in navigation, is a machine which has been described with sufficient accuracy in the Encyclopaedia; but the following account of its invention, given by Professor Beckmann, is perhaps not unworthy of a place in this Supplement.

"In the Zuider-Zee, opposite to the mouth of the river Y, about six miles from the city of Amsterdam, there are two sand banks, between which is a passage called the Pampus, which is sufficiently deep for small ships, but not for such as are large or heavy laden. In 1672 the Dutch contrived, however, to carry their numerous fleet through this passage, by means of large empty chests fastened to the bottom of each ship; and this contrivance gave rise to the invention of the camel."

In the Encyclopaedia Britannica its invention is given to the famous De Wit; in the German Cyclopaedia to Meyer a Dutch engineer of very considerable eminence; but the Dutch writers, almost unanimously, ascribe the invention of the camel to a citizen of Amsterdam, who calls himself Meuvées Meindertsoon Bakker. "Some make the year of the invention to have been 1688, and others 1690. Much has been said of the utility of this invention; but however beneficial it may be, we have reason to suppose that such heavy vessels as ships of war cannot be raised up, in so violent a manner, without sustaining injury. A sure proof of this is the well-known circumstance mentioned by Muenchenbrock (Introductio ad Philosoph. Natur.), that the ports of a ship which had been raised by the camel could not afterwards be shut closely."