APPENDIX. 579 



APPENDIX H. 



APOCKYPHAL PASSAGES. 



Statements that have at various times been published as matters of 

 fact relating to the personal history of the Marquis of Worcester. 



1. The Pot-lid Story. No account of the Marquis s great dis 

 covery has hitherto been considered complete without relating what 

 is usually offered as a traditional anecdote of its origin. The latest 

 publication, in a popular form, occurs in &quot;A History of &quot;Wonderful 

 Inventions,&quot; where its interest is enhanced by a neatly executed 

 engraving. It relates that, at the conclusion of the Civil &quot;War, the 

 Marquis &quot; hastened over to France, where, after spending some time 

 at the court of the exiled royal family of England, he returned to 

 this country as their secret agentj but being detected, was confined 

 a prisoner in the Tower.&quot; It is said that during this imprisonment, 

 &quot;while he was engaged one day in cooking his own dinner, he observed 

 the lid of the pot was continually being forced upwards by the 

 vapour of the boiling water contained in the vessel. Eeing a man 

 of thoughtful disposition, and having, moreover, a taste for scientific 

 investigation, he began to reflect on the circumstance, when it oc 

 curred to him that the same power which was capable of raising the 

 iron cover of the pot might be applied to a variety of useful pur 

 poses ; and on obtaining his liberty, he set to work to produce a 

 practical expositioD of his ideas on the subject in the shape of an 

 acting machine, which he described in his work &quot; the &quot; Century.&quot; 



Every writer varies this story in its details. Here the compiler, 

 drawing on his imagination, certifies to the Marquis being his own 

 cook, providing his own dinner, and verifies the pot-lid being of iron. 

 Disraeli and others vaguely state it to have been his meal that was 

 being prepared in his presence, saying nothing whether the pot was 

 brass, copper, or iron. The Tower must have had a large supply of 

 these cooking utensils to meet the wants of its prisoners ! 



The story reminds one of that of the Three Black Crows related 

 by Addison in The Spectator, for like it this &quot; pot-lid&quot; story may after 

 all have originated in some lecture or conversation, in which the 

 speaker indulged his fancy by venturing the statement as what 

 might appear to him a feasible suggestion, and one calculated to 

 render the matter interesting and impressive. Had it happened at 

 all it must have occurred from 1652 to 1654; but the &quot; pot-lid &quot; 



