if the papyri had undergone the action of fire, because it is since
their exposure to the atmosphere that they have suffered. They have,
indeed, all the appearance of charcoal, even the sticks on which they
are rolled; and it was therefore very naturally supposed that this
effect had been produced by the heat of the lava which overflowed that
devoted city; but Sir Humphry Davy has proved, that they were protected
from the heat by a thick bed of sand and ashes, and, in his opinion,
their charred appearance has been the result of a gradual process of
decomposition.”
“What means, uncle, could be taken to unfold and read manuscripts that
were in such a state? Surely all the characters must have been effaced.”
“No, not quite: the characters are seen black and shining upon the black
but not shining surface; just in the same way that a letter sometimes
appears after we have burnt it, the traces of writing being still
visible on the gauzy substance, while it flickers about in the smoke, at
the back of the grate. To unrol them, many ingenious contrivances were
invented; that which I saw, when at Portici, and which, I believe, has
been generally adopted, is to glue some thin flexible material to the
back of the papyrus, and then to raise it gently by a number of threads,
while the folds are at the same time carefully opened by a pin. In this
way a few of the most perfect have actually been restored, and
published; but, to the great disappointment of the world, they are works
of no value. One is a treatise on the inutility of music, in Greek; a
few pages of a Latin poem, and some other fragments, but all equally
uninteresting. One of the chief difficulties arose from the adhesion of
the folds, as if they had been gummed together; and to conquer this Sir
Humphry applied the resources of his profound chemical knowledge. He
exposed some of the fragments to the action of chlorine, and to the
vapour of iodine, and succeeded to a considerable extent in loosening
and detaching the folds; but the jealousy of the Neapolitans prevented
his further progress, and he left them to pursue their own plans.
Unfortunately, the best specimens were operated on long ago, and those
that now remain are in too mutilated a state to afford much hope for the
future.”
“But,” said Caroline, “as they are rapidly unburying Pompeii, perhaps
some manuscripts may be found there--and in a much more perfect state;
for Pompeii was covered with mud and ashes, and not with burning lava
like Herculaneum.”
“Several rolls of papyrus,” my uncle replied, “have been already found
in the houses of Pompeii, but all in a far worse condition than those of
Herculaneum,--having nearly the appearance of the white ashes produced
by burning common paper.”
“Then, uncle,” said I, “to what quarter do you look for the lost books
of Livy?”
“To the vast collections of vellum manuscripts,” he answered, “which
have for centuries been accumulating in public and private libraries.
It has been discovered, that many of these have been twice written upon,
and some even three times. In the middle ages the art of reading and
writing was almost entirely confined to the monks; and all true taste
for literature being suspended, it was natural that they should consider
the finest effusions of the ancient poets, or the most important records
of profane history, as of little value, in comparison with the statutes
of their own order, or the histories of their general councils. It
appears, therefore, to have been a common practice of those times, to
expunge the writing on the parchment manuscripts in their possession, in
order to substitute copies of those works which they estimated so much
more highly; and in some instances the former characters have been
discovered, and successfully traced.”
“But, papa, if the original writing was expunged, how is it now
legible?” Frederick asked.
“The ink,” said my uncle, “in general use among the ancients, was merely
a mixture of lamp-black and gum; and, as that did not sink into the
parchment, a wet cloth in the hands of a monk did the business as
effectually and finally as your sponge, Frederick, annihilates your most
elaborate calculations from a slate. But the injury to which writing,
with such materials, was liable from damp and other accidents, had been
long known, and various expedients were adopted to provide a remedy.
Pliny says it was difficult to efface ink which had been made with
vinegar; and it appears, that at a later period, some preparation of
iron was added for the same purpose, as both of these ingredients sink
into the parchment. In either of those cases, the lamp-black, or
colouring matter, could be only partially removed by washing; so that it
was necessary to scrape the surface, in order to obliterate the
characters, or to rub it with pumice stone, in the same manner that it
had been originally prepared for writing on; and to such a parchment or
manuscript the name of _palimpsest_ was given, from a Greek word
signifying twice scraped. But though the process that I have described
apparently removed the writing, it could not draw out the infusion of
iron which had been absorbed by the parchment; and as you all know that
ink is nothing but a combination of iron with a solution of _galls_, it
will readily occur to you, that by applying that solution with a light
brush, to any of the palimpsest manuscripts, the original writing would
be revived,--provided there had been any iron in the composition of the
ink.”
