CHAPTER IX.

Phosphorescent substances — Sudden appearance of flames — Heat developed by the slacking of lime — Substances which are kindled by contact with air and water — Pyrophorus, phosphorus, naptha, and alcoholic liquids employed in different apparent miracles — The blood of Nessus was a phosphuret of sulphur ; and also the poison that Medea employed against Creusa — Greek fire — This fire, re-discovered, after many attempts — In Persia and Hindustan an unextinguishable fire was used.
Nothing is more striking to the vulgar, than the sudden production of light, heat, and flame, without any apparent cause; or with a concurrence of causes seemingly opposed to such an effect.
Art teaches the preparation of substances, which emit light, without allowing any sensible heat to escape. The phosphorus of Bologna,* and the phosphorus of
* The Bologna phosphorus is a natural gypseous spar, or sele- nite, which has the property of emitting light, when it is calcined for that purpose. It is powdered after calcination, and then formed into small cakes by means of a solution of gum-tragacanth ; these cakes are dried, brought to a state of ignition, and then suffered to
USED IN MAGIC. 203
Baldwin,* are known to the learned, but they now only figure in books, among the amusements of physics. The ancients were acquainted with bodies endowed with a similar property. Isidoref mentions a brown stone, which became luminous when sprinkled with oil.
The Rabbins, given up to the study of the Cabbala, f speak of a light belonging to Saints, to the elect, upon whose countenance it shines miraculously from their birth, or when they have merited this sign of glory. || Arnobus,§ on the authority of Hermippus, gives to the
cool. If kept from air and moisture, they shine like a burning coal when carried into a dark place, after being exposed for a few minutes to the light. In 1602, Vincentius Casciorolus, a shoemaker of Bologna who had discovered the properties of this spar, showed it to Scipio Bezatello, an alchemist, and several learned men, under the martial name of lapis solans, and as the substance called the sol of the alchemist, or philosopher's stone, fitted for con- verting the ignoble metals into gold.8 — Ed.
* Baldwin's phosphorus is nitrate of lime which, after the water of crystallization has been evaporated, and the salt has be- come dry, acquires the property of emitting light in the dark. — Ed.
f Savinius lapis, oleo addito, etiam lucere fertur, Isid. Hispal. Origin, lib. xvi. cap. iv.
% The Cabbala is the work which contains the esoteric philo- sophy of the Jewish doctors, and which derives its name from the Hebrew word Kibbel, to receive; as the laws it contains were re- ceived by Moses from above. — Ed.
1| Gaulmyn. De vitd et morte Mosis, not. lib. n. pages 233 — 325.
§ Arnobus lived in the reign of Dioclesian, and was converted to Christianity. In proof of his sincerity, he wrote a Treatise in which he exposed the absurdity of irreligion, and ridiculed the heathen gods. — Ed.
a Beckman's Hist, of Inventions, Tran. vol. iv. p. 423.
204 DRUIDICAL FIRE.
magician Zoroaster* a belt of fire ; a suitable ornament for the institutor of the worship of fire. A philosopher of the present age would be very little embarrassed how to produce these brilliant wonders, particularly if their duration was not required to be much prolonged.
The Druids extended the resources of science much further. The renowned person, who, in the poem of Lucan, proclaims their magical power, boasts of possessing the secret of making a forest appear on fire, when it does not burn.f Ossian paints old men, mixed with the sons of Loda, and at night making conjurations round a Cromlech, or circle of stones ; and, at their command, burning meteors arose, which terrified the warriors of Fingal ; and by the light of which Ossian distinguished the chief of the enemy's warriors.f An English transla- tion of Ossian observes that every bright flame, sudden, and resembling lightning, is called in Gaelic the Druid's flame. || It is to this flame that Ossian compares the sword of his son Oscar.§ Connected with the recital of the bard, this expression indicates that the Druids pos- sessed the art of causing flames to appear, for the purpose of dismaying their enemies.^[
* Nunc veniat quis, super igneam zonam, magus interiore ab orbe Zoroaster. — Arnob. lib. i. It is without any reason that some commentators wish to read it thus : Quin Azonaces magus, %c.
t " Et non ardentis fulgere incendia sylvse." — Lucan. Phars. lib. in. vers. 420.
X Ossian's Poems, &c. published by John Smith, 1780.
|| Ibid.
§ G. Higgins. The Celtic Druids, p. 116.
% From one strophe of the Hervorar Saga, it may be inferred that this art was not unknown to the Scandinavian magicians. (See Magasin Encyclop. 1804, vol. iv. pp. 250—260.)
