in truth I think a very good one too for beside that they are no way liable to fire as the wooden Laths are they hold the heat so much better that being once heated a small matter of fire will keep them so which are valuable advantages in the Profession of Maulting 91. And which brings me to the Arts relating to Stone they have lately also about Burford made their Mault kills of stone the first of them being contrived after an accident by fire by Valentine Strong an ingenious Mason of Teynton much after the manner of those of brick which for the benefit of other Counties where they are not known I have caused to be delineated so far forth at least as may be direction enough to an ingenious Work-man in Tab. 13. Fig. 1 2. whereof the first Figure shews the front of such a Kill and the Letters a. The Kill hole b. The Pillars that support the principal Joists c. The sloping away of the inside of the Oast d. The ends of the Joists e. The spaces between the Joists for the Laths And the second Figure the square above immediatly supporting the Oast-hair and the Mault wherein the Letters f f. shew the Flame-stone g g. The Pillars on which the principal Joists lie h h. The principal Joists i i. The shorter Joists k k. The Laths between the Joists l l. The spaces between the Laths Which first Kill of Valentine Strong built after this manner in stone succeeded so well that it hath since obtained in many other places nor do I wonder at it for beside the great security from fire to which the old Kills were very subject these also dry the mault with much less fuel and in a shorter time than the old ones would do insomuch that I was told by one Mr. Trindar an ingenious Gentleman of West-well who shewed me a fine one of his own at Holwell that whereas he could formerly dry with the ordinary Kill but two Quarters in a day he can now dry six and with as little fuel Now if Mault-kills or Oasts made with ordinary stone prove so advantagious what would one of them do if the Joists and Laths at least were made of the Cornish warming-stone that will hold heat well eight or ten hours or of Spanish Ruggiola's which are broad plates like tiles cut out of a Mountain of red salt near Cardona which being well heated on both sides will keep warm 24 hours o See Mr. Willughby's Voyage through Spain p. 471. 92. To which may be added the Invention of making Glasses of stones and some other materials at Henly upon Thames lately brought into England by Seignior de Costa a Montferratees and carryed on by one Mr. Ravenscroft who has a Patent for the sole making them and lately by one Mr. Bishop The materials they used formerly were the blackest Flints calcined and a white Christalline sand adding to each pound of these as it was found by solution of their whole mixture by the ingenious Dr. Ludwell Fellow of Wadham College about two ounces of Niter Tartar and Borax 93. But the Glasses made of these being subject to that unpardonable fault called Crizelling caused by the two great quantities of the Salts in the mixture which either by the adventitious Niter of the Air from without or warm liquors put in them would be either increased or dissolved and thereby indure a Scabrities or dull roughness irrecoverably clouding the transparency of the glass they have chosen rather since to make their glasses of a great sort of white Pebbles which as I am informed they have from the River Po in Italy to which adding the aforementioned salts but abating in the proportions they now make a sort of Pebble glass which are hard durable and whiter than any from Venice and will not Crizel but endure the severest trials whatever to be known from the former by a Seal set purposely on them 94. And yet I guess that the difference in respect of Crizeling between the present Glass and the former lies not so much in the Calx the Pebbles being Pyrites none but such I presume being fit for vitrification as well as the Flints but rather wholly in the abatement of the salts for there are some of the Flint glasses strictly so called whereof I have one by me that has endured all tryals as well as these last But if it be found otherwise that white Pebbles are really fitter for their turns than black Flints I think they have little need to fetch them from Italy there being enough in England of the same kind not only to supply this but perhaps Foreign Nations Which is all concerning Arts relating to stone and glass except it be also worth notice that Venerable Bede of this Vniversity first brought Building with stone and Glass windows into England p Vid. Comment in Carmen Phaleucium Johan Seldeni before Hoptons Concordance of years 95. Whence according to my proposed method I proceed to the Arts relating to Plants amongst which the first that present themselves are those that concern the Herbaceous kind Of this sort we may reckon that ingenious Experiment made in June 1669. by my worthy Friend John Wills M. A. and Fellow of Trin. Coll. Oxon. in order to find in what measure Herbs might perspire wherein he made use of the following method He took two glass Vials with narrow necks each holding one pound 8 ounces and 2 drachms of water Avoir de pois weight into one of these glasses filled with water he put a sprig of florishing Mint which before had grown in the water weighing one ounce the other glass he also fill'd with water and exposed them both in a window to the Sun After ten days time he found in the bottle where the mint was only five ounces and four drachms of water remaining and no more so that there was one pound two ounces and six drachms spent the mint weighing scarce two drachms more than at first 96. From the other Glass where water was put of the same weight