A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume 2 (of 2) (part 3 of 3)

A History of Inventions, Discoveries, and Origins, Volume 2 (of 2) (part 3 of 3)

The first hospitals, at least in general, were built close to cathedrals or monasteries; and the bishops themselves had the inspection of them; but afterwards, either for the greater convenience or the want of leisure, when their occupations increased, they committed this charge to the deacons. In the course of time, when houses for the sick were erected by laymen, and entirely separate from monasteries, the bishops asserted their right, often confirmed to them by imperial as well as pontifical laws, of visiting these institutions. We find, however, that in later times they were deprived of this privilege by princes and sovereigns, either because they wished to omit no opportunity of lessening the power of the clergy, or because the latter had given reason to suspect that the incomes destined for the use of the hospitals were not always applied to the intended purpose. Instances are found also, where, by the letters of foundation, the whole management is consigned to the sovereign or the heirs of the founder. These institutions, however, have the appearance of ecclesiastical establishments, and still retain in many cases similar privileges. As such they are free from all taxes, are spared as much as possible in war, and enjoy the same rank as churches.

Of the internal œconomy of the oldest houses for the reception of the sick, no information, however, is to be found. It is not even known whether physicians and surgeons belonged to them, nor in what manner they were supplied with medicines. Apothecary shops were not then established; and those found in hospitals at present, are but of modern existence.

In the hospitals at Jerusalem the knights and brothers attended the sick themselves, bound up their wounds, and, in imitation of the Grecian heroes, Hercules, Achilles and others, acted as their physicians. Thus we find in Amadis, and other books of knight-errantry written in the middle ages, how much the knights exerted themselves to obtain the best balsamic mixtures, and that, in general, they dressed each other’s wounds. The well-known baume de commendeur is one of the oldest compositions of this kind, belonging to the times of knighthood.

Profound or extensive knowledge of medicine could not be expected among these knights, were we even unacquainted with the account given of their skill by Guy de Chauliac. This author, who wrote his book on the healing of wounds in the year 1363, mentions the different medical sects, and among these names the German knights as the fourth sect, who, he says, cured wounds by exorcism, beverages, oil, wool, and cabbage-leaves, and trusted to the belief that God had conferred a supernatural power upon words, plants, and stones[1115].

The oldest mention of physicians and surgeons, established in houses for the sick belonging to the order of Templars, is under the government of John de Lastic, who, in 1437, undertook the office of grand-master, and defined very exactly the duty of physician and surgeon[1116]. It however appears to me, as it does to Möhsen, that the hospitals had regular and learned physicians at a period much earlier.

But, as long as this was not the case, they could afford no instruction to young physicians in the theory or practice of their art, like our hospitals at present. We, however, find a very singular account in regard to Persia, where it is said that some Nestorian priests had an hospital adjacent to their monastery, together with an institute or school for young physicians, who under certain prescribed rules were allowed to visit the sick. This establishment was in a town called Gandisapora, or, as Professor Sprengel writes it, Dschandisabor, the medical school of which is not unfrequently mentioned after the seventh century. The pupils who were desirous of attending the hospital for their improvement, were first obliged to submit to a trial, and to read the psalms of David and the New Testament. Many of those who had here studied medicine attained to high ecclesiastical dignity, which is the more surprising as the rest of the Nestorian schools in the East pay attention only to theology, and prohibit the young clergy entirely from studying medicine[1117].

Mad-houses, or houses for the reception and cure of insane persons, seem also to have been first established in the East. Zimmerman, in his work on Solitude, says that as early as the year 491 there was a house of this kind at Jerusalem, the chief object of which was to take care of such monks as became insane in the monasteries, or such hermits as were visited by the same affliction in the deserts; but, as usual, he has given no proofs. In the twelfth century, when the Jew, Benjamin of Tudela, was in Bagdad, he found many hospitals having nearly sixty shops or dispensaries belonging to them, which distributed, at the public expense, the necessary medicines. A large building called Dal almeraphtan, that is, the House of Grace, was destined for the reception of those who lost their reason in summer. They were kept there in chains till they were cured; and every month this house was visited by magistrates, who examined the state of the patients and suffered those who had recovered their reason to return to their relations or friends.

To those police establishments which form the subject of this article belong also hospitals for invalids. Though it may be true, that among many ancient nations the soldiers, as sailors in some privateers at present, served voluntarily and without pay, in the hope of acquiring by plunder a sufficient compensation for the expenses, labour, and dangers to which they were exposed in war, it was at any rate considered as a general duty to make such provision for the indigent, and also for those become incapable of military service, when they had no means of support, that they might not be a burthen on the public. If any one should be so devoid of feeling as to suppose that our soldiers, after enjoying years of peace without much waste of their bodily powers or laborious occupation, free from care, amidst every necessary of life, and the enjoyment of rank above those members of the state from which they were taken, ought to consider it no hardship to perform military service when war renders it necessary; it still remains a duty incumbent on the government to provide for soldiers incapable of further service, who are destitute of support; and besides, political prudence requires it, in order that others may not be deterred from defending their native country or sovereign, but rather by the confident hope of a future provision may have their courage and fidelity strengthened; which, notwithstanding the strictest subordination, and though fire-arms require less personal bravery than bows and arrows, is still indispensably necessary. This truth seems to have been fully acknowledged in the oldest periods.

Solon deducted something from the pay of soldiers, and employed it for the education of children whose fathers had fallen in battle, in order that others might be encouraged to bravery[1118]. Pisistratus, following this example, made an order that those who had lost any of their limbs in war should be maintained at the public expense. The pensions granted do not seem at all times to have been equally great, and they appear to have been even modified according to circumstances[1119].

Of the attention paid by the Romans to the care of their invalids, milites causarii, or soldiers become unfit for service, either by wounds or old-age, many instances may be found, some of which occur in the Justinian and several in the Theodosian code[1120]. They were not only exempted from taxes, but frequently obtained lands and cattle as well as money, and were assigned over, to be taken care of by rich families and communities[1121]. The assertion, however, that the Romans had particular houses for invalids, in which soldiers worn out by the fatigues of war were taken care of, and that the taberna meritoria was a house of this kind, is one of the many errors of Peter von Andlo, canon of Colmer, who is entitled to the merit of having written in the fifteenth century, and with a great deal of freedom, the first work on the German public law[1122].

How such an idea could be conceived by this author I do not know, for the following is the only account of the taberna meritoria to be found among the ancients. In the first place we are told by Valerius Maximus[1123], that a traveller was murdered in one of them in which he lodged. Judging from this circumstance, the taberna meritoria appears to have been a public tavern or inn, a meaning which writers on jurisprudence seem always to have adopted[1124]. In the next place Eusebius, who died in the year 340, relates in his Chronicon[1125], that under the second or third year of the reign of Augustus, an oil issued from the earth in a taberna meritoria, on the other side of the Tiber, and continued flowing without interruption the whole day; but I cannot see what relation this phenomenon can have to Jesus Christ. In the third place, the same thing is related by Orosius[1126], who lived about the year 416; but he makes the time of this event much later, that is to say, in the year 730 or 731 after the building of the city, which would be about twenty years before the birth of Christ. Nevertheless, Martinus Polonus said, in the thirteenth century, that this oil appeared at the birth of Christ[1127]. Damasus (Pope Formosus? in the ninth century) added that, on this account, Pope Callistus I., so early as the third century, caused a Christian church to be built in that place; and some modern writers believe, contrary to the assertion of Platina[1128], that it is the present church of St. Mary Transtiberina, Maria in Trastevere; and in this church a stone is still shown with the inscription fons olei. To render the building of a church in the third century probable, some moderns have conjectured that this taberna was the cook’s shop purchased by the Christians under the reign of Alexander Severus, who assigned it to them with the observation that “it was better that God should be served in any manner in that place, than that tavern-keepers, cooks, or perhaps the ministers of voluptuousness, popinarii, should there carry on their occupations[1129].” Our writers on historical criticism positively deny that Callistus I. built a church at Rome[1130]. It is to be observed also, that Donatus, who died in 1640, confidently asserts that the taberna meritoria was the house where the people of Ravenna lodged when they came to Rome to see the public spectacles; but he does not tell us whence he derived this information[1131]. What I have here collected in regard to the taberna meritoria may serve to correct a false and often repeated relation; but all I can prove from it is, that this taberna was not an hospital for invalids.

Hardouin also was of opinion that there were hospitals for invalids at Rome, one of which was built by Metellus, the son-in-law of Pompey; but for proof he refers only to a coin with the image of Metellus, on the reverse of which is the naked figure of a man walking, who holds in his right-hand the palladium, and bears on his left shoulder a naked man, with the inscription on the face, “Q. Metellus Pius.” From this Hardouin infers that Metellus built an Hôtel des Invalides for sick or wounded soldiers, which he dedicated to Pallas, and that on this account he obtained the surname of Pius[1132]. It is indeed remarkable, that two coins having the same reverse, and the inscription pietas, occur in Patin. I shall leave to the judgement of the critics this opinion of Hardouin; but I must confess that the explanation of ambiguous figures on coins, has a resemblance to the far-fetched derivations of etymologists. Both may be learned, ingenious, and probable; but they cannot be employed alone as evidence, except to add more force to a truth already proved. These coins, perhaps, allude to some other attention paid to wounded soldiers, of which Metellus, Herennius, and Cæsar may have given examples; and the people are always weak enough to set too high a value on every mark of compassion or benevolence exhibited by their sovereigns or commanders, because it is seldom that they observe as they ought the general duties incumbent upon them.

I do not consider it a reproach to the Romans, notwithstanding their propensity to war and robbery, that they had no hospitals for invalids; because the remark already made in regard to orphan-houses is applicable also to them. Magnificent buildings, fitted up at great expense, afford a proof of the wealth and perhaps the liberality of the founder; but there can be no doubt that, with the capital employed, a greater number of invalids might be maintained, and in a manner much more beneficial to the public; that is to say, by making such arrangements that the invalids could be distributed throughout the country, and placed out at board and lodging for a certain sum. In this case many families would be glad to receive them, both on account of the money, and because these invalids could be of great assistance to them in their domestic œconomy, either by labouring themselves or overlooking others. People may praise large and expensive hospitals as much as they please; but the sight of so many men who have lost their health or limbs in war is but a melancholy spectacle, and gives too great occasion to reflect how much mankind suffer from the avarice, pride, and revenge of sovereigns, without which wars would be less frequent.

The first establishment for the reception of invalids which, as far as I know at present, occurs in history, was that formed at Constantinople by the emperor Alexius Comnenus, at the end of the eleventh century. A complete description of it may be found in the history of that prince, written by his learned daughter Anna Comnena, who says that the emperor caused a great number of buildings standing around a church to be fitted up as an hospital, which undoubtedly was never exceeded in size; though other historians relate that Alexius only revived and enlarged in an uncommon degree an old institution. It was indeed called the Orphan-house; but sick and indigent persons of both sexes and of every age, and, as the female historian expressly says, soldiers dismissed from service, were admitted into it, and provided with bed, board, and clothing[1133]. Though the emperor secured to this institution several sources of revenue, it however appears not to have long existed; at any rate, in the time of George Codinus, that is, in the fifteenth century, the high office of director or manager had long been disused.

Of the hospitals for invalids existing at present, the oldest and largest is the Hôtel des Invalides at Paris. The kings of France enjoyed from the earliest times what was called droit d’oblat, which consisted in the power of sending to abbeys and monasteries, in order to be maintained, officers and soldiers unfit for further service, and particularly such as had been wounded. Traces of this practice are said to occur under the reign of Charles the Great; at least Seissel, in the Life of Louis XII., relates that there was an old tradition in an abbey in Languedoc, that the abbot had been punished by that prince, because he would not receive the soldiers assigned to him. It may be readily conceived how unpleasant these guests must have been to the clergy, and how little the ideas, mode of living, and manners of these two classes would accord with each other. The complaints on this subject had become so great under Henry IV., that he at length resolved to cause all invalids to be lodged and maintained together in a palace called “La Maison Royale de la Charité Chretienne.” But as the revenues destined for the support of this establishment were not sufficient, it was abolished under the same sovereign, and the invalids were again distributed among the abbeys and convents. In the course of time these houses purchased exemption from this burthen, by giving an annual pension to their guests; but they soon spent their money, and then fell into a state of the greatest poverty. On this account Louis XIII. renewed the experiment of founding an hospital for invalids, which through the want of money was never completed. At length Louis XIV., in the year 1670, began to build the Hôtel des Invalides, the extravagant magnificence of which is rather a proof and monument of the profusion and pride of that sovereign, than of his care for meritorious soldiers.

In the year 1682, the hospital for soldiers at Chelsea was founded in England by Charles II.[1134], carried on by James II., and completed by William III. But far larger and more magnificent is the hospital for seamen at Greenwich, which was first suggested by Queen Mary, the consort of King William. The building, determined on in the year 1694, was begun in 1695, and from time to time enlarged and beautified[1135]. As France was the first country in Europe that maintained a standing army of national troops, it had therefore first occasion to make provision for its native soldiers when disabled by service. As long as military men consisted chiefly of foreigners, who served during a certain period for pay and plunder, sovereigns believed that when a war was ended, they were no further indebted to these aliens; they consequently suffered them to retire wherever they thought proper, and gave themselves no further trouble respecting them.

In the last place, I shall here consider the question, Since what time have regular surgeons been appointed to armies? and lay before the reader the little I have been able to collect towards answering it. In the Trojan war they were indeed not known. At that period many of the principal heroes had acquired some knowledge of surgery, and, like the knights in the time of the crusades, undertook the office of assisting and curing the wounded[1136]. Such persons in armies were particularly honoured, and considered to be of great value, as appears from what Idomeneus, speaking of Machaon, says:

Ιητρὸς γὰρ ἀνὴρ πολλῶν ἀντάξιος ἂλλον. Medicus vir multis æquiparandus aliis[1137].

Yet the instance of Machaon shows how little care was then taken of the wounded; for Virgil makes him even, whose assistance must every moment have been necessary, mount into the wooden horse, and he was the first who came out of it[1138]. There is reason to think that the armies in Homer, and until the introduction of Christianity, and the invention of gunpowder, had in every battle but few wounded, and always a much greater proportion of killed than in modern times. Hostile bands stood nearer to each other; all came to close action; prisoners were not exchanged, but made slaves, and among the Romans sold to the infamous schools for gladiators. Wounded prisoners were a burthen to the victorious party; such as could not escape defended themselves to the last, and were put to death by the conquerors.

In Achilles Tatius[1139], who seems to have lived in the third century of the Christian æra, I find that an army-physician, exercitus medicus, was called in to a sick person; and one might almost believe that a regular physician appointed to attend an army is here meant, especially as Salmasius, on this passage, says that each cohort had in general a physician, and therefore the appellations medicus cohortis, medicus legionis, were found in ancient inscriptions. I will not venture to contradict so great an authority on a subject of this kind; but I am sorry that I have not been able to find any other evidence of such army-physicians.

The first traces of field-hospitals, or, as they are commonly called at present, flying-hospitals, occur perhaps in the East. At any rate, the emperor Mauricius, in the sixth century, had along with his armies deputati, whose duty he describes, as did also the emperor Leo VI. in the ninth century, who has copied many things verbatim from the work of that prince. These deputati were distributed in the armies among the cavalry, and were obliged to carry off those wounded in battle. On this account they had on the left side of the saddle two stirrups, in order that they might more easily take up the wounded behind them; and for every person thus saved, they obtained a certain reward. They were obliged also to carry with them a bottle containing water, for the purpose of reviving those who might have fainted through the loss of blood. Leo, besides the officers necessary for each band or company of a regiment, mentions expressly not only the deputati, but also physicians and attendants on the sick[1140].

Though an order was made by the Convention of Ratisbon[1141] in 742, that every commander of an army should have along with him two bishops, with priests and chaplains, and that every colonel should be attended by a confessor, no mention is to be found either of field-hospitals or army-surgeons belonging to the first Christian armies in the writings of the middle ages. We read, however, in the works of Paracelsus, Thurneyser, Lottich and others, that they were present at battles and sieges; but it can be proved that they were not appointed as army-surgeons, but served merely as soldiers.

The field-surgeons, who occur as accompanying armies in the beginning of the fifteenth century, were destined rather for the use of the commanders and principal officers, than for the service of the field-hospital. Their number was too small for a whole army; and as they were authorised by their commission to receive prisoners and booty, and, like the knights, were obliged to bring with them archers, it is highly probable that to fight was a part of their duty also.

When Henry V. of England carried on war with France in 1415, he took into his service Nicholas Colnet, as field-surgeon, for a year[1142]. He was bound to carry with him three archers on horseback, and to accompany the king wherever he went. In return he was to receive yearly forty marks or pounds, to be paid at the rate of ten marks every quarter. He was allowed also twelve pennies per day as subsistence money, and each of his archers had twenty marks a year, and six pennies daily for subsistence. The chief army-surgeon, Morstede, was engaged with fifteen men, three of whom were to be archers, and the remaining twelve surgeons. He received also ten pounds quarterly as pay, and twelve pennies daily for subsistence. His archers and surgeons were placed on an equal footing; each was to receive quarterly five pounds, and six pennies daily as subsistence. Both Colnet and Morstede could receive prisoners and plunder; but when the latter amounted to more than twenty pounds in value, a third part of it was to be given to the king. Both these head-men had a quarter’s pay in advance; and, that they might always have security for the next quarter, the king engaged to put into their hands, by way of pledge, as many jewels or other articles as might be equivalent to one quarter’s pay and subsistence.

Harte, in his Life of Gustavus Adolphus, seems to believe that this prince first appointed four surgeons to each regiment, which he reduced from the number of two or three thousand, first to 1200, and afterwards to 1008; and he is of opinion that it may with certainty be believed that the imperial troops at that time had no surgeons, because Tilly himself, after the battle at Leipsic, was obliged to cause his wounds to be dressed by a surgeon established at Halle. He adds in a note, that he was told that the Austrians, till about the year 1718, had no regimental surgeons regularly appointed. However this may be, it is certain that the field-hospital establishments of the imperial army, till the beginning of the eighteenth century, were on a very bad footing. Even in the year 1718, they had no field-surgeons; but at this period the company surgeons were dismissed, and a regimental surgeon, with six assistants, was appointed to each regiment; and beside the field medicine-chest, surgical instruments were provided at the emperor’s expense[1143].

The establishment of field-hospitals in Germany is certainly much older; for Fronsperger, who wrote in the middle of the sixteenth century, does not speak of field-surgeons, army-surgeons and their servants, as if they had been then newly introduced; but in such a manner as shows that the need of them had been generally acknowledged long before that period[1144]. According to his statement, it was necessary that there should be along with the commander-in-chief, or, according to the modern phrase, the general staff, a field-surgeon-in-chief, a doctor who had the inspection of the field-surgeons, the barbers and their servants, whose duty was to drag the wounded from the heaps of slain and to convey them to the former. He was obliged to keep by him instruments and medicines, and at each mustering to examine the instruments and apparatus of the field-surgeons; he decided also, in disputed cases, how much soldiers whose wounds had been cured ought to pay to the field-surgeon. During marches he was bound to remain with the commander-in-chief. Fronsperger says also, that there ought to be with the artillery a field-surgeon of arckelley, and with each company a particular field-surgeon, not however a paltry beard-scraper (bart-scherer), but a regularly instructed, experienced and well-practised man. This person was bound always to accompany, with able servants, the ensign, and he received double pay.

[To give a description of all the hospitals, infirmaries and dispensaries in this country would fill volumes. It may be sufficient here to observe, that there are ten large hospitals in the metropolis, each of which receives a considerable number of patients into the house, and a still larger number of out-door patients are prescribed for and supplied with medicines, but attend at the establishments. In the largest of these, which is that of St. Bartholomew, the annual number of patients, both in-door and out, is about 12,000; about three-fifths of these are out-door patients. The number of beds in the hospital amounts to upwards of 550.

There are twenty-eight dispensaries; such patients as are able, attend at these establishments; those who are incapable, are visited and relieved at their own homes.

Moreover, there are in the metropolis ten midwifery establishments, three ophthalmic institutions, three public lunatic asylums, a venereal hospital, a small-pox and a fever hospital, as also one for patients suffering from consumption.

There are also ninety-seven county hospitals, infirmaries and dispensaries[1145].

Admission to the hospitals is gained by the presentation of a petition signed by a governor, on a certain day in each week; of course, out of the number of patients who apply, the worst cases have the preference. Accidents and very severe cases are admitted at any time, and without any petition or recommendation. The out-patients require no recommendation. The same general rule gains attendance at the other medical establishments.]

FOOTNOTES

[1107] J. Bodini De Republica libri vi., lib. 1. cap. 5.

[1108] The imperial order has been preserved by Sozomenus in his Ecclesiastic History, v. 16, where more information on this subject, worthy of attention, has been collected. See Juliani Opera, edit. Spanhemii, Lips. 1696, fol. p. 430.

[1109] Hieron. ep. 39.

[1110] Hieron. Epitaph. Paulæ.

[1111] Baronii Annal. ad an. 845, xxxvi. ed. Mansii. Lucæ 1743, tom. xiv. p. 325.

[1112] Muratori Antiq. Ital. Med. Ævi, iii. p. 581.

[1113] Ib. et Antiquitat. Ital. Med. Ævi, iii. p. 581.

[1114] Antiquitat. l. c. p. 593.

[1115] See La Grande Chirurgie de M. Guy de Chauliac, Medecin tres-fameux de l’Université de Montpelier, restituée par M. Laurens Joubert. A Rouen 1641, 8vo.

[1116] There are various editions of the statutes of this order. 1. Nova Stat. ord. S. Joannis Hierosolymitani. Madriti 1577, small folio. 2. Privilegia ordinis S. Jo. Hierosol. small folio, Romæ 1588. 3. Statuta Hospitalis, without place or date, small folio. Each copy, however, has many things which in the others are wanting. 4. Histoire de Malthe, avec les Statuts et les Ordonnances de l’Ordre. Paris, 1643, fol. 5. Codice del sacro militare ordine Gerosolimitano. In Malta 1782, fol. The words relating to this subject may be found in Titulo quarto, xi et xii.

[1117] The proofs of this singular account may be seen in Assemani Bibliotheca Orientalis, tom. iii. P. 2. pag. CMXL.

[1118] Diogen. Laert. lib. i. seg. 55. This regulation has been praised by many. Plato in Menexemo, Æschines contra Ctesiphon.

[1119] Suidas, v. αδυνατοι, Lysiæ Orat. 23, contra Pancleonem.

[1120] Cod. Theodos. lib. vii. tit. 20, 8. Brissonius v. Causarius.

[1121] Livius, ii. 47, p. 458.--Dio Cassius, lib. lv. 23, p. 793.--Sueton. Vita Jul. Cæsar. cap. 38. To this subject belong many passages in the Auctor. Rei Agrar. pp. 15, 16, 17, 205, ed. Amstelod. 1674, 4to.

[1122] De Imperio Romano, lib. ii. cap. 12. Argent. 1612, 4to.

[1123] Lib. i. cap. 7, ext. 10.

[1124] Brisson de Verbor. Signif. v. Meritorius.

[1125] p. 146.

[1126] Histor. lib. vi. cap. 20.

[1127] This I learn from Pontac’s Observations on the Chronicon of Eusebius, p. 507, Chronica trium illustrium auctorum. Burdigalæ 1604, fol.

[1128] Platina de vitis Pontificum, p. 48, 1664, 12mo.

[1129] Lamprid. vita Alex. Severi, cap. 49.

[1130] Walch’s Histor. der Päbste. Göttingen, 1758, 8vo, p. 57.

[1131] Roma Vet. et Nova. lib. iii. cap. 21.

[1132] See Hardouin’s Observations on Plin. lib. viii. seg. 74, p. 477; and the figure of the coin, plate vii.

[1133] Annæ Comnenæ Alexiados lib. xv. p. 484. The authoress says expressly, that the name ὀρφανοτροφεῖον is taken only a parte potiori, as it is known that at later periods not only children who had lost their parents, but others also who were entirely or in part educated at the public expense, and likewise the children of the choir, were called ὀρφανοί. See Du Cange, Gloss. Græcit. The emperor was accustomed to send orphans to the monasteries to be educated and instructed; but with this express intimation, that they were not to be treated and instructed as serfs, but as the children of freemen.--Anna Comn. p. 381.

[1134] [There is a tradition that this institution owes its rise to the patriotic exertions of Nell Gwynn, the celebrated mistress of Charles II. A paragraph in a newspaper of the day seems to give some little strength to the supposition that her family once dwelt in the vicinity; and a public-house still exists at no great distance from the hospital, having her portrait for its sign, with an inscription ascribing to her the merit of the foundation. The anonymous author also of the life of Eleanor Gwynn states, that it was at her instigation that this noble charity was established. “Another act of generosity,” he says, “which raised the character of this lady above every other courtezan of these or any other times, was her solicitude to effect the institution of Chelsea Hospital. One day, when she was rolling about town in her coach, a poor man came to the coach-door soliciting charity, who told her a story, whether true or false is immaterial, of his having been wounded in the civil wars in defence of the royal cause. This circumstance greatly affected the benevolent heart of Eleanor; she considered that (besides the hardships of their being exposed to beggary by wounds received in defence of their country) it seemed to be the most monstrous ingratitude in the government to suffer those to perish who had stood up in their defence.

“Warm with these reflections and the overflow of pity, she hurried to the king, and represented the misery in which she had found an old servant; entreated that he might suffer some scheme to be proposed to him towards supporting those unfortunate sons of valour, whose old age, wounds, or infirmities, rendered them unfit for service; so that they might not close their days with repining against fortune, and be oppressed with the misery of want.”

Another anecdote of that period states, with somewhat more probability, “That when the garrison was withdrawn from Tangiers, there was among them a considerable number of aged and decrepid persons. It was therefore proposed to build an hospital for them; and the king being applied to for a piece of ground for the site, he offered the spot on which king James’s College stood; but recollecting himself, ‘Odso,’ says he, ‘’tis true I have already given that land to Nell, here.’ She, who was one of the most generous and benevolent of human beings, immediately said, ‘Have you so, Charles? then I will return it to you again for this purpose;’ and the hospital was accordingly erected. The king however built a house for Eleanor in Pall Mall.”

