Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 21.djvu/162

Rh 144 S A D S A F Not long afterwards his strong Protestant sympathies and his acquaintance with Scottish affairs recommended him as a fit person to be employed by Elizabeth in her intrigues with the Scottish lords of the congregation against Queen Mary. In 1584 he was appointed keeper of Mary queen of Scots in the castle of Tutbury ; but on account of " age and infirmity " he was permitted to resign his charge some time before the death of the queen. His last service was to repair to Scotland to pacify the king's indignation on account of Mary's death. He died after his return home at Standon in Hertfordshire, 30th March 1587. The Letters and Negotiations of Sir Ralph Sadler were published at Edinburgh in 1720, and a more complete collection under the title State Papers and Letters of Sir Ralph Sadler, with a life by Sir Walter Scott, in 1809. The Memoir of the Life and Times of Sir Ralph Sadlcir, by his Descendant Major F. Sadleir Stoncy, appeared in 1877. SADOLETO, JACOPO (1477-1547), Italian humanist and churchman, was born at Modena in 1477, and, being the son of a noted jurist, was designed for the same profession. He gave himself, therefore, to humanistic studies and acquired reputation as a Latin poet, his best-known piece being one on the group of Laocoon. Passing to Rome, he obtained the patronage of Cardinal Carafa and adopted the ecclesiastical career. Leo X. chose him as his secretary along with Peter Bembo, and in 1517 made him bishop of Carpentras. Sadoleto had a remarkable talent for affairs and approved himself a faithful servant of the papacy in many difficult negotiations under successive popes, especi- ally as a peacemaker ; but he was no bigoted advocate of papal authority, and the great aim of his life was to win back the Protestants by peaceful persuasion he would never countenance persecution and by putting Catholic doctrine in a conciliatory form. Indeed his chief work, a Commentary on Romans, though meant as a prophylactic against the new doctrines, gave great offence at Rome and Paris. Sadoleto was a diligent and devoted bishop and always left his diocese with reluctance even after he was made cardinal (1536). His piety and tolerant spirit, combined with his reputation for scholarship and eloquence and his diplomatic abilities, give him a somewhat unique place among the churchmen of his time. He died in 1547. His collected works appeared at Mainz in 1607, and in- clude, besides his theologico-irenical pieces, a collection of Ejristles, a treatise on education (first published in 1533), and the Pk&drus, a defence of philosophy, written in 1538. S^EMUND. See EDDA, vol. vii. p. 650, and ICELAND, vol. xii. p. 624. SAFES. A safe is any repository in which valuable property is guarded against risk of loss by fire or from the attacks of thieves. The protection of valuable documents and possessions was only imperfectly effected in the charter- rooms of old mansions and in the iron-bound oaken chests and iron coffers of the Middle Ages ; but these in their day represented the strong rooms and safes of modern times. The vast increase in realized wealth and the complication of financial and banking operations necessitate in our days the greatest attention to the safeguarding of securities and property. The ingenuity of inventors has, within practicable limits, effected much in safe-making ; but the cunning of thieves has increased in proportion to the obstacles to be overcome and to the value of the booty at which they aim. No safe can be held to be invulnerable ; for, whatever human ingenuity can put together and close, the same ingenuity can tear down and open. An impreg- nable safe would indeed be a source of greater danger than of security to its owner, for, were the key or other means of access lost or rendered unworkable, the contents of the safe would of necessity be irrecoverable. The efficiency of a safe, therefore, does not depend on absolute impregna- bility, but on the nature of the obstacles it presents to successful attack, and to the generally unfavourable con- ditions under which such attacks are made. It is common to make safes both thief- and fire-resisting, and the condi- tions necessary for the one object to a certain extent con- duce to the attainment of both ; but for many purposes security from the one danger alone is requisite. The devices for baffling thieves are numerous. The safe must in the first place be made heavy and unwieldy, or otherwise it must be so fixed that it can only be carried away with the utmost difficulty. Next, the greatest obstacles to obtaining illegitimate access must be presented. To prevent fracturing a tough metal must be used in the construction, and to resist penetration by drilling metal of great hardness must be interposed. These conditions are commonly met by making the outer casing of the safe of boiler plate, backed by a lining of hard steel, over which is an inner lining of thin boiler plate, the three layers being securely bolted together by screws from within. By some makers a layer of hard metal is poured, in a fluid state, between the outer and inner casing ; others case- harden one surface ; and there are numerous additional de- vices for securing the combination of hardness and tough- ness. To prevent wrenching of joints, the two sides with top and bottom of the outer shell are sometimes made out of a single plate welded at the joint, and the back and front are then attached to that shell by angle irons screwed from within. The frame upon which the door hangs and into which the bolts shoot is made of great strength, with special precautions to prevent the wrenching off of the door by means of crowbars or wedges. In an ordinary safe the massive bolts, three or more in number, shoot only at the front, and fixed dogs or sham bolts fit into slots at the back or hinged side. This arrangement is sufficient to keep the door closed independent of hinges, which are merely the pivot on which the door turns. In all Chubb's safes bolts shoot both to front and back; and in the higher quality of that and of every other good maker bolts shoot on every side, front, back, top, and bottom. Ordinarily the bolts shoot straight into the slot as in an ordinary lock ; but, to defy wrenching, additional grip is secured by Chatwood, who makes a bolt with a clutch or projection, which falls into a recess in the slot and thus holds against any direct wrench. In Chubb's finer safes the bolts shoot diagonally all round, so that in each face of the door they go in two different directions. Safe bolts are shot not by the key, as in an ordinary lock, but by the door handle, and the key simply secures them in their position. By this arrangement, patented by Mr Charles Chubb in 1835, a series of the most ponderous bolts can be secured in locked position by a small key which can be carried in the vest pocket. The lock of a safe must be a careful piece of mechanism, not subject to derangement, unpickable, and gunpowder- proof. The portion of the door on which it is fastened is generally provided with extra precautions against drilling. A safe being well made and securely locked remains vulnerable through the medium of the key, which may be surreptitiously obtained either for direct use or to form a mould by which false keys can be cut. On this account, keyless locks and time locks are coming into great favour in America. In keyless permutation locks, such as those of Hall, Sargent, Yale, and Dalton, the bolts can bo withdrawn only after an indicator has been successively set against a combination of numbers arranged before the closing of the door ; and in the time lock of these inventors the safe can only be opened at any hour to which the time controller is set before closing. Electrical arrangements have also been attached to safes by which signals are conveyed to any spot when a safe so guarded is unlawfully interfered with. It is much easier to render a safe fire-proof than to