smell If this is not sufficient, let us consider some other objects of nature; as, for instance, one of those silk threads, the work of a poor worm. Suppose this thread is three hundred and sixty feet long, it will weigh but a single grain. Again, consider into how many perceptible parts a length of three hundred and sixty feet can be divided. A single inch may be divided into six hundred parts, each as thick as a hair, and consequently be perfectly visible. Hence a single grain of silk can be divided into at least two millions five hundred and ninety-two thousand parts, each of which may be seen without the help of a microscope. And as every one of these parts may be again divided into several more millions of parts, till the division is carried beyond the reach of thought, it is evident that this progression may be infinite. The last particles, which are no longer divisible by human industry, must still have extension, and be consequently susceptible of division, though we are no longer able to effect it. If we examine the animal kingdom, we shall discover still further proofs of the infinite divisibility of matter. Pepper has been put into a glass of water, and on looking through a microscope, a multitude of animalcules were seen in the water, a thousand million times less than a grain of sand! How inconceivably minute then must be the feet, muscles, vessels, nerves, and organs of sense, in these animals! And how small their eggs and their young ones, and the fluids which circulate in them! Here the imagination loses itself, our ideas become confused, and we are incapable of giving form to such very small particles. What still more claims our attention is, that the more we magnify, by means of glasses, the productions of nature, the more perfect and beautiful do they appear: whilst with works of art it is generally quite contrary; for when these are seen through a microscope, we find them rough, coarse, and imperfect, though executed by the most able artists, and with the utmost care. Thus the Almighty has impressed even upon the smallest atom the stamp of his infinity. The most subtile body is as a world, n which millions of parts unite and are arranged in the most perfect order. CHAP. LXXXV. MISCELLANEOUS CURIOSITIES.-(Continued.) The Jew's Harp-Remarkable Aqueducts-Crichup Linn-Eddy- THE JEW'S HARP.-The Jew's trump, or Jew's harp, as it is often called, though now a boy's instrument, is of ancient origin, for Mr. Pennant informs us, (Tour to Scotland, p. 195,) that one made of gilt brass was found in Norway, deposited in an urn. There appears to be an allusion, in the name, to the inhabitants of Judea; and it is to be observed, that in Dodsley's old plays, vol. iv. p. 171, Quick calls the usurer, on account of his Jewish avarice, notable Jew's trump." In the plate, however, of Jewish musical instruments, in Calmet's Dictionary, nothing of this kind occurs; so that perhaps there is a corruption here of jeu-trompe, a plaything, or playtromp, as it is now only used by boys for that purpose; or it may be a corruption of Jew's harp, from the circumstance of its being placed between the teeth when played. 46 a REMARKABLE AQUEDUCTS.-Aqueducts are conveyances for carrying water from one place to another; made on uneven ground, to preserve the level. Aqueducts of every kind were long ago the wonders of Rome; the vast quantity of them which they had; the prodigious expense employed in conducting waters over arcades from one place to another, at the distance of thirty, forty, sixty, and even one hundred miles, which were either continued or supplied by other labours, as by cutting mountains and piercing rocks: all this may well surprise us, as nothing like it is undertaken in our times; we dare not purchase conveniency at so dear a rate. Appius Claudius, the censor, devised and constructed the first aqueduct. His example gave the public luxury a hint to cultivate these objects; and the force of prodigious and indefatigable labour diverted the course of rivers and floods to Rome. Agrippa, in that year when he was edile, put the last hand to the magnificence of these works. The aqueduct of the Aqua Martia, had an arch of sixteen feet in diameter. The whole was composed of three different kinds of stone; one of them reddish, another brown, and a third of an earth colour. Above, there appeared two canals, of which the highest was fed by the new waters of the Tive rone, and the lower by what they called the Claudian river. The entire edifice is seventy Roman feet high. Near this aqueduct, we have, in Father Montfaucon, the plan of another, with three canals; the highest supplied by the Aqua Julia, that in the middle from Tepula, and the lowest from the Aqua Martia. The arch of the aqueduct of the Aqua Claudia is of hewn stone, very beautiful; that of the aqueduct of the Aqua Neronia is of bricks. they are each of them seventy-two Roman feet in height. The canal of the aqueduct which was called Aqua Appia, deserves to be mentioned for a singularity which is observed in it; for it is not, like the others, plain, nor gradual in its descent, but much narrower at the lower than the higher end. The consul Frontinus, who superintended the aqueducts under the emperor Nerva, mentions nine of them which had each 13,594 pipes of an inch in diameter. Vigerus observes, that, in the space of twenty-four hours, Rome received 500,000 hogsheads of water. Not to mention the aqueducts of Drusus and Rhiminius, that which gives the most striking idea of Roman magnificence, is the aqueduct of Metz, of which a great number of arcades still remain. These arcades crossed the Moselle, a river which is of vast breadth at that place. The copious sources of Gorze furnished water for the representation of a sea-fight. This water was collected in a reservoir; whence it was conducted by subterraneous canals formed of hewn-stone, and so spacious, that a man could walk erect in them: it traversed the Moselle upon its superb and lofty arcades, which may still be seen at the distance of two leagues from Metz; so nicely wrought, and so finely cemented, that except those parts in the middle which have been carried away by the ice, they have resisted, and will still resist, the severest shocks of the most violent seasons. From these arcades, other aqueducts conveyed the waters to the baths, and to the place where the naval engagement was exhibited. If we may trust Colmenarus, the aqueduct of Segovia may be compared with the most admired labours of antiquity. There still remain one hundred and fifty-nine arcades, wholly consisting of stones enormously large, and joined without mortar. These arcades, with what remains of the edifice, are one hundred and two feet high; they are formed in two ranges, one above another. The aqueduct flows through the city, and runs beneath the greatest number of houses, which are at the lower end. After these enormous structures, we may be believed when we speak of the aqueduct which Louis XIV. caused to be built near Maintenon, for carrying water from the river Bucq to Versailles: it is perhaps the greatest aqueduct now in the world, being 7000 fathoms in length, above 2560 in height, and containing no fewer than two hundred and forty-two arcades. 