It is however very probable, according to Mr. Evelyn’s Memoirs, that the design originated with Sir Stephen Fox, who for some years had been paymaster of the forces, and certainly had better opportunities of becoming acquainted with the wants and distresses of the aged and worn-out veterans, great numbers of whom had been thrown on the charity of the country at this period. The building was erected under the superintendence of Sir C. Wren, and cost £150,000. It usually contains about 500 invalids; there are also a number of out-door pensioners, amounting to about 85,000.]

[1135] An Historical Account of the Royal Hospital for Seamen at Greenwich. London, 1789, 4to. [The foundation-stone of this magnificent building was laid on June 3, 1696, and the whole of the superstructure, under the honorary superintendence of Sir Christopher Wren, was finished within two years; the hospital was opened for the reception of pensioners in 1705. In the year of the foundation an act was passed, 7 and 8 William III., cap. 21, by which sixpence a month of the wages of all seamen belonging to the royal navy is appropriated to the benefits of the institution. Since that time large sums have been bequeathed for the use of the hospital, and the buildings have been successively enlarged and improved.

The indoor pensioners, of whom there are 2700 (which number is kept up by filling the vacancies twice a month), are maintained, clothed, and lodged, having also a weekly allowance for pocket-money.

By the act, 10 Anne, cap. 27, it is enacted that the seamen of the merchant service shall contribute equally with those of the royal navy; and that such of the former as may be wounded in the defence of property belonging to Her Majesty’s subjects, or otherwise disabled while capturing vessels from an enemy, shall also be admitted to the benefits of the institution. The money received from visitors and other sources is appropriated to the support of a school, wherein upwards of 4000 boys have been (1838) educated, from the foundation of the establishment to the present time. There are also about 32,000 out-pensioners.]

[1136] Even Alexander the Great undertook this office, as Plutarch expressly says in his life.

[1137] Iliad. xi. 514.

[1138] Æneid. ii. 263.

[1139] Achil. Tat. Lugd. Batav. 1640, 12mo, pp. 243, 617.

[1140] Mauricii Ars Militaris, pp. 29, 62. Upsaliæ 1664, 8vo.--Leonis Tactica, ed. Meursii, Lugd. Batt. 1612, 4to, lib. iv. 6; xii. 51, 53, p. 150; 119, p. 128. To this subject belongs, in particular, a passage in the Tactica of the emperor Leo, p. 430, n. 62, 63, where it is recommended that medicines both for the healing of wounds and the curing of diseases should be kept in readiness in armies.

[1141] Often called Concilium Carolomanni. See Semleri Hist. Eccles. Selecta Capita. Halæ, 1769, 8vo, ii. p. 144.

[1142] Rymer’s Fœdera, t. iv. 2, pp. 116, 117.

[1143] See Hoyers Gesch. der Kriegskunst, 1799, 8vo, ii. p. 176.

[1144] Kriegsbuch, durch Leonhart Fronsperger. Frankfort, 1565.

[1145] The Margate sea-bathing infirmary deserves especial mention, as being the only institution of the kind in England, perhaps in Europe. Its object is to provide sea-bathing for necessitous patients suffering under scrofulous and such other diseases as are likely to yield only to sea-air and bathing. It was set on foot in 1793, and established in 1796, by a few benevolent individuals in London, under the fostering auspices of Dr. Lettsom, John Nichols, Esq. (the eminent printer), and his son-in-law, the Rev. John Pridden. Its present site, Westbrook, near Margate, was selected after much inquiry, as the most salubrious spot on the coast within a convenient distance of the metropolis. From a small beginning this excellent charity has arisen to considerable importance in the scale of those valuable institutions which are designed to lessen the amount of human suffering, and it now numbers 230 in-door and about as many out-door patients. This praiseworthy institution however is closed during six months in the year (from November to April), and the in-door patients are required to pay, either by themselves or their friends, from 5_s._ to 6_s._ per week for adults, and 4_s._ to 4_s._ 6_d._ per week for children; which, as scrofulous diseases more particularly afflict the very poorer classes, are subjects of regret.

COCK-FIGHTING.

Until a recent period the English were almost the only people among whom cock-fighting was a favourite amusement; and on that account it is considered as peculiar to them, though it was esteemed among various nations many centuries ago. It is not improbable that it was first introduced into England by the Romans. That it, however, has been constantly retained there, though the practice of inciting animals to fight has been long scouted by moral and enlightened nations, is as singular an anomaly, as that the Spaniards should still continue their bull-fights, and that princes who wish to avoid the appearance of cruelty should nevertheless pursue, with immoderate passion, the detestable and so often condemned hunting with dogs. I shall leave to others the task of moralising on these contradictions in the character of whole nations as well as individuals, and shall here only give the history of cock-fighting as far as I am acquainted with it.

This pastime is certainly very old; but I agree in opinion with Mr. Pegge[1146], that Palmerius[1147] has made it much older than can fully be proved. The latter supposes that Adrastus, the son of Midas, king of Phrygia, killed his brother in consequence of a quarrel which took place between them in regard to a battle of quails. Adrastus on account of this murder fled to Crœsus; and as that prince lived about 550 years before the Christian æra, quail-fighting, according to the opinion of Palmerius, must have been customary at that time; and in this case one might admit that cock-fighting was of the same antiquity, because the battles of the domestic cock are still more violent, and can afford more amusement. Herodotus[1148], who relates the story of Adrastus, does not mention the cause of the quarrel; but it is given by the historian Ptolemy, the son of Hephestion, called also Alexandrinus, who lived about the time of Trajan and Adrian[1149]. He however only says that the two brothers quarrelled about a quail. Did any other proofs exist that quail-fighting was common at so early a period, it would indeed be then probable that the brothers quarrelled during that pastime. But as no such proofs are to be found, many other causes of quarrelling in regard to a quail, either in catching or pursuing it, may be conceived.

It is however certain that quails, as well as the domestic cock, are exceedingly irritable and quarrelsome birds; and that, like the latter, they can be employed for fighting; but it appears that quail-fighting was first practised by the Romans, in whose writings it is frequently mentioned[1150]; whereas among the Greeks it seldom or never occurs, while cock-fighting is spoken of on many occasions. The latter however sported with quails; but their pastime with these birds seems not to have been fighting, properly so called, where the great object of contest is whose quail shall be the victor; but the information on this subject is so imperfect that it cannot be fully understood[1151]. Sometimes the parties laid bets who could kill the other’s quails, or the greatest number of them, with one blow. One placed a quail within a circle, and another endeavoured by irritating the animal to make it go beyond it. If he proved successful in this attempt, he was declared the winner. Several were often placed within a circle at the same time, and the person lost whose bird first quitted it. Kühn and others are of opinion, that each of the parties endeavoured to induce the quail of the other to leave the circle, by irritating or enticing it; but the words appear without doubt to allude to a contest of several quails with each other[1152], were it possible that the later Greeks had learned to play at this game from the contests of the Romans.

Solon, however, in Lucian[1153], speaks of cock-fights and quail-fights exhibited publicly at Athens. But Lucian lived in the second century, had travelled into Italy, was well acquainted with the Roman customs, and made Solon mention quail-fighting, which he never saw in Greece, merely because he himself had seen it in Italy. This blunder may appear too gross, perhaps, for so acute a writer as Lucian; but since he has fallen into two anachronisms in the same dialogue, as he not only makes Solon a contemporary of Lycurgus, who lived two centuries earlier, but also introduces him as speaking of public cock-fights at Athens, which were first established half a century later, that is to say, after the battle of Marathon, he may readily have been guilty of a third oversight, by transferring quail-fighting to Athens. But at any rate similar games were usual in the island of Cyprus in the sixteenth century.

It appears, however, that the Romans bred and employed partridges for fighting in the same manner as quails. Lampridius relates, that the emperor Alexander Severus was fond of seeing battles of this kind[1154]; and Ælian, who lived in Italy under Heliogabalus, in the second century[1155], says that those who kept partridges for fighting, when they pitted them against each other, placed the females close to the males, in order to render them more courageous. Without doubt he here speaks of what was then usual at Rome.

Cock-fighting was appointed at Athens to be a public or solemn pastime, in consequence of a circumstance which occurred to Themistocles. At least Ælian relates[1156] that this commander, when he led out the Greeks against the Persians, happening to see two cocks fighting, took that opportunity to rouse the courage of his soldiers, by telling them that as these animals contended with so much obstinacy, though they fought neither for their country, their families, nor their liberty, but merely for the honour of victory, it was much more incumbent on them to exert themselves with bravery, as they had all these causes of incitement. Having defeated the enemy, as a memorial of his victory and a future encouragement to bravery, it was ordered that fighting-cocks should be exhibited every year, in a public theatre, in the presence of the whole people.

Mr. Pegge and others are of opinion that the Greeks afterwards took so much pleasure in the fighting of these birds, that they were generally employed throughout all Greece for this pastime and for betting. I am ready to admit that this is probable; but the institution of Themistocles appears to me to be no proof that cock-fighting was not practised at an earlier period. Even if it had been common, the Athenians might have thought proper to establish a religious or at least solemn cock-fighting to be exhibited every year. Themistocles however is not the only person who employed the courage of game-cocks as an incitement to bravery. Socrates inspired Iphicrates with courage, by showing him with what ferocity the cock of Midas, or Meidias, and that of Callias attacked each other[1157]. What Themistocles said to his soldiers was addressed by Musonius as a philosopher to mankind, to encourage them to support labour, danger, and pain, when duty or honour require it[1158].

Many modern writers ascribe the establishment of public cock-fighting at Athens, not to Themistocles, but to his contemporary Miltiades. I have hitherto suspected that this arises merely from a confusion of names, as is certainly the case in Moses du Soul[1159], where a reference is made to Ælian, by whom however Miltiades is not mentioned. At present, I am of opinion that Philo Judæus, who wrote in the first century, gave occasion to this assertion. He relates, that when Miltiades was about to lead the Grecian troops against the Persians, he exhibited a cock-fight, in a place which had been employed for public shows, in order to inspire courage into his soldiers by this spectacle, and that the end proposed was accomplished; but nothing is said by that author in regard to the establishment of annual cock-fights[1160]. According to this account, cock-fighting seems to have been at that time not uncommon; but as it remains doubtful whether Philo speaks of the campaign before the battle of Marathon, in which Miltiades and Themistocles were both present, very little can be gathered from his relation, and it appears to me not sufficient to contradict the more circumstantial account of Ælian.

Another small mistake, which Pegge thought it worth while to notice, deserves also perhaps to be rectified. Dalechamp[1161] and Potter[1162] assert that Themistocles, while leading out his army, having heard a cock crow, declared this to be an omen of victory, and after beating the enemy he instituted cock-fighting in remembrance of that event. I shall here remark, that Dalechamp is not the first person who made this assertion. Peucer[1163], and at a period still earlier, Alexander ab Alexandro[1164] mentioned the same thing, but no one ever pointed out the passage in any ancient author upon which this assertion was founded; and I have been as unsuccessful in my endeavours to find it, as those who attempted to discover the sources from which Alexander derived his information. This author perhaps collected from manuscripts, in the fifteenth century, many things never printed, and which therefore have been lost. He may also have written many things from memory without remembering them all with accuracy.

It is indeed true, that the crowing of a cock was sometimes considered as a presage of victory. Thus Cicero quotes an instance[1165] where a Bœotian soothsayer promised victory to the Thebans from the crowing of a cock; and according to Pliny[1166], the same circumstance once served to the Bœotians as an omen of victory over the Lacedæmonians. How then could Themistocles make choice of a cock-fight to commemorate a victory announced by the crowing of a cock? Besides, Anacharsis in Lucian confirms the object of the institution assigned by Ælian. In the history of antiquity many things are often repeated, without any one taking the trouble to examine whether they can be proved by the testimony of the ancients. Those who wish to attain to truth and certainty in matters of this kind, will not consider such short examinations to be of so little importance as they may to others appear.

Dempster has assigned another reason for the cock-fights established by Themistocles, which, though adopted by many, is not even supported by probability. He conceives that these cock-fights were like a kind of permanent trophies or monuments of the conquered Persians, because the game-cock was indigenous in Persia, and conveyed thence to other countries[1167].

Athenæus[1168], indeed, quotes from a work of Menodotus some lines by which the latter part of this assertion is confirmed; and Aristophanes[1169] in two places calls the domestic cock a Persian bird. It is proved by more modern accounts, that this species of fowl is at present found wild in the East Indies and many neighbouring countries. Sonnerat[1170] found them in Hindostan; and they were seen by Cook and by Dampier on Pulo Condor and many islands of the South Sea. According to the testimony of Gemelli Careri, they were indigenous in the Philippine islands, and according to Morolla in the kingdom of Congo. That they are still found wild in Georgia is asserted by Reineggs[1171]. The account therefore of the Greeks, that they obtained domestic fowls from Persia, may be admitted; but as in cock-fights one Persian overcame another, how could these convey the idea of a victory of the Greeks over the Persians? Is the object, then, as stated by Lucian and Ælian not sufficient and intelligible?

That cock-fighting, in the course of time, became a favourite pastime among the people, is proved by the frequent mention which is made of it in various authors. Pliny says[1172] that it was exhibited annually at Pergamus, in the same manner as combats of gladiators. In this city, according to Petronius[1173], a boy was promised a fighting-cock; and therefore it appears that boys kept cocks there for this pastime. Æschines reproaches Timarchus with spending the whole day in gaming and cock-fighting. Plato[1174] complains, that not only boys but grown-up persons, instead of labouring, bred birds for fighting, and employed their whole time in such idle amusements.

Cock-fights were represented also by the Greeks on coins and on cut stones. That the Dardani had them on their coins we are told by Pollux[1175]; and this seems to prove that these people were as fond of that sport as their neighbours of Pergamus. Mr. Pegge caused engravings to be made of two gems in the collection of Sir William Hamilton, on one of which is seen a cock in the humble attitude of defeat, with its head hanging down, and another in the attitude of victory, with an ear of corn in its bill as the object of contest. On the other stone two cocks are fighting, while a mouse carries away the ear of corn for the possession of which they had quarrelled; a happy emblem of our law-suits, in which the greater part of the property in dispute falls to the lawyers and attorneys. Two cocks in the attitude of fighting are represented also on a lamp found in Herculaneum[1176].

That the Greeks employed various means to increase the irritability and courage of fighting-cocks is beyond all doubt. Besides the circumstance already mentioned in regard to the females, they gave them also food which produced nearly the same effect as opium does in India, and as brandy did some years ago on the European armies. Dioscorides[1177] and Pliny[1178] ascribe this effect to a plant which they call adiantum. The former says it was given to game-cocks and quails, and the latter that it was given to game-cocks and partridges, to incite them to fight. Garlick, allium, was employed also, as we are told by Xenophon, not only for game-cocks but also for horses and soldiers. That the Greeks, however, like the English at present, armed their cocks with steel spurs, in order to render their battles more bloody, is denied by Pegge; though the contrary seems to be proved by a passage in Aristophanes, now become a proverb, and the remarks of the scholiast[1179]. As the English procure the strongest and best fighting-cocks from other countries, and often from Germany, through Hamburg, the Greeks, in the like manner, obtained foreign game-cocks for the same purpose[1180].

Why the Romans showed more fondness for quail-fighting than for cock-fighting I do not know; but it is certain that they had not the latter, or at any rate only seldom and at a late period, which appears to be very singular, as they began then more and more to imitate the Greeks. Varro mentions the breeds which were chiefly sought for in Greece; but he adds, that though they might be good for fighting, they were not fit for breeding[1181]. Had the breeding of game-cocks been an employment, he would have spoken in a different manner. Columella also ridicules the breeding of these cocks, as a Grecian custom, and prefers the native race to all others. Eustathius, in the place already quoted, says expressly that the Romans preferred quails to game-cocks; yet in later times we find mention among them of cock-fighting, as has been before remarked.

There were cocks in England in the time of Julius Cæsar[1182]; but it is said that they were kept there merely for pleasure, and not used as food. The latter part of this account is not improbable. The inhabitants of the Pelew Islands, we are told, eat only the eggs of their hens, and not the flesh. But the question, how old cock-fighting is in England, cannot be determined. Pegge says, the oldest information which he found on this subject was in the Description of the City of London by William Fitz-Stephens, who lived in the reign of Henry II., and died in 1191[1183]. This writer relates that every year on Shrove Tuesday the boys at school brought their game-cocks to the master, and the whole forenoon was devoted to cock-fighting, for the amusement of the pupils. The theatre or cock-pit, therefore, was in the school-house, and the pupils seem to have had the direction of it. To this information I can add, that cock-fighting in France was forbidden by a council in 1260, on account of some mischief to which it had given rise[1184].

This pastime has been sometimes forbidden even in England, as was the case under Edward III. and Henry VIII.; also in the year 1569, and even later; but it was nevertheless retained to a late period. Even Henry VIII. himself instituted fights of this kind; and a writer worthy of credit relates, that James I. took great delight in them[1185]. In modern times this cruel amusement has been carried beyond all bounds; so that the cock-fights in China[1186], Persia[1187], Malacca[1188], and America[1189], are nothing in comparison of those called the battle-royal and the Welsh main. In the former a certain number of cocks are let loose to fight, and when they have destroyed each other, the survivor is accounted the victor, and obtains the prize. In the latter kind of battle, sixteen pair of cocks, for example, being pitted against each other, the sixteen conquerors are made to fight again; the eight of these which are victors, must fight a third time; and the four remaining a fourth time, till at length the two last conquerors terminate, by a fifth contest, this murderous game, after thirty-one cocks have successively butchered each other amidst the noisy exultation of the spectators, who however make a pretence to the character of magnanimity.

[Cock-fighting is one of the chief amusements throughout the East Indies and China, and it is a fashionable pastime for ladies in Peru. The spot on which the cock-pit Royal, which was built in the reign of Charles II., existed, is now used for the meetings of the members of Her Majesty’s Privy Council. The custom of cock-throwing, that is, of throwing sticks at a cock exposed at a stake and which was practised in this country at Shrovetide, is supposed to have originated during the war with France in the reign of Edward III., and to have been considered a mark of hatred and contempt for the French people, of whom that bird was the national emblem; but the conjecture rests upon no solid authority and must be regarded as mere legend.

Cock-fighting is now forbidden and punishable by law in Great Britain, and every attempt is made to prevent this and other similar barbarous sports and to convict the offenders, by the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.]

FOOTNOTES

[1146] Archæologia, vol. iii. p. 132. A Memoir on Cock-fighting, by Samuel Pegge, M.A., Rector of Wittington. As this learned antiquary made use of what was collected by others on this subject, I have taken the same liberty with his paper; but have rectified some mistakes and made new additions.

[1147] Palmerii Exercit. in Auct. Græcos. Ultraj. 1694, 4to, p. 3.

[1148] Lib. i. cap. 35 et 45.

[1149] See Vossius de Historicis Græcis, lib. ii. cap. 10. Extracts from this book of Ptolemy may be found in Photii Bibliotheca, 1612, fol. p. 472.

[1150] The passages which indisputably relate to quail-fighting, as far as I know, are as follows: Plutarch. Apophthegm. p. 207, ed. Francofurt, 1620, fol. Cæsar Augustus caused a person to be punished for having purchased and used as food a quail which had always been victorious; and in Vita Antonini, p. 930, it is said that Antoninus often had the satisfaction of seeing his game-cocks and quails victorious. M. Antoninus de Se-ipso, i. § 6, declares that he never took pleasure in keeping quails for fighting. Herodian, iii. 10, 4, says that the son of Septimus Severus always got into quarrels at quail- and cock-fighting.

[1151] This account is given by Jul. Pollux, lib. ix. cap. 7, § 102 et 108.--Suidas, v. ὀρτυγοκόπος, ed. Kusteri, ii. p. 717.--Meursius de Ludis Græcorum, in Gronovii Thes. Græc. Antiq. vii. p. 979.

[1152] Pollux, p. 1095.

[1153] De Gymnasiis, cap. 37.

[1154] Cap. 41, p. 985.

[1155] Histor. Anim. iv. 1.

[1156] Var. Histor. ii. 28. Kühn quotes from Eustathius’s commentary on the Iliad, p. 740, a passage which contains a new proof that the Romans had quail-fighting rather than cock-fighting. The words of Ælian are admitted by Petit among the Attic laws. See his Leges Atticæ, p. 156.

[1157] Diogen. Laert. ii. 30. p. 98.

[1158] Stobæi Eclog. ed. Gesneri. Tiguri 1543, fol. p. 298. Cœlius Rhodiginus Lection. Antiq. xvi. 13, and after him Delechamp, Kühn, Pegge, and others say, that the philosopher Chrysippus extols the game-cock also on account of its courage; but none of these writers has told us where this fragment of the lost works of that polygraph is to be found. I met with it in Plutarchi lib. de Stoicorum repugnantiis, p. 1049.

[1159] Solanus ad Luciani lib. c.

[1160] The passage occurs in the treatise, Liber quisquis virtuti studet, in op. ed. Mangey, ii. p. 466.

[1161] In his observations on Pliny, lib. x. 21, sect. 34.

[1162] Antiq. of Greece.

[1163] De Divinationum Generibus, 1591, 8vo, 232, b.

[1164] Geniales Dies, v. 13.

[1165] De Divinatione, i. cap. 34.

[1166] Plin. x. 21, sect. 34.

[1167] In his Annotations on Rosini Antiquit. Rom. iii. cap. 10. See Hyde de Religione Persarum, p. 163.

[1168] Lib. xiv. cap. 20.

[1169] Aves, 484, 707. Beck, in his edition of this comedy, Lips. 1782, 8vo, p. 50, thinks that the ancients themselves did not know whence this appellation arose. He refers therefore to the scholiasts, and to Suidas, v. Περσικός ὄρνις, p. 102, whose words have been copied by Phavorinus into his dictionary, p. 598; and he supposes, with Suidas, that the similarity of the cock’s comb to the Persian covering for the head gave occasion to the name. But the passage quoted from Athenæus assigns a much more probable reason.

[1170] Voy. aux Indes Or. ii. p. 117, where there is also a figure of the wild fowls.

[1171] Reineggs Beschreibung des Kaukasus, 1797, 8vo, p. 69.

[1172] Lib. x. c. 7.

[1173] Cap. 86.

[1174] De Legibus, l. vii.

[1175] Onomast. ix. 84.

[1176] Antich. di Ercolano, tom. viii. Lucerne, p. 63. More engravings of coins with similar impressions may be found in Haym. Thes. Brit. i. pp. 213, 234, in Agostini Gem. P. i. p. 199, and in Gorleus, P. i. 51, and 114, also P. ii. 246. Frölich Notit. Numism. p. 81. A single cock may often have been the emblem of vigilance.

[1177] Lib. iv. cap. 36.

[1178] Lib. xxii. cap. 21, sect. 30: “perdices et gallinaceos pugnaciores fieri putant, in cibum eorum additis.” This affords a further proof that partridges also were made to fight.

[1179] Aves, 760: αἶρε πλῆκτρον εἰ μάχει: tolle calcar si pugnas. See what has been said in regard to this proverb by Suidas, and by Erasmus in his Adagia.

[1180] The most celebrated breeds are mentioned by Columella, viii. 2.--Plin. x. 21.--Geopon. xvi. 3, 30.

[1181] Varro, iii. 9.

[1182] De Bello Gallico, lib. v. 12.

[1183] “Præterea quotannis die, quæ dicitur carnivale (ut a puerorum ludis incipiamus, omnes enim pueri fuimus) scholarum singuli pueri suos apportant magistro suo gallos gallinaceos pugnatores, et totum illud antemeridanum datur ludo puerorum vacantium spectare in scholis suorum pugnas gallorum.” I have transcribed these words from the first edition of this old topography, which is entitled A Survey of London, written in the year 1598, by John Stow ... with an appendix containing Libellum de situ et nobilitate Londini, written by William Fitzstephen. Lond. 1599, 4to, p. 480. Stow translates the word Carnivale by Shrove Tuesday.

[1184] Du Cange, Glossarium. This council, as I conjecture, was held in the town of Copriniacum in diocesi Burdegalensi, which, as some think, was Cognac.

[1185] See Maitland’s London, and Stow’s Survey, by Strype, i. p. 302. edit. 1754.

[1186] Bell’s Travels, p. 303.

[1187] Tavernier.

[1188] Dampier. Also the Gentleman’s Mag. 1770, p. 564.

[1189] Wafer, p. 118.

SALTPETRE. GUNPOWDER. AQUAFORTIS.

In examining the question, whether Theophrastus, Pliny, and in general the ancient Greeks and Romans, were acquainted with our saltpetre, or at what period it became known, I shall perhaps meet with as little success as those who have preceded me in the same research[1190]. I shall therefore be satisfied if competent judges allow that I have contributed anything new that can tend to illustrate the subject.

Our saltpetre, which is commonly called nitrum, and sometimes, though more rarely, sal nitræ, is a neutral salt composed of a peculiar acid, named the acid of saltpetre or nitric acid, and that alkali called potash. The characters by which it is most readily distinguished from other salts are its cooling taste, its fusibility when exposed to a small degree of heat, and in particular its so-called deflagration; that is, the property it has when placed in the fire, or on an ignited body, or when melted in a crucible, with a combustible substance, of suddenly bursting into a very bright flame, by which it loses its acid, and nothing remains but a carbonate of potash. The principal use of it is in making gunpowder, and for the preparation of that acid known under the name of aquafortis[1191], which is employed in various ways.

Native saltpetre is so rare, that Cronstedt was not acquainted with it. At present, however, it is known to occur in the East Indies, in the lower part of Italy, also in Portugal[1192], Spain, America, and some other countries[1193]. But almost all the saltpetre obtained in Europe is produced partly by nature and partly by art. The putrefaction of organic bodies gives rise, under certain circumstances, to nitric acid, which in general combines with calcareous earth wherever it finds it, and forms the so-called earthy saltpetre. This is decomposed by potash, and the latter uniting with the acid forms common saltpetre. Sometimes also it is found that the nitric acid, instead of being united with calcareous earth, is combined with soda, which produces the so-called cubic saltpeter[1194]. Both these saline substances, but the earthy more frequently than the cubic, are often found on effloresced walls; and both are then comprehended under the common names of Mauersalz or Mauerbeschlag, sal murale.

