296 NATURAL HISTORY 



the working of bellows is by sucking in of the air, to shun 

 vacuity (as they say), and to send it out by compression. 



2. We also use hand fans to make a wind, and to cool, 

 only by driving forward of the air softly. 



3. The cooling of summer rooms we spake of in answer 

 to the ninth article. There may other more curious means 

 be found, especially if the air be drawn in somewhere after 

 the manner of bellows, and let out at another place ; but 

 those which are now in use have relation only to mere com 

 pression. 



4. The breath in man s microcosmos, and in other ani 

 mals, do very well agree with the winds in the greater 

 world ; for they are engendered by humours, and alter with 

 moisture as wind and rain doth, and are dispersed and blow 

 freer by a greater heat. And from them that observation 

 is to be transferred to the winds, namely, that breaths are 

 engendered of matter that yields a tenacious vapour, not 

 easy to be dissolved ; as beans, pulse, and fruits; which is 

 so likewise in greater winds. 



5. In the distilling of vitriol and other minerals which 

 are most windy, they must have great and large receptacles, 

 otherwise they will break. 



6. Wind composed of nitre and gunpowder, breaking out 

 and swelling, the flame doth not only imitate but also 

 exceed winds, which blow abroad in the world, unless they 

 be such as are made by thunder. 



7. But the forces of it are pressed in, as in human en 

 gines, as guns, mines, and powder houses set on fire. But 

 it hath not yet been tried whether in open air, a great heap 

 of gunpowder set on fire would raise a wind for certain 

 hours, by the commotion of the air. 



8. There lies hidden a flatuous and expansive spirit in 

 quicksilver, so that it doth (in some men s opinions) imitate 

 gunpowder, and a little of it mixed with gunpowder will 

 make the powder stronger. Likewise the chymists speak 

 the same of gold, that being prepared some way, it will 

 break out dangerously like to thunder ; but these things I 

 never tried. 



A greater Observation. 



The motions of winds is for most things seen as it were 

 in a lookingglass, in the motion of waters. 



Great winds are inundations of the air, as we see inun 

 dations of waters both through the augmentation of the 

 quantity. As waters either descend from above, or spring 



