390 Historical 



The cord in general was much congested, as was the brain, but 

 I saw nothing else abnormal, there or in the other organs. 



3. Diving Suits. 



As we said when we began this chapter, the diving bell has 

 been entirely abandoned for the diving suit, an apparatus which 

 is infinitely simpler and less costly, and which allows each man to 

 work by himself with a certain liberty. 



I have no intention of going back to the origin of this invention 

 although it is very recent; the French word itself scaphandre 

 (o-Ka'/'os, boat, avSpos, man) dates from the end of the last century, 

 and was given to a simple life preserver. It is only during the last 

 fifty years that Siebe of London, then M. Cabirol, and finally MM. 

 Rouquayrol and Denayrouze have made a practical apparatus of 

 it, easy to use in fishing for oysters, coral, pearls and sponges, in 

 saving sunken objects, in cleaning and inspecting the hulls of ships, 

 etc. 



However, I cannot keep from mentioning a strange invention of 

 Borelli, which had some connection with the diving suit and is 

 interesting in the history of the theories of respiration; I borrow 

 the description of this apparatus, very poorly planned because it 

 did not provide for renewing the air for the diver, from Brize- 

 Fradin who quotes it without telling where the celebrated doctor- 

 mathematician described his apparatus. He expresses himself in 

 these words: 



Borelli, inventor of the machine called diver's bladder, prefers 

 it, for some reason or other, to Halley's bell. It is a globe of brass or 

 copper about two feet in diameter, placed over the head of the diver; 

 it is fastened to -a goat-skin garment made to fit the diver. In this 

 globe are the tubes by which the circulation of the air is maintained; 

 at his side the diver carries an air-pump, by means of which he can 

 make himself heavier or lighter, as fishes do, compressing or expand- 

 ing their air-bladder: in this way he thinks he can meet all the objec- 

 tions made in regard to other machines, and especially the objection 

 in regard to lack of air, since the air which has been breathed is, 

 according to him, deprived of its harmful qualities by circulation in 

 the tubes. (P. 44.) 



Let us recall that in Halley's diving bell a man could take 

 several steps outside the bell and continue to breathe by means of 

 a sort of helmet and a tube which ended in the air of the bell; he 

 was therefore almost in the conditions of the modern diving suit. 

 The principal part of the present apparatus (Fig. 7) consists of a 

 heavy metal helmet, with glass portholes, which the diver places 

 over his head; a tube which communicates with a compressing 



