Hales, of Beckelbourn, in Kent, who was created a baronet by King Charles II. on the 12th of July, 1670; his mother was Mary, the daughter and heirefs of Richard Wood, of Abbots Langley, in Hertfordshire. They had many children, and Stephen was their fixth fon. After he had been properly inftructed in grammar learning, he was fent to the univerfity of Cambridge, and on the 19th of June, 1696, being in his 19th year, was entered a penfioner of Corpus Chrifti or Bennet College, under the tuition of Mr. Robert Mofs, who was then a fellow of that house, and who, in 1713, was advanced to the deanery of Ely. Stephen, having taken his first degree of batchelor of arts, was pre-elected into a fellowship of his college on the 16th of April, 1702, being then in his 25th year; he was admitted into this fellowship on the 25th of February following; he proceeded master of arts at the next commencement ; fome time afterwards entered into orders, and became batchelor of divinity in 1711. While he refided in the college, he applied himself with great affiduity and fuccefs to the study of natural and experimental philofophy. One of the first affociates of his ftudies was William Stukely, now M. D. fellow of the College of Phyficians, and F. R. S. who came to refide at Corpus Chrifti College at Lady-day, 1704. With this gentleman he used to ramble over Gogmagog hills, and the bogs of Cherry Hunt-Moor, to gather fimples, with Ray's Catalogus Plantarum circa Cantabrigiam nascentium in his pocket, to which Stukely, who was a ready draughtf Mr. Hales alfo, in conjunction with his friend Stukely, applied himself to the study of anatomy, frequently diffecting frogs, and other animals, in their herbalizing walks; they proceeded alfo to the diffection of dogs, and Mr. Hales contrived a method of obtaining a preparation of the lungs in lead, of which Dr. Stukely has now feveral fpecimens. He placed a mufket barrel over a pan of lighted charcoal, so as to be kept in an equal and pretty confiderable degree of heat: he then took the lungs of a dog, with the windpipe, and having fastened the windpipe very clofely to the touchhole of the barrel, he applied a pair of bellows to the muzzle, and thus poured a ftream of air, heated by its paffage through the barrel, into the lungs; by continuing this for about an hour, fo as to keep the lungs always inflated, they were at length perfectly dried in an inflated ftate, fo as not to collapfe when taken away from the gun barrel; they were then properly placed as a mould, and melted lead poured into them, the metal not being more heated than juft to bring it into fufion; the lungs, thus filled, were put into cold water, and fuffered to macerate till their whole fubftance wash ed off, and left a perfect caft in lead of all their fine pipes and cavities, in all their various convo lutions, lutions, and in their natural fituation with refpect to each other. They applied themselves alfo to chemistry, and repeated many of Mr. Boyle's experiments, making flowers of benzoin, pulvis fulminans, elixir proprietatis, and various other preparations, fome of ufe, fome of curiofity; but befides what they did between them, they attended the chemical lectures that were then read by the public profeffor, fignior Vigani, in Queen's College cloyfters, and went alfo to fee the chemical operations which he performed in a room in Trinity College, which had been the laboratory of Sir Ifaac Newton, and in which, unfortunately for the world, Sir Ifaac's manufcript concerning chemical principles was accidentally burnt. the fphere he invented, and that original drawing is ftill in his poffeffion. About the year 1710, he was prefented to the perpetual cure of Teddington near Twickenham, in Middlefex, and afterwards accepted of the living of Porlock in Somerfetfhire, which vacated his fellowfhip in the college, and which he exchanged for the living of Farringdon in Hampshire. Soon after, he married Mary, the daughter and heiress of Dr. Newce, who was rector of Halifham in Suffex, but refided at Much Haddam in Hertfordshire. On the 13th of March, 1718, he was elected member of the Royal Society; and on the 5th of March, in the year following, he exhibited an account of fome experiments he had lately made on the effect of the fun's warmth in raising the fap in trees. This procured him the thanks of the fociety, who alfo requested him to profecute the subject. With this request, which was like the charge given by Pharaoh's daughter to the mother of Mofes, to take care of her fon, Hales complied with great pleafure; and on the 14th of June, 1725, exhibited a treatise in which he gave an account of his progrefs. This treatise being highly applauded by the fociety, he farther enlarged and improved it, and in April, 1727, he published it under the title of Ve Mr. Hales was equally affiduous and fuccessful in the study of aftronomy; for having acquired a perfect knowledge of the Newtonian fyftem, he contrived a machine to demonftrate it, which was conftructed of brafs, and