Invention of Fire Engines. 245 



the account,, there is reafon to conclude thatthefe were not 

 hand enoines, but large compound machines.. In that re* 

 fpectabie dictionary MiidL'ys reulfcijjprdacb, printed at Zu- 

 rich in 1561. 8vo., I find Jt'unrbalen (tire hooks), and /^v/t-r- 

 Ititcrn (fire ladders) ; but no machines for extinguiOiing 

 fires, nor any where a fire engine. 



In the vear 165", the jchiit Cafpar Schott was ftruck with 

 adnii ration on fccuig at Nuremberg an engine, made there 

 bv John Plautich. It Itood on a fledge ten feet in lencfth 

 and four in breadth. The vcflel that contained the water 

 was eia;ht feet in length, four in height, and two in breadth. 

 It was put in motion by twenty-eight men, and forced a, 

 ftream »if water an inch in dianicter to the height of eighty 

 feet, and confcquentlv above the houTes. The whole ma- 

 chine was drawn bv two horlViJ. Hautfch is laid to have 

 caufed an engraving to be made of this machine, which .he 

 circulated, with an ofier of conftrufting fiinilar ones at a 

 moderate price, and teaching the ufe of them. He refuicd 

 to fhow Schott the internal conftruftion of his machine j 

 but the latter readilv conceived it. From what Schott fays, 

 it evixlently appears that the cvlinders did not (land perpen- 

 dicuhu-., but lay in a horizontal dircilion in the bo.x ; fo that 

 tlie piftons moved horizontallv, and not vertically as at pre- 

 fent. Vertical cvlinders, therefore, feem to be among the 

 improvements iiiice made to this engine. Schott adds, that 

 this iuvention Wiifi not new, .it had been known rn other 

 cities; aiui he himfelf forty years before, cotifequently in 

 1617, had.feenone, but much fmaller, in his native city *. 

 Schott, as is well known, was born at Konigfhofen, not far 

 ironi VViirzburg, in i6o<S. George Hauli'eh, the fon of the 

 former arlift, conllructcd fuch engines alio; and probably 

 made ft)me improvement in them; for Wagenfeil f and 

 others alccibe to him the iuveiition. 



The firlt regulauons at Paris reipc6ting fire.'!, as far as is 

 known, relate to fupprelling thofe incendiaries who, under 

 the name of houtefiuxy oeeafioned great devaftation ii\ the 

 capital as well as in the provinces];. Paris feems to have 

 obtained tlie firll tire engines in 1699 : in that year, at lead, 

 the king gave to Dumourier Duperrier an e.xclufive privilege 



'■ Mugia.U'iivcrJul'ts, p. lii. lib. 6. p. 510 ; iind in Pafrbii Iniuni. Aw.. 

 antiii- Li()f. 1700. 4!o. p. bbS. I'ht Magia Univerfalis was printed in 

 1657. Sic lUo Doiipo<iii:ivi , p. 3c I, uliD fitys that the water was railed 

 to the hcij;ht of a hundred feet. 



t Dc Civitate Noriljcrj^iriU, p i!;3. Msrpcrgcrs Geofnttes Mapu> 

 faktiuhius. Hamhurij 17c-. iimo. p. 210. Dopptlmayr, p. 303. 



\ Co uinuation ttu Traitc lic la Police par Dclamarc, Paris 1738. ft!. 

 9- «37- 



