Star.
London, England, 1830-12-22 00:00:00

SCINTILI,4E.

A FEW WORDS ON PRECISION.

4, precise villains,"---Sumrsneaat.

I. Dr. ANDLIMON says the mathematician can denies,
orate, with the most decisive certainty, that no fly can
alight on this globe, without communicating motion to it ;
and he can ascertain, with the most accurate precision,
what must be the exact amount of the motion so produced
—See his Recreations in Agriculture, ii. 350.
11. CH Ev REA tr, in his History of the World, tells us,
that it was created the 6th September, on a Friday, a little
after four o'clock in the afternoon ;
111. Dr. CA IUB makes out, in a quarto tract, printed
1574, that the University of Cambridge, had, for its foul•
der, Cantaber, 394 years before Christ, and in the year of
the world, 4,300 and odd ; and, therefore, that the Uai•
versity of Cambridge was 1267 years more ancient than
Ox ford.

IV. Mr. HA Limn, in his preface to the Gentoo Lava
says, what shall we say to a work composed 4,000 year;
ago, and from thence training mankind upwards through
several millions of years ?
V. SIR Wn.r.ten JON Es says (Asiatic Researches ii
that if it were worth while to calculate the age of Menu's
Institutes, according to the Brahmins, we must multiply
4,300,000 by 6 times 71, and add to the product the num.
ber of years already past in the seventh Manwantara!
VI. GREGORIO LETI boasted that he had been the fa-
ther of a book, and the father of a child, for 20 years suc-
cessively.
VII. SWIFT counted the number of steps he took from
London to Chelsea; and Bishop WREN calculated that he
walked round the earth while a prisoner in the Tower of
London.
VIII. Honest MA N row wrote 119 Sermons on the 119th
Psalm !

IX. PZTRARCH is no less accurate and precise about bis
Laura. These are his own words : " Laura, illustrious by
the virtues she possessed, and celebrated during many years
by my verses, appeared to my eyes, for the first time, on the
6th day of April, in the year 1327, at Avignon, in the
church of St. Clare, at 6 o'clock in the morning. I was
then in my early youth. In the same town, on the same*,
and at the same hour, in the year 1348, this light, this sun
withdrew fiom the world." ,

X. STURM calculates, that there are thousands of insects
in a crumb of bread ; MALEZIEU says, he has seen 'icing
animalculm twenty-seven millions of times smaller than
mites ; NIEWENTYT has computed that in a second of a
minute, there escapes out of a burning candle particles of
light ten millions of millions of times more than the number
of the grains of sand computed to be contained in the
whole earth ; and SPALLANZANI finds that the spermatic
particle of a toad, designed to fecundate a tadpole, has tin
2,994,687,500 th part of a grain !
XI. General WASHINGTON was extremely exact, even
to folly. A man came to Mount Vernon to pay rent, and
be had not the exact balance due to the General ; when the
money was counted, the General said. " There wants four-
pence." The man offered him a dollar, and desired him to
put it to the next year's account. No, he must get the
change, and leave the money on the table until he had got
it. The man rode to Alexandria, which is nine miles from
Mount Vernon, and then the General settled the account....
See Parkinson's Tour, ii. 438.
XII. BOYLE demonstrated the practicability of dividing
a grain of gold into 18,000,000 visible parts. He like-
wise dissolved a grain of copper in spirit of sal ammoniac,
and mixing it so dissolved with a certain quantity of water
weighing 28,534 grains, a blue tincture was given to the
water in every part. He, inferred, then, that there must
be in every visible part of the water a small particle of
copper. Now the water measured 105,57 cubic inches,
and in a cubic inch there are 216,000,000 visible parts ;
consequently, a grain of copper was divided into
22,788,000,000 visible parts !
XIII. Lae u WINHOCK discovered in some water three kinds
of animalcules, of which the diameters were to one another
as the numbers 1, 10, and 50 • the diameter of a common
grain of sand was to that of the smallest of these animal-
cules as 1,000: 1 ; and, consequently, its magnitude as
1,000,000,000: 1.