and no mint he found the Sun had exhaled near one ounce of water and therefore concluded it drew but so much out of the first glass at least not more So that allowing one ounce for what the Sun had exhaled there was in those ten days spent by the mint one pound one ounce six drachms of water and the mint being increased in weight only two drachms 't was plain the mint had purely expired in those ten days one pound one ounce and four drachms that is each day above an ounce and half which is more than the weight of the whole mint Whence he concluded that what Malpighius so wonders at in his Book De Bombyce viz. that those Animals will somtimes eat in one day more than the weight of their bodies is out-done by every sprig of mint and most other Herbs in the Field which every summers day attract more nourishment than their own weight amounts too 97.
to some all Pump waters are such but that they are mistaken my experience has taught me for I have met with some that will lather very well 34. At Henly they are troubled with many of them but not so much as they are at Thame for there they have a way to let them stand two days within which time as I was informed by my worthy Friend Mr Munday Physitian there the Vitriol or whatever other acid it be falls down to the bottom of the Vessels that hold them and then they will wash as well as one can desire But at Thame where there is never a Well in the whole Town whose water will wash or which is worse brew This Experiment for I caused it to be tryed will by no means succeed so that were they not supplyed by the adjoyning Rivulet the place must needs be in a deplorable condition The reason I suppose why the acid will not fall as it do's at Henly and some other places is because these waters beside their salt in all probability also hold a crude Sulphur whose viscous particles do so tenaciously embrace it that it will not admit of any separation which may also perhaps be a hint to the cause why their Beer will stink within fourteen days whenever they attempt to brew with this water for where a Sulphur is any thing great in quantity and its body opened and exalted by the heat in brewing and the active spirituous particles of Mault as I guess the case may have it self here the frame of that mixtion may probably be loosed wherein the spirits first taking their flight the Sulphur will next begin to evaporate whose steams being smartly aculeated by the salt that then bears the chief sway in the subject cause the stink of the Beer that is brewed with such water 35. Other waters there are that are palatably salt and sufficiently stinking without being brewed and such is that before-mentioned near Churchill-mill but I think within the bounds of the Parish of Kingham The water as it stands looks of a greenish colour as most of the palatably salt waters do and do it resort all the Pigeons in the Country which should they not do I should much wonder since besides its saltness it has such a stink that it equals the salt stone and roasted dog too so that should the Proprietor but build a Dove-house here he might honestly rob all his neighbors of their flights but that he may not put it to so invidious a use I shall divert him anon by a more profitable way 36. As to the salt that impregnates this water I do not take it to be a simple one but some Mineral concrete both of salt and sulphur for without these two be in their exaltation and become so far fluid as to endeavor a divorce from each other it could never acquire so noisom a smell Which concrete should I call a salt Marine peradventure I might not be much mistaken for if you take but a small quantity of thrice calcined Bay salt and dissolve it in a pint of Well-water upon dissolution you will have much such an odour as has been observed by a late Author in a short account of the Sulphur Well at Knarsborough x Simpsons Hydrolog Chym part 2. 37. Nor hinders it at all that the Sea is so remote since whether springs have any communication with it or no such marine salts may be had very well for if the Sea grow salt by the Earth that it licks which I take to be as certain as that 't is not so by torrefaction then if it be possible we may have such Earths as give the Sea those salino-sulphureous tinctures it 's altogether as possible we may have such waters too without any necessity of such communication 38. If it be objected That the waters of the Sea send forth no such stench as we find these do let it be considered that the flux of the one and stagnation of the other may well occasion such a difference whil'st the Sea-waters are in their motion 't is true their salts and sulphurs so involve one another that their mutual imbraces hinder all evaporations but whenever they come to stand but awhile as they do most times in the holds of Ships then their sulphurs evaporate with as great a stink as can be supposed ours have here at Land and this the Ships pump doth frequently witness to the great content of all that travel by Sea it being a sure indication of the Ships health which abundantly recompences the inconvenience of the stench 39. Such another I have heard of in the Parish of Chadlington in the grounds of one Mr Rawlison there not differing in any thing at all from the former but only it 's somwhat stronger of the marine salt this I must confess I saw not my self yet having my information from so knowing a Person and of so unquestionable fidelity as Sir Thomas Pennyston I doubt not at all the truth of the thing 48. A salt spring there is also at Clifton near Deddington within a Quoits cast of the River side but its saline particles are so subtilized in the water that they scarcely can at all be perceived by the palate