Chapter XXV: Introduction (3)

We have next to consider the present article No. 21. The conditions stated require the use of but one pulley, one cord, and two buckets, without any “force” or pump plunger, or “any wheel, or sucker.” An arrangement so simple seems only possible to be attained by some such plan as that exhibited in the illustration given below. We have here an endless chain or cord, A B, passing over the pulley C, with a bucket D, at the upper end; and another bucket E, at the lower end; the first in the act of discharging its contents into the trough G, the second re-charging with water at the level E. This endless chain is further supplied with a series of conical or other shaped buckets, _a_, _a'_, set on the endless cord in a reverse direction, so as to receive water conveyed from an upper stream by the spout F, by which means the side B, of the cord will descend, and the side A, ascend, “without any other force than its own motion,” and that “with two buckets only, day and night.” On the side _a'_, the conical buckets reverse and empty themselves, thereby lightening the ascending side A, of the endless chain or cord.

22.

To make a River in a Garden to ebbe and flow constantly, though
twenty foot over, with a childs force, in some private room or
place out of sight, and a competent distance from it.

[_An ebbing and flowing River._] In reference to this invention Mr. Partington has quoted Peter Bogaerts’ ingenious method of a canal lock, so contrived that, in a model, a weight of seven pounds was made to raise ten hundred weight of water more than four feet in a few seconds.

But still the process of ebbing and flowing is not made out; it does appear, however, that its operation requires the constant services of a boy or other attendant, probably to keep alternately opening and closing certain sluice arrangements, placed somewhere concealed from view; the whole affording a water-work to amuse and surprise, and forming a variety on the usual strange schemes attached to grottos, caves, &c. spouting water in every variety of form.

See further the comments on article No. 57, which very probably includes the principle here employed by the Marquis.

There is no communication in this article of facts requisite to direct an engineer or inventor in the adjustment of any special kind of machinery to obtain the desired ebbing and flowing river; which is a novelty, in this respect, peculiar to the Marquis of Worcester’s ingenuity. He was evidently not copying or improving any anterior system of water-work. The next article is but an application of this new system; and it is not until he has taken us through descriptive hints of thirty-three totally different designs or devices, that in No. 57, he offers “A constant water-flowing and ebbing motion.” We think the three may be taken together, that is, No. 57, refers to the principle and mechanism, of which Nos. 22 and 23, are mere simple applications.

Thus, referring to what we have stated under No. 57, the purpose named in the present article might be attained by means of two domed or bell-shaped vessels, placed like gasometers, but otherwise immoveable, partially immersed in a pond, or other artificial piece of water; which being arranged so that, by admitting a steam pipe into each, the contained air could be driven out thereby, condensation would naturally follow, or might be accelerated; and one vessel immediately filling with water, while the other was emptying, the surface of the pond or river would be kept in a continual state of agitation, and the water might be said to “ebb and flow constantly, though 20 feet over.”

No reason is assigned for proposing this modification of water work, no advantage is pointed out, the Marquis doubtless depending on its apparent impossibility for its exciting and stimulating inquiry. He knew how the promulgation of such a wonder would have affected his own mind, and never imagined but that the public would feel equally inquisitive. His incomprehensible truths are, however, often denounced, without investigation, as though they were false.

23.

To set a Clock in[9] a Castle, the[1] water filling the Trenches
about it;[2] it[3] shall shew by ebbing and flowing the Hours,
Minutes and Seconds, and all the comprehensible motions of the
Heavens, and Counterlibation[4] of the Earth, according to
_Copernicus_.

Footnotes

[9] as within a. MS and P. [1] and the. [2] about it shall show the hours, minutes, and seconds by ebbing. [3] which--for it. P. [4] counterlibration.

[_An ebbing and flowing Castle-clock._] John Bate, in his “Mysteries of Nature and Art,” 1635, at p. 45, describes--“A water-clock, or a glasse showing the hour of the day,” by three different arrangements.

