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FIFTY-ONE Familiar Sketches and Moral Essays; Two HUNDRED Miscellaneous Articles of Instruction and Entertainment; THIRTY-SIX Stories, or Tales;
TWENTY-SIX Biographies of eminent Individuals; and FORTY-ONE pieces of Poetry-making a total of Three hundred AND FIFTY-FOUR Articles, Two
HUNDRED AND SIXTEEN of which are original, the remainder being either selected or partially re-written; besides TWO HUNDRED Anecdotes and Paragraphs.

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CONDUCTED BY WILLIAM AND ROBERT CHAMBERS, EDITORS OF "CHAMBERS'S HISTORICAL NEWSPAPER."

No. 157.

CHAMBERS'S EDINBURGH JOURNAL. IN addressing our readers at the commencement of a new volume, we are rather complying with a custom which we appear to ourselves to have established, than acting under any immediate desire of communicating with the public. Our way is now so smooth-the success of our little miscellany is so completely ascertained and so little ever occurs to disturb the happy relation which seems to subsist between it and its readers, that we might perhaps have intermitted this task for a year, without either disadvantage to ourselves, or disappointment to the public. The occasion, however, has occurred, and we have been tempted to seize it, if only for the purpose of conveying some assurance of the continued prosperity of our work, and, consequently, of inspiring in those who approve of its object, renewed hopes of the beneficial influence which so copious and so constant an effusion of moral literature may be expected to have upon society.

SATURDAY, JANUARY 31, 1835.

The success, then, of this Journal continues to be proved, not only by an undiminished, or rather, we may say, an increasing circulation, but by innumerable circumstances which, coming by chance under our notice, manifest to us the strong hold which it has taken of the public mind. It still penetrates into every remote nook of the country; still travels from hand to hand over pastoral wastes-the fiery cross of knowledge-conveying pictures of life, and snatches of science, and lessons of morality, where scarcely any such things were ever received before; still visits, and we would hope cheers, the labour-worn artizan, and animates to the struggle of the world the rausing boy. As a single fact illustrative of its extensive reception among the working classes, we have been informed that, in a single cotton-work near Glasgow, no fewer than eighty-four copies are regularly purchased, notwithstanding that in such places a single copy of a newspaper or other periodical work generally serves a dozen readers. But it is not alone among the inferior orders of society that the Journal is circulated. We have been given to understand that it reaches the drawing-rooms of the most exalted persons in the country, and the libraries of the most learned; that, in the large towns, a vast proportion of the mercantile and professional persons of every rank and order are its regular purchasers; and that, in short, it pervades the whole of society. Let it not be imagined that we relate these circumstances in a spirit of personal boasting: unconscious as we are of having ever anticipated them, they surprise ourselves as much as they can surprise others, and, so far as we are not tempted to speak of them by a mere sense of wonder, we are prompted to do so by that disinterested feeling of philanthropic gratulation which they can hardly fail to excite in every generous bosom. Is it possible-we would say, and say in all humility to over-estimate the social blessings that may be expected to flow from a work which is thus qualified to re-unite the sympathies of the most opposite and remote orders of the people-which can tell the great about the humble, and the humble about the great, and promote a spirit of natural human kindness amongst all-which serves, it may be said, as an universal instructor and monitor, chastening the proud, chastising the vicious, guiding the ignorant to correct views of society, and creating a diversion every where from harmful indulgences to those thoughts which advance all who cherish them in the scale of being?

While referring to this universality of circulation, it may be worth while to mention, that, to whatever causes the public may attribute it, we have all along seen reason to ascribe, at least its continuance, to a No. 1. VOL. IV.