and yet it lays them down plentifully enough on the stones and Earth over which it passes What sort of salt this is I care not to determine because it will be difficult not to mistake for upon evaporation of about a gallon it yielded a salt of a urinous tast which at first I must confess was so surprizing to me that I could not but think that during my absence some waggish fellow had either put a trick on me or else that I might have used some unfit vessel whereupon I caused a new earthen pot to be bought well glased and then repeated the Experiment very carefully but found in the end all had been honest about me for I had a salt again of the very same tast 41. How this should come about I cannot divine unless from the sweat of the Bodies of Animals it being much used in cuticular Diseases but this I think neither can well be because 't is a constantly running spring and would sure carry off what might be left of that nature I therefore wholly leave it to the Readers greater perspicacity and shall content my self with this satisfaction that however improbable the thing may seem that in the mean time 't is an improbable truth 42. I have often since wish'd that I had tryed this water with a solution of Alum and seen whether it would have given any thing of that milky precipitation it do's with Vrines which being then quite out of my head is left to the tryal of some ingenious person that lives thereabout though before-hand I must tell him that I believe it will not succeed because urinous substance seems not to be copious enough 43. Divers might be the uses of these waters and particularly of the two first as good
or perhaps better than that at Clifton for cuticular Diseases of Men and Beasts some whereof I have known carryed out of these Inland Countrys to the Sea side whereas 't is likely they might in all the Distrempers for which we have recourse thither with much more ease have had a remedy at home 44. But far more profitable must they surely be if imployed to improve poor and barren Lands which no question might be done by casting them on it In Cheshire y Sir Hugh Plat's Jewel-house of Art and Nature cap. 104. near the Salt-pits of Nantwich 't is yearly practiced thus to brine their Fields which though never done but after the fall of great store of Rain-waters into their pits which before they can work again must be gotten out and with it some quantity of their brine too yet even with these but brackish waters do they so season their adjoyning Lands that they receive a much more profitable return then they could have done from any soil or dung 45. In Cornwall and Devonshire so considerable are their improvements by sea-sand that it is carryed to all parts as far as they have the advantage of the water and afterwards 10 or 12 miles up higher into the Country on horses backs At which I must confess I marvel not at all since we are informed by an intelligent Gentleman of those parts z Philosoph Transact Num. 113. that where-ever this sand is used the seed is much and the straw little I have seen saies he in such a Place good Barly where the ear has been equal in length with the stalk it grew on and after the Corn is off that the grass in such places turns to Clover Some of the best of this sand he saies lies under Ouse or Mud about a foot deep and who knows but there may be such a Sand under the briny Bog near Church-hill-mill or at Chadlington I am sure the salt spring at Clifton comes from a sand if so and the Farmers thereabout get such Corn and Clover-grass I hope I shall not want the thanks of the Country 46. However I do not doubt but the water will serviceable either to cast on their Land as at Nantwich or to steep their Corn in before they sow it to preserve it from all the inconveniencies formerly prevented by brining and liming it and to strengthen it in its growth 47. Sir Hugh Plat a Id. loco citato tells us of a poor Country-man who passing over an arm of the sea with his Seed-corn in a sack by mischance at his landing fell into the water and so his Corn being left there till the next Ebb became somwhat brackish yet such was the necessity of the Man that notwithstanding he was out of all hope of any good success yet not being able to buy any other he sowed the same upon his plowed grounds and in fine when the Harvest time came about he reaped a crop of goodly Wheat such as in that year not any of his Neighbors had the like 48. Now let the Owners or Farmers of these springs fit down and consider of what has been said and if they shall think fit make tryal of them wherein if they meet with success I only beg of them which I shall gladly accept as the guerdon of my labors that they would be as free of it to their poor Neighbors that have lean grounds and ill penny-worths as God has been to them by me his weak instrument in the discovery 49. Having spoke of such waters as cure faulty grounds and cuticular distempers by external application it followeth that we treat of such as are or may be taken inwardly and deserve the repute of Medicinal waters The first and perchance the best of these I found at Deddington a small Mercat Town within the Close of one Mr. Lane where not long since digging a Well and passing through a blew Clay adorned with some glittering sparks and meeting by the way with pyrites argenteus and a bed of Belemnites or as they call them Thunder-bolts He came within few yards to this water of a strong sulphureous smell the most like of any thing I can think of to the water that has been used in the scouring a foul gun in weight lighter than pure Spring-water by an â„¥ js in a quart and yet after several tryals I found it so highly impregnated with a vitrioline salt