Transcriber’s Note
Italic text displayed as: _italic_
SPECTACLE
SECRETS.
BY GEORGE COX.
SECOND EDITION.
LONDON:
PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR, 128, HOLBORN HILL;
AND SOLD BY
COX, 100, NEWGATE STREET;
HAMILTON, ADAMS, & CO., PATERNOSTER ROW;
COX, 5, BARBICAN;
AND BY ALL BOOKSELLERS AND OPTICIANS.
1844.
BASINGSTOKE:—PRINTED BY ROBERT COTTLE.
[Illustration: No. 1.]
[Illustration: No. 2.]
[Illustration: No. 3.
_Anti Pressure_
_Solid_
_Blue Steel._]
[Illustration: No. 4.]
[Illustration: No. 5.]
[Illustration: No. 6.]
[Illustration: No. 7.]
[Illustration: No. 8.]
PREFACE.
Every effort of human ingenuity professing to remove or lessen pain
and inconvenience, is, naturally enough, hailed with approbation, and
the public require not so much to be aroused to estimate fully the
advantages proposed, as to be guarded against implicit belief and
heedless confidence in the value and importance of the remedy. It
is, however, of the utmost importance to be accurately informed what
kind of benefit we may fairly expect from the use of the given means,
and to what extent this benefit may be obtained; and yet the man who
steps forward to state this plainly and fairly, too often fails of
the success which his undertaking deserves. Experience proves that
such endeavours have been contemned by some, looked upon with cold
indifference by others, and viewed with suspicion by nearly all. We
are too apt to suspect interested motives, to doubt the sincerity, and
undervalue the abilities of men, who have devoted their lives, and the
force of their talents, to a particular pursuit; and then, as though
this cunning incredulity was closely allied to implicit credence in the
wildest chimeras, we become ready listeners, and passive victims, to
pompous and plausible charlatans, who make the largest promises, alike
indifferent to the practicability or usefulness of their specifics.
“It is a great mistake,” said an able English statesman of the last
century, “to suppose men harmless because they are blockheads; the
dunce thinks neither of country nor of consequences in the pursuit of
his petty interests and passions, which may, and often do, lead him to
work the greatest public calamities.”
I have refrained from advancing any crude theoretical opinions, which
might fairly be questioned. The information conveyed in these pages is
of a practical character; has stood the purifying test of time; and,
being based upon the immutable principles of optical science, courts
every enquiry and challenges all investigation.
My object has been to provide the public with a compendium of sound and
standard information on this most interesting and essential subject, in
order that, possessing themselves of the truth, and becoming conversant
with the real merits of the question, they may no longer be the victims
of ignorant, designing, and knavish speculators, who so mercilessly
practise on their credulity. I have freely availed myself of facts and
observations with which I have become familiar in the course of my own
experience and connexion with an establishment of more than one hundred
years’ standing, and, at the same time, have endeavoured to condense in
one publication the essence of many voluminous treatises.
“It is only by condensing, simplifying, and arranging in the most lucid
manner possible, the acquired knowledge of past generations, that those
to come can be enabled to avail themselves to the full of the advanced
point from which they will start.”
I have only to add, that though I would not desire to offend the
critical acumen of any of my readers, yet, having but little leisure,
and those moments of rest being snatched from the busy whirl of
commercial pursuits, I have been much more anxious to give solid
information in language universally understood, and divested of
technicalities, than to employ nice set terms, chosen to please the
critic’s curious ear.
GEORGE COX.
The first edition of this work having found a ready sale, spite of
all the opposition and abuse lavished against it by the itinerant
_opticians_, I have reprinted it with such improvements as the kindness
of friends and my own experience have suggested.
128, HOLBORN HILL, LONDON,
_January, 1844_.
Reviewers’ Opinions of this Work.
“The information which this little book contains is really very good
and very applicable to the instruction both of the short-sighted, who
never reflect before they buy, and of the very long-sighted, who, from
excess of cunning in the search of great bargains, are, like our friend
Moses in the Vicar of Wakefield, open to very _gross_ impositions in
the matter of spectacles and their very _chagrin_ cases. Those who are
not opticians or oculists will do well to read the book before they
commit themselves in the purchase of glasses either from itinerant or
stationary quacks. But this is not all: though a simple monograph of
the frauds of one trade, the book may be generalized into “a manual
of the whole art of puffing,” and an exposure of the silly credulity
of the public in all its branches. Mr. Cox also discloses some of the
machinery of newspaper puffing in a way which almost tempts us to
claim it as “our thunder,” it is so much in unison with our published
opinions on the subject.”