This efflorescence on walls was observed, in all probability, at a very early period, especially as it is produced in many parts in great abundance, and as it makes itself perceptible by the decay of walls, which it seems to corrode. It is the plague or leprosy of houses mentioned in the Mosaic code of laws. As the ancients were so much inclined to expect medicinal virtue in all natural bodies, there is reason to think that they soon collected and made trial of this saline incrustation. That this indeed was actually the case, and that they gave the name of nitrum to this saline mass, may be proved from their writings. Their nitrum, however, must have been exceedingly various in its properties. For this incrustation is not always calcareous saltpetre; it is often soda[1195], mixed with more or less calcareous earth; and sometimes it consists of salts of sulphuric acid. In modern times, on closer examination, other salts of nitric acid have been found in the incrustation of walls, such as flaming saltpetre or nitrate of ammonia, bitter saltpetre or nitrate of magnesia; but of these no mention can be expected in the works of the ancients.

Substances so different ought not indeed to have been all named nitrum; but before natural history began to be formed into a regular system, mankind in general fell into an error directly contrary to that committed at present. Objects essentially different were comprehended under one name, if they any how corresponded with each other even in things accidental. Whereas at present every variety, however small, obtains a distinct appellation; because many wish to have the pleasure, if not of forming new species, at any rate of giving new names. The elephant and rhinoceros were formerly called oxen; the sable and ermine were named mice, and the ostrich was distinguished by the appellation of sparrow. In the like manner, calcareous saltpetre and alkali might be called nitrum. The ancients, however, gave to their nitrum some epithets, but they seem to have been used only to denote uncommon varieties.

Now, as the ancients were not acquainted with any accurate method of separating and distinguishing salts, it needs excite no wonder that they should ascribe to their nitrum properties which could not possibly be united in a salt, and much less exist in our saltpetre. But as they were neither acquainted with aquafortis nor manufactured gunpowder, and as no particular use of calcareous saltpetre was known, the nitrum most valuable to them must have been that which consisted chiefly of soda, and which consequently could be employed in washing, in painting, and in glass-making.

It is well known that in warm countries this alkali effloresces here and there from the earth, particularly in a dry soil, and even in such quantity as to be employed in commerce. Hence it may be readily comprehended why this effloresced salt, which is very often mixed with common salt, obtained the name of nitrum.

The important discovery, that a similar salt, having the like properties, and applicable to the same uses, named at present soda, may be obtained from the ashes of certain plants, was first made, in my opinion, by the ancient Egyptians or Arabians[1196]. This salt also, at least by the Greeks, was named nitrum, or considered as a species of it. By the incineration of the plants this salt was rendered slightly caustic; and it then became moist in the air, and deliquesced when not preserved in very close vessels. It was therefore like those salts which are obtained, in the same manner, from the ashes of all other plants; though the latter are essentially different from the former, and in the course of time obtained the peculiar appellation of potash or pearlash. One can hardly be surprised that the ancients were not able to distinguish soda from potash, especially as they were both obtained from vegetable ashes.

But were the ancients, under the ambiguous name of nitrum, acquainted with our saltpetre? There is certainly reason to think that it became known to them by lixiviating earths impregnated with salts. There are, as already said, not only in India but also in Africa, and particularly in Egypt, earths which, without the addition of ashes or potash, give real saltpetre, like that of the rubbish-hills on the road from new to old Cairo[1197], and like the earth in some parts of Spain. It is a knowledge only of this natural kind of saltpetre, which required no artificial composition, that can be allowed to the ancients, as it does not appear by their writings that they were sufficiently versed in chemistry to prepare the artificial kind used at present.

But even admitting that they had our saltpetre, where and by what means can we be convinced of it? Is it to be expected that any of the before-mentioned characters or properties of this salt should occur in their writings? They neither made aquafortis nor gunpowder; and they seem scarcely to have had any occasion or opportunity to discover its deflagration and the carbonization thereby effected, or, when observed, to examine and describe it. No other use of our saltpetre which could properly announce this phenomenon has yet been known. How then can it be ascertained that under the term nitrum they sometimes meant our saltpetre?

Those inclined to believe too little rather than too much, who cannot be satisfied with mere conjectures or probabilities, but always require full proof, will acknowledge with me, that the first certain accounts of our saltpetre cannot be expected much before the invention of aquafortis and gunpowder. It deserves also to be remarked, that the real saltpetre, as soon as it became known, was named also nitrum; but, by way of distinction, either sal nitrum, or sal nitri, or sal petræ. The first appellation, from which our ancestors made salniter, was occasioned by an unintelligible passage of Pliny, which I shall afterwards point out. The two other names signify, like sal tartari, sal succini, a salt which was not nitrum but obtained from nitrum. Sal-nitri, therefore, or salniter, was that salt which, according to the representation of the ancients, was separated by art from nitrum, yet was essentially different from the nitrum or soda commonly in use. Biringoccio says expressly, that the artificial nitrum, for the sake of distinction, was named, not nitrum, but sal nitrum.

The name nitrum is of great antiquity, and seems to have been conveyed from Egypt and Palestine to Greece, and thence to Italy and every part of Europe. For it is evidently the neter mentioned by the prophet Jeremiah, chap. ii. ver. 22; and which occurs also in the Proverbs of Solomon, chap. xxv. ver. 20. But whether the name nitrum, as Jerome says[1198], be derived from the Egyptian province Nitria, whence it was exported in great abundance, or the name of the province was derived from nitrum, is a question of little importance in regard to this research. Nitron is mentioned by Herodotus, where he describes the Egyptian method of embalming dead bodies[1199]; by some of the Greeks the word was written and pronounced litron. In the same manner people say nympha and lympha. In order to avoid confusion, I shall here call the nitrum of the ancients nitrum, and the nitrum of the mineralogists saltpetre.

In the course of time men became acquainted with the purer, more useful, and cheaper mineral alkali which was furnished, under the name of soda, by the Moors and inhabitants of the southern countries, who had learned the method of preparing it. The vegetable alkali also was always more and more manufactured in woody districts, as an article in great request, and sold under the name of potash, cineres clavellati. All knowledge of the impure alkali from the incrustation of walls was then lost; and as there was no further need of guarding against confusion, it was not longer thought worth while to name saltpetre sal nitri: it was called nitrum; and the oldest signification of this word being forgotten, it was admitted without further examination, that the nitrum of the ancients was nothing else than our saltpetre.

In the sixteenth century some learned Europeans, while travelling through the East, heard the name natrum given to the mineral alkali which was then exported as an article of commerce, and introduced in their works this transformation of the ancient word nitrum. This appellation was employed by the systematic mineralogists, who, giving themselves little trouble about the original meaning of words, and taking care only to avoid confusion, called the mineral alkali also natrum, and applied the name of nitrum to saltpetre. As far as I know at present, it was first stated by Peter Bellon and Prosper Alpinus[1200], that the mineral alkali was in the East called natrum. The former returned in 1549, and the latter was still in Cairo in 1580.

This word was adopted in mineralogy by Linnæus, in the year 1736, as the name of a species, in which he comprehended for the first time the alkaline incrustation found on walls. In this he is followed by Wallerius, who includes also the mineral alkali from the East. Afterwards the word natrum was employed in the same sense by all mineralogists.

It deserves here to be remarked, that Boyle had even examined and determined the difference between the fixed and volatile alkalies; but that mineralogists and chemists, till the latest periods, believed that all fixed alkali arose, or at least was obtained, by the incineration of plants. The difference between the mineral and vegetable alkalies was first defined, in a proper manner, by the exertion of the German chemists Pott, Model and Marggraf[1201]; especially after the last had proved, in the year 1758, that the basis of common salt was not, as had before been generally believed, an alkaline earth, but a fixed alkali, to which, because it was in many of its properties different from the fixed vegetable alkali, he gave the name of fixed mineral alkali. Soon after this substance was discovered in mineral springs; and Model and others have shown that it is not essentially different from that which in the East is called natrum.

It is singular, and yet may be accounted for, that since that time many have spoken of the nitrum and natrum of the ancients, though they are only different pronunciations of the same word; and natrum is never found in the works of the Greeks or the Romans, and not even in writings of the middle ages.

But if the greater part of what I have here said should be considered only as conjecture, it must nevertheless be acknowledged that it is deduced from the nature of the thing; and when impartially compared with what we read in the ancients, the latter I hope will be better understood than it hitherto has been; the impropriety of many readings will become apparent, and the truth of this conjecture be admitted.

Were I here to relate everything that we read of nitrum, in order to compare it with nature and to examine it thoroughly, I should be obliged to extend this article to a greater length than might be agreeable to the reader. I shall therefore give only the principal proofs of my assertion, premising, that doubts which might be excited by single passages not here mentioned, will, on a closer comparison, vanish without my assistance. But I maintain that those who wish to explain the old names of natural objects must relate everything said of them, and not that alone which is favourable to their opinion, and which may be often contradicted by what was purposely or accidentally concealed. The first part of such an examination is always a careful collection from the writings of the ancients of all the predicates of the natural object, the systematic name of which one is endeavouring to prove.

There is reason however to conjecture, that the ancients, in the history of their impure nitre, the manner of obtaining which the Romans at least had no opportunity themselves of seeing, for Pliny says expressly that it was not procured in Italy, fell into many errors and mistakes, which at present cannot all be explained.

Hence it happened that the ancients did not understand the art of purifying the salt which they obtained from minerals; and therefore they were obliged to use it in the same impure state in which they found it. On this account they considered each natural mixture as a peculiar kind; gave to the greater part of them, or those most useful, particular names; and of these recommended for different purposes those which, according to their purity or mixture, or according to other circumstances, were the most convenient. It is not probable that all these varieties could be again found out or defined; and it seems to be of little importance, when it is known that the names denote nothing more than the varieties of a mineral.

In this examination it is to be regretted that the book of Theophrastus, in which he expressly treated of nitrum, has not been preserved. But it may be believed, even without the testimony of Pliny, that he was one of the most accurate and acute naturalists among the ancients, and that he gave the best account of this substance[1202]. It must, however, be admitted that Pliny thoroughly understood this author, and gave a correct extract from him, and that the transcriber fell into no mistake.

That the nitrum of the ancients was an alkali more or less impure, but not saltpetre, has been long admitted by those who had the least knowledge of mineralogy, as well as by the most sagacious physicians. The grounds for this opinion, as far as I have yet learned, are as follows: more indeed might be found, but these are sufficient to afford a complete proof. Galen, a cautious writer, says that nitrum was in general burnt, by which means its effects were strengthened[1203]. Had it been saltpetre, it is impossible that the ancients should not in burning it have observed its deflagration, and this property is too remarkable not to have been mentioned. But nothing is to be found that can with any probability be supposed to allude to it.

But should it be admitted without any grounds that it was not an alkali but saltpetre which they burnt, it must certainly have been carbonized; for a burning body may easily have fallen into the crucible, and in general nitrum seems to have been burnt in an open fire, like our lime, because Pliny, speaking of the Egyptian, considers the contrary as somewhat uncommon. Physicians then, at any rate, must have observed, that a body very different both in its appearance and effects was produced from saltpetre by burning, but which could not be used for any other purpose than that salt. Of this however we do not find the least intimation.

But nitrum was undoubtedly soda, and on that account when burnt must have become more caustic as well as stronger in most of its effects, and in this respect similar to potash, since [owing to impurities] it in the same manner became moist and deliquesced in the air. What Pliny relates of the Egyptian nitrum becomes then intelligible. The latter, he says, was transported in pitched vessels, because it would otherwise have deliquesced; and he afterwards adds, that it was burnt before it was sent off. Had he known that the latter was the cause and the former the effect, he would have mentioned the latter first; but his whole extract, in regard to nitre, is written in general without order. The vessels, no doubt, were of clay; but whether he means in what he adds that they were not burnt but only baked in the sun, or that before they were filled they were completely dried in the sun, has been determined by no commentator. To me the latter is the more probable. Pliny also mentions another circumstance in regard to the burning of the Egyptian nitrum; namely, that it must be done in a close vessel, otherwise it would decrepitate or fly off. This is perfectly intelligible, when it is considered that it contained a great deal of common salt, which alone possessed the property of decrepitating; and it is well known in mineralogy that native soda, and even that which in modern times has been introduced into our collections from Tripoli, and of which I have in my possession a specimen, contains common salt[1204], and often in cubic crystals. Pliny had just reason to add, that nitrum otherwise does not properly decrepitate. The ancients were well acquainted with the resemblance of their nitrum to lime, and especially of that which was burnt. On this account, because the Egyptian was exported after it had been burnt, it could easily be mixed with quicklime, or, as Pliny says, be adulterated. But the proof which he gives he does not seem to have thoroughly understood. The Egyptian must at all times have been caustic (pungens) even without lime; but that which was mixed with lime could not so speedily or completely dissolve on the tongue as that which was pure, and left behind it more earth. What he says of a test by the smell, I cannot understand in any other manner than that burnt lime, when moistened with water, diffused that disagreeable vapour observed in apartments the walls of which have been newly plastered; though when the quantity is small this is hardly perceptible.

If I understand Theophrastus[1205] properly, he seems to say, that if nitrum be burnt as soon as it is dug up, it communicates heat to water in the same manner as lime. It may here be seen how great a resemblance the ancients found between their nitrum, alkaline earth and lime.

The similarity of wood-ashes to the nitrum of the ancients, which they acknowledged, proves also that it was in reality an alkaline salt. We are told by Theophrastus[1206] that nitrum was said to be produced from oak-ashes; and Pliny[1207], who borrowed from this writer, remarks that it was certain the ashes of that wood were nitrous. He ascribes also to burnt wine-lees the nature and properties of nitrum[1208]. Nay he considers as a kind of nitrum those saline ashes which, in many countries destitute of salt, were used for seasoning food, and which were prepared by pouring sea-water or salt brine over burning piles of wood, gradually and in small quantities, so that the fire was not extinguished, by which means the water evaporated, leaving the salt behind, but mixed indeed with charcoal, ashes, earth, and alkaline salts; consequently it must have been moist, or at any rate nauseous, if not refined by a new solution. This method of preparing or boiling salt, which perhaps is the oldest, has been mentioned by various writers; but many of them, through ignorance or neglect, have not told us that sea-water or brine was employed, as they speak in such a manner as if any kind and even fresh water had been used for that purpose.

Varro relates that he saw this process employed on the Rhine[1209]. Pliny says[1210] that oak timber had before been burnt for that purpose. In another place he mentions a similar process among the Gauls and the Germans[1211], as Tacitus does among the Hermanduri and the Catti[1212]. The former also states, on the authority of Theophrastus, that the Umbri burnt salt in the like manner[1213]. It is however certain that Pliny and other ancient writers often quote from Theophrastus what, at present, is not to be found in the works of that naturalist, but in those of his preceptor Aristotle[1214].

Pliny adds, that this paltry method of obtaining salt had been long given up; and this indeed was the natural consequence of increased civilization. It is however certain that it was long continued in many countries, and in some still exists.

About two centuries ago the inhabitants of the province of Zeeland, descendants perhaps of the Catti, used no other salt than what they obtained in the like manner, from mud thrown up by the sea, which they burned and moistened with sea-water, as we are told by Lemnius, who was himself a native of that country. Boxhorn says, in his annotations on the above-quoted passage of Tacitus, that he saw a painting at Zirkzee, in which the whole process was represented. It is probable that salt was boiled exactly in the same manner as at some of the Sleswic islands, described by Denkwerth[1215], from whose account it is seen that the glebæ marinæ, of which Lemnius speaks, consisted of mud mixed with roots growing in them; and that the salt when afterwards refined was called there Frisic, in all probability because the inhabitants had learned to make it from their ancestors the Frieslanders. I remember somewhere to have read that salt was made for a long time in this manner by the so-called Wurst-Frieslanders, in the country of Wurst, belonging to the duchy of Bremen. The inhabitants also of the Austrian part of Moldavia, or Buccowina as it is called, still use a salt, which they do not boil, but burn with their superfluous wood, in the like manner from the brine of a saline spring. A member of the former Academy of Brussels[1216] took the trouble to examine the process as described by the ancients, and obtained, as might certainly have been expected, a highly alkaline kind of common salt, similar to that which Pliny, not without reason, considered as a sort of nitrum, because undoubtedly it may oftener have been an alkaline carbonate than common salt.

Boerhaave[1217], in quoting the passages of the ancients, did not reflect that, during the incineration of the wood, salt water was poured over it. He considered the whole process as a burning of potash, and thought that the salt obtained was fit for use only because it was made according to the manner of Tachenius. That indeed gives a carbonated salt, which is almost saponaceous, and so mixed with various parts of the burnt plants that it is much milder, consequently fitter for use than common soda or pearlash can be; but that salt was not so much of the Tachenian kind as a species of common salt superabundant in alkali.

If the nitrum was carbonated alkali, there is reason to suppose that the ancients must have occasionally mentioned in their writings that it effervesced with acids. With the mineral acids indeed they were not acquainted; but they had vinegar, and that nitrum produced with this an effervescence had been known in the oldest times. A very clear allusion to this circumstance is found in the book of Proverbs, chap. xxv. ver. 20; where Luther however translates the word by chalk. Jerome, whose explanation I have already quoted, was in some degree acquainted with this phænomenon; and therefore to him the comparison of Solomon was intelligible[1218]. But at present I can produce no proofs from Greek writers; though they might have occurred during the use of nitrum in medicine, in consequence of which it was often put into vinegar.

We shall be further convinced what nitrum really was, when the uses to which it was applied, as mentioned in the works of the ancients, are considered. The most common, as soap was not then known, appears to have been in washing, a purpose for which our saltpetre would not be fit; besides, it is at all times too scarce and too dear. I shall not here adduce any proofs of its being employed in this manner, as they often occur, and as several have been already given in the preceding volume[1219]. Many salves and cosmetics were prepared with nitrum; and in all probability articles of this kind, used chiefly among the women, are to be understood by the term nitron parthenicon, which occurs in Nicholas Myrepsius, in the beginning of the fourteenth century; matronicon, mentioned by the same, and by Alexander of Tralles, about the year 565; and the nitrum matronale of Marcellus Empiricus, in the fifth century. That the use of it for washing still continues in the East, is confirmed in various books of travels.

The oldest glass, of the preparation of which any account is to be found in history, was made by means of nitrum or mineral alkali. For though I doubt that it could have been produced on the sandy banks of the Belus, where some merchants, when cooking, supported their pots with lumps of nitrum[1220], because sand is not so easily brought to a state of fusion; it at any rate remains certain, that this supposed fusion with our saltpetre is altogether impossible.

The use of nitrum for painting announces, without doubt, an alkaline carbonate, and not saltpetre[1221]; and the case is the same with the various uses in the cookery of the ancients, many of which we have still retained. It was added to bread in baking, according to Pliny[1222], in the stead of salt, but probably to promote its rising, for which purpose it is still employed by the Egyptians, as potash was by our bakers. For this use the mineral alkali was formerly brought from the Levant to France, till it was declared by the physicians to be injurious to the health[1223].

When meat which was too fresh was to be dressed, it was put into nitrum[1224], in order to make it tender; and, according to Forskäl and others, this is still practised in the East. Our cooks also know that smoked meat, fish and other dried provisions become more tender when placed in a ley of potash, or when a little potash is added while they are boiling.

Nitrum, however, was employed for curing articles of food which people wished to preserve. This appears to contradict what has been mentioned above; but in all probability a caustic sort was used for the former purpose; but for the latter a mild kind, mixed with a great deal of common salt. There were so many species, that some of them might have been applied to quite contrary purposes.

As I conjecture, the use of nitrum for causing chestnuts and other husky fruits to boil soft, was also known: to produce the same effect, potash is at present thrown among boiling lentils and peas. I am inclined to think that for this reason Apicius caused chestnuts to be boiled with nitre.

It is highly probable that this effect of alkaline carbonates induced agriculturists to believe that beans, peas, lentils and other leguminous fruits, if steeped, before they were sown, in water in which nitre had been dissolved, or if the dung spread over the earth had been mixed with nitre, the future product could be more easily boiled soft[1225]. However useful this addition may be in cookery, it would produce little effect on seed; and it appears to me that the old agriculturists placed little confidence in the last-mentioned use, because they were not agreed in regard to the result. Virgil and others seem to expect from it an increase of the fruit[1226]; but others, security against beetles, which eat the fruit and leave the husks empty[1227]. When cabbages were transplanted they were strewed over with nitre, and by these means were said to come sooner to maturity[1228]. Radishes also were treated in the same manner, or besprinkled with nitrous water, in order to make them more tender[1229].

A common method employed by the ancient cooks to give a beautiful green colour to pickled or boiled vegetables, was to add nitrum to them while boiling; but this effect could be produced by natrum, and not by the nitrum of the moderns, or that neutral salt called saltpetre[1230].

Among the oldest accounts of nitrum is that where it is mentioned as being employed for embalming dead bodies. It would be tiresome to read over and examine everything written on that subject by the learned; but this much I think is clear, that either the flesh, and in general the softer parts of the body could be corroded in the course of seventy days by the Egyptian nitrum[1231], which, as above shown, was burnt, and in general mixed with unslaked lime, and consequently caustic[1232]; or that the moist parts could be desiccated by carbonate alkali, in the same manner as the manufacturers of parchment purify and dry their skins by the application of chalk. That saltpetre in no case could be useful for this purpose needs hardly be mentioned.

The ancient physicians, who were unacquainted with our numerous class of salts, employed their nitrum in many ways, and for a great variety of mixtures; but no writer, as far as I know, ever took the trouble to examine these recipes, though it has long since been declared that nitrum must have been potash or salt of tartar. Matthioli[1233] asserted, that those physicians would act very improperly who should prescribe our saltpetre where the ancients employed their nitrum; and indeed those in the least acquainted with the effects of salts must know, that all those extolled by the ancients announce carbonated alkalies. Thus burnt nitrum was employed for cleaning black teeth, as at present many use tobacco ashes instead of tooth-powder. It is seen by the works of Aretæus and others, that burnt nitrum was used as a caustic, till people learned in modern times to prepare the more active causticum potentiale, or sal causticum.

What the ancients say of the taste of their nitrum seems, however, not entirely applicable to pure carbonated alkali; and much less, or not at all, to our saltpetre. Had they meant the latter, they would certainly not have failed to mention the sensation of coolness which it occasions when applied to the tongue. Galen and Aetius say, that nitrum is as bitter as gall; but Serapio ascribes to it a saline taste, with a small degree of bitterness; as does also Pliny, only that for bitterness he substitutes the word sharpness. The names of tastes, however, are as uncertain as the names of the colours which occur in the works of the ancients. Both certainly deserve to be more accurately examined, and to be defined by comparing the things to which these names are given. Prosper Alpinus, however, is of opinion that what the ancients called amarum, is not inapplicable to the taste of natrum.

The ancients mention various springs and streams which contained what they called nitrum[1234]; but nitrous water, according to the present acceptation of the word, that is, water which contains saltpetre, does not exist; and if credit is to be given to Marggraf and others, that they observed traces of saltpetre in some kinds of water, the instances must have been so rare that mention of them could not be expected among the ancients. Their nitrous water was undoubtedly alkaline, and this indeed is not scarce. Such water was recommended by the ancient physicians, both for bathing and drinking[1235]; and Pliny says, it was singular that the salt of such water would not shoot into crystals, like common salt, which is undoubtedly true[1236].

Alkaline water of this kind, such as that of Armenia, was used for washing, and also by fullers. In Egypt, at present, people wash in the same manner with nitrum.

It appears to me that many kinds of water, which were only impure and not potable on account of their nauseous taste, were considered by the ancients as nitrous. This seems to be proved by the means which they propose for rendering nitrous water fit to be drunk; that is, by throwing into it clay, or some grains of barley[1237]. In the like manner, I saw the brewers at Amsterdam improve their dirty water, in some degree, by putting into it kneaded clay, and allowing it to sink to the bottom.

One foundation more for my assertion may be found, I think, in the name borax. The ancient nitrum by the Arabians was called Bauracon or Baurach. When that salt, which at present is everywhere called borax, became known to the Arabians, it was at first generally considered as a kind of nitre, and on that account called Baurach, because in most of its properties it approached near to the nitrum of the ancients, that is, the natrum of the present day. But afterwards, when the difference became known, our borax, at least in Europe, retained exclusively the general name of Baurach, from which at length was formed the present word borax. My conclusion therefore is, that the nitrum of the ancients must have been mineral alkali; otherwise it is impossible that our borax, which till modern times was reckoned to be mineral alkali, should have been considered as a nitrum.

For many centuries past, the people in Africa and Asia, and also in Spain and Sicily, have cultivated some kinds of plants, which they dry and then burn to ashes. By regulating the fire in a particular manner, they cause these ashes to assume a certain degree of concretion, or vitrification, by which means they are formed into solid cakes of a grey colour, interspersed with many white and black spots. This substance, which in consequence of the vitrification does not become moist in the air, is broken into fragments, and sent to every part of Europe under the name of soda, for the use of the glass-houses, soap-boilers, dyers, and for other purposes.

These plants were undoubtedly first cultivated and employed in Europe by the Arabians, who made known the use of them. Those first or chiefly employed were named by them axnan, usnan, usnen, or uscnanon; and also Hasciscio alcali, that is, herba kali, the plant or herb kali, because the name kali, or, with the article prefixed, al kali, was not given to the plant but to the half-vitrified ashes kali. Hence the chemists call salts obtained from the ashes of plants, alkaline salts. I do not know how old this appellation may be; but it is to be found in Vincent Bellovacensis and in the interpolated writings of Geber and Avicenna, and particularly in a passage quoted by the former from an old alchemist named Jahie, where it is called sal alchali[1238]. All these salts formerly were considered as nitrous salts, or a kind of nitrum. It was indeed soon observed that soda and wood-ashes, which from the earliest periods had been burnt in woody districts, and which are now called potash, were not all of the same nature; but when the difference between the mineral and vegetable alkalies began to be studied, it was then known that soda contains the former, that is, our natrum, and potash the latter, but both indeed often rendered impure by earthy and foreign saline particles; and that there are many plants from the ashes of which mineral and not vegetable alkali is obtained. A question now arises, How old in the Levant is the method of preparing this natrum from the ashes of plants?