as well as sulphur that two grains of the powder of galls would turn a gallon of water into a dusky red inclining to purple nor did they only so alter the site and position of the particles as to give a different colour and consistence as it happens in waters but meanly sated but in a quarter of an hour did so condense and constipate the pores of the watery vehicle that the excluded particles of the Minerals appeared in a separate state curdled in the Vessel and of so weighty a substance that they subsided to the bottom in a dark blue colour 50. The sediment being great in quantity I tryed upon red hot Irons and some other ways to see whether the salts or sulphur either by colour scintillation or odour might not by that means betray themselves but with small success whereupon I betook me to distillation putting about a quart into a glass body to which fitting a head and clean receiver I gave an easie heat till there was distilled off about three or four ounces which when poured out I found had neither smell tast or any other properties that might distinguish it from any other spring water distilled for with galls it would make no more alteration than any other simple common water would Then ordering the fire to be slackned to see what precipitate it would let fall upon filtration of what remained in the body I procured only a pale calx of a gritty substance shewing as it dryed in the Sun many transparent particles intermix'd in tast it had a faint pleasant piercing with a gentle warmth diffused on the tongue but pouring on it Spirit of Vitriol Oyl of Tartar c. I could not perceive any manifest ebullition so as to judge whether the salt contained in this residence were either of the acid or lixiviate kind 51. Wherefore to come closer to the point and taking directions from that accurate severe and profound Philosopher the Honorable Robert Boyle Esq the glory of his Nation and pride of his Family and to whose most signal Encouragement of the Design in hand these Papers in great part owe their birth I took good Syrup of Violets impregnated with the tincture of the Flowers and drop'd some of it into a glass of this water as it came from the Well whereupon quite contrary to my expectation not only the Syrup but the whole body of the water turned not of a red but a brisk green colour the Index of a lixiviate and not that acid Vitriol which I before had concluded on from the infusion of galls
and is naturally of it self so hollow and spungy that one would think it were always in the very ferment and may therefore be used at any fit time of year of colour when dry it is of a whitish gray intermixed with sand and very friable and may in all probability be the very same with the Marga candida arenosa friabilis of Hildesheim mention'd by Kentmannus s Kentman nomenelat rer fos cap. 3. de Margis and out of him by Lachmund Of just such another Marl as this brittle and dusty when dry but fat when wet we are inform'd there is at Wexford in the Kingdom of Ireland by Dr Gerrard Boat t Boats Nat. Hist. of Ireland cap. 12. somtime Physitian there only that that is blue and this a whitish gray and may therefore be fitter for Pasture than Arable It being observed in the Counties of Sussex and Kent where Marls are most plenty of any places of England that the gray suit with Pastures and the blue such perhaps as Sir Thomas Pennystons with Arable best 11. It may therefore be expedient that these new found Marls be thus agreeably tryed and though they answer not expectation the first year as some say they will not u Plin. Nat. Hist lib. 17. cap. 8. let not their Owners be thus discouraged but still continue to make frequent tryals of divers proportions of Earth at all seasons of the year with all kinds of Grain upon all sorts of Soil till they find out the most suitable and necessary circumstances so shall they in time attain to a knowledge beyond the expectation and perchance imitation of their Neighbors But I forbear to instruct such Ingenious Persons as the Owners of the above-named Marl-pits are the Orator being accounted little less than a fool that went about in his Speech to teach Hannibal to fight 12. But beside these we have another sort of Earth of a fat close texture and greenish colour so well impregnated with some kind of salt that put in the fire it presently decrepitates with no less noise than salt it self and in water after a quick and subtile solution leaves behind it a kind of brackish tast which I thought might proceed from a sort of Vitriol and perhaps true enough though the water would not tinge with powder of galls it takes grease out of cloaths extreamly well and would it but whiten as Fullers earth doth I should not doubt to pronounce it the same with the viridis Saponaria found near Beichling in Thuringia and mentioned by Kentmannus in his collection of Fossils w Cap. 1. De terris This we have in great plenty in Shot-over Forest where 't is always met with before they come to the Ochre from which it is separated but by a thin Iron crust and may peradventure be as strickt a concomitant of yellow Ochre as Chrysocolla another green Earth is said to be of Gold At present 't is accounted of small or no value but in recompence of the signal favors of its present Proprietor the Right Worshipful Sir Timothy Tyrril who in person was pleased to shew me the pits I am ready to discover a use it may have that may possibly equal that of his Ochre Which brings me next to treat of such Earths as are found in Oxford-shire and are useful in Trades 13. And amongst these the Ochre of Shotover no doubt may challenge a principal place it being accounted the best in its kind in the world of a yellow colour and very weighty much used by Painters simply of it self and as often mix'd with the rest of their colours This by Pliny x Plin. Nat. Hist. lib. 33. cap. 12. and the Latines was anciently called Sil which we have now changed for the modern word Ochra taken up as some think from the colour of the Earth and the Greek word 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 Pallidus or as others and they perhaps more rightly from the River Ochra that runs through Brunswick whose Banks do yield great quantities of it y Encelius de re Metal lib. 2. cap. 20. and from whence in all likelyhood we received the name upon the arrival of the Angles and Saxons in Britan. 