121 



likewise for the king an immense gallery, of twenty 

 banks of oars, "containing spacious apartments, gar- 

 dens, walks, ponds, and all other conveniences suitable 

 to the dignity of a great king. He constructed also a 

 sphere representing all the motions of the stars, which 

 Cicero esteemed one of the indentions, that did the 

 highest honour to human genius. He perfected the 

 manner of augmenting the mechanic powers, by the 

 multiplication of wheels and pullies ; and, in short, 

 carried mechanics so far that the works he produced 

 surpass imagination. 



4. Nor was Archimedes the only one, who succeed, 

 ed in mechanics. The immense machines, and of 

 astonishing force, as were those which the ancients 

 adapted to the purpose of war, are a proof, they 

 came nothing behind us in this respect. It is with 

 difficulty we can conceive,how they reared those bulky 

 towers, a hundred and fifty-two feet in height, and 

 sixty in compass, ascending by many stories, having 

 at bottom a battering ram, a machine of strength suf- 

 ficient to beat down walls; in the middle a draw-bridge, 

 to be let down upon the wall of the city attacked, 

 in order to open a passage into the town for the as- 

 sailants; and at the top a body of men, who being 

 placed above the besieged, harrassed them without 

 - running any risk. An ancient historian has trans- 

 mitted to us an action of an engineer at Alexandria, 

 which deserves to have a place here. In defending 

 that city, when it was attacked by Julius Caesar, he, 

 by means of wheels and other machines, drew from 

 the sea a prodigious quantity of water, which he 

 turned upon the adversary, to thejr extreme annoy- 

 ance. Indeed the art of war gave occasion for a great 

 number of instances of this kind, which cannot but 

 excite in us the highest idea of the enterprizing genius 

 of the ancients, and the vigour wherewith they put 

 their designs in execution. The invention of pumps 

 by Ctesibius, and that of water-clocks, cranes, auto- 

 matical figures ; and wind- machines by Herou ; and the 

 VOL. v. & 



