6 t Henry Riddell on 



sphear and an artificial heaven, wherein lie did represent the 

 rotations and revolutions of the planets — those motions were 

 driven and acted u])on by certain spirits within." The book now 

 quoted from, printed in 1661, tells also of a "Silver heaven sent 

 by the Emperour Ferdinand to Solyman the Grand Signior " with 

 twelve men and a book which showed the use of it and how to 

 keep it in order " and in perpetual motion." There is also here an 

 account of Fanellus Turrianus, a citizv."n of Cremona, "who did 

 recreate the Emperor Charles the Fift with ingenious and rare 

 devices." " He framed a mill of iron that turned itself, of such 

 subtile work and smallness that a monk could easily hide it in his 

 sleeve, yet it would daylie grind as much wheat as would serve 

 abundantly 8 persons for their day's allowance." 



{Hiimafi Industry, or a histo?y of most manual arts. \2 mo. 

 London, i66t. pp. 14 — 23.) 



These mills did not die out with Fanellus ; they seem to have 

 been quite common in Wales, the country, to be sure, of Glen- 

 dower ; and we are told of a Dictionary of the Bible, which relates 

 under the head of " Mills," that there are in Wales mills which 

 work without wind or water or the aid of man, once put in motion. 

 It is also said that about the year 1500 William Salisbury, the 

 first translator of the Bible into Welsh, had such a mill. A wheel 

 and millstone supposed to belong to one are gravely recorded as 

 being found at Corwen. The wheel was all of wood except one 

 quarter, and the millstone v^^as three feet in diameter, " having a 

 piece of metal attached to its edge which had probably been a 

 loadstone." 



I mention all these references to show that during many 

 hundreds of years no doubt of the possibility of success in the 

 quest seems to have been felt in any quarter. The thing was 

 difficult, no doubt, but not impossible. It had been done, and 

 therefore could be done again. 



In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, however, a new 

 race of natural philosophers arose, and with those men doubts 

 rapidly developed, and very soon the greater number were con- 

 vinced of the fact that perpetual motion was contrary to natural law. 