14. They dig it now at Shotover on the east side of the Hill on the right hand of the way leading from Oxford to Whately though questionless it may be had in many other parts of it The vein dips from East to West and lies from seven to thirty feet in depth and between two and seven inches thick enwrapped it is within ten folds of Earth all which must be past through before they come at it for the Earth is here as at most other places I think I may say of a bulbous nature several folds of divers colours and consistencies still including one another not unlike the several coats of a Tulip root or Onyon The 1. next the turf is a reddish earth 2. a pale blue clay 3. a yellow sand 4. a white clay 5. an iron stone 6. a white and somtimes a reddish Maum 7. a green fat oily kind of clay 8. a thin iron-coloured rubble 9. a green clay again 10. another iron rubble almost like Smiths cinders And then the yellow Ochre which is of two parts 1. The stone Ochre which we may also call native because ready for use as soon as 't is dug and 2. Clay Ochre which because of the natural inequality in its goodness they wash and steep two or three days in water and then beat it with clubs on a plank into thin broad cakes of an equal mixture both of good and bad then they cut it into squares like Tiles and put it on hurdles laid on trestles to dry which when throughly done 't is fit for the Merchant 15. Where perhaps by the way it may be worthy our notice how different either the Ochres or opinions of men concerning them are now from what they formerly were for whereas Dioscorides as quoted by Wormius z Ol Wormii Musaeum cap. 4. commends to our choice the lightest earthy Ochre highly before the other of stone We on the contrary and not without reason prefer the stone Ochre as far before the clay 16. I was told of a yellow Ochre somwhere between Ducklington and Witney that serves them thereabout for inferior uses and met with it beside at some other places but none so good as this at Shotover that at Garsington being full of blue streaks and a small parcel that was shewn me taken up about Pyrton intermixed a little too much with red as if it were now in the transmutation so much spoke of by Naturalists by the earth and suns heat first into Rubrick or Ruddle and thence at last into pnigitis or else black chalk a Encel. de re Metal cap. 20. 17. Now that Nature indeed proceeds in this method I am almost perswaded by what I have found in Shotover-hill and elsewhere near it for within two beds
and makes it a product of Lime-stone and water Gignitur says he ex saxo calcis cum pauca aquâ permisto u De Natura Fossilium lib. 5. and thus I find it to grow here with us at Heddington in a blue clay that lies over the Quarry whose outermost crust is a hard Lime-stone 10. The learned and ingenious Steno w Prodromi prop. 1. obser vat 1. in his Prodromus thinks Chrystalls and Selenites's and all other Bodies having a smooth surface to have been already hardened when the matter of the Earth or stones containing them was yet a fluid if so indeed Agricola must be out in his aim But I cannot see how our bed of clay at Heddington above the Quarry at some places ten foot thick could have been a fluid within some ages past and yet of the Selenites's of the Rhomboideal Figure I find some as small as a Barley-corn some about three inches and others again at least half a foot long so that they seem rather to have some succession of growth and now to be in fieri than to have been all together already hardened when the clay that now contains them was but a fluid Beside they then would have been found close together whereas we here meet them some higher some lower and mix'd all together little and great and the very clay it self as 't is broken to pieces seeming somwhat inclinable to this sort of form 11. A third sort we have of them also found here at Heddington in the very same clay as also at Cornwell and Hanwell with two sides like the former more depressed then the other in compass also hexangular the thinest sides of them being divided by a ridge but in the form not of a Rhomboid but an inequilateral parallelogram as in Tab. 2. Fig. 1. d * There are such as these in Spain Thuringia and Cappadocia Aldrovand lib. 4. cap. 33. Some of these we find single lying in any posture the biggest scarce an inch broad or above four inches long and others joined together in a certain position with their flattest sides towards each other and edges downward and their ends constantly meeting in a center The Ingenious Sir Thomas Pennyston has observed that at Cornwell they generally lye in ternaries but here at Heddington we find them oftentimes more and not unfrequently irradiating all manner of ways into the form of a Globe the several Selenites like so many radii all pointing to the center as is plainly represented by one half of such a globe of them in Tab. 2. Fig. 1. c. 12. The texture of these is somthing agreeable and somthing different from the Rhomboideal Selenites for they all cleave in a planum to the flattest