and Towns incorporate in the County which I have placed in the upper margin of the Map but on the sides and bottom those of the Nobility and Gentry are industriously ranged in Alphabetical order to avoid the difficulties that might otherwise have risen about precedency which beside the use above mentioned of discovering the Owners of the Houses and that they are an ornament to the Map I hope may also have these other good effects 1. That the Gentry hereby will be somwhat influenced to keep their Seats together with their Arms least their Posterity hereafter not without reflexions see what their Ancestors have parted with And secondly Vagabonds deterr'd from making counterfeit Passes by puting false names and Seals to them both which may be discovered by such Maps as these To these add the ancient houses of Kings the principal Seats of ancient Baronies ancient Ways Fortifications and the sites of Religious houses all distinguish'd as described by their respective marks in the Table for that purpose All which put together make the sum of the Map as I intend they shall in all others hereafter so that those Memento's need no more be repeated since they are designed to be applyed to all following Maps as well as this Yet this Map though it contains near five times as much as any other of the County before partly by reason of its being the first I ever made and partly because either of the pure ignorance or absence of some and over curious pievishness that I met with amongst others is not so perfect I confess as I wish it were there being upon these accounts some few Arms omitted and others out of place at the foot of the Map and perhaps here and there a Village overlook'd wherefore I have entertained some thoughts of cutting it again and perhaps somwhat larger to be hung up in Frames without alteration of this for the Book with all the defects above-mentioned supplyed provided such Gentry as find their Arms omitted or any Villages near them containing ten houses under which number I seldom think them worth notice please to bring in their Arms in colours with the particular bearings and distances of their Houses and Villages from the most noted place near them to the Porter or one of the Keepers of the Bodleyan Library who will be ready to receive them or any other Curiosity of Art or Nature in order to the compiling an Appendix to this Work to be Printed apart Which is all concerning the Map but that the Reader also note that the Right Honorable the Earl of Berkshire Lord Lovelace c. are designedly left out in regard that though they have Estates and Seats in this County yet their chiefest and places of most common residence being elsewhere I have chosen rather to omit them here and to place them in those that seem their more desirable Counties Concerning the History it self I can advise little more but that I undertook it at first for my own pleasure the subject of it being so pleasant and of so great variety that it surprised me to think how many Learned Ages had past careful and laborious enough in compiling the Civil and Geographical Histories of England without so much as ever attemting that of Nature or Arts it seeming to be a design had the Undertaker been suitable more highly deserving of the publick too than either of the former as tending not only to the advancement of a sort of Learning so much neglected in England but of Trade also which I hope in some measure is made to appear in the following Treatise Which though sufficient to justifie my choice of this subject yet I ventured not upon it without the joint approbation of the most knowing in these matters such as the Honorable Robert Boyle Esq Dr. Willis Dr. Wallis Dr. Bathurst c. whose celebrated names serving to remove the groundless suspitions many had of the attemt I proceeded to give this Specimen of it Wherein the Reader is only desired to take notice that most of the Curiosities whether of Art Nature or Antiquities engraven in the Cuts are so certain truths that as many as were portable or could be procured are in the hands of the Author But for such things as are inseparable from their places they remain to be seen as in the History directed there being nothing here mention'd but what either the Author has seen himself or has received unquestionable testimony for it which for the most part if not alwaies the Reader will find cited In the Philosophical part I have chiefly embraced the Principles of Dr. Willis as the most universally known and received and therefore most likely in this inquisitive Age to be the truest which if I have any where mis-applied as 't is manifold odds some where or other I may yet I doubt not but the Learned and sober Reader will candidly accept of the honesty of my endeavor in excuse of my Error But as for the hot-headed half-witted Censurer who perhaps only looks on the Title of a Chapter or here and there a Paragraph that makes for his turn I must and do expect the lash of his tongue it being indeed his business to find out the lapses and decry all attemts wherein forsooth he himself has not been consulted But I would have such to know that if I meet with but proportionable encouragement from the former 't is not all they can say or do shall discourage me from my purpose for if I have erred in any thing I shall gladly receive the calm reproofs of my Friends and still go on till I do understand my business aright in the mean time contemning the verdict of the ignorant and fastidious that throw words in hast To the Right Reverend Father in God IOHN by divine permission L. d BISHOP of OXON THE MAP OF OXFORDSHIRE being his Lordship's Diocess newly delineated and after a new manner with all imaginable Reverence is humbly dedicated by R.P. L.L.D. Michael Burghers sculp THE NATURAL HISTORY OF Oxford-shire CHAP. I. Of the Heavens and Air. OXFORD being not undeservedly by Mr. Cambden stiled Our most noble Athens The Muses seat and One of Englands Pillars nay The Sun The Eye c. It would have occasion'd as strange a remark as any to be mention'd in this whole Essay had there not some eminent Celestial Observations been made in this County especially since that stupendous Mathematical Instrument now called the Telescope seems to have been known here above 300 years ago But these being chiefly matters of Art relating either to the discovery of the magnitude figure or determination of the motions of the Heavenly Bodies must be referr'd as most proper to the end of this Work it being my purpose in this History of Nature to observe the most natural method that may be 2. And therefore I shall consider first Natural Things such as either she hath retained the same from the beginning or freely produces in her ordinary course
