CHAP. VIII. CHRONOLGICAL TABLE OF MECHANICAL INVENTIONS. SCIPIO Nasica's clepsydra* Scissors invented in Africa B. C. 159 Diophantus employed some algebraic symbols. Montucla. Glass introduced into England A. D. 635 671 Silk worked in Greece about 700 The Chinese canal 806 miles long, finished by 30,000 men in 43 years 980 Paper of linen introduced about 1100 The first canal in England, from the Trent to the Witham 1134 Gunpowder used at Lyons in Brabant Wiegleb Muskets used at the siege of Arras 1292 1299 1299 1330 1331 1351 1338 1346 Shipping improved, and port holes invented by Decharges * An instrument to meas ctime by the fall of water. Many Flemish weavers were driven to England by the Duke Bows and arrows still used in Engiand, and artillery with Fromantil is said to have applied pendulums to clocks in 1656 In 1787 about twenty-three million pounds of cotton were manufactured in Britain; about six were imported from the British colonies, six from the Levant, and ten from the settlements of other European nations. Half the quantity was employed in white goods, one-fourth in fustians, one fourth in hosiery, mixtures, and candle wicks; giving employment to 60,000 spinners, and 360,000 other manufacturers. In 1791, the quantity was in. creased from twenty-three millions to thirty-two. The value of the wool annually manufactured in England is about three millions sterling; it employs above a million persons, who receive for their work about nine millions. Thread has been spun so fine as to be sold for £ 4 an ounce; lace for £40. The premiums annually proposed by the Society for the Encou ragement of Arts, enable us to form some opinion of the present state of our machinery and manufactures. Some of their objects are, a substitute for white lead paint, a red pigment, a machine for carding silk, cloth made from hop stalks, paper made from raw vegetables, transparent paper, the prevention of accidents from horses falling, cleaning turnpike roads, machines for raising coals, and for making bricks, instruments for harpooning whales; machines for reaping or mowing corn, for dibbling wheat, for threshing; a family mill, a gunpowder mill, a quarry of millstones; and a mode of boring and blasting rocks 1802. [Luckombe's Tablet of Memory. Young's Nat. Phil. Edit. |