, 1877-02-09
Disooveris. Made by Accident.

sciences have been made or suggested
by accident. The use Of the pendulum.
suggested by the vibrating Of a chan
delier in a cathedral; the power of steam,
intimated by the oscillating Of the lid of
a tea-kettle; the utility of coal gas for
| light, experimental on by an ordinary
tobacco-pipe of white clay; the magnif-
cent property of the lens, stumbled upon
by an opticians apprentice while hold
ing spectacle glasses between his thumb
and tinger-are well known instances in
proof of the fact.
/ Galvanism was discovered by acei-
dent. Prof. Galvani, of Bologna, in
Italy, gave his name to the operation,
but his wife is considered as actually
| She being in bad health, some frogs
were ordered for her. As they lay
upon the table, skinned, she noticed
that their limbs became strongly con-
vulsed when near an electrical conduc-
tor. She called her husbands attention
to the fact; he instituted a series of ex-
periments, and in 1892 the galvanic bat
terry was invented.
Eleven years later, with that discovery
for his basis, Prof. Alessandro Volta,
also an Italian, announced his discovery
of the ''voltaic pile"
The discovery of glass making was
effected by seeing the sand vitrifed
upon which a fire had been kindled.
Blancourt says that the making of
plate-glass was suggested by the fact
of workman happening to break a
crucible filed with melted glass. The
fluid ran under one of the large flag
stones with which the floor was paved.
On raising the stone to recover the
glass, it was found in the form of q
plate, such as could not be produced by
the ordinary process of blowing.
Glass pearls, though among the most
beautiful, inexpensive and common Or
naments worn by the ladies, are pro-
duced by very singular process. In
1856 Venetian named Joaquin discov-
cred that the scales of a fish called
bleak-fish possessed the property Of
communicating pearly hue to the
water. He found by experimenting that
beads dipped into the water assumed,
when dried, the appearance of pearls.
1t proved, however, that the pearly
coat, when placed outside, was easily
rubbed off; and the next improvement
w0s to make the beads hollow. Making
these beads is carried on to this day
in Venice. The beads are all blown sep
arately. By means of small tube; the
insides are delicately coated with the
pearly liquid, and a waxed coating is
placed over that. 1t requires the scales
of four thousand fish to produce half a
pint of the liquid, to which a small
quantity of sal-amoniac and isinglass are
afterward added.
Lundy Foot, the celebrated snuff
manufacturer, originally kept small
tobbacconist shop at Limerick. One
night his house, which was uninsured,
was burned to the ground. As he con-
templated the smoking ruins on the fol-
lowing morning in state bordering
on despair, some of the poorer neigh
bOrs, cropping among the embers for
what they could find, stumbled upon
several canisters of unconsumed but
half-baked snuff, which they tried, and
found so pleasant to their nose that they
soon loaded their waistcoat pockets
with it. Lundy Foot, aroused from his
stupor, initiated their example and took
pinch OF his own property, when he
was struck with the superior pungency
and flavor it had acquired from the
great heat to which it had been exposed.
Acting upon the hint, he took another
house in a place called Black Yard,
erected ovens and set about the manufac-
ture of high-dried commodity, which
soon became widely known as Black
Yard snuff. Eventually he took large
house in Dublin, and making his GUS
toners pay literally through the nose,
amassed great fortune by having been
ruined.
JEFFERsoN's PoLITIcAL MAxIMs.-
} l. Legal equality of human beings.
2. The people the only source OF le-
gitimate power.
3. Absolute and lasting severance of