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| Ranelagh
Gardens (Rijksmuseum): "File:Gezicht op de Rotunda in
Ranelagh Gardens te Londen A view of the Rotundo, House, & Gardens, &c.
at Ranelagh (titel op object) Ranelagh Gardens en Vauxhall Gardens
(serietitel), RP-P-1932-434.jpg" by Rijksmuseum is marked with CC0 1.0 |
Ah, the romance of the eighteenth century: beautiful clothing, formal manners, elegance. These are the characteristics we usually associate with that period[1]. All those things existed. We may also know of non-existent sewerage, disease, unspeakable poverty, and crime. We don’t tend to think of the Enlightenment’s lively interest in science (or natural philosophy, as it was called). Yet experiment and discovery were not limited to academics or even to the privileged classes. Anyone who could read could take part if they wished[2].
Originally I meant to write a short, zippy post about eighteenth century science in general. But the more I read about it, the more there was to write about. So instead I’m writing about one of the many amateurs of natural philosophy. Joseph Addison (1672-1719), co-founder of the The Spectator magazine, conducted a series of experiments while touring Italy and described them in his travel book, Remarks on several parts of Italy, &c., in the years 1701, 1702, 1703.
Visiting the Grotto del cani (sometimes spelled “Grotta del cane”) near Naples, he described the poisonous steams found within a foot of the water’s surface, and the common experiments conducted there. He wrote that a dog having its nose held in the vapors “loses all signs of life (i.e., lost consciousness) in a very short time” but would revive if taken into the open air or thrown into the nearby lake. A torch held in the vapors would be extinguished in a moment, and a pistol could not be fired. He found this fascinating and devised his own experiments.
“I split a Reed, and laid in the Channel of it a Train of Ġun-powder, so that one End of the Reed was above the Vapour, and the other at the Bottom of it; and I found, tho’ the Steam was strong enough to hinder a Pistol from taking fire in it, and to quench a lighted Torch, that it could not intercept the Train of Fire when it had once begun flashing, nor hinder it from running to the very End.” He repeated this experiment several times and found that doing so reduced the vapor enough that it was possible to fire a pistol in it.
He made a number of other observations about the vapor’s actions and properties and discounted the theory of its being sulphurous based on its lack of odor. In fact, it was carbon dioxide gas, which is heavier than air, emitted from fumeroles. Naples is near the sites of both Herculaneum and Pompeii, both of which were destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius, so the area was known for volcanic activity. Incidentally, excavation of the ruins began in 1739.
The Grotta del cane was described in greater detail in the January, 1753 issue of The Gentleman’s Magazine. “The water of the lake near this grotto is wont to gurgle and boil up…” The author described masses of a glittering mineral called mundick by English miners (modern spelling: mundic) in the walls, which he says all chemists affirm is made up of vitriol and sulfur[3].
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| "File:The lake of Agnano. Etching, 16--. Wellcome L0038338.jpg" is licensed under CC BY 4.0 The grotto is right of center, with three men and a dog at the entrance. |
Another half dozen scientific articles included “The path of the Moon, with cut”, “Of tillage with marle, &c”, and “Leech, how to use as a barometer”. Imagine The Atlantic Monthly, GQ Magazine, or Cosmopolitan running multiple scientific articles in addition to poetry, political reports, and art and entertainment features. No, I can’t, either.
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