This article is further noticed in commenting on No. 57.

24.

How to increase the strength of a Spring to such an height,[5] as
to shoot Bumbasses and Bullets of an hundred pound weight a
Steeple-height, and a quarter of a mile off and more,
Stone-bow-wise, admirable for Fire-works and astonishing of
besieged Cities, when without warning given by noise they find
themselves so forcibly and dangerously surprised.

Footnote

[5] degree--for height. P.

[_A Strength-increasing Spring._] The technical term BUMBASSES, or probably bombasses, here used, has escaped the attention of all compilers of Archaic Dictionaries. By the context we may presume it was applied to the large stones usually fired from bombards, and differing only from bullets in these last being made of lead or iron.

Ancient cannon appear to have consisted of two kinds; a large one for discharging stones, called a _Bombard_, and a lesser one for darts. In 1388, a stone bullet, weighing 195 pounds, is related, according to Meyrick, to have been discharged from a _Bombard_, called the Trevisan. Such stone missiles may have been of the kind called by the Marquis “bumbasses,” and would be perhaps more properly named bombasses. The Stone-bow was the Prodd; probably the Slurbowe was furnished with a barrel through a slit, in which the string slided, when the trigger was pulled. Three kinds are mentioned by Du Cange. See Fosbroke’s Encyclopædia of Antiquities, 8vo. 1840.

Bishop Wilkins, treating on Catapultæ in his _Mathematicall Magick_, 1648, observes that their usual form was “after the manner of great bows placed on carriages, and wound up by the strength of several persons;” adding: “These were sometimes framed for the discharging of two or three arrows together.”

As the Marquis wrote the Century in 1655, only seven years after Wilkins’ publication, it is not at all unlikely that he seriously contemplated the contriving of a most useful warlike implement; and this appears the more reasonable when we find the worthy and learned prelate advancing, as it appeared to him, cogent reasons in his 19th chapter, in favour of the “Military offensive engines used amongst the ancients,” as compared to cannon; gravely summing up his observations with the remark--“that the force of these Engines does rather exceed than come short of our gun-powder inventions.” Then again on the ground of expense he shows an advantage in favour of Ballistæ and Catapultæ. Thus: “the price of these gun-powder instruments is extremely expensive.” This is proved from “a whole Cannon weighing commonly 8,000 pounds, a half Cannon 5,000, a Culverin 4,500, a Demi-culverin 3,000,” which “must needs be very costly,” amounting “to several hundred pounds,” for which sum “at least 10 of the ancient timber made engines might be purchased”!

Then their transport was a serious matter, for “a whole Cannon does require at the least 90 men, or 16 horses,” and so in proportion for others. But the timber made engines are light, and their “materials to be found everywhere.”

Then the gun-powder is costly; “a whole Cannon requiring for every charge 40 pound of powder, and a bullet of 64 pounds,” and in proportion for lesser cannon; whereas those other engines may be charged only with stones. So that only for the superior force of cannon “those ancient inventions” he conceives to be “much more commodious than these later inventions.”

Among questions propounded and agreed upon, in January, 1660, to be sent to Teneriffe by the Lord Brouncker and Mr. Boyle, the fifth was,--“Try the power of a stone bow, or other spring, both above and below (the hill), and note well the difference.”--Weld’s Hist. Royal Society, Vol. i. p. 98.

25.

How to make a Weight that cannot take up an hundred pound, and
yet shall take up two hundred pound, and[6] at the self-same
distance from the Centre; and so proportionally to millions of
pounds.

Footnote

[6] and--omitted.

