In 1823, _the first patent of invention_ was taken out in Paris by Madame Dutillet, for the formation of artificial marble. This was so successful a patent, that she sold it in 1824; and the purchaser renewed it, with still further improvements. In 1836, Burrows, an Englishman, took out a patent for cement. Madame Bex, of Paris, found this cement a failure in damp places, and published a method of less limited application, in which bitumen was employed. In 1840, Mrs. Marshall, once of Manchester, England, and now of Edinburgh, was struck with the idea, that the electric forces evolved by decaying animal and vegetable matter, acting upon calcareous substances, must have much to do with the natural formation of marble. In five years, by upwards of ten thousand experiments, she perfected an artificial marble, whose constituents and manufacture were entirely within control, and which could be made in hours or months, at the maker's volition. To this cement she gave the simple Italian name of _intonuca_. It is singular that she should so intuitively have seized this secret; for, under Madame Dutillet's patent, we are expressly informed that all vegetable matter must be removed from the composition, if we would have the cement indestructible. The example is an interesting one; for the ten thousand disagreeable experiments show that one woman at least possessed the power of persistent application, of long-protracted labor, so often denied. Starch first came into use in England in 1564. It was carried thither by a Mrs. Dinghen Vanden Plasse, of Flanders, who set up business as a professed starcher, and instructed others how to use the article for five pounds, and how to make it for twenty pounds. Side-saddles for ladies first came into use in 1138. Anne, queen of Richard II., introduced these to the English ladies. The braiding of straw in this country was first begun in Providence, in 1798, by Mrs. Betsey Baker, lately residing in Dedham, Mass. The first bonnet she made was of seven straws with bobbin let in like open-work, and lined with pink satin. I had hoped to add to these names that of a peasant woman, who successfully drained a large estate in France after her own original fashion, and was sent from Paris to do the same in French Guiana for the government; but, although no phantom, she eludes my researches. [19] Historical Pictures of the Middle Ages, in Black and White. [20] Ernest Legouvé.