Farewell: finished in camp at the siege of Lucera on the eighth day of August, Anno Domini MCCLXIX. NOTES EARLY REFERENCES TO THE MARINER’S COMPASS The following are the passages referred to in the introductory notice: Abbot Neckam (1157-1217), in his _De Naturis Rerum_, writes: “The sailors, moreover, as they sail over the sea, when in cloudy weather they can no longer profit by the light of the sun, or when the world is wrapped up in the darkness of the shades of night and they are ignorant to what point their ship’s course is directed, these mariners touch the lodestone with a needle, which (the needle) is whirled round in a circle until when its motion ceases, its point looks direct to the north. (_Cuspis ipsius septentrionalem plagam respiciat._)” In his _De Utensilibus_, we read: “Among other stores of a ship, there must be a needle mounted on a dart (_habeat etiam acum jaculo superpositam_) which will oscillate and turn until the point looks to the north, and the sailors will thus know how to direct their course when the pole star is concealed through the troubled state of the atmosphere.”[5] Alexander Neckam was born at St. Albans in 1157, joined the Augustinian Order and taught in the University of Paris from 1180 to 1187, after which he returned to England to take charge of a College of his Order at Dunstable. He was elected Abbot of Cirencester in 1213 and died at Kemsey, near Worcester, in 1217. The satirical poem of Guyot de Provins, written about 1208, contains the following passage: The mariners employ an art which cannot deceive, By the property of the lodestone, An ugly stone and brown, To which iron joints itself willingly They have; they attend to where it points After they have applied a needle to it; And they lay the latter on a straw And put it simply in the water Where the straw makes it float. Then the point turns direct To the star with such certainty That no man will ever doubt it, Nor will it ever go wrong. When the sea is dark and hazy, That one sees neither star nor moon, Then they put a light by the needle And have no fear of losing their way. The point turns towards the star; And the mariners are taught To follow the right way. It is an art which cannot fail. Provins, from which Guyot took his surname, was a small town in the vicinity of Paris. Cardinal Jacques de Vitry, in his _Historia Orientalis_, Cap. 89, writes: “An iron needle, after having been in contact with the lodestone, turns towards the north star, so that it is very necessary for those who navigate the seas.” Jacques de Vitry was born at Argenteuil, near Paris, joined the fourth crusade, became Bishop of Ptolemais, and died in Rome in 1244. He wrote his “Description of Palestine,” which forms the first book of his _Historia Orientalis_, in the East, between 1215 and 1220.