PETITION OF THE LETTER Z.* *

From "The Tatler," No. 1778.

To the Worshipful Isaac Bickerstaff, Esquire, CensorGeneral.

The petition of the letter Z, commonly called Ezzard, Zed, or Izard, most humbly showeth ;

That your petitioner is of as high extraction, and has as good an estate, as any other letter of the Alphabet;

That there is therefore no reason why he should be treated as he is, with disrespect and indignity;

That he is not only actually placed at the tail of the Alphabet, when he had as much right as any other to be at the head; but is by the injustice of his enemies totally excluded from the word WISE; and his place injuriously filled by a little hissing, crooked, serpentine, venomous letter, called S, when it must be evident to your worship, and to all the world, that W, I, S, E, do not spell Wize, but Wise.

Your petitioner therefore prays, that the Alphabet may by your censorial authority be reversed; and that in consideration of his long-suffering and patience he may be placed at the head of it; that s may be turned out of the word Wise; and the petitioner employed instead of him.

And your petitioner, as in duty bound, shall ever pray, &c. &c.

The date of this jeu d'esprit in imitation of "The Tatler," from which it purports to be an extract, is not known. It is inserted in this place as being somewhat kindred in its subject to the preceding article. - EDITOR

Mr. Bickerstaff, having examined the allegations of the above petition, judges and determines, that Z be admonished to be content with his station, forbear reflections upon his brother letters, and remember his own small usefulness, and the little occasion there is for him in the Republic of Letters, since S whom he so despises can so well serve instead of him.

TO JOHN WINTHROP.

Telescope and Books for Harvard College.

DEAR SIR,

London, 11 March, 1769.

At length after much delay and difficulty I have been able to obtain your telescope, that was made by Mr. Short before his death. His brother who succeeds in the business has fitted it up and completed it. He has followed the business many years at Edinburgh, is reckoned very able, and therefore I hope every thing will be found right; but, as it is only just finished, I have no time left to get any philosophical or astronomical friends to examine it, as I intended, the ship being on the point of sailing, and a future opportunity uncertain. Enclosed is his direction-paper for opening and fixing it.

I have not yet got the bill of the price. It is to be made from the deceased Mr. Short's book of memorandums and orders, in which he entered this order of ours, and, as it is supposed, the price. I do not remember, it is so long since, whether it was one hundred pounds, or one hundred guineas; and the book is in the hands of the executor as I understand. When I have the account, I shall pay it as I did Bird's for

way,

the transit instrument, which was forty guineas, and then shall apply for the whole to Mr. Mauduit. By the I wonder that I have not heard from you of the receipt of that instrument, which went rom nence in September by Captain Watt. I hope it got safe to hand and gave satisfaction. The ship was the same that Mr. Rogers went in, who I near is arrived; and by him too I sent the Philosophical Transactions, with a number of copies of your paper as printed separately. But I have no letter from you since that by the young gentleman you recommended to me, grandson to Sir William Pepperell, which I think was dated about the beginning of October, when you could not have received them.

By a late ship, I sent your College a copy of the new edition of my Philosophical Papers; and others, I think, for yourself and for Mr. Bowdoin. I should apologize to you for inserting therein some part of our correspondence without first obtaining your permission; but, as Mr. Bowdoin had favored me with his consent for what related to him, I ventured to rely upon your good-nature, as to what related to you, and I hope you will forgive me.

I have got from Mr. Ellicot the glasses, &c. of the long Galilean telescope, which we presents to your college. I put them into the hands of Mr. Nairne, the optician, to examine and put them in order. to have sent them by this ship, but am disappointed. thought They shall go by the next, if possicle.

Л

There is nothing new here in tre phnosopnical way at present.

With great and sincere esteem, I am, Dear Sir,

Your most obedient and numble servant,
B. FRANKLIN.

P. S. There is no prospect of getting the duty acts

repealed this session, if ever. Your steady resolutions to consume no more British goods may possibly, if persisted in, have a good effect another year. I apprehend the Parliamentary resolves and address will tend to widen the breach. Enclosed I send you Governor Pownall's speech against those resolves; his name is not to be mentioned. He appears to me a hearty friend to America, though I find he is suspected by some on account of his connexions.

TO M. DUBOURG.*

Introducing Dr. Lettsom.

London, 30 August, 1769.

THIS letter will be forwarded to you by Dr. Lettsom, a young American physician of much merit, and one of the peaceable sect of Quakers; you will therefore at least regard him as a curiosity, even though you should have embraced all the opinions of the majority of your countrymen concerning these people.

B. FRANKLIN.

ON VENTILATION.

Written by Mr. Small, the Surgeon, but containing Dr Franklin's Observations on the Subject.

I Do not know that we have in any author particula and separate directions concerning the ventilating of hospitals, crowded rooms, or dwellinghouses; or the

Trans.ated from M. Dubourg's edition of Franklin's Works, Vol. II p. 314. EDITOR.

making of proper drains for carrying off stagnant or putrid water. The want of such general information on these subjects, has induced me to endeavour to recollect all I can of the many instructive conversations I have had upon these matters with that judicious and most accurate observer of nature, Dr. Benjamin Franklin. I do this in hopes that either the Doctor himself, or some other person well qualified for the task, may follow the example set in so masterly a manner by Sir John Pringle, Baronet, when speaking on the preservation of the health of seamen.

It has long been observed, that if a number of persons are shut up in a small room, of which the internal air has little or no communication with the external, the respiration of those who are so confined renders by degrees the air of that room effete, and unfit for the support of life.

Dr. Franklin was, if I mistake not, the first who observed, that respiration communicated to the air a quality resembling the mephitic; such as the Grotto del Cane near Naples. The air impressed with this quality rises only to a certain height, beyond which it gradually loses it. The amendment begins in the upper part, and descends gradually until the whole becomes capable of sustaining life. The Doctor confirmed this by the following experiment. He breathed gently through a tube into a deep glass mug, so as to impregnate all the air in the mug with this quality. He then put a lighted bougie into the mug; and upon touching the air therein the flame was instantly extinguished; by frequently repeating this operation, the bougie gradually preserved its light longer in the mug, so as in a short time to retain it to the bottom of it, the air having totally lost the bad quality it had contracted from the breath blown into it.