Tabor and pipe. When I was a boy, before the late civill warres, the tabor and pipe were commonly used, especially Sundays and Holydayes, and at Christnings and Feasts, in the Marches of Wales, Hereford, Glocestershire, and in all Wales. Now it is almost lost: the drumme and trumpet have putte that peaceable musique to silence. I believe 'tis derived from the Greek[1310] sistrum, a brasen or iron timbrel; cratalum[1311], a ring of brasse struck with an iron rod—so we play with the key and tongs.—MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 11v.
Clocks:—Chaucer, Nonne's Priest's tale—(Chanteclere).
'Well sikerer was his crowing in his loge
Then is a clock or in an Abbey an orloge.'
Sir Geoffrey Chaucer obiit 1400, aetatis 72.—MS. Aubr. 6, fol. 10v.
<The> clock[1312] at Paule's on the north crosse aisle west side <is> stately. That at Welles is like it. Vide Chaucer in aliqua vita[1313].—MS. Aubr. 8, fol. 10v.
Spectacles[1314]. Dr. Pell tells me the antiquity of spectacles is about two hundred yeares standing, and that they were sold, when first invented, for 3 or 5 li. a paire. The ancientest author wherin he finds them is cardinal Cusa—vide Cusanum, quaere Sir John Hoskins, who (I thinke) knowes. ['Tis ... Redi, an Italian, about 400 yeares since.] The Germans call them Brill, from the beril-stone, i.e. chrystall, of which they were first made. Κρύσταλλος is not properly 'chrystall,' but 'ice.' Erasmus in Colloquio Senis—
'Quid tibi vis cum vitreis oculis, fascinator?'
Vide Thomas Hobbes' Optiques in libro De Homine, where he interprets this piece of Plautus, in Cistellaria, act. 1, scen. 1:—
'Conspicillo consequutus 'st clanculum me usque ad fores,'