“What a beautiful discovery!” exclaimed Caroline. “And when generally
known, how zealously will all our antiquaries attack the hordes of
manuscripts now dormant in the public libraries!”
“Yet,” said my uncle, “it is not a new discovery; the celebrated
Montfaucon endeavoured to draw the attention of the learned world to
these palimpsest parchments just a century ago; but antiquaries are not
put into zealous activity quite so easily as you imagine. In that long
interval, nothing very material seems to have been effected till the
present accomplished librarian of the Vatican devoted himself to the
subject; and the success with which his efforts have been already
crowned, more than justify the sanguine hopes which I expressed. Other
industrious labourers are also in the field, and what has been already
achieved is only a pledge of the rich harvest that will distinguish this
age.”
_6th._--In conversing about our approaching journey, and the fine
mountainous tracks that we are to see in Wales, Wentworth asked the
meaning of the word _pen_, which is prefixed to some of the Welsh names,
as Pen-man-mawr, for instance.
“It is an old British word,” my uncle told him, “signifying head or
summit; and it is joined to the names of several of those hills, amongst
the inhabitants of which much of that ancient dialect is still to be
found.
“It is singular that this term appears to have been used in the same way
among the Romans; for we find that the crest of the Alps near Mount St.
Bernard was anciently called _Alpes Penninæ_; and that the very same
name was also applied by them to the central chain of mountains which
extends from the borders of Scotland to the middle of Derbyshire. This
Penine chain traverses the great northern coal district; and many of its
hills retain the old British term pen, as, Penygent, Pendle hill, &c.”
“There are several wild and very picturesque views,” said my aunt, “in
that Penine chain; and its caverns, precipices, and torrents, have all a
singular character, particularly the sublime and curious scenery of _The
Peak_. I am sure, Caroline, you recollect a beautiful description of the
banks of the Greta in Yorkshire, in your favourite poem of Rokeby.”
Caroline immediately repeated these lines--
“Broad shadows o’er the passage fell,
Deeper and narrower grew the dell;
It seemed some mountain, rent and riven,
A channel for the stream had given,
So high the cliffs of limestone grey
Hung beetling o’er the torrent’s way,
Yielding along their rugged base
A flinty foot-path’s niggard space;
Where he who winds ’twixt rock and wave,
May hear the headlong torrent rave,
And like a steed in frantic fit,
That flings the froth from curb and bit,
May view her chafe her waves to spray
O’er every rock that bars her way.”
“I have lately read two facts,” Mary said, “which shew the depth of
those remarkably abrupt ravines that intersect these craggy mountains in
the moorlands of Staffordshire. In Narrowdale, the sun is never seen by
the inhabitants for the three winter months; and even when it is
visible, it does not rise to them till one o’clock in the afternoon. The
other circumstance is this--at Leck, the sun at a certain time of the
year, seems to set twice in the same evening: for, after it sinks
beneath the top of a high intervening mountain, it again breaks out from
behind the steep northern side before it reaches the horizon.”
_7th._--My uncle shewed me to-day a hard black substance of very close
grain. I did not know what it could be, for it evidently was not coal,
nor flint. He told me, that the soil which covers the great northern
coal-field appears to be alluvial, and that it contains masses of all
the different rocks that compose the whole district; and among them,
portions of this hard black _basalt_ are found every where in abundance.
“I shew you this,” he said, “because the ancient inhabitants of Britain
formed the heads of their battle-axes, which are commonly called
_celts_, from this stone. They resemble in shape the tomahawks of the
South Sea islands. Barbed arrow-heads, neatly finished, and made of
pale coloured flint, are also frequently picked up on the moors, and
are called _elf-bolts_.”
I asked, if those things were often found in other parts of England, as
they must be very interesting in tracing the history of our early
ancestors.