circumstance in the highest degree creditable to the
public itself. It is our habitual impression and con-
viction, from all we have ever learned of the details of
our circulation, that a few delinquencies in the ethics
of the Journal, or even a few transgressions of the
bounds of good taste, not to speak of a partizanship in
politics, would instantly prove its ruin. We feel that
we stand only by our devotion to what is good, and
our hostility to what is bad, in ordinary conduct; and
if no other consideration made us the friends of vir-
tue, the commercial quality of prudence would come
to our aid, and erase the peccant word, paragraph, or
article. Many of our readers, while satisfied of the
purity of our general intentions, may be ignorant of
the pains which are necessary in order to preserve a
quality of such importance. We can declare that
numberless topics and expressions which the conduct-
ors of hardly any other periodical work would think
objectionable, are avoided by us, and that we hardly
ever receive a contribution from the most practised
writers, which does not require purification before we
deem it fit for insertion. Nor is it only in regard to
matters of moral decency that we find it necessary to
maintain a vigilant guard: we deem it only in a less
degree essential to exclude every thing that tends to
keep alive the recollection of the superstitions, savagery,
and darker vices of the past-even the details of
ordinary warfare, and the drolleries of ordinary baccha-
nalian fellowship, we regard as in some measure objec-
tionable, as tending to foster only the lower propensi-
ties of our nature. In whatever degree, we are per-
suaded, a departure might be made from these rules,
would the circulation of this work decline from the
universality which it has attained, and in so far would
it forfeit that reputation which, against every disad-
vantage of form and price, its right-forward good aims
have procured for it. The public, indeed, have this
matter entirely in their own hands, and we consider it
impossible that our work should ever be less pure and
innocuous than it now is, unless the community shall
suddenly become thoroughly vicious, or the light of
reason be withdrawn from ourselves. We think it
the more necessary to make this avowal, as it serves
to meet the arguments of those who, taking upon sys-
tem every degrading view of their species, allege that
the bulk of the people of even this enlightened land
deliberately prefer an immoral and grovelling litera-

ture.

PRICE THREE HALFPENCE.

to have acquired increased powers of both instruction and entertainment, with views, almost new to us, of the social relations of our race. Unskilled as we may yet be in many departments of knowledge, we find ourselves to be constantly advancing from less to greater things, and at the same time receiving a deeper and deeper sense of the importance of using these to the advantage of our fellow-creatures. We therefore venture a humble but earnest hope that this miscellany, through the improving faculties of both its writers and its readers, will be enabled to go on freshening and strengthening, and yet adopt higher purposes and reach more splendid triumphs than any yet contemplated.

All that remains for us to do, is to advert to the INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE, which is now concluded in fifty sheets similar to the numbers of the Journal, each in general containing some particular department of knowledge, treated in a popular manner. Of this work, eighteen thousand copies at least have been issued of each successive number, and this success we deem in some measure even more agreeable than that of the more widely diffused Journal, as the advantage of a miscellane ous and entertaining character was here entirely wanting. When we mention that each of the sheets contains exactly the same quantity of literary matter as a number of the Library of Useful Knowledge, the public may conceive what an important addition has thus been made to the amount of reading produced by the moderately priced publications. The INFOR. MATION FOR THE PEOPLE, in its new character as a volume, will be comparatively the cheapest work in existence that bears the character of a collection of treatises. At the price of an ordinary duodecimo, it presents a series of between forty and fifty volumes

for so they may be styled-each constructed with the utmost care, and with the advantage of the most recent discoveries, and all of them very immediately bearing upon the necessities and uses of the people.

each number, within a short period after its publication,

Note. Our efforts in the diffusion of cheap literature having been followed by the establishment of various similarly moderate-priced publications, it may perhaps have been anticipated that the circulation of CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL would therefore have been in some degree lessened; we are happy to say that this has not been in any respect the case, the world But it is not only by such negative qualities-it is being seemingly wide enough for the exertions of all. From the period of a few months after the commencenot only by our continuing to think and write in the ment of the Journal, when the work had become gespirit which it is no more than our duty as individual citizens to cherish that we are to expect this publica-nerally known, till the present time, the circulation tion to be supported. Great efforts, we are sensible, has continued to be remarkably uniform; the sale of must also be made to maintain that humble literary re. putation which is also to be considered as an element in its success. In reference to this point, we can state with a reasonable expectation of being credited, that victory, so far as gained, has never lulled us for a moment into security or indifference. We have not only been induced, by the approbation which the public was pleased to bestow upon our trivial labours, to devote ourselves to them more and more unsparingly, but we have used the results of success in no niggard spirit in purchasing literary aid. While vigorously resolving to continue the exertions of every kind applied to the Arts-Printing-The Steam-Engine-Domestic Economy and Cookery-Preservation of Health-History of the British which have been already made, we must also confess Empire-Resources of the British Empire-General Account of the that we look chiefly for the means of maintaining our United States of America-Palestine-China-The East Indiesground, to our own improvement and progressive acThe West Indies-South America-Egypt-The Cotton, Woollen, quirements. At the time when the Journal was Silk, and Linen Manufactures-History of the French Revolution commenced, our experience in literature was compa--History of the American Revolution-Life of Benjamin Franklin ratively slight, and our studies had referred to a li--Emigration to Canada, the United States, Nova Scotia and New mited and in many respects useless range of knowledge. Brunswick, Van Diemen's Land, and New South Wales-Th Dog With the progress of the work, we conceive ourselves -The Horse.

