THE NEW SCIENCE AND COMEDY 103 



he found the tradition false while Valeria thinks it is true. To 

 Sydenham's Book of Fevers and a Discourse on Fermentation (by 

 W. Sympson, 1675) was due the popular "fermentation" idea. 

 Ray's book of travels was an inexhaustible fountain for the comic 

 spirit.^''" 



Another source of material was the popular lectures on the new 

 science. Yearly there was a free course of lectures given in Lon- 

 don on the Boyle Foundation, beginning early in the 90 *s. The 

 ablest scientists were called to this service, and large crowds of 

 people assembled to hear them. At these lectures experiments were 

 performed, at least on occasion, for Desaguliers, a popularizer of 

 science during the first half of the eighteenth century, developed 

 his Royal Lectures into a book of two volumes, entitled A Course 

 of Experimental Philosophy, 1744. This scientist also gave private 

 popular lectures year by year in the city, as did others.^'^'^ 



A fourth source of material was rumor. The sensational ex- 

 periments, such as the transfusion of blood from a sheep into a 

 man, would spread by report through the city. According to 

 Pepys, there was a long discussion over the advisability of inviting 

 the Duchess of Newcastle to attend a meeting of the Royal Society 

 lest the town should be full of ballads on the event.^^^ If such a 

 simple incident would be noised abroad, how much more a sensa- 

 tional experiment. 



Another method by w^hich scientific activity became known was 

 the return of students from the university. The "pert young 

 Soph" would not only boast of his knowledge of "violent Motions", 

 of "Atoms and Globuli","'' but w^ould also report whatever was 

 sensational. The physicians, for instance, had difficulty in keep- 

 ing their dissections private ; wild stories were spread abroad as to 

 the source of the bodies and the manner of dissecting them. A 

 burlesque on such practices is contained in F. Coventry's Pompey 

 The Little, 1750. 



The collecting of "rarities" had become such a fad by the early 

 years of the eighteenth century that no dramatist needed to want 



130 Wright, Thos., The Female Virtuosoes, Witlfss's Tale of my Travels. 



"^ Supra, chap. I, p. 16. 



^3« Pepys, Samuel, Biary, May 30, 1667. 



^^ Supra, chap. I, p. 14. 



