With what view the Author engaged in this arduous course of study, how eager he was in the pursuit of knowledge, how anxious to avail himself of the best means of obtaining complete information on every subject to which he applied, and how careful to minute down whatever he procured that could be useful, have been already shewn in the course of the foregoing narrative; but in order to prevent the necessity of interrupting there the succession of events, it has been reserved for this place to describe the contents and extent of his collections, and to give a brief idea of the branches to which they relate.
On inquiry then we learn, that Leonardo’s productions of this kind consist of fourteen manuscript volumes, large and small, now in the library of the National Institute at Paris, whither they have been some few years since removed from the Ambrosian library at Milan; and of one folio volume in manuscript also, in the possession of his Majesty the King of Great Britain. Of those at Paris, J. B. Venturi, Professor of Natural Philosophy at Modena, and of the Institute of Bologna, &c. who was permitted to inspect them, says[1], that “they contain speculations in those branches of natural philosophy
- ↑ Venturi, p. 4.