as Animals Plants and the universal furniture of the World Secondly her extravagancies and defects occasioned either by the exuberancy of matter or obstinacy of impediments as in Monsters And then lastly as she is restrained forced fashioned or determined by Artificial Operations All which without absurdity may fall under the general notation of a Natural History things of Art as the Lord Bacon a De Augm Scient Lib. 2. cap. 2. well observeth not differing from those of Nature in form and essence but in the efficient only Man having no power over Nature but in her matter and motion i. e. to put together separate or fashion natural Bodies and somtimes to alter their ordinary course 3. Yet neither shall I so strictly tie my self up to this method but that I shall handle the two first viz. The several Species of natural things and the errors of Nature in those respective Species together and the things Artificial in the end apart Method equally begetting iterations and prolixity where it is observed too much as where not at all And these I intend to deliver as succinctly as may be in a plain easie unartificial Stile studiously avoiding all ornaments of Language it being my purpose to treat of Things and therefore would have the Reader expect nothing less then Words Yet neither shall my Discourse be so jejune as wholly to consist of bare Narrations for where the subject has not at all or but imperfectly been handled I shall beg leave either to enlarge or give my opinion 4. Since then the Celestial Bodies are so remote that little can be known of them without the help of Art and that all such matters according to my proposed method must be referred to the end of this Book I have nothing of that kind to present the Reader with that 's local and separate from Art but the appearance of two Parhelia or mock-Suns one on each side of the true one at Ensham on the 29th of May early in the morning in the year 1673. With them also appeared a great circle of light concentrical to the true Sun and passing through the disks of the spurious ones as in Tab. 1. Fig. 1. which though I saw not the Phaenomenon is as truly drawn for so it was confest by some that did as I could possibly have done it if personally present and yet so incurious was the amazed multitude that they could not so much as give me ground to guess at the diameter of the circle much less whether it were interrupted in some of its parts or intersected as they usually are with any other circles of a fainter colour 5. Whether these appearances are caused by reflection or refraction in the Clouds according to the old Philosophy or by both in a great annulary cake of Ice and Snow as Des Cartes or by semiopaque Cylinders as M. Hugens de Zulichem will be too too tedious hereto dispute Let it therefore at present suffice that this Phaenomenon is worthy our notice in regard 1. That no circle passes through the true Suns disk nor the spurious ones found in the intersection of two Irides as in those that appeared at Rome March 20. 1629. b Des Cartes Meteor cap. 10. Gassend in Ep. ad Renerium and in France April 9. Anno 1666. c Philos Trans num 13. 2. That whereas generally such mock-Suns appear not so bright nor are so well defined as the true one is these according to the agreement of all appeared of so even and strong a light that 't was hard to distinguish the true from the false and perhaps might not be inferior to the Parhelia mention'd by Cardan d De rerum Varietate lib. 14. c. 70. or that lately were seen in Hungary e Philos Trans numb 47. 6. When they appear thus bright and illustrious Astrologers heretofore always presaged a Triumvirate thus the Triumvirate of Antonius Augustus and Lepidus with all the evils that attended it was referred to the Parhelia seen a little before and herein Cardan is so positive that he fears not to assert That after such an appearance we seldom if ever fail of one and therefore refers the Parhelia seen by himself to the Triumvirate of Henry the second King of France Charles the fifth and Solyman the Turkish Emperor And truly were not these to be more than suspected of vanity it were easie to adapt a Triumvirate to ours But my Religion and that God that hath exhorted us not to be dismayed at the signs of Heaven and solemnly professes that 't is even He that frustrates the tokens of the Lyars and makes the Diviners mad f Isa 44. v. 24 25. has taught me to forbear I shall therefore add no more concerning these things but that though most commonly the Parhelia with the true Sun appear but three in number yet that somtimes more have been seen as four g Philos Trans numb 13. in France Anno 1666. five h Des Cartes Meteor cap. 10. at Rome Anno 1629. five i Matthew Paris 17 Henr. III. in England Anno 1233. and six k Des Cartes Meteor cap. 10. Fromond Meteor Lib. 6. Art 2. Anno 1525. by Sigismund the first King of Poland which are the most that we read were ever seen at a time though Des Cartes endeavors to shew 't is possible there may be seven 7. And indeed this had been all I thought I should have mentioned concerning the Heavens but that even now while I am writing this at Oxon on the 23d of November Anno 1675. about 7 at night behold the Moon set her Bow in the clouds of a white colour entire and well determined which continued so for about half an hour after I first saw it The reason why such appear not of divers colours as Rain-bows do that are made by the Sun has been alwaies ascribed by Philosophers to the weakness of the Moons raies not entring so deeply into the opacity of the clouds But if we may give credit to l Sennertus in Epitom Phys Dan Sennertus it has once to his knowledge happened otherwise viz. in the year 1593 when after a great storm of Thunder and Lightning he beheld an Iris Lunaris adorned with all the colours of the Rain-bow As for ours though I could not perceive in any part of it that it had the least shade of any colour but white however I thought it not unworthy our notice not only for the infrequency of the thing they never happening but at or near the Moons full and then but so very seldom too that m 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Meteor lib. 3. cap. 2. Aristotle professes that he saw but two in above fifty years and I know several learned and observing Men that never saw such an Iris in their lives but also because of the great clemency of the weather that followed upon it at that time of the year there falling not one drop of rain nor
finer kind and richer in bitumen for though on the out side it looks like wood yet broken it shews a smooth and shining superficies not unlike to stone-pitch and put in the fire has not near so ill a smell This was dug and kindly bestowed upon me by the Worshipful William Bayly Esq who told me beside of an Aluminous earth that he somwhere also fâ—und in his ground As for the substance Lignum fossile it is thought to be originally a cretaceous earth turned to what it is by subterraneous heats which probably at Kidlington may indeed be great because reflected by the Quarry above it for that it was never formerly wood notwithstanding its specious and outward likeness is plain from its never being found with roots or boughs or any other signs of wood 43. At Marsh Balden Heath and Nuneham-Courtney they have a sort of earth of ductile parts which put in the fire scarcely cracks and has been formerly used by Potters but upon what account I know not now neglected There is also a Clay near Little Milton that might very well serve for the Potters use And at Shotover-hill there is a white clay the fourth fold of earth in the way to the Ochre which during the late wars in the siege of Oxford was wholly used for making Tobacco-pipes there and is still in part put to that service mixed with another they have from Northampton-shire It is also of excellent use to Statuaries for making Moddels Gargills or Anticks and containing a hard but very small grit in polishing Silver it comes near to Tripela 44. And so do's an anonymous very white earth found in the seams of the Quarries at Teynton which at first I concluded a crude Alabaster because I found near it a piece that was perfect but reducing it into a very fine powder and putting it over a quick fire it would not