PHOTOGRAPHIC CORRESPONDENCE
Washing Collodion Pictures—Test for Lens.—As I was indebted to the kindness of Dr. Diamond, amongst other friends, for my original initiation into the mysteries of photography, it may appear somewhat presumptuous in me to differ from one who has had so much more experience in a point of practice. I allude to that of washing the collodion negative after developing, previously to fixing with the hyposulphite of soda; but, probably, the reasons I urge may have some weight. As the hyposulphite solution is intended to be used repeatedly, it appears to me not advisable to introduce into it any free acid (which must occur if the negative be not washed, although the quantity at each operation may be small), because it causes a decomposition of the salt, setting free sulphurous acid, and also sulphur; which last is slightly soluble in the hyposulphite of soda, and thus the sulphur is brought in contact with the reduced silver, and forms a sulphuret of that metal. But the change does not stop here: for, by the lapse of time, oxygen is absorbed, and thus a sulphate of silver is formed, and the colour changed from black to white. That sulphur is set free by the addition of an acid to the solution of hyposulphite of soda, is fact so easily demonstrable both to the eyes and nose of the operator, that no one need remain long in doubt who is desirous of trying the experiment.
A correspondent desires to know how to test the coincidence or otherwise of the visual and actinic foci of a combination: this is very readily accomplished by the aid of a focimeter, which can be easily made thus:
Procure a piece of stout card-board, or thin wood covered with white paper, on which draw a considerable number of fine black lines, or cover it with some fine black net (what I believe the ladies call blond), which may be pasted on. Cut up the whole into a dozen good-sized pieces of any convenient form, so that about four square inches of surface at least be allowed to each piece. Paste over the net a circular or square label about the size of a shilling, bearing a distinctly printed number one on each piece, from 1 upwards; and arrange the pieces in any convenient manner by means of wires inserted into a slip of wood; but they must be so placed that the whole can be seen from one point of view, although each piece must be placed so that it is one inch farther from the operator than the next lowest number. Having placed the camera eight or ten feet from the cards, carefully focus to any one of the numbers, 4 or 5 for instance and observe, not that the number is distinct, but that the minute lines or threads of the net are visible: then take a picture, exposing it a very short time, and the threads of the card bearing the number that was most perfectly in focus visually ought to be most distinct; but, if otherwise, that which is most distinct will not only show whether the lens is over or under corrected, but will indicate the amount of error. If under corrected, a lower number will be most distinct; if over corrected, a higher.
Geo. Shadbolt.
Test for Lenses.—I beg to submit to a Country Practitioner the following very simple test for the coincidence of the chemical and visual foci of an achromatic lens:
Take a common hand-bill or other sheet of printed paper, and having stretched it on a board, place it before the lens in an oblique position, so that the plane of the board may make an angle with a vertical plane of about thirty or forty degrees. Bring any line of type about the middle of the sheet into the true visual focus, and take a copy of the sheet by collodion or otherwise. Then, if the line of type focussed upon be reproduced clearly and sharply on the plate, the lens is correct; but if any other line be found sharper than the test one, the foci disagree; and the amount of error will depend on the distance of the two lines of type one from the other on the hand-bill.
J. A. Miles.
Fakenham, Norfolk.
Improvement in Positives.—I have great pleasure in communicating to you an improvement in the process of taking positives, which may not be uninteresting to some of your readers, and which ensures by far the most beautiful tints I have yet seen. I take three ounces of the hyposulphite of soda, and dissolve it in one pint of distilled or rain water; and to this I add about one or one and a half grains of pyrogallic acid, and seventy grains of chloride of silver; which must be squeezed up between the finders facilitate its solution and separate the lumps, which, in their dry state, are tough, and not easily pulverised. The whole is then to be set aside for a week or two in a warm place. The solution, at first colourless, becomes brown, and ultimately quite opaque; in this state it is fit for use, and the longer kept the better it becomes. I generally use French paper for this process, and, according to the time of immersion, obtain fine sepia or black tints; the latter requiring long over-exposure to the light, and proportionately long exposure to the action of the liquid; which however will be found, particularly when old, to have a more rapid action than most other setting liquids, and has the merit of always affording fine tints, whatever the paper used. I imagine the pyrogallic acid to possess a reducing influence on the salts of silver employed; but this effect is only produced by its combination with the hyposulphite of soda and chloride of silver. I may add, that in any case the pictures should be much overdone before immersion, as the liquid exerts a rapid bleaching action on them; and when the liquid becomes saturated, a few crystals of fresh hyposulphite will renew its action.