Michaelis is of opinion that it is mentioned in Malachi, chap. iii. ver. 2; which passage I shall give according to Luther’s translation: “Who shall stand when he appeareth? for he is like the fire of the goldsmith, and the soap of the scourer. He will sit and melt and purify the silver, and make pure like gold and silver.” This learned man here seems to think that the sacred writer alludes to refining the noble metals, and that the word borith means soda, which indeed may serve as a flux in the purification of them. I at first considered this meaning as true; but, on closer examination, I am fully convinced that we have both erred.

Those who read without prejudice the above passage of Malachi, must remark, that a double comparison or double image is employed. The messenger there promised was to separate the good from the bad, the clean from the unclean. The first occupation is compared with the labour of the gold-refiner; the other, with that of the scourer of clothes. The first image is afterwards heightened, because the poet, in all probability, was desirous of applying the separation of the ignoble parts, such as slag, by means of fire, as being the stronger image which denotes punishment, in a closer manner to the Levites and priests. At the time of the poet, before the invention of soap, people employed for washing either nitre or the saponaceous juice of certain plants, which I have already endeavoured to determine. The borith of the washer there expressly named, was undoubtedly one of these soap plants, and not the half-vitrified ashes either of soda or potash.

This passage of Malachi was so understood in the oldest times. Professor Tychsen, a true pupil and intimate friend of Michaelis, to whose opinion I subjected my doubts, assured me that Michaelis was never able to convince him of the justness of his exposition; especially as Jerome[1239], without the least hesitation, understood borith to be a plant growing in Palestine, and used there for washing; and as the Greek translators, who were much nearer to the period of the poet, and could not be unacquainted with a thing so much used, have translated borith by the word ποα, a plant.

In Jeremiah, chap. ii. ver. 22[1240], both the substances formerly used for washing, nitrum and the soap-plant, are so clearly named, that Michaelis was obliged to admit that we cannot understand there soda or potash, but a ley or soap, the last of which however was not at that time known. But, to speak the truth, potash and soda would not be altogether unfit for washing; at any rate, not less fit than the nether or nitrum there named. What may serve, however, to refute entirely the opinion of Michaelis is, that no proof has yet been found that soda is of so great antiquity. For my part, I am acquainted with no older mention of it than that which occurs in the works of the more modern Arabian physicians, Avicenna, Serapio, and others[1241].

All these grounds afford sufficient proof that the nitrum of the ancients was our natrum, and not our saltpetre. But still, in the account given by the ancients of that salt, there remain many things inexplicable. Thus, for example, no one can accurately define the epithets, chalastricum, halmirhaga, agrium, spuma nitri, aphronitrum, and others, because they do not indicate different kinds, as already said, but accidental properties of the same salt. Without enlarging further on this subject, I shall only remark that Pliny admits a natural and an artificial kind of nitrum, and this division is adopted by Serapio; but the latter term has not the meaning which we affix to it at present. The ancients were acquainted with no other than native nitrum, which they called artificial only when it required a little more trouble and art to obtain it.

Most of the physicians recommend red nitrum, which is mentioned also by many of the modern travellers. When Prosper Alpinus was in Egypt the rose-red nitrum cost twice as much as the white. The red colour, in all probability, arises from a metallic admixture; yet the red nitrum may be purer than the other, as red or violet rock-salt is often clearer and purer than that which is colourless.

One of the darkest parts in the history of nitrum is the following passage of Pliny: “Faciunt ex his vasa, nec non frequenter liquatum cum sulphure, coquentes in carbonibus.” The latter words he seems soon after to repeat: “Sal nitrum sulphuri concoctum in lapidem vertitur.” From these words J. Rhodius[1242] concludes that nitrum fixum was at that time known, because he considered nitrum to be saltpetre; but in that case with the sulphur, Glaser’s sal polychrest must properly have been produced. This, however, was not the case, because nitrum was fixed alkali. The ancients therefore, when they placed it with sulphur in a crucible upon burning coals must have obtained liver of sulphur, which when it cools is hard, but soon becomes moist when exposed to the air. But I will not venture to determine whether anything of this kind is to be supposed in Pliny, who did not himself fully understand the subject on which he touches.

The account of vessels made of nitrum is still more singular. Michaelis conjectured[1243] that articles of various kinds were cut out of this substance, not for real use but merely for ornament, in the same manner as similar things are cut out of rock-salt in Transylvania, many specimens of which I have in my collection[1244]. But even if nitrum had been compact and strong enough for this purpose, there could not be the same inducement to employ it as rock-salt, which, in consequence of its solidity, transparency, brightness and smoothness, appears to be capable of furnishing vessels equal to those made of the most beautiful crystal. Dalechamp seems to explain the whole as applicable to glazing; but in this case nitrum could serve only as a flux.

Though it can be certainly proved that the nitrum of the ancients was an alkaline salt, it is difficult to determine the time when our saltpetre was discovered or made known. As many have conjectured that it was a component part of the Greek fire, invented about the year 678, which, in all probability, gave rise to the invention of gunpowder, I examined the prescriptions for the preparation of it. The oldest, and perhaps the most certain, is that given by the princess Anna Comnena; in which however I find only resin, sulphur and oil, but not saltpetre. Klingenstierna[1245] therefore judged very properly, that all recipes in which saltpetre occurs are either forged or of modern invention. Of this kind are those which Scaliger, at least according to his own account, found in Arabic works, and in which mention is made of oleum de nitro and sal petræ[1246]. But it does not occur in that prescription given by Marcus Græcus, and copied by Albertus Magnus, who died in 1280[1247].

I must still believe that the first certain mention of saltpetre will be found in the oldest account of the preparation of gunpowder, which, in my opinion, became known in Europe in the thirteenth century, about the same time that the use of the Greek fire, of which there were many kinds, began to be lost. Among the oldest information on this subject is that found in the above-quoted work of Albertus Magnus, and the writings of Roger Bacon, who died in 1278. It is doubted whether the first-mentioned treatise belongs to Albertus; but it is certain that the author, whoever he may have been, and also Bacon, both derived their information from the same source.

When M. von Arretin lately announced that he was about to publish a manuscript preserved in the electoral library at Munich, which contained the true recipe for making the Greek fire and the oldest for gunpowder, the same writing, as appears, was printed from two manuscripts in the library at Paris. I have now before me a copy of it, which was transmitted to the library of our university by M. Laporte Dutheil, conservateur des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque[1248].

It contains many recipes, but only with a few variations, as in Albertus Magnus; and it may be evidently seen that Roger Bacon employed this writing, which is mentioned by Jebb in the preface to his edition, from a copy preserved in the library of Dr. Mead. Of this Marcus Græcus nothing at present is known. According to some, he lived in the ninth century; but others, with more probability, place him in the thirteenth. Of his work, perhaps, we have only a translation; for, from the surname Græcus, there is reason to think that the original was written in the Greek language. I must, however, remark that Cardan, where he gives directions for making a fire which can be kindled by water, names Marcus Gracchus, but not Græcus. Scaliger, who, as is very probable, had this writing also, makes no mention of it or its author.

This Marcus speaks of saltpetre three times; first under the name of sal petrosum, which occurs also in the same prescription in Albertus Magnus; but the addition, which Albertus does not repeat, is very remarkable. In my opinion, scrophulæ contra lapides means the incrustation found on walls, which was represented as a kind of leprosy. The addition of ashes, or alkaline salts, the author either forgot or omitted, because perhaps he did not consider it as indispensably necessary. In another place it is said, Lapis qui dicitur petra solis, or, as it is in other manuscripts, salis; but whether saltpetre is here understood I will not venture to determine. In a third passage we find the words de sale petroso, or de salepetro.

In the works of Bacon the term sal petræ occurs at least three times. According to Casiri, the term pulvis nitratus is to be found in an Arabic manuscript, the author of which lived about the year 1249[1249]. If the work of Geber, already quoted, be genuine, and if this writer lived, as some think, in the eighth century, it would be the oldest where saltpetre is mentioned, in a prescription for an aqua solutiva or dissolutiva, which almost seems to be aqua regia. I have not observed the name sal petræ in the works of Vincent Bellovacensis, who lived in the thirteenth century.

In a word, I am more than ever inclined to accede to the opinion of those who believe that gunpowder was invented in India, and brought by the Saracens from Africa to the Europeans, who however improved the preparation of it, and found out different ways of employing it in war, as well as small arms and cannon[1250]. In no country could saltpetre, and the various uses of it, be more easily discovered than in India, where the soil is so rich in nitrous particles that nothing is necessary but to lixiviate it in order to obtain saltpetre; and where this substance is so abundant, that almost all the gunpowder used in the different wars with which the sovereigns of Europe have tormented mankind was made from Indian saltpetre[1251]. If it be true that saltpetre was not known in Europe till the thirteenth century, neither gunpowder nor aquafortis could have been made before that time; for the former cannot be prepared without saltpetre, nor the latter without nitre. But if it be true that this salt was known at a much earlier period in India, it is not improbable that both gunpowder and aquafortis were used by the Indians and the Arabians before they were employed by the Europeans, especially as the former were the first teachers of chemistry to the latter. In my opinion, what I have already related proves this in regard to gunpowder; and what I shall here add will afford an equal proof in regard to aquafortis.

It is difficult to discover the first mention of mineral acids in the writings of the ancient chemists. In the course of their numerous experiments they obtained indeed, at an early period, acids, the utility of which they extol; but each concealed the process by which they were made; and as they had no method of obtaining them pure, they were for a long time unacquainted with the difference between the kinds. Their prescriptions, when they are found, are so contradictory and so carelessly written, that it is almost impossible to conjecture which of the known acids forms the principal component parts in their recipes or mixtures.

It appears to me, that the first intelligible account of aquafortis occurs in the writings of the Arabians, or of the pupils of Arabian chemists. At present I am acquainted with none older than that to be found in the works of Geber. For though I do not believe that those of which we have Latin translations belong to a Geber of the eighth or ninth century, I am ready to admit that they may be, at any rate, of the twelfth. This appears probable, because about that period aquafortis and various arts are oftener mentioned, and in a much clearer manner, in these writings.

It is to be regretted in the history of chemistry, that it is impossible to determine the period of the Greek chemist or alchemist known under the name of Synesius; but it cannot be doubted that he borrowed a great deal from the works of the Arabians. This Synesius, among the chemical solvents, mentions water of saltpetre, which might be considered as aquafortis[1252]. But, as he mentions at the same time aqua fæcis, he appears to me to allude to the nitrum of the ancients, not to our saltpetre, and in general to strong alkaline leys, which indeed are capable of dissolving many bodies.

The monk Theophilus, of whom I have already spoken, and who in all probability lived in the twelfth century, appears also to have been acquainted with aquafortis; for in some of the passages quoted from his works by Raspe[1253], he speaks of an acid which dissolved all metals. In the writings of Vincent Bellovacensis, in the thirteenth century, some traces, but very doubtful, are found of aquafortis. Where he mentions the different sorts of gold he speaks of dissolving it, but by this expression he does not allude to its treatment with fire, which he speaks of separately[1254]. In another place he mentions the different solvents, and among these names vegetable acids, a water of sal-ammoniac, and a water obtained from alum by distillation. He here means undoubtedly a mineral acid[1255]. Michael Meier, the most learned chemist of the seventeenth century, says that Vincentius speaks of aquafortis as of a secret; but the passage I have not yet been able to find[1256].

Spielman states that Lullius, who died in 1315, in the eightieth year of his age, gave an account of his obtaining aquafortis from saltpetre by the addition of vitriol, and that Basilius Valentin was acquainted with the use of clay for the same purpose. Picus Mirandula however declares it to be uncertain whether Arnoldus de Villa Nova was acquainted with the acid of saltpetre in the fourteenth century.

It appears to be an old tradition that this acid was first employed at Venice, by some Germans, for separating the noble metals, and conveyed thence as an article of merchandize to every part of Europe. The persons who prepared it were there narrowly watched, in order that the process might not become known. They were employed chiefly for separating the gold from the Spanish silver, and by these means acquired great riches. Hence arose the report that the people of Venice understood the art of making gold; and it is certain that in many countries the gold refiners were for a long time considered as gold makers; but in no period were there more gold makers than in that when separation in the moist way became known. I can however give less account of this art of the Venetians than of the introduction of it into France in the fifteenth or the beginning of the sixteenth century.

William Budæus, who was born in 1467, and died in 1540, speaks of it in his book, printed for the first time in 1516, as a thing entirely new at that period[1257]. A man of low extraction, named Le Cointe, first undertook to separate gold from silver at Paris, by means of a water which Budæus calls aqua chrysulca. It is very remarkable, that by means of this water he could separate the smallest particle of gold from silver, and from every other metal; nay, he could even take from vessels their gilding without altering their form. By this art he acquired great wealth; which together with his secret descended to his son, who at the time was the only gold refiner at Paris.

He adds, that the art was exceedingly dangerous as well as unhealthy, and required great precaution. The possessor of it, when he became rich, left the execution of the work to a servant, whom he directed at a distance, that he might not expose himself to the pernicious fumes of the effervescing liquor. The fumes of the acid derived from saltpetre are indeed prejudicial to the health; but the danger has been much exaggerated, and no doubt with a view to deter people from attempting to discover the art, and to furnish a pretence for raising the price of the production[1258].

Budæus relates also, that the gold was left behind undissolved. The silver only was dissolved, and by another art was separated from the water and washed. It may here be easily perceived that Le Cointe employed aquafortis; but if he was able to loosen the gold from gilt vessels without destroying them, he must have used aqua regia, which consequently was not then unknown.

From other information, it appears that the mint at Paris purchased the art from Le Cointe’s son, but still kept it a secret. On this account Francis I., by a decree issued at Blois on the 19th of March 1540, authorized the raising the value of coin, in order to defray the expense of fuel and assaying-water. In the middle of the seventeenth century, the preparation of aquafortis and the process of assaying in the moist way were fully known in France. At any rate, in the month of January 1637, the distillers obtained a guild letter, in which aquafortis is mentioned among the articles sold by them.

When saltpetre became necessary to governments for the manufacture of gunpowder, they endeavoured to obtain it at as cheap a rate as possible. No one before suspected that rulers would be justified in exclusively carrying away the incrustation of walls from private houses, which, when it could be used, became accessorium fundi. But the idea of regalia, so often abused, was extended so wide under various pretences, that the saltpetre regale and the letting of it was one of the severest oppressions to which the people were exposed by their rulers, and which occasioned almost as bitter complaints as the hunting regale, founded on no better grounds. I shall not here attempt to delineate the sufferings which were thus occasioned in many countries; they are still fresh in remembrance.

The oldest mention of this hated regale which I myself have found is of the year 1419. At that time, Gunther, archbishop of Magdeburg, granted to some person the right of searching out saltpetre and boiling it, during a year, in the district of Gibichenstein, for which he was to pay a barrel of saltpetre, and deliver to the archbishop the remainder at the rate of five cross-groschens per pound. The succeeding archbishop, Frederick, let in the year 1460, to a burgher of Halle, all the earth and the saltpetre that could be collected from it in the bailiwick of Gibichenstein, for four years, at the annual rent of a barrel of good refined saltpetre. On the same conditions, bishop Ernest, in 1477, let to some one for his lifetime the collection of the saltpetre. In 1544, a certain person obtained the collection of saltpetre from two heaps of rubbish before the gates at Halle. The magistrates of Halle also in 1545 had a saltpetre-work and a powder-mill. In the year 1560, John VI., archbishop of Triers, gave to some one permission to search for and dig up saltpetre. In 1583, the saltpetre regale was confirmed by a Brandenburg decree as a thing long known, and the case was the same with a Hessian of the year 1589.

It is very probable that this example was soon followed by most sovereigns; but even if they had collected and scraped together the nitrous incrustation of all the walls in Europe, they certainly would not have found a quantity of saltpetre sufficient for the gunpowder used in the numerous wars which took place, had not a much greater supply been obtained from India, and particularly from Patna. I do not know whether the Portuguese brought this article to Europe; but that it was imported at a very early period by the Dutch is proved by the oldest ladings of their return ships; and they at length found means to appropriate this branch of trade so entirely to themselves, that the other Europeans for a long time could not obtain any saltpetre in India.

In the seventeenth century, when chemistry began to be studied with more care and attention in Europe, and particularly in Germany, and the component parts and production of saltpetre became better known, many conceived the idea of improving the methods of obtaining it in Europe so much, that it might be possible to dispense with the Indian saltpetre, and flattered themselves with the hopes of thence deriving great advantages. Some proposed to fill tubes with putrifiable substances and earth capable of fixing of the nitric acid; others preferred building vaults of these substances, and Glauber recommended the filling of pits with them. The proposal, however, which met with the greatest approbation was that of building walls of them. Through a confidence in this idea, towns and villages were compelled to erect and maintain a certain number of saltpetre walls, under the most gracious promise that the collectors of saltpetre should no longer be allowed to spoil private dwellings, or render them unhealthful.

But experience has shown that all the means and coercive measures hitherto employed have rendered the European saltpetre much dearer than that obtained by commerce from Bengal. This will be readily comprehended, when it is known that earth richly impregnated with saltpetre abounds in India, and that it may be extracted by lixiviation without any addition, and brought to crystallize in that warm climate without the aid of fire; that the price of labour there is exceedingly low; that this salt is brought from India instead of ballast by all the commercial nations of Europe, where the competition of the sellers prevents the price from ever being extravagantly high, while the preparation of it in Europe, in consequence of the still increasing price of labour, fuel and ashes, is always becoming dearer. This regale will at length be everywhere scouted. In the duchy of Wurtemberg and the Prussian states, where it was most rigidly enforced, in consequence of an urgent representation from the States it was abolished in 1798; but in both countries an indemnification was given to government for the loss. The case also has been the same in Sweden[1259]. In the duchy of Brunswick it was soon suffered to drop; but in the electoral dominions it never was introduced.

[The greater part of our nitre is derived from Bengal, where, as in Egypt, Persia, Spain, &c., it exists in the soil. It is separated by lixiviation and crystallization. In France, Sweden and some other countries it is prepared artificially in nitre-beds. These are formed of various animal matters, mixed with lime or mortar-rubbish; the mixture is watered and stirred occasionally, and allowed to remain for a considerable time. The whole is then lixiviated and decomposed by carbonate of potash. The nitre is then separated and purified by crystallization. In some cases wood-ashes are mixed with the animal matters; the decomposition with potash is then unnecessary.

It is a question whether the nitric acid in the nitre arises from the nitrogen of the atmosphere or that in the animal matters. Dr. Davy has found nitre in a cave at Ceylon, where no nitrogenous matter was present; and in some parts of India, Spain, and some other countries, at a distance from all habitations, immense quantities of nitre are reproduced in soils which have been washed the year before. Nitre is directly brought into this country from Calcutta and Madras, in bags containing from 150 lbs. to 175 lbs. each. From 200,000 cwts. to 260,000 cwts. are annually imported into the United Kingdom.

In making gunpowder, the components, the sulphur, nitre, and charcoal should be as pure as possible, and reduced to the finest possible powder; they are sifted and mixed in the proper proportions. The mixture is then made into a cake with water, and ground between calcareous millstones. It is then granulated through sieves in another mill, and again sifted. It is then polished and hardened by revolving rapidly in a cask, and finally dried. The proportions of the constituents vary in different countries; at Waltham Abbey they are seventy-five nitre, fifteen charcoal and ten sulphur. The quantity of gunpowder consumed in this country is enormous; moreover, 4,000,000 lbs. are annually exported, the greater part of which is sent to the western coast of Africa.

The force of the explosion of gunpowder is owing to the sudden disengagement of gaseous products; these consist of nitrogen, carbonic oxide, carbonic acid, and sulphurous acid gases; and their volume has been calculated to amount to 2000 times the bulk of the powder.]

FOOTNOTES

[1190] To this subject belong the following works:--Ars Magna Artilleriæ, Auct. Cas. Siomienowicz. Amst. 1650, fol. p. 61. The author thinks that the nitrum of the ancients is not at present known.

Natural History of Nitre, by W. Clarke. Lond. 1670, 8vo. It is here said that the nitrum of the ancients was impure saltpetre, and that the latter is produced from the former by purification.

G. C. Schelhameri de Nitro, cum veterum, tum nostro commentatio, Amst. 1709, 8vo, contains good philological observations, particularly in regard to the period, but leaves the question undetermined.

Saggi sul ristabilimento dell’ antica arte de’ Greci e Romani pittori, del Sig. Doct. Vin. Requeno. Parma, 1787, 2 tomi in 8vo, ii. pp. 95, 131: a learned but diffuse work. He thinks that the nitrum of the ancients was our saltpetre; and what others consider as proofs of its being mineralized alkali, he understands as indicating alkalized saltpetre. I am not, however, convinced. Before I ascribe to the ancients a knowledge of our saltpetre, I must be shown in their writings properties of their nitrum sufficient to satisfy me that it was the same substance.

Commentat. de nitro Plinii, in J. D. Michaelis commentationes. Bremæ 1784, 4to. The author only illustrates the account of Pliny, and states what, according to his opinion, we are to understand in it in regard to alkali, and what in regard to our saltpetre.

[1191] [Since the discovery of the immense deposits of nitrate of soda in Peru, this salt, from its being much cheaper, has replaced the nitrate of potash in the manufacture of aquafortis, but it is not adapted to the making of gunpowder owing to its deliquescent property.]

[1192] I found the account of the Portuguese saltpetre in Mémoires Instructifs pour un Voyageur. The author of this work was the well-known Theodore king of Corsica.

[1193] More accounts of native saltpetre may be found in Recueil de Mémoires sur la Formation du Salpetre. Par les Commissaires de l’Academie. Paris, 1776, 8vo. Del Nitro Minerale Memoria dell’ ab. Fortis, 1787, 8vo.

[1194] The first, or one of the first, who was acquainted with and made known the cubic saltpetre, was professor John Bohn of Leipsic, in the Acta Eruditorum, 1683, p. 410; but with more precision in his Dissertat. Chymico-Physicæ, Lips. 1696, 8vo, p. 36.

[1195] [It is scarcely necessary to inform the reader that the author understands the soda of commerce, which is a carbonate of soda, and not the hydrated or caustic soda of chemists.]

[1196] [Crude soda or kelp was formerly manufactured to a very large extent in the Highlands, by burning the sea-weed, but since the tax has been taken off salt, most of the soda of British commerce is made by decomposing this with chalk and some carbonaceous matter.]

[1197] In like manner, a heap of dung covered with earth is lixiviated, and the result, without the addition of ashes, used as saltpetre.

[1198] The passage of Jerome relating to Proverbs, xxv. 20, I here insert entire, because I shall often have occasion to employ it:--“Nitrum a Nitria provincia, ubi maxime nasci solet, nomen accepit. Nee multum a salis Ammoniaci specie distat. Nam sicut salem in litore maris fervor solis conficit, durando in petram aquas marinas, quas major vis ventorum, vel ipsius maris fervor in litoris ulteriora projecerit; ita in Nitria, ubi æstate pluviæ prolixiores tellurem infundunt, adest ardor sideris tantus, quod ipsas aquas pluviales per latitudinem arenarum concoquat in petram; salis quidem vel glaciei aspectui simillimam; sed nil gelidi rigoris, nil salsi saporis habentem, quæ tamen, juxta naturam salis, in caumate durare, et in nubilos, aere fluere ac liquefieri solet. Hanc indigenæ sumentes servant, et ubi opus extiterit, pro lomento utuntur. Unde Judæo peccanti dicit propheta Jeremias: Si laveris te nitro, et multiplicaveris tibi herbam borith, maculata es in iniquitate tua, dicit Dominus Deus. Crepitat autem in aqua quomodo calx viva; et ipsum quidem disperit, sed aquam lavationi habilem reddit; cujus natura cui sit apta figuræ, cernens Solomon ait: Acetum in nitro, qui cantat carmina cordi pessimo. Acetum quippe si mittatur in nitrum, protinus ebullit.”

[1199] Herodot. ii. cap. 86 et 87.

[1200] Histor. Ægypti Naturalis iii. 2. See also Forskäl Flora Ægyptiaco-Arabica, p. xlv.

[1201] [Duhamel proved soda to be distinct from potash in 1736, Marggraf confirmed it in 1758.]

[1202] Lib. xxxi. cap. 10.

[1203] De Simplic. Med. Facult. ix. Dioscorides also, v. 131, speaks as if it had been well known that nitrum was commonly burnt.

[1204] Phil. Transactions, 1771, vol. lxi. p. 567.

[1205] De Igne, p. 435, ed. Heinsii, where he speaks of the heat produced in lime by slaking it. Aristotle also mentions together κονία and νίτρον, on account of similar properties. Problemat. i. 39. ed. Septalii, p. 71.

[1206] Hist. Plant. iii. 9, p. 50.

[1207] xxvi. 8.

[1208] xiv. 20.

[1209] De Re Rustica, lib. i. c. 7. Little, however, depended on the wood; the principal thing was the sprinkling with water.

[1210] xxxi. 10.

[1211] xxxi. 7. Here express mention is made of brine.

[1212] Taciti Annal. xiii. 57.

[1213] Lib. xxx. 7.

[1214] This is particularly the case in regard to Aristot. Auscult. Mirab., as I have remarked in the preface to my edition.

