Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1884-08-14
THE WORK OF CHANCE.

l
Newton owed his great discovery of
the attraction of gravitation TO chance
falling of an apple, which set his mind
going to discover why it fell down and
not up.
And we may well imagine the aston
ishment Of those Venetian marines gaz-
ing in wonder at the liquid stream of
glass flowing from their fires on the
beach.
Two little children of a spectacle
maker, playing outside the door of their
fathers shop in Holland, with two of
his glasses suddenly found that the stes-
pie Of ths distant church was brought
seemingly near to the eye, and the tele
scope was thus discovered.
But for this accident we should not
now have SO intimate knowledge of
the mighty bodies in the celestial firma-
ment.
At the present day electricity has be-
come a necessity of every day existence,
but had not Madame Galvant been at
tackled by that severe cold in 1890, the
electric telegraph might yet be thing
Of the future.
The good lady, instead of putting her
feet in mustard and water. and dosing
herself with spirits of nitre, was ordered
to take bowl of frog soup.
Those who have tasted that delicious
preparation may not have known that
the hind legs of the frog are used for
making soup, and the mere chance of
hanging the legs by copper hooks from
an iron rail. caused the crural nerves to
contract as if endowed with life, and the
electric current was discovered.
Galvani. it must be said, merely con-
sidered the reptile as an animated Ley
den jar, and it was left to Volta, in 1900,
to attach the right importance to the
action of the frogs legs
We are not told whether Madame Gal
wants cold got better, but we simply
hope, in common gratitude, that it did.
The steam engine we see coursing
along the railroads which now intersect
every civilized country, owes many of its
mprovements-if,in indeed, it does not owe
its origin-to chance.
Captain Savery's mind had long been
occupied endeavoring to procure me-
ehanicsl means of superseding hand
labor in difficult places, but he was in
debted to freak in Florence, in which
an empty wine bottle was flung into the
fire, for the idea, from which he develop
ed his steam engine.
Hastily snatching the heated bottle
from the fire, he plunged it neck fore
most into basin of cold water, and was
delighted to find a vacuum had been
created, and the water rushed in, half
6lling the bottle.
Newcomers engine, In 1905, was, no
doubt, considered a marvel of perfection,
but Nature, smiling at mans littleness,
by accident revealed another of her hid
den wonders.
One morning Newcomer woke up
gratified at the great success Of his noisy,
Gathering engine, but before another day
had dawned this marvel of perfection
was looked upon as incomplete and clum
sy, and despised accordingly.
His system. as most of our readers are
no doubt aware, was to condense the
8 cam by pouring cold water on the out
side the cylinder.
The wOrkmen stopped the engine to go
to dinner, and Newcomer, looking about
his factory to STE that all was right, sud-
denly, to his great surprise, sees the en-
gine start off at full speed, and, after a
few moments, as mysteriously stop.
On examining the piston, it was found
that jet of water had made its way in
side through small hole and effectively
condensed the steam within, and thence
forward cold water was applied internally
instead Of externally.
But this engine. improved as it was,
still required improving to make it au-
tomato. One of Newcomers "cockboys"
Humphrey Potter by name, whose duty
it was at stated times to admit this jet
by turning cock, felt his task irksome
and monotonous when the merry voices
of his playmates at play in the fields out
side rang in his ears.
Why should he stop inside turning
that tiresOme old cock, when a piece of
string joining this and that would do
just as we'll? Potter ties the string, and
Newcomers engine is for the first time
made automatic.
We never hear again of Humphrey
Potter as an inventor, but his mode of
arranging the strings certainly earned
for him his extra hours of boyish amuse-
ment.
This is not the only case where the
inherent love of fun and mischief in a
boy has brought about great discovery.
Argand. senior. is in his laboratory
trying hard to solve the problem of how
to make lamp give clear, smokeless
fame.
The dull flame gives out black smoke,
do what be will, and the man of thought
is in despair.
His mischievous son, playing among
his fathers retorts and crucibles, is put
ting an empty flower pot, out of which
the bottom is knocked, over everything
he sees.
His fathers back is turned for mo-
ment, and down comes the flower pot
upon the flame.
Suddenly the room is illuminated by a
bright, white light, and Argand's troubles
are at an end.