Page:The Works of Francis Bacon (1884) Volume 1.djvu/229

 barks from the ice, no, not in July, and met with great mountains of ice, some floating, some fixed, at that time of the year, being the heart of summer.

The caves under the earth noted to be warmer in winter than in summer, and so the waters that spring from within the earth.

Great quantity of sulphur, and sometimes naturally burning after the manner of Ætna, in Iceland; the like written of Groenland, and divers others the cold countries. The trees in the cold countries are such as are fuller of rosin, pitch, tar, which are matters apt for fire, and the woods themselves more combustible than those in much hotter countries; as, for example, fir, pineapple, juniper. Qu. Whether their trees of the same kind that ours are, as oak and ash, bear not, in the more cold countries, a wood more brittle and ready to take fire than the same kinds with us?

The sunbeams heat manifestly by reflection, as in countries pent in with hills, upon walls or buildings, upon pavements, upon gravel more than earth, upon arable more than grass, upon rivers if they be not very open, &c.

The uniting or collection of the sunbeams multiplieth heat, as in burning-glasses, which are made thinner in the middle than on the sides, as I take it, contrary to spectacles; and the operation of them is, as I remember, first to place them between the sun and the body to be fired, and then to draw them upward towards the sun, which it is true maketh the angle of the cone sharper. But then I take it if the glass had been first placed at the same distance to which it is after drawn, it would not have had that force, and yet that had been all one to the sharpness of the angle. Qu.

So in that the sun's beams are hotter perpendicularly than obliquely, it may be imputed to the union of the beams, which in case of perpendicularity reflect into the very same lines with the direct; and the further from perpendicularity the more obtuse the angle, and the greater distance between the direct beam and the reflected beam.

The sunbeams raise vapours out of the earth, and when they withdraw they fall back in dews.

The sunbeams do many times scatter the mists which are in the mornings.

The sunbeams cause the divers returns of the herbs, plants, and fruits of the earth; for we see in lemon-trees and the like, that there is coming on at once fruit ripe, fruit unripe, and blossoms; which may show that the plant worketh to put forth continually, were it not for the variations of the excesses and recesses of the sun, which call forth, and put back.

The excessive heat of the sun doth wither and destroy vegetables, as well as the cold doth nip and blast them.

The heat or beams of the sun doth take away the smell of flowers, specially such as are of a milder odour.

The beams of the sun do disclose summer lowers, as the pimpernel, marigold, and almost all flowers else, for they close commonly morning and evening, or in overcast weather, and open in he brightness of the sun: which is but imputed to dryness and moisture, which doth make the beams heavy or erect, and not to any other propriety in the sunbeams; so they report not only a closing, but a bending or inclining in the "heliotropium" and "calendula." Qu.

The sunbeams do ripen all fruits, and addeth to them a sweetness or fatness; and yet some sultry hot days overcast, are noted to ripen more than bright days.

The sunbeams are thought to mend distilled waters, the glasses being well-stopped, and to make them more virtuous and fragrant.

The sunbeams do turn wine into vinegar; but Qu. whether they would not sweeten verjuice?

The sunbeams do pall any wine or beer that is set in them.

The sunbeams do take away the lustre of any silks or arras.

There is almost no mine but lieth some depth in the earth; gold is conceived to the highest, and in the hottest countries; yet Thracia and Hungary are cold, and the hills of Scotland have yielded gold, but in small grains or quantity.

If you set a root of a tree too deep in the ground, that root will perish, and the stock will put forth a new root nearer the superficies of the earth.

Some trees and plants prosper best in the shade; as the bays, strawberries, some wood-flowers.

Almost all flies love the sunbeams, so do snakes; toads and worms the contrary.

The sunbeams tanneth the skin of man; and in some places turneth it to black.

The sunbeams are hardly endured by many, but cause headache, faintness, and with many they cause rheums; yet to aged men they are comfortable.

The sun causes pestilence, which with us rages about autumn: but it is reported in Barbary they break up about June, and rage most in the winter.

The heat of the sun, and of fire, and living creatures, agree in some things which pertain to vivification; as the back of a chimney will set forward an apricot-tree as well as the sun; the fire will raise a dead butterfly as well as the sun; and so will the heat of a living creature. The heat of the sun in sand will hatch an egg. Qu.

The heat of the sun in the hottest countries nothing so violent as that of fire, no not scarcely so hot to the sense as that of a living creature.

The sun, a fountain of light as well as heat. The other celestial bodies manifest in light, and yet "non constat" whether all borrowed as in the moon, but obscure in heat.