F. Maxwell Lyte.
Florian, Torquay.
P. S.—In answer to a Country Practitioner, he will find great assistance in choosing his lens by laying it on a sheet of blue wove post paper, when he will immediately perceive the slightest yellow tinge in the glass, this being the fault which frequently affects many well-ground and well-made lenses. Of course, for sharpness of outline he must be guided entirely by experiment in the camera; but where weakness of action exists, it most frequently arises from this yellow colouration, and which the manufacturers say is very difficult to avoid.
[Mr. Lyte having sent with his communication a positive prepared in the manner described, we are enabled to corroborate all he says as to the richness and beauty of its tints.]
Cheap Portable Tent.—M. F. M. inquires for a cheap and portable tent for working collodion out of doors. I have been using one lately constructed on the principle of Francis's camera stand. It has a good size table, made like the rolling patent shutters; and it is not necessary to stoop, or sit down at your work, which is a great consideration on a hot day: you may get them of any respectable dealer in photographic apparatus; it is called Francis's Collodion Tent.
H. D. Francis.
Rev. Mr. Sisson's New Developing Fluid (Vol. vii., p. 462.).—The Rev. Mr. Sisson's developing fluid for collodion positives, the formula for which was published in the last Number of "N. & Q.," is merely a weak solution of the protonitrate and protosulphate of iron. It does not, as he seems to think, contain any lead; for the whole of the latter is precipitated as sulphate, which the acetic acid does not dissolve even to the smallest extent: and Mr. Sisson will find that an equivalent proportion of the nitrate of baryta will answer equally as well as the nitrate of lead.
I have myself for a long time been in the habit of using a weak solution of the protonitrate of iron in conjunction with acetic acid for positive pictures; for, although I do not consider it so good a developer as that made according to the formula of Dr. Diamond, it produces very good pictures; occupies very little time in preparing, and will moreover keep good for a much longer time than a more concentrated solution would.
J. Leachman.
20. Compton Terrace, Islington.
Replies to Minor Queries
Vanes (Vol. v., p. 490.).—Taking up by accident the other day your fifth volume, I saw what I believe is a still unanswered Query respecting the earliest notice of vanes as indicators of the wind; and turning to my notes I found the following extract from Beckman's Inventions, &c.:
"In Ughelli Italia Sacra, Romæ 1652, fol. iv., p 735., we find the following inscription on a weathercock then existing at Brixen; 'Dominus Rampertus Episc. gallum hunc fieri præcepit an. 820.'"
L. A. M.
Loselerius Villerius (Vol. vii., p. 454.).—I beg to inform S. A. S. that his copy of the New Testament, which wants the title-page, was printed by Henry Stephens the second, at Geneva, in the year 1580. As to it being "valuable," I should not consider him unfortunate if he could exchange it for a shilling.
Loselerius Villerius was Pierre l'Oyseleur de Villiers, a professor of Genevan divinity, who came over to London, and there published Beza's Latin version of the New Testament, in 1574. He was not, however, as your correspondent supposed him to be, the editor of the decapitated volume in question; but Beza transferred his notes to an impression completed by himself.
S. A. S. has, in the next place, inquired for any satisfactory "list of editions of the Bible." It appears that, so far as he is concerned, Le Long, Boerner, Masch, and Cotton have lived and laboured in vain.
