whole of what is here described. A bell rope attached to the
trigger will suffice to elicit fire, which, communicating with
a quick-match or fusee, will quickly ignite and produce the
required light. If the fire is previously prepared with wood
or some other combustible material, and a small quantity of
inflammable spirits sprinkled over it, the slightest spark will
throw the whole into a blaze. For the latter qualification
mentioned by the noble author, a pistol barrel may easily be
secreted under the tinder.
The inflammable air-lamp contrived by Volta possesses similar
properties: a stream of hydrogen gas being inflamed by the spark
from an electrophorus.--Vide _Brande's Manual of Chemistry_,
vol. i. p. 240.
No. XLVI.
How to make an artificial bird to fly which way and as long as one
pleaseth, by or against the wind, sometimes chirping, other times
hovering, still tending the way it is designed for.
NOTE.
In the year 1810, two birds were exhibited at the museum of
the late Mr. Merlin; these performed nearly all the evolutions
described by the Author: with this exception, however, that they
were supported by fine wires; and a similar bird was exhibited
in London in the year 1786.--Vide _77th Art. in the Century_.
No. XLVII.
To make a ball of any metal, which, thrown into a pool or pail of
water, shall presently rise from the bottom, and constantly show,
by the superficies of the water, the hour of the day or night, never
rising more out of the water than just to the minute it showeth of
each quarter of the hour; and if by force kept under water, yet the
time is not lost, but recovered as soon as it is permitted to rise
to the surface of the water.
NOTE.
A metal ball graduated on the surface, in the same manner as
the index stem to an hydrometer, with a balance to preserve
its equilibrium, must first be exhausted of air, which being
effected, the water may be allowed to enter by a small aperture,
and it will gradually sink till the vessel is filled: this, if
the ball is about 12 inches in diameter and the aperture of a
proportionate size, will not take place in less than twelve
hours.
No. XLVIII.
A screwed ascent, instead of stairs, with fit landing places to the
best chambers of each story, with back stairs within the _noel_ of
it, convenient for servants to pass up and down to the inward rooms
of them, unseen and private.
NOTE.
It is most probable that the Marquis here alludes to the
geometrical staircase now in such general use, with the addition
of a small flight of stairs in the centre, in lieu of the common
handrail, which being surrounded by a partition of boards,
would readily serve as a private communication with the upper
stories: sufficient space being left between the ceiling and
under side of the principal staircase to admit of a passage to
the inner rooms. Since writing the above, the Editor has seen a
more explicit account of this species of staircase. It occurs
in "Evelin's Memoirs," vol. i. page 59, and forms part of that
learned and amusing author's tour through France in 1644. The
following is an extract. "Quitting our barke, we hired horses
to Blois, by way of Chambourg, a famous house of y^e King's,
built by Francis I. in the middle of a solitary parke, full of
deere; the enclosure is a wall. I was particularly desirous
of seeing this palace, from the extravagance of the design,
especially the _stayrecase_, mentioned by Palladio. It is said
that 1800 workmen were constantly employed in this fabric for
twelve yeares; if so, it is wonderfull that it was not finish'd,
it being no greater than divers gentlemen's houses in England,
both for roome or circuit. The carvings are very rich and full.
The stayrecase is devised w^{th} four entries or ascents, which
cross one another, so that though four persons meete, they never
come in sight, but by small loope-holes, till they land. It
consists of 274 steps (as I remember), and is an extraordinary
worke, but of far greater expense than use or beauty."
No. XLIX.
A portable engine, in way of a tobacco-tongs, whereby a man may get
over a wall, or get up again, being come down, finding the coast
proveth insecure for him.
NOTE.
It is not very easy to discover to what the noble author here
alludes: if by _tobacco-tongs_, he means a combination of levers
such as is used by gardeners, to gather choice fruit or lop the
upper boughs of trees, the mode of applying them is extremely
easy. A number of short pieces of brass, jointed together, and
made to resemble a row of _trellis_ work, may, by distending the
joints in an horizontal direction, be made to go in the smallest
compass; and again, by closing the arms, the machine will be
elevated. An ingenious mechanic has constructed a _fire-escape_
upon this principle, of which a model is preserved in the Museum
of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, &c.
No. L.