moved by wheels, fo as to reprefent the motions of all the planets, upon the fame principles, and nearly in the fame manner, as the machine afterwards conftructed by Mr. Rowley, mafter of mathematics to king George I. which was abfurdly called an Orrery, because an earl of Orrery was Rowley's patron. This machine of Hales's was fuppofed to be the first of the kind; but it ap-getable Statics, or an account of peared that Dr. Cumberland, rector some statical experiments on the sap of All-Saints at Stamford, and af- in vegetables, being an essay toterwards bishop of Peterborough, wards a natural history of vegetahad conftructed one of them before, tion; also a specimen of an attempt when he was fellow of Magdalen to analyse the air, by a great vaCollege, Cambridge. riety of chemico-statical experiments, which were read at several meetings of the Royal Society. Stukely, at the request of his friend Hales, made a drawing of This work he dedicated to his late majesty king George the fecond, who who was then prince of Wales; and was the fame year chosen one of the council of the Royal Society; Sir Hans Sloane being at the fame annual election chofen their prefident. The Vegetable Statics was well received, and a second edition of it was published in 1731; in a preface to this edition Mr. Hales promised a sequel to the work, which he published in 1733, under the title of Statical essays, containing dæmastatics, or an account of some hydraulic hydrostatical experiments made on the blood and blood vessels of animals ; also an account of some experiments on stones in the kidney and bladder; with an enquiry into the nature of these anomalous concretions; to which is added, an appendix containing observations and experiments relating to several subjects in the first volume. In 1732 he was appointed one of the trustees for establishing a new colony in Georgia. On the 5th of July, 1733, the univerfity of Oxford honoured him with a diploma for the degree of doctor in divinity, a mark of diftinction the more honourable, as it is not ufual for one univerfity to confer academical honours on those who were educated at another. In 1734, when the health and morals of the lower and middling clafs of people were fubverted by the exceffive drinking of gin, he publifhed, though without his name, Afriendly admonition to the drinkers of brandy, and other spirituous liquors, which was afterwards twice re-printed. The latter end of the fame year he publifhed a fermon which he reached at St Bride's before the reft of the truftees for establishing a new colony in Georgia. His text was, Bear ye one another's burthens, and so fulfil the law of Christ; Galatians vi. 2. In 1749 he printed a volume in 8vo, intituled, Philosophical Expe-riments on Sea Water, Corn, Flesh, and other Substances: this work, which contained many useful inftructions for voyagers, was dedicated to the lords of the admiralty. The fame year he exhibited to the Royal Society an account of fome farther experiments towards the difcovery of medicines for diffolving the ftone in the kidnies and bladder, and preferving meat in long voyages, for which he received the gold medal of Sir Godfrey Copley's donation. The year following (1740) he published fome account of experiments and obfervations on Mrs. Stephens's medicines for diffolving the ftone, in which their diffolvent power is enquired into and demonftrated. : In 1741 he read before the Royal Society an account of an inftrument which he invented, and called a ventilator, for conveying fresh air into mines, hofpitals, prifons, and the clofe parts of fhips he had communicated it to his particular friends fome months before; and it is very remarkable that a machine of the fame kind, for the fame purpose, was in the fpring of the fame year invented by one Martin Friewald, an officer in the fervice of the king of Sweden, called captain of mechanics, for which the king and fenate granted him a privilege in October following, and ordered 4 1 ordered every fhip of war in the fervice of that state to be furnished with one of them; a model alfo of this machine was fent into France, and all the fhips in the French navy were alfo ordered to have a ventilator of the fame fort. It happened alfo that about the fame time, one Sutton, who kept a coffee-house in Alderfgate-ftreet, invented a ventilator of another conftruction, to draw off the foul air out of fhips, by means of the cook-room fire; but poor Sutton had not intereft enough to make mankind accept the benefit he offered them: he was, however, at length, introduced to Dr. Mead, who foon perceiving that it was greatly preferable to any other method for fea fervice, drew up and prefented a memorial to the Royal Society, in which the fimplicity and excellence of it was demonftrated; he also caused a model of it to be made in copper at the expence of 2001. which he prefented to the fociety, and which is now in their museum. After ten years folicitation, fupported by the influence of Dr. Mead, Sutton obtain ed an order