FLAME EVOLVED BY MOISTURE. 205
We may join to the traits of resemblance already observed between the Celts and the ancient inhabitants of Italy, the fable of Caeculus, the founder of the city of Preneste. Wishing to make himself known as the son of the God Vulcan, he implored the aid of his sire, when suddenly an assembled multitude, who had refused to acknowledge his brilliant origin, was en- veloped in flames, and the alarm quickly subdued their incredulity.*
We may remark, that Caeculus, most probably, had chosen the place of assembly ; and that the Druids only exercised their power in sacred enclosures, interdicted to the profane, as in certain optical illusions, where fire has often played a part ; for these apparent miracles required a theatre suitable to those who worked them ; and, in other places, in spite of the urgency of necessity, they would have experienced great difficulty in any attempt to produce them.
The instantaneous development of latent heat is not less likely to excite astonishment, particularly if water kindles the flames. Substances susceptible of evolving heat, or of taking fire, in absorbing or in decomposing water, are numerous ; and they have very often occasioned fires ; such as were attributed, formerly, to negligence or to malice. Stacks of damp hay, and slates of pyrites,f
* Servius in JEneid, lib. vu. vers. 678 — 681.
f Pyrites consists of a natural combination of iron and sulphur. It is frequently found in seams of coal ; and when it is exposed to moisture, the sulphur and the iron aid one another in decomposing the water, and attracting its oxygen, which changes the sulphur into sulphuric acid, and the iron into an oxide ; and thus forming,
206 SUBSTANCES EXTRICATING HEAT
moistened by a warm shower, will produce this pheno- menon.*
Were the Thaumaturgists acquainted with phenomena similar to the latter ? I reply, without doubt, they were. The prodigious heat, which is emitted by quick lime, sprinkled with water, could not have escaped their observation. Now, let us suppose that a sufficient quantity of quick lime is hidden at the bottom of a pit, or kiln, and that the pit is then filled with snow : the absorbed snow will disappear ; and the interior tem- perature of the pit or kiln will be so much more raised, owingto its being thus closely shut, that less of the expanded heat will be allowed to escape ; and an apparent miracle
by the union of these two, the sulphate of iron. During these natural processes the degree of heat developed is often suffi- cient to inflame the hydrogen, the other constituent of the water, as it escapes into the air. — En.
* In ricks of hay thus consumed, the combustion is the result of fermentation, a fact which was known to the ancients, for Galen informs us, that the fermenting dung of pigeons is sufficient to set fire to a house, a phenomenon which he has witnessed ; and it is recorded on good authority, that the fire which consumed the great church of Pisa, was occasioned by the fermentation of the dung of the pigeons that had for centuries built their nests under its roof. Many other substances, also, cause spontaneous combus- tion. When recent charcoal is reduced to an impalpable powder, by rollers, it gradually absorbs air, which is consolidated, and heat is developed during the process equal to 360° of Fahrenheit, which soon causes the combustion of the charcoal. The inflamma- tion is more active in proportion to the shortness of the interval between the production of the charcoal, and its reduction into powder ; and the free admission of air is indispensable." — Ed.
* Brewster's Natural Mayic, p. 215.
KNOWN TO THAUMATURGISTS. 20 7
will be proclaimed. Thus a writer of legends has orna- mented the History of St. Patrick, by relating that the Apostle of Ireland lighted a kiln with snow.
Theophrastus# gives the name of Spinon to a stone which is met with in certain mines ; and which, if pounded, and then exposed to the sun, ignites of itself; particularly if care has been taken to wet it first. The Spinon, there can be little doubt is merely an efflorescing pyrites. The stone named Gagatesf (true pyritic jet) is black, porous, light, friable, and resembles burnt wood. It exhales a disagreeable odour ; and when it is heated, it attracts other bodies in the same manner as amber. The smoke which it exhales in burning, relieves women attacked with hyste- rics ; and it is kindled by means of water and extinguished when immersed in oil. This latter peculiarity was also the distinguishing feature of a stone which, according to Aelian and Dioscorides,| ignited in a like manner, when sprinkled with water ; and, in burning, exhaled a strong bituminous smell ; but, as it was extinguished by blowing above it, its combustion seems to have de- pended on the escape of a gaseous vapour. ||
* Theophrast. De Lapidihus,
f Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxxvi, cap. xix. — Solin. cap. xxv. — Isid. Hispal. Origin, lib. xvi. cap. iv. — So named from being ob- tained near the river Gagas, in Lycia. — Ed.