The folio Bible lastly described by your correspondent is not "so great a curiosity" as family tradition maintained. The annotations "placed in due order" are merely the Genevan notes.—See the Archdeacon of Cashel's very accurate and excellent work, Editions of the Bible, and Parts thereof, in English, p. 75.: Oxford, 1852.
R. G.
Westminster Parishes (Vol. vii., p. 454.).—In 1630 the City and Liberties of Westminster contained the churches of St. Margaret, St. Martin-in-the-Fields, St. Clement Danes, and St. John Baptist Savoy.
The registers of burials, marriages, and christenings, of St. Margaret's Church, began January 1, 1538.
The Fire of London did not destroy any church in Westminster.
Mackenzie Walcott, M.A.
Hevristic (Vol. vii., p. 237.).—The term hevristisch, in the first edition of the translation of Kant's Critik, is not given in the vocabulary appended to the translation; but under the word ostensiv it is stated that in its meaning it stands opposed to the word euristic (hevristisch in German). But in the second edition, published in 1818, it is remarked, under the words evristic, euristic, hevristisch, that the term should, in Sir Wm. Hamilton's opinion, be euretic or heuretic; the word hevristisch being an error of long standing in German philosophy. The derivation of euretic would be from εὑρετικος.
In Tissot's translation, hevristisch is rendered by heuristique; in Mantovani's, by evristico; in Born's, by heuristicus. In Krug's Lexicon, hevristik is given as derived from εὑρισκω, εὑρειν. The hevristic method, Krug remarks, is also called the analytical. It may be added, that in the first edition of the Critik (Riga, 1781), the word is hevristisch. In the fourth edition (Riga, 1794), published also in Kant's lifetime, it is hevristisch. In Rosenkranz's edition (Leipzig, 1838), the word is changed into heuristisch; and also, in another edition of the same year, published also at Leipzig, it is written heuristisch, and not hevristisch.
In respect to the Leipzig edition of 1818, which is that now before me, the term hevristisch, in speaking of hevristich principles, is particularly alluded to. (See page 512. line 10.) I do not find, after a hasty inspection, this word changed, in any of the editions I possess, to empirisch.
Francis Haywood.
Liverpool.
Creole (Vol. vii., p. 381.).—The word appears to be a French form of the Spanish criollo, which in the dictionary of Nuñez de Taboada is defined, "El hijo de padres Europeos nacido en America;" whilst in the old dictionary of Stevens (1726) it is translated, "Son of a Spaniard and a West India woman." In Brande's Dictionary of Science, &c. Creole is said to mean the descendants of whites born in Mexico, South America, or the West Indies, the blood remaining unmixed with that of other races, &c.
Von Tschudi says, that in South America the Spaniards apply the term Creole not only to the human race, but also to horses, bullocks, and even to poultry.
A. C. M.
Exeter.
General Monk and the University of Cambridge (Vol. vii., pp. 427. 486.).—Leicestriensis begs to thank Mr. C. H. Cooper and Mr. J. P. Ord for their replies to his Query on this subject. He avails himself of this, the earliest opportunity, of assuring Mr. Ord of his readiness to afford him what slight information is in his power respecting the MS. in question (which only came into his possession within the last two or three months), if he will communicate with him as below.
William Kelly.
Town Hall, Leicester.
Ecclesia Anglicana (Vol. ii., pp. 12. 440.).—I am much obliged to your correspondent W. Fraser for his answer to my Query, and the references with which he supplies me. I shall be glad to ask a still more extensive question, which will probably explain the object of the former more limited one. Is it usual, in any of the unreformed branches of the church on the continent, to find a similar appellation (implying distinct nationality) employed in authoritative documents, e.g. would it be possible to find in the title-pages of any Missal, &c., such words as "in usum Ecclesiæ Hispanicæ, Lusitanæ, Gallicanæ?" If not now, was it more customary in mediæval times, and when did it cease?