[1215] In the island of Dagebull, and also in Faretoft and Galmesbull, Frisio salt is made in the following manner. The inhabitants proceed along the coast in small vessels, and at low water go on shore on the mud, which they dig up till they come to a kind of earth called torricht; it is of a turfy nature, and interwoven with roots. This earth they convey to the islands, where they spread it out in the sun and leave it to dry, after which it is formed into a heap and burnt to ashes. What remains is again spread out, moistened and trod upon with the naked feet; the small stones and other useless parts are picked out, and being again dried and besprinkled with water, the ley is put into salt-pans and boiled into salt.

[1216] Mémoires de l’Acad. de Bruxelles, 1777, i. p. 345.

[1217] Elementa Chemiæ. Lugd. Bat. 1732, 4to, i. p. 767.

[1218] Boyle considered the words of Solomon as a proof that nether must be fixed alkali; and he was the more convinced of it when he saw nitre obtained from Egypt effervesce with acids.

[1219] See the History of Soap in vol. i.

[1220] Plin. xxxvi. 26, § 65. The use of nitrum in making glass is often mentioned.

[1221] Plin. xxxi. 10.

[1222] Lib. xxx. 10.

[1223] Forskäl Flora, p. xlvi.

[1224] Plutarchi Sympos. lib. vi. at the end.

[1225] Theophrasti Histor. Plant. ii. 5.--Geopon. ii. 35, 2; and ii. 41.--Palladius, xii. tit. i. 3, p. 996.

[1226] Virg. Georg. i. 193.--Plin. xviii. 7. 845.--Geopon. ii. 36, p. 184.

[1227] Columella, ii. 10, 11.

[1228] Plin. xix. 8, § 41.--Pallad. iii. 24, 6.--Geopon. xii. 17, 1.--Theophrast. de Causa Plant. vi. 14.

[1229] Plin. xxxi. 10; and xix. 5, § 26, 10.

[1230] Apicius, iii. 1, p. 70.--Martial, lib. xiii. ep. 17.--Plin. xix. 8, §41, 3; xxx. 10.--Columella, xi. 3, 23. [Carbonate of soda, as is well known, is still frequently used for this purpose in culinary operations.]

[1231] Herodot. ii. 87.

[1232] Our tanners use unslaked lime for a similar purpose.

[1233] Annot. to Dioscorides, v. 89, p. 951.

[1234] A catalogue of such waters may be found in Baccii Liber de Thermis. Patavii, 1711, fol. v. 5, 6, 7, p. 160. [Carbonate of soda occurs for instance in the celebrated mineral waters of Seltzer and Carlsbad, and also in the volcanic springs of Iceland, especially the Geyser.]

[1235] Plin. xxxi. 6, § 32, p. 556. Vitruv. viii. 3, p. 158.

[1236] xxxi. 10.

[1237] Plin. xxiv. 1; xxxi. 3, § 22. Geopon. ii. 5, 14, p. 85.

[1238] Speculum Naturæ, vii. 87, p. 480.

[1239] Hieronym. ad Jerem. ii. 22.

[1240] “For though thou wash thee with nitre, and take much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord God.”

[1241] In regard to the two plants usnee, asne, and usnem, assuan, see Avicennæ Canon. Medic. Venet. 1608, fol. pp. 338, 406, 407. Serapio de Temperam. Simplic. p. 164. In Du Cange’s Gloss. Gr. p. 12, addend. ἀλκαλη, and in Gloss. Lat. v. the word alcali is quoted only from modern writers. That kali, however, does not mean the plant, but the concrete ashes, is proved by the explanation in Castelli’s Lexicon.

[1242] In the annotations to Scribonius Largus, p. 228.

[1243] Commentationes, p. 145. Recueil des Questions, &c., p. 231.

[1244] Such things were known to Aristotle. See Mirab. Ausc. c. 146.

[1245] Dissertat. de Igne Græco. Upsaliæ, 1752.

[1246] De Subtilitate, xiii. 3. p. 71. ed. Francof. 1612, 8vo.

[1247] De Mirabilibus Mundi, p. 201; at the end of the book De Secretis Mulierum. Amst. 1702, 12mo.

[1248] Liber Ignium ad Comburendos Hostes, auctore Marco Græco; ou, Traité des Feux propres à détruire les Ennemies, composé par Marcus le Grec. Publié d’après deux manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Nationale. Paris, 1804, three sheets in quarto.

[1249] Biblioth. Arab. Hisp. Escurial, ii.

[1250] See the works quoted in Fabricii Bibliograph. Antiquar. p. 978. In the year 1798, M. Langles proved, in a paper read in the French National Institute, that the Arabians obtained a knowledge of gunpowder from the Indians, who had been acquainted with it in the earliest periods. The use of it in war was forbidden in their sacred books, the Veidam or Vede. It was employed in 690 at the battle of Mecca.

[1251] The following may be advantageously consulted:--Archæologia, v. p. 148; Henry’s Hist. of Great Britain, vol. iv.; Muratori Antiq. Italiæ Medii Ævi, ii. p. 514; Watson’s Chemical Essays, i. pp. 284, 327; Histoire de France, par Velly, xvi. p. 330; Dow’s Hist. of Hindostan, vol. ii.; Erdbeschreibung der entferntesten Welttheile, ii. p. 159; Stettler Schweitzer Chronik. p. 109. The inhabitants of Berne purchased the first gunpowder from the people of Nuremberg in 1413.

[1252] A fragment from the writings of Synesius was printed, for the first time, in Frabricii Bibliotheca Græca, viii. p. 236, where the words occur.

[1253] Raspe on Oil-painting. London, 1781, 4to, p. 145.

[1254] Speculum Naturale, vii. cap. 13, p. 432.

[1255] Lib. vii. cap. 88, p. 480.

[1256] Symbola Aureæ Mensæ. Francof. 1617, 4to, lib. vii. p. 335.

[1257] De Asse, 1556, fol. lib. iii. p. 101.

[1258] Les Anciens-Minéralogistes de France, par Gobet. Paris, 1779, 2 vols. 8vo, i. p. xxxiv. i. p. 51, 284; ii. p. 847.

[1259] [The celebrated chemist Baron Berzelius, professor at Stockholm, states in his Manual of Chemistry (edit. 1835, vol. iv. p. 86), that every possessor of land in Sweden is still compelled to deliver a certain quantity of saltpetre yearly to the state, and gives directions for testing its goodness.]

BOOK-CENSORS.

“On account of the great ease,” says M. Putter, “with which, after the invention of printing, copies of books could be multiplied and dispersed, it was necessary that some means should be devised to prevent a bad use from being made of this art, and to guard against its being employed to the prejudice of either religion or good morals, or to the injury of states. For this reason it was everywhere laid down as a general maxim, that no one should be allowed to establish a printing office at pleasure, but by the permission and under the inspection of government; and that no work should be suffered to go to press until it had been examined by a censor appointed for that purpose, or declared by a particular order to be of a harmless nature[1260].”

Many centuries however before the invention of printing, books were forbidden by different governments, and even condemned to the flames. A variety of proofs can be produced that this was the case among both the ancient Greeks and Romans. At Athens the works of Protagoras were prohibited; and all the copies of them which could be collected were burnt by the public crier[1261]. At Rome the writings of Numa, which had been found in his grave, were, by order of the senate, condemned to the fire, because they were contrary to the religion which he had introduced[1262]. As the populace at Rome were, in times of public calamity, more addicted to superstition than seemed proper to the government, an order was issued that all superstitious and astrological books should be delivered into the hands of the prætor. This order was often repeated; and the emperor Augustus caused more than two thousand of these books to be burnt at one time[1263]. Under the same emperor the satirical works of Labienus were condemned to the fire, which was the first instance of this nature; and it is related as something singular, that a few years after the writings of the person who had been the cause of the order for that purpose shared the like fate, and were also publicly burnt[1264]. (In a manner somewhat similar the works of Ben. Arias Montanus, who assisted to make the first catalogue of prohibited books in the Netherlands, were afterwards inserted in a catalogue of the same kind). The burning of these works having induced Cassius Severus to say, in a sneering manner, that it would be necessary to burn him alive, as he had got by heart the writings of his friend Labienus, this expression gave rise to a law of Augustus against abusive writings[1265]. When Cremutius Cordus, in his History, called C. Cassius the last of the Romans, the senate, in order to flatter Tiberius, caused the book to be burnt; but a number of copies were saved by being concealed[1266]. Antiochus Epiphanes caused the books of the Jews to be burnt[1267]; and in the first centuries of our æra the books of the Christians were treated with equal severity, of which Arnobius bitterly complains[1268]. We are told by Eusebius, that Diocletian caused the sacred Scriptures to be burnt[1269]. After the spreading of the Christian religion the clergy exercised against books that were either unfavourable or disagreeable to them, the same severity which they had censured in the heathens as foolish and prejudicial to their own cause. Thus were the writings of Arius condemned to the flames at the council of Nice; and Constantine threatened with the punishment of death those who should conceal them[1270]. The clergy assembled at the council of Ephesus requested the emperor Theodosius II. to cause the works of Nestorius to be burnt; and this desire was complied with[1271]. The writings of Eutyches shared the like fate at the council of Chalcedon; and it would not be difficult to collect examples of the same kind from each of the following centuries.

We have instances also that, many centuries prior to the invention of printing, authors submitted their works, before they were published, to the judgement of their superiors. This was done principally by the clergy; partly to secure themselves from censure or punishment, and partly to show their respect to the pope or to bishops. It however does not appear that this was a duty, but a voluntary act. In the year 768, Ambrosius Autpert, a Benedictine monk, sent his Exposition of the book of Revelation to Pope Stephen III., and begged that he would publish the work and make it known. On this occasion he says expressly, that he is the first writer who ever requested such a favour; that liberty to write belongs to every one who does not wish to depart from the doctrine of the fathers of the church; and he hopes that this freedom will not be lessened on account of his voluntary submission[1272].

Soon after the invention of printing, laws began to be made for subjecting books to examination; a regulation proposed even by Plato, and which has been wished for by many since. It is very probable that the fear under which the clergy were, lest publications should get abroad prejudicial to religion, and consequently to their power, contributed not a little to hasten the establishment of book-censors. The earliest instance of a book printed with a permission from government, is commonly supposed to occur in the year 1480; and Dom Liron, a Benedictine monk, is perhaps the first person who made that remark. He is the author of a work called Singularités Historiques et Litteraires[1273]; in the last part of which, where he speaks of the Heidelberg edition of the book Nosce te ipsum, in 1480, he says, “This is the first publication I found accompanied with several solemn approbations and attestations in its favour.” The same thing is said by J. N. Weislinger, one of the most illiberal defenders of the Catholic church, in whose work, entitled Armamentarium Catholicum[1274], there is an account of that book. He there tells us in Latin, without mentioning Liron, “This is the first book which I have seen, subjected to the examination, reading, and approbation of the clergy;” and in the opinion of Mercier, it really is the oldest. It has four approbations (in Latin); the first and last of which I shall here insert (in English), as they will serve to show the foolish pride of the clergy at that period:--“I Philip Rota, doctor of laws, though the least of all, have read over carefully, and diligently examined, this small work, Nosce te; and as I have found it not only composed devoutly and catholically, but abounding also with matter of wonderful utility, I do not hesitate, in testimony of the above, to subscribe my name.... I Mapheus Girardo, by the divine mercy patriarch of Venice and primate of Dalmatia, confiding in the fidelity of the above gentlemen, who have examined and approved the above-mentioned book, do testify that it is a devout and orthodox work.” There were, therefore, censors at this early period who gave their opinion of books without reading them.

I should have considered these instances as the oldest information respecting book-censors, had I not been induced by M. Eccard, the learned amanuensis belonging to our library, to look into the Literary Weekly Journal of Cologne, for the year 1778. In that work I found an ingenious account, by an anonymous author, of the early state of printing in that city, and of two books printed almost a year sooner than 1479, with the approbation of the public censor. The first is Wilhelmi episcopi Lugdunensis Summa de Virtutibus; at the end of which are the following words:--“Benedictus sit dominus virtutum, qui hoc opus earundem felici consummatione terminari dedit in laudabili civitate Coloniensi, temptatum, admissumque et approbatum ab alma universitate studii civitatis praedictae, de consensu et voluntate spectabilis et egregii viri pro tempore recteris ejusdem, impressum per Henr. Quentel.” The other book is a Bible, with the following conclusion:--“Anno incarnationis dominice millesimo quadringentesimo LXXIX ipsa vigilia Matthaei apostoli. Quando insigne veteris novique testamenti opus cum canonibus evangelistarum et eorum concordantiis in laudem et gloriam sancte et individue trinitatis intemerateque virginis Marie impressum in Civitate Coloniensi per Conradum de Homborch, admissum, approbatum ab alma universitate Coloniensi.”

The oldest mandate for appointing a book-censor is, as far as I know at present, that issued by Berthold, archbishop of Mentz, in the year 1486, and which may be found in the fourth volume of Guden’s Codex Diplomaticus[1275].

In the year 1501, pope Alexander VI. published a bull, the first part of which may form an excellent companion to the mandate of the archbishop of Mentz[1276]. After some complaints against the devil, who sows tares among the wheat, his holiness proceeds thus: “Having been informed, that by means of the said art many books and treatises containing various errors and pernicious doctrines, even hostile to the holy Christian religion, have been printed, and are still printed in various parts of the world, particularly in the provinces of Cologne, Mentz, Triers, and Magdeburg; and being desirous, without further delay, to put a stop to this detestable evil ... we, by these presents, and by authority of the Apostolic chamber, strictly forbid all printers, their servants, and those exercising the art of printing under them, in any manner whatsoever, in the abovesaid provinces, under pain of excommunication, and a pecuniary fine, to be imposed and exacted by our venerable brethren the archbishops of Cologne, Mentz, Triers, and Magdeburg, and their vicars-general or official in spirituals, according to the pleasure of each in his own province, to print hereafter any books, treatises, or writings, until they have consulted on this subject the archbishops, vicars, or officials above-mentioned, and obtained their special and express licence, to be granted free of all expense, whose consciences we charge, that before they grant any licence of this kind, they will carefully examine, or cause to be examined, by able and catholic persons, the works to be printed; and that they will take the utmost care that nothing may be printed wicked and scandalous, or contrary to the orthodox faith.” The rest of the bull contains regulations to prevent works already printed from doing mischief. All catalogues and books printed before that period were to be examined, and those which contained anything prejudicial to the Catholic religion were to be burned.

In the beginning of the sixteenth century, it was ordered by the well-known council of the Lateran, held at Rome in the year 1515, that in future no books should be printed but such as had been inspected by ecclesiastical censors.

In France, the faculty of Theology usurped, as some say, the right of censuring books; but in the year 1650, when public censors, whom the faculty opposed, were appointed without their consent, they stated the antiquity of their right to be two hundred years. For they said, “It is above two hundred years since the doctors of Paris have had a right to approve books without being subjected but to their own faculty, to which they assert they are alone responsible for their decisions[1277].”

[In no country of Europe does the liberty of the press prevail to such an extent as with us, the only vestige of censorship being the censor for the drama. In Rome the same strictness prevails as ever, but a brighter day seems dawning. In Germany the censorship is excessively severe, especially in Austria, Bavaria, and Prussia. However, most of the prohibited works are printed in Switzerland, Hamburg, or Leipsig, and there being a very large demand for such works, they may be had of almost any bookseller in every principal town. To put a stop to this, the present monarch of Prussia, professedly a liberal, placed under ban all the works issued by the firm of Hoffmann and Campe of Hamburg, because they published the political poems of Hoffmann von Fallersleben. Caricatures are, as the reader may suppose, subject to as strict a law, and no H.B. could be tolerated there.]

FOOTNOTES

[1260] Der Büchernachdruck nach ächten Grundsätzen des Rechts geprüft. 1774, 4to.

[1261] Diogenes Laert. lib. ix. 52.--Cicero de Nat. Deor. lib. i. cap. 23.--Lactantius De Ira, ix. 2.--Eusebius De Præparatione Evang. xiv. p. 19.--Minucius Felix, viii. 13.

[1262] Livius, lib. xl. c. 29.--Plin. xiii. 13.--Plutarchus in Vita Numæ.--Lactantius de Falsa Relig. i. 25, 5.--Valer. Max. i. cap. 1, 12.

[1263] Sueton. lib. ii. cap. 31.

[1264] The whole circumstance is related by Seneca the rhetorician, in the introduction to the fifth, or, as others reckon, the tenth book of his Controversiæ.

[1265] Taciti Annal. lib. i. c. 72. Bayle, in his Dictionary, has endeavoured to clear up some doubts respecting the history of Cassius and Labienus. See the article Cassius.

[1266] Tacit. Annal. lib. iv. cap. 35.

[1267] Maccab. ii.

[1268] Adversus Gentes, lib. iii.

[1269] Hist. Eccles. 1. viii. cap. 2. Suidas says the same.

[1270] Socrates, lib. i. cap. 6.

[1271] Digestor, lib. x. tit. 2, 4, 1.

[1272] Baillet, Jugemens des Sçavans, 4to, i. p. 26.

[1273] Paris, 1738-40, 4to, vol. viii.

[1274] Argentinæ 1749, fol.

[1275] Codex Diplomaticus. Franc. 1758, 4to, iv. p. 460. An account of the establishment of a book-censor at Mentz may be found also in G. C. Johannis Rerum Mogunt. i. p. 798.

[1276] The whole bull may be seen in Baronii Annales Ecclesiastici tom. xix. Colon. 1691, p. 514.

[1277] Baillet, Jugemens des Sçavans, i. p. 19.

EXCLUSIVE PRIVILEGE FOR PRINTING BOOKS.

I do not mean in this article to give a complete catalogue of all the books printed under a privilege in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, for such a list would be attended with very little utility. All I wish is to contribute something towards answering the question, What are the oldest privileges granted to books?

The oldest known at present is that granted in the year 1490, by Henry bishop of Bamberg, to the following book: Liber Missalis secundum ordinem ecclesiæ Bambergensis--Anno incarnationis dominice MCCCCXC. nono vero kal. April.--In civitate Babenbergn. per magistrum Johannem Sensenschmidt, prefate civitatis incolam, et Heinr. Petzensteiner. This privilege was first noticed by Panzer, in his History of the Nuremberg editions of the Bible, and afterwards by Mr. Am Ende, in Meusel’s Collection for enlarging Historical Knowledge. The latter says, “One may readily believe that this bishop was not the inventor of such privileges, and that they are consequently of much greater antiquity than has hitherto been supposed.” Mr. Am Ende mentions also a privilege of the year 1491, to a work called Hortus Sanitatis, typis Iacobi Meydenbach.... Impressum autem est hoc ipsum in incl. civ. Moguntina ... sub Archipraesulatu rever. et benigniss. principis et D. D. Bertholdi, archiep. Moguntinensis ac princ. elector. cujus felicissimo auspicio graditur, recipitur et auctorisatur. This, says Mr. Am Ende, may allude to a privilege, and perhaps not. For my part, I conjecture that it refers only to a permission to print, granted in consequence of the institution of book-censors by the archbishop Berthold, in the year 1486.

The oldest Venetian privilege at present known, is of the year 1491, found by M. Pütter to the following work: Foenix Magistri Petri memoriae Ravennatis. The Colophon is Bernardinus de Choris de Cremona impressor delectus impressit. Venetias die X Ianuarii MCCCCXCI. The book is in quarto, and has the privilege on both the last pages. There is a Venetian privilege also of the year 1492, to Senecæ Tragediæ cum commento.... Cum privilegio ne quis audeat hoc opus cum hoc commento imprimere, sub pena in eo contenta, Venetiis per Lazarum Issarda de Saliviano 1492, die XII. Decembris.

The oldest Papal privilege hitherto known is of the year 1505, to Hervei Britonis in IV Petri Lombardi Sententiarum volumina, scripta subtilissima.

In the year 1495, Aldus published the works of Aristotle, at the end of the first part of which we find the following notice: “Concessum est eidem Aldo inventori ab illustrissimo senatu Veneto, ne quis queat imprimere neque hunc librum, neque caeteros quos is ipse impresserit; neque ejus uti invento.” The last words allude to the Greek types which were employed in printing the Aldine editions of the Greek classics.

The following among other early privileges are quoted by Pütter[1278] and Hoffmann[1279]--

1495. A Milanese, by duke Louis Sforza, to Michael Ferner and Eustachius Silber for I. A. Campani Opera.

1501. Privilegium sodalitatis Celticæ a senatu Romani imperii impetratum, to Conrade Celtes’ edition of the works of Hroswitha.

1506. A papal, of pope Julius II., to Evangelista Tosino the bookseller, for Ptolomaei Geographia.

1507. A French, of Louis XII. to Antoine Verard.

1510. The first Imperial, to Lectura aurea semper Domini abbatis antiqui.

1512. An Imperial, to Rosslin’s Swangere Frauwen Rosegarten.

1527. A privilege from the duke of Saxony to the edition of the New Testament by Emser.

Anderson remarks on the year 1590, that the first exclusive patent, for printing a book in England, which occurs in Rymer’s Fœdera[1280], was granted in the above year by queen Elizabeth, to Richard Weight of Oxford, for a Translation of Tacitus. I am much astonished that Anderson, who was so often obliged to use Rymer’s Fœdera, and who seems indeed to have consulted it with attention, should have overlooked the oldest patents which are to be found in that collection. In that laborious work, so important to those who wish to be acquainted with the history of British literature, Ames’ Typographical Antiquities, there are privileges of still greater antiquity. The oldest which I observed in this work are the following:--

1510. The history of king Boccus ... printed at London by Thomas Godfry. Cum privilegio regali.

1518. Oratio Richardi Pacei ... Impressa per Richardum Pynson, regium impressorem, cum privilegio a rege indulto, ne quis hanc orationem intra biennium in regno Angliæ imprimat, aut alibi impressam et importatam in eodem regno Angliæ vendat.

Other works printed cum gratia et privilegio occur 1520, 1521, 1525, 1528, 1530, &c.

In the year 1483, when the well-known act was made against foreign merchants, foreigners however were permitted to import books and manuscripts, and also to print them in the kingdom; but this liberty was afterwards revoked by Henry VIII., in the year 1533, by an order which may be found in Ames. In 1538, Henry issued an order respecting the printing of bibles; and in 1542, he gave a bookseller an exclusive privilege during four years for that purpose[1281].

With a view of finding the oldest Spanish privilege, I consulted a variety of works, and among others Specimen Bibliothecae Hispano-Majansianae, but I met with none older than that to the following book: Aelii Antonii Nebrissensis Introductiones in Latinam Grammaticen. Logronii Cantabrorum Vasconum urbe nobilissima; anno salutis millesimo quingentesimo decimo. fol. That privileges to books were usual in Poland, has been shown by Am Ende, in Meusel’s Collections before-mentioned.

FOOTNOTES

[1278] Der Büchernachdruck nach ächten Grundsätzen des Rechts geprüft.

[1279] Von denen altesten kayserlichen und landesherrlichen Bücherdruck-oder Verlag-privilegien, 1777, 8vo.

[1280] Vol. xvi. p. 96.

[1281] [Exclusive privileges for printing the English Bible and Prayer have been granted by the Crown at different periods up to the present time, with the exception of the period of the Commonwealth, during which they were abolished. In the 27th year of Charles II. a Royal patent was granted to Thomas Newcomb and Henry Hills. In the 12th of Anne to Benjamin Tooke and John Barber; in the 22nd of George I. to John Basket. Then came John Reeves, who received his patent from George III. in the 39th year of his reign, and in association with George Eyre and Andrew Strahan, printed the many editions of the Bible and Prayer described as Reeves’ editions. The present patent was conferred by George IV. upon Andrew Strahan, George Eyre, and Andrew Spottiswoode, for a term of thirty years, which commenced January 21, 1830, and consequently ceases in 1860. By this last patent every one but the patentees is prohibited from printing in England any Bible or New Testament in the English tongue, of any translation, with or without notes; or any Prayers, Rites, or Ceremonies of the United Church of England and Ireland; or any books commanded to be used by the Crown; nor can either of the above be imported from abroad, if printed in English, or in English mixed with any other tongue. The Universities of Oxford and Cambridge also enjoy the right of printing Bibles, &c., in common with the patentees; but in their case it is a simple affair of permission, they having no power to prohibit or prosecute. The present patentees, it may be here observed, have not of late years attempted to enforce their rights, and Bibles are now printed almost ad libitum.

In Scotland, prior to 1700, various persons held concurrent licenses, consequently it is very difficult to say who were king’s printers and who were not. On July 6, 1716, George I. granted a patent to John Basket, the English patentee, and Agnes Campbell, jointly for forty-one years. To them succeeded Alexander Kincaird, whose patent dates from June 21, 1749; and then James Hunter Blair and John Bruce, whose patent commenced in 1798 and expired in the hands of their heirs, Sir D. H. Blair and Miss Bruce. In 1833 the patent ceased, and has never been renewed. Unlike either England or Ireland, the four Scotch Universities have never participated in this monopoly.

In Ireland, George III. in 1766 granted a Bible patent to Boulter Grierson for forty years. He was succeeded by his son George Grierson, who, in 1811, obtained a renewal, and is still with Mr. Keene, the Irish patentee. Trinity College, Dublin, has also a concurrent right, but both Oxford and Cambridge are, by the Irish printers’ own patent, permitted to import their Bibles into Ireland.--Dr. Campbell’s Letters on the Bible Monopoly.]

CATALOGUES OF BOOKS.

