Endless Amusement Part 8

Multiply the numbers from 1 to 12 continually into each other, as follow: and the last product will give the number required.

1 2 -- 2 3 -- 6 4 -- 24 5 ---- 120 6 ---- 720 7 ----- 5,040 8 ------ 40,320 9 ------- 362,880 10 --------- 3,628,800 11 ---------- 39,916,800 12 ----------- 479,001,600

_To find how many square Yards it would require to write all the Changes of the Twenty-four Letters of the Alphabet, written so small, that each Letter should not occupy more than the hundredth part of a square Inch._

By adopting the plan of the preceding article, the changes of the twenty-four letters will be found to be

62,044,840,173,323,943,936,000.

Now, the inches in a square yard being 1,296, that number multiplied by 100 gives 129,600, which is the number of letters each square yard will contain; therefore, if we divide the above row of figures, (the number of changes,) by 129,600, the quotient, which is 478,741,050,720,092,160, will be the number of yards required to contain the above mentioned number of changes. But as all the 24 letters are contained in every permutation, it will require a s.p.a.ce 24 times as large, _viz._,

11,849,785,210,282,211,840.

Now, as the surface of the whole globe only contains 617,197,435,008,000 square yards, it would require a surface 18,620 times as large as the earth to contain them.

_The Enchanted Bottle._

Fill a gla.s.s bottle with water to the beginning of the neck; leave the neck empty, and cork it. Suspend this bottle opposite a concave mirror, and beyond its focus, that it may appear reversed. Place yourself still further distant from the bottle; and instead of the water appearing, as it really is, at the bottom of the bottle, the bottom will be empty, and the water seen at the top.

If the bottle be suspended with the neck downwards, it will be reflected in its natural position, and the water at the bottom, although in reality it is inverted, and fills the neck; leaving the bottom vacant. While the bottle is in this position, uncork it, and let the water run gradually out: it will appear, that while the real bottle is emptying, the reflected one is filling. Care must be taken that the bottle is not more than half or three parts full, and that no other liquid is used but water, as in either of these cases the illusion ceases.

_The Solar Magic Lantern._

Make a box, a foot high, eighteen inches wide, and about three inches deep. Two of the opposite sides of this box must be quite open, and in each of the other sides let there be a groove wide enough to admit a stiff paper or pasteboard. You fasten the box against a window, on which the sun's rays fall direct. The rest of the window should be closed up, that no light may enter.

Next provide several sheets of stiff paper, blacked on one side. On these papers cut out such figures as your fancy may dictate; place them alternately in the grooves of the box, with their blacked sides towards you, and look at them through a large and clear gla.s.s prism; and if the light be strong, they will appear painted with the most lively colours. If you cut on one of these papers the form of a rainbow, about three-quarters of an inch wide, you will have a very good representation of the natural one.

For greater convenience, the prism may be placed on a stand on the table, made to turn round on an axis.

_The Artificial Rainbow._

Opposite a window into which the sun s.h.i.+nes direct suspend a gla.s.s globe, filled with clean water, by means of a string that runs over a pulley, so that the sun's rays may fall on it. Then drawing the globe gradually up, you will observe, when it comes to a certain height, and by placing yourself in a proper situation, a purple colour in the gla.s.s; and by drawing it up gradually higher, the other prismatic colours, blue, green, yellow, and red, will successively appear; after which, the colours will disappear, till the globe is raised to about fifty degrees, when they will again appear, but in an inverted order, the red appearing first, and the blue or violet last; on raising the globe a little higher, they will totally vanish.

_The aeolipiles._

The aeolipile is a small hollow globe of bra.s.s, or other metal, in which a slender neck or pipe is inserted. This ball, when made red-hot, is cast into a vessel of water, which will rush into its cavity, then almost void of air. The ball being then set on the fire, the water, by the rarefaction of the internal air, will be forced out in steam by fits, with great violence, and with strange noise.

If to the necks of two or more of these b.a.l.l.s, there be fitted those calls that are used by fowlers and hunters, and the b.a.l.l.s placed on the fire, the steam rus.h.i.+ng from them will make such a horrible noise, that it will astonish any person who is ignorant of the contrivance.

_The Talking Busts._

Procure two busts of plaster of Paris; place them on pedestals, on the opposite sides of the room. Let a thin tube, of an inch diameter, pa.s.s from the ear of one head through the pedestal, under the floor, and go up to the mouth of the other; taking care that the end of the tube that is next the ear of the one head, be considerably larger than that end which comes to the mouth of the other.