66 CRICHUP LINN.--This is a very beautiful cascade, formed by the rivulet Crichup, in Berwickshire. It falls over a precipice about eighty-five or ninety feet high, and almost perpendicular. About a half a mile below this, descends a hill of red free-stone, forming a linn, or waterfall, peculiarly romantic. The linn from top to bottom is upwards of a hundred feet, and though twenty deep, it is yet so narrow at the top, that one might easily leap across it, were it not for the tremendous prospect below, and the noise of the water running its dark course, and by its deep murmuring, affrighting the imagination. In the time of persecution, (says the Rev. Mr. Yorstoun,) the religious flying from their persecutors found an excellent hiding-place in Crichup Linn; and there is a seat, cut out by nature in the rock, which, having been the retreat of a shoemaker in those times, has ever since borne the name of the Sutor's Seat. Nothing can be more striking than the appearance of this linn from its bottom. The darkness of the place, upon which the sun never shines; the ragged rocks rising over one's head, and seeming to meet at the top, with here and there a blasted tree bursting from the crevices; the roaring of the water, together with some degree of danger to the spectator, while he surveys the striking objects-all naturally tend to work upon the imagination. Hence many fabulous stories which are told, were once believed concerning this curious linn." EDDYSTONE ROCKS.-This is the name of some rocks in the English Channel, so called from the variety of contrary currents in their vicinity. They are situated nearly S. S. W. from the middle of Plymouth Sound, their distance from the port is about fourteen miles, and from Rame Head, the nearest point of land, twelve and a half. They are almost in the line which joins the Start and Lizard points; and as they lie nearly in the direction of vessels coasting up and down the channel, they were very dangerous, and ships were sometimes wrecked on them, before the lighthouse was established. They are so exposed to the swells of the ocean, from all the south and west points of the compass, that the heavy seas come uncontrolled, and break on them with the utmost fury. Sometimes after a storm, when the sea in general is, to all appearance, quite smooth, and its surface unruffled by the slightest breeze, the growing swell or under current, meeting the slope of the rocks, the sea beats dreadfully upon them, and even rises above the lighthouse in a magnificent manner, overtopping it, for the moment, as with a canopy of frothy wave. Notwithstanding this tremendous swell, Mr. Henry Winstanley, in 1696, undertook to build a lighthouse on the principal rock; and he completed it 1700. This ingenious mechanic was so confident of the stability of his structure, that he declared his wish to be in it during the most tremendous storm that could blow. Unfortunately he obtained his wish, for he perished in it, during the dreadful storm which destroyed it on the 27th of November, 1703. In 1709, another lighthouse was erected of wood on this rock, but on a different construction, by Mr. John Rudyard. It stood till 1755, when it was burnt. A third one, of stone, was begun by the late celebrated Mr. John Smeaton, on the 2d of April, 1757, and finished 24th of August, 1759; and has withstood the rage of all weathers ever since. The rock which slopes towards the south-west is cut into horizontal steps; into which are dovetailed, and united by a strong cement, Portland stone, and granite for Mr. Smeaton discovered, that it was impossible to make use of the former entirely, as there is a marine animal that can destroy it; and that he could not use the latter solely, as the labour of working it would have been too expensive. He therefore used the one for the internal, and the other for the external part of the structure. Upon the principle of a broad base and accumulation of matter, the whole, to the height of thirty-five feet from the foundation, is a solid mass of stones engrafted into each other, and united by every kind of additional strength. The lighthouse has four rooms, one over another, and at the top a gallery and lantern. The stone floors are flat above, but concave below, and are kept from pressing against the sides of the building by a chain let into the walls. The lighthouse is nearly eighty feet high, and withstands the most violent storms, without sustaining the smallest injury. It has now stood above sixty-three years, during which time it has been often assaulted by all the fury of the elements; and, in all probability, as Mr. Smeaton said, nothing but an earthquake can destroy it. The wooden part of it, however, was burnt in 1770, but renewed in 1774. DISMAL SWAMP,--is a morass in North America, reaching from Albermarle Sound, in North Carolina, to the neighbourhood of Portsmouth, on the opposite side of the harbour to Norfolk. It is supposed to contain about two hundred and fifty square miles, or one hundred and fifty thousand acres. Some of the interior parts of this vast swampy plain are seldom explored, being full of danger; yet several adventurous huntsmen sometimes pursue their game within its precincts, but they cannot advance far without great risk of forfeiting their lives to their temerity. Mr. Janson a late traveller, relates, that in one of these excursions he was often knee-deep, though, in other parts, the ground supported him firmly. In endeavouring to pass one of these fenny spots, he attempted to avail himself of a |