The subjects of the INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE may be enumerated in the following systematic arrangement :-Astronomy -Physical and Political Geography-Geology-Botany-History of Mankind-Account of the Human Body-Natural Theology

Moral Philosophy-Duties of Life-History and Present State of
Education-Manufactures and Commerce of the World-Political

Economy-Natural Philosophy-Mechanics-Electricity and Gal

vanism-Hydrostatics and Hydraulics-Pneumatics, Acoustics,

and Aeronautics-Optics-Architecture-Chemistry-Chemistry

being 50,000, while the subsequent or after demand,ercise of genius among themselves; in the present day,
as we have found, has been to the extent of not less this is a question which it is impossible to settle sa-
tisfactorily.
than 5000 additional, making a total average circula-
tion of 55,000 copies. Latterly, the demand for sets
of the work from the commencement has been very
considerable, particularly from some of the British
colonies, to which not fewer than two hundred thou-

sand numbers have been sent during the last twelve months. It is likewise gratifying for us to learn that CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL is now regularly reprinted in New York; though this forms a branch of circulation over which we of course can exercise no control. It was formerly stated that the quantity of paper used for these sheets annually, amounted to 5416 reams; upon a calculation now made, we find that during the last three years we have consumed, reckoning the English and Scotch editions of our works, fully 20,000 reams, or the astonishing number of nine million six hundred thousand sheets, which, by the heavy duty of 3d. per pound weight on the paper, have yielded a clear revenue to government of L.6000.

POPULAR INFORMATION ON SCIENCE.

TIME MEASURERS.

In ancient times there were neither clocks nor watches by which time might be measured. The only instrument in use calculated to be of service in this respect was the sun-dial, which appears to have been known in very early times. It was most likely invented by the Egyptians, from whom its use spread among the Chaldeans and Jews, or Hebrews; it being mentioned in the Old Testament, in the book of Isaiah, chapter xxxviii. verse 8., "Behold I will bring again the shadow of the degrees, whereby it is gone down in the dial of Ahaz by the sun," and so forth, by which we may learn that the sun-dial was the instrument in use for measuring time at that remote period.

The Greeks became acquainted with the sun-dial from the Jews, and from the Greeks it was derived by the Romans, who were the means of introducing it into the western nations of Europe. The Romans came to a knowledge of the use of dials in a remarkable way. In one of their warlike excursions, they saw one, and carried it off as a part of their spoil, and placed it in the forum of Rome; but it being constructed for a place four degrees different, they

found that it could not indicate the true time-a cir

cumstance they had not anticipated, as in these times little or nothing was known of degrees of latitude or longitude. It is probable that they soon rectified the dial to the situation of Rome. Before they thus became acquainted with sun-dials, they measured time by means of a thing called a clepsydra-a word signifying in Greek, I steal water, the time being rec koned by the dropping of water; and it was the duty of a slave to attend and make a sound at the recurrence of every certain number of drops. Clepsydra were long used in both Greek and Roman courts and assemblies, and, like our sand-glasses, they determined the time which members were permitted to speak.

As sun-dials were available only while the sun shone, the invention of some kind of instrument which could measure time both during darkness and sunshine, became a matter of anxious research to many reflective persons; but this appears to have been a matter of extraordinary difficulty. Sun-dials for the day, and clepsydra for the night or cloudy weather, were in use for many centuries after the destruction of the Roman empire and the establishment of Christianity. It is related in an ancient chronicle that Charlemagne, king of France, received a present of a clock from the caliph Haroun Airaschid in the year 809, but on the best investigations it is found that this was only a species of clepsydra, and not a clock with wheels and other mechanism. According to the best authenticated accounts, it appears that we are indebted to the monks of the middle ages for the invention of clocks or time-keepers. These men, who formed the only learned classes of their time, enjoyed consider. able seclusion, free from the necessity of providing for their support; and when not engaged in devotional exercises, they often practised various arts now entirely committed to the hands of the artizan and tradesman. At what precise period clocks were first made by the monks, is not known; but it is ascertained from old chronicles, that such instruments, put in motion by wheels, were made use of in the inonasteries in the twelfth century, and that they announced the termination of every hour by strokes on a bell. The hand for marking the time is likewise mentioned in these old records. In the thirteenth century, there is mention made of a clock, given by sultan Saladin to the emperor Frederic II., and which was put in motion by wheels. It not only marked the hours, but also the course of the sun, of the moon, the planets, in the zodiac. Some have concluded that the Saracens must have learned the art of clock-making from the recluses in Eastern monasteries; but they may have acquired their knowledge from the ex

