went immediately in search of this school-fellow, and was overjoyed to find, upon inquiry, that the book was still in his possession. Having borrowed this important volume, he returned home with it, and beginning his studies as he went along, he pursued them with such application, that in about six months he was master of the rule-of-three with fractions. The reluctance with which he began to learn the powers and properties of figures was now at an end; he knew enough to make him earnestly desirous of knowing more; he was, therefore, impatient to proceed from this book to one that was more difficult, and having at length found means to procure one that treated of more intricate and complicated calculations, he made himself master of that also before the end of the year 1739. He had the good fortune soon after to meet with a Treatise of Geometry, written by Pachek, the same author whose arithmetic he had been studying; and finding that this science was in some measure founded on that which he had learned, he applied to his new book with great assiduity for some time, but, at length, not being able perfectly to comprehend the theory as he went on, nor yet to discover the utility of the practice, he laid it aside, to which he was also induced by the necessity of his immediate attendance to his fields and his vines.

The severe winter which happened in the year 1740, obliged him to keep long within his cottage, and having there no employment either for his body or his mind, he had once more recourse to his book of geometry: and having at length comprehended some of the leading principles, he procured a little box ruler and an old pair of compasses, on one point of which he mounted the end of a quill cut into a pen. With these instruments he employed himself incessantly in making various geometrical figures on paper, to illustrate the theory by a solution of the problems. He was thus busied in his cot till March, and the joy arising from the knowledge he had acquired was exceeded only by his desire of knowing more.

He was now necessarily recalled to that labour by which alone he could procure himself food, and was besides without money to procure such books and instruments as were absolutely necessary to pursue his geometrical studies. However, with the assistance of a neighbouring artificer, he procured the figures which he found represented by the diagrams in his book, to be made in wood, and with these he went to work at every interval of leisure, which now happened only once a week, after divine service on a Sunday. He was still in want of a new book, and having laid by a little sum for that purpose against the time of the fair, where

alone he had access to a bookseller's shop, he made a purchase of three small volumes, from, which he acquired a complete knowledge of trigonometry. After this acquisition he could not rest till he had begun to study astronomy; his next purchase, therefore, was an introduction to that science, which he read with indefatigable diligence, and invented innumerable expedients to supply the want of proper instruments, in which he was not less successful than Robinson Crusoe, who, in an island of which he was the only rational inhabitant, found means to supply himself not only with the necessaries but the conveniences of life.

During his study of geometry and astronomy he had frequently met with the word philosophy, and this became more and more the object of his attention. He conceived that it was the name of some science of great importance and extent, with which he was as yet wholly unacquainted; he became therefore impatient in the highest degree to get acquainted with philosophy, and being continually upon the watch for such assistance as offered, he at last picked up a book, called An Introduction to the Knowledge of God, of Man, and of the Universe. In reading this book he was struck with a variety of objects that were equally interesting and new.

But as this book contained only general principles, he went to Dresden, and inquired among the booksellers, who was the most celebrated author that had written on philosophy. By the booksellers he was recommended to the Works of Wolfius, written in the German language, and Wolfius having been mentioned in several books he had read, as one of the most able men of his age, he readily took him for his guide in the regions of philosophy.

The first purchase that he made of Wolfius's Works was his Logic, and at this he laboured a full year, still attending to his other studies, so as not to lose what he had gained before. In this book he found himself referred to another, written by the same author, called Mathematical Principles, as the fittest to give just ideas of things and facilitate the practice of logic, he therefore inquired after this book with a design to buy it; but finding it too dear for his finances, he was obliged to content himself with an abridgment of it, which he purchased in the autumn of 1743. From this book he derived much pleasure and much profit, and it employed him from October, 1743, to February, 1745.

He then proceeded to metaphysics, at which he laboured till the October following, and he would fain have entered on the study of physics, but his indigence was an insupera ble impediment, and he was obliged to content himself with

this author's Morality, Politics, and Remarks on Metaphysics, which employed him till July, 1746; by this time he had scraped together a sum sufficient to buy the Physics, which he had so earnestly desired, and this work he read twice within the year.

About this time a dealer in old books sold him a volume of Wolfius's Mathematical Principles at large, and the spherical trigonometry which he found in this book was a new treasure, which he was very desirous to make his own. This, however, cost him incredible labour, and filled every moment that he could spare from his business and his sleep, for something more than a year.

He proceeded to the study of Kahrel's Law of Nature and Nations, and at the same time procured a little book on the terrestrial and celestial globes. These books, with a few that he borrowed, were the sources from which he derived such a stock of knowledge, as is seldom found even among those who have associated with the inhabitants of an university and had perpetual access to public libraries.

