380 Mr. J. W. L. Glaisher on Early Logarithmic 



have met with an edition of one of them, viz. Hugonis Grotii 

 de Imperio summarum Potestatum circa sacra Comment arius, 

 editio quarta. . . . printed by Vlacq at the Hague in 1651 ; the 

 De Jure Plebis of David Blondel is added, also printed by Vlacq, 

 with date 1652. 



In the Calendar of State Papers (Domestic Series), 1600- 

 1638, Briggs's name occurs several times. He was a Commis- 

 sioner of Sewers for Norfolk, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, &c, and 

 in conjunction with Sir Anthony Thomas, John Worsopp, Hilde- 

 debrand Prusen, and others was an undertaker for draining the 

 fens (Dec. 2, 1629). When in February 1625 the tides over- 

 threw 1120 rods of bank in the neighbourhood of Yarmouth, 

 Briggs was consulted with regard to the levels. Pie was also a 

 member of a commission to effect the removal of several houses in 

 Oxford; and his death is reported by the Vice-Chancellor (Jan. 27, 

 1631) as having occurred the previous day. 



Under date Nov. 12, 1630, there is, in the handwriting of 

 Archbishop Laud, a list of Master Printers of London, with a 

 sum placed against each, headed " To S. Paul's " (viz. to the 

 repair of St. Paul's). The Calendar states that the sums 

 assessed run from £6 to George Miller, to £40 to William 

 Jones. This is the only mention I have anywhere seen of the 

 George Miller who printed the English (1631) edition of Vlacq 

 (except the tables themselves, which were all printed at Gouda) ; 

 William Jones was the printer of Briggs's Arithmetica of 1624. 



In more than one place I have remarked that a good many 

 of the English (Miller) copies of the Arithmetica contain the 

 titlepages to the Tables in Dutch, and have inferred therefrom 

 that Vlacq either did publish, or meditated the publication of a 

 Dutch edition of his work (that is to say, of the Introduction to 

 it ; the tabular portion is the same in all editions) ; and this 

 view is confirmed by the following extract from a letter of 

 Briggs to Pell (MS. Birch, orig. 3495, now made 3498*). " My 



* The letter is addressed "To his very good and muche respected 

 frende Mr. John Pell at Trinitie Coll. in Cambridge," and is sealed with 

 what was, I suppose, Briggs's seal. The device may be thus described : — 

 Draw a parabola with axis vertical upon a horizontal line terminated both 

 ways by the curve as base. Divide this base into seven equal parts, and 

 erect six ordinates at the points of section, terminated by the curve. 

 Join one extremity of the base to the top of the third ordinate from the 

 other extremity, and the top of the first ordinate to the top of the second 

 ordinate from the other extremity, and render the figure symmetrical by 

 joining the other corresponding points. Then, supposing these four lines 

 passed through a point (in point of fact they do not), we should have a 

 representation of the device, the motto under which is " IN VNVM." 

 What the proposition referred to is, I do not know. I at first thought it 

 was as described above, but found on investigation that, although in a 

 drawing the lines pass well enough through a point, they do not really 

 do so. 