sides and seem to consist of small threds like them but some have the threds running obliquely to the whole square as in the lower part of Fig. 1. d. others have them meeting in the middle of the flat in an obtuse angle as in the upper part of the same Figure 13. The meeting of which threds so in an obtuse angle I thought at first might have very well occasioned that representation of the gramen segetum paniculâ sparsa fair panicled corn or bent-grass to be seen in most if not all of this kind which like a fly or spider in amber seem to be included at each end of them with the panicles turned contrary to each other But I quickly found my self mistaken by slitting of several whereby I discovered that the threds somtimes ran quite contrary to the spreading panicles of the corn or bent-grass so very well counterfeited in many of them and therefore not likely to give that form And that the thing it self was nothing but clay thus pretily dispersed in the form of a bent which beside the pleasure of the surprizal gave me another argument against Steno's opinion That Selenites 's were all hardened when their beds they now lie in were nothing but fluids for it cannot well be conceived how the clay should any way get to be within them had it not had a being before the selenites and thus included at the time of their formation 14. Of formed stones though there are few that have any yet some there are of eminent use and such is our selenites or specular stone good taken inwardly for many distempers number'd up by Cerutus y In Musaeo Calceolario sect 3. Aldrovandus z Lib. 4. cap. 33. Mus Metal and Galen a De Simp. Med. facult lib. 9. and externally to take away the blemishes of the face In ancient times before the invention of glass it was of very great use for Lanterns and Windows it being easily slit into very thin plates yet loosing nothing thereby of its diaphaneity Of this says Agricola b De Natura Fossilium lib. 5. are the Church-windows made at Caswick in Saxony and Merseburg in Thuringia which certainly must be of a different sort from what is described by Aldrovandus c Mus Metal lib. 4. c. 33. and Wormius d In Musaeo cap. 7. the one whereof says 't is imbrium impatiens and the other humido corruptibilis I exposed this of ours many rainy days but could not find that from the weather it received any damage and therefore guess it to be the same describ'd by Agricola I steeped it likewise many days in water but found not any sensible alteration of its body though it gave the water both an odd smell and tast As for Lanterns and Windows so they anciently used it in making of Bee-hives that through it they might see the Bees operations as in glasshives now an Invention by some people taken for new though very well known in the days of Pliny e Nat. Hist. lib. 21. cap. 14. 15. Out of burnt selenites is made the best gypsum for Plaistering Images Fret-works c. When burn'd it turns to a pure white Calx by the Italians called Gesso from the Latin word gypsum Of this they make those curious counterfeit Tables like Marble in-laid with divers Pretious stones in the forms of Animals Plants c. The way of making them is taught us by Kircher f Kircheri Mundus sub terr Lib. 12. sect 5. part 3. cap. 3. but there is a friend of mine has a better method who intends very speedily to make some attempt to make them in England and of English materials And so much for our first formed stone Selenites on which I had not dwelt so long but to supply the defects of other Authors whose descriptions of it are but mean and imperfect 16. After the Moon-stone the Asteriae or Star-stones next offer themselves to our consideration which to avoid the confusion of other Authors I shall only call those whose whole Bodies make the form of a Star as in Tab. 2. Fig. 2 3 in opposition to the Astroites which in the whole are irregular but adorned as it were with a Constellation as in Fig. 4 5 6
ordinary course of nature 7. The same Pliny h Nat. Hist lib. 7. cap. 14. informs us that many men indeed have begotten children at sixty or eighty years old for which he instances in Volusius Saturninus who on Dame Cornelia of the lineage of the Scipio's begat Volusius Saturninus who afterward was Consul at sixty two years old and upwards Cato Censorius says the same Pliny ancestor to Cato who slew himself at Vtica begat a son on the daughter of Salonius his Vassal after he was past 80 years of age and King Massinissa another whom he called Methymathnus when he was eighty six But as to women he is positive that they are past child-bearing at fifty and that for the most part their customary purgations stop at forty 8. But I met with an instance at Shetford near Banbury that proves him plainly mistaken where I saw and spoke with one Catharine Tayler that had a son then living and lusty in the sixtieth year of her age which was testified also to me by many there about And I have since heard of one Good wife Harvey of Smithen-green in the Parish of Leigh within three miles of Worcester that is now with child in her sixty third year which are instances wonderful rare and scarce heard of in other Countrys though we are informed indeed by Dr. Boat i Natural History of Ireland chap. 23. sect 1. that amongst the women in Ireland there are several found who do not only retain their Catamenia but even their fruitfulness above the age of fifty and some till that of sixty years whereof he tells us his brother knew some who being above threescore years old did not only conceive and bring forth children but nursed them and brought them up with their own milk which also as we are acquainted by Gul. Piso * Gul. Piso de Indiae utriusque re Nat. Med. lib. 1 cap. 1 p. 13 