boil like Alabaster dust nor keep the colour but turned reddish Many other tryals were made with it in Plasticks Polishing Painting c. but my endeavors succeeded in nothing so well as in polishing smaller silver Vessels that could not endure burnishing well to which it gave a more glorious brightness than Tripela would though perhaps not so lasting and not far behinde that of burnish'd Plate 45. And yet neither this nor the former will polish brass nor any thing else that is not of its colour which has lately engaged my thoughts in a Query whether in all other Metals the rule does hold for I find that sulphur gives a luster to Gold and that nothing does brighten Copper so well as a sort of stuff they call rotten stone also somthing of its colour 46. At Teynton also within a spit of the surface they dig a sort of earth they there call Lam of a whitish colour inclining to yellow which mixt with sand and some other earth makes the best earthen floors for ground-rooms and barns it dissolves as quick as Fullers-earth and were it not for a fault which might possibly be help'd it may serve their turns perhaps as well as any they use 47. To these may be added another whitish earth which corruptly I suppose from its colour is called Which-earth mixed with straw they use it for side-walls and ceilings and with horse-dung it makes mortar for laying of stones it seems to be a natural mixture of lime and sand found at Thame Waterperry and Adwell and slakes in water like Gypsum without any heat 48. At Milton near Adderbury Great Tew and Stunsfield I met also with another sort of spungy chalk which though it will not slake like the former yet at Milton and Adderbury used for pointing seems to binde the stones of their walls very well and theirs at Great Tew being somwhat finer serves as well to white their rooms within as I saw at Swerford as to point walls without but at Stunsfield there was no body knew of its use 49. Other earths there are that I find in this County for whose names as well as natures I am quite at a loss whereof there is one in Sir Thomas Pennystons Park which for the strangeness of its qualities deserves the first place Of colour it is extreamly white of little tast and less smell lying in veins in a yellowish clay like a medulla about the bigness of ones wrist taken out with a knife it falls into a fine powder somwhat gritty but of so very great a weight that its double at least to any other earth of its bulk put in the scale against white Marble dust it equall'd its weight and exceeded that of Alabaster by almost a fourth part set in sand in a glass retort and driven with a quick and strong fire it sublimed to the sides of the glass a little but still preserved its colour and weight till put between two Crucibles one inverted upon the other well luted and strongly forced in a wind-furnace for about two hours it lost above the moiety of its weight for as I well remember of three ounces put in there came not out full one and a half and yet nothing sublimed in the top of the Crucible the colour still remained as white as ever and the bulk as near as I could guess the same but now of a strong salt and urinous tast which after solution filtration and evaporation came at last to what people as little understood as what became of its ponderous ingredient 50. We tryed it also at Cornwell in Sir Thomas Pennyston's Laboratory because of its weight with divers fluxing salts in hopes of some kind of metalline substance but all as before to little purpose So that I cannot tell what to divine it should be except the Gur of the Adeptists congealed which they describe in their Books to be much such a thing which for want of more time to spend in its service I leave to the discovery of future ages 51. In the Chalk-pits almost every where in the South-east parts of Oxford-shire they finde a sort of iron-colour'd terra lapidosa in the very body of the chalk which I think they call Iron-moulds and particularly at a place between Brightwell and Berrick of an oval figure how they came to be of that shape or at all grow in a substance of so different a nature as chalk I confess to be a problem beyond my knowledge as well as the use they may probably have which I also remit to posterity to find 52. They have an earth about Teynton of a yellowish colour adorned all over with glittering sparks which unless they are particles of the specular stone or English Talc with the former must be reckoned amongst the unknown earths 53. To which add another kind of terra lapidosa found about Thame at the bottom of their Quarries it is much of the colour of the Turkish Rusma hollow and spungy and full of shining grains like a sort of Pyrites but of what nature or use I can no where find Nor of another sort of
lapides m Libro citato Lettre 28. have the very marks characters eminencies cavities and all other parts alike with the true living Nautili and Herissons spatagi and Brissi of Imperato and Rondelet which proves says he the body changed to have been the very same thing with that which is living But I must tell him it do's it but very weakly all arguments drawn a similitudine being the most inefficacious of all others such rather illustrating than proving rather perswading than compelling an adversaries assent For how many hundred things are there in the World that have some resemblance of one another which no body will offer to think were ever the same and particularly amongst some other formed stones hereafter to be mentioned Such are the stones Otites or Auriculares several sorts of Cardites Lapides Mammillares Hysterolithos c. which though they as exactly resemble those parts of Men from whence they have their names as any Conchites or Echinites do those shell-fish yet no Man that I ever heard of so much as dreamed that these were ever the real parts of Men in process of time thus turned into stone As well might we say that our Kettering-stone in Northampton-shire here in England was once nothing else but the spawn of Lobsters than which that I know of there is nothing more like 119. But should it be granted that these stone Herissons spatagi were somtime real shell-fish as reasonably enough perhaps we may they being found at Malta as you come into the Port over-against St. Erme n Libro citato Lettre 26. yet this by no means would conclude that all others of the form must needs be so that are attended with much different and indeed in respect of having once been shells inexplicable circumstances 120. Thirdly and lastly That it seems quite contrary to the infinite prudence of Nature which is observable in all its works and productions to design every thing to a determinate end and for the attaining that end makes use of such ways as are as far as the knowledge of man has yet been able to reach altogether consonant and agreeable to mans reason and of no way or means that doth contradict or is contrary to human ratiocination Whence it has been a general observation and Maxim that Nature doth nothing in vain It seems I say contrary to that great wisdom of Nature that these pretily shaped bodies should have all those curious figures and contrivances which many of them are adorned and contrived with generated or wrought by a plastic virtue for no higher end than only to exhibit a form o Mr. Hooks Micrographia Observ 17. 