% Aelian. De Nat. Animal, lib. ix. cap. xxvin.
|| Many instances of spontaneous combustion can be traced to the escape of carburetted and sulphuretted hydrogen gases through rents in the earth. Near the village of Bradley, in Staf- fordshire, an unextinguishable fire has burned for seventy years, arising from a burning stratum of coal, to which the air has free
208 PERSIAN PHOSPHORUS STONE.
Those three substances, whether they were the pro- ductions of art or of nature, might have sufficed to work miraculous conflagrations. But Pliny and Isidore of Seville have described a fourth, still more powerful : a black stone that is found in Persia; and which, if broken between the fingers, burns them.# This is precisely the effect produced by a bit of pyrophorus, or phosphorus stone ; and this wonderful stone was probably nothing else. It is known that phosphorus melted by heat, may become black and solid ;f and the word stone, ought not to impose more upon us here,
access from beneath it. At Bedly, also, near Glasgow, a constant stream of inflammable gas issues in the bed of a river, which is occasionally set on fire, and, in calm weather, continues burning at the surface of the water for weeks together. It consists of a mixture of two volumes of hydrogen gas, and one volume of carbon, so that it is little more than half the weight of atmospheric air.a The light, which has been termed the " Lantern of Mara- caybo," in South America, and which is seen every night hovering over a mountainous, desert spot, on the banks of the river Cata- tumba,b near its junction with the Sulia, is another example of the escape of inflammable gas issuing from the ground, inflamed, most probably, at first by electricity. In some places these gases are applied to domestic use, as at the salt mine of Gottizabe, near Rheims in Fecklensburg. — Ed.
* " Pyrites ; nigra quidam, sed attrita digitos adurit." Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxxvu. cap. 11. — "Pyrites; Persicus lapis .... tenentis manum, si vehementius prematur, adurit." Isidor. Hipsal. Origin, lib. xvi, cap. iv.
t It is not probable that it was phosphorus ; but it might have been a natural pyrophorus, which took fire on the exposure of a fresh surface to the air. — Ed.
a Edinb. Journal of Science, New Series, vol. i. p. 71.
b Humboldt's Personal Narrative, vol. iv. p. 354.
PHOSPHORUS KNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS. 209
than the words lake and fountain when a liquid is spoken of. Custom has consecrated in our own lan- guage, the words infernal-stone (lapis infernalis), and cauterizing -stone* for a pharmaceutical preparation.
But were the ancients acquainted with phosphorus and pyrophorus? I reply in the affirmative, since they relate wonders which could have been produced by no other means than the employment of these sub- stances ; or by reactives, endowed with analogous properties. We shall have occasion to mention an ancient description of the effects of a combination of phospho- rus ; a description as exact as if it had been made at the present time by a modern chemist. As to pyro- phorus, science possesses so many substances which ignite after some minutes' exposure to the air, that it may without improbability, be believed, that many of them were known to the ancients. Without mention- ing bitumens as being highly inflammable; or petroleum, or naptha, which take fire at the approach of a lighted candle ; how many of the residue of distillations kindle spontaneously in a damp atmosphere. This pro- perty, to which no attention is paid, except to explain it by a general principle, was certainly never neglected by the performers of apparent miracles, since the art of dis- tillation formed an important part of the Sacred Sciences.
We will not then hesitate to believe, though it may well astonish us, what history relates of a vestal, threatened with the punishment reserved for those who allowed the sacred fire to go out, that she had only to spread her veil over the altar in order that the flame
* It is a preparation of pure potassa. — Ed. VOL. II. P
210 PHOSPHORUS KNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS.
should suddenly rekindle, and burn more vividly than before.* From beneath the friendly veil, we may imagine that we perceive a grain of phosphorus or of pyrophorus to fall on the hot cinders, and supply the place of the intervention of the divinity.
Nor need we longer share the incredulity of Horace, respecting the apparent miracle which was worked in the sanctuary of Gnatia;f where the incense kindled of itself in honour of the Gods, j We also may under- stand how Seleucus, sacrificing to Jupiter, saw the wood- pile upon the altar ignite spontaneously to offer a bril- liant presage of his future greatness :j| neither can we deny that the Theurgist, Maximus,§ offering incense to Hecate, might have been able to announce that the torches, which the Goddess held, would light them- selves spontaneously ; and that his prediction had been accomplished.^
* Vuler. Maxim, lib. I. cap. iv. § 8.
f A town of Apulia, about eighty miles from Brundusium. — Ed.
X Horat. Serm. lib. i. sat. v. vers. 97 — 190; Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. ii. cap. vu.
|| Pausanias. Attic, cap. xvi.
