch Russland, ii. p. 199.

281

Acta Philosophica Societatis in Anglia, auctore Oldenburgio. Lipsiæ, 1675, 4to, p. 724.

282

Scheeps-bouw beschreven door Nic. Witsen. Amsterdam, 1671, fol. p. 288.

283

[See the account of the Ceylon pearl fishery in Percival’s Ceylon.]

284

“Were the ignorant vulgar told that one could descend to the bottom of the Rhine, in the midst of the water, without wetting one’s clothes, or any part of one’s body, and even carry a lighted candle to the bottom of the water, they would consider it as altogether ridiculous and impossible. This, however, I saw done at Toledo, in Spain, in the year 1538, before the emperor Charles V. and almost ten thousand spectators. The experiment was made by two Greeks, who taking a very large kettle, suspended from ropes with the mouth downwards, fixed beams and planks in the middle of its concavity, upon which they placed themselves, together with a candle. The kettle was equipoised by means of lead fixed round its mouth, so that when let down towards the water no part of its circumference should touch the water sooner than another, else the water might easily have overcome the air included in it, and have converted it into moist vapour. If a vessel thus prepared be let down gently, and with due care, to the water, the included air with great force makes way for itself through the resisting fluid. Thus the men enclosed in it remain dry, in the midst of the water, for a little while, until, in the course of time, the included air becomes weakened by repeated aspiration, and is at length resolved into gross vapours, being consumed by the greater moisture of the water: but if the vessel be gently drawn up, the men continue dry, and the candle is found burning.” – Taisneri Opuscula de celerrimo motu, quoted by Schott in his Technica Curiosa, lib. vi. c. 9, p. 393.

285

“Excellent use may be made of this vessel, which is employed sometimes in labouring under water on sunk ships, to enable the divers to continue longer under water, and to breathe, in turns, for a little while. It was constructed in this manner. A hollow vessel was made of metal, which was let down equally to the surface of the water, and thus carried with it to the bottom of the sea the whole air it contained. It stood upon three feet, like a tripod, which were in length somewhat less than the height of a man; so that the diver, when he was no longer able to contain his breath, could put his head into the vessel, and, having breathed, return again to his work.” – Novum Organum, lib. ii. § 50. Bacon relates the same thing in his Phænomena Universi.

286

G. Sinclari Ars nova et magna gravitatis et levitatis. Rot. 1669, 4to, p. 220.

287

Paschii Inventa nov-antiqua. Lipsiæ, 1700, 4to, p. 650.

288

Theatri Statici universalis pars tertia. Lipsiæ, 1726, fol. p. 242.

289

This account is taken from the History of the British Empire in America, by J. Wynne. London, 1770, 2 vols. 8vo, i. p. 131, and from Campbell’s Lives of the Admirals.

290

Martin’s Description of the Western Islands. The second edition. London, 1716, 8vo, p. 253. – Campbell’s Political Survey of Britain. London, 1774, 2 vols. 4to, p. 604.

291

These figures are to be found in the following editions of Vegetius: – Lutetiæ apud C. Wechelum, 1532, fol. p. 180. Fegetius, vier Bücher von der Rytterschafft. Erfurt, Hans. Knappen, 1511, fol. These figures are inserted also in Leupold’s Theatrum Pontificale, p. 11, tab. ii. fig. 6.

292

Le Fortificationi di Bounaiuto Lorini. Venet. 1609, fol. p. 232.

293

Fran. Kessleri Secreta. Oppenheim, 1617, 8vo.

294

Bartholini Acta Hafn. 1676, p. i. obs. 17.

295

Scheeps-bouw, ut supra.

296

See vol. i. p. 222, edit. Hag. Com. 1743.

297

Acta Eruditorum, 1683, Decemb. p. 553. Jac. Bernoulli Opera.

298

Phil. Trans. 1736. – Martin Triewald’s Konst at lefwa under watnet. Stockholm, 1741, 4to.

299

Brewster’s Edinburgh Encyclopædia, Art. Diving-bell.

300

Reports of the late John Smeaton, F.R.S., vol. iii. p. 279.

301

Phil. Trans. 1717 and 1721. The art of living under water, by Halley.

302

Martin’s Philosophia Britannica, vol. iii. p. 180.

303

For further information on this important subject the reader is referred to the article Diving-bell in the Encyclopædia Britannica and its Supplement, also the Encyclopædia Metropolitana, Brewster’s Edinburgh and the Penny Cyclopædia, Halley’s papers in the Phil. Trans. for 1716 and 1721, Triewald’s in the same for 1736, Healy in the Philosophical Magazine, vol. xv., and Leopold’s Theatrum Machinarum Hydraulicarum.

304

Lib. xxxvi. c. 26.

305

Lib. xxxv. c. 26. and lib. xxxvii. c. 9. The lapis obsidianus, which Obsidius first found in Ethiopia, and made known, is undoubtedly the same as that vulcanic glass which is sometimes called Icelandic agate, pumex vitreus, and by the Spaniards, who brought it from America and California, named galinace.

306

Historiæ Augustæ Scriptores, in vita Gallieni, cap. 12.

307

Ib. in Vopisc. vita Saturnini, c. 8.

308

Strabo, Amst. 1707, fol. lib. xvi. p. 1099. – Some consider the glass earth here mentioned as a mineral alkali that was really found in Egypt, and which served to make glass; but, as the author speaks expressly of coloured glass, I do not think that the above salt, without which no glass was then made, is what is meant; but rather a metallic oxide, such perhaps as ochre or manganese.

309

Sen. Op. Lipsii, p. 579.

310

Hist. Nat. lib. xxxvii. c. 12. A passage in Diodorus Siculus, lib. ii. c. 52, alludes, in my opinion, to this method of colouring by cementation.

311

Magia Naturalis. Franc. 1591, 8vo, p. 275.

312

Kunkel’s Ars Vitraria. Nur. 1743, 4to, pp. 98, 101.

313

Comment. Soc. Scient. Gotting. ii. p. 41.

314

Montamy von den Farben zuni Porzellan- und Email-malen. Leipsic, 1767, 8vo, p. 82. Fontanieu, p. 16.

315

[The extensive use of this substance in colouring glass and porcelain has rendered its best and most œconomical preparation a subject of interest both to the chemist and the manufacturer. Although the determination of its true chemical composition has presented obstacles almost insuperable, still many important points with regard to its manufacture have been elucidated. It has been found that the tin salt used in precipitating it must contain both the binoxide and protoxide of tin in certain proportions, and it has been also discovered that the degree of dilution both of the gold and tin solutions exerts a very perceptible influence on the beauty of the preparation. Capaun has examined this latter point with great attention, by testing all the different products as to their power of colouring glass.