218 
of the description^ which the scholiast of Apol- 
lonius has left us of these machines for kindling 
fire=^. He says, that the upper wood, which 
turns, resembles a wimble : rpvTrdvco' 
and such is the idea given by your paintings. 
No philologist has remarked the allusion, which 
Apollonius makes in this place to the passage of 
the Homeric hymn to Mercury. This allusion 
however seems to me calculated to dispel the 
doubts, which the learned Rhunkenius has raised 
respecting the interpolation of this passage 
The resemblance of the pyreia to the wimble 
must be referred to the early period of the inven- 
tion of this tool ; and we might be surprised at 
finding it attributed to Dedalus:}:, who was a con- 
temporary of Theseus, if the invention of the 
Athenian artist did not agree more exactly with 
the trepan of sculptors, a much more perfect in- 
strument than the mere wimble, from the rapidity 
which the cord and the moving traverse give to 
its motion. This connexion between the pyreia 
and the wimble has not escaped the ancient wri- 
ters, who treat of the culture of trees ||. They 
complain, that the action of the borer, employed 
* Liv. 1, v,llB4. 
t Ep, crit. 1, ad Hymn, in Mercurium. 25. 
X Pliny, lib. 7, § 57, 
II Ibidem, lib. 17, § 25- Columella, lib. 4, v. 29, 