§ This Maximus was a cynic, and a magician of Ephesus. He instructed the Emperor Julian in magic j but refused to reside in his Court. He was appointed Pontiff in the province of Lydia. When his patron Julian went into the East, Maximus promised him success ; and that his conquests should be more numerous than those of Philip. After the death of Julian, he was almost sacrificed to the fury of the soldiers, but escaped to Constanti- nople, where he was, soon afterwards, accused of magical prac- tices before the Emperor Valens ; and being condemned, he was beheaded at Ephesus, a.d. 366. — Ed.
% Eunapius in Maxim.
PHOSPHORUS KNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS. 211
Notwithstanding the precautions which the love of mystery inspired, and which was seconded by the enthusiasm of admiration, the working of the science was sometimes openly shown in its assumed miracles. Pausanias relates what he saw in two cities of Lydia, the inhabitants of which, subjected to the yoke of the Persians, had embraced the religion of the Magi. " In a chapel," he says, " is an altar, upon which there are always ashes, that in colour do not resemble any others. The Magi placed some wood upon the altar, and invoked I know not what God, by orisons taken from a book, written in a barbarous language unknown to the Greeks : — the wood soon ignited of itself without fire, and the flame of it was very brilliant."*
The extraordinary colour of the cinders which were always kept upon the altar, doubtlessly concealed an inflammable composition ; simply, perhaps, earth soaked in petroleum or naptha; a species of fuel still employed in Persia, in every place where these bitu- menous substances are common. The Magi in placing the wood, probably threw there, without its being perceived, a few grains of pyrophorus, or of that stone which was found in Persia, and which was kindled by a light pressure. Whilst the orison lasted, the action of either substance had time to develop itself.
The vine-branches which a priest placed upon an altar, near Agrigentum, lighted spontaneously in the same manner. Solinusf adds, that the flame ascended from the altar towards the assistants without incom-
* Pausanias. Eliac. lib. i. cap. xxvn. t Solin. cap. xi.
p 2
21 2 PHOSPHORUS KNOWN TO THE ANCIENTS.
moding them. This circumstance announces that be- tween the vine-branches, a gas escaped, and was lighted, from below the altar, in a manner similar to that at Mount Eryx, where a perpetual flame is preserved on the altar of Venus.* The fumes of a spirituous liquor would have produced the same phenomenon. By the inflammation of an ethereal fluid, also, may be explained the power that Fromann attributes to the Zingarif of making fire appear upon a single bundle of straw placed among many others, and of extinguishing it at pleasure.!
* Refer to chap. iv. vol. i.
f Zingari is the Italian appellation of that extraordinary race of mankind known as wanderers in almost every part of the world, but whose original home, or aboriginal region, is still a problem. In every country, although the same people, yet they have a dis- tinct name. In England, we term them Gypsies, from their sup- posed Egyptian origin ; in France, they are called Bohemians ; in Holland, Heydens ; in Germany, Zigeuners ; in Spain, Gitanos ; in Russia, Tzengani ; and in Italy, Zingari ; whilst the Oriental na- tions call them Tschingenes. From the time they first appeared in Europe, they pretended to possess magical science, and to have the power of looking into the future. The art of chiromancy, or telling fortunes, by the inspection of the hand, however, is not of their invention ; lectures having been read in colleges upon that absurd art, long before the Gypsies appeared in Europe. With respect to their origin, the most probable opinion brings them ori- ginally from Hindostan. Their language has a close resemblance to the Hindostanee ; and it is supposed that they migrated from India in the beginning of the fifteenth century, when Timur-Beg invaded that country, and endeavoured to establish in it the Ma- homedan faith. Whatever may have been their origin, they are now little better than lawless wanderers, thieves, impostors, and the only pretenders to sorcery in Europe at the present time. — Ed.
% Fromann. Tract, de Fascinatione, pp. 263, and 527, 528.
COMBUSTIBLES INFLAMED BY MOISTURE. 213
In this manner school-boys amuse themselves by making alcohol burn in their hands : — a puff of breath disperses the flame at the moment when they begin to feel the heat of it.
" It has been observed," says Buffon,* " that some substances thrown up by Etna, after having been cooled during several years and then moistened with rain, have rekindled, and thrown off flames, with an explosion violent enough to produce even a slight earthquake." The composition of these volcanic productions may have been imitated by art, or the Thaumaturgist may have carefully collected and preserved those which nature had formed. One of the four stones inflammable by water, of which we have spoken, shall be explained elsewhere.