A complete light portable ladder, which taken out of one's pocket,
may be by himself fastened an hundred feet high to get up by from
the ground.
NOTE.
A number of light brass tubes, each having a socket to receive
the end of the preceding joint, may be raised to any given
height, and with the assistance of small loops of cord will
fully answer the purpose here described. It will be necessary
to have a small stud at one end of each joint, with a narrow
slit at the end of the following tube to receive it, which
being carried on in a right angle for about twice its width,
will on being turned round serve as a key to prevent the joints
separating.
No. LI.
A rule of gradation, which, with ease and method, reduceth all
things to a private correspondence, most useful for secret
intelligence.
NOTE.
_Vide_ Article V.
No. LII.
How to signify words, and a perfect discourse, by jangling of bells
of any parish church, or by any musical instrument within hearing,
in a seeming way of tuning it, or of an unskilful beginner.
NOTE.
By varying the order of arrangement, the whole alphabet may
readily be rung on three bells; and these, being formed into
sentences by short pauses between each word, will fully serve
for distant conversation. For musical instruments, it is merely
changing keys for bells, and the same purpose may be answered
without the trouble of forming changes upon so small a number
of fixed tones. A table is subjoined, by the use of which a
combination of three bells is made to express the whole alphabet:
A represented by 111
B 112
C 113
D 121
E 122
F 123
G 131
H 132
I 133
K 211
L 212
M 213
N 221
O 222
P 223
Q 231
R 232
S 233
T 311
V 312
U 313
W 321
X 322
Y 323
Z 333
No. LIII.
A way how to make hollow and cover a water-screw, as big and as long
as one pleaseth, in an easy and cheap way.
NOTE.
A leathern water-pipe, such as is used by the firemen, being
nailed in a spiral form round a long circular pole, is the
cheapest and most simple method yet discovered of making the
Archimedean screw.
No. LIV.
How to make a water-screw tight, and yet transparent, and free from
breaking; but so clear, that one may palpably see the water, or any
heavy thing, how and why it is mounted by turning.
NOTE.
This may be readily effected either by making a coarse screw in
the usual manner, and covering it with horn, or by fitting a
spiral tube of glass on a wooden cylinder, and filling up the
interstices with wax or any hard cement so as to project beyond
the glass tube: this appears the most eligible method, though
the former is the most economical.
M. A. Rochon has likewise proposed a most ingenious substitute
for the use of horn in the construction of the Archimedean
screw, and other hydraulic instruments. It is formed (like the
safety lamp of Sir H. Davy) of a coarse wire gauze which, on
being immersed in pure fish-glue or size, forms when varnished a
cheap and durable substitute for the use of glass.
No. LV.
A double water-screw, the innermost to mount the water, and
the outermost for it to descend more in number of threads, and
consequently in quantity of water, though much shorter than the
innermost screw, by which the water ascendeth, a most extraordinary
help for the turning of the screw to make the water rise.
NOTE.
This appears one of those extraordinary slight of hand
discoveries in which the noble author is too apt to indulge;
and though we may readily admit that two water-screws may be
most advantageously employed in turning of any water-wheel,
where an abundant supply is found at the top of the machine,
it yet requires a greater share of penetration than we choose
to take credit for, to discover how a larger quantity of water
can descend than has been previously raised, or, if so, how the
machine could be at all applied to the _raising_ of water.
No. LVI.
To provide and make, that all the weights of the descending side of
a wheel shall be perpetually farther from the centre than those of
the mounting side, and yet equal in number and heft of the one side
as the other. A most incredible thing, if not seen, but tried before
the late king of happy and glorious memory, in the Tower, by my
directions; two extraordinary ambassadors accompanying his Majesty,
and the Duke of Richmond, and Duke Hamilton, with most of the court
attending him. The wheel was fourteen feet over, and forty weights
of fifty pounds a-piece. Sir William Belford, then Lieutenant of the
Tower, can testify it, with several others. They all saw, that no
sooner these great weights passed the diameter line of the upper
side, but they hung a foot farther from the centre; nor no sooner
passed the diameter line of the lower side, but they hung a foot
nearer. Be pleased to judge the consequence.
NOTE.