121. To which I answer that Nature herein acts neither contrary to her own prudence human ratiocination or in vain it being the wisdom and goodness of the Supreme Nature by the School-men called Naturans that governs and directs the Natura naturata here below to beautifie the World with these varieties which I take to be the end of such productions as well as of most Flowers such as Tulips Anemones c. of which we know as little use as of formed stones Nay perhaps there may proportionably number for number be as many of them of Medicinal or other use such as Selenites Belemnites Conchites Lapis Judaicus c. as there are of Plants So that unless we may say also which I guess no body will that these are produced contrary to the great wisdom of Nature we must not of stones 122. And thus I have given the grounds of my present opinion which has not been taken up out of humor or contradiction with intent only to affront other worthy Authors modest conjectures but rather friendly to excite them or any others to endeavor collections of shell-fish and parts of other Animals that may answer such formed stones as are here already or may hereafter be produced Which when ever I find done and the reasons alleged solidly answered I shall be ready with acknowledgment to retract my opinion which I am not so in love with but for the sake of Truth I can chearfully cast off without the least reluctancy 123. However in the mean time since no doubt it will be expected upon so deliberate rejection of Animal molds that some further and more particular account should be given of the Plastic virtue or whatever else it is that effects these shapes I shall briefly set down also my present thoughts concerning it which yet I intend not my self much less desire the Reader to embrace any further then I shall find them agreeable to future experience 124. That Salts are the principal Ingredients of stones I think has so sufficiently been noted already that to endeavor any further evidence of the thing would be actum agere in me and loss of time to the Reader And if of stones in general much rather sure of formed ones it being the undoubted prerogative of the Saline Principle to give Bodies their figure as well as solidity and duration No other principle that we yet know of naturally shooting into figures each peculiar to their own kind but salts thus Nitre always shoots into Pyramids salt Marine into Cubes Alum into octo and Sal Armoniac into Hexaedrums and other mixt salts into as mixt figures 125. Of these spontaneous inclinations of salts each peculiar to its kind we have further evidence in the Chymical Anatomy of Animals particularly in the volatile salt of Harts-horn which in the beginning of its ascent is always seen branched in the head of the Cucurbit like the natural Horn. And we were told the last Term by our very Ingenious and Learned Sidleyan Professor * Dr. Tho. Millington Fellow of All Souls Coll. here in Oxon That the salt of Vipers ascends in like manner and shoots into shapes somwhat like those Animals placed orderly in the glass Thus in congelations which are all wrought by adventitious salts we frequently find curious ramifications as on Glass-windows in winter and the figur'd flakes of snow of which Mr. Hook p Mr. Hooks Micrograph Observ 14. Schem 8. observed above an hundred several sorts yet all of them branched as we paint stars with six principal Radii of equal length shape and make issuing from a center where they are all joined in angles of 60 degrees 126. What salt it should be that gives this figure though it be hard to determin yet certainly it must not be a much different one from that which gives form to our Astroites and Asteriae whereof though the latter have but five points and therefore making angles where they are joyned at the center of 72 degrees yet the Astroites both in mezzo Rilievo and Intagli as in Tab. 2. have many more Perhaps there may be somthing of an Antimonial salt that may determin Bodies to this starry figure as no question it do's in the Regulus and the Caput mortuum of the Cinnabar of Antimony To such a salt may also be referr'd our
highly obliged the World having been made in this place 34. Whereof I shall mention no more it being indeed uncertain as to most of them which were made here which at London and which at other places only the Barometer a well known Instrument also invented here by the same Noble Person whereby the gravity of the Atmosphere has been daily observed by the Reverend and Learned Dr. John Wallis for about six years together in all which time he found the Quick-silver in the Tube never to ascend much above 30 inches and never to descend much below 28 which he takes to be the whole latitude of its variation He also observed for most of that time the temper of the air by a Thermometer whereof he has still the Notes by him which are very particular for every day 35. Which latter instrument though of very ancient invention there having been one of them found by Robert de Fluctibus graphically delineated in a MS. of 500 years antiquity at least y Mosaical Philosophy lib. 1. cap. 2. yet it has still received other useful advancements beside that above mention'd from that curious Artist Sir Christopher Wren who finding the usual Thermometers not to give so exact a measure of the airs extension by reason the gravity of the liquor as it stands higher or lower in the Glass weighs unequally on the air and gives it a contraction and extension beside what is produced by heat and cold he therefore invented a Circular Thermometer in which the liquor can occasion no such fallacy it remaining continually of one height and moving the whole instrument like a wheel on its axel z History of the Royal Society part 2. sub finem 36. Amongst other Aerotechnicks here is a Clock lately contrived by the ingenious John Jones LL. B. and Fellow of Jesus College Oxon which moves by the air equally expressed out of bellows of a cylindrical form falling into folds in its descent much after the manner of Paper Lanterns These in place of drawing up the weights of other Clocks are only filled with air admitted into them at a large orifice at the top which is stop'd up again as soon as they are full with a hollow screw in the head whereof there is set a small brass plate about the bigness of a silver half penny with a hole perforated scarce so big as the smallest pins head through this little hole the air is equally expressed by weights laid on the top of the bellows which descending very slowly draw a Clock-line having a counterpoise at the other end that turns a pully-wheel fastened to the arbor or axis of the hand that points to the hour which device though not brought to the intended perfection of the Inventor that perhaps it may be by the help of a tumbrel or fusie yet highly deserves mentioning there being nothing of this nature that I can find amongst the writers of Mechanicks 37. To which may be added a hopeful improvement of that uncommon Hygroscope made of two Deal or rather Poplar boards mention'd in our English Philosophical Transactions a Philosoph Transact Numb 127. contrived by my ingenious Friend John Young M. A. of Magdalen Hall who rationally concluding that the teeth of the thin piece of brass placed across the juncture of the two boards must needs in its passage from bearing on one side of the teeth of the pinion to the other upon change of weather make a stand as it were in respect of the motion of the axel of the hand thinks a pretty stiff spring cut on the under side after the manner of a fine file placed flat and not edge-ways and bearing pretty hard upon an axel of Copper may turn