The natural history of ants : from an unpublished manuscript in the archives of the Academy of Sciences of Paris / by René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur ; translated and annotated by William Morton Wheeler.

  • René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur
Date:
1926
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The natural history of ants : from an unpublished manuscript in the archives of the Academy of Sciences of Paris / by René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur ; translated and annotated by William Morton Wheeler. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    lustre to the scales of fishes, and this led him to study the development and growth of the scales themselves. These inquiries became linked to researches which he had carried on ever since 1709, into the formation and growth of the shells of mollusks, which he showed not to arise by intus¬ susception [or incorporation of new matter with every part of a pre-existing structure; Reaumur maintained that the shell grows by the addition of layers]. In 1717 he attended to pearl-formation, and sought to compel bivalves to pro¬ duce pearls. When he had occasion, in 1715, to describe the turquoise mines of the south of France, and the methods in use for producing the blue colour, he discovered that tur¬ quoises are the teeth of the large [extinct] animal, since described under the name of mastodon [this is true only of the so-called occidental turquoise, which forms on teeth and bones after long burial in the ground]. But his most impor¬ tant researches in technical science were those upon iron and steel, published as a separate work in 1 72.x under the title Traité sur Vart de convertir le fer en acier, et d'adoucir le fer fondu. Our forges were then almost in their infancy, and we made no steel; all that was required in the arts was brought to us from abroad. It was only by innumerable experiments that Reaumur came to discover the art of steel-making. The Duke of Orleans, then Regent of France, proposed to remu¬ nerate him for his service by a pension of twelve thousand livres. At this date no tinplate was made in France; all came to us from Germany; Réaumur succeeded in making it by a cheap method, which he published in 172.5. In his numerous experiments he had more than once occasion to remark that cast metals, in cooling, assumed regular forms; and this led him in 17x4 to give a first sketch of metallic crystallography. The manufacture of porcelain also inter¬ ested him; he sent to China for the materials, and busied himself in searching for similar minerals in France. His memoirs on this subject date from 17x7 to 172.9; his attempts were not entirely successful, but Darcet, and especially Mac- quer, following the indications given by him, were more fortunate, and succeeded in discovering the fine hard por-