_Athenæum._
“In this well-written work Mr. Cox has given a popular description of
the eye, and the adaptation of spectacles to correct constitutional
defects or organic disease: by attention to a few simple rules which he
lays down, any one may effectually fortify himself against the artful
representations of dishonest dealers in spectacles “made to sell.” The
public is indebted to Mr. Cox for having exposed the tricks of the
insidious marauders in several towns in which they were practising
their impositions, and his tract contains some correspondence between
him and several eminent surgeons, from which it appears that they had
been represented as vouching for pretended improvements in spectacles,
of which they either knew nothing at all, or with regard to which they
themselves had been deceived by the fraudulent pretenders.”
_Christian Advocate._
“This is a useful little work, treating on a subject of universal
importance—namely, defining the laws by which deficiency of sight can
be assisted, founded on scientific principles, and aided by extensive
observation in a long practice; we would recommend a perusal of
the pamphlet to such as are about to seek the aid of the maker of
spectacles.”
_Morning Advertiser._
“This little _brochure_ is correct, ingenious, and useful: moreover,
it is valuable as exposing the gross ignorance, impostures, and frauds
of Jews, pedlars, and other locomotive quacks. The humbug of _amber_
spectacles, _coloured_ pebbles, clarified crystals, &c., is here
thoroughly exploded. Altogether the information in this pamphlet is
well deserving of attention.”
_Aldine Magazine._
“An amusing exposure of the puffing and swindling systems pursued by
some self-styled opticians, from which besides may be gathered a good
deal of sound, practical information.”
_Era._
“If every body’s sight were impaired, we should strongly hope that this
little treatise would become universally known; but as we have reason
to believe there are some people in the world who can see a little, we
shall only address ourselves to the former, to whom we can confidently
recommend the perusal of this talented work. Besides a great deal of
necessary and sound information on the use and nature of spectacles, we
find a number of _exposés_ of the tricks pursued by many unprincipled
persons styling themselves opticians, which is put forth by the author
in a very distinct manner.”
_Blackwood’s Lady’s Magazine._
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER I.
Page.
Invention of Spectacles and Burning Glasses 1
Examination of Opticians—Artful Impositions 2
Duke of Wellington and the Bubble Schemes 4
Basis of Optical Knowledge—Physiology of the Eyes 6
CHAPTER II.
Failure of Sight and the Application of Spectacles 10
Lenses—how to determine their Focal Lengths 12
Brazil Pebbles—Periscopic and Parallel Lenses—Process of 13
Working—Tests of Quality—and Experiment 14
Railroad Spectacles—Neutral Tint Shades 16
Country-made Spectacles—Trial Box of Sight 18
CHAPTER III.
A Visit to the Optician—Rules for selecting Spectacles 21
Spectacle Frames—Russian Remedy for Short Sight 24
Solid Blue Steel Spectacles 26
Anti-pressure Spectacles—Single Eye Glasses injurious 27
Prices of Spectacles 28
CHAPTER IV.
Specious Quackery—Testimonial Writers 30
Amber Spectacles analysed—Puffing Advertisement 33
Opinions of Dr. Neill Arnott, Dollond, Curtis, &c. 34
Absurdity and Ignorance of Puffing Advertisers, 36
CHAPTER V.
Instances of Gross Imposition—Clarified Crystals and
Coloured Pebbles! 37
Naval and Military Officers—Definition of LAW 39
Ladies and Spectacles—Persevering Roguery 41
An Old Clothes Man Metamorphosed 43
CHAPTER VI.
Specimens of Puffing Advertisements, 44
Royal Patronage—Cataract Alarmists 45
Abstract of Act of Parliament 46
Newspaper Paragraphs, 50
CHAPTER VII.
Provincial and Metropolitan Scheming 52
Public Cautions—Tricks at Brighton 56
Liverpool Mercury—Parabolic Cheats 60
CHAPTER VIII.