the hand upon change of weather in the punctum of reversion without any more than a negative rest which being an opinion so very rational and unlikely to fail when brought to the test I thought fit to propound it to the Ingenious though the Press would not give us leave first to experiment it our selves Whence I proceed 38. To such Arts as relate to the Fire which I have placed next in regard we have knowledge of no other but what is Culinary that in the concave of the Moon being only a dream of the Ancients Amongst which we must not forget the perpetual at least long-lived Lamps invented by the Right Worshipful Sir Christopher Wren nor his Registers of Chymical Furnaces for keeping a constant heat in order to divers uses such as imitation of Nature in the production of Fossiles Plants Insects hatching of Eggs keeping the motions of Watches equal in reference to Longitudes and Astronomical uses and several other advantages b History of the Royal Society Part. 2. sub finem 39. But amongst all the Fire-works ever yet produced by the Art of Man there is none so wonderful as that of Frier Bacon mention'd in his Epistle ad Parisiensem where speaking of the secret works of Nature and Arts he has these words In omnem distantiam quam volumus possumus artificialiter componere ignem comburentem ex sale Petrae aliis c In Epist ad Parisiensem cap. 6. which alia as the Reverend and Learned Dr. John Wallis saw it in a MS. Copy of the same Roger Bacon in the hands of the Learned Dr. Ger. Langbain late Provost of Queens College were Sulphur and Carbonum pulvis concerning which after a while he further adds Praeter haec i. e. combustionem sunt alia stupenda naturae nam soni velut Tonitrus coruscationes possunt fieri in aere imo majore horrore quam illa quae fiunt per naturam Nam modica materia adapta sc ad quantitatem unius pollicis sonum facit horribilem coruscationem ostendit violentem hoc fit multis modis quibus Civitas aut Exercitus destruatur Igne exsiliente cum fragore inaestimabili Mira haec sunt si quis sciret uti ad plenum in debitâ quantitate materiâ 40. That is that of Salt-peter and other matters viz. Sulphur and the dust of coal he could make fire that should burn at what distance he pleased and further that with the same matter he could make sounds like Thunder and coruscations in the air more dreadful than those made by Nature For says he a little of this matter rightly fitted though not bigger than ones Thumb makes a horrible noise and shews a violent coruscation which may be ordered many ways whereby a City or Army may be destroyed the Fire breaking forth with an unspeakable noise which are wonderful things if a man knew exactly how to use them in due quantity and matter 41. Whence 't is plain he either invented or knew Gun-powder though I think we cannot allow him less than the first till we find out an ancienter Author for it * Baconus fatis concessit Anno 1292 near 100 years before any of the other pretended Inventions which if no body
a growing have a plentiful issue of thin sap between the bark and the wood and that readily bleed when they are wounded or bored do most commonly if not always certainly dye whereas some of the same trees when older past growing especially if they have a more gummy juice such as Ash Elm Lime-tree c. may live and flourish many years after their disbarking by the saps ascent through the sap or air vessels of the wood 75. Moreover amongst the accidents that have happen'd to Elms I must not forget a very pleasant one that fell out at Middle-Aston where cleaving of Elm blocks at one Mr. Langston's there came out a piece so exactly representing a shoulder of Veal that it was thought worth while to preserve it from the fire by the owner of it by whom it was kindly bestowed on me as an addition to the rest of my Curiosities of Nature 76. But the most remarkable accidents that ever befel trees perhaps here or in any other County were the foundations of two eminent Religious houses both occasion'd by trees The first Oseney Abby founded in that place by Robert D'Oyly the second by reason of a certain tree that stood in the meddows where after he built the Abbey to which it seems repaired a company of Pyes as often as Editha the wife of Robert came to walk that way which in company with her maid she often used to do as Leland expresses it to solace her self g Lelandi Itinerarium Vol. 2. pag. 18 19. at whose arrival the Pyes were alwaies so clamorous that she took notice of it and consults with one Radulphus Canon of St. Frideswid's what this might signifie who cuningly advises that she must build some Church or Monastery where the tree stood which she instantly procures her Husband to do and this Radulphus her Confessor to be made the first Prior. 77. What tree this was Leland acquaints us not but that which occasioned the second Foundation in the place where it is was a triple Elm having three trunks issuing from one root Near such a Tree as this Sir Thomas White Lord Major of London as we have it by Tradition was warned in a Dream he should build a College for the education of Youth in Religion and Learning whereupon he repairs to Oxford and first met with somthing near Glocester-Hall that seem'd to answer his Dream where accordingly he erected a great deal of Building But afterward finding another Elm near St. Bernards College supprest not long before by King Hen. 8. more exactly to answer all the circumstances of his Dream he left off at Glocester-Hall and built St. John Bapt. College which with the very Tree beside it that occasion'd its Foundation flourishes to this day under the Presidence of the Reverend and Learned Dr. Levinz a cordial promoter of this Design 78. Beside the Elms at St. Johns knit together at the root there are two Beeches in the way from Oxford to Reading near a place called Cain-end more strangely joined together a great height from the ground for the bodies of these Trees come from different roots and ascend parallel to the top but are joined together a little before they come to bough by a transverse piece of timber entering at each end into the bodies of the Trees and growing jointly with them for which reason 't is commonly called the Gallow-tree though the piece that intercedes them lies somwhat obliquely How this should come to pass many have wondered but the problem I guess may be easily solved only by allowing the transverse piece of Timber to be one of the boughs of the Tree to which its lowermost end still joins which whilst young and tender might bear so hard against the body of the neighboring Tree that with the continual motion of the wind it might not only fret it self asunder but gall off the bark too of the other Tree which closing up again in calm weather at the rising of the sap might well include so near a neighbor first within its bark and after some time within the wood it self which I have observed to have been done but very lately in New College Gardens where the boughs of two different Sycomores are thus grown together only by bearing hard on one another and interchangably fretting away each others bark and then closing up again at the rising of the sap 79. There have also some accidents befallen the Ash and Willow not commonly met with the former whereof in a Close of one Mr. Coker of the Town of Bisseter grows frequently out of the boal of the other yet not as 't is usual amongst other Trees but so that the roots of the Ashes have some of them grown down through the whole