Should we be justified in saying, that at every period of her existence, with rare exceptions, the Anglican church, consciously or unconsciously, maintained the theory of her nationality with greater distinctness than any of the continental churches? I fancy I have heard, though I cannot state on what authority, that this assertion might be made most truly of the Portuguese church, and should be very glad to have any light thrown on the subject by your able correspondent. Certain it is, that amongst the various complaints made against Cardinal Wiseman and the Papal aggressors, it has never been laid to their charge, that they arrogated to themselves the title of members of the Anglican church.
G. R. M.
Gibbon's Library (Vol. vii., p. 485.).—In 1838 I purchased some of Gibbon's books at Lausanne, out of a basketful on sale at a small shop, the depôt of the Religious Tract Society! Edward Gibbon, printed on a small slip of paper, was pasted in them.
A. Holt White.
Golden Bees (Vol. vii., p. 478.).—When the tomb of Childeric, father of Clovis, was opened in 1653, there were found, besides the skeletons of his horse and page, his arms, crystal orb, &c., "more than three hundred little bees of the purest gold, their wings being inlaid with a red stone like cornelian."
Ceridwen.
Passage in Orosius (Vol. vii., p. 399.).—May not the "twam tyncenum," between which Cyrus the Great's officer attempted to cross a river, be the inflated skins which the Arabs still use, as the ancient inhabitants of Assyria did, for crossing the Tigris and Euphrates, and of which the Nimroud sculptures give so many illustrations?
Ceridwen.
Names first given to Parishes (Vol. iv., p. 153.).—I wish to repeat this Query in another form, and particularly in reference to the termination -by. I suspect that wherever a cluster of villages, like that given by F. B., occurs with this Danish suffix, it is a proof that the district was originally a colony of Danes. The one in which I reside (the hundreds of Flegg), from its situation is particularly likely to have been so. Its original form was evidently that of a large island in the estuary of the Yare, which formed numerous inlets in its shores; and this was flanked on each aisle by a Roman garrison, one the celebrated fortress of Garianonum, now Burgh Castle, and the other Caistor-next-Yarmouth, in which a camp, burying-ground, &c., besides its name, sufficiently attest its Roman origin. The two hundreds of Flegg, (or Fleyg, as appears on its common seal) comprise twenty villages, thirteen of which terminate in -by. These are Ormesby, Hemesby, Filby, Mauteby, Stokesby, Herringby, Thrigby, Billockby, Ashby or Askeby, Clippesby, Rollesby, Oby, and Scratby or Scroteby.
Professor Worsaae, I believe, considers Ormesby to have been originally Gormsby, i.e. Gorm's or Guthrum's village, but I have not his work at hand to refer to. Thrigby, or Trigby as it is vernacularly pronounced, and Rollesby, may take their names from Trigge or Tricga, and Rollo, names occurring in Scandinavian history. I should feel obliged if Professors Worsaae and Stephens, or other Scandinavian antiquaries and scholars, would kindly inform me if my surmises are correct, and if the rest of the names may be similarly derived. I should add that Stokesby fully hears out the suggestion of C. (Vol. v., p. 161.), as there is even now a ferry over the Bure at that point. The district is entirely surrounded by rivers and extensive tracts of marshes, and intersected by large inland lakes, locally termed "Broads," which undoubtedly were all comprised in the estuary, and which would form safe anchorages for the long galleys of the Northmen.
E. S. Taylor.
Ormesby, St. Margaret, Norfolk.
Grafts and the Parent Tree (Vol. vii., p. 436.).—In order to insure the success of grafts, it is material that they be inserted on congenial stocks: delicate-growing fruits require dwarf-growing stocks; and free luxuriant-growing trees require strong stocks. To graft scions of delicate wooded trees on strong stocks, occasions an over-supply of sap to the grafts; and though at first they seem to flourish, yet they do not endure. A few examples of this sort may lead to an opinion, that "grafts, after some fifteen years, wear themselves out;" but the opinion is not (generally speaking) well founded. I have for many years grafted the old Golden Pippin on the Paradise or Doucin stock, and found it to answer very well, and produce excellent fruit. Taunton has long been famous for its Nonpareils, which are there produced in great excellence and abundance. The Cornish Gilliflower, one of our very best apples, was well known in the time of King Charles I.; and, as yet, shows no symptoms of decay: that fruit requires a strong stock.
