297 



ARCHYTAS. 



ARDEN, EDWARD. 



298 



is complete); by Torelli, Oxford, 1732, the best perhaps of all. The 

 last-mentioned edition was purchased by the University of Oxford 

 after the death of the editor, and is the only one which contains the 

 various readings. We have also the Latin translation of Borelli, 1661 ; 

 and the French translation of Peyrard, Paris, 1809, undertaken at the 

 request of the Institute, and revised by Delamhre, being for public 

 use by much the most convenient version which has yet appeared. A 

 German translation of all the works of Archimedes, by Ernst, appeared 

 at Stralsund in 1824, in 4 to. 



(Montucla cites the following lives of Archimedes : Mazuchelli, 

 Notizie Hitoriche alia Vita, <tc., d'Archimede, 4to., 1735 ; and an 

 unfinished work of M. Melot, Mem. de tAcad. des Belles Lettres, 

 voL xv.) 



ARCHYTAS, a native of the Greek city Tarentum in Italy. All 

 ancient accounts concur in regarding him as uniting the merits of a 

 philosopher, mathematician, statesman, and general He appears to 

 have been contemporary with the younger Dionysius and with Plato. 

 Archytaa belonged to the Pythagorean school, and was himself pro- 

 bably the founder of a sect. He ia distinguished more particularly for 

 his knowledge of mathematics, and for his discoveries in practical 

 mechanics. Among the mathematical problems he attempted to solve 

 was the duplication of the cube, but in too complicated a manner to 

 be explained here : the wooden pigeon that could fly was the most 

 celebrated of bis mechanical inventions. Many works are ascribed to 

 him, and we have still several sin-ill pieces under his name, but there 

 seems good reason to doubt whether they are the genuine productions 

 of Archytas. A list of the works of Archytas is given by Fabricius in 

 his ' Bibliotheca Grseca," i. 831. There is a ' Treatise on the Ten 

 Categories, or on the Nature of The All,' published iu Greek by 

 Camerarius (Lips., 1564, Venet., 1571); and a fragment on Mathe- 

 matics, edited, with some other Opuscula, by Stephens (Paris, 1557), 

 reprinted at Copenhagen, 1707. A complete collection of the frag- 

 ments ascribed to Archytas was published by J. C'u. Orelli, Leipzig, 

 1821, 8vo. ' The Political Fragments of Arcliytas,' &c., translated 

 from the Greek by Thomas Taylor, was published at London, 1822, 

 in 8vo. 



ARGON, JEAN CLAUDE D', a native of Pontarlier im Franche- 

 Comte', born in 1733, showed an early inclination for the military pro- 

 fession. He became an expert engineer, and wrote several treatises, 

 among which may be enumerated, ' Correspondence sur 1'Art de la 

 Guerre,' and ' Reflexions d'un In^nieur en RiSponse a un Tacticien,' 