length of the trunks of the Willows and at last fastening into the earth it self have so extended themselves that they have burst the Willows in sunder whose sides falling away from them and perishing by degrees what before were but the roots are now become the bodies of the Ashes themselves But this happens only to Willows that have been lopt at six or seven foot high the Willows at Enston in the walks near the Rock whereof there are several about 50 foot high being incapable I suppose of any such accident 80. Beside this unusual growth of the Ash I have met with other accidents that frequently attend it which because so much commended by Pliny h Nat. Hist. lib. 16. cap. 16. in Maple in which they are common I think ought much more to be noted in this And such are the Nodosities called Bruscum and Molluscum to be found in Ash as well as Maple which when cut shew a curled and twining grain the Bruscum thick and intricate the Molluscum being streaked in a more direct course With the Molluscum of Ash there is a whole Closet wainscoted at the much Honored Mr. Stonor's of Watlington Park the grain of the panes being curiously waved like the Gamahe's of Achats And at the Worshipful Mr. Reads of the Parish of Ipsden the Bruscum of an old Ash is so wonderfully figured that in a Dining-table made of it without the help of fansie you have exactly represented the figure of the Fish we commonly call a Jack though endeavoring to mend they have somwhat marr'd it by Art and in some other Tablets the figures of a Vnicorn and an old Man from the navel upwards but neither of these so plain as the former 81. Jacobus Gaffarellus amongst his unheard of Curiosities i Unheard of Curiosities chap. 5. tells us of a Tree found in Holland which being cut to pieces by a wond-cleaver had in one part of it the figure of a Chalice in another that of a Priests Albe in another that of a Stole and in a word there were represented very near all the ornaments belonging to a Priest which relation if true says he it must needs be confest that these figures could not be there casually or by chance and
indeed 't is very hard to think how so many things pertinent to the same office should thus meet together without some design of Nature However till I am better satisfied of the truth of the thing or convinced by the sight of some other such Curiosity I cannot afford to think ours being altogether independent more than meer accidents 82. Beside these unusual accidents of whole Trees or their Trunks there are some also that have happened to their upper branches and leaves whereof the former are somtimes fasciated and the latter striped In willows and some other of the softer woods the uppermost boughs are commonly fasciated but the best of the kind I ever yet saw was the top-branch of an Ash which I met with at Bisseter not only fasciated but most uniformly wreathed two or three times round And there is a good example of this nature in a top branch of Holly hanging up in the Gate-house of the Physick-garden whence 't is plain that this happens also to the hardest woods and in both by the ascent of too much nourishment though in branches of Trees especially such as are not only flat but helically curled I guess there concurs some blast or some such like matter that contracts the fibers and so turns them round beside the excess in the ascent of their nourishment 83. As for the striped leaves of Trees as well as those of Shrubs and herbaceous Plants I suppose they may be met with almost in every kind The greater Maple miscalled the Sycomore was found striped white not many years since in Magdalen College Grove and translated thence into the Physick-garden where it flourishes still and retains its stripings and I hear of a striped Elm somwhere in Dorset-shire Dr. Childrey k Britannia Baconica in Cornwall and out of him the ingenious Mr. Evelyn l Discourse of Forest Trees cap. 3. inform us of an Oak in Lanhadron Park in the County of Cornwall to omit the painted Oak in the Hundred of East which constantly bears leaves speckled with white And there was another of these found this instant year 1676. by my worthy Friend Dr. Thomas Tayler in a place called Frid-wood in the Parish of Borden near Sittingbourn in Kent But of these more hereafter when I come into those Counties 84. Of Vnusual trees now cultivated in Oxford-shire there are some remarkable such is the Abele-tree advantagiously propagated by Sir George Croke of Waterstock which he does by cutting stakes out of the more substantial part of the wood which put into moist ground grow more freely than willows coming in three or four years time to an incredible height And such are the Fir-tree and the lesser mountain Pine whereof there are several Nurseries planted in the Quincunx order at Cornbury in the Park of the Right Honorable the Earl of Clarendon which they propagate by slips twisted as well as by Kernels to that advantage that there is great hopes of beautiful and stately Groves of them such as I met with at the Right Worshipful Sir Peter Wentworths at Lillingston Lovel where there are three Walks of Firs most of them 20 yards high 85. Which Parish if the Reader look for in the Map of Oxfordshire he must not expect to find though it belong to the County it lying five miles within Buckingham-shire as on the other side several Parishes of Berkshire Buckingham-shire and Worcester-shire are placed within Oxford-shire How these things come to pass we have little of certainty but in all probability this Lillingston was accounted in Oxfordshire for the sake of the Lords Lovels whose Inheritance from the addition we may conclude it once was who being powerful men in these parts and not unlikely most times the Kings Lieutenants might have permission to reckon this their own Estate within their own Jurisdiction as part of Oxford-shire as I suppose all other Parishes thus placed out of the body of their Counties may also have been 86. From this necessary and therefore I hope pardonable digression I proceed to some Fruit-trees not ordinary elsewhere such as the double-bearing Pear-trees whereof I met with one in the Parish of Haseley at a place called Latchford in the Hortyard of Mr. Gooding called the Pear of Paradice whose first Crop is ripe about Midsummer and the second at Michaelmass There is also another of these but of a different kind in the Parish of Stanlake at the Chequer-Inn called the Hundred-pound Pear which Blossoms at two distinct times and bears two Crops whereof it has both sorts much like the Fig upon the Tree at a time some ripe and others green But in both these trees the Pears in the second Crops are somwhat less than of the first and grow both after a peculiar manner most of them if not all coming forth at the ends of the twigs which are all the pedicles they seem to have and therefore on the tree they do not hang downwards like those of the first Crop but point up in the air or any other way the shoots direct them 87. At Corpus Christi College they have a sort of Pear-tree that bears Fruit in hardness little inferior to the younger shoots of the very tree that bears them and therefore not undeservedly by some called the Wooden-pear though in wet years I have known them pretty soft but generally they are so sound and of so unalterable a constitution that I have now some by me that were seasonably gather'd above ten years old as hard and firm as ever they were at first only somwhat less than when first gather'd for which very