to conftruct his machine on board his majefty's fhips of war, and his contrivance to preferve his fellow creatures from peftilential diseases was rewarded by a permiffion to put it in practice; an inftance of attention to the public, and liberality to merit, which must reflect everlasting honour upon the great names who at that time prefided over the affairs of this kingdom. M. Duhamel, a celebrated mathematician of France, and furveyor-general of the French marine, has fhewn how Sutton's machine may be applied with great advantages to other pur pofes; and the late ingenious Mr. Benjamin Robins, F. R. S. who was the best military mathematician of his time, gave his teftimony in favour of the fuperiority of Sutton's contrivance. The public, however, is not lefs indebted to the ingenuity and benevolence of Dr. Hales, whose ventilators came more easily into ufe for many purposes of the greateft importance to life, particularly for keeping corn fweet, by blowing through it fresh fhowers of air, a practice very foon adopted by France, a large granary having been made under the direction of M. Duhamel, for the prefervation of corn in this manner, with a view to make it a general practice. In the year 1743, Dr. Hales read before the Royal Society a defcription of a method of conveying liquors into the abdomen during the operation of tapping, and it was afterwards printed in their Transactions. In 1745 he published some experiments and obfervations on tarwater, which he had been induced to make by the publication of a work called Siris, in which the late learned and moft excellent Dr. Berkley, bifhop of Cloyne, had recommended tar-water as an univerfal medicine: on this occafion feveral letters paffed between them on the fubject, particularly with refpect to the ufe of tar-water in the difeafe of the horned cattle. In the fame year he communicated to the public, by a letter to the editor of the Gentleman's Ma gazine, a defcription of a back heaver, heaver, which will winnow and clean corn much fooner and better than can be done by the common method. He also, at the same time, and by the fame channel, communicated to the public a cheap and eafy way to preferve corn fweet in facks, an invention of great benefit to farmers, especially to poor leafers, who want to keep fmall quantities of corn for fome time, but have no proper granary or repofitory for that purpofe. He alfo the fame year took the fame method to publifh directions how to keep corn fweet in heaps without turning it, and to fweeten it when mufty. He published a long paper, containing an account of feveral methods to preferve corn by ventilators, with a particular defcription of feveral forts of ventilators, illuftrated by a cut, fo that the whole mechanism of them may be eafily known, and the machine conftructed by a common carpenter. He published alfo in the fame volume, but without his name, a detection of the fallacious boafts concerning the efficacy of the liquid fhell in diffolving the ftone in the bladder : in the urine of perfons who had taken the liquid fhell, there appeared a white fediment, which the difpenfer of the noftrum pretended to be the diffolved ftone; but Dr. Hales demonftrated that it was no other than the lime of the burnt fhell, which he precipitated with spirit of hartfhorn without a ftone, and which he also precipitated by putting a ftone into fome of the liquid fhell, though the ftone fuffered not the leaft alteration. In 1746 he communicated to the Royal Society a propofal for bring ing fmall paffable ftones foon, and with ease, out of the bladder; and this was alfo printed in their Transactions. In the Gent. Mag. for July, 1747, he published an account of a very confiderable improvement of his back heaver, by which it became capable of clearing corn of the very fmall grain, feeds, blacks, fmut-balls, &c. to fuch perfection as to make it fit for feed corn. On the 21st of April, 1748, he communicated to the Royal Society a propofal for checking, in fome degree, the progrefs of fires, occafioned by the great fire which happened that year in Cornhill. And the fubftance of this propofal was printed in their Transactions. In the fame year he also communicated to the fociety two memoirs, which are printed in their Transactions, one on the great benefit of ventilators, and the other on fome experiments in electricity. In the year 1749, his ventilators were fixed in the Savoy prison, by order of the right honourable Henry Fox, efq; then fecretary at war, and now lord Holland; and the benefit was fo great, that tho' 50 or 100 in a year often died of the gaol diftemper before, yet from the year 1749, to the year 1752, inclufive, no more than 4 perfons died, though in the year 1750 the number of prifoners was 240; and of thofe 4, one died of the fmall-pox, and another of intemperance. In the year 1750, he published fome confiderations on the causes of earthquakes, occafioned by the flight fhocks felt that year in London. The fubftance of this work was alfo printed in the |