 12u>o, Amsterdam, 1773. In 1780, when the Spaniards were besieging 

 Gibraltar, D'Arcon devised a plan of attack, by means of floating bat- 

 teries, which were to be incombustible and not liable to sink. His 

 scheme being approved by the Spanish government, the batteries were 

 commenced at Algesiras about the 12th of May, 1782, by striking the 

 topmasts and cutting down the poops of ten ships of war, from 600 to 

 1400 tons burden : the larboard side of each was entirely covered with 

 green timber to a thickness of six or seven feet, the pieces being fastened 

 with iron bolts, and the whole was covered with layers of junk and 

 raw hides. Over the deck also was built a shell-proof blindage, or roof, 

 of strong timbers, forming two inclined planes with a ridge along the 

 middle ; and above the lower deck, the starboard side, or that which 

 was to be turned from the fortress, was left open. Port-holes were 

 formed for guns, the number of which in the different batteries varied 

 from nine to twenty-one ; and a large reservoir was formed in each, 

 whence by pump-* water could be thrown over the roof and sides so as 

 to keep the timber constantly wet. It was imagined that the thick 

 manses of wood forming the sides, which were exposed to the fire from 

 the fortress, would prevent the vessels from being sunk, and that the 

 pumps would secure them against being set on fire, The ten battering 

 ships were to have been moored within half gun-shot of the walls by 

 iron chains, and to have been supported by ten Spanish ships of the 

 line, besides bomb-vessels and gun-boats. Large boats filled with 

 troops, protected by mantelets, were to be in readiness ; and the man- 

 telet* being provided with hinges, were to be let down when the boats 

 approached the shore, iu order to facilitate the landing of the men. 



The combined fleets of France and Spain, consisting of forty-seven 

 sail of the line, besides frigates, gun-boats, and the ten battering ships, 

 came before the fortress on the 12th of September; and on the fol- 

 lowing morning the latter got under weigh in order to proceed to their 

 stations, D'Arjon himself keeping ahead in a small boat, and taking 

 the sounding*. The garrison of the fortress, which during the siege 

 was commanded by General Elliot, in the meantime lighted the fur- 

 naces which had been prepared for heating shot. The two greatest 

 hips anchored about nine hundred yards from the ramparts ; but from 

 insufficiency of sail or want of skill in the commanders, the eight others 

 remained at a greater distance. As soon as the ships were moored 

 the firing commenced on both sides, the garrison discharging red-hot 

 shot, carcasses, and shells. For several hours however very little effect 

 seemed to be produced on the floating batteries, the heaviest shells 

 often rebounding from the roofs ; and thirty-two-pouuder shot made 

 no visible impression on the hulls of the vessels ; but iu the afternoon 

 a red-hot ball lodged in the side of the Talk Piedra, and could not be 

 extinguished. An order was then precipitately given to wet the powder 

 in the magazine, and the guns ia consequence ceasing their fire, the 

 hip wai no longer covered with smoke, so that it became completely 

 exposed to the artillery of the garrison. D'Arcon, who was in the 



ship, proposed to send out an anchor for the purpose of warping her 

 beyond the range of the English guns, but a sufficient number of men 

 could not be obtained to perform the duty ; he then, about midnight, 

 went to the admiral's ship to solicit assistance, but he could obtain 

 none ; and during the night, or in the following morning, all the ten 

 ships either blew up or were burned to the water's edge. In his 

 ' Me'moires pour servir a 1'Histoire du Siege de Gibraltar,' which he 

 published at Cadiz in the following year, General D'Ar9on ascribes the 

 disaster to the jealousy of the Spaniards; and the fact that the bat- 

 tering ships were not supported by the rest of the fleet affords some 

 ground for the charge. 



D'Arcou afterwards served in the French army at the time of the 

 Revolution, and assisted in the conquest of Holland. In 1795 he pub- 

 lished ' Considerations Militaires et Politiques sur les Fortifications," 

 in which he condensed all that he had previously written on the sub- 

 ject. He was made a senator in 1799, and died the following year at 

 his estate near Auteuil. 



AliDEN, EDWARD, descended from a very ancient and honourable 

 family seated at Parkhall in Warwickshire, was born in 1531. He 

 succeeded his grandfather, Thomas Arden, in the family estate in 1563. 

 Thomas Arden, his grandfather, was squire for the body to Henry VII. ; 

 and he was the son of Walter Arden, who married Eleanor, daughter 

 of John Hampden of Buckinghamshire. The younger brother of 

 Walter Arden was the great-grandfather of Mary Arden, the mother 

 of William Shakspere ; and thus there was a family connection between 

 the great poet of the days of Elizabeth and the staunch opposer of the 

 claims of Charles I. to tax the people without consent of parliament. 