In fact we may remark, with a man whom science and his country have equally regrettedf , that quick-lime mixed with sulphur, by the heat which it emits when sprinkled with water, first fuses, and then causes the combustion of the sulphur ; that this mixture rapidly sets on fire mixed with sulphur and chlorate of potassa ; and as suddenly ignites gunpowder and phosphorus ; and that, in the latter case, there exists a physical means of fixing the precise moment, when the developed heat will cause the combus- tion.
Let us transport ourselves among a people whose first historical centuries, owing to the marvellous recitals with which they are filled, are thrown back into the indefinite ages of mythology.
* Théorie de la Terre. Preuves. § xvi.
f Cadet- Gassicourt. De V Extinction de la Chaux, etc. Thesis sanctioned before the Faculté des Sciences. August, 1812.
214 COMBUSTIBLES INFLAMED
The impartial reader will follow us in the march of these recitals. Let him weigh well all the expressions which Dejanira* employs for describing the first effects of the Blood of Nessus, a marvellous philtre, with which she im- pregnated the precious tunic that was to bring back the heart of her inconstant husband.f " Nessus," says she, " advised me to keep this liquid in a dark place until the moment when I wished to make use of it. This is what I have done. To-day in the dark, with a flock of wool dipped in this liquid, I have dyed the tunic which I have sent, after having shut it in a box, without its having been exposed to the light. The flock of wool, exposed to the sun upon a stone, was spontaneously consumed, without having been touched by any one. It was reduced to ashes ; into powder resembling that which
* Dejanira was the daughter of Olmus, King of ^Etolia. She was married to Hercules, and travelling with him, on one occa- sion, being stopped by the swollen waters of the Evenus, she was conveyed across the river by the Centaur Nessus, who no sooner, however, landed her on the opposite shore, than he offered violence to her person in the sight of her husband. Hercules, to revenge the insult, killed the Centaur with a poisoned arrow. Nessus, in dying, beqeathed his tunic, stained with his poisoned blood, to Dejanira, observing that it had the power of reclaiming husbands from infidelity. The lady gladly accepted and preserved the tunic ; and when Hercules proved faithless to her bed, she sent it to him ; and he, having put it on, was burned to death. The romance of the legend is scarcely destroyed by the explanation given by our author. — Ed.
f Sophocl. Trachin, act iv. sc. 1. — To be more concise, I have blended together two passages very much like each other. Se- neca (Hercules Œtacus, act in. sc. 1.) describes the same details, and particularly the efflorescence produced, whenever the philtre touched the earth.
BY MOISTURE AND LIGHT. 215
the saw causes to fall from wood. I have observed that above the stone on which I had placed it, froth bubbles appeared, like those which, in Autumn, are produced from wine poured from a height."
Let a chemist read these details, stripped of all mythological recollections ; what will he recognize in this pretended philtre, given by the hand of vengeance, and which, from its consistence, colour, or some other property, received the appellation of blood ? I reply, a liquid preparation of phosphorus,* which, owing to the proportions of its elements, inflamed spontaneously when it was exposed to the light and heat of the sun. The phos- phoric acid produced from its combustion, would pro- duce upon the stone the effervescence, which struck the eyes of Dejanira ; and also the ashes of the wool reduced to a dry and insoluble phosphate.
Hercules clothed himself with the fatal tunic ; then he sacrificed twelve bulls; but scarcely had he taken the fire to the wood-pile, on which the victims were de- posited, than he felt the effects of the philtre.f The vicinity of the flame, the chemist will say, and the humid heat of the skin of a man who works with strength and activity before a kindled pile will infal- libly determine, though without visible inflammation, the decomposition of the phosphoret spread upon the garment. The compound being dried up and there-
* A portion of phosphorus, combined with one portion of sulphur, composes a phosphoret which remains liquid at the tem- perature of 10°, and is ignited at that of 25° of the centrigrade thermometer, 50° and 77° of Fahrenheit.
t Sophocl. Trachin, act iv. sc. 2.
216 COMBUSTIBLES INFLAMED
fore much more caustic, would act upon all parts of the body, disorganize the skin and the flesh, and by inexpressible pains, cause the death of its unfortu- nate victim. Even at this day, when its nature is not unknown, it would be difficult to arrest the action once begun of these consuming substances : formerly it would have been impossible.
In discovering so perfect a uniformity between the picture painted by Sophocles and the illustrations of science, can it fairly be supposed that by chance alone the dreams, or the imaginings of a poet should coincide exactly with the operations of nature ? It is more reason- able to admit that the details of these marvellous facts were preserved in the memory of men ; than that the poet would digress from the received tradition, of which he knew not the origin. There can be little doubt that this origin belonged to Occult Science, to Magic studied in Thessaly, in the country of Nessus, from the time of the siege of Troy.*
Convinced that the Greek tragedian has described the effects of a secret preparation which, perhaps, in his time, still existed in the temples, I have given to the blood of Nessus the property of inflaming spontaneously in the light, although this may not have been an essen- tial condition of the phenomenon that it produced. Every potential cautery spread in sufficient quantity upon the surface of the body will exercise -the same power ; will cause the same pains, and soon occasion the same impossibility of taking off the garment which
* Plin. Hist. Nat. lib. xxx. cap. i.