reason in some parts of Worcester-shire where they have plenty of them they are called Long-lasters being not subject to rot like other Pears 88. And thus I had finish'd the Chapter of Plants but that I think fit to acquaint the Reader of a further design I have concerning them viz. Of enquiring hereafter into some other accidents of Plants of an inferior quality to any before mentioned which yet perhaps are more abstruse in their consideration than the more noted ones are And such are the blebs or blisters we find on the leaves of many Trees and Shrubs which somtimes happen to them after heat and droughts and somtimes too upon cold nipping weather but whether thus infected from the air from without or by juices within or by both and when by one or the other or both together is a Question requires a great deal of time and more sedulity than has yet been afforded to be but probably solved 89. And this I the rather design because all that I find certain concerning them yet is only that the weak and free growing sappy Trees are most subject to them and the stout Ever-greens but little if at all that the infection for the most part is under and the blister above the leaf but somtimes otherwise that the blisters somtimes have Insects in them somtimes bear fungus's on their tops l See Mr. Hooks
done all with the greatest Improvements within the compass of Wit and Reason And having fully discovered the Hypostasis of the sensitive Soul its affections and senses he further obliges Mankind with a most rational account of the diseases seated in it and the Nervous Juice according to the different parts of the Brain and the Systema nervosum placing Cephalalgies in the Meninges Lethargies somnolentia continua Coma Carus Pervigilium and Coma vigil in the Anfractus and Cortical part of the Brain the Incubus in the Cerebellum Then descending to the Corpus callosum he finds the Spirits there somtimes hurled round into Vertigo's somtimes exploded in Spasms Convulsions Epilepsies somtimes eclypsed in Apoplexies 219. In the Corpora striata and Medulla oblongata if the spirits that serve to motion be disturbed thence he shews come likewise Spasins and Convulsions if those that serve to sensation dolor if either or both are impeded or destroyed the Palsie And as the sensitive Soul is the seat and organ of the Rational so the ill constitution of that he observes proves oftentimes the disorder of the other For the Animal spirits being spirituo-saline if they are inflamed they produce a Phrensie if acid Melancholy if acrous like Aqua stygia Madness if vapid Stupidity In discoursing of which distempers his Aetiologies of the various symptoms his methods of cure and forms of prescriptions are founded upon far more rational principles than ever Greece taught us And how far Antiquity and later Ages too were mistaken in their notions of divers other diseases his evincing Hysterical and Hypochondriacal affections the Colic Gout Scurvy some sort of Asthma's the Tympanitis with others either wholly or in part to be Nervous does plainly demonstrate 220 Nor has the Pathological part of Physick been only happy in his labors but the Pharmaceutical part likewise highly improved in the Inventions of his Spiritus Salis Armoniaci succinatus Syrup of Sulphur preparation of Steel without Acids and from thence of his artificial Acidulae In general this part of Physick has been so far advanced by him that what was formerly Empirical and but lucky hits is now become most rational by his making the operations of Chathartic Emetic Diaphoretic Cardiac and Opiat Medicines intelligible by Mechanical Explications having subjoined to each most neat and artificial Formula's as well Chymical as others a Province but meanly adorned by the Ancients though of infinite use And where Nature is exorbitant in any of these Evacuations he has likewise taught us how to check and reduce her adding for the better illustration of the whole a new Anatomy of the Stomach Intestines Gula Veins and Arteries 221. Which he has seconded with a further discovery and rational account of Thoracic and Epatic Medicines and of the Diseases belonging to those parts discoursing also of Venesection stopping of Hemorraghies of Issues and cutaneous Distempers In all which it may be observed what is almost peculiar to him that there is nothing trivial most new and all most ingenious To which add that the organs of Respiration which have been the subject of so many Learned Pens of late are best understood from his most elegant descriptions and beautiful Cuts But it is too difficult a task to give a just account how far Physick Anatomy Chymistry and Philosophy stand indebted to him for their Improvements Let it suffice to say that he has introduced a new Body of Physick almost universally embraced before all others and a new Sect of Philosophers at home and abroad called Willisians so that England for ought I know may have as much reason to boast of her Learned Willis as Coos and Pergamus of old of their great Masters in Physick 222. The Learned and Ingenious Sir Christopher Wren Savilian Professor of Astronomy in this Vniversity was the first Author of that noble Experiment of injecting Liquors into the Veins of Animals first exhibited to the meetings at Oxford about the Year 1656 b Vid. Epistol Timoth. Clarck M. D. Philosoph Transact Numb 35. and thence carryed by some Germans and published abroad by which operation divers Animals were immediatly purged vomited intoxicated kill'd or revived according to the quality of the Liquor injected c History of the Royal Society Part. 2. sub finem whereof we have several Instances in our Philosophical Transactions of Decemb. 4. 1665 d Philosoph Transact Numb 7. From whence arose many other new Experiments 223. Particularly that of transfusing of Blood out of one Animal into another first performed here at Oxford about the latter end of February in the Year 1665 e Vid. Tractat. de Corde c. cap. 4. de transfusione Sanguinis by that most exquisite Anatomist and eminent Physitian Dr. Richard Lower Student of Christ Church the method whereof I shall not here mention nor the considerations upon it because there is a particular account of both already given by the Learned Inventor in his fore-cited Book de Corde c. and in our Philosophical Transactions f Philosoph Transact Numb 20. Nor how much the famous Willis was beholding to him for most of his Anatomical Discoveries because already freely acknowledged by the Doctor himself in the Preface to his Book de Cerebro 224. Wherefore passing by those I shall only hint in short what I meet with new in Dr. Lowers Book de Corde a subject though handled by many Learned Men yet not so far exhausted but it afforded new discoveries when it came to be examined by this most curious most judicious Author For though the Heart by Hippocrates was called 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 yet Dr. Lower was the first that published the true method of dividing it into its several Muscles illustrating the same with most elegant Cuts and by attributing to it a muscular motion and shewing several ways how it may be impeded or disturbed has done a good piece of service toward the advancement of the Pathological part of Physick 225. His computation of the frequency of the Bloods circulation through the heart is very ingenious and the cause he assigns of the florid colour of it when emitted I think is new and believe generally received And having discovered the Channels that carry away the Serum that is separated by the Glandules of the Brain to be those two foramina in the Os Cuneiforme which empty it into the Jugular Veins he has sufficiently detected how far the Ancients were mistaken in making the causes of several distempers to be defluxions or humors falling from the Brain which passage of the secreted humors into the Jugular Veins is indeed mention'd also by Dr. Willis but supposed by most to be Dr. Lowers Invention 226. The Ingenious John Mayow L. L. D. and Fellow of All-Souls College but Student in Physick has lately also taught us that the Air is impregnated with a Nitro-aerial Spirit and that it is diffused almost through the whole System of Nature that Fire it self as to its form and
