"Let the annexed diagram, Fig. 17, represent a wheel of 14 feet in diameter, having 40 spokes, seven feet each, and with an inner rim coinciding with the periphery, at one foot distance all round. Next provide 40 balls or weights, hanging in the center of cords or chains two feet long. Now, fasten one end of this cord at the top of the center spoke C, and the other end of the cord to the next right-hand spoke one foot below the upper end, or on the inner ring; proceed in like manner with every other spoke in succession; and it will be found that, at A, the cord will have the position shown outside the wheel; while at B, C, and D, it will also take the respective positions, as shown on the outside. The result in this case will be, that all the weights on the side A, C, D, hang to the great or outer circle, while on the side B, C, D, all the weights are suspended from the lesser or inner circle. And if we reverse the motion of the wheel, turning it from the right to the left hand, we shall reverse these positions also (the lower end of the cord sliding in a groove towards a left-hand spoke), but without the wheel having any tendency to move of itself." But it is quite as likely that the wheel constructed by the Marquis was like one of the "overbalancing" wheels described at the beginning of this article. It is upon this "scantling" that has been based the claim that the Marquis really invented a perpetual motion, but to those who have seen much of inventors of this kind, the discrepancy between the suggested claim made by the Marquis and what we know must have been the actual results, is easily explained. The Marquis felt sure that the thing _ought to work_, and the excuse for its not doing so was probably the imperfect manner in which the wheel was made. Only put a little better work on it, says the inventor, and it will go. Caspar Kaltoff, mechanician to the Marquis, probably got the wheel up in a hurry so as to exhibit it on the occasion of the king's visit to the tower. If he only had had a little more time he would have made a machine that would have worked. (?) I have heard the same excuse under almost the same circumstances, scores of times.