BY MOISTURE AND LIGHT. 217
is daubed with it, without tearing the skin and the flesh, and without redoubling instead of diminishing the sufferings of the victim, irrevocably doomed to death.*
The poison poured by Medea upon the robe which she sent to her rival, resembles, by its effects, that which Dejanira, without knowing its malignity, em- ployed. But this myth presents, farther, an impossible circumstance. From the fillet of gold offered with the dress to the unhappy Creusa, there shot unextinguish- able flames.f As it cannot be supposed that here there was an elevation of temperature, or the power of a burning sun, the spontaneous inflammation discloses the employment of naptha, which takes fire at the approach alone of a lighted body. Many authors relate that Medea really rubbed the robe and the crown destined for Creusa with naptha.j Procopius strengthens this tradition by twice observing that the liquor called naptha by the Medes, received from the Greeks the name of the oil of Medea. \\ Pliny, in fact, says that
* Towards the end of the last century, a pharcomopolist of Paris, M. Steinacher, was called into a house, under the pretext of giving relief to a sick person. Some people who pretended to condole with him, made a barbarous game of covering him with blisters, and holding him in this state during several hours. When he recovered his liberty, the most active and best directed means to relieve him were useless ; he languished for some time and died in the most horrible torments ; the authors of this crime remained unknown and unpunished.
t Euripid. Medea, act vi. sc. i.
X Plutarch. Vit. Alexandr.
|| Procope. Histoire mêlée, chap. xi.
218 THE GREEK FIRE.
Medea having rubbed the crown of her rival, whom she wished to destroy with naptha, it caught fire at the in- stant when the unfortunate individual approached the altar to offer a sacrifice.*
In the tragedy of Seneca, Medea, after having announ- ced that the " golden frontlet, sent to Creusa enclosed a hidden fire, the composition of which she had learnt from Prometheus, adds that Vulcan had also given her fire, concealed under the form of a light sulphur, and that she borrowed from Phseton the flashes of an unex- tinguishable flame."f In withdrawing the veil from these figurative expressions, it is difficult not to perceive there a genuine Greek fire, which a grain of pyrophorus, or a little naptha, would kindle, when the fatal mixture was dispersed through the air, or by the vicinity of flame, such as that burnt upon the altar, which the wife of Jason approached.
We do not inadvertantly add the Greek fire to the number of the weapons of Medea. According to every probability, we may ask, what was the foundation of the Greek fire ? 1 answer, naptha ; the oil of Medea : and those bulls which vomited flame in order to defend the golden fleece that Medea's lover had delivered up to Jason ; those bulls, the feet and the mouth of which were of brass, and which Vulcan had fabricated J— were they
* Plin Hist. Nat. lib. n. cap. 105.
t " Ignis fulvo. .clausus in auro..latet obscurus . . quel mihi cœli. .qui furta luit, .viscère fœto. .dédit et docuit. .condere vires . . arte Prometheus . . dédit et tenui . . sulfure tectos . . Mulciber ignés . .Et vivaces . . fulgura flammée. -De cognato. .Phœtonte tuli .." — Senec. Medea, act iv. se. 2.
% Apollon. Rhocl. Argonaut, lib. m.
THE GREEK FIRE. 219
not machines adapted for throwing out the Greek fire?
Faithful to the method which we have followed, we shall endeavour to trace the history of this weapon, for- merly so dreaded, from the earliest times when it was employed, till the latest records of it ; when nothing announced that the discovery of it was still recent.
Two troubadours, one of whom flourished in the first years of the 1 3th century, mention the Greek fire. One of them says that it was extinguished by means of vinegar.* Joinville enters into a curious detail upon the use of this fire, which the Saracens darted forth upon the Crusaders.f The Arabs have, at all times, made a great use of inflamed darts for the attack and the defence of places ; so that the Sheik of Barnou, who derived his knowledge from this people, was much astonished to learn that the English had never employed this method of destruction in war.f Manuel Comnenus || employed the Greek fire upon the
* Millot. Histoire littéraire des Troubadours, vol. i. page 380, tome ii. pages 393 — 394.
t Mémoires de Joinville. Edition in-folio de 1761, p. 44.