J. J. 11.
Till QUAKERS. —July, 16.56, I had the curiosity to
That soma quaker, here, (Ipswich,) in prison ; a new phanactic sect.
of dangerous principles, who chew no respect to an man, magistrate,
or saber, and seeme a melancholy proud son of people, and exceedingly
ignorant. One of these was said to have fasted 20 ie., but another
endeavouring to do the like, perished on the 10th, when he would have
eaten,laut could not.—Berlya's Diary, voL L p. 301, 4to. ed.
BILLIARDS.—St. Ignatius de Loyola, says N. Tunas
in his treatise on " Games and Diversions," being desired one day to
play at billiards, did not refuse to do it, and was so plainly &enact, by
Heaven, that though he could not play, he won every game.
FRIENDSHIP.—" The intercourse of minds, the free
use of reason, and the exercise of mutual love and friendship, is the
highest of all hvapinesees and enjoyments."--Lonn SiserrEssotv.
Pages 10.--" For= of magnitude, although
shaped, will, however on account of their vastness, draw our emotion.
and raise our admiration. The full-bottomed wig, like the lion's mane.
hath something noble in it, and adds not only dignity, but sagacity, IJ
the counumance."— HOGARTIeI " Analysis of Beauty," eh. VI.
TEA, WHEN FIRST KNOWN IN ENGLAND.—" Sept.
25, 11160.-1 did send for a cup of tee (a China drink) of which I
never had drank before.—Pxrra's Diary, i. 141." June 28, 1667.
Home, and there find my wife making of tea ; a drink which Mr
Perna& the Potticary, tells her is good for her cold and defittriour."—
lb.

BIRTH.
Saturday, the Lady of G. W. Newton, Req. succfrugh.terrace. Cr.
per Clapton, of a son.

MARRIED.
On Thursday, at As ley, Beds, Edmund Wadley, second tel of
the late Rev. Charles Ash&ld, of Stewkley, Bucks, to Mary Aar.
only daughter of the late Mr. Wright, of Aspley—On the Lune day.
Septimus Wright, of Hitchin, Herta, to Anne, youngest daughter of
the late Mr. Mellor, of Duontable, Bede.

DIED.

•
At Hampstead, on Saturday, Mrs. Hill, widow of the late Law-
rence Hill, Writes to the Signet, Edinburgh—Suddenly, on the 10th
of June last, Lieutenant Cecil Hammond (on his passage ftorn Born-
bay, on board the Bomalen, Captain Martin), of his 111ajetty's 6th
Regiment of Infantry—On the Illth inst. Mr. William Gaston, aged
82, upwards of fifty years vestry.clerk of Norton.falgate—At St.
Martin's, Scilly, Thomas Nance, usually celled The Goal. He was
formerly in the habit of drinking, regularly, a quart of spirits &der,
and complained much when compelled by various circumstances to m-
arkt 'himself to half that quantity—At Paris, on the Bth of October
last, Mr. Joseph Donaldson, from disease, brought on by over.eza•
tion and fatigue in the late revolution. He was a native of Glasgow.
and well known as the author of The Eisen{ We of a Soldier sad
Seems and iffbikkete elf a Soldier's We in Ireland, where he has It.
corded In a manner, his early life and adventures, by
" Soled anditif t's' °lc
About eighteen months ago, he left Magog
(sibere be had hem tumbled, has the premeds of his writings. to pro•
smuts his implies as a sawn Isendes. He remained there but
Isheit time, *MU prneesded to Pads ; he was there at the breaibir
mit et the WNW" 'mad, as might have been expected, embrice4
with ithimelmeth, ihe ems el the people. A gentleman at Paris, grh,'
ant banat halftime of hie death, mays, " that his conduct, during
the dine days eT the *mistimes week, was most distinguished : itg
wasliodead hap the, Paris Joessels, as be was constantly engaged in
the Nelt plat* attacks. His exertion that week brought him unite
the MOW of the- new Orivermosat. He was employed under Meislist
l and had received an appoineetest so remit to (Amyx in some
empteity, when an hitlammathin terminated his eventful career.

NIOM WATER AT LONDON BRIDGI TO•MORROW.
a. a. a. 1111
Illeraiag
_7 ta I Aftemes•
____

Isom : Rimed sad kabliebed by Jou )[•Txs, •t the 3s.a
Orrsea, No. L, Pbrkettibber, Temple:Bor.