The first printers printed books at their own expense, and sold them themselves. It was necessary therefore that they should have large capitals. Paper and all other materials, as well as labour, were in the infancy of the art exceedingly dear for those periods; and on the other hand the purchasers of books were few, partly because the price of them was too high, and partly because, knowledge being less widely diffused, they were not so generally read as at present. For these reasons many of the principal printers, notwithstanding their learning and ingenuity, became poor[1282]. In this manner my countrymen Conrade Sweynheim and Arnold Pannarz, who were the first, and for a long time the only printers at Rome, a city which on many accounts, particularly in the sixteenth century, might be called the first in Christendom, were obliged, after the number of the volumes in their warehouses amounted to 12,475, to solicit support from the pope[1283]. In the course of time this profession was divided, and there arose booksellers. It appears that the printers themselves first gave up the bookselling part of the business, and retained only that of printing; at least this is said to have been the case with that well-known bookseller John Rainmann, who was born at Oehringen, and resided at Augsburg[1284]. He was at first a printer and letter-founder, and from him Aldus purchased his types. Books of his printing may be found from the year 1508 to 1524; and in many he is styled the celebrated German bookseller. About the same period lived the booksellers Jos. Burglin and George Diemar. Sometimes there were rich people of all conditions, particularly eminent merchants, who caused books which they sold to be printed at their own expense. In this manner that learned man Henry Stephens was printer at Paris to Ulric Fugger at Augsburg, from whom he received a salary for printing the many manuscripts which he purchased. In some editions, from the year 1558 to 1567, he subscribes himself Henricus Stephanus, illustris viri Hulderici Fuggeri typographus. In the like manner also, in the beginning of the seventeenth century, a society of learned and rich citizens of Augsburg, at the head of whom was Marx Welser, the city-steward, printed a great number of books, which had commonly at the end these words, ad insigne pinus. Printing therefore thus gave rise to a new and important branch of trade, that of bookselling, which was established in Germany, chiefly at Frankfort on the Maine, where, particularly at the time of the fairs, there were several large bookseller’s shops in that street which still retains the name of Book-street.

George Willer, whom some improperly call Viller, and others Walter, a bookseller at Augsburg, who kept a very large shop, and frequented the Frankfort fairs, first fell upon the plan of publishing every fair a catalogue of all the new books, adding the size, and publishing names. Le Mire, better known under the name of Miræus[1285], says, that catalogues were first printed in the year 1554; but Labbe[1286], Reimann[1287], and Heumann[1288], who took their information from Le Mire, make the year, perhaps erroneously, to be 1564. Willer’s catalogues were printed till the year 1592, by Nicol. Bassæus, printer at Frankfort. Other booksellers however must have soon published catalogues of the like kind, though that of Willer continued a long time to be the principal[1289].

In all these catalogues, which are in quarto, and not paged, the following order is observed. The Latin books occupy the first place, beginning with the Protestant theological works, perhaps because Willer was a Lutheran; then come the Catholic; and after these, books of jurisprudence, medicine, philosophy, poetry, and music. The second place is assigned to German books, which are arranged in the same manner.

In the year 1604, the general Easter Catalogue was printed with a permission from government.

After this the Leipsic booksellers began not only to reprint the Frankfort catalogues, but to enlarge them with many books which had not been brought to the fairs in that city. I have, dated 1600, a catalogue of all the books on sale in Book-street, Frankfort, and also of the books published at Leipsic, which have not been brought to Frankfort; with the permission of his highness the elector of Saxony to those new works which have appeared at Leipsic. Printed at Leipsic, by Abraham Lamberg; and to be had at his shop. On the September catalogue of the same year, it is said that it is printed from the Frankfort copy, with additions. I find an imperial privilege, for the first time, on the Frankfort September catalogue of 1616. Some imperial permissions however may be of an earlier date; for I have not seen a complete series of these catalogues.

Reimmann says that, after Willer’s death, the catalogue was published by the Leipsic bookseller Henning Grosse, and by his son and grandson. The council of Frankfort caused several regulations to be issued respecting catalogues, an account of which may be seen in Orth’s work on the Imperial Fairs at Frankfort[1290]. After the business of bookselling was drawn from Frankfort to Leipsic, occasioned principally by the restrictions to which it was subjected at the former by the censors, no more catalogues were printed there; and the shops in Book-street were gradually converted into taverns.

In perusing these old catalogues one cannot help being astonished at the sudden and great increase of books; and when one reflects that a great many of them no longer exist, this perishableness of human labours will excite the same sensations as those which arise in the mind when one reads in a church-yard the names and titles of persons long since mouldered into dust. In the sixteenth century there were few libraries; and these, which did not contain many books, were in monasteries, and consisted principally of theological, philosophical and historical works, with a few however on jurisprudence and medicine; while those which treated of agriculture, manufactures and trade, were thought unworthy of the notice of the learned, and of being preserved in large collections. The number of these works was, nevertheless, far from being inconsiderable; and at any rate many of them would have been of great use, as they would have served to illustrate the instructive history of the arts. Catalogues which might have given occasion to inquiries after books, that may be still somewhere preserved, have suffered the fate of tombstones, which, being wasted and crumbled to pieces by the destroying hand of time, become no longer legible. A complete series of them, perhaps, is nowhere to be found.

This loss might in some measure be supplied by two works, were they not now exceedingly scarce. I mean those of Cless and Draudius, who, by the desire of some booksellers, collected together, as Georg[1291] did at a later period, all the catalogues published at the different fairs in different years. The work of Cless has the following title:--Unius sæculi ejusque virorum litteratorum monumentis tum florentissimi, tum fertilissimi, ab anno 1500 ad 1602 nundinarum autumnalium inclusive, elenchus consummatissimus--desumtus partim ex singularum nundinarum catalogis, partim ex bibliothecis. Auctore, Joanne Clessio, Wineccensi, Hannoio, philosopho ac medico[1292]. By the editor’s preface it appears that the first edition was published in 1592. The order is almost the same as that observed by Willer in his catalogues.

The work of Draudius, which was printed in several quarto volumes, for the first time, in 1611, and afterwards in 1625, is far larger, more complete, and more methodical. I have never seen a perfect copy of either edition; but perhaps the following information may afford some satisfaction to those who are fond of bibliography. One part, which I consider as the first, has the title of Bibliotheca Classica, sive Catalogus officinalis, in quo singuli singularum facultatum ac professionum libri, qui in quavis fere lingua extant, recensentur; usque ad annum 1624 inclusive. Auctore M. Georgio Draudio. It contains Latin works on theology, jurisprudence, medicine, history, geography and politics. The copy in the library of our university ends at page 1304, which has however a catchword that seems to indicate a deficiency. The second part is entitled Bibliotheca Classica, sive Catalogus officinalis, in quo philosophici artiumque adeo humaniorum, poetici etiam et musici libri usque ad annum 1624 continentur.

This part, containing Latin books also, begins at page 1298, and ends with page 1654, which is followed by an index of all the authors mentioned. A smaller volume of 302 pages, without an index, has for title, Bibliotheca Exotica, sive Catalogus officinalis librorum peregrinis linguis usualibus scriptorum; and a fourth part, forming 759 pages besides an index of the authors, is called, Bibliotheca Librorum Germanicorum Classica; that is, A Catalogue of all the books printed in the German language till the year 1625. By the indices, and the proper arrangement of the matter, the use of this work is much facilitated. I must however observe that the oldest catalogues had the same faults as those of the present time, and that these have been copied by Draudius. Many books are mentioned which were never printed, and many titles, names and dates, are given incorrectly; but Draudius, nevertheless, is well worth the attention of any one who may be inclined to employ his time and ingenuity on the history of literature.

[Towards the end of the seventeenth and especially during the eighteenth century, book-catalogues of every description multiplied rapidly. Their progress is copiously treated of in Nichols’s Literary Anecdotes, vol. iii. pp. 608-693, to which the reader is referred. Perhaps the most remarkable bookseller’s-catalogue ever printed is Mr. Henry Bohn’s so-called Guinea Catalogue, which is upwards of six inches thick, and contains, in about 2000 pages, merely the details of his own stock.]

FOOTNOTES

[1282] Several of them were editors, printers, and proprietors of the books which they sold.

[1283] Their lamentable petition of the year 1472 has been inserted by Fabricius in his Bibliotheca Latina. Hamburghi, 1772, 8vo, iii. p. 898. See also Pütter von Büchernachdruck, p. 29.

[1284] Von Stetten, Kunst-geschichte von Augsburg, p. 43.

[1285] Le Mire, a Catholic clergyman, who was born in 1598, and died in 1640, wrote a work De Scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis Sæculi xvi., which is printed in Fabricii Bibliotheca Ecclesiastica, Hamburgi 1718, fol. The passage to which I allude may be found p. 232; but perhaps 1564 has been given in Fabricius instead of 1554 by an error of the press.

[1286] Labbe Bibliotheca Bibliothecarum, Lips. 1682, 12mo, p. 112.

[1287] Hist. Lit. i. p. 203.

[1288] Conspectus Reip. Litter, c. vi. § 2, p. 316.

[1289] [The earliest known catalogue of English printed books on sale by a London bookseller, was published in 1595, by Andrew Maunsell, in folio. It was classed and consisted of two parts; the first containing Divinity, the second the Arts and Sciences; a third, containing History and Polite Literature, was intended but never published.]

[1290] Frankf. 1765, 4to, p. 500.

[1291] [Bücher Lexicon; a Catalogue of books printed in Europe, to 1750; with supplements to 1758, 8 parts in 4 vols. folio. A very elaborate compilation, in which the title, place of publication, name of publisher, date, size, number of sheets, and publication price, of all the books known at the time, are given, including even those printed as early as 1462. It mentions however a great many books which never existed.]

[1292] Francofurti, ex offic. Joannis Saurii, impensis Petri Kopffii, 1602, 4to. The first part contains 563 pages, and the second 292.

RIBBON-LOOM.

Among the inventions, which, by lessening labour, render a great number of workmen unnecessary, and consequently deprive many of bread, and which, with whatever ingenuity they may be contrived, have been considered as hurtful, and were for a long time suppressed by governments, may be reckoned the ribbon-loom. In its general construction, this machine approaches very near to that of the common weaving loom; but the workman, instead of weaving one piece, or one ribbon, as is the case when the latter is used, can, on the former when it has all the necessary apparatus, weave sixteen or twenty pieces at the same time, and even of different patterns. Such a loom is so made, that the workman can move the batten as in the common loom, towards him and from him, and also to the right and left, with all the shuttles it contains; or, it is furnished with certain machinery below, which can be moved by a boy unacquainted with the art of weaving, and which keeps the whole loom with all its shuttles in motion. Looms of the former kind are certainly much simpler than those of the latter, and in all probability are older. To the first kind belongs the loom at Erfurt, and that which was lately brought thence to Göttingen. Of the other kind there are two at Berlin; and some of them may be seen in many other places. The art has been discovered also of causing such looms to be driven by water; and an instance of this may be found, as I have been told, in the neighbourhood of Iserlohe[1293]. The proprietors however in most places keep the construction of their looms a secret, and, as far as appears, no complete description or figure of them has ever been published. There is reason to believe that this invention is as yet little used in France; no mention at least is made of it in the Encyclopedie, where, however, the common loom of the ribbon-weavers and lace-weavers is fully represented with all its parts in ten copper-plates.

Attempts were made in Europe to suppress this invention, as was the case with printing in Turkey. But without here inquiring whether inventions may not save too much labour, and be therefore hurtful, as Montesquieu affirms, or whether it would be possible to suppress them throughout all Europe, I shall restrict myself to the history of the ribbon-loom as far as information is to be collected on the subject.

We are told by M. Jacobson, that it is believed the Swiss invented such looms above a hundred years ago; but I do not know any grounds upon which this conjecture can be supported. To me it appears much more probable that this invention had its rise in the Netherlands or Germany, either about the end of the sixteenth or beginning of the seventeenth century. The oldest account with which I am acquainted seems to be in favour of Germany and the sixteenth century. Lancellotti, in a work[1294] published at Venice in 1636, says “Anthony Moller of Dantzic relates, that he saw in that city about fifty years before a very ingenious machine, on which, from four to six pieces could be wove at the same time; but as the council were afraid that by this invention a great many workmen might be reduced to beggary, they suppressed it and caused the inventor to be privately strangled or drowned.” Who this Anthony Moller was I do not know; but that he saw a ribbon-loom at Dantzic is beyond all doubt. If the date of the printing of the book be taken as the time in which Lancellotti wrote, there is reason to believe that there was a ribbon-loom at Dantzic about the year 1586; but it appears to me that the book was written in 1629, which would bring us to the year 1579.

The next oldest information with which I am acquainted, is that given by Boxhorn, who says, “About twenty years ago some persons in this city (Leyden) invented a weaving-machine on which one workman could with ease make more cloth than several others in the same space of time. This gave rise to rioting among the weavers, and to such loud complaints, that the use of this machine was at length prohibited by the magistrates.” According to this account, Leyden was the place of the invention; but, in order to determine the time, it will be necessary to attend to the following circumstances. Boxhorn’s Institutiones Politicæ have been often printed, as for example, at Amsterdam 1663, in 12mo. Boxhorn read lectures on the Institutiones Politicæ, and gave verbal illustrations of them to his scholars, one of whom, in the year 1641, carried a fairly written copy of the latter to Germany, and gave them to Professor C. F. Franckenstein, who caused them to be printed for the first time at Leipsic in 1658, and again in 1665, 12mo. The passage above-quoted is to be found in the illustrations which are appended. Hence there is reason to conclude that the ribbon-loom was known in Holland about the year 1621.

It is some confirmation of Boxhorn’s account, that the States-General, as early as the 11th of August 1623, if they did not totally prohibit the use of the ribbon-loom, as commonly asserted, at any rate greatly circumscribed it. The proclamation for that purpose may be found in the Groot Placaet-Boeck[1295], a valuable collection published at the Hague in seven large folio volumes, between the years 1658 and 1746. Nothing further however is found there respecting the history of ribbon-looms, which are called Lint-molens, than that they had been in use for several years to the great injury and even total ruin of many thousands of workmen, who were accustomed to weave ribbons on the common loom. This prohibition was renewed on the 14th of March 1639, and again on the 17th of September 1648, as appears by the same work[1296]. On the 5th of December 1661, the use of them was extended a little longer, and defined with more precision[1297]; but as far as I have been able to find, no other regulations were made respecting these machines in the Netherlands.

The council of Nuremberg, it is said, prohibited the use of them in 1664, as is mentioned in the Hanau work, which I shall soon have occasion to quote.

On the 24th of December, the same year, ribbon-looms were prohibited in the Spanish Netherlands. In the proclamation for that purpose, it is stated that a great number of articles manufactured on these looms were privately imported from Viane and Culenburg.

In the year 1665, there was to be seen at Frankfort-on-the-Maine, a loom which of itself wove all kinds of lace, tape, &c., provided the silk or yarn was properly arranged in the usual manner; but if a thread happened to break, it was necessary that some one should again join it by means of a knot[1298]. The year following, some person in that city applied not only to the council, but even to the emperor, for permission to establish such a loom, but was not able to obtain it.

In 1676 the ribbon-loom was prohibited at Cologne, and the same year some disturbance took place in consequence of its being introduced into England[1299]. It is probable that Anderson[1300] alludes to this loom when he says, speaking of the above year, “As was also brought from Holland to London, the weavers’ loom-engine, then called the Dutch loom-engine.” He however praises the machine without describing it; nor does he mention that it occasioned any commotion.

The lace-weavers in Germany, but in particular the councils of Augsburg and Cologne, applied to Frederick Casimir, count of Hanau, who had great influence in the empire, and requested that he would endeavour to procure a general prohibition of ribbon-looms throughout all Germany; and the count accordingly presented a representation on this subject to the electors and states.

On the 8th of January 1681, it was declared by Imperial authority that a prohibition of ribbon-looms was both useful and necessary. This was followed by an imperial decree, dated January the 5th, 1685, and on the first of September following it was strengthened by a conclusum in senatu of the council of Frankfort.

The council of Hamburg, it is said, ordered a loom to be publicly burnt; and the emperor Charles VI. caused the prohibition of 1685 to be renewed on the 19th of February 1719; though some mercantile people made considerable opposition to this measure. A general prohibition was likewise issued in the electorate of Saxony, on the 29th of July 1720. All these coercive means however were ineffectual; and the ribbon-loom, being found useful, has now become common.

In the year 1718, the first loom of this kind was brought from Holland to Charlottenburg on the Spree; but Nicolai, in his Description of Berlin, says that this circumstance took place in the year 1728. The workmen were then engaged from foreign countries; and the loom was supported at the king’s expense. The electorate of Saxony also, in the year 1765, revoked its prohibition, and permitted such looms to be publicly used. In the rescript dated March the 20th, it is said, that as things were much changed, and as other German states had annulled the prohibitions against ribbon-looms, it was induced to grant full liberty to the lace-weavers to employ freely and publicly in future, ribbon and lace-looms, and to manufacture all kinds of ribbons and other articles of the like kind that could be wove on them. It stated further, that the lace-weavers should give notice whether any of them wished to establish ribbon-looms, and how soon they could get them ready for work; that such of them as did not choose to be at the expense, should for every loom constructed receive a certain sum, besides being admitted a member of the company; and that three months after the publication of this order, fifty rix-dollars would be given, by way of premium, for every loom on which from twelve to fifteen pieces of silk-ribbon could be wove; and thirty rix-dollars for every loom employed to weave ferret and articles of woollen[1301].

[The profitable application of steam-power to silk weaving was long considered to be almost impossible; so much time being consumed in the handling and trimming of the silk, in proportion to the time that the loom is in motion, there was consequently a waste of power. A small factory was built in 1831, for the purpose of making the experiment on ribbons. It was, however, burnt during a disturbance relating to prices; and though the act was disclaimed by weavers in general, the feeling amongst them was so strong against the employment of inanimate labour whilst their own was superabundant, that the scheme was given up. Within a few years there were numerous steam-factories at work at Congleton, Leek, Derby and other places, which made large quantities of plain ribbons, chiefly black sarsenets. The Coventry manufacturers, alarmed for the interests of their trade, formed in 1836 a steam-company, and erected a large factory, but difficulties arose as to the apportionment of the power among the different parties, and it has never yet been fitted up for its original purpose. Another large factory was soon after built, and applied to the making of figured ribbons, but owing to the failure of the parties, the experiment was not in this instance fairly tested. One experiment on a smaller scale had some success. The factories of the North and of Derby have proved the advantage of steam-power as applied to plain ribbons. At Congleton there were in 1838, 254 power-looms engaged in the manufacture of plain silk, a few black satin and some plain coloured ribbons; at Leek there were 100 employed in the same way, and at Derby 233. In these, each loom is tended by one pair of hands, which pick up and keep the machinery in order: the gain consists, not in a more rapid motion of the shuttles, the delicacy of the materials not allowing of this; but in the shooting down being seldom interrupted during the picking up, as in hand-loom weaving; in the greater regularity of the fabric, and also in the addition of from one-fifth to one-third more shuttles, for which one workman suffices, the loom being so constructed as to enable him to reach from the front over the batten to the warps behind. But when two pairs of hands are required for one loom, as is the case with the Jacquard loom, one before to tend the work and one behind to pick up, the advantage is much lessened. Steam-loom weaving is undoubtedly making great progress notwithstanding all disadvantages: in 1840, the steam-factory at Coventry, which formerly failed, was again at work under fresh parties, who were making both plain and fancy ribbons with a strong probability of ultimate success. The fine factory belonging to the Steam Company, which is now occupied by broad silk steam-looms, has one ribbon-loom at work; and in one other instance, in Coventry, Jacquard steam-looms are employed in making light figured ribbons with great beauty and precision, and in this case it is found that one man is able to tend the front and another the back of two looms. There can be little doubt that the time is approaching when steam will be the chief motive-power of the ribbon as of other manufacturing districts, and that the strength of English machinery will be called for to enter into competition with French taste.

Coventry is the great city for the manufacture of ribbons in England; in 1838, the number of persons employed there was 6000 or 7000, and in the rural parishes, 10,000 or 11,000[1302].]

FOOTNOTES

[1293] Looms of the first kind are seldom capable of weaving above sixteen pieces at one time: and very rarely eighteen, because the breadth necessary for that purpose would render them highly inconvenient. At a ribbon manufactory in the Milanese, there were some years ago, thirty looms of an excellent construction, each of which could weave twenty-four pieces together, so that sixty dozen of pieces were wove by the whole at the same time. See Voyage d’un François par Italie, i. p. 387. M. Escher, at Zurich, is said to have had a large ribbon-loom which was driven by water; but the traveller who saw the work, assured me that it was a machine for winding silk; and this seems to be probable, from the short account given of it by M. Andreæ, in his Briefen aus der Schweitz, pp. 49, 50.

[1294] L’Hoggidi overo gl’ingegni non inferiori a’ passati.

[1295] Page 7.

[1296] Page 1191.

[1297] Ibid. p. 2762.

[1298] Von Lersner, Chronica der Stadt Frankfurt, ii. p. 566.

[1299] Relatio Historica semestralis vernalis 1776, Art. 10.

[1300] Hist. of Commerce.

[1301] See this rescript in the Leipsiger Intelligenz-Blattern, 1765, p. 119.

[1302] Penny Cyclopædia.

GUNS. GUN-LOCKS.

The first portable fire-arms were discharged by means of a match, which in the course of time was fastened to a cock, for the greater security of the hand while shooting. Afterwards a fire-stone was screwed into the cock, and a steel plate or small wheel, which could be cocked or wound up by a particular kind of key, was applied to the barrel. This fire-stone was not at first of a siliceous nature, like that used at present for striking fire, but a compact pyrites or marcasite, which was long distinguished by that name. But as an instrument of this kind often missed fire, a match till a late period was retained along with the wheel; and it was not till a considerable time after, that instead of a friable pyrites, so much exposed to decay, a siliceous stone came into use with the improved cock or present lock. On each new improvement, the piece, the caliber and length of which were sometimes enlarged and sometimes lessened, obtained various new names; such, for example, as Büchse, Hakenbüchse, Arquebuse; Matchlock, Musket, Pistol, Flinte, &c. But I shall leave it to those who are versed in matters of artillery to determine the difference between these kinds, and shall here add only what follows.

The first name undoubtedly arose from the oldest portable kind of fire-arms having some similarity to a box. There were long and short büchse, the latter of which, as Hortleder says, were peculiar to the cavalry. The long kind also, on account of their similarity to a pipe, were called rohr. Large pieces, which were conveyed on cars or carriages, were called karrenbüchse, but soon after also canna, cannon. Instead of artillery-man, artillery and arsenal, people used the terms büchsenmeister, büchsenmeistery, büchsenhaus, &c. The hakenbüchsen were so large and heavy that they could not be carried in the hand; it was necessary therefore to support them with a prop, called bock, because it had two horns, between which the piece was fixed with a hook that projected from the stock[1303]. Hence arose the name hakenbüchse, hakenbüsse, which the French and different nations, along with many other German words, adopted, and corrupted till they at length became arquebuse, archibugio, archibuso, &c. From the passages of ancient writers collected by Daniel, it may be concluded that these hakenbüchsen with a wheel were invented in Germany, in the beginning of the sixteenth century; and this is confirmed by the testimony of Martin Bellay. Speaking of the league formed between the emperor Charles V. and pope Leo X. against France, and the siege of Parma undertaken in the year 1521, he says, “De ceste heure là furent inventées les harcquebouzes qu’on tiroit sur une fourchette.”

Pistols also, which at first had a wheel, seem to have been used at an earlier period by the Germans than by the French. Bellay mentions them in the year 1544, in the time of Francis I., and under Henry II. the German horsemen, des reiters, were called pistoliers. De la Noue, who served under both these kings, says, in his Discours Politiques et Militaires, that the Germans first employed pistols. I know no probable derivation of this term. Frisch conjectures that it may have arisen from Pistillo or Stiopo, because pistols used to have large knobs on the handle. Daniel and others think that the name comes from Pistoia in Tuscany, because they were there first made. He says he saw an old pistol, which, except the ramrod, was entirely of iron.

Muskets received their name from the French mouchet, or the Latin muschetus, which signifies a male sparrow-hawk. This derivation is the less improbable, as it is certain that various kinds of fire-arms were named after ravenous animals, such, for example, as falconet. Daniel proves that they were known in France as early as the time of Francis I. Brantome however asserts, that they were first introduced by the duke of Alva, in the year 1567, when he exercised his cruelty in the Netherlands, in order to overawe and keep in subjection the people of that country; and that they were not then known in France. In another place he says that they were first made general in France by M. de Strozzi, under Charles IX.[1304]

That the lock was invented in Germany, and in the city of Nuremberg, in 1517, has been asserted by many, and not without probability; but I do not know whether it can be proved that we are here to understand a lock of the present construction. In my opinion, the principal proof rests on a passage made known by Wagenseil[1305], from an unprinted Nuremberg Chronicle, the antiquity of which he has not determined. The same year is given by J. Guler von Weineck[1306], Walser[1307], M. von Murr and others. It is also certain that in the sixteenth century there were very expert makers of muskets and fire-locks; for example, George Kühfuss, who died in 1600, and also others, whose names may be seen in Doppelmayer. I must not omit here to remark, that many call the fire-lock the French lock, and ascribe the invention to these people; yet as, according even to Daniel’s account, the far more inconvenient wheels on pistols were used in France in 1658, it is probable that our neighbours, as is commonly the case, may have made some improvement in the German invention. In the history of the Brunswick regiments, it is stated that the soldiers of that duchy first obtained, in 1687, flint-locks instead of match-locks. It has often been asserted, that fire-tubes, which took fire of themselves, were forbidden first in Bohemia and Moravia, and afterwards in the whole German empire, under a severe penalty, by the emperor Maximilian I.; but I have not found any allusion to this circumstance in the different police laws of that emperor.

That the first fire-stones were pyrites, appears from various accounts; and as a siliceous kind of stone was introduced in its stead, this circumstance gave often rise to confusion, some instances of which are related by Henkel, so that many applied to the stone what was related by our forefathers of pyrites. In the greater part of Europe[1308] people use at present that hornstein called by Wallerius Silex igniarius, and by Linnæus S. cretaceus. In Germany it was formerly called Flins or Vlins, which some consider as more proper; and in the Swedish, Danish and English, Flinta and Flint. This appellation is of great antiquity; for the Wends had a pagan deity of that name, which they erected on a stone called Flynstein[1309]. In some districts of Germany this word has been still retained; for example, white or grey ferruginous spar, Minera ferri alba, is called in Styria Flins, or, as it is often improperly written, Pflinz; and in Bayreuth that fire-stone is still called flint-stone[1310]. In our neighbourhood the same name is still used by the stone-cutters. It cannot be doubted that the weapon which is fired by the help of this stone, obtained from it, in German, the names of Flintgewehr, Flint, or Flinte; but since the old name of the stone has been forgotten, it is in general named from the weapon flint-stone. Those acquainted with the German and northern antiquities, know that the knives employed at the ancient sacrifices, and other articles, were made of this kind of stone, as appears by the remains still found in old barrows and between urns[1311]. This proves that these stones were much used by the ancients. In England and France old buildings constructed of them are still to be seen, and the stones appear to have been cut with the greatest care[1312]. The above articles, which have lain in the earth more than a thousand years, and these edifices, among which some at Norwich were inhabited in 1403, show the wonderful durability of this kind of stone. Some imagine that the art of working it has been lost; but though our artists prefer employing their talents and dexterity on stones which have a more beautiful appearance and less brittleness, they are able to cut also the flint-stone. Enamel painters, for the most part, rub their glass enamel on plates made of it; but they are obliged to purchase them at a very dear rate[1313].