% Voyages of Denham, Oudney and Clapperton. vol. i. pages 115 and 238.
|| Manuel Comnenus, although the second son of John Com- nenus, yet, ascended the throne after the death of his father, in 1143. His reign, of thirty years, was filled with the vicissitudes of military enterprizes against the Christians, the Saracens, and the scarcely civilized nations beyond the Danube. He believed in astrology, and the professors of that mystical art had promised him many years of glory, even when his death was approaching ; but not feeling any confidence in their predictions, he requested to have the habit of a monk brought to him, and, substituting it for the royal robe, he expired. — Ed.
220 THE GREEK FIRE.
galleys, which he had armed to oppose Roger of Sicily ; and the historian observes that he restored the use of it, after it had been given up for a long time.* Alexis Com- nenus had employed it, however, against the Pisans. Upon the prow of his vessels were lions of bronze, which vomited flame in every direction where it was intended to falLf Anna Comnenusj speaks of fire that the soldiers, armed with tubes resembling our fusees, shot forth upon the enemy. But, according to her, they pre- pared their fire with a mixture of sulphur and resin reduced into powder. This account, however, is not worthy of credit ; for such a composition would have melted before igniting, and would not have shot forth with an explosion.
Here, three observations present themselves : firstly, the lions in bronze, employed by Alexis Comnenus, recals to our remembrance the fire-vomiting bulls manufactured in bronze by Vulcan — they are evidently the same description of weapon ; secondly, sixty years had scarcely elapsed between the maritime expedition of Alexis, and that of Manuel Comnenus : in so short a space of time had the Greek fire been almost entirely forgotten ! How many other processes of Occult Science may have perished by a more prolonged disuse. Thirdly, the delu-
* " Ignis Grsecus qui longo jam tempore abditus latuerat." f Ann. Comnen. Hist. lib. xi. cap. ix. — Alexius Comnenus commenced his reign in 1081. His daughter Anna endeavoured to immortalize his memory in the Alexiad, or the history of his reign. If her narrative can be depended upon, it would almost induce the belief that the use of gunpowder was then understood and employed instead of the Greek fire ; or that gunpowder was that fire. — Ed.
J Ibid. Hist. lib. xm. cap. ix.
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sive process which Anna Comnenus gives for the compo- sition of the Greek fire, is another proof of the care with which the ancients then concealed these processes beneath a double ve!l of mystery and of falsehood.
Constantine Porphyrogenetus,* indeed, recommends his son never to disclose to the barbarians the secret of the composition of the Greek fire ; but to say to them that it was brought from heaven by an angel, and that it would be sacrilegious to reveal it to them.f Leon, the philosopher,]: ordered brass tubes to be placed upon the vessels, and tubes of smaller dimensions to be put in the hands of the soldiers. Both shot forth fire upon the enemy, with a noise similar to that of thunder ; but the Emperor alone directed the fabrication of that fire.
It is said that Callinicus, of Heliopolis, in Syria, invented the Greek fire in the seventh century of our era ; but he only restored or divulged a process, the origin of
* He was the son of Leo, and, although clothed with the im- perial purple, yet, he was of a retired habit, and dedicated much of his time to the cultivation of literature and science. He drew many- learned men to his court; and himself became an author. He delineated what he regarded as a perfect image of royalty, in the life of his grandfather, Basil : he also wrote a Treatise, intended to instruct his son in the practice of government ; and another entitled Theurata, in which a detailed account of the empire is given. Such a monarch was likely to inquire into the nature of the Greek-fire ; and, knowing it, to secure its influence for his people. Water only increased its burning ; it was only extinguished by stifling it under a heap of dust. — Ed.
f Constantin, Pophyr. De administ. imper.
X Léon le philosophe. Institutions militaires. Inst. xix. vol. n. page 139.
222 THE GREEK FIRE.
which, like many others, was lost in the obscurity of initiations. The initiated, who were discovered and punished at Rome in the year 186 b.c., possessed the secret : they plunged their lighted torches into water without extinguishing them, " because," says Livy, " the composition consisted of lime and sulphur ;# but they most probably added a bitumen, such as naptha or pe- troleum to the other ingredients."
Callinicus and the initiated must have borrowed their unextinguishable fire from some Asiatic initiation. The Persians possessed the secret, but they reserved the use of it for combats. " They composed an oil, with which they rubbed the darts which, when thrown with a moderate force, carried with them wherever they fixed themselves devouring flames,f increased and strengthened by water, and only extinguishable by dust."
Traditions almost always lead us back towards Hin- dustan, when we are desirous of discovering the inventors of ancient arts.
