in question, after having lost a large amount of money at play, stole a clock belonging to the king, and hid it in his sleeve. The clock nevertheless continued its movements, and after a time gave notice of its place of concealment by striking the hour; this immediately discovered the theft, and the king, capricious in his kindness as well as in his cruelties, not only forgave the offender but actually made him a present of the clock. In the year 1544 the corporation of master clock-makers at Paris obtained from Francis I. a statute in their favour, forbidding any one who was not an admitted master to make clocks, watches, or alarms, large or small. Before portable clocks could be made, the substitution of the main-spring for a weight, as the moving power, must have taken place; and this may be considered a second era in horology, from which may be dated the application of the fusee; for these inventions completely altered the form and principles of horological machines.

The application of a pendulum to the clock, marked another era in their construction. Galileo and Huygens contended for the priority of applying the pendulum to clocks; but the honour really belongs to a London artist named Richard Harris, who invented and made a long-pendulum clock in 1641, seventeen years before the date at which Galileo describes himself to have made, or directed the making of one.

In 1617, Barlow, a London clock-maker, invented the repeating mechanism by which the hour last struck may be known by pulling a string; but a much more important addition to the improvements in clocks speedily followed, namely, the invention of the anchor escapement, which, like most others that have stood the test of time, belongs to the English. This was the work of Clement, a London clock-maker, in 1680.

It would be a matter of some difficulty to determine what artist first reduced the portable spring-clock to the dimensions of a watch to be worn in the pocket. The small clocks prior to the time of Huygens and Hooke were very imperfect

machines; they did not even profess to subdivide the hours into minutes and seconds until the invention of the balancespring, which is to the balance what gravity is to the pendulum, and its introduction has contributed as much to the improvement of watches as did that of the pendulum to clocks. The honour of this invention was warmly contested by the lastnamed individuals previous to 1658; but, so far as priority of publication is concerned, the honour is due to Hooke.

Towards the end of the last century a clock was constructed by a Genevan mechanic named Droz, capable of performing a variety of surprising movements, which were effected by the figures of a negro, a shepherd, and a dog. When the clock struck, the shepherd played six tunes on his flute, and the dog approached and fawned upon him. This clock was exhibited to the King of Spain, who was highly delighted with the ingenuity of the artist. The king, at the request of Droz, took an apple from the shepherd's basket, when the dog started up and barked so loud that the king's dog, which was in the same room, began to bark also. We are moreover informed, that the negro, on being asked what hour it was, answered the question in French, so that he could be understood by those present.

A common watch has for its moving power a main-spring, the variable force of which is equalized, or rendered uniform, by the introduction of the fusee-a very beautiful contrivance, which is, nevertheless, nothing more than a variable lever, upon which the main-spring acts through the medium of the chain. As the chain winds upon it, the distance from the centre of motion of the fusee to the semi-diameter of the chain which is in contact with it varies, in the proportion, that the distance of the centre of motion of the fusee to the semi-diameter of the chain, at that point where it leaves the fusee for the barrel, multiplied by the force of the main-spring acting on the chain at that time, shall be what mathematicians term a constant quantity—that is, it shall be the same whatever point of the fusee may be taken.

F WE could call up before us the library of an English monastery in the olden time, we should see the monks seated at their desks, their ink, pens, brushes, gold, and colours before them; one busily employed in finishing some richly illuminated initial, another slowly adding letter to letter, and word to word, translating and copy ing the ancient manuscript before him as he pro gressed with his tedious task. From day to day, and month to month, would he slowly proceed, forming those thick, angular, black-letter cha racters, with no cessation, saving to attend to his meals, his prayers, and his sleep, unless he paused now and then to erase some error he had made upon the parchment, as with his quaint old-fashioned knife he carefully

obliterated the mistake, before he again proceeded with his labour. Greece and Rome were then the great marts for books, and many a journey did our ancient Saxon forefathers make to obtain those rare manuscripts, which they purchased at great cost, and, on their return to England, translated into the Saxon language, or merely multiplied copies from the Latin. So precious were manuscripts in those days, that an Anglo-Saxon bishop named Wilfred had the books of the four evangelists copied out in letters of gold upon purple parchment ; and such value did he set upon the work when it was completed, that he kept it in a case of gold adorned with precious stones. Few men, excepting the monks, were capable of writing in those early times. We find Wilitred, the king of Kent, affixing to a charter the sign of the cross, and causing the scribe to add below, that it was on account of his ignorance of writing that he could not sign his name. Literature would have made greater progress among the Saxons than it did, had it not been for the ravages of the Danes. These brave but ignorant seakings were heathens, and they looked upon the Saxon Christians, who once worshipped Woden, and were idolaters like themselves, as renegadoes to the old religion, and thus considered that they were performing a pious duty by destroying their monasteries and libraries; for their ideas of heaven consisted in the belief that after death they should drink ale out of the skulls of their enemies, and feast off a bone whose bulk never diminished, however much they ate. Many valuable manuscripts, which had cost the Saxon monks years of labour to produce, were burned by the heathen invaders, or England would no doubt, but for these ravages, have possessed the most valuable histories of any country in Europe, since the commencement of Christianity. Many treasures that we lost for ever would have been made familiar to us in the present day, through the discovery of printing, but for these savage sea-kings.

It is a pleasing change to turn from the survey of a discovery

like that of gunpowder, which only increases man's power of slaughter, to an inquiry into the origin of an invention so grand and important as that of printing. We leave the records of death and destruction, havoc and suffering, conquest and false glory, to cnter on the path of an art which has already led to grand results in civilisation, and opened the door of science and wisdom, and that must better the condition of man. Every human invention sinks into inferiority when compared with the discovery of printing. The period of its birth, late as it was in human history, may, indeed, be styled the era of light-the commencement of true civilisation. Men built pyramids, reared obelisks and temples, dug canals, constructed aqueducts and bridges, and formed gigantic highways for the march of armies, thousands of years ago; but their civilisation, with a few bright exceptions, only amounted to an advance above barbarism compared with the progress society has made since the discovery of printing. Knowledge, it has been wisely said, is Power, and while the few possessed knowledge they too generally employed it only to rule over and keep down the many. And this condition of things must have continued but for the means of printing, which made knowledge universal.

The blessings which will be eventually derived from this discovery are certain; and yet the date of their complete accomplishment may be distant. We have already observed that man learns but slowly. The great consolation is, that now he possesses the means of learning, and also of recording all that he does learn, his discoveries cannot, again, be lost; his inventions can no more sink into oblivion. One discovery produces another-and printing renders it impossible that any valuable invention can fail to yield its full improvement for the human race. Languages much more philosophical in construction, and copious in expression, than any living tongues, were spoken and written in ancient times; but, so long as the thoughts they embodied were restricted to laborious methods of inscription, knowledge