The ancient Ribston Pippin was a seedling:
"It has been doubted by some, whether the tree at Ribston Hall was an original from the seed: the fact of its not being a grafted tree has been satisfactorily ascertained by Sir Henry Goodricke, the present proprietor, by causing suckers from its root to be planted out—which have set the matter at rest that it was not a grafted tree. One of these suckers has produced fruit in the Horticultural Garden at Chiswick."—Lindley's Guide to the Orchard and Kitchen Garden, 1831, p. 81.
J. G.
Exon.
Lord Cliff and Howell's Letters (Vol. vii., p. 455.).—The Lord Cliff, as to whom your correspondent inquires, and to whom James Howell addresses some of his letters, is intended for Henry Lord Clifford, and afterwards, on the decease of his father, fifth and last Earl of Cumberland. He died in December, 1643. Amongst the many republications of modern times, I regret that we have no new edition, with illustrative notes, of Howell's Letters. It is the more necessary, as one at least of the later editions of this most entertaining book is very much abridged and mutilated.
James Crossley.
Y. S. M. asks "Who was Lord Cliff?" He might as well have added, "Who was Lord Viscount Col, Sir Thomas Sa, or End. Por?" who also figure in Epistolæ Ho-Elianiæ. Had he looked over that entertaining book more attentively, Y. S. M. would have seen that all these were mere contractions of Howell's correspondents, Lord Clifford, Lord Colchester, Sir Thomas Savage, and Endymion Porter.
J. O.
The Bouillon Bible (Vol. vii., p. 296.).—H. W., who was good enough to answer my Query respecting Philip D'Auvergne, has probably seen that the Bible of which he inquires has turned up. It seems to have been pawned (if I rightly understand the report in the newspapers) to a Mr. Broughton of the Foreign Office, who had advanced money to the prince to enable him to prosecute his claim to the dukedom. It has now been ordered by Vice-Chancellor Sir W. P. Wood to be offered for sale as part of Mr. Broughton's estate, for the benefit of that gentleman's creditors. It was stated in court, that on a former occasion, when the late Archbishop of Canterbury wished to purchase it, 1500l. was asked for it. I was much obliged to H. W. for the information he gave me, as I took some little interest in Philip D'Auvergne from having heard that he was a friend of my grandfather. They were, I find, both of them officers in the Racehorse during Lord Mulgrave's discovery voyage to the North Pole.
E. H. A.
Rhymes on Places (Vol. vii., p. 143.).—Northamptonshire:
"Armston on the hill,
Polebrook in the hole,
Ashton turns the mill,
Oundle burns the coal."
Repeated to me by poor old drunken Jem White the sexton, many years since, when on the "battlements" of Oundle Church; Oundle being the market town for the three villages in the rhymes quoted.
Brick.
Serpents' Tongues (Vol. vi., p. 340.; Vol. vii., p. 316.).—May I be allowed to inform Mr. Pinkerton that the sharks' teeth (fossils), now so frequently found imbedded in this tufa rock, and cheaply sold, are not known as "the tongues of vipers," but, on the contrary, from time immemorial, as the "tongues of St. Paul." In proof of this, I would refer Mr. Pinkerton to the following extract, which I have taken from an Italian letter now in the Maltese Library; which was published on August 28, 1668, by Dr. Francis Buonamico, a native of this island, and addressed to Agostino Scilla of Messina. Page 5., the writer remarks:
"Che avanti de partire da questa isolde dovesse farle una raccolta di glossopietre, O lingue come que le chiamiamo di S. Paolo."
W. W.
Malta.
Consecrated Roses, &c. (Vol. vii., pp. 407. 480.).—An instance of the Golden Rose being conferred on an English baron, will be found related in Davidson's History of Newenham Abbey in the County of Devon, p. 208.
J. D. S.