Correspondence with the Duke of Wellington 61
—— Frederick Tyrell, Esq. J. Hodson, Esq. 62
Signatures of J. Soden, Esq., J. F. Ledsam, Esq.,
—— Alexander, Esq. 64
Correspondence with Robert Keate, Esq. 64
Pretended Discoveries, Humorous Scraps, &c. 66
SPECTACLE SECRETS.
CHAPTER I.
“Science should be stripped of every thing that tends to clothe it
in a strange and repulsive garb, and especially every thing that, to
keep up an appearance of superiority in its professors over the rest
of mankind, assumes an unnecessary guise of profundity and obscurity,
should be sacrificed without mercy.”—SIR I. F. W. HERSCHEL.
Spectacles and side-saddles, we are quaintly informed, became common
in England in the reign of Richard the Second. The ancients, however,
knew the power of burning-glasses, and one cunning rogue, we are told,
discovered a new way to pay old debts, by means of a round stone
or glass used in lighting of fires, with which he melted the bond,
written, as usual in those days, on wax. Their burning glasses were
spheres, either solid or full of water, their foci were consequently
very short and confused. A long interval occurred before spectacles
were constructed, and three hundred years elapsed between the invention
of spectacles and telescopes.
Our eyes should have our nicest and most tender care, since it is by
them we are familiarized with objects of the most exquisite interest
and beauty, abounding on the earth we inhabit, and in the starry
firmament above us:—
“My soul, while Nature’s beauties feast mine eyes,
To Nature’s God contemplative shall rise.”—DODSLEY.
The faculty of sight should be estimated and regarded by us with more
than ordinary care, when we reflect that it is the medium through
which the most exalted and gratifying impressions are received; and
our watchful regard to its healthful preservation and agreeable
exercise is the more required from the consideration, that while to its
admirable organization and delicate sense of perception we stand so
much indebted, those very qualities render it extremely sensitive to
injudicious treatment.
It would be a wholesome, fair, and proper regulation, to restrain all
from practising as opticians but those practically conversant with
the production and application of lenses for the purpose of aiding
the exercise of sight. It is considered indispensable for the surgeon
and medical practitioner to prepare for his profession by a course
of study, reading, and practical operations, and to be subjected to
an ordeal where his capabilities are examined and tested. Such an
arrangement, though it _may_ sometimes be abused, guarantees to us
practitioners who understand their duties; and thus are the many “ills
which human flesh is heir to” alleviated and subdued, while those
unfortunates who are practised upon by the empiric and miracle-monger,
have their calamities aggravated, and their sufferings increased.
It is a question often mooted, how far it is the duty of a just and
equal government to interfere in such cases for the protection of
its subjects: this, however, is evident, that whatever restrictive
laws are framed, if they are attempted to be enforced while a want
of information prevails upon the subject, the very people for whose
benefit and protection they are introduced, will, likely enough, view
them with distrust and suspicion, and, until the imposition has been
unmasked, will look upon those who have assumed characters not their
own, as persecuted individuals, entitled to their sympathy rather than
their detestation. It is by diffusing information, and clearing away
obscurity, that we shall erect the best safeguard against delusion.
Those who are ignorant are consequently credulous, superstitious,
and undefended against the tricks and subtleties of the artful and
designing.
If a book is published, our opinion is almost insensibly influenced
by what the reviewers say of it. If a new association, a company, or
enterprise of any kind is projected, we look to the list of directors,
committee, and patrons. Our education and universal custom induces us
to pay deference to those whom we suppose to be possessed of superior
information, to be men of character and reputation, and entitled, from
their position in society, to be regarded with respect.
These legitimate feelings have been so poisoned and tampered with by
those who have designedly entered into a conspiracy to hoodwink the
people, and share the plunder; and again by the hardly less criminal
apathy of others, who, without dividing the spoil, have suffered the
trickery to pass unexposed; that professional and literary men cannot
but perceive distrust and want of confidence in their decisions, now
becoming general among the reflecting and intelligent classes of
society, who see that they have been trifled with, and treated as
credulous dupes, and that they really have no guarantee for the merits
of a production, the purity of a proposal, or the honesty or propriety
of any measure to which distinguished names and lofty patronage are
appended. The exposé of the practices of the railway, mining, and other
bubble schemes illustrates this truth; and the secrets elicited during
the discussion on Mr. Serjeant Talfourd’s Copyright Bill, clearly
demonstrate how infamously the confidence of “a generous public” has
been abused.[1]
The great and benevolent men who existed before us, and devoted their
time and contemplations to the interesting science of optics, have
fully and clearly demonstrated the laws which regulate the action of
light, the cause and effect of luminous phenomena, and the principles
upon which vision depends. We have the conclusive and unvarying
results of their numberless experiments, performed under every
modification of circumstances, to guide us in establishing principles
and rules of action, which the studious and practical opticians of our
own times have tested, and, ascertaining them to be free from error,
now adopt and act upon them.