“Yes,” said he, “in all parts of Great Britain; and not only weapons,
but various utensils; besides other articles, of which the uses have not
been ascertained. For instance, at Kimmeridge, on the coast of
Dorsetshire, where there are beds of a kind of stony coal, there has
been found on the tops of the cliff’s, what the country people call
‘_coal money_.’ The pieces are round, and about two inches and a half in
diameter, by a quarter of an inch in thickness; one side is convex, with
mouldings, and the other is flat and plain, but with two, or sometimes
with four small round holes in the surface. They are, in general, two or
three feet below the surface, inclosed between two stones, set edgeways,
and covered by a third; and the bones of some animal are always found
along with them. A little deposit of this coal-money was also discovered
in a shallow bowl of the same material.”
“And was coal ever really used as money, uncle? It would make rather a
bulky currency.”
“Some people imagine that they were amulets; others, that they were
connected with the ancient Druidical rites; and many suppose them to
have been coin. Perhaps the cant, or vulgar expression, ‘down with your
coal,’ which means ‘pay your money,’ may assist you in choosing which of
these hypotheses you like best.”
_8th._--The back gate of the garden is not often unlocked, and to-day
when the gardener was going to open it, the key-hole appeared to be so
stopped up, that he took off the lock, and finding a little nest in the
inside, he brought it to my uncle.
It proved to be the nest of a species of bee, called _apis manicata_.
The cells are formed of two or three layers of a silky membrane, which
seems to be composed of a kind of glue secreted by the insect; it
resembles gold-beater’s-leaf, but so thin and transparent, that you can
distinguish through it the colour of the smallest object. As soon as
each cell is completed, I am told that the bee deposits an egg in it,
and then nearly fills it with a mixture of pollen and honey; and so
proceeds till all the cells are finished and filled. As the situation is
rather cold for the grubs, we found the cells plastered over with the
same composition, and even a warm outer coating of wool was stuck to
this paste to preserve them from any change of temperature. The wool
appeared to be the down of some plant; and my uncle says, they have
been observed to scrape the down from the leaves of the woolly
hedge-nettle, and the common rose campion, with their mandibles; while
with their fore legs they roll it into a little ball and carry it to the
nest.
I have been excessively busy putting my garden in order before we set
out. Indeed, I have become so wonderfully active, that you would
scarcely know your little indolent girl; and I am often inclined to sing
the old nursery song to myself, “Sure this is none of I.” Among other
things, I have performed a grand operation in my hyacinth beds. Lady
Binning, you know, is a great florist; I heard her speak of the manner
in which her gardener manages the hyacinths, for which her garden is
remarkable; and I determined to try it. As soon as the leaves become all
yellow, he takes up the bulbs, removes the loose skins and offsets and
all the fibres that are decayed, and immediately replants them in a bed
of fresh compost. Her ladyship told us, that when treated in this
manner, they equal the Dutch hyacinths in strength.
All this was duly executed yesterday. I had been watching the leaves for
some time, as I wanted them to be quite yellow; and I now flatter myself
with having a very grand display next year.
I had also many cuttings to make, and seedlings to plant out, as well as
layers of pinks and carnations, and various plants to trim and tie up;
besides the daily occupations of weeding, watering, pruning, and
earthing.
_9th._--I have just found the most curious miniature cocoons of yellow
cotton, sticking on a chrysalis of the cabbage caterpillar. Some time
ago I put up two of these caterpillars in paper boxes; they were
regularly fed, and made quite comfortable; and now though one is a
perfectly sound chrysalis, the other is only an empty skin. In the
little book which I have so often mentioned, Mary shewed me the cause of
this in the dialogue between Lucy and her mother on _ichneumons_; it was
from their eggs, which were deposited in the body of the caterpillar,
that the maggots proceeded who destroyed it, and then spun those pretty
little yellow cocoons. It is a great pleasure, mamma, to have traced a
curious fact of this kind for myself, and actually to have seen one
chrysalis dwelling in another. These ichneumons must be very useful in
thus destroying other mischievous insects: Reaumur found, that out of
thirty common cabbage caterpillars which he put into a glass to feed,
twenty-five were killed by an ichneumon; and my aunt says, that if the
myriads of caterpillars which prey on our vegetables, are compared with
the small number of butterflies that they usually produce, it will
appear that they are destroyed in a still larger proportion. This is
one of the innumerable instances of the goodness of Providence, which
balances the necessary evils of one tribe of animals by the instinctive
efforts of another.
