An historical tidbit from an unknown source:
In the heyday of sailing ships, all warships carried iron cannons. Those cannons fired round iron cannon balls. It was
necessary to keep a good supply near the cannon.
How to prevent them from
rolling about the deck?
The best storage method devised was a square-based pyramid with
one ball on top, resting on four resting on nine, which rested on sixteen.
Thus, a supply of 30 cannon balls could be stacked in a small area right next
to the cannon. But, you see the problem: how to prevent the bottom layer from
sliding or rolling from under the others?
The solution was a metal plate called
a “monkey” with 16 round indentations.
However, if this plate were made of
iron, the iron balls would quickly rust to it.
The solution to the rusting
problem was to make “brass monkeys.”
Few landlubbers realize that brass contracts much more and much
faster than iron when chilled. Consequently, when the temperature dropped abruptly,
the brass with its circular indentations would shrink so much that the iron
cannonballs would roll right off the plate. Thus, it was literally “cold enough
to freeze the balls off a brass monkey.”
I offer this instructive item purely in the interests of
scientific lexicology,
and certainly not from any prurient motivation…..
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