The captious and consequential may complain of this admission,
as tending to detract from the importance with which they might
otherwise be regarded; but the optician, who deserves that name, is
not anxious to array himself in borrowed plumage, nor to appropriate
as his own that which rightfully belongs to others. Granted that we
act upon settled and incontrovertible philosophical principles, is
it not infinitely more gratifying to have the assurance of a correct
result, than to be for ever experimentalizing without arriving at a
satisfactory conclusion? The skilful surgeon and the talented engineer
are guided in their operations by certain fixed and universal laws,
yet no one will dispute that to perform the duties of either of those
professions requires much application, skill, and expertness. Precisely
so with the optician of the present day. He has fixed, universal, and
certain data for his operations; and it is upon his intimate knowledge
of these, and the careful and judicious application of them, that his
success depends.
When the healthy powers of vision begin to fail, we feel a tender
and anxious concern to perpetuate the enjoyment we find to be so
intimately dependent upon the uninterrupted exercise of sight, and
are instinctively led to seek for a remedy. Much mischief will be
avoided, and misapprehension removed, if we consider that in applying
artificial aid to the eye, we have to do with one of our most
sensitive and easily deranged organs. The human eye is composed of
a series of humours and membranes: the outer coating, called the
_sclerotica_ (_a_), see _Plate, Fig. 1_, is exceedingly strong, and
the muscles which move the eye are attached to it; the white of the
eye is a portion of this coating. The _cornea_ (_b_) arches out or
projects from the eye-ball; it is transparent, and of a circular form.
The next coating to the sclerotica is called the _choroides_ (_c_);
it has no muscular motion except at its extremities, near the front
of the eye. The _iris_ (_d_) is next apparent; it attaches itself to
the sclerotica by a cellular substance called the _ciliary circle_
(_e_). According to the colour of the iris the eye is termed black,
blue, hazel, &c. It is composed of two sets of muscular fibres, the one
tending, like radii, towards a centre, the other forming a number of
circles concentric with the same centre. The aperture in the iris is
called the _pupil_ (_f_); it is always round, but varies in diameter
as the radial or the circular fibres of the iris are contracted
or expanded, according to the quantity and quality of light it is
required to admit, acting like a watchful centinel to regulate the
amount of rays requisite to transmit a perfect and well-defined image
of objects onwards to the brain, which, without its agency, would
appear one undistinguishable mass of confusion. The chamber of the eye
is darkened by the posterior surface of the choroid membrane having
a lining of dark-coloured mucus, called the _pigmentum nigrum_. The
last coating of the eye is the _retina_ (_g_), a delicate and most
important membrane in the construction of this noble instrument; it
is an expansion of the _optic nerve_ (_h_), directly emanating from
the brain; and is spread like a net of exquisite delicacy all over
the surface of the choroides, terminating at the ciliary ligament.
It receives the images of objects by means of the rays of light that
enter at the pupil; it is transparent, but appears black on account of
the dark pigmentum behind it. The optic nerve passes through a small
aperture in the “_architectural dome_” containing the eye, and it
conveys the impressions made on the retina into the depository of the
brain, where the “very form and spirit of the scene is now conceived.”
It is situated a little on one side of the centre of the eye, inclining
towards the nose.
