piece of workmanship as the original." This model was frequently placed upon the top of the house in which he lived at Grantham, and was put in motion by the action of the wind upon its sails. In calm weather, however, another mechanical agent was required, and for this purpose a mouse was put in requisition, which went by the name of the miller. It does not distinctly appear how the mouse was compelled to perform a function so foreign to its ordinary habits, but it was supposed to act upon something like a tread-wheel when attempting to reach some corn placed above it; or, according to another supposition, it was placed within a wheel, and by pulling a string tied to its tail, it went forward "by way of resistance," as Dr. Stukely observes, and thus turned the mill. 66 The water-clock constructed by Sir Isaac was a more useful piece of mechanism than his wind-mill. It was made out of a box which he begged from Mrs. Clark's brother, and, according to Dr. Stukely, to whom it was described by those who had seen it," it resembled pretty much our common clocks and clock-cases," but was less in size, being about four feet in height, and of a proportional breadth. There was a dial-plate at top with figures of the hours. The index was turned by a piece of wood, which either fell or rose by water dropping." The clock stood in Sir Isaac's bed-room, and it was his daily practice to supply it every morning with the proper quantity of water. It was frequently resorted to by the inmates of Mr. Clark's house to ascertain the hour of the day, and it remained there long after Sir Isaac went to Cambridge. Dr. Stukely informs us, that having had occasion to talk of clepsydræ, or water-clocks, Newton remarked, that their chief inconvenience arose from the furring up of the small hole through which the water passed, by the impurities which it contained,-a cause of inequality in its measure of time, the reverse of what takes place in clocks made with sand, which enlarges the hole through which it descends. The mechanical carriage which Sir Isaac is said to have invented, was a four-wheeled vehicle, and was moved with a handle or winch wrought by the person who sat in it. We can find no distinct information respecting its construction or use, but it must have resembled a Merlin's chair, which is fitted only to move on the smooth surface of a floor, and not to overcome the inequalities of a common road.1 Although Sir Isaac was at this time a "sober, silent. and thinking lad," who never took part in the games and amusements of his school-fellows, but employed all his leisure hours in "knocking and hammering in his lodging room," yet he was anxious to please them by "inventing diversions for them above the vulgar kind." In this way he often succeeded in alluring them from trifling amusements, and teaching them, as Dr. Stukely says, " to play "to philosophically;" or, as Dr. Paris has better expressed it, in the title of his charming little work, to make " philo 66 1 It is a curious fact that Leibnitz, the rival of Newton, had laboured at similar inventions. In a letter written to Sir Isaac from Hanover, about a month after Leibnitz's death, on the 14th November 1716, the writer informs him that Leibnitz had laboured all his life to invent machines, which had never succeeded, and that he was particularly desirous of constructing a wind-mill for mines, and a carriage to be moved without horses. Fontenelle, in his Eloge on Leibnitz, mentions these two inventions in different terms. He had bestowed, says he, much time and labour upon his wind-mill for draining the water from the deepest mines, but was thwarted in its execution by certain workmen who had opposite interests. In the matter of carriages, his object was merely to render them lighter and more commodious; but a doctor, who believed that Leibnitz had prevented him from getting a pension from the King of Hanover, stated in some printed work, that he had contemplated the invention of a carriage which would perform the journey from Hanover to Amsterdam in twenty four hours.