essence is nothing else but this Nitro-aerial Spirit put into motion and that all Fermentations whether tending to generation perfection or corruption also depend on this Spirit with many other Phaenomena of Nature all which he has ingeniously deduced from his Nitro-aerial principles and confirmed them by Experiments 227. He has taught us also in his Treatise de Motu musculari that whereas Anatomists have hitherto perswaded us that the carneous Fibres chiefly make the contraction in Muscles that it is much more probable that the Fibrillae transversly set into the greater Fibres are the immediate instruments of that motion by reason as well of their position as cize and number And he has given the best account that I have any where met with of the reason of the Incurvation of the Leg-bones and Spina dorsi in the disease called the Rickets 228. Lastly the ingenious Edward Tyson M. A. of Magdalen Hall and Student in Physick has lately observed that many other strong scented Animals beside the Hyaena odorifera Catus Zibethicus or Civet-cat the Fiber Castor or Bever from whom we have our Castoreum the Gazella Indica or Capra Moschi from whom our Musk and the Fishes Sepia Loligo Purpura have follicular Repositories or Bags near the exit of the Intestinum rectum wherein they keep those humors or liquors that are the Vehicles of their respective scents 229. This he first observed in a male Pol-cat he dissected here at Oxford Febr. 4. 1674. and was further confirmed therein the second of March in the year following 1675. in a female Pol-cat at the opening whereof I was present my self since which times he has found the same in a Fox dissected in the presence of Dr. Grew and since again in Weasels Cats c. the vesicles or little bags being found by pairs one on each side the gut and according to the bigness of the Animals largest in the Fox and least in the Weasel 230. Those of the Pol-cat were about the bigness of Peas of a somwhat oblong figure and a yellowish colour and seemed to consist of a double substance glandulous and membranous the membranous toward the necks of the bags being cover'd with glandules but toward the fundus wholly membranous representing upon being emptied orbicular muscular Fibres which he supposes by contraction force the contained humor out into the gut 231. The use of the Glandules he doubts not to be to seperate the humor from the mass of blood all secretions in the Body being performed by the help of Glandules and the necks of the bags immediatly emptying themselves into the gut without any continued ductus and being placed near the Sphincter Ani made him think the contained humor in respect of the Animal to be excrementitious In this Pol-cat it was of somwhat a thick consistence for the most part white but in some places of a greenish yellow colour and upon pressing out of so strong a scent that I could scarce I well remember endure the room which once removed from the body we could not perceive any considerable ill smell in any of the other parts 232. In a Cat that he dissected which was but a young one and a female the bags when blown up were not above the cize of ordinary Peas seated like the former on both sides the intestinum rectum just under the Sphincter Ani which covering them he supposes might both occasion their not being noted before and help in the expression of the humor out which he observed in the Cat was not into the gut but in the limb or margo Ani the orifices of the bags terminating there so that he plainly perceived them before he began to dissect her The Glandules that seperate the humor from the mass of Blood and transmitted it into the bags afforded a pleasant sight there being seven small round ones placed in a circle about the vesicles the humor within not being considerable but for the faetor 233. Such Glandules which he thinks hold the nature of Emunctories he has likewise observed in Rabbits but with no considerable cavity the liquor whereof he rationally guesses may give the ranck tast we find about those parts after they are roasted He thinks also such like Glandules are found in Mice and Rats and observes that in some Animals they are found more glandulous in others with a more signal bag or cavity And analogous to these scent-bags in Quadrupeds he believes those Glandules seated on the rumps of Fowls whose excretory vessels may be those little protuberances or pipes we observe on them whence 't is also as in Rabbits that we find the rumps of Fowls strongest tasted and to partake most of the natural scent of the Fowl 234. That all Animals conserve their peculiar scents in such like parts though he dares not assert yet if the analogy that Nature observes in forming most of the parts of most Animals alike be sufficient Logick to warrant an inference he thinks it highly probable that 't is so in most and that should they be found in Man which he has not yet had opportunity to Experiment it might be worthy enquiry how far Fistula's Tenesme's c. might be concern'd in them Which is all I have met with new relating to this County in Medicine Anatomy or Natural Philosophy For to mention the many and new Experiments of the Famous Mr. Boyle did we distinctly know which were made here would be endless and to recapitulate the New Discoveries if there be any in this Essay but a vain repetition CHAP. X. Of Antiquities AND thus having finish'd the Natural History of Oxford-shire I had accordingly here put a period to my Essay but meeting in my Travels with many considerable Antiquities also relating to Arts either wholly past by both by Leland and Camden or but imperfectly mention'd and finding that I may as well also note them in other Counties hereafter as let them alone I have been perswaded to add because perhaps a digression that may be acceptable to some what I have met with in this kind whether found under ground or whereof there yet remain any foot-steps above it such as ancient Mony Ways Barrows Pavements Vrns ancient Monuments of stone Fortifications c. whether of the ancient Britans Romans Saxons Danes Normans Of which in their order 2. Leaving the Antiquities and Foundations of Churches and Religious Houses their Dedications Patronages and foundation Charters with the pedigrees and descents of Families and Lands c. as sufficient matter for another Historian and as too great a task and too much beside my design for me to attempt However I have taken care in the Map prefix'd to this Essay to put a mark for the site of all Religious houses as well as ancient ways and Fortifications except Brockeley and Saucomb both mention'd in the Catalogues of Harpsfield g Catalogus Aedium Religiosar in fine Hist. Angl. Ecclesiast and Speed h History of Great Britan. lib. 9. cap. 21. sub