48 



NOTES AISD QUERIES. 



[No. 246. 



because it did not give any account of the dis- 

 coveries of living mathematicians ; while the His- 

 toire, for a contrary reason, was sharply attacked. 

 His sagacity led him to the true explanation of 

 this, namely, that the dead could not speak for 

 themselves, but that the living could. 



While on this subject I may, with reference to 

 the battle of the books, fought at the British Mu- 

 seum in 1850, quote Me. Cockle's remark as one 

 instance to be added to many of the advantage of 

 full titles. Had I written the article in question 

 in 1852 instead of 1842, I should have continued 

 the title at least to the words "I'annee 1808," 

 which would have given sufficient evidence that 

 the work of 1802 must have been reprinted, or 

 another substituted for it. A. De Morgan. 



The enumeration of ancient mathematical his- 

 torians made by Montucla at pp. xvi — xvii. of the 

 Preface to the first edition (Par., 1758) of his 

 Histoire is repeated, in substantially the same 

 terms, at p. v. of the Preface (Par., An vii.) to the 

 second edition of that work. Professor De Mor- 

 gan, at p. 4. of his excellent References (Lond., 

 1842), mentions this part of Montucla's enu- 

 meration without comment, and, indeed, without 

 naming Theophrastus, Eudemus, and Geminus, of 

 whose works Montucla regrets that the only re- 

 remains are " Le peu que Proclus parait en avoir 

 extrait, et employe dans son prolixe commentaire 

 sur le premier livre d'Euclide." I have some doubts 

 as to the supposition of Montucla being entirely 

 well founded. 



There is a paged index at the end of the Latin 

 translation (Patavii, 1560), by Barocius, of the 

 Commentaries of Proclus. So far as Geminus is 

 concerned, this index is very defective. I find 

 (and it may be useful to know) that his name 

 occurs in the text of pp. 22. 61. 63, 64. 67. 100. 

 105. 108. 110. 116. 139. 143. and 159.; and in 

 the margin of pp. 65. 102. and 264., as well as of 

 those just specified. 



^ That the marginal scholia constitute no por- 

 tion of the labours of Proclus, would seem to be 

 clear from the fact (see pp. 264. and 266.) of 

 Eutocius being cited in them. That Barocius is 

 their author will I think appear when they are 

 examined by the light of the middle paragraph 

 (commencing with " Pra3terea, quae" &c.) of the 

 tiiird page of his Prcefatio. 



^ Now the scholiast refers (see p. 264.) to the 

 sixth book of the Geometricce Enarrationes, or (as 

 they are called by Montucla in the Preface to his 

 first edition) Enarrationes Geometricce, of Geminus, 

 in a manner which seems to treat the verification 

 of the reference as a thing perfectly practicable. 

 That work of Geminus has then probably been 

 extant at a comparatively recent period, and there 

 may be some hope of recovering it. Is it among 



his Opera (Heilbronner, p. 571.) in the library of 

 Paris ? or are there any traces of it in the Ba- 

 rocian Library (Heilb., p. 287., art. P.), or else- 

 where ? 



Thomas Taylor, at p. 199. of the second volume 

 (Lond., 1789) of his English translation of Pro- 

 clus, replaces the scholium just alluded to (that 

 at p. 264. of the Latin of Barocius) by references 

 to a treatise of Simson (Sect. Con., Src). The 

 parts referred to do not bear upon the present 

 question, although they may give a portion of the 

 information for which the scholiast refers to Ge- 

 minus and Eutocius as accessible authors. 



James Cockle, M.A., F.R.A.S. 



4. Pump Court, Temple. 



P- S. — In my former article (Vol. x., p. 3.) I 

 omitted to mention that the fact of Bonnycastle's 

 name being John, may be in some way connected 

 with the error in the title-page of the translation 

 of Bossut. 



CLAT TOBACCO-PIPES. 



(Vol. ix., pp. 372. 546.) 



It is a somewhat singular fact, and would seem 

 to support the theory that "something wa» 

 smoked " before the introduction of the tobacco 

 plant, that, in spite of the suppressive edict of 

 Queen Elizabeth, and the Counterhlaste of James, 

 the Society of Tobacco-pipe Makers, in the 

 seventeenth year of the reign of the latter, had 

 become so very numerous and considerable a body, 

 that they were incorporated by royal charter, and 

 bore on their shield a tobacco plant in full 

 blossom. It is also worthy of remark, that al- 

 though the common clay pipe is entirely diiferent 

 in material and form from the original American 

 pipe, it was used in nearly its present shape at the 

 first introduction of tobacco, as though before ap- 

 proved for a similar use. Clay pipes, supposed to 

 be of a date anterior to this period, have occa- 

 sionally been found in the Irish bogs. An en- 

 graving of a dudheen, which was dug up at Bran- 

 nockstown, co. Kildare, sticking between tho 

 teeth of a human skull, will be found in the An- 

 thologia Hibernica (vol. i. p. 352.), together with 

 a paper, which, on the authority of Herodotus 

 (lib. i. sec. 36.), Strabo (lib. vii. 296.), Pompo- 

 nius Mela (2.), and Solinus (c. 15.), would prove 

 that the northern nations of Europe, long before 

 the discovery of America, were acquainted with 

 tobacco, or a herb of similar properties, and that 

 they smoked it through small tubes. (See note 

 to Croker's Legends and Traditions of the Sovih of 

 Ireland.') 



I find the following among my Nicotiana, which 

 I remember transcribing from one of the volumes, 

 I cannot say which, of the Mirror : 



" The Inverness Courier says, that in one of the an- 