- Mém. Acad. Par. 1718. Hist. Hist. p. 115. sophy in sport science in earnest." With this view he introduced the flying of paper-kites, and he is said to have investigated their best forms and proportions, as well as the number and position of the points to which the string should be attached. He constructed also lanterns of " crimpled paper," in which he placed a candle, to light him to school in the dark winter mornings; and in dark nights he tied them to the tails of his kites, in order to terrify the country people, who took them for comets. Hitherto the attention of Sir Isaac had not been directed to any of the celestial phenomena, and when he did study the apparent daily motion of the sun, he was probably led to it by the imperfect measure of time which he obtained from his water-clocks. In the yard of the house where he lived, he was frequently observed to watch the motion of the sun. He drove wooden pegs into the walls and roofs of the buildings, as gnomons to mark by their shadows the hours and half hours of the day. It does not appear that he knew how to adjust these lines to the latitude of Grantham ; but he is said to have succeeded, after some years' observation, in making them so exact, that anybody could tell what o'clock it was by Isaac's Dial, as it was called. It was probably at the same time that he carved two dials on the walls of his own house at Woolsthorpe; but though we have seen them there, we were not able to determine whether they were executed by a tentative process like those in Mr. Clark's yard, or were more accurately projected, from a knowledge of the doctrine of the sphere.1 1 One of these dials was taken down in 1844, along with the stone on which it was cut, by Mr. Turnor of Stoke Rochford, and presented by his uncle, the Rev. But saws and hammers were not the only tools which our young philosopher employed. He was expert also with his pencil and his pen, drawing with the one, and inditing verses with the other. It is not improbable that he received some instruction in drawing from his writingmaster, called “Old Barley," who lived in the place occupied, in Dr. Stukely's time, by "the Millstone Alehouse in Castle Street." But whether he was instructed or selftaught, he seems to have made some progress in the art. His room was furnished with pictures drawn by himself, some of them being copied from prints, and some from life. The frames of these pictures were made by himself, and “coloured over in a workmanlike manner." Among those portraits Dr. Stukely enumerates "several of the Kings' heads, Dr. Donne, Mr. Stokes, his teacher at Grantham, and King Charles I." In addition to these portraits, there were well-designed drawings of "birds, beasts, men, ships, and mathematical diagrams, executed with charcoal on the wall, which remained till the house was pulled down in 1711." Although Sir Isaac told Mr. Conduit that he "excelled particularly in making verses," yet it is strange that no authentic specimen of his poetry has been preserved. Beneath his portrait of Charles I., the following verses were written : A secret art my soul requires to try, If prayers can give me what the wars deny. Charles Turnor, to the Museum of the Royal Society. The dial was traced on a large stone in the south wall, at the angle of the building, and about six feet from the ground. The name NEWTON, with the exception of the first two letters, which have been obliterated, may be seen under the dial in rude and capital letters. The other dial is smaller than this, but not in good preservation. The gnomons of these dials have unfortunately disappeared. In the woodcut representing the Manorhouse of Woolsthorpe, the birth-place of Sir Isaac, are shown the places on the wall where the dials were traced.-See Phil. Trans. 1845, pp. 141, 142. Three crowns distinguished here, in order do Sharp is this crown, but not so sharp as sweet; The crown of glory that I yonder see, Is full of bliss and of eternity. Mrs. Vincent, who repeated these lines to Dr. Stukely from memory, fancied that they were written by Sir Isaac; but even if he had thus early tasted of the Pierian spring, he must have lost his relish for its sparkling waters, as he often expressed in his later years a dislike for poetry" not unlike Plato," as Conduit observes, when mentioning this fact," who, though he had addicted himself to poetry in his younger days, would not, in his serious years, allow even Homer a place in his commonwealth." During the seven years which Sir Isaac spent at Grantham, there were some female inmates in Mr. Clark's house, in whose society he took much pleasure, and spent much of his leisure time. One of these, Miss Storey, sister to Dr. Storey, a physician at Buckminster, near Colsterworth, and the daughter of Mr. Clark's second wife, was two or three years younger than Newton, and seems to have added to great personal attractions more than the usual allotment of female talent. To the society of his schoolfellows he preferred that of the young ladies at home, and he often made little tables, cupboards, and other utensils for Miss Storey and her playfellows, to set their dolls and their trinkets upon. Miss Storey, who after her second marriage bore the name of Mrs. Vincent, confessed to Dr. Stukely, when he visited her at Grantham in 1727, when she had reached the age of 82, that Newton had been in love with her, but that the smallness of her portion and the inadequacy of his own income, when the fellow |