is very common in Brasil 9. As in the child-bearing of women and the accidents attending it I have met with also somwhat extraordinary in their growth which must be ranked among the accidents that have befallen the sex during their course of life and such is the growth of one Philippa French born at Milcomb in this County now six or seven and thirty years of age and a marryed woman having all her parts proportionable and of good symmetry yet wanting half an inch of a yard in height which is somwhat lower than Manius Maximus or M. Tullius who as Varro reports were each but two cubits high and yet they were Gentlemen and Knights of Rome but higher then Conopas the Dwarf of Julia Neece to Augustus who as Pliny k Nat. Hist lib. 7. cap. 16. tells us was but two foot high and a hand bredth but he tells us not whether Conopas were at his full growth or had good symmetry of parts like our Philippa it being common enough for persons to be very low of stature when either their Bodies are awry or some of their parts disproportionable to the rest 10. And amongst such accidents as these we may reckon a strange disease that befel Mary the daughter of John Collier of Burford who out of the corners of her eyes excluded a sort of congealed matter which after some time turned into a stony kind of substance not unlike the stones as they were described to me that somtimes come forth of the tumor called Atheroma which I therefore guess to have been only a more exalted kind of Aegilops or fistula lachrymalis and not to have been caused by fascination as Lachmund l Fred. Lachmundi 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 〈◊〉 sect 3. cap. 22. thinks the stones were that came forth of the left eye of Margaret the daughter of Conrad Brandis of Banteln she being cured of the disease by that eminent Oculist Dr. Turbervil of Sarum 11. Yet a much stranger accident than that befel one Rebeckah Smith the Servant-maid of one Thomas White of Minster Lovel who being of a robust constitution though she seldom eat flesh it scarce agreeing with her and above 50 years of age after she came from the Communion on Palm-sunday April 16. Anno 1671. was taken with such a dryness in her throat that she could not swallow her spittle nor any thing else to supply the decays of nature and in this case she continued without eating or drinking to the amazement of all for about ten weeks viz. to the 29 of June being both St. Peters and Witney-fair day by which time being brought very low her master enquired and found out a person who gave him an Amulet for it was supposed she was bewitch'd against this evil after the application whereof within two or three days time though I dare not suppose there was any dependence between the medicin and disease she first drank a little water then warm broaths in small quantities at a time and nothing else till Palm-sunday again twelve months after when she began to eat bread and other food again as formerly she had done and is now about the age of sixty and still living at the same place ready to testifie the truth of the thing as well as Tho. White and his wife who were all that lived in the house with her and will confidently assert for they carefully observed that they do not believe she ever took any thing in those ten weeks time nor any thing more all the year following but what was above-mentioned wherein I think they may the rather be credited because there was never any advantage made of this wonder which argues it clear of all juggle or design 12. Concerning the death of women we have two as remarkable examples as any perhaps to be met with in History both of them being confirmations of what Pliny says of them that they much more frequently revive after they have been reputed dead than males do * Hist Nat lib. 7. cap. 52. whence doubtless also the Proverb mulieri ne credas ne mortuae quidem Of which recoveries of the female Sex rather than the male the same Pliny offers us a natural reason but I think fit to wave it especially since the reviviscence of Anne Green innocently condemned to dye and executed at Oxford for the murther of an abortive Infant is rather ascribed to the Justice of Heaven than to the strength or other conveniencies of nature for such purpose in women rather than men though it must also be allowed that God Himself makes use many times of natural means in production of the most wonderful most amazing effects The History whereof as it is taken out of a Chronicle of the late Civil Wars by James Heath Gentleman m History of the Civil Wars of England Scotland and Ireland in Anno 1650. and the continuation of the History of the World by Dionysius Petavius n Append. ad Hist D. Petavii in Anno 1650. with some few additions and alterations take as followeth 13. In the year
and other Furs of several Beasts c. the use they have for them is to apparel themselves with them their manner being to tear them into gowns of about two yards long thrusting their arms through two holes made for that purpose and so wrapping the rest about them as we our loose Coats Our Merchants have abused them for many years with so false colours that they will not hold their gloss above a months wear but there is an ingenious person of Witney that has improved them much of late by fixing upon them a true blue dye having an eye of red whereof as soon as the Indians shall be made sensible and the disturbances now amongst them over no doubt the trade in those will be much advanced again 172. Of their best tail wooll they make the blankets of 6 quarters broad commonly called cuts which serve Sea-men for their Hammocs and of their worst they make Wednel for Collar-makers wrappers to pack their blanckets in and