Now, when a person speaks quite low into the ear of one bust, the sound is reverberated through the length of the tube, and will be distinctly heard by any one placing his ear to the mouth of the other.

It is not necessary that the tube should come to the lips of the bust.

If there be two tubes, one going to the ear, and the other to the mouth of each head, two persons may converse together, by whispers, without the knowledge of any person who may stand in the middle of the room.

_The Inanimate Oracle._

Place a bust on a pedestal in the corner of a room, and let there be two tubes, as in the preceding article, one to go from the mouth, and the other from the ear, through the pedestal and the floor to an under apartment; there may be also wires, that go from the under jaw and the eyes of the bust, by which they may be easily moved.

A person being placed in the room underneath, and applying his ear to one of the tubes at a signal given, will hear any question asked, and can immediately reply, by applying his mouth to the tube which communicates below, at the same time moving the eyes by the wire, to accompany his speech.

_The Solar Concerto._

In a large case, similar to what is used for dials and spring clocks, the front of which, or at least the lower part, must be of gla.s.s, covered on the inside with gauze, place a barrel organ, which when wound up is prevented from playing by a catch that takes a toothed wheel at the end of the barrel. To one end of this catch join a wire, at the end of which is a flat circle of cork, of the same dimensions with the inside of a gla.s.s tube, in which it is to rise and fall. This tube must communicate with a reservoir that goes across the front part of the bottom of the case, which is to be filled with spirits, such as is used in thermometers.

This case being placed in the sun, the spirits will be rarefied by the heat, and, rising in the tube, will lift up the catch or trigger, and set the organ in play; which will continue as long as it is kept in the sun; for the spirits cannot run out of the tube, that part of the catch to which the circle is fixed being prevented from rising beyond a certain point, by a check placed over it. Care must be taken to remove the machine out of the sun before the organ runs down, that its stopping may be evidently affected by the cold.

In winter it will perform when placed before the fire.

CURIOUS EXPERIMENTS WITH THE MAGIC LANTERN.

The construction of this amusing optical machine is so well known, that to describe it would be superfluous; particularly as it can now be purchased at a very reasonable expense, at any of the opticians': but as many persons who have a taste for drawing might not be pleased with the designs to be had at the shops, or might wish to indulge their fancy in a variety of objects, which to purchase would become expensive, we here present our readers, in the first place, with the method of drawing them, which will be succeeded by a plain description of some very diverting experiments.

_Of Painting the Gla.s.ses._

You first draw on a paper, the size of the gla.s.s, the subject you mean to paint; fasten this at each end of the gla.s.s with paste, or any other cement, to prevent it from slipping. Then with some very black paint mixed with varnish, draw with a fine camels'-hair pencil, very lightly, the outlines sketched on the paper, which, of course, are reflected through the gla.s.s. Some persons affirm that those outlines can be more readily traced with j.a.pan writing ink, and a common pen with a fine nib; but this, even if it succeeds in making a delicate black outline, is sure to be effaced by damp or wet.

It would improve the natural resemblance, if the outlines were drawn with a strong tint of each of the natural colours of the object; but in this respect you may please your own fancy. When the outlines are dry, colour and shade your figures; but observe, to temper your colours with strong white varnish. A pleasing effect will be produced, if you leave strong lights in some parts of the drapery, &c., without any colours. The best colours for this purpose are transparent ones; opaque or mineral colours will not do. The following are in most repute.

For Pink and crimson Lake or carmine.

Blue Prussian blue.

Green Calcined verdigris, or distilled ditto.

Yellow Gamboge.

_To represent a Storm at Sea._

Provide two strips of gla.s.s, whose frames are thin enough to admit both strips freely into the groove of the lantern. On one of these gla.s.ses paint the appearance of the sea from a smooth calm to a violent storm. Let these representations run gradually into each other, as in Fig. 9, and you will of course observe, that the more natural and picturesque the painting is, the more natural and pleasing will be the reflection.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 9.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Fig. 10.]

On the other gla.s.s, Fig. 10, paint various vessels on the ocean, observing to let that end where the storm is, appear in a state of violent commotion, and the vessels as if raised on the waves in an unsettled position, with heavy clouds about them.