Note 8 — Chapter IV
Reading edition
The experiment we have just described is a very old one. M. V. Sircoulon has told us that it was described at length in the works of Rabelais. The following remarks are in “Pantagruel,” book II., chap. xvii.
“Panuræ then took two glasses of the same size, filled them with water, and put one on one stool, and the other on another, about five feet apart, and placed the staff of a javelin about five-and-a-half feet long across, so that the ends of the staff just touched the brim of the glasses. That done, he took a stout piece of wood, and said to the others: “Gentlemen, this is how we shall conquer our enemies; for in the same way that I shall break this staff between these two glasses, without the glasses being broken or injured, or spilling a single drop of water, so shall we break the head of our Dipsodes, without any injury to ourselves, and without getting wounded. But that you may not think there is magic in it, you, Eusthenes, strike with this stick as hard as you can in the centre.” This Eusthenes did, and the staff broke in two pieces, without a drop of water being spilt.