tilt-cloths for Barge-men They send all the sorts of Duffields and Blankets weekly in waggons up to London which return laden with fell wooll from Leaden-hall and Barnaby-street in Southwark whether 't is brought for this purpose from most places above-mention'd Oxford-shire and the adjacent Counties being not able to supply them 173. There are also in this Town a great many Fell-mongers out of whom at the neighboring Town of Bampton there arises another considerable trade the Fell-mongers sheep-skins after dressed and strained being here made into wares viz. Jackets Breeches Leather linings c. which they chiefly vent into Berk-shire VVilt-shire and Dorset-shire no Town in England having a trade like it in that sort of ware 174. Which two trades of the Towns of VVitney and Bampton are the most eminent that are too the most peculiar of this County The Maulting trade of Oxford and Henly on Thames 't is true are considerable and Burford has been famous time out of mind for the making of Saddles and so has Oxford had the reputation of the best Gloves and Knives of any place in England but these trades being not peculiar to the places where they are practised I therefore pass them by without further notice 175. But the Starch trade of Oxford though indeed it be not great yet being practiced in few places and the method known to fewer how it is made its discovery perhaps may be acceptable to some I shall not therefore stick to give a short account of it Let them know therefore that the substance we commonly call Starch notwithstanding its pure whiteness is made of the shortest and worst bran that they make in the Meal shops worse than that they sell to Carriers to feed their Horses This they steep in a water prepared for that purpose by a solution at first of Roch-Alum about a pound to a Hogshead which will last for ever after for ten or fourteen days in great tubs then 't is taken and washed through a large Osier basket over three other tubs the sower water of the second tub washing it into the first and the sower water of the third into the second and clear water from the Pump washing it into the third 176. Whereby the way it must be noted that only Pump water will serve the turn to give it this last washing and continue the waters sowerness for ever after by reason I suppose of the incisive particles of salt to be found in most Pump waters which are plain from their not taking soap that are apt to work upon and separate the finest flower yet sticking to the bran notwithstanding the mill and sieve which at last becomes starch 177. What remains in the basket at last after the three washings is thrown upon the dung-hill which as they have found of late becomes a very good manure for meddow land and should therefore have been mentioned in the 70 § of this Chapter amongst the uncommon manures And the fine flower thus washed from the bran is let stand again in its own water for about a week then being all setled at the bottom it is stirred up again and fresh Pump water added and strained from its smalle'â—â— bran through a Lawn sieve which done they permit it to settle again which it does in one day and then they draw off the water from it all to a small matter then standing two days more it at last becomes so fixt that with a burchen broom they sweep the water left at the top which is a slimy kind of matter up and down upon it to cleanse it from filth and then pouring it off they wash its surface yet cleaner by dashing upon it a bucket of fair Pump water 178. Which done they then cut it out of the tubs in great pieces with sharp trowels and box it up in troughs having holes in the bottom to drain the water from it always puting wet cloths between the wood and it for the more commodious taking it out of the troughs again to dry which they do within a day laying it first on cold bricks for about two days which suck away a great deal of moisture from it and after over a Bakers oven four or five days together which will dry it sufficiently if intended only to be ground to powder for hair as it is chiefly here but if intended to be sold as starch they then use a stove to give it the starch-grain which the oven will not do 179. From the inferior I proceed to the superior Arts and Sciences and others instrumental to them for in these too there have been many Inventions and Improvements made in this Vniversity In enumeration whereof if we begin so low as the very Elements of Speech we shall find that the Reverend and Learned Dr. Wallis Savilian Professor of Geometry here first observed and discovered the Physical or Mechanical formation of all sounds in Speech as plainly appears from his Treatise de Loquela prefix'd to his Grammar for the English Tongue first publish'd in the Year 1653. 180. In pursuance whereof he also found out a way whereby he hath taught dumb persons who were therefore dumb because deaf not only to understand what they read and by writing to express their minds but also to speak and read intelligibly according to directions for the artificial position and motion of the Organs of Speech and thereby also assisted others who have spoken very imperfectly Of which no more there being a particular account given by himself in our English Philosophical Transactions of July 18. 1670 b Philosoph Transact Numb 61. 181. I know that the Right Reverend Father in God John Wilkins late Lord Bishop of Chester hath also laid down the distinct manner of forming all sounds in Speech and shewed in Sculpture which letters are Labial Lingual Nasal c. and how the Epiglottis Larynx Aspera Arteria and Oesophagus conduce to them Since him in the Year 1669. the Reverend and Ingenious William Holder D.D. publish'd an