The celebrated problem of a self-impelling power, though denied
by Huygens and de la Hire, who have attempted to demonstrate its
fallacy, has yet been supported by some of the most celebrated
among the ancient as well as modern philosophers. Innumerable
have been the machines to which the idea of _the perpetual
motion_ has given birth; but the most celebrated among the
moderns is the _Orffyrean wheel_. This machine, according to
the description given of it by M. Grævesande, in his _Œuvres
Philosophiques_, consisted of a large circular wheel or drum,
twelve feet in diameter, and fourteen inches in depth. It
was composed of a number of thin deals, the spaces between
which were covered with wax cloth, in order to conceal the
interior parts of it. On giving the wheel, which rested on the
two extremities of an iron axis, a slight impulse in either
direction, its motion was gradually accelerated; so that after
two or three revolutions it is said to have acquired so great a
velocity as to make twenty-five or more turns in a minute: and
it appears to have preserved this rapid motion for the space of
two months, during which time the Landgrave of Hesse, in whose
chamber it was placed to prevent a possibility of collusion,
kept his own seal on the outer door. At the end of that time it
was stopped to prevent the wear of the materials. Grævesande,
who had been an eye-witness to the performance of this machine,
examined all the external parts of it, and was convinced that
there could not be any communication between it and the adjacent
rooms. Orffyreus, however, having been informed of the ill-timed
curiosity of the professor, and incensed at the refusal of a
premium of _twenty thousand pounds_, which he had made a _sine
quâ non_ for disclosing the mechanism of its construction,
broke the whole apparatus into atoms, and his life was soon
after sacrificed to chagrin at his disappointment. The analogy
between the Marquis's description and the Orffyrean wheel is
sufficiently evident; and the experiment having been made in the
Tower, more than fifty years prior to the attempt of the German
mechanic, it is more than probable that the idea was derived
from the noble author's work.
No. LVII.
An ebbing and flowing water-work in two vessels, into either of
which, the water standing at a level, if a globe be cast in, instead
of rising, it presently ebbeth, and so remaineth, until a like
globe be cast into the other vessel, which the water is no sooner
sensible of, but that the vessel presently ebbeth, and the other
floweth, and so continueth ebbing and flowing, until one or both
the globes be taken out, working some little effect besides its own
motion, without the help of any man within sight or hearing: but
if either of the globes be taken out, with ever so swift or easy
a motion, at that instant the ebbing and flowing ceaseth; for if,
during the ebbing, you take out the globe, the water of that vessel
presently returneth to flow, and never ebbeth after, until the globe
be returned into it, and then the motion beginneth as before.
NOTE.
This invention, which is evidently more a matter of curiosity
than of real utility, is no doubt effected upon the principle
of an ebbing and flowing spring; the throwing in of the ball,
by causing a commensurate rise of the water, fills a syphon,
and sets the water-work in motion, but as the effect of this
would cease after the two vessels attained an equilibrium, the
machine must be assisted by a moving power attached to one or
both of the vessels, as the Marquis merely says, that it may
be performed "without the help of any man _within sight or
hearing_."
No. LVIII.
How to make a pistol to discharge a dozen times with one loading,
and without so much as once new priming requisite; or to change it
out of one hand into the other, or stop one's horse.
NOTE.
An attentive examination of this and the subsequent articles
has suggested what appears an improvement of considerable
importance in the principle of modern fire-arms. The expense
attendant on the manufacture of double barrelled guns, and the
inconvenience which arises from their additional weight, have
hitherto prevented their coming into general use, though their
utility in the field is very generally allowed. An economical
gun uniting all the advantages of the one, with the lightness
and portability of the other, must therefore be considered
as a desideratum of the first importance. To effect this, a
common gun barrel must be pierced with the required number
of touchholes, at a sufficient distance to allow of an equal
number of charges. A detonating magazine gunlock may then be
made to slide on the lower part of the barrel, with a parallel
ratchet and click to fix precisely opposite the touchhole to be
inflamed. The gun must then be loaded by a graduated ramrod,
the powder of each charge being brought opposite its proper
touchhole. After the first discharge, the cock must be moved
back one tooth of the ratchet, and this motion continued till
the whole are exploded, each hole being covered successively by
a plate attached to the lock.