Among the numerous writers, who have transformed the history of Alexander into romance, some relate that the Macedonian, when in India, opposed to the elephants
* Tit. Liv. lib. xxix. cap, xxm.
f Ammian. Marcell. lib. xxm. cap. vi, and Pliny {Hist. Nat. lib. ii. cap. civ.) describes the effects of a substance called Maltha, of which the inhabitants of Samosate made use against the soldiers of Lucullus. The Maltha was drawn from a neighbour- ing pond situated near the town. Naptha, or petroleum, doubtless formed the basis of it. Beseiged by Lucullus, the defen- ders of Tigranocerta shot out inflamed naptha upon their enemies. (Dio. Cass. Xiphilin. in Pompeio.)
THE GREEK FIRE. 223
of his enemies machines of bronze, or of iron, which vomited fire, and which secured his conquest.* Others, on the contrary, describe " the large flashes of flame that Alexander beheld as showered upon his army, on the burning plains of India."f These conflicting recitals have a common foundation, and the tradition only relates that, in India, a composition analogous to the Greek fire was employed as an engine of warfare. It was a composition similar to that which a sorcerer and a sorceress shot forth from inflamed jets, mentioned in one of the mar- vellous narrations of Hindoo origin. The spectators of the combat, and the combatants themselves experienced the bad effects of it.| Fictions of this kind generally originate in reality. Thejire which burns and crackles on the bosom of the waves, instead of being extinguished, denotes that the Greek fire was anciently known in Hin- dustan, under the name of the fire of Barrawa.\\ It was employed against besieged towns. " On the banks of the Hyphasis, an oil was composed, and enclosed in pots of earth; and on being shot out against the wood-works, or the gates of a city, kindled with an unextinguishable flame. The fabrication of this dangerous substance was left to the King ; no other person had permission to pre-
* J. Vactrius Vit. Alexand. (discovered and published by M. Mai.) Biblioth. Univ. Littérature, vol. vu. pages 225, 226. — Extract from the romance of Alexander the Great, from a Persian manuscript, &c. — Bibliothèque des Romans. October 1775, vol. i.
f This tradition given in an Apocryphal letter of Alexander to Aristotle, has been adopted by Dante. Inferno, cant. xiv.
X The Arabian Nights' Entertainments, 55th. night, vol. i. pages 320—322.
|| Sacountala, ou l'Anneau fatal, act in. sc. 2.
224 THE GREEK FIRE.
pare even a drop of it."* This recital by Ktesias has been rejected, because what the historian adds, as to the manner of composing this unextinguishable oil, is thought improbable. He has been assured that it was drawn from a very dangerous water serpent. This circum- stance does not appear absolutely destitute of truth. Philostratusf says that the unextinguishable oil was extracted from afresh water animal, resembling a worm. In Japan, the Inari, an aquatic lizard, black and vene- mous, furnishes an oil, which is burnt in the temples. | Nothing interferes with the supposition that, in India the element of the unextinguishable fire, an animal grease or oil, is united to the naptha for giving more body to the incendiary projectile, and a longer duration to its action. In supposing, moreover, that Ktesias had, incorrectly translated and misunderstood the account he received ; or that an erroneous account purposely had been given to him, the fact itself does not remain less probable. We again repeat, that we are too apt to accuse the recitals of the ancients of absurdity. To confirm what they had said of the Greek fire, Cardan has indicated the method of preparing fire-works endowed with similar properties.!
* Ktesias in Indie. — Aelian de Nat. Animal, lib. v. cap. in.
f Philostrat. Vit. Apollon, lib. in. cap. i. — Aelian (Be Nat. Animal, lib. v. cap. in.) quoting Ktesias, also uses the expression ScwXjj^, worm ; but this worm which lives in the river Indus, is seven cubits long and of proportionate breadth. From the expres- sion of Aelian it may be inferred, that the oil thus prepared, kindled without fire, and by the contact alone of a combustible body.
\ Koempfer. Histoire du Japon, liv. in. chap. v. p. 53.
|| H. Cardan. De Subtilitate. lib. n.
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Prompt to refute Cardan, Scaliger,* a man more erudite than able, and more presumptuous than erudite, boldly ridiculed those who professed that they could produce physical compositions, which, exposed to the rays of the sun, or sprinkled with water, would ignite. A student of chemistry, would ridicule Scaliger for such an opinion, and work, before his eyes, the two apparent miracles which he had declared to be impossible.
* J. C. Scaliger. Exoteric, ad. Cardan, xm. no. 3.
VOL. II.
226 GUNPOWDER KNOWN TO THE MAGI.