Chapter C: Forbes

June 19.

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THE HYDRO-INCUBATOR.

Most, if not all, of your readers have heard of the newly-invented machine for hatching and rearing in chickens, without the maternal aid of the hen; probably many of them have paid a visit (and a _shilling_) at No. 4. Leicester Square, where the incubator is to be seen in full operation. The following extract will, therefore, be acceptable, as it tends to show the truth of the inspired writer's words, "There is no new thing under the sun:"--

"Therefore ... it were well we made our remarks in some
creatures, that might be continually in our power, to observe in
them the course of nature, every day and hour. Sir _John
Heydon_, the Lieutenant of his Majesties Ordnance (that generous
and knowing gentleman and consummate souldier, both in theory
and practice) was the first that instructed me how to do this,
by means of a furnace, so made as to imitate the warmth of a
sitting hen. In which you may lay several eggs to hatch and by
breaking them at several ages, you may distinctly observe every
hourly mutation in them, if you please. The first will be, that
on one side you shall find a great resplendent clearness in the
white. After a while, a little spot of red matter, like blood
will appear in the midst of that clearness, fast'ned to the
yolk, which will have a motion of opening and shutting, so as
sometimes you will see it, and straight again it will vanish
from your sight, and indeed, at first it is so little that you
cannot see it, but by the motion of it; for at every pulse, as
it opens you may see it, and immediately again it shuts, in such
sort as it is not to be discerned. From this red speck, after a
while, there will stream out a number of little (almost
imperceptible) red veins. At the end of some of which, in time,
there will be gathered together a knot of matter, which by
little and little will take the form of a head and you will, ere
long, begin to discern eyes and a beak in it. All this while the
first red spot of blood grows bigger and solider, till at length
it becomes {85} a fleshy substance, and, by its figure, may easily
be discern'd to be the heart; which as yet hath no other inclosure
but the substance of the egg. But by little and little, the rest
of the body of an animal is framed out of those red veins which
stream out all about from the heart. And in process of time,
that body encloses the heart within it by the chest, which grows
over on both sides, and in the end meets and closes itself fast
together. After which this little creature soon fills the shell,
by converting into several parts of itself all the substance of
the egg; and then growing weary of so strait a habitation, it
breaks prison and comes out a perfectly formed chicken."--Sir
Kenelm Digby's _Treatise of Bodies_, Ch. xxiv. p. 274. ed. 1669.

Could Sir Kenelm return to the scenes of this upper world, and pay a visit to Mr. Cantelo's machine, his shade might say with truthfulness, what Horace Smith's mummy answered to his questioner,--

"--We men of yore
Were versed in all the knowledge you can mention."

The operations of the two machines appear to be precisely the same: the only difference being the Sir Kenelm's was an experimental one, made for the purpose of investigating the process of nature; while Cantelo's, in accordance with "the spirit of the iron time," is a practical one, made for the purposes of utility and profit. Sir Kenelm's Treatise appears to have been first published in the year 1644.

HENRY KERSLEY.

Corpus Christi Hall, Maidstone.

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ETYMOLOGY OF THE WORD "PARLIAMENT."

It has been observed by a learned annotator on the _Commentaries of Blackstone_, that, "no inconsiderable pains have been bestowed in analysing the word 'Parliament;'" and after adducing several amusing instances of the attempts that have been made (and those too by men of the most recondite learning) to arrive at its true radical properties, he concludes his remarks by observing that

"'Parliament' imported originally nothing more than a council or
conference, and that the termination '_ment_,' in parliament,
has no more signification than it has in _impeachment_,
_engagement_, _imprisonment_, _hereditament_, and ten thouand
others of the same nature."

He admits, however, that the civilians have, in deriving testament from _testari mentem_, imparted a greater significance to the termination "ment." Amidst such diversity of opinion, I am emboldened to offer a solution of the word "Parliament," which, from its novelty alone, if possessing no better qualification, may perhaps recommend itself to the consideration of your readers. In my humble judgment, all former etymologists of the word appear to have stumbled _in limine_, for I would suggest that its compounds are "_palam_" and "_mens_."

With the Romans there existed a law that in certain cases the verdict of the jury might be given CLAM VEL PALAM, viz., _privily_ or _openly_, or in other words, by _tablet_ or _ballot_, or by _voices_. Now as the essence of a Parliament or council of the people was its representative character, and as secrecy would be inconsistent with such a character, it was doubtless a _sine quâ non_ that its proceedings should be conducted "_palam_," in an open manner. The absence of the letter "_r_" may possibly be objected to, but a moment's reflection will cast it into the shade, the classical pronunciation of the word _palam_ being the same as if spelt _PARlam_; and the illiterate state of this country when the word Parliament was first introduced would easily account for a _phonetic_ style of orthography. The words enumerated by Blackstone's annotator are purely of English composition, and have no _correspondent_ in the dead languages; whilst _testament_, _sacrament_, _parliament_, and many others, are Latin words Anglicised by dropping the termination "_um_"--a great distinction as regards the relative value of words, which the learned annotator seems to have overlooked. "_Mentum_" is doubtless the offspring of "_mens_", signifying the mind, thought, deliberation, opinion; and as we find "_palam populo_" to mean "_in the sight of the people_," so, without any great stretch of imagination, may we interpret "_palam mente_" into "_freedom of thought or of deliberation_" or "_an open expression of opinion_:" the essential qualities of a representative system, and which our ancestors have been careful to hand down to posterity in a word, viz., _Parliament_.

FRANCISCUS.

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"INCIDIS IN SCYLLAM, CUPIENS VITARE CHARYBDIM."

I should be sorry to see this fine old _proverb in metaphor_ passed over with no better notice than that which seems to have been assigned to it in Boswell's _Johnson_.

Erasmophilos, a correspondent of the _Gentleman's Magazine_ in 1774, quotes a passage from Dr. Jortin's _Life of Erasmus_, vol. ii. p. 151., which supplies the following particulars, viz.:--

1. That the line was first discovered by Galeottus Martius of Narni, A.D. 1476.

2. That it is in lib. v. 301. of the "Alexandreis," a poem in _ten_ books, by Philippe Gualtier (commonly called "de Chatillon," though in reality a native of Lille, in Flanders).

3. That the context of the passage in which it occurs is as follows:--

"-- Quo tendis inertem
Rex periture, fugam? Nescis, heu perdite, nescis
Quem fugias: hostes incurris dum fugis hostem.
Incidis in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charybdim."

where the poet apostrophises Darius, who, while {86} flying from Alexander, fell into the lands of Bessus. (See _Selections from Gent. Mag_. vol. ii. p. 199. London, 1814.)