To describe more minutely the various fibres, humours, and ciliary
processes of the eye, or to enter more fully into its anatomical
arrangement, would be incompatible with the design of this publication,
which is intended for the “general reader,” and therefore so simplified
as that it is hoped he cannot fail to understand. The three transparent
humours enclosed by the coats of the eye, viz., the _aqueous_ (_i_),
the _chrystalline_ (_k_), and the _vitreous_ (_l_), are, however,
too important to be passed over without some notice. The aqueous
(_i_) humour it is which gives a protuberant figure to the cornea
(_b_); it has a refractive power, similar to that of water, which it
also resembles in appearance. The chrystalline (_k_) humour is more
transparent than the purest chrystal; its form is that of a double
convex lens, which it also resembles in its use, as it converges the
rays which pass through it, from every visible object to its focus on
the retina. It is suspended in a fine transparent sheathing. The shape
or convexity of this natural lens alters occasionally, and shifts a
little backwards or forwards in the eye, so as to adapt its focal
distance from the retina to the different distances of objects. The
vitreous humour is situated at the back of the chrystalline, filling
nearly three-fourths of the globe of the eye; it is surrounded by a
thin capsule, which sends off a number of membranous processes into the
vitreous substance, where they form cells, which, communicating with
each other, give a high degree of firmness and tenacity to the whole.
_Fig. 2._ represents the eye at the time when spectacles are required,
the cornea, or the chrystalline, or both, having lost a part of their
natural convexity, consequent upon age or constitutional weakness.
An object placed at the same distance from the eye as in the perfect
eye, (_Fig. 1_), has the focus carried beyond the retina. A convex
lens applied to the eye compensates for this loss of capacity, and,
converging the rays, corrects the focal distance, and the image is now
imprinted naturally on the retina. The reverse of this takes place in
the case of the short-sighted; the humours being _more_ convex than in
the perfect eye, the rays converge in a focus _before_ they reach the
retina. A concave lens carries the focus further on, and, by its aid,
an object will be depicted perfectly on the retina.
No. 4 represents a plano convex lens—5, a double convex—6, a plano
concave—7, a double concave—8, a periscopic or meniscus lens.
What grandeur and sublimity of contrivance is here blended with
simplicity of action and power of expression! How indispensable to a
full appreciation of the bounties of nature and the beauties of art by
which we are surrounded! To be deficient of this heavenly gift is truly
to have “wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.”
Surely every consideration should influence us to treat this invaluable
faculty with judicious care, instead of allowing it to be tortured and
trifled with by the ignorant and unprincipled.
Having surveyed the general construction, and glanced at the inimitable
mechanism of those windows of the soul, we shall be better prepared to
understand the reasoning, and to comprehend the principles upon which
the science of optics is based. Those of my readers who have leisure
to pursue this subject, will find new light, and more convincing
illustrations attend their enquiry at every step. It is a subject
abounding in beauty and interest, introducing us to new regions of
sublimity and grandeur, where the contemplative mind will assuredly
find “ample scope and verge enough” to gratify its most exalted
anticipations. We have seen the admirable, yet at the same time
delicate contrivances by which the functions of the eyes are performed.
It cannot fail to have occurred to us, that a machine so beautiful and
complete is liable to derangement and improper treatment by the wayward
and the ignorant. If it is desirable that a person possessed of a
well-constructed watch should understand its general action, and know
what treatment it should have to keep it in sound and underanged order,
still more essential is it that every individual should possess a clear
and familiar knowledge of the nature of vision, and understand the
requirements of the eyes. I cannot forbear indulging a sanguine hope
that the circulation of this little manual will open the eyes of its
readers to the simple facts of the case, and animate them to think and
judge for themselves, instead of giving a ready ear to the marvellous
and ridiculous tales, which, though, like the sailor’s tough yarn,
so often told that the cheat believes them himself, are nevertheless
utterly devoid of truth.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] In the month of August, 1838, the solicitor to the Duke of
Wellington waited upon Sir Frederick Roe, at Bow-street, in reference
to the use which had been made of his grace’s name by “The London
Equitable Loan Company.” A gentleman, who was desirous of purchasing
shares in the company, seeing the Duke of Wellington mentioned as
patron, and that the account of the company was kept with the Bank of
England, wrote to the Duke to ascertain if it were true that he was
connected with the concern? The duke never had consented to become a
patron, but, on the contrary, when asked to do so, answered that he was
so situated that he could not comply with their request. On receiving
the communication the duke wrote to Sir F. Roe, to see what could be
done to guard the public against any transaction which might be entered
into in consequence of the use made of his name; and in answer to a
letter written by him to the Bank of England, he was informed “that no
such company was known there, nor had they any account of the London
Equitable Loan Company.” The publicity given to this manœuvre has no
doubt saved many a family from enthralment and destitution.