In the fourteenth century, traces of clock work become more common. Dante, the Italian poet, particularly mentions clocks. Richard, abbot of St Alban's in England, made a clock, in 1326, such as had never been heard of till then. It not only indicated the course tide. Large clocks on steeples, likewise, were first of the sun and moon, but also the ebb and flow of the made use of in the fourteenth century. It is thought that one Jacob Dondi, in Padua, was the first who made one of this kind; at least his family was called after him dell' Orologio. A German, Henry de Wyck, was celebrated in the same century for a large clock | which he placed in a tower built by the command of Charles V. king of France. This clock was preserved till 1737. Watches are a much later invention, although it has been alleged that they were known in the fourteenth century. The more general belief is, that they were contrived in 1510 by a person named Peter Hele. Reckoning back from the present era, it may reasonably be concluded that clocks were invented about seven hundred, and watches from three to four hundred years ago, which is a very moderate antiquity.

THE USES OF ADVERSITY,

A STORY."

where they are made by thousands. Among French watchmakers, Berthoud, Breguet, Chevalier, Courvoisier, Preud'homme, and others, are distinguished. England and France have been active in perfecting the art of horology. The elegant Parisian pendulum clocks are well known, in which the art of the sculptor is combined with that of the machinist. Elegance, however, is their principal recommendation. It is the finest, have not the finish which gave such great much to be regretted that the present watches, even durability to those of former times. This is particularly the case with French watches. We speak now of the better sort of watches; the ordinary ones are The hardly worth the trifling sum which they cost: English watches are generally much more substantial and accurate in their workmanship than those of France or Geneva; but it must be allowed that a great depreciation is taking place in this department of our manufactures. Perfect accuracy in going, is now a rare quality in a new made watch, unless it be of the most expensive kind. The most accurate of all time measurers are chronometers, which are of a peculiar construction, and are much employed by navigators in determining the longitude at sea. In general, chronometers are much larger than common watches, and are hung in gimbals, in boxes six or eight inches The earliest made clocks wanted many of the con- square; but there are also many pocket chronometers trivances which now distinguish these valuable in. which, externally, have all the appearance of the bet struments. The first great improvement was the ter sort of pocket watches, and internally differ from Huygens in 1656, and which is of use in regulating balance and hair-spring are the principal agents in addition of the pendulum, which was invented by these only in the construction of the balance. The the motion of the wheelwork. The doctrine of the regulating the rate of going in a common watch, being pendulum, which belongs to dynamics, or the science to this what the pendulum is to a common clock; of bodies in motion, is one of great importance. A and this spring in the former, like the pendulum in oscillate, or swing, were it not for the friction at the under different degrees of heat and cold, which of pendulum once put in motion would never cease to the latter, is subject to expansions and contractions point of suspension, and the resistance of the air. course affect the speed or rate of the machine; and Neither of these circumstances can ever be avoided the methods of correcting this inaccuracy mark the entirely, and have to be provided against by certain difference between the watch and chronometer. These The times of the vibrations of the are very numerous. With British and American naarrangements. pendulum chiefly depend on three circumstances-vigators, chronometers are more common than with the angle by which the heavy body of the pendulum those of any other nation. is removed from the vertical line; second, the length Wooden clocks are made chiefly in the Schwarz. of the pendulum; and, third, the accelerating powerwald, or Black Forest, in South Germany, and furnish of gravity. The principal thing to be attended to is an important object of manufacture for this mountainthe length. A short pendulum oscillates quickly, a ous and barren country. It is said that 70,000 of such arranging the length must keep in view the situation long pendulum more slowly. But the clockmaker in clocks are made there annually; and great numbers are sent to North and South America, and all over on the earth's surface where the clock is to be placed; Europe. for the pendulum which will suit at one degree of latitude will not answer at another. The reason for this is, that the power of gravity, that is, the unseen power which attracts all things to the earth's sur face, acts more strongly at one part than another, from the oscillations of the pendulum in such a manner the peculiar shape of the globe, and this power affects that the pendulum of a clock must be made somewhat shorter at the equator than towards the poles. The oscillations of the pendulum have hence served as data whereupon to draw conclusions regarding the power of gravity in different parts of the world. The honour of being the inventor of the balance-spring in watches was contested by Huygens and the English philosopher Hooke. In order to prevent friction, Facio, a Genevan, invented the method of boring holes in diamonds or rubies for the pivots to re. volve in, which was found a great improvement. Thus chronometers had their origin, in which the English have attained great perfection. This nation also invented repeaters. An individual of the name of Barlow first made one, in 1676, for Charles II; and Graham was the inventor of the compensation-pendulum in 1715. This was perfected by Harrison, who formed the pen. dulum of nine round rods, five of which were of iron and four of brass. With these pendulums the astronomical clocks are still provided, and perfect dependence may be placed in the regularity of their action. Amongst the important inventions of the 18th century, the astronomical clocks of the clergyman Hahn, in Echterdingen, Wurtemburg, deserve to be particularly named. He formed the idea of measuring time in its whole extent. The principal hand in his instrument is that of universal history. This turns on a table, and indicates the principal epochs of history, according to the chronology of the Old Testament, and the great events of future times, according to the calculations of Bengel, founded on the Apocalypse. Its revolution embraces a period of nearly eight thousand years. Another hand on this table marks the year of the century, and makes its circuit in one hundred years. Still more remarkable is the representation of the motions of the planets known at the time of the inventor, and of the systems of Ptolemy and Copernicus. They and their satellites perform their revolutions in exactly the same time as they actually do in the heavens; and these automata not only have the central motion, but their course is also eccentrical and elliptic, like that of the heavenly orbs, and the motion is sometimes slower, sometimes quicker, and even retrograde. This instrument must have been the fruit of deep knowledge, indefatigable research, and the calculations of years. It is much to be regret ted that the limited means of the artist prevented his machine from being better finished, and that he was not acquainted with clock-making in its present advanced state, and with the excellent instruments which have been invented since his time.

