William Harvey / by James Risdon Bennett.

  • Bennett, James Risdon, 1809-1891.
Date:
[1880]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: William Harvey / by James Risdon Bennett. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    tious cavillings, and contumelous epithets, are all that have been levelled against the doctrine and its author. But even as the waves of the Sicilian Sea, excited by the blast, which dash against the rocks around Charybdis, and hiss and foam, tossed hither and thither, are they who oppose sophistical and false reasoning to the evidence of the senses.” We append a photographic copy of a fragment of the Harvey ms. in the British Museum, which Dr. Sieveking showed to his auditors when he delivered the Ilarveian Oration in 1877, together with Mr. Bond’s skilful deciphering of the crabbed notes and Dr. Sieveking’s translation of the same. “ WI Constat per fabricam cordis sanguinem per pulmones in aortam perpetuo transferri—as by two clacks of a water bel- low to rays water. “ Constat per ligaturam transition sanguinis ab arteriis ad venas. “Unde A [demonstratin'] perpetuus sanguinis motus in cir- culo fieri pulsu cordis. “ An ? lioc gratia nutritionis, an inagis conservationis san- guinis et membrorum per infus. calidi, vicissimque sang, cali- faciens membra frigifactus, a corde calefit. ” Rendered thus by Dr. Sieveking :—- 11 VV4. By the structure of tlie heart it appears that the blood is continually transfused through the lungs to the aorta—as by the two clacks of the water ram for raising water. “ It is shown by ligature that there is a perpetual motion of the blood from arteries to veins. “ Whence A it is demonstrated that there is a perpetual motion of the blood in a circle, effected by the beat of the heart. “ Query : Is this for the sake of nutrition ; or rather for the preservation of the blood and the members by the infusion of heat ; the blood, cooled by warming the members, being warmed in turn by the heart ? ” CURIOSITIES OE COMMERCE AND TRADE. THE AMERICAN LUMBER TRADE. IN books about America the English reader will remark the prominence given to the lumber, or, as we would call it, the timber trade. In the North- western States of the Union, and also in Canada, it is one of the chief industries. We are not going to give any detailed account nor formal statistics, but only a few notes of what we witnessed in one great centre of the lumber trade. In looking over the map of Chicago there will be noticed, in the south-western part, a number of indentations in the river, as though it had so many tributaries running into it. They are slips, or canals, 100 feet wide, and varying in length from 1,000 to 2,000 feet. Each of them has a name, as Joy’s Canal, Sampson’s Canal, Empire Slip, and so on. They are all cut into the land for the accommodation of the lumber trade, so that vessels can come in and unload their cargoes on the wharfs. There are so many vessels engaged in the trade between May and November, that out of the 10,233 vessels which arrived in the river in 1878, it was computed that two-thirds of them were freighted with lumber. Along the river, and on the lines of the canals, for about a mile and a half, may be observed piles of lumber, lath, shingles, cedar posts, and timber, till the eye wearies with the sight. The spaces between the canals are filled with it, except so much as is left for roadway's and railroad tracks. For a long distance it is nothing but “ lumber.” Travellers are amazed at the quantity as well as the height of the piles, and wonder how perfectly straight they are piled, as if gauged by a plumb-line. It is quite an art to pile up boards so evenly', but men learn to do it by' making a business of it, and continuing at it year after year. Between every course one inch of vacant space is left; thus the air passes freely through to dry the wood. When first put up into piles it is as full of water as if it had been soaked, and it is reckoned that in the first ninety day's from the day it is piled it loses one-third of its weight by evaporation. The question naturally occurs, How much is there of it, and where does it all come from ? It may not be so difficult to see where most of it goes to, when the growth of the North- west in population is considered. As to quantity, it of course never remains the same two days in succession, because fresh lumber is all the time coming in, while that which is partially dry is as constantly going out. There were by a recent return 159 regular lumber yards where nothing is done but receive, pile, sell, unpile, and ship away'. On the 1st of January', 1878, those yards contained 385,560,024 feet of boards, or about 73,022 miles of boards. Now as the globe is said to be 25,020 miles in circumference at the equator, there was on hand on that day nearly enough to make a path three feet wide around the globe.