My aunt told me, that in St. Domingo the cassada and indigo plantations
are materially injured by a large caterpillar. When it changes to its
last robe of sea-green, its tortures begin; a swarm of ichneumon flies
fasten themselves all over the poor victim, drive their stings into the
skin, and then deposit their eggs in the wounds they have made. The
caterpillar swells and becomes of a deeper green, and in a fortnight,
when the eggs are hatched, it appears covered with little worms, which
start out of every pore. The existence of these worms is but short;
after raising themselves on one end, shaking their heads, and swinging
themselves in every direction, each of them begins to form its cocoon;
and in two hours the caterpillar is completely clothed in a white robe.
In eight days the ichneumon flies are hatched, and the little cocoons
they leave behind are composed of a very fine silky cotton of the most
dazzling whiteness, which may be used without any preparation, as soon
as the flies have quitted them.
The quantity of this glossy substance, produced by the millions of those
little parasites, is so great, that it is said a single person has
collected a bushel in two hours. But the chief importance of their
services is, the keeping within bounds the mischievous cassada
caterpillars; and as these caterpillars are destroyed by heavy rain, it
has even been proposed to collect and put them under cover as soon as
the ichneumon’s eggs are deposited, in order to multiply these useful
insects.
_10th._--June is really a most lovely month here;--the trees are clothed
in foliage of the freshest green, and flowers are scattered everywhere
in profusion. Mowing is just beginning, and everybody looks busy,
active, and cheerful.
I was very happy yesterday; we went to see the sheep-shearing at Farmer
Moreland’s; it seemed to be almost a festival, and was conducted with a
degree of regularity and ceremony that was quite amusing. Caroline
delights in these rural employments; and we were all allowed to go there
early in the morning. We found the sheep enclosed in a fold under the
shade of an ash-grove, and the shearers seated on the knotted roots of
some of the old trees. Dame Moreland gave us some brown bread and new
milk; and before the day grew very hot we returned home. In the evening,
however, having dined early, we returned to the pretty grove and the
poor bleating sheep, whom I could not help pitying when thrown down to
be shorn; though they looked a great deal more comfortable as soon as
they were relieved from their thick hot clothing.
I saw some of them washed a day or two before the shearing began; their
fleeces were well rubbed and rinced in the stream, and then the poor
creatures ran to a sunny bank,
Where, bleating loud, they shook their dripping locks.
My uncle told me that England has been always famous for its sheep and
their rich fleeces, the various qualities of which are so well suited to
the different branches of our woollen manufactures; but it is the Downs
of Dorsetshire, and all the southern and western counties, which supply
those sheep whose fleeces are employed in making the finest broad cloth.
We stayed till the men ceased working, and till we had seen the shearers
and all their assistants sitting down to a comfortable supper, with
abundance of cider; we then left them, and came home by a long winding
path. We were quite in the dark for some of the last part of the walk,
which gave me an opportunity of seeing the English glow-worm on the dry
banks at the edge of the forest.
When evening closes Nature’s eye,
The glow-worm lights her little spark
To captivate her favourite fly,
And tempt the rover through the dark.
Conducted by a sweeter star,
Than all that decks the skies above,
He fondly hastens from afar,
To soothe her solitude with love.
My uncle told me that Dr. Macartney, who has investigated the subject of
luminous insects with great ability, has ascertained, that in the
glow-worm, part of the light proceeds from a yellow substance lying
underneath a transparent part of the skin. Besides this, he observed in
the last segment of the body, two minute oval sacks, formed of an
elastic fibre, wound spirally, and containing a yellow substance also,
but of a closer texture, and giving a more permanent light. This light
seemed less under the control of the insect than the other, which it has
the power of voluntarily extinguishing, and which ceases to shine when
extracted from living glow-worms; but the two sacks, when taken out,
continue to give light for some hours.