The country where watches are manufactured in the greatest numbers is French Switzerland, particularly at Geneva, La-Chaux-de Fonds, Locle, &c.,

AT the age of twenty-one, the young, gay, and voluptuous Earl of Glenthorn succeeded to the vast possessions of his family; an event to which he had

anxiously looked forward during the, to him, tedious
years of minority. But this consummation of his
hopes and prospects did not relieve the young noble-
man from that dreadful malady to which those are
subject, and to which he was already a prey, who are
in possession of all that there is to desire on earth,
who have nothing to employ them, and nothing to
fear or to hope; where every wish has only to be ex-
pressed to be gratified, and where every command
has only to be issued to be obeyed. This malady, for
which we have no English name, is entitled by the
French ennui-a term now naturalised amongst us.

cunning and dishonest guardian in every desire, how.
While yet a boy, the earl, who was indulged by a
ever wayward or foolish, which his imagination could
suggest, and which wealth could gratify, was rendered
less life. The bustle and excitation consequent on his
miserable by this oppressive vacuity of mind and aim.
accession to the entire control of his large possessions,
subdued for a time that feeling of apathy and listless-
ness which in the midst of every luxury and enjoyment
was rendering his life miserable. It was, however,
but for a time that it had this effect. No sooner had
the novelty of his situation worn off, than the demon
rendered him more wretched than ever.
of ennui seized again upon the unhappy earl, and
In vain he
had recourse to all the usual expedients with which
fashion and folly endeavour to relieve themselves of
the burden of time. He associated himself with de-
bauchees, and in their society indulged himself in
every species of excess. He mingled with boxers and
immensely wealthy as he was, he soon lost such sums,
horse-racers, and finally took to gambling, at which,
as, together with the robberies of his stewards and
servants, whose doings he was too indolent to check,
him, and compelled him to look out for such a matri-
and too easy tempered to punish, greatly embarrassed
monial alliance as should relieve him from his diffi-
culties. In this he succeeded. He married a lady
of large fortune; but as money had been the object of
the one, and a title that of the other, neither added
dissolved by the almost inevitable result of such ill-
to their happiness by the connection, which was finally
assorted matches. Lady Glenthoru, shortly after their
marriage, eloped with a Captain Crawley, a sort of
fac-totum of the earl's-one of those hangers-on who

This story has been condensed from one of Miss Edgeworth's best tales depicting fashionable life, entitled "Ennui." Our object in giving it in this form and place is to point out the wretched results of idleness, and the value of compulsory industry in improving the mind.

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