NOTES —ORIGINAL AND SELECTED.
135
Method of Boring Wooden Water-Pipes in the
Seventeenth Century.—Mr. Eliot Howard has obligingly
called attention to a passage in Evelyn's Sylva, describing the
method of boring elm-trunks for water-pipes, and he has sent a
copy of the book, so that the accompanying photographic re-pro-
duction of the original copper-plate engraving could be made.
The extracts are from the 3rd edition (1679) of the book,
Chap, xxx., page 195:—1
". . . But I pursue these Instances no farther, concluding this Chapter
with the Norway Engine or Saw-Mill, to be either moved with the force of
Water or Wind, etc., for the more expedite cutting and converting of Timber, to
which we will add another, for the more facile perforation and boring of Elms, or
other Timber to make Pipes and Aquaeducts, and the excavating of column, to
preserve their shafts from splitting, to which otherwise they are obnoxious.
[Then follows a description and plate of the Norway Saw-Mill.] . . . The
second figure for Boring consists of an Ax-tree, to which is fastened a wheel of
six and thirty teeth, or more, as the velocity of the water-motion requires; for if
it be slow more teeth are requisite; there must also be a Pinion of six, turn'd by
the said indented Wheel. Then to the ax-tree of the Pinion is to be fixt a long
Auger, as in the letter A,2 which must pass through the hole B, to be opened and
clos'd as occasion, somewhat like a Turner's Lathe; the Tree or piece of Timber
to be Bored, is to be placed on the Frame C D, so as the Frame may easily slide
by the help of certain small Wheels, which are in the hollow of it, and turn upon
strong Pins, so as the Work man shove forward, or draw the Tree back, after
'tis fastened to the Frame; that so the Auger turning, the end of the Tree may
1 Sylva, Or a Discourse of Forest-Trees, and the Propagation of Timber in His Majesties
Dominions. . . . Third Edition. By John Evelyn Esq., Fellow of the Royal Society.
London. Printed tor John Martyn. Printer to the Royal Society, and arc to be sold at the
Bell in St. Paul's Churchyard. MDCLXX1X.
2 The lettering does not appear on the engraving.