12 



collection of secrets. The author or compiler was Ticonardo 

 Fioravanti, a physician of Bologna, who died in 1588. His col- 

 lection is arranged very much in the same way as Fallop})io's, and 

 it contains not only secrets of medicine and surgery with the 

 necessary preparation of drugs and remedies, but receipts for 

 several technical purposes as well. Besides the Italian edition of 

 1571, Venice, 8vo, I have here the German translation of Darm- 

 stadt, 1624. Of this work an English translation was made by 

 John Hester, which was first published at London in 1582, in 

 16mo. It was afterwards reprinted with some other translations 

 by the same hand, and appeared in small quarto in 1G52. Of 

 this edition I possess a copy. The translation diflers in several 

 details from the Italian, and it embraces only the medical section 

 of the original. 



A much better known man than any of these published a collec. 

 tion of curions arts at Naples in 1558. This was the Neapolitan, 

 Giambattista Porta, who lived between 1538 and 1G15, made 

 long journeys in search of natural knowledge, and formed an 

 Academy of tlie Secrets of Nature in his house at Rome, which 

 was suppressed of course. 



His work is entitled " Magia Naturalis,^^ and it is divided 

 into twenty books, according to subjects. This is a more compre- 

 hensive work than some of its predecessors, but I cannot say tliat 

 in its contents it is much more sensible. It had its share of 

 popularity, however, passed through many Latin editions, and 

 was translated into all the languages. Besides three of the Latin 

 editions (Franckfurt, 1591, Leyden, 1644, and Amsterdam, 1G64), 

 I have here a copy of the scarce English translation of 1658, with 

 the still scarcer frontispiece, which contains a portrait of the 

 author, and a representation of the four elements, and of Art and 

 Nature, disposed in compartments. Among the curiosities con- 

 tained in the first edition of this book, 1558, is an account of the 

 camera obscura as it was known — without the lens — to Leonardo 

 da Vinci. In the 1589 edition it is described with the lens, but 

 there is no proof of what has been stated, that the instrument was 

 either invented or improved by Porta. On the Avhole, the optical 

 division is one of the best in the Magia Naturalis. 



The last of the Italian collections I have to show is that of 

 Leonardo Locatelli, a physician, like most of the older naturalists. 

 The work is entitled " Theatro cVArcani" and it deals chieiiy 



