of Herculaneum were discovered, by the accidental striking upon some pieces of marble and statues, which subsequently proved to be part of a temple, situated in the midst of Herculaneum, buried by an eruption of Vesuvius, 1630 years before ; and it is a fact interesting in itself and not foreign to our subject, to add, that among the remarkable discoveries of this long buried city, was a well in a high state of preservation, which, having been protected by a covering and surmounted with a curb, had been kept free from the lava and ashes. It still con- tains excellent water, and is in the same condition as when the last females retired from it, bearing vases of its water to their dwellings, from which they were never to emerge again. The most remarkable well, probably, ever made by man, is Joseph's well at Cairo, of which we copy from Ewbank this brief arid clear description : " This well, which for magnitude and the skill displayed in its construction, has never been surpassed, is an oblong square, 24 feet by 18, being sufficiently capacious to admit within its mouth a moderate sized house. It is excavated of these dimensions through solid rock to the depth of 165 feet, where it is enlarged into a capacious chamber, in the bottom of which is formed a basin, or reservoir, to receive the water raised from below, for this chamber is not the bottom of the well. On one side of the reservoir, another shaft is continued 130 feet lower, where it emerges through the rock into a bed of gravel, in which the water is found, the whole depth being 297 feet. The lower shaft is not in the same vertical line as the upper one, nor is it so large, being 15 feet by 9. As the water is first raised into the basin by means of machinery, propelled by horses or oxen within the chamber, it may be asked how are these animals conveyed to that depth, in this tremendous pit, and by what means do they ascend 1 It is the solution of this problem that renders Joseph's well so peculiarly interesting^ and which indicates such an advanced state of the arts at the period of its construction. " A spiral passage way is cut through the rock, from the surface of the ground to the chamber, independent of the well, round which it winds with so gentle a descent, that persons sometimes ride up or down upon asses or mules. It is six feet four inches wide, and seven feet two inches high. Between it and the interior of the well, a wall of rock is left, to prevent persons falling, or even looking down into it except through certain openings, or windows, by means of which it is faintly lighted from the interior of the well ; by this passage the animals descend which drive the machinery that raises the water from the lower shaft into the reservoir, or basin, from which it is again raised by similar machinery and other animals on the surface. In the lower shaft a path is also cut down to the water, but as no partition is left between it and the well, it is extremely perilous for strangers to descend. The water is raised in earthenware pots attached to endless chains or ropes, that as they pass over the wheel at the top, empty their contents into a trough and descend in a reversed position. " This celebrated well resembles an enormous hollow screw, the centre of which 4 PRELIMINARY ESSAY. forms the well, and the threads a winding stair-case round it. To erect of granite a flight of "geometrical" or "• well-stairs," two or three hundred feet high, on the surface of the ground, would require extraordinary skillr although in the execution every aid from rules, measures,, and the light of day, would guide the workmen at every step ; but to' begin such a work at the top and construct it downward, by excavation alone, in the dark bowels of the earth,, is a more arduous undertaking, especially as deviations from the correct lines could not be corrected. Yet in Joseph's well, the partition of rock be- tween the pit and the passage way, and the uniform inclination of the latter, seem to have been ascertained with equal precision as if the whole had been constructed of cut stone on the surface. Was the pit or the passage formed first, or were they simultaneously carried on, and the excavated masses from both borne up the latter 1 The extreme thin- ness of the partition justly excited the astonishment of M. Jomard, whose account of the well is inserted in the 2d volume of Memoirs of Napoleon's