A watch to go constantly, and yet needs no other winding from the first setting on the cord or chain, unless it be broken, requiring no other care from one than to be now and then consulted with, concerning the hour of the day or night; and if it be laid by a week together, it will not err much; but the oftener looked upon, the more exact it showeth the time of the day or night.
NOTE.
For a pocket watch it will be necessary to employ a small balance, with a nut attached to its axis and communicating with the fusee, the continued vibration of which will, by winding the watch, give it nearly all the advantages of a perpetual prime mover. Should the time-piece be placed in a fixed case it will require a communication between the joint of the door and the fusee, and this may likewise be readily applied to the case of a hunting watch.
Mr. Gout's pedometer not only marks the time, but the number of paces passed over from one place to another: this is accomplished by means of a chain or string passing to the leg of the wearer, or to the wheel of a chariot, which is made to advance the index hand one division at each elevation of the foot: thus, on the same dial, exhibiting, at one view, both time and distance. The same pedometer will, by a proper application to the saddle, ascertain every pace a horse takes, and it may be made to change its performance in a second, should the horse in the course of measuring go from one pace to another.
No. LXXIX.
A way to lock all the boxes of a cabinet (though never so many) at one time, which were, by particular keys appropriated to each lock, opened severally, and independent the one of the other, as much as concerneth the opening of them, and by these means cannot be left open unawares.
NOTE.
This suggestion, which is both ingenious and useful, might be advantageously adopted in every description of cabinet or chest now in use; it may be performed either by cranks and wires, or by sliding bolts and levers communicating with each lock: the latter way, though attended with greater expense, is by far the most durable.
Another and more simple mode offers itself in the use of a series of spring locks, which may be closed by the pressure of the lid, unconnected with any other mechanism.
No. LXXX.
How to make a pistol barrel no thicker than a shilling, and yet able to endure a musket proof of powder and bullet.
NOTE.