Dorothy glanced around her for a moment.
'I would not be troublesome, my lord,' she said; 'but would you tell me in a few words what it is you make here ?' 'Had I three tongues, and thou three ears,' answered lord Herbert, 'I could not.

But look round thee, cousin, and when thou spiest the thing that draws thine eye more than another, ask me concerning that, and I will tell thee.' Hardly had Dorothy, in obedience, cast her eyes about the place, ere they lighted on the same huge wheel which had before chiefly attracted her notice.
'What is that great wheel for, with such a number of weights hung to it ?' she asked.
'For a memorial,' replied lord Herbert, 'of the folly of the man who placeth his hopes in man.

That wonderful engine; it is now nearly three years since I showed it to his blessed majesty in the Tower of London, also with him to the dukes of Richmond and Hamilton, and two extraordinary ambassadors besides, but of them all no man hath ever sought to look upon it again.

It is a form of the Proteus-like perpetuum mobile--a most incredible thing if not seen.' He then proceeded to show her how, as every spoke passed the highest point, the weight attached to it immediately hung a foot farther from the centre of the wheel, and as every spoke passed the lowest point, its weight returned a foot nearer to the centre, thus causing the leverage to be greater always on one and the same side of the wheel.

Few of my readers will regret so much as myself that I am unable to give them the constructive explanation his lordship gave Dorothy as to the shifting of the weights.