The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1871-10-06
Nothing New Under the Sun.


Photography only adds another il
| stance to the many records Whic
| prove the truth of SOlomOA's saying
"The thing that hath been is ths
/ which shall be, and there is no nel
! thing under the SUE"
| Humbolt, In his Cosmos, states tina
! the Chinese had magnetic carriage
with which to guide themselves acrOs
! the great plains of Tartary, 1 900 year
| before our era, on the principle Of tn
| compass. The prototype Of the stean
| engine has been traced to the eeOli
| pyle Of Hero Of Alexangria. The Ro
| mans used movable types to mari
! their pottery and indorse their books
Mr.. Layard found in Nineveh q mag
nifying lens of rock crystal, Whici
Sir D. Brewster considers g true Opti
cal lens, and the origin of the micro
scTope. The principal of the stereOs
cope, invented by Professor Wheat
stone, was known to Euclid, describ
ed by Galen 1, 800 years ago, and more
fully in 1899, A. D., in the works o.
Baptista Porta. The Thames tunnel
thought such a novelty, was an.
ticipated by that under the EuphrateS
at Babylon; and the ancient Egypt.
ans had Suez canal. Such examples
might be indefinitely multiplied, but
we turn to photography. NJ. Jobard
in his NOuvelles Invention aux Expo
sitions Universities, 1857, says trans
lation from German was discovered IN
Russia, 800 years old, which contains
a clear explanation of photography.
The old alchemists understood the
properties of chloride Of silver in lela-
ton to light, and it's Photographic ac-
ton is explained by Fabricius in DE
Rebus Metallicis, 1866. The dagueT-
TeOtype process was anticipated by
De la Roche in his Giphantic, 1850,
though it was only the statement Oi
a dreamer.
In DIR. HOoper's Rational Recrea-
tions, 1774, is the following method OF
writing on glass by the rays of the
sun. "Dissolve chalk in aquafortis to
the cOnsistence of milk, and add to
tEat a strong dissolution of silver.
Keep this liquor in q glass decanteT,
we'll stopped. Then cut out from a
paper the Letters you would have ap-
pear, and paste the paper on the de-
canteT, which you are to place in the
sun, in such manner that its rays
may pass through the spaces cut out
of the paper, and all on she surface OF
the liz uUr. The part of the glass
through which the rays pass will turn
black, and that under the paper will
remain white"
IN 1902, Thomas Wedgwood and
Sir Humphrey Davy contributed to
the Journal of the Royal Institution a
paper on IAN Account of Method of
Coping Paintings upon Glass, and
of making Profiles by the Agency of
Light upon Nitrate of Silver" Let
us take an extract or two from this
paper, first reminding our readers that
DaguerTe did not announce his inven-
ton till 1889. "Whte paper or white
leather" says the memoir, "mOisten-
ed with solution q nitrate Of silver,
UndeTgOes no change when kept in a
dark place; but, on being exposed to
the daylight, it speedily changes color
and, after passing through different
shades of gray aud brown, becomes,
at length nearly black. The altera-
tions of color take place more speedily
i'm proportion as the light is intense.
When the shadow Of any figure is
thrown upon the prepared surface, the
part concealed by it remains white,
and the other parts speedily become
dark, For copying paintings on glass,
the solution should be applied on
leather; and in this case it is more
readily acted on than when paper ia
used. The copy of a painting, or
the profile, Immediately after be-
ing taken, must be kept in auy OBJ
scuTe place. The instruments Wedg-
wood and Davy used were the camera
Obscura and the solar microscope; the
images produced, however, by the
former were ''found too faint to pro-
duce in any moderate time an effect
upon the nitrate of silver" Davy
says: "Nothing but q method of pre-
venting the unshaded parts of the
delinea tions from being cOlOred by ex-
pOsure to the day is wanting, to render
this process as useful as it Is elegant" -"