[_A double-drawing Engine for weights._] The articles Nos. 25, 27, and 29 can only be taken as descriptive of elucidatory models, demonstrative of the applications of a certain principle, the result of condensation. For some unaccountable reason there has been a prevalent opinion that the Marquis was ignorant of condensation. If such an opinion is grounded on his not expressly alluding to it in the “Century,” then by the same rule it might be doubted whether he understood anything about steam! But as the “Century” was written to remind himself, and not to inform others of the _modus operandi_, it was sufficient for his purpose to particularise only the results. We can usually distinguish where he treads a beaten track, the result of reading, and where his course deviates into his “fire-water-work” experiments. The former generally has its parallel in some old author; but when the same rule is attempted to be applied to measure the others, we find we are dealing either with a new order of things, or else with sheer paradoxes of the most chimerical character. While, on the other hand, follow him in his own new track of experimental research, and we are rewarded at every step with a full and clear exposition of the wonderfully ingenious processes of inquiry by which he attained the perfection ascribed by him to his “Water-commanding Engine.”

In the present article it is required that a weight shall take up double its own weight, not by the old rule of leverage, but “at the self-same distance from the centre.” In the subjoined diagram we have two cylinders C, B, connected at the lower end with a steam pipe, supplied with the steam-cock A. A cord passing over the drum wheel D, is connected at its ends with the pistons B, C; and the whole stands in a trough E. Steam having been admitted to B, and then cut off, condensation has ensued, the piston B has descended and C has been raised, and along with it a quantity of water. Here we may take the two pistons as representing “one hundred pound” each, and although they balance, yet we thus find “how to make a weight” under such circumstances, nevertheless, take up “two hundred pounds,” that is, including the water.

A very similar kind of piston to the one here shown, is suggested by Fludd, Besson, and others, to be worked by a spiral spring, which being drawn to the bottom of a cylindrical vessel, water may be poured in above it, and being then tightly covered, with a lid having either an open jet or a tap in the centre, on releasing the spiral spring, the false bottom rising, and pressing the liquid, causes it to escape in a jet d’eau, gradually diminishing as the spring relaxes. The contrivance is elaborately illustrated in the 18th folio engraving of Besson’s “Theatrum Instrumentorum et Machinarum,” 1578; the Marquis, therefore, had only to substitute steam for the spiral spring.

26.

To raise weight as[7] well and as forcibly with the drawing back
of the Lever, as with the thrusting it[8] forwards; and by that
means to lose no time in motion or strength. This I saw in the
_Arcenal_ at _Venice_.[9]

Footnotes

[7] so--for as. [8] of it. [9] at Venice in the arsenal.

[_A to and fro Lever._] William Bourne offers the following as his 112th Device, “touching the making of engines to thrust from or pull to you with great force or strength.” He says, “And furthermore, you may make an engine to thrust from you or to pull unto you, to lift vp or to presse downe with great force, eyther to goe with wheeles as before is declared, or else to goe with skrewes or to goe with both, as to thrust open huge and strong gates, or else you taking good hold, to pull them open vnto you wards, and will make but little noyse in the doyng thereof, but you must be sure to set the engine fast, if to thrust from, to be strongly and well backed, and to pull to them it must be strongly bolstered before, sufficient to be of force to scrue the turne.”

The Venetian arrangement may be described, as shown in the annexed engraving, where A, B, C, is a frame, the two upright sides of which D E, are provided with a series of clicks, appearing in the drawing like the serrated edge of a saw, and each is so placed secured by a pin on which it moves, as always to incline to fall outwards. F, F, is a long lever, having a stout short cross bar in the centre, and is represented on the point of taking up on a click at _a_, while it leaves one on the opposite _b_, such being the _to_ and _fro_ motion required, thereby losing “no time in motion or strength.”

27.

A way to remove to and fro huge weights with a most
inconsiderable strength from place to place. For example, Ten
Tunne with ten pounds, and less; the said ten pounds not to fall
lower then it makes the ten Tunne to advance or retreat upon a
Level.

