Page:The Construction of the Wonderful Canon of Logarithms.djvu/154

130 CATALOGUE.

Napier left a mass of papers, including his mathematical treatises and notes, all of which came into the possession of Robert as his father’s literary executor. When the house of Napier of Culcreugh was burnt, these papers perished, with only two exceptions that I have been able to discover. The one is the manuscript treatise on Alchemy by Robert Napier himself; but the other is a far more valuable manuscript, being entitled, “The Baron of Merchiston, his booke of Arithmeticke, and Algebra; for Mr Henrie Briggs, Professor of Geometrie at Oxforde.” it is of great length, beautifully written in the hand of his son, who mentions the fact, that it is copied from such of his father’s notes as the transcriber considered “orderlie sett doun.”

“Orbis quicquid opum, vel habet medicina salutis,

Omne Leo Geminis suppeditare potest.”

Libraries. Adv. Ed.; etc.

III.—Rabdologi.