Year: 1875

/ y Limerick tUbaccOnISt, looking


dOlefully at his poor neighbors crop


ing among the smouldcring ruins OF


his burned out shop, noticed that
some Of them, after trying the con-
/ tents Of certain Canistcrs, loaded their
waistcoat pockets from some Of them.
/ He followed suit, and found the snuii
had come out Of the fiery ordeal very


much improved in pungency and
aroma. Like wise man he said


nothing, but took another place, set
/ up a lot Of ovens, and before long
/ Black Yard Snuii-othcrwise Irish
Blackguard" was all the rage with


lovers Of nasal titilIation; and in a


few years Lundyloot was a rich man,


owing to the accident he thought had
ruined him. \ would be alchcmist,


Seeking to discover what mixture of
carth's would make the strongest


crucibles, one day found he had made
porcelain; he was on a sudden trans
formed from an alchemist into a pot


ter. When one Of Van Evck's


pictures cracked in the sunshine, the


artist experimental to produce a


yarnish that would dry in the shade.


He found what he sought, and found


beside that bv mixing it with his


coIorS they acquired greater force and


brilliancy, and required no subsequent


vanishing; and so came about the


discovery, or rc-discOvcry, of the art


of painting in oil MezzotintO owed


its invention by Prince Rupert to the


simple accident Of sentry's gun bar


rel being rusted by the dew. Henry


Schaiiward, a Nuremberg glass cutter,
happened to let some aquafortis fall
upon his spectacles, and noticed the
glass was corroded and softencd


where the aquafortis had touched it.
Taking the hint, he made a liquid ac-
cordingly, drew some figures upon
piece Of glass, covered them with
varnish, and applied bis corroding


fluid, cut away the glass around his
drawing, SO that when he removed
the varnish the figures appeared
raised upon dark ground, and etch-
ing upon glass was added to the
ornamental arts. Alois Sencfeldcr,
playwright and actor, thinking it
possible to etch upon stone in lieu of
copper, polished 4 slab for the purpose.


He was disturbed by his mother
coming into his small laboratory with
q request that he would jot down her
list of things for the wash, as the
woman was waiting to take the
basket away. Lacking pen and ink,
he scrubbed the items on the stone
with bis etching preparation, that he
might copy them at leisure. Some
time afterward, when about to clean
the stove, he thought he might as
well see what would be the effects of
biting the stove with aquafortis, and
in few minutes saw the writing
standing out in relief Taking up
pelt-ball charged with printing ink,
he linked the stone, took off few i'm
pressions upon paper, and be had
invented lithography. The pelt-ball
used by Senefelder was long indis-
pensable in a printing Office. A
Salopian printer, in hurry to get on
with job, could not find his ball,
and linked the form with a piece of
soft glue that had fallen out of the
glue-pot, with such excellent results
that he thenceforth discarded the pelt-
ball altogether, and by adding treacle


to glue, ,-to. keep it from hardening, hit


upon the composition of which
printers rollers have ever since been


made. So much for happy accidents.