[_A most easie level Draught._] The weight is in this case to be moved “with a most inconsiderable strength.” Ten pounds, or less, are to be capable of moving 22,400 pounds. And the precise conditions are--“the said ten pounds not to _fall lower_ than it makes the ten ton _to advance_.” The annexed engraving shows, as in No. 25, two cylinders B, C, with their steam-pipe and valve at A, having above a platform G, on which is a loaded truck F, attached by a cord _a_, at one end passing over a pulley, and the drum wheel D, to the piston B; and a second cord at the other end passing over a pulley at _a'_, attached in like manner to the other piston C. Steam having been admitted to B, on its condensation the piston descending draws along with it the weighted truck F, while the piston C, ascends, drawing in air at E.

We thus attain the strict letter of the conditions set down, the _fall_ and the _advance_ being equal.

28.

A Bridge portable in[1] a Cart with six horses, which in a few
hours time may be placed over a River half a mile broad, whereon
with much expedition may[2] be transported Horse, Foot and
Cannon.

Footnotes

[1] upon a. MS. and P. [2] there may be.

[_A portable Bridge._] The great painter, Leonardo da Vinci, born in 1452, and who died at 67 years of age in 1520, was a man of singularly inventive talent. Among his other projects, he declares:--“I have the means of constructing light bridges, easy of carriage, and equally adapted to pursue or escape an enemy, secure from fire; and as easy to remove as to replace; and also the means of destroying those of the enemy.” See an interesting Memoir of him by J. W. Brown. 12mo. 1828.

Bourne’s 94th Device promises, “How you may make a bridge upon a sudden, that a whole army of men and their carriages may pass over any river or haven, if that it be of not too great breadth.”--See his Inventions or Devices, 1578.

Sir Hugh Plat, in his “Jewel House of Art and Nature,” 1653, shows, in article No. 22, “How to erect or build over any brook, or small river, a cheap and wooden bridge of 40 or 50 feet in length, without fastening any timber work within the water.”

29.

A portable Fortification able to contain five hundred fighting
men, and yet[3] in six hours time may[4] be set up, and made
Cannon-proof, upon the side of a River or Pass, with Cannon
mounted upon it, and as complete as a regular Fortification, with
Half-moons and Counterscarps.

Footnotes

[3] yet--omitted. [4] able to be--for, may be.

[_A moveable Fortification._] Vegetius, in “De re militari,” 1535, offers many similar schemes but less ambitious than the present one; which is, after all, little if any more than an extension and improvement on what had previously been more or less practised.

In his “Naturæ simia seu technica,” dated 1618, Robert Fludd, at page 421, gives a folio engraving of a triangular fort, with six pieces of cannon and three gunners. It appears to be on wheels, and is pushed along by a beam running on three wheels, having four horses yoked to it; literally the cart before the horse.

30.

A way in one nights time to raise a Bulwork twenty or thirty foot
high, Cannon-proof, and Cannon mounted upon it, with men to
overlook, command and batter a Towne; for though it contain but
four Pieces, they shall be able to discharge two hundred Bullets
each hour.

[_A Rising Bulwork._] Grose, in his “Military Antiquities,” Vol. I. Page 355, notices a moveable tower, the use of which was revived by the Royalists in their attack on Gloucester, during the Civil War.

In 1644, Edmond Felton, gentleman, published a pamphlet entitled, “Engins invented to save blood and moneys;” the nature of which he “discovered unto the Committee for the fortifications of the City of London.” The Honourable Major General Skippon attested in respect of it, that the engine “was of three tiers of ten muskets in a tier, to shoot arrows withal.” The inventor satisfied the Committee, “how an engine will secure the foot from the horse, and the soldiers from musket shot, which engine in fair ways two men may manage at pleasure.”

He complains of a piracy of his invention, observing, “There was about twenty of the said engines made at Oxford, and from thence carried to Gloucester, to go up to the walls. And had not his Excellency the Earl of Essex so happily arrived to raise the siege as he did, it was reported by some of the army, the city was in great fear to be taken thereby; most of which said engines the besiegers burnt, because they should not be taken.”

