100 YEARS AGO

The first sealed thermometer was made some time prior to 1654 by Ferdinand II., Grand Duke of Tuscany; he filled the bulb and part of the tube with alcohol, and then sealed the tube by melting the glass tip. Ferdinand and his brother, Leopold de Medici, promoted the establishment in Florence of the Accademia del Cimento, and the account of their experiments, published in 1667 and translated into English by Waller in 1684, contain descriptions of various thermometers made and used by the members. One of these old thermometers was given by the Grand Duke of Tuscany to the late Prof. Babbage, and is now in the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge. In England about the same time Boyle made experiments on thermometers. His “Lectures on Cold” were published in 1665 in obedience to the command of the Royal Society, “imposed on me in such a way that I thought it would less misbecome me to obey it unskilfully than not at all. Especially since from so illustrious a company (where I have the happiness not to be hated) I may, in my endeavours to obey and serve them, hope to find my failings both pardoned and made occasions of discovering the truth I aimed at.”

From Nature 9 May 1901.

50 YEARS AGO

The publication of the Sanskrit manuscript of “Mānasōllāsa” by King Sōmēs'vara, son of King Vikramāditya VI of the later Chālukyas, in the Vikramāditya VI of the later Chālukyas, in the Gaekwad's Oriental Series (Publication No. XXVIII, Baroda, 1925), has brought to light a chapter on angling which gives details, almost modern in practice, about this pleasant pastime. “Mānasōllāsa” is an encyclopædic work and was composed in A.D. 1127. The kingdom of Sōmēs'vara, comprised practically the whole of the Deccan plateau and included the Godavari, Narbada, Tapti and Kistna river systems.... The work referred to here shows that the art of angling was developed in ancient India to a very high standard, for the methods described therein are quite in line with those used by anglers in India to-day. The gipsies of Europe, who use Mongolian, Hindi and other fragments of Asiatic languages, to-day practise the same methods as those described by King Sōmēs'vara, and it is likely that they wandered from India to Europe and spread the art of angling there.

From Nature 12 May 1951.