352 Dr George Wilson on the Early History of the 



construqt^d in 1670-1, and Hooke tried various experiments 

 on himself with it, as the Journals of the Society record.* 

 No minute reference occurs to the exhausting part of the ap- 

 paratus, nor is any allusion made to it as having been fur- 

 nished with two barrels-t There is no evidence, then, extant, 

 or hitherto, at least, made public, to shew that Papin^s 

 double-pump was not as new to Hooke as it was to Boyle. 



Hooke (ob. 1702) survived Boyle (ob. 1691) about ten 

 years, and may have constructed a new air-pump after the 

 latter' s death ; but I have not been able to find evidence that 

 he did. 



The first double-barrelled air-pump of English construc- 

 tion, of which, so far as I am aware, a figure and description 

 are extant, is Hauksbee's. They occur in a small quarto, 

 " Physico-Mechanical Experiments on Various Subjects, by 

 Francis Hauksbee, F.R.S." In the preface, the author says, 

 " The Honourable and most excellent Mr Boyle * * * * 

 gave much light into the causes and operations of Nature ; 

 and particularly by the invention of that most useful instru- 

 ment, the air-pump. The principal subject of the following 

 papers is, an account of great and further improvements of 

 this noble machine, the air-pump, and of many new experi- 

 ments made thereby." 



The date of Hauksbee's work is 1709; but it consists 

 chiefly of reprints from the Philosophical Transactions, of 

 papers published in earlier years. All of these papers are 



* Birch's History of Royal Society, vol. ii., pp. 463,467, 469, 470, 472, 473, 

 476. 



t This " air vessel" must, on the lowest estimate, have heen of large dimen- 

 sions. It only provided room, however, for a person sitting ; and, perhaps, was 

 suited solely for the reception of its ingenious deviser, who was, according to 

 Waller, "low of stature" and "very crooked." {Life of Hooke, p. xxvi.) A 

 very interesting account of llooke's personal appearance, with an estimate of 

 his character, which has been much misconceived, is contained in a little known 

 work, '' Aubrey's Letters and Lives of Eminent Men of the Seventeenth and 

 Eighteenth Centuries." For a knowledge of Aubrey's volumes, as well as for 

 other valuable references, throwing light on the present inquiry, I am indebted 

 to my friend, the Rev. Thomas Baynes, of Bristol, one of the happily consti- 

 tuted few, who combine a knowledge of metaphysics, with a strong relish for 

 the investigation of the higher departments of physical science. 