In the second volume of “Bibliotheca Gloucestrensis: a collection of scarce and curious tracts, by John Washbourn, jun. Gloucester. 4to. 1825,” there is a reprint of “Corbet’s Historicall relation of the Military Government of Gloucester, 1645,” which contains this passage: “Wherefore besides their mine and battery, they framed great store of those unperfect and troublesome engines to assault the lower parts of the city. Those engines ran upon wheels, with planks musket-proof placed on the axle-tree, with holes for musket-shot and a bridge before it, the end whereof (the wheels falling into the ditch) was to rest upon our breast works.” Page 54.

And in the reprint of “A briefe and exact diurnall of the siege before Gloucester, by John Dorney, Esquire, 1643,” we meet with the following:--“Munday, September 4. We understood likewise that the enemy had by the direction of that Jesuitticall Doctor Chillingworth, provided great store of engines after the manner of the Romane Testudines cum Pluteis, with which they intended to have assaulted the parts of the city, between the south and west gates. These engines ran upon cart wheeles, with a blinde of plankes musquet proofe, and holes for foure musquetiers to play out of, placed upon the axeltree to defend the musquetiers and those that thrust it forward, and carrying a bridge before it; the wheeles were to fall into the ditch, and the end of the bridge to rest upon our brest-workes, so making severall compleat bridges to enter the city. After the raising of the siege, we tooke all these engines, and brought them into the towne.”--Page 225.

In the first volume of this work there is a note on the two preceding passages, in which the editor observes:--“The plan of these machines was borrowed from the ancients. Various contrivances of this kind were also employed in the middle ages, before and for a considerable time after the invention of fire-arms. Sometimes they used them for undermining the walls. At the siege of Ribadavia in Spain, during the reign of Richard II. similar moveable machines were used. See Froissart, viii. c. 26. Such an engine is also mentioned by the Marquis of Worcester in his Century of Inventions.”

31.

A way how safely and speedily to make an approach to a Castle or
Town-wall, and over the very Ditch at Noon-day.

[_An approaching Blinde._] Vegetius, in “De re militari,” 1535, depicts and describes several kinds of these ancient military blinds, screens, and other contrivances and machines for protecting the attacking party. At page 15 he shows a ponderous advancing screen or shield on four wheels, and at two pages further a side view of the same, covering a large body of soldiers. Some have raised, hinged platforms, to be lowered for crossing a ditch.

Grose says:--“The cattus, cat-house, gattus or cat, was a covered shed, occasionally fixed on wheels, and used for covering soldiers employed in filling up the ditch, &c.”--Military Antiquities, 4to. 1801.

32.

How to compose an universal Character methodical and easie to be
written, yet intelligible in any Language; so that if an
English-man write it in English, a French-man,[5] Italian,
Spaniard, Irish,[6] Welsh,[7] being Scholars; yea, Grecian or
Hebritian shall as perfectly understand it in their owne Tongue,
as if they were perfect[8] English, distinguishing the Verbs from
the Nouns, the Numbers, Tenses and Cases as properly expressed in
their own Language as it was written in English.

Footnotes

[5] man--omitted. [6] Irish and. [7] or Welchman. P. [8] perfect--omitted. P.

[_An universall Character._] In 1668, the Royal Society ordered the printing of “An Essay towards a real Character, and a philosophical language; by John Wilkins, D. D. Dean of Ripon, and F. R. S.,” folio. It is dedicated to the president, William Lord Viscount Brouncker, and consists of a treatise of 454 pages, to which is appended a dictionary of 155 pages. The very extent of such a work is almost fatal to its acceptance, and we must admit that it is questionable whether, with all its learning and ingenuity, it affords a single hint calculated to promote the intended object.

In relation to this subject, the reader, desirous of enlarged information, could not do better than consult the recently published “Lectures on the Science of Language,” by Professor Max Müller, M. A.

It would be highly interesting to possess any clue whatever to the ideas of the Marquis on this subject. He was so truthful in his statements, that he must have made a considerable advance in the discovery of means for obtaining the end proposed, although he may have over-estimated its application, according to our judgment.