 Edward Arden married Mary, the daughter of Sir George Throck- 

 morton. At the Reformation he held to the old forms of religion, but 

 this did not prevent him filling the office of Sheriff of Warwickshire 

 in the year 1568. The Earl of Leicester was Arden's neighbour. He 

 was an enemy of the Throckmortons (Sir John and Sir Nicholas), and 

 Arden, who appears to have been a man of high spirit, nut only par- 

 took of the general dislike of his wife's family to that nobleman, but 

 openly quarrelled with Leicester, called him an upstart, and, as it 

 would appear, publicly reflected upon his connection with the Countess 

 of Essex. One of Edward Arden's daughters was married to John 

 Somerville, a young gentleman of family and fortune in Warwickshire, 

 a Roman Catholic, of violent temper. In Whitsuntide 1583 Somer- 

 ville and his wife were at Mr. Arden's, and Hugh Hall, Arden's priest, 

 appears to have persuaded Somerville to attempt the death of Queen 

 Elizabeth, as an incorrigible heretic, as one who was daily growing 

 worse, and whom it would be a service to the cause of true religion to 

 destroy. Somerville appears to have brooded upon this after his return 

 home till he became so melancholy, that his wife wrote to Hall to 

 come and converse with him. Hall did not come, but he wrote to 

 Somerville a long letter to incite him to prosecute his plan for the 

 destruction of Elizabeth ; and this letter seems to have produced the 

 effect intended, for Somerville immediately set out for London; but 

 when he got to Warwick he attacked some Protestants with his sword, 

 and was seized. Somerville's wife after his departure had found Hall's 

 letter, and took it to her father Arden, who threw it into the fire. On 

 the 30th of October 1583 Somerville was committed to the Tower on 

 a charge of high treason, and having on his apprehension said some- 

 thing of his father-in-law and mother-in-law, orders were sent into 

 Warwickshire for their apprehension. On the 4th of November Hall 

 was committed to the Tower, and on the 7th Arden. On the 16th 

 Mary, Arden's wife, Margaret, Somerville's wife, and Elizabeth, Somer- 

 ville's sister, were committed. On the 23rd Somerville was tortured 

 in the Tower, and on the following day Hugh Hall also. On the 16th 

 of December Edward Arden, Mary his wife, John Somerville, and Hugh 

 Hall, were tried for high treason in Guildhall ; they were all found 

 guilty on the confession extorted from Hall, and were all sentenced to 

 death. On the 19th of December Arden and Somerville were removed 

 from the Tower to Newgate. Here Somerville was strangled, by his 

 own hands, as it was given out, but by others who were afraid of what 

 he might say, as was suspected. On the 20th of December, 1583, 

 Ardeu was executed in Smithfield. He asserted that Somerville was 

 murdered, that he himself was innocent, and that he was to be exe- 

 cuted, not for conspiring against the queen, but for his firmness in 

 maintaining and asserting his religion as a Roman Catholic. He 

 excited general commiseration. His head was set on London bridge, 

 his quarters on the city gates. Somerville's head was also set ou 

 London bridge, but his body was interred in Moorfields. Mrs. Ardeu 

 was pardoned, but the queen gave away her husband's estate to Edward 

 Darcy. Hall, the priest, was also pardoned ; and it was said that 

 Leicester tried to induce Chancellor Hatton to banish him, but without 

 success. 



1 lolliushed, Stow, and others speak of Arden as a traitor justly con- 

 victed, but Camden says : " The woful end of this gentleman, who 

 was drawn in by the cunning of the priest, and cast by his evidence, 

 was generally imputed to Leicester's malice. Certain it is that he had 

 incurred Leicester's heavy displeasure, and not without cause, for he 

 had rashly opposed him in all he could, reproached him as an adulterer, 

 and defamed him as a new upstart." The account which Dugdale gives 

 of him is as follows: "Which Edward, though a gentleman not infe- 

 rior to the rest of his ancestors in those virtues wherewith they were 

 adorned, had the hard hap to come to an untimely death in 27 Eliz., 