_11th, Sunday._--“I think, father,” said Mary, “that in reflecting on
the three dispensations, it appears, that neither the Jews, nor the
religious people of the patriarchal ages had that clear and distinct
knowledge of the doctrine of future rewards and punishments which we
Christians possess; nor that full conviction of the immortality of the
soul which now cheers mankind.”
“True,” said my uncle, “those awful truths had indeed been early opened
to them, and they were gradually unfolded with increasing clearness by
the later prophets; but at the best they were obscurely understood, or,
in the language of St. Paul, they were seen as ‘through a glass,
darkly.’ It was reserved for our Saviour to throw such a clear and
steady light upon the doctrine of immortality, that ‘we might have a
strong consolation, who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope
set before us: which hope we have as an anchor of the soul, both sure
and stedfast[9].’
“This beautiful simile,” continued my uncle, “which compares hope to an
anchor, was first used by St. Paul. The ancient poets described Hope as
a nymph, decorated with smiles and flowers, and soothing the labours of
man with the idea of distant pleasures; but St. Paul represents hope as
the stay and anchor of the soul; and so striking is the figure, that it
has been since adopted into every language. He does not allude to the
vain wishes arising from a heated imagination, but to the stedfast hope
which springs from faith: as the vessel is kept firm at her anchor, in
defiance of storms and currents, so the Christian is ‘not moved away
from the hope of the Gospel,’ by adversities and temptations.
“You are all acquainted with the ancient fable of Pandora’s box; at the
bottom of which it is said that, as the only means of supporting the
human race under the multiplied evils that were about to issue from it,
Jupiter placed the last and best blessing of Hope. It is not improbable
that this fable was founded on a tradition of the original promise of
the future seed; the hope of which could alone have sustained the
virtuous part of mankind amidst the general corruption that followed the
transgression of Adam.
“But an unsettled kind of hope will be of little avail; to be useful it
must be grounded on faith; on that entire faith which not only believes
in the authenticity of our Saviour’s sacrifice, and in the importance of
the doctrines he taught, but which fully and gratefully confides in the
sufficiency of his atonement. Then hope indeed helps us to anticipate
the glorious future; we view him as risen triumphantly to heaven; and we
feel that we shall partake in the happiness of the hereafter, which He
has promised.
“That the hopes of a future state are natural to the mind may be
inferred from the craving and dissatisfied feeling which accompanies our
very enjoyments, and which always more or less clouds them with fresh
wishes and indefinite hopes. These hopes, it is true, in the worldly
man, are set upon pleasures, business, or ambition; or on some of those
bustling objects of life, which, from their vicinity to the human eye,
assume a false magnitude. But the true Christian learns that heavenly
objects, which from their distance appear comparatively faint, swell
upon the sight of those who earnestly study them; while the others fade
away, and elude the grasp. Religion assists him in correcting those
illusions of vision; faith helps him in assigning the proper direction
to his hopes; and he makes it his continual care to preserve the
enlightened views, which, through the divine mercy, he has obtained.
This awful truth has sunk deeply into his mind, ‘The things which are
seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal;’ and a
just impression of their relative value enables him to maintain a happy
composure in all the vicissitudes of life.”
Before my uncle dismissed us, he said, “This, my dear little friends, is
the last quiet home Sunday that we shall have for some time. Before we
return, many unforeseen changes may occur; we are going, as it were, to
launch into the world; we may be separated; and our regular habits must
be unavoidably interrupted. But in every situation we can cultivate and
strengthen in our hearts the Christian hope; and though we may perhaps
no longer give each other mutual aid, we can, at least, each of us watch
over our own hearts. Let me then intreat your attention to a few
practical hints.
“Never allow yourselves to consider religion as a painful restraint, but
rather as the performance of a grateful duty. Whenever that duty has
the least appearance of being irksome, search and you will find that
some incompatible but favourite pursuit entices away your thoughts:
throw it then aside, however blameless it may otherwise be, or however
innocent may be its pleasures. Remember with whom St. Paul classes those
who are ‘lovers of pleasures more than lovers of God.’
“Frequently examine the state of your moral and religious feelings, and
when you perceive a deficiency in any point, beware of lowering the
standard of virtue to meet your practice; instead of endeavouring to
rise to the level of your duty.