No. 60 is evidently performed by filling a cylindrical flask,
made the same size as the barrel, with the required number of
charges and afterwards forcing the whole of them into the barrel.
Nos. 61 and 67 may be performed by filling a flask previously
made to fit the breech of the musket, and forcing forward each
successive charge by a screw or lever, in the same manner as the
charging is effected in a magazine air-gun.
No. LIX.
Another way, as fast and effectual, but more proper for carabines.
_Vide_ Article LVIII.
No. LX.
A way, with a flask appropriated unto it, which will furnish either
pistol or carabine with a dozen charges in three minutes' time, to
do the whole execution of a dozen shots, as soon as one pleaseth,
proportionably.
_Vide_ Article LVIII.
No. LXI.
A third way, and particularly for muskets, without taking them from
their rests to charge or prime, to a like execution, and as fast as
the flask, the musket containing but one charge at a time.
_Vide_ Article LVIII.
No. LXII.
A way for a harquebuss, a crock, or ship musket, six upon a
carriage, shooting with such expedition, as, without danger, one
may charge, level, and discharge them sixty times in a minute of an
hour, two or three together.
_Vide_ Article LVIII.
No. LXIII.
A sixth way, most excellent for _sakers_, differing from the other,
yet as swift.
_Vide_ Article LVIII.
No. LXIV.
A seventh, tried and approved before the late king (of ever blessed
memory), and an hundred lords and commons, in a cannon of eight
inches and half a quarter, to shoot bullets of sixty-four pounds
weight, and twenty-four pounds of powder, twenty times in six
minutes; so clear from danger, that, after all were discharged, a
pound of butter did not melt, being laid upon the cannon britch, nor
the green oil discoloured that was first anointed and used between
the barrel thereof, and the engine having never in it, nor within
six foot, but one charge at a time.
_Vide_ Article XXIX.
No. LXV.
A way that one man, in the cabin, may govern a whole side of ship
muskets, to the number (if need require) of two or three thousand
shots.
NOTE.
The plan of this and the following Articles, though not of much
practical utility, may yet be acted upon with a certainty of
success. The powder may be ignited by the means of a powerful
electrifying machine made to communicate with each separate
piece, and the charging must be performed by conducting wires or
rods made to act upon the magazine lever described in Article
LVIII.
Since writing the above, an article has appeared on the subject
in one of the French Journals, of which the following is a
translation: At two o'clock in the afternoon M. Bouche made an
experiment in the _Jardin des Plantes_ at Paris, to try the
effect of electricity applied to gun batteries. Instead of
guns he had fixed about one hundred rockets on long sticks,
disposed in the garden. The rockets were all connected by an
iron wire, and the same spark produced a spontaneous explosion.
The concourse of people was very great, the weather being
remarkably fine. This new invention is not intended to increase
the destructive powers of those formidable weapons; but it is
expected to afford the means of using them without exposing
gunners to the fire of the enemy.
No. LXVI.
A way, that against the several avenues to a fort or castle, one man
may charge fifty cannons, playing and stopping when he pleaseth,
though out of sight of the cannon.
_Vide_ last Article.
No. LXVII.
A rare way likewise for muskettoons, fastened to the pommel of the
saddle, so that a common trooper cannot miss to charge them, with
twenty or thirty bullets at a time, even in full career.
NOTE BY THE AUTHOR.
When first I gave my thoughts to make guns shoot often, I
thought there had been but one only exquisite way inventible;
yet, by several trials, and much charge, I have perfectly tried
all these.
No. LXVIII.
An admirable and most forcible way to drive up water by fire, not by
drawing or sucking it upwards, for that must be, as the philosopher
calleth it, _infra sphæram activitatis_, which is but at such a
distance. But this way hath no bounder, if the vessels be strong
enough; for, I have taken a piece of a whole cannon, whereof the end
was burst, and filled it three-quarters full, stopping and screwing
up the broken end, as also the touchhole; and making a constant
fire under it, within twenty-four hours it burst and made a great
crack: so that having found a way to make my vessels, so that they
are strengthened by the force within them, and the one to fill after
the other, have seen the water run like a constant fountain stream,
forty feet high; one vessel of water, rarefied by fire, driveth up
forty of cold water: and a man that tends the work is but to turn
two cocks, that one vessel of water being consumed, another begins
to force and refill with cold water, and so successively, the fire
being tended and kept constant, which the self-same person may
likewise abundantly perform in the interim between the necessity of
turning the said cocks.