Many of my readers will perhaps be desirous to know in what manner our gun-flints are prepared. Considering the great use made of them, it will hardly be believed how much trouble I had to obtain information on this subject. One would laugh were I to repeat the various answers which I obtained to my inquiries. Many thought that the stones were cut down by grinding them; some conceived that they were formed by means of red-hot pincers; and many asserted that they were made in mills. On the least reflection it may be readily conjectured, that the double cuneiform shape is given to these stones without much labour, because they are so cheap; and as every country, at all times, with whatever other it may be engaged in war, can obtain them in sufficient quantity, no nation can have an exclusive trade in them. It is nevertheless difficult to discover the places whence they are procured; and in works which give an account of the different articles of merchandise they are not named. The best account with which I am acquainted, is that collected by my brother, and published in the Hanoverian Magazine for the year 1772. Shepherds, and other persons who gain little by their service, break the flint-stone merely by manual labour, and chiefly in Champagne and Picardy. Some years ago, Gilbert de Montmeau, a merchant at Troye, carried on the greatest trade with them, and sold them at the rate of five livres six sous per thousand. The Dutch always buy up large quantities of them, which they keep in reserve, in order to sell them when the exportation of them is forbidden by France, in the time of war. Savary, however, relates that the largest quantity and best stones come from Berry, and particularly the neighbourhood of St. Agnau and Meusne. I know also that a great many are made at Stevensklint in Zeeland[1314], and exported from that country. In the year 1727, the chancery of war at Hanover sent some persons to learn the art of breaking flints; but after their return, it was given out that our horn-stone was unfit for that purpose. It is possible that those stones which occur in continued veins may be split easier in any required direction than those found in single pieces, as it appears to me that the latter are harder and more compact than the former. Perhaps the case is the same with flints as with vermilion, the preparation of which we endeavoured to learn from the English and Dutch, though from the earliest periods it had been made better in the very centre of Germany than anywhere else.

That stones were used at least in the middle of the sixteenth century, is confirmed by the account of an ingenious Italian, named Francis Angelerius. This artist had constructed a short piece of wood, to which he applied a wheel, and instead of a cock substituted a dog, which held the stone in its mouth, the whole so ingeniously made, that a person who appeared with it at a masquerade was arrested by the guard, because it was considered to be a real pistol[1315]. I have thought it proper to mention this circumstance, because it proves that the wheel was then invented and known under the appellation of pistol. In old arsenals and armouries, large collections of arms with the wheel are still to be seen. I have inspected those preserved in the arsenal at Hanover. What I consider to be the oldest, have on the barrel the figure of a hen with a musket in its mouth, because perhaps they were made at Henneberg. A pistol of this kind was entirely of brass without any part of wood, and therefore exceedingly heavy. On the lower part of the handle were the letters J. H. Z. S. perhaps John duke of Saxony. A piece with a wheel, which seemed to be one of the most modern, had on the barrel the date 1606.

Together with fire-stones, properly so called, pyrites, which is sometimes named fire-stone, continued long in use. In the year 1586, under duke Julius of Brunswick, when abundance of sulphureous pyrites was found near Seefen, the duke caused it to be collected, and formed it himself into the necessary shape, though in doing so he often bruised his fingers, and was advised by the physicians not to expose himself to the sulphureous vapour emitted by that substance.

[The use of flint-locks to guns has, within the last few years, been almost entirely laid aside in this country; the percussion- or detonating-lock being substituted for it. The certainty and rapidity with which the discharge takes place, gives them a very great superiority. This ingenious invention belongs to a Scottish clergyman, the Rev. Mr. Forsyth, minister of Belhelvie in Aberdeenshire, but it has since received some great improvements, especially in the application of the copper cap, to which indeed may be attributed all its superiority.--Brande.]

FOOTNOTES

[1303] A figure and description of the Hakenbüchse, the bock, the wheels and key, may be found in Daniel Histoire de la Milice Francaise. Amst. 1724, 2 vols. 4to, i. p. 334. At Dresden there is still preserved an old Büchse, on which, instead of a lock, there is a cock with a flint-stone placed opposite to the touch-hole, and this flint was rubbed with a file till it emitted a spark.

[1304] [The musquet or musket is said to be a Spanish invention, and to have been first used at the battle of Pavia. They were so long and heavy as to require the support of a rest. In the time of Elizabeth and long after, the English musqueteer was very different from one at the present day. In addition to the musquet itself, he had to carry a flask of coarse powder for loading, and a touch-box of fine powder for priming; the bullets were contained in a leathern bag, the strings of which he had to draw to get at them; while in his hand was his burning match and musquet-rest.]

[1305] De Civitate Noribergensi Commentat. 1697, 4to, p. 150: In chronico quodam MS. legitur: the fire-locks belonging to the shooting tubes were first found out at Nuremberg in 1517.

[1306] Raetia das ist Beschreibung, &c. Zurich, 1616, fol. p. 152.

[1307] Appenzeller Chronik. St. Gall, 1740, 8vo, p. 194.

[1308] This kind of stone is not everywhere used for this purpose. In the Tyrol, for example, the hardest ferruginous granite, which consists of corneous, partly irregular and partly polyedral, pieces, is employed as flints, which therefore are called Tyrol flints. In other places, jasper, such as that found in great abundance in Turkey, is formed by grinding, and used in the same manner.

[1309] Of this deity an account may be found in Schedii Syntagma de Diis Germanis. Halæ, 1728, 8vo, p. 726.

[1310] Esper Nachricht von neu entdeckten Zoolithen, Nurnberg, 1774, fol. Mr. Esper says, those fire-stones only which contain fossils or petrifactions are called flins, flint; and it is possible that the singular formation may be the cause why they have retained longest the name of the pagan deity.

[1311] Figures of such instruments may be found in the fifth volume of the Archæologia Britannica.

[1312] Philosophical Transactions, No. 474.

[1313] A polished plate a foot square is sold at the Vienna porcelain manufactory for five hundred florins.

[1314] Chemnitz regrets that the largest and most beautiful pieces are broken in many thousand fragments, and afterwards sold for a trifle as gun-flints.--Berliner Beschäftigungen, p. 213.

[1315] Hippolytus Angelerius, in a work entitled De Antiquitate Atestinæ, p. 14, in vol. vii. of Thes. Antiquit. Italiæ.

FINIS.

INDEX.

Adulteration of wine, i. 245; ancients clarified their wine with gypsum, i. 250; potters-earth used for clarifying wine, ib.; Jacob Ehrni beheaded for adulterating wine, i. 253; arsenical liver of sulphur used for detecting metal in wine, ib.; fumigating with sulphur, i. 255; adulteration with milk, i. 256; adulteration of wine in England, ib.

Air-chamber, when first applied to the fire-engine, ii. 252.

Alum, i. 180; alum of the ancients was vitriol, ib.; places where they procured it, i. 182; use of the ancient alum to secure buildings from fire, i. 184; invention of the modern alum, i. 185; alumen roccæ, i. 186; the oldest alum-works in the Levant, i. 187; the oldest in Europe on the island of Ænaria, i. 188; origin of those at Tolfa or Civita Vecchia, i. 190; at Volterra, i. 193; Popes’ exclusive trade in alum, i. 194; oldest alum-work in Germany, i. 195; the first in England, i. 196.

Apothecaries, i. 326; Greek and Roman physicians prepared their own medicines, i. 327; their employment in the 13th and 14th centuries, i. 329; pharmacy first separated from medicine by the Arabian physicians, ib.; medical establishments in Europe formed after that at Salerno, i. 331; English apothecaries, i. 333; French, ib.; German, i. 333-338; portable apothecary’s shop at the Byzantine court, i. 339; first dispensatory, ib.

Aquafortis, first intelligible account of, i. 506.

Archil, i. 35; known to the ancients, i. 36; art of dyeing with, brought, in 1300, from the Levant, i. 38; account of the family of the Oricellarii or Rucellai, who made that art known in Italy, ib.; trade of the Canary islands with, i. 39; of the Cape de Verde islands, i. 40; invention of Lacmus, 41.

Artichoke, i. 212; cinara of the ancients the same with the carduus, i. 213; Scolymus described, i. 215; not our artichoke, i. 216; Cactus, what parts of it were eaten, i. 219; our artichoke known in the fifteenth century, i. 220; origin of the name, ib., opinions respecting the country from which it was first brought, i. 221.

Artificial ice, ii. 142; preserving snow for cooling liquors, known to the ancients, ib.; ice preserved for the same use, ii. 143; Nero’s method of cooling water, ib.; how cooled in Egypt, ii. 144; water made to freeze in summer, ii. 146; art of making ice at Calcutta, ib.; method of cooling water mentioned by Plutarch, ii. 147; earthen vessels used in Portugal for cooling water, ib.; use of snow known at the French court under Henry III., ii. 149; trade carried on with snow and ice in France, ii. 150; cooling property of saltpetre, when discovered, ii. 151; drinking-cups of ice used in France, ii. 155; ice extensively used for œconomical purposes, ii. 158; machinery employed for cutting it, ii. 159.

Aurum fulminans, i. 509; of what composed, ib.; invention of it obscure, ib.; said to have been discovered by a German monk, i. 510; Valentin’s receipt for preparing it, ib.; deprived of its power by means of vinegar, i. 511.

Bankers, the oldest at Rome, ii. 5.

Bellows, wooden, i. 63; whether first invented by Anacharsis, i. 64; bellows at the oldest melting-houses driven by men, ib.; leather and wooden bellows compared, ib.; description of the latter, i. 65; advantages of them, i. 66; invented in Germany, ib.; the inventor supposed to be Hans Lobsinger, Shellhorn a miller, or a bishop of Bamberg, i. 66, 67; introduction of them at the mines of the Harz Forest, i. 67.

Bills of exchange, ii. 203; account of the oldest, ib.; ordinance issued at Barcelona respecting them, ii. 204.

Black lead, ii. 388; names by which it is known, ib.; ancient manuscripts ruled with lead, ii. 389; plumbago, by whom first mentioned, ii. 390; black lead pits in Cumberland, ii. 392; in commerce, called potloth, ii. 393; first pencils used for drawing, ib.; black and red chalk, ii. 394.

Bologna stone, ii. 429; description of, ii. 429-430; how rendered capable of shining in the dark, ii. 431; discovery of this, by whom made, ib.; preparation of the stone concealed by the Italian chemists, ii. 432; taught by Poterius, a French chemist, ib.; luminous stone from India mentioned by De Thou, ii. 433; other kinds of pyrophori, ii. 434.

Book-censors, ii. 512; reason of their being established, ib.; books forbidden and burnt before the invention of printing, ii. 513; books of the Jews and Christians burnt, ii. 514; works of Arius and Nestorius burnt, ib.; earliest instance of books published by permission of government, ib.; mandate respecting book-censors, ii. 516; bull of Alexander VI. prohibiting books unless previously examined, ii. 517; book-censors established in France, ib.

Book-keeping, history of, i. 1.

Buckingham, duke of, the first person in England who used six horses to his carriage, i. 76.

Buck-wheat, i. 425; not known to the ancients, i. 426; introduced into Europe the beginning of the 16th century, ib.; said to have been brought from Asia, ib.; conjectures respecting other names given to it, i. 428; when cultivated in England, ib.; account of a new species, ib.; sows itself in Siberia, i. 429; difficult to be cultivated, i. 430.

Butter, i. 499; whether known to the Hebrews, i. 500; passage in Proverbs respecting it wrongly translated, ib.; oldest mention of it in Greek writers, ib.; known to the Scythians, ib.; used by the Lusitanians instead of oil, ib.; elephants drank it, ib.; anecdote related by Plutarch, i. 503; invention of butter ascribed by Pliny to the Germans, i. 504; uses to which butter was applied by the ancients, i. 506, 507; butter of the ancients was fluid, ib.; scarce in Norway during the ages of paganism, i. 508.

Camp-mills, ii. 55; invention ascribed to the Germans, ii. 56.

Canary-birds, i. 32; when known in Europe, ib.; flew from a ship wrecked on the roast of Italy to Elba, where they multiplied, ib.; trade with them, i. 33; Canary seed, where first cultivated, i. 34; use of, might be extended, i. 35.

Carp, history of, ii. 46; Cassiodorus the oldest author who uses the term carpa, ii. 51; origin of the name, ii. 52; carp supposed to have been first found in the southern parts of Europe, ib.; known in England, ii. 53.

Catalogues of books, ii. 522; first printers printed books at their own expense, ib.; when bookselling became a distinct business, ib.; catalogues first printed, ii. 523; account of some of the earliest, ii. 524; rapid increase of catalogues, ii. 527; Bohn’s guinea catalogue, ib.

Cauliflower, brought from the Levant to Italy, ii. 345.

Cheese known earlier than butter, i. 502.

Chemical names of metals, ii. 23; given first to the heavenly bodies, ib.; nomination of metals after the heathen deities, ii. 24; astrological nomination known to the Brahmans in India, ii. 26; origin of the characters by which the planets are expressed, ii. 27; those by which the metals are signified, ii. 28; list of metals known at the present day, ii. 31.

Chimneys, i. 295; no traces of at Herculaneum, i. 296; principal writers on their antiquity, i. 296, 297; passages in Greek authors supposed to allude to them, i. 297-299; in Roman authors, i. 299-301; houses of the ancients had no chimneys, ib.; in what manner they warmed their apartments, i. 305; description of the stoves used in Persia, ib.; derivation of the word chimney, i. 308; houses of the ancients kept warm by pipes, i. 309; Winkelmann’s description of stoves found in a ruined villa, ib.; no chimneys in the 10th, 12th and 13th centuries, i. 312; oldest account of chimneys in an inscription at Venice, i. 313; first chimney-sweepers in Germany came from Savoy and Piedmont, i. 314; chimney-sweeps at Paris Savoyards, ib.

Clocks and watches, history of, i. 340; clocks known in the eleventh century, i. 346; first public clock at Padua, i. 351; when in use among private persons, i. 354; first mention of watches, ib.; history of clocks and watches, by Barrington, i. 355; Queen Mary’s watch, i. 362; Sir Richard Burton’s, ib.; letter on the watch said to have belonged to Robert Bruce, i. 364; Harrison’s invention, i. 368; Arnold’s chronometer, i. 370.

Coaches, i. 68; covered carriages at Rome, ib.; women only rode in carriages at the beginning of the 16th century, i. 70; use of covered carriages forbidden, ib.; order of Julius duke of Brunswick, forbidding his vassals to ride in carriages, i. 72; French monarchs rode on horseback in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, i. 74; citizens’ wives at Paris forbidden to use carriages, ib.; Henry IV. had only one coach, i. 75; whirlicotes, the oldest carriages used by the English ladies, ib.; coaches first known in England, i. 76; when introduced into Italy, Spain, Sweden, and Russia, ib.; origin of the word coach, i. 77; berline, invention of, i. 78; first coaches let out for hire at Paris, i. 79; hackney-coaches first established at London, i. 81; number of coaches in some of the principal cities of Europe, ib.

Cobalt, i. 478; is melted with siliceous earth and potashes to a blue glass called smalt, ib.; ground smalt, or powder-blue, ib.; cobalt not known to the ancients, ib.; reason why Lehmann and others think that the ancients used smalt, i. 481; Gmelin’s experiments on the blue of the ancients, ib.; origin of the name cobalt, i. 483; first colour-mills in Germany for grinding smalt, i. 484; smalt not mentioned in books till a later period, i. 486; the oldest description found in the works of Biringoccio, ib.

Cock-fighting, ii. 473; reflections on, ib.; antiquity of, ib.; quail-fighting among the Romans, ii. 474; cock-fights and quail-fights mentioned by Solon, ii. 475; Romans employed partridges for fighting, ib.; cock-fighting instituted by Themistocles, ib.; ascribed to Miltiades, ii. 476; mentioned by ancient authors, ii. 477-479; oldest information about cock-fighting in England, ii. 481; this pastime forbidden, ib.

Cork, i. 318; properties of, ib.; account of the cork-tree, i. 319; known to the Greeks and Romans, ib.; cork used by the ancient fishermen as floats to their nets, i. 321; anchor-buoys made of it, ib.; Romans made soles of it, i. 322; cork jackets, antiquity of, ib.; ancient methods of closing up wine-casks and other vessels, i. 323; cork stoppers, i. 324; various substitutes for corks, i. 325, 326.

Corn-mills, i. 147; earliest methods of grinding corn, ib.; the oldest hand-mills, ib.; cattle-mills, i. 148; water-mills, i. 151; mills constructed at Rome by Belisarius, i. 154; invention of floating-mills, i. 155; of wind-mills, i. 158; difference between German and Dutch wind-mills, i. 160; bolting-machinery, when invented, i. 161; bolting-cloth, i. 162; invention of barley-mills, i. 168; anecdote of a feudal lord, i. 170.

Cryptography, when invented, i. 106.

Diamond, when first used for writing on glass, ii. 87.

Diving-bell, i. 111; ancient divers, ib.; principles explained, i. 113; earliest use in Europe, ib.; described by Lord Bacon, i. 115; cannon fished up by it from the wreck of the Spanish Armada, ib.; old inventions, i. 117; Dr. Halley’s diving-bell, i. 118; Triewald’s improvement, i. 119; when employed in civil engineering, i. 121; apparatus for walking at the bottom of the sea, i. 122.

Embroidery, antiquity of, i. 415.

Enamel, i. 132.

Etching on glass discovered by Henry Schwanhard, ii. 88; process which he employed, ii. 89.

Etruscan vases, colours of, produced by calx of iron, ii. 239.

Exclusive privilege for printing books, ii. 518; oldest privilege known, granted in 1490, ib.; account of some granted in different countries, ii. 519, 520; privileges granted in England, ii. 520; in Spain, ii. 521.

Falconry, i. 198; not a modern invention, i. 199; birds of prey used in India and Thrace, i. 201; employed also in Italy, ib.; forbidden to the clergy in the sixth century, i. 203; ancients bred other rapacious animals besides hawks, ib.; falconry common in the twelfth century, ib.; Frederick II. wrote a book upon it, ib.; ladies formerly fond of falconry, i. 204; oldest writers on this art, ib.

Fire-engines, ii. 245; idea borrowed from the common pump, ib.; sipho mentioned by Pliny, a fire-engine, ii. 246; fire-engines at Rome, ii. 247; in the East, engines employed to produce fires, ii. 249; Greek fire, ib.; fire-engines introduced into Germany uncertain, ii. 250; first mentioned in the building accounts of Augsburg, ib.; fire-engines at Nuremberg, ii. 251; fire-engines very imperfect in the seventeenth century, ii. 252; air-chamber, when added, ib.; improved engines made by Leupold, ii. 253; Dutch improvements, ii. 255-256; pipes for conveying water not unknown to the ancients, ii. 256; fire-engines, when introduced at Constantinople, ii. 257.

Floating of wood, i. 454; what gave rise to this invention, i. 455; wood floated by Solomon for the temple at Jerusalem, i. 456; wood transported on water by the Romans, ib.; earliest account of floating wood in Germany, i. 458; in France, i. 459, 460.

Forks, ii. 407; Greeks and Romans had no name for them, ii. 408; Romans often used ligulæ instead, ii. 409; forks not employed by the ancients, ib.; meat cut by a carver, ii. 410; forks not in use among the Chinese, ib.; forks supposed to be found among the ruins of a Roman town, ii. 411; when first known in Italy, ib.; forks and spoons still rarities in some parts of Spain, ii. 413; table knives, when introduced among the Highlanders, ib.; English, Dutch, and French have adopted the Italian names forca and forchetta, ib.; German word gabel of great antiquity, ii. 414.

Foundling hospitals, ii. 434; reflections on child-murder, ib.; no law against it formerly in Christian states, ii. 436; children exposed by the ancients, ii. 437; permitted in Greece but not at Thebes, ii. 438; when prohibited by the Romans, ii. 439; humane decrees of Constantine the Great, ii. 440; public orphan-houses at Athens and Rome, ib.; foundlings declared to be free by Justinian, ii. 441; oldest establishments for orphans in Germany, ii. 442; similar establishments in France, ii. 444, 445; one of the same kind at Einbeck, ii. 445; hospital at Nuremberg, ii. 446; institution for foundlings at Venice, ib.; foundling hospital in England, ib.; inefficiency of such institutions, ii. 448.

Fowls said to thrive near smoke, i. 303.

Fur dresses, ii. 296; raw skins first used for clothing, ii. 297; fur clothing little used by the Romans, ib.; introduced by their northern invaders, ii. 301; seal-skins, ii. 302; rein-deer skins, used by the ancient Germans, ib.; furs, considered by the Getæ objects of magnificence, ii. 304; forbidden by Honorius, ib.; Gothic breeches adopted by the Romans, ii. 305; furs employed by the Persians instead of mattresses and bolsters, ii. 308; origin of the fur trade to the southern parts of Europe, ii. 309; riches of the northern nations consisted in furs, ii. 310; skins counted by decuriæ or decher, ii. 311; skins of the Pontic mouse, ii. 312; ermine, various names of, ii. 315; the sable, ib.; marten, ii. 316; grauwerk, meaning of, ii. 317; cats’ and rabbits’ skins, ib.; beaver skins, ii. 318; furs, when they began to be dyed, ii. 319; Charlemagne, anecdote respecting his dress of sheep’s skin, ib.; fur gloves, ii. 320; use of furs forbidden, ii. 321, 322; not used at the court of Byzantium, ii. 322; fur trade in modern times, ii. 323.

Garden-flowers, history of, i. 512; modern taste came from Persia and Constantinople, ib.; tuberose, when first brought to Europe, ib.; auricula carried to Brussels, i. 513; ranunculus brought from the Levant, i. 516; fondness of Mahomet IV. for this flower, ib.; favourite flowers of the present day, i. 517.

Gilding, ii. 290; mentioned in the books of the Old Testament, ib.; art of gold-beating at Rome in the time of Pliny, ii. 291; process of gold-beating in the twelfth century, ib.; pellicle first used by the German gold-beaters, ii. 292; art of gilding facilitated by the invention of oil-painting, ii. 294; gold-leaf affixed to metals by quicksilver in the time of Pliny, ii. 295; false gilding, ib.; gilding leather, ii. 296.

Glass-cutting, ii. 84; known to the ancients, ib.; revived by Caspar Lehmann, ii. 85; figures engraved on glass with a diamond, ii. 86; etching on glass, ii. 88; history of sparry fluor, ii. 90; its property of emitting light discovered, ib.; ornaments of, made in Derbyshire, ii. 92.

Guns, gun-locks, ii. 533; first portable fire-arms discharged by a match, ib.; when flints were used, ii. 534; pistols, when brought into use, ii. 535; derivation of the word, ib.; muskets, whence they received their name, ib.; gun-lock, when invented, ib.; how gun-flints are prepared, ii. 538.

Honey used by the ancients for preserving natural curiosities, i. 286.

Hops, ii. 376; whether known to the ancients, ii. 377; known in the time of the Carolingian dynasty, ii. 380; in Egypt bitter things added to beer, ii. 382; when hops were used in the Netherlands, ib.; when in England, ii. 384; sweet gale employed for beer in Sweden, ii. 385; Chinese hops, how prepared, ii. 387; cultivation of hops in England, ib.

Horse, burnt as being possessed by the devil, ii. 118.

Horse-shoes, i. 442; writers on their antiquity, i. 443; methods employed by the ancients to preserve the feet of cattle, ib.; mules shod with silver and gold, i. 444; hoofs of the ancient cavalry soon worn out, i. 446; ancients unacquainted with horse-shoes such as ours, ib.; horses not shod in Ethiopia, Japan and Tartary, i. 449; horse-shoe said to have been found in the grave of Childeric, i. 451; first mentioned in the ninth century, i. 452; mentioned by Italian, English and French writers of the same century, i. 453; shoeing horses, when introduced into England, i. 454.

Hungary water, i. 315; method of preparing it, ib.; fabulous origin of the name, ib.; receipt for making it first mentioned in a small book by John Prevot, i. 316; copy of the receipt, ib.

Hydrometer, ii. 161; earliest mention of it occurs in the fifth century, ib.; description of the hydrometer by Synesius, ii. 163; Hypatia not the inventress of the hydrometer, ii. 168; revived in the sixteenth century, ii. 169; improvements in, ii. 171.

Indigo, ii. 258; brought first from the East Indies, ib.; medicinal properties of, ii. 261; cultivated in Malta in the seventeenth century, ii. 262; the Indicum nigrum of the ancients was China ink, ii. 264; authors in which this term occurs, ii. 267; indigo, as well as Indian ink, procured from India, and named indicum, ii. 270; indigo mentioned by Arabian physicians, ib.; indigo substituted in dyeing for woad, ii. 273; when introduced into Germany, ii. 274; great importation into Holland, ib.; American indigo, ib.; indigo prohibited in Germany, ii. 277; dyers obliged to take an oath not to use it, ii. 278; first mention of it in the English laws, ii. 279.

Infirmaries, hospitals, lazarettos, ii. 454; no hospitals for sick at Rome, ib.; pilgrimages gave rise to their erection, ii. 456; brotherhoods established to provide for sick pilgrims, ii. 457; first hospitals built close to cathedrals, ii. 458; mad-houses, where first established, ii. 461; attention paid by the Romans to their invalids, ii. 462; first establishment for invalids at Constantinople, ii. 465; Hôtel des Invalides, at Paris, ib.; regular surgeons, when appointed to armies, ii. 468-471; establishment of field hospitals in Germany, ii. 471.

