Papin

Abstract

IN the review of my “Life and Letters of Papin”¹ in NATURE, vol. xxiv. p. 378, the hope is expressed that I might succeed “to fill the lacunæ in the career of this remarkable man.” The only important blank remaining now in our knowledge of Papin's life consists in our ignorance of the time of his death. We may rest assured that he died in London, and therefore this blank is not likely to be filled but by a person who is familiar with the city and its inhabitants of the present and of the beginning of last century. Papin died about 1712. During 1709 he lived at “Madam Portal chez M. Charron, apothécaire dans Compton Street, proche St. Anne.” As it is not probable that he changed his lodgings before his death a search in the registers of the district to which Compton Street belonged (if they are in existence) would lead to results equally important for the history of science and for that of technology. Maybe a reader of this note who enjoys such opportunities will render me his assistance in this thankful task.