Mr. Hoffman, during Ludwig's residence at his house, dressed him in his own gown, with other proper habiliments; and he observes that this alteration of his dress had such an effect, that Hoffman could not conceive the man's accent or dialect to be the same, and he felt himself secretly inclined to treat him with more deference than when he was in his peasant's dress, though the alteration was made in his presence and with his own apparel.

It happened also that before Ludwig went home there was an eclipse of the sun, and Mr. Hoffman proposed to his guest that he should observe this phenomenon as an astronomer, and for that purpose furnished him with proper instruments. The impatience of Ludwig till the time of the eclipse is not to be expressed; he had hitherto been acquainted with the planetary world only by books and a view of the heavens with the naked eye; he had never yet looked through a telescope, and the anticipation of the pleasure which the new observation would yield him, scarcely suffered him either to eat or sleep; but it unfortunately happened, that just before the eclipse came on, the sky became cloudy, and continued so during the whole time of its continuance. This misfortune was more than the philosophy even of Ludwig could bear; as the cloud came on, he looked up at it in the agony of a man that expected the dissolution of nature to follow; when it came over the sun, he stood fixed in a consternation not to be described, and when he knew the eclipse was past, his disappointment and grief were little short of distraction.

Mr. Hoffman soon after went in his turn to visit Mr. Ludwig, and take a view of his dwelling, his library, his study, and his instruments. He found an old crazy cottage, the inside of which had been long blacked with smoke; the walls were covered with propositions and diagrams written with chalk. In one corner was a bed, in another a cradle; and, under a little window at the side, three pieces of board, laid side by side over two trestles, made a writing table for the philosopher, upon which were scattered some pieces of writing paper, containing extracts of books, various calculations, and geometrical figures; the books which have been mentioned before, were placed on a shelf with the compass and ruler that have been described, which, with a wooden square and a pair of six-inch globes, constituted the library and museum of the truly celebrated John Ludwig.

In this hovel he lived till the year 1754, and while he was pursuing the study of philosophy at his leisure hours, he was indefatigable in his day labour as a poor peasant, sometimes carrying a basket at his back, and sometimes driving a wheelbarrow, and crying such garden-stuff as he had to sell, about the village. In this state he was subject to frequent insults, such as "patient merit of the unworthy takes," and he bore them without reply or any other mark either of resentment or contempt, when those who could not agree with him about the price of his commodities used to turn from him with an air of superiority, and call him in derision a silly clown, a stupid dog.

Mr. Hoffman, when he dismissed him, presented him with 100 crowns, which have fulfilled all his wishes and made him the happiest man in the world: with this sum he has built himself a more commodious habitation in the middle of his vineyard, and furnished it with many moveables and utensils, of which he was in great want, but above all, he has procured a very considerable addition to his library, an article so essential to his happiness, that he declared to Mr. Hoffman, he would not accept the whole province in which he lived upon condition that he should renounce his studies, and that he had rather live on bread and water, than withhold from his mind that food, which his intellectual hunger perpetually required.

1757, Sept.

XII. Secret of the Fire-eating Art.

MR. URBAN,

Ashbourn, Derb. Jan. 20. LAST spring Mr. Powell, the famous fire-eater, did us the

honour of a visit at this town; and, as he set forth in his printed bills, that he had shewn away not only before most of the crowned heads in Europe, but even before the Royal Society of London, and was dignified with a curious and very ample simple medal, that, he said, was bestowed on him by that learned body, as a testimony of their approbation, for eating what nobody else could eat, I was prevailed upen, at the importunity of some friends, to go and see a sight that so many great kings and philosophers had not thought below their notice. And, I confess, though neither a superstitious nor an incurious man, I was not a little astonished at his wonderful performance in the fire-eating

way.

After many restless days and nights, and the profoundest researches into the nature of things, I almost despaired of accounting for the strange phenomenon of a human and perishable creature eating red hot coals, taken indiscriminately out of a large fire, broiling steaks upon his tongue, swallowing huge draughts of liquid fire as greedily as a country squire does roast beef and strong beer. Thought I to myself, very wisely and logically, how can the minor include the major? How can that element, which we are told is ultimately to devour all things, be devoured itself, as familiar diet, by a mortal man? Here I stuck, and here I might have stuck, as a very learned man says in another matter of great importance, if a thought had not darted into my mind, early one morning, as I lay between sleeping and waking, that I had, many years ago, read something of this kind in the Journal des Sçavans. Like Archimedes I started out of bed, and cried, Evenna, I have found it out, I have it, rushing at the same time almost naked into my study, where, in the 8th volume of that work, p. 282, I met with the following anecdote:

"The secret of fire-eating was made public by a servant to one Richardson, an Englishman, who shewed it in France about the year 1667, and was the first performer of the kind that ever appeared in Europe. It consists only in rubbing the hands, and thoroughly washing the mouth, lips, tongue, teeth, and other parts that are to touch the fire, with pure spirit of sulphur. This burns and cauterizes the epidermis,