Of early publications on this topic we would especially notice, “Le Caractère universel, par lequel toutes Nations peuvent comprendre les conceptions l’une de l’autre en lisant par une escriture commune, à toutes leur propre langage maternelle. Par Cave Beck. M. A.” London, 1657, 12mo. Also “Joh. J. Becheri Spirensis character, pro Notitia Linguarum Universali.” Francfort, 1661. And “Ars signorum, vulgo character universalis et lingua philosophica,” by Georgius Dalgarno: a small 12mo. volume in Latin. 1661.

A system of a universal alphabet has been recently proposed for telegraphic purposes, by means of which it is believed all the sounds of the human speech may be recorded and transmitted; mastering all the sounds which the human voice is capable of uttering in any language. The proposed scheme is even said to have been severely tested by many eminent linguists. It is to be hoped that the announced discovery will be found to realize all it promises, and remunerate the ingenious inventor.

33.

To write with a Needle and Thred, white, or any[9] colour upon
white, or[1] any other[2] colour, so that one stitch shall
significantly shew any letter, and as readily and[3] as easily
shew the one letter as the other, and fit for any Language.

Footnotes

[9] any other. P. [1] or upon. [2] other--omitted. [3] and as. MS. and P.

[_A Needle-alphabet._]

34.

To write by a knotted Silk string, so that every knot shall
signifie any letter with Comma, Full point, or Interrogation, and
as legible as with Pen and Ink upon white Paper.

[_A knotted String-alphabet._]

35.

The like, by the fringe of Gloves.

[_A Fringe-alphabet._]

36.

By stringing of Bracelets.

[_A Bracelet-alphabet._]

37.

By Pinck’d Gloves.

[_A Pinck’d Glove-alphabet._]

38.

By holes in the bottom of a Sieve.

[_A Sieve-alphabet._]

39.

By a Lattin or[4] Plate Lanthorn.[5]

Footnotes

[4] or candlestick lantern. P. [5] plate candlestick Lanthorn.

[_A Lanthorn-alphabet._]

40.

By the Smell.

41.

By the Taste.

42.

By the Touch.

By these three Senses as perfectly, distinctly and unconfusedly, yea as readily as by the sight.

[_An alphabet by the--Smell; Taste; Touch._]

43.

How to vary each of these, so that ten thousand may know them,
and yet[6] keep the understanding part from any but their
Correspondent.

Footnote

[6] yet--omitted.

[_A variation of all and each of these._] We have here ten Alphabets, concluding with a variation on each, which, had it been given, would have at least increased the number to twenty, but that was by no means the limit. Cipher Alphabets are the least interesting portion of the “Century;” we imagine we trace in them some of the Marquis’s earliest studies, and fancy that later in life they were retained from fond recollections of the past.

These secret methods of corresponding are no longer of any service, and have no interest beyond what may attach to them in connection with the history of short-hand writing, wherein the object is rather dispatch than secrecy. Among early writers on the art of Senigraphy, and Stenography, are Bright, 1588, Bales 1590, Arnold Bostius, Trithemius 1600, Willis 1618, Dix 1633, Wilkins 1641, Cartwright 1652, Rich 1654, Falconer (“The Art of Secret Information,”) 1685, with others.

John Baptista Porta, a Neapolitan of considerable eminence, born 1445, and who died in 1515, wrote “De Occultis Literarium Notis, Libri quinque,” Argent. 1608, octavo, in which he gives no less than 180 different methods of secret writing.

The learned and ingenious Bishop Wilkins in 1641, published his “Mercury, or the Secret and Swift Messenger.”

Of line alphabets he says--“Who would mistrust any private news or treachery to lie hid in a thread, wherein there was nothing to be discerned, but sundry confused knots or other the like marks?” It is, however, easily effected by each party having like tablets marked at top with the alphabet, and having hooks down each side for the passing and holding of a thread worked backwards and forwards, in which action it is to have a knot made on it for the desired letter above; making altogether words and sentences.