746 ■ tF.CTURE LX. 



in Theophrastus, Dioscorides, andPlmy,.as wellas in some of the historical writ- 

 ers of aatiquity. Protagorides of Cyziciim, who is quoted by Athenaeus, rehites 

 that in the time of king Antiochus, it was usual, as a luxury, to cool water by 

 evaporation ; and it is not impossible that the custom may have been introduced 

 from the east, where even ice is frequently made at present by a similar process; 

 others of the ancients had remarked, according to Dr. Falconer, that water 

 usually froze the more readily for having been boiled; and it is possible that 

 some other detached observations of a similar nature may occur to those who 

 have the curiosity to make them objects of research. 



The thirteenth century may be considered as the date of the revival, if not 

 of the commencement, of physical discoveries. Our countryman, Roger 

 Bacon, was one of its principal ornaments: he appears to have anticipated in 

 his knowledge of chemistry, as well as of many other parts of natural phi- 

 losophy, the labours of later times. The polarity of the magnetic needle is 

 described in some lines which are attributed to Guyot, a French poet, who 

 lived about 1180; but some persons are of opinion that this description was 

 actually written by Hugo Bertius, in the middle of the succeeding- century; 

 and it is generally believed that the compass was first employed in navigation 

 by Gioja of Amalfi, about the year 1260; he is said to have marked the north 

 with a fleur de lis, in compliment to a branch of the royal familv of France, 

 then reigning at Naples. The declination of the needle from the true meri- 

 dian is mentioned by Petei* Adsiger, the author of a manuscript which bears 

 the date 1269. The poet Dante, who flourished at the close of this century, 

 distinguished himself not only by his literary, but also by his philosophical 

 pursuits; and we find among his numerous works an essay on the nature of 

 the elements. 



The learned and voluminous labours, by which Gesncr and Aldrovandus 

 enriched the various departments of natural history, may be considered as 

 comprehending the greatest part of what had been done by the ancients in 

 the investigation of the economy of the animal world; but their works 

 have too much the appearance of collections of what others had asserted, rather 

 than of original observations of their own. 



The first of the moderns, whose discoveries respecting the properties of 