NOTE.
_Vide_ Article C., to which is prefixed a brief historical and
descriptive account of that stupendous machine, the Steam-engine.
No. LXIX.
A way how a little triangle and screwed key shall be capable and
strong enough to bolt and unbolt, round about a great chest, an
hundred bolts through fifty staples, two in each, with a direct
contrary motion, and as many more from both sides and ends, and at
the self-same time shall fasten it to the place, beyond a man's
natural strength to take it away; and, in one and the same turn,
both locketh and openeth it.
NOTE.
This invention, with its two following modifications, is
evidently intended to operate on the principle of applying a
screw for the purpose of forcing the _lock bolt_, in lieu of
using the handle of the key as a lever for that purpose. That
this plan might be applied to locks generally, there can be no
doubt, and by a similar contrivance the large keys at present in
use for outer doors, iron chests, &c. might be advantageously
reduced to the size described by the noble author. By employing
the escutcheon mentioned in No. LXXII. these locks would be
equally safe and much more simple than those in common use. For
the latter part of the Article, any ingenious smith may make a
lock with an hundred bolts; and to fasten it to the place, the
power of a screw key is abundantly sufficient to force an iron
bar through a staple previously fixed in the floor.
No. LXX.
A key, with a rose-turning pipe, and two roses pierced through
endwise; together with several handsomely contrived wards, which may
likewise do the same effects.
No. LXXI.
A key, perfectly square, with a screw turning within it, and more
conceited than either of the rest, and no heavier than the triangle
screwed key, and doth the same effects.
No. LXXII.
An escutcheon, to be placed before any of these locks with these
properties.
1. The owner (though a woman) may, with her delicate hand, vary
the ways of coming to open the lock ten millions of times,
beyond the knowledge of the smith that made it, or of me who
invented it.
2. If a stranger open it, it setteth an alarm a going, which
the stranger cannot stop from running out; and, besides, though
none should be within hearing, yet it catcheth his hand, as a
trap doth a fox; and though far from maiming him, yet it leaveth
such a mark behind it, as will discover him if suspected; the
escutcheon, or lock, plainly shewing what money he hath taken
out of the box, to a farthing, and how many times opened since
the owner had been at it.
NOTE.
The two principal properties of this escutcheon may be readily
contrived; and the first of them has, in fact, been already
applied to a very ingenious padlock, invented by Mr. Marshall,
and for which the Society of Arts voted him a reward of ten
guineas. In Mr. M.'s escutcheon the letters or figures commonly
used in the ring padlock allow an almost endless variety of
changes, and the owner may in one minute alter the arrangement
in such a manner that even the maker would experience as
much difficulty to open it, as an entire stranger to its
construction. To render the combination of letters variable, the
characters must not be engraved upon the outside of the rollers
themselves, but upon a thin brass hoop made to fit on its outer
surface; and a spring fastened to the roller, and pressing
upon the inside of the hoop, will cause a sufficient degree of
friction to make them move together.
The other part of this invention is equally simple with the
preceding. An alarum, such as is attached to a clock, may easily
be wound up prior to closing the box; and the lid provided with
a chamfered bolt or staple, capable of effecting its discharge
when the box is opened.
To register the amount of money taken from the box, it will
be necessary either to place each distinct piece of money in
separate divisions, or to put a number together in one deep
recess capable of admitting but one piece to pass at a time. As
the pieces are shaken out, they will in their passage raise a
lever capable of moving a wheel one division in the passage of
each piece.
The Bank of England have a method somewhat similar for
registering the number of notes worked from the printing press
of that establishment.
No. LXXIII.
A transmittable gallery over any ditch or breach in a town-wall,
with a blind and parapet, cannon proof.
No. LXXIV.
A door, whereof the turning of a key, with the help and motion of
the handle, makes the hinges to be of either side, and to open
either inward or outward, as one is to enter or to go out, or to
open in half.
NOTE.
By making the handle act on a lever communicating with the
hinges, they may be raised from their sockets on the required
side; and to open in half, it is merely necessary to joint them
in the centre.
No. LXXV.