Ink, sympathetic, history of, i. 106.

Ink, in what manner it acquires a superior quality, ii. 266.

Insurance, i. 234; not known to the Romans, ib.; Puffendorf and others endeavour to prove the contrary, ib.; does not occur in the Hanseatic maritime laws, ib.; policies drawn up in 1523, still used in Leghorn, i. 237; insurance-laws of the 16th and 17th centuries, i. 238; invention of insurance against fire, i. 240; insurance companies in England, i. 242-244.

Jackets, cork, of the ancients, i. 322.

Jugglers, ii. 115; who comprehended under that title, ib.; observations on their employment, ii. 115-119; breathing out flames very ancient, ii. 119; how performed, ib.; deceptions with naphtha, ii. 120; feats of Richardson with burning coals and melted lead, ii. 121; feat with melted copper, ii. 122; ancient Hirpi could walk through burning coals, ii. 123; ordeal, a juggling trick of the priests, ib.; secret of it disclosed, ii. 124; exhibition with balls and cups mentioned by the ancients, ib.; Von Eckeberg suffered large stones to be broken on his breast, ii. 126; ancient rope-dancers, ib.; feats of horsemanship came from the East, ii. 128; performers at the Byzantine court, ib.; Romans taught elephants to walk on a rope, ii. 129; Sybarites taught horses to dance, ii. 130; Wildman’s exhibition with bees, ib.; puppets, ii. 132; antiquity of automata, ii. 133; tripods of Vulcan, ii. 134; moving statues of Dædalus, ib.; pigeon of Archytas, ii. 135; wooden eagle and iron fly of Regiomontanus, ib.; automata of Vaucanson and Du Moulin, ii. 136, 137; of De Gennes, ii. 137; speaking machines, ii. 138-141; Chinese shadows, ii. 141.

Kermes and cochineal, i. 385; belong to the same genus, i. 386; three kinds described, ib.; places where the ancients collected them, i. 387; still found in the Levant, i. 388; French and Spanish kermes, ib.; name given to them in the middle ages, i. 390; how preserved at those periods, ib.; when this dye was known in Germany, i. 391; origin of the name kermes, i. 392; discovery of American cochineal, i. 396; disputes whether cochineal was insects or berries, i. 398; real cochineal brought to St. Domingo, i. 399; kermes early employed in the East to dye red, ib.; derivation of the word scarlet, i. 400; Drebbel discovered that a solution of tin produced with cochineal a beautiful scarlet colour, i. 402; Gobelin improved the art of dyeing scarlet in France, i. 403; first dye-house for scarlet in England established by a Fleming, ib.; three kinds of cochineal in the English market, i. 404.

Kitchen vegetables, ii. 336; bulbous roots, favourite dishes among the ancients, ii. 338; some vegetables, formerly cultivated, now little esteemed, ib.; borage not known to the ancients, ii. 339; spinage, no traces of in the works of the ancients, ii. 340; its native country unknown, ib.; broccoli, known to the ancients, ii. 342; species of the cabbage according to Linnæan system, ii. 343-348; whether the Greeks and Romans were acquainted with our carrots, ii. 349-351; shallots brought from Ascalon in Palestine, ii. 353; our shallots obtained only by the bulbs, ib.; potatoes, when introduced into Europe, ii. 354.

Kircher, whether the inventor of the speaking-trumpet, i. 97; read the litany through one to a congregation from two to five Italian miles off, i. 99.

Knitting, stocking-loom, ii. 355; fishing and hunting-nets mentioned in the Scriptures, ii. 357; nets, in modern times found among very rude nations, ii. 358; mantles of the clergy in the middle ages covered with silk nets, ii. 359; stocking-knitting, when invented, ii. 360; when known in England, ii. 361; breeches and hose, when worn in Scotland, ii. 362; stockings of cloth, in the time of Queen Mary, ii. 364; knitting, when common throughout England, ii. 365; art of knitting stockings in Germany, ib.; terms which relate to knitting older than the art itself, ii. 366; wire-screens of curious workmanship, ii. 367; stocking-loom, invention of, ii. 368-373; stocking-looms at Venice, ii. 373; invention claimed by the French, ib.; brought to Germany, ii. 375; present state of the hosiery manufacture, ib.

Lace, i. 463; method of making it, ib.; not known to the ancients, i. 464; lace among old church furniture, i. 465; establishment of the lace manufacture in France, ib.; lace a German invention, ib.; application of machinery to the manufacture of lace, i. 466.

Lapidary’s wheel known to the ancients, ii. 84.

Lead, sugar of, when invented, i. 250; whether used for secret poison, i. 60.

Leaf-skeletons, ii. 195; first made by Severin, ii. 197; also by Gabriel Clauder, ib.; insects employed for this purpose by Ruysch, ii. 198; leaf-skeletons by Seligmann, ii. 200; art of raising trees from leaves, ii. 201.

Lending-houses, history of, ii. 1; ancient princes lent money to the poor without interest, ii. 2; their example followed in modern Italy, ii. 3; Tabernæ argentariæ of the Romans different from lending-houses, ii. 5; public loans in the fourteenth century, ib.; lending-houses opposed by the Dominicans, ii. 7; Tomitano preached in favour of them, ii. 9; established in different parts of Italy, ii. 10-12; dispute respecting their legality, ii. 12; confirmed at the council of the Lateran, ii. 13; Banco de’ poveri at Naples, ib.; origin of the name Mons pietatis, ii. 15; account of the oldest public loans, ii. 16; first lending-house in Germany, ii. 17; Lombards in the Netherlands, ii. 18; Mont de piété at Paris, ii. 20; account of pawnbroking in England, ii. 21.

Lighting of streets, ii. 172; Rome not lighted, ib.; contrary opinion of Meursius, ib.; streets of Antioch lighted, ii. 173; Cæsarea not lighted, ib.; antiquity of illuminations, ii. 174; Paris lighted, ii. 175; reverberating lamps invented, ii. 177; first account of lighting London, ii. 178; Amsterdam, the Hague, and Copenhagen, ii. 180; streets of Rome have no lights but those before the images of saints, ib.; lighting at Philadelphia, Hamburg, Berlin, ii. 181; at Vienna and other cities, ii. 181, 182; introduction of gas, ii. 182-185.

Lottery, ii. 414; two kinds in Europe, ib.; Congiaria of the Romans resembled our lotteries, ib.; shopkeepers in the middle ages sold wares in the manner of a lottery, ii. 416; established at Florence, ii. 417; brought from Italy to France, ii. 418; lottery for giving portions to young women, ii. 419; others for similar purposes, ib.; lotteries, properly so called, when established, ii. 420; lottery proposed by Tonti, ib.; French lotteries, ii. 421; origin of the name, ii. 422; first in England, ii. 423; at Amsterdam, ii. 425; in Germany, ib.; Genoese lottery, ii. 426; Art-Unions, the only lottery existing in England, ii. 428.

Machine for noting down music, i. 12; one invented in Germany by Unger, ib.; another, constructed by Hohlfeld, ib.; Dr. Burney ascribes this invention to the English, i. 13.

Madder, ii. 108; known to the ancients, ii. 110; in the middle ages, ii. 111; its property of colouring the bones, ib.; cultivation of, ii. 113, 114.

Mad-houses, where first established, ii. 461.

Magnetic cures, i. 43; external use of the magnet in curing the tooth-ache, known in the 6th century, i. 44; mentioned by writers in the 15th and 16th centuries, ib.; effect of on the bodies of animals, ib.; properties of, i. 45.

Maize brought from America, i. 497.

Manganese, ii. 235; employed in glass-making, ib.; frees glass from dirt, ii. 236; use of it retained, ii. 239; brought from Piedmont and Perigord, in France, ii. 240.

Mantles of the knights bordered with furs, ii. 319.

Mantles of the clergy covered with silk nets, ii. 359.

Manuscripts, ancient, ruled with lead, ii. 389.

Mills, history of, i. 147; East Indian oil-mills, i. 148; philosophical mill, by whom invented, i. 150; water-mills, when invented, i. 151; floating mills, i. 155; wind-mills, i. 158.

Mirrors, ii. 56; the oldest of metal, ii. 57; known in the time of Moses, ib.; ancient mirrors of silver, ib.; of copper, brass, and gold, ii. 62; how cleaned, ii. 63; chemical examination of the metal, ib.; mirrors made of stones, ii. 65; mirrors of the native Americans, ii. 68; mirrors of glass made at Sidon, ii. 69; mirrors in the twelfth century, ii. 75; first certain mention in the thirteenth century, ii. 76; manner in which the oldest were made, ib.; process for silvering them described, ii. 79; Venetian mirrors esteemed till the seventeenth century, ib.; establishment of glass-houses in France, ib.; invention of casting glass plates for mirrors, ii. 80; advantage and disadvantage of this, ii. 81; abandoned for the old method of blowing, ii. 82; ingenious process for silvering glass, ii. 83.

Mosaic work, i. 130.

Natural curiosities, collections of, i. 282; deposited by the ancients in their temples, i. 283; an account of different articles of this kind, and where kept, i. 283-284; collection formed by Augustus, i. 285; natural bodies preserved in ancient times by means of salt, ib.; dead bodies among the Scythians, Assyrians and Persians covered with wax, i. 287; fish and apples transported in wax, i. 288; origin of wrapping up dead bodies in wax cloth, ib.; books found in the grave of Numa, how preserved, i. 289; where collections were first formed by private persons, i. 290; first private collections in the 16th century, ib.; oldest catalogues of such collections, i. 291; collections in England, i. 293.

Night-watch, ii. 185; among the ancients, ib.; when calling the hours began to be practised, ii. 186; rich people kept servants to announce certain periods of the day, ib.; methods of watching in time of war, ii. 187; ancient watchmen carried bells, ii. 188; night-watching established early at Paris, ib.; at Berlin, ii. 189; in Germany, ii. 190; watchmen stationed on steeples and towers, ib.; watchmen posted on towers among the Chinese, ii. 192; watchmen in times of feudal alarm, ii. 193; modern system of, ii. 194.

Ordeal, account of, ii. 123.

Odometer, i. 5; supposed to be mentioned by Capitolinus, ib.; figure of one on the ducal palace of Urbino erected in 1482, ib.; one made by Paul Pfinzing, ib.; odometer with which Augustus elector of Saxony measured his territories, i. 7; odometers of Rodolphus II., ib.; Butterfield’s odometer, ib.; Meynier’s, i. 8; Hohlfeld’s, ib.; Payne’s, i. 11.

Orphan-houses, ii. 449; first formed by Trajan, ib.; inspector of orphans, an office at the court of Byzantium, ii. 454.

Painters, ancient, often poor slaves, ii. 261.

Paper-hangings, i. 379; velvet paper, how prepared, i. 380; invented by Jerome Lanyer, ib.; called at first Londrindiana, i. 381; Audran, his invention, i. 382; art of imprinting gold and silver figures on paper invented by Eccard, ib.; oldest account of such hangings in Germany, ib.; new improvement in, i. 383; metallic dust invented at Nuremberg, ib.; silver-coloured glimmer, i. 384.

Paving of streets, i. 269; first by the Carthaginians, i. 270; Thebes paved, ib.; whether Jerusalem was paved not known, ib.; when Rome began to be paved uncertain, i. 271; information by Livy, ib.; pavement of Herculaneum and Pompeii, i. 272; Cordova paved in the ninth century, ib.; Paris not paved in the twelfth century, ib.; cause of its being paved, ib.; London not paved in the eleventh century, i. 273; Smithfield-market, when paved, i. 274; German cities, when paved, ib.; citizens of Paris obliged in 1285 to repair and clean the streets, i. 275; reason why no swine were suffered about the streets, i. 276; privies erected in France by an order from government, i. 278; earlier in Germany than Paris, i. 279; wooden pavement, i. 281.

Pearls, artificial, i. 258; art of forcing shell-fish to produce, known to the ancients, i. 260; how the Chinese cause mussels to produce pearls, ib.; invention of Linnæus for the same purpose, i. 261; how pearl-fishers know shells which contain pearls, i. 263; different kinds of artificial pearls, i. 264; invention of Jaquin for preparing them, i. 265.

Pilgrimages, the cause of hospitals, ii. 456.

Plague, origin of, i. 374.

Poison, secret, i. 47; mentioned by Plutarch and Quintilian, i. 48; dreadful poison of the Indians, ib.; secret poison known to Theophrastus, i. 49; invention of it falsely ascribed to Thrasyas, ib.; when known at Rome, ib.; employed by Sejanus and Agrippina, ib.; secret poison, supposed to have been given to Regulus, ib.; ancients unacquainted with mineral poisons, i. 51; Toffania invented a kind of secret poison, i. 51, 52; detected and strangled, i. 53; Marchioness de Brinvillier’s poisonings, i. 55; seized and beheaded, i. 56; chambre de poison established at Paris, i. 57; Count Corfitz de Ulfeld intended to poison the king of Denmark, ib.; Charles XI., king of Sweden, poisoned, ib.; ingredients of, i. 60, 61; antidote, i. 61; powst, a kind of secret poison used in the East Indies, i. 63.

Prince Rupert’s drops, ii. 241; not known till the seventeenth century, ii. 242; first experiments with, ib.; brought to England by prince Rupert, ii. 244.

Pumps, by whom invented, ii. 245.

Quarantine, i. 373; origin of, obscure, ib.; said to have been established by the Venetians, ib.; account by Le Bret, i. 376; institution of the council of health, i. 377; when letters of health were first written, ib.

Quicksilver used for purifying gold ore, i. 14; how recovered afterwards, i. 15.

Quills for writing, antiquity of, i. 405; scarcity of, i. 413.

Ribbon-loom, ii. 527; construction of it, ib.; attempts made to suppress it, ii. 528; such looms invented by the Swiss, ib.; loom seen by Anthony Moller at Dantzic, ib.; inventor of it put to death, ii. 529; weaving machine mentioned by Boxhorn, ib.; ribbon-looms prohibited in Holland, ii. 530; prohibited also in the Spanish Netherlands and at Cologne, ib.; prohibited by imperial authority, ii. 531; loom burnt publicly at Hamburg, ib.; prohibition of this kind annulled in Germany, ib.

Rubies, artificial, how to make, i. 125.

Saddles, i. 431; coverings, when introduced, ib.; order of Theodosius a proof of their antiquity, i. 433; prohibition of Leo I. that no one should ornament them with precious stones, i. 434; conjecture that they were invented by the Salii, ib.; invented by the Persians, i. 435.

Saffron, i. 175; medicinal use of, i. 176; employed by the Romans for perfuming apartments, ib.; scented salves made with it, ib.; used by the ancients for seasoning dishes, ib.; introduced into Spain by the Arabs, i. 178; by whom brought to France, i. 179; introduced into England in the reign of Edward III., ib.; when cultivated in Austria, ib.; an important article in husbandry in the fifteenth century, ib.; adulteration of it, i. 180.

Sal-ammoniac, ii. 396; whether known to the ancients, ii. 397; first traces in the works of the Arabians, ii. 402; recipe for its preparation, ii. 404; invention of aqua regia, ii. 405; obtained from Egypt, ib.; brought also from the East Indies, ii. 406; first works for making it in Europe, ib.

Saltpetre, gunpowder, aquafortis, ii. 482; saltpetre, properties of, ii. 483; native saltpetre, where found, ii. 484; name nitrum, of great antiquity, ii. 487; difference between mineral alkalies, when defined, ii. 489; nitrum of the ancients an impure alkali, but not saltpetre, ii. 491; was a real lixivious salt, ii. 492; red nitrum, ii. 502; saltpetre, when first mentioned, ii. 503; gunpowder invented in India, ii. 505; used by Indians and Arabians before Europeans, ii. 506; first account of aquafortis, ib.; said to have been employed at Venice for separating the noble metals, ii. 508; saltpetre regale, ii. 509; when abolished, ii. 511.

Saw-mills, i. 222; ancient method of making boards, ib.; our saw not known to the Americans, ib.; by whom invented, i. 223; bone of the saw-fish used by the old inhabitants of Madeira, i. 224; ancient saws, i. 224, 225; invention of saw-mills, i. 225; the first saw-mills in Norway, i. 228; first saw-mill in Holland, ib.; the first in England erected by a Dutchman, i. 229; saw-mill at Limehouse destroyed by the mob, ib.; saw-mill at Leith in Scotland, i. 230.

Sealing-wax, i. 137; substances used by the ancients, ib.; wax employed in the earliest ages, i. 140; red, green, and black sealing-wax, ib.; impressions made on paste, i. 141; how public acts have been forged, i. 143; East Indian and Turkish sealing-wax, ib.; oldest known seal on a letter written from London, i. 144; oldest printed receipt for making sealing-wax, i. 145; Spanish wax, i. 146; antiquity of wafers, ib.

Ships at first were a kind of rafts, i. 455.

Sowing-machines, ii. 230; Locatelli considered as the inventor, ii. 231; his machine described by Evelyn, ii. 232; honour of this invention disputed by the Italians, ii. 233.

Snow, used by the ancients for cooling liquors, ii. 142.

Soap, ii. 92; invented by the Gauls, ib.; used at Rome as a pomade, ii. 93; Germans dyed their hair with it, ib.; oldest method of washing, ii. 95; alkaline water in Armenia, ib.; urine employed for washing, ii. 97; tax upon it, ii. 98; saponaceous plants, ii. 98-102; bran, ii. 102; fullers-earth, ib.; manufactory in England, ii. 107, 108.

Spangles, how made, and when invented, i. 423.

Speaking-trumpet, i. 93; speaking-trumpet of Alexander the Great, i. 94; ear-trumpet older than the speaking-trumpet, i. 96; invention of the latter disputed by Sir S. Morland and Kircher, ib.; ear of Dionysius described, i. 97; Kircher constructed an ear-trumpet in the Jesuits’ College at Rome, i. 99.

Stamped paper, i. 230; whether introduced by Justinian, ib.; Romans marked their runaway slaves, i. 231; stamped paper invented in Holland, i. 233; introduced into Saxony, ib.; used in Denmark and other countries, ib.

Stamping works, ii. 333; ancients acquainted with the art of stamping ores, ib.; remains of mills used for that purpose, ib.; modern stamping-mills, ii. 334; invention of, ib.; process of sifting and wet stamping, ii. 335; wet stamping said to have been invented in 1505, ii. 336.

Steel, ii. 324; its properties, ib.; invention very old, ii. 325; two methods of making, ii. 327; art of hardening it, ii. 328; supposed hardening water, ii. 329; invention of converting bar-iron into steel, ii. 330; three kinds of steel now principally manufactured, ii. 333.

Stirrups, i. 435; no traces of any such invention in ancient works, i. 436; no term for them in Greek or Latin, i. 437; warriors had a projection on their spears for resting the foot, while getting on horseback, i. 439; first certain account of stirrups, i. 440; Isidore in the seventh century speaks of them, i. 441; appear in a piece of tapestry of the 11th century, i. 442; pride of the clergy in causing kings to hold their stirrups, ib.

Surgeons, in the time of the Trojan war, unknown, 491.

Telescope, invention of it made metal mirrors necessary, ii. 60.

Tin, ii. 206; employed in the time of Homer and Moses, ib.; oldest mention in the Scriptures, ii. 207; stannum of the ancients not our tin, ii. 209; as an article of commerce, ii. 212; tin of the ancients mixed with lead, ii. 220; names of such mixtures, ib.; tinning seldom employed by the Romans, ii. 221; according to Pliny, invented by the Gauls, ii. 222; ancient vessels of cast tin dug up in England, ii. 223; tin, where procured by the ancients, ii. 223, 224; tin mines in Germany, ii. 226; invention of tinning plate iron, ii. 227; East Indian tin, ii. 228; produce of the Cornish mines, ii. 229.

Tourmaline, i. 86; supposed to be the lyncurium of the ancients, ib.; probably belongs to the carbuncles, i. 88; tourmaline brought from Ceylon about the end of the last century, i. 89; first described in Germany, ib.; its electrical properties first known to Linnæus, i. 92; investigated by Æpinus, ib.; Huygens’ discovery, ib.

Trees, how raised from leaves, ii. 200.

Tulips, i. 22; came from Turkey, ib.; effects produced by cultivation, ib.; how called by the Turks, i. 23; first described by Gesner, i. 24; origin of the name, ib.; first introduced into England, ib.; tulipomania, i. 25; the tulip-trade and stock-jobbing compared, i. 29; lesser tulipomania, i. 30; anecdotes, ib.

Turf, i. 205; use of, discovered by the earth catching fire, ib.; known to the Chauci, i. 206; whether known to the Dutch in the thirteenth century, ib.; invention ascribed to Erasmus, i. 207; Williams’ patent, i. 211.

Turkeys, i. 487; not known in Europe before the discovery of America, i. 490; first mentioned by Oviedo, ib.; called by Lopez de Gomara galloparones, i. 491; still found wild in America, ib.; earliest account of Turkeys in Italy, i. 492; in England, i. 493; in France, ib.; in Germany, &c., i. 495; in Asia and Africa, i. 496.

Ultramarine, i. 467; how prepared from lapis lazuli, ib.; price of ultramarine, i. 469; origin of the name, i. 473; oldest mention of, ib.; preparation of it found out in England, i. 476; artificial method of making, i. 477.

Vanes, weathercocks, ii. 281; the oldest nations distinguished the four principal winds only, ib.; Æolus first made navigators acquainted with the winds, ii. 282; names given by Charles the Great, ib.; means for indicating the winds invented early, ii. 283; Varro’s apparatus, ii. 285; similar apparatus at Constantinople, ib.; when constructed, ii. 286; wind-indicator at Emessa, ii. 287; weathercocks in the ninth century, ib.; in France, in the twelfth century, none but noblemen allowed to have vanes on their houses, ii. 288; flags or vanes on ships, ib.; Norman fleet had vanes at the tops of the masts, ii. 289; anemoscopes and anemometers described, ib.

Verdigris, method of making, i. 171; used in early periods for plasters, i. 172; made formerly in Cyprus and Rhodes, i. 174; why called Spanish green, ib.

Vitriol, white, when first known, ii. 38.

Water-clocks, i. 82; invention ascribed to Ctesibius of Alexandria, i. 83; Clepsydræ, when introduced at Rome, ib.; modern water-clock described, ib.; by whom invented, i. 84; latest improvements, i. 85.

Wheat, attempts to plant it in the time of Sir F. Bacon, ii. 234.

Windows in Russia, how cleaned when frozen, ii. 154.

Wire-drawing, i. 414; earliest use of gold threads for dresses, ib.; cloth of Attalus embroidered with the needle, i. 415; wire-drawing not known in Italy in the time of Charlemagne, i. 416; brought to great perfection at Nuremberg, i. 420; art of wire-making, when known in England, i. 422; in France, ib.; filigrane work, antiquity of, i. 423.

Writing-pens, i. 405; instruments used by the ancients, ib.; still in Persia for writing, i. 406; use of quills said to be as old as the 5th century, i. 409; oldest certain account of them, ib.; mentioned by Alcuin, i. 410; used in the 9th, 11th and 12th centuries, ib.; substitution of steel pens, i. 413.

Zinc, ii. 32; unknown to the ancients, ib.; furnace-calamine, ii. 34; use of in making brass, known to Albertus Magnus, ii. 36; first brought in use at the furnaces of Rammelsberg, ii. 37; the name zinc occurs first in Paracelsus, ii. 40; procured from calamine, ii. 42; imported from the East Indies, ii. 43; origin of its different names, ii. 44; zinc works in England, ii. 45.

Printed by Richard and John E. Taylor, Red Lion Court, Fleet Street.

Transcribers’ Notes

Text contains Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, and astronomical symbols. Equipment that cannot display these characters may substitute question marks or other placeholders.

Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed. Words spelled differently in quoted text than elsewhere were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were silently corrected, except as noted below; ambiguous unbalanced quotation marks and hyphens at the ends of lines were retained.

Text often uses periods where commas might be expected. As the author’s intent is unknown, all of them have been retained.

In some cases, it was not possible to distinguish between the letter “l.” and the number “1.”, usually in footnotes, and usually followed by a period.

The spelling and accent marks of non-English words have been retained as printed in the original book; some possible or likely errors are noted below, but not comprehensively.

Footnotes, originally at the bottom of the page, have been renumbered and moved to the end of each chapter. The footnotes to a footnote retain their original letter-identifications.

Index references not checked for accuracy.

Text uses both “lye” and “ley”; both retained.

Text uses both “Duhamel” and “Du Hamel”; both retained.

Frontispiece: The artist’s initials actually were “J. J.”

Page 19: “give then in return” was printed that way.

Footnote 67, referenced on page 26: contains an extra closing quotation mark or is missing an opening one.

Page 35: “βοτρυίτις” is a typographical error for “βοτρυΐτις”.

Footnote 119, referenced on page 50: “Greek names” was misprinted as “games”; changed here.

Page 57: “interpretators” was printed that way.

Page 196: “one of the principle is the art” was printed that way.

Page 300: “אדות שכער” is a typographical error for “אדרת שנער”.

Page 300: “אדרת שעו” probably is a typographical error for “אדרת שער”.

Page 317: One “vech” in “vech, veh, vech,” probably is a misprint for “veeh”.

Page 353: “μόνα γἀρ” is a typographical error for “μόνα γὰρ”.

Page 423: “January 1569” was printed as “January 1659” and has been changed here, based on the dates earlier in the same sentence.

Page 448: “scarcely ten” and “54½ died” were printed that way.

Page 451: Some of the Roman Numerals were overlined in the original, but not here. In the same paragraph, “55 5 55” was printed with the digits sideways.

Page 468: “ἂλλον” is a typographical error for “ἄλλον”.

Page 478: “Περσικός” is a typographical error for “Περσικὸς”.

Footnote 1219, referenced on page 495, references “Soap” in vol. i., but it's actually in this volume.

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