Henry Darcy and His LawHenry Darcy and His Law
About the Translation
The translation of Darcy's
1856 Appendix, Note D was started as an experiment in the use
of translation programs. What it turned out to be was a lesson
in the difference between 19th century French and Modern English.
The French of that era preferred compound and run-on sentences.
Thus, a word for word, or phase for phase translation will yield
a document that modern English speakers would find almost offensive.
However, I didn't want to destroy Darcy's voice by rewriting each
passage in my own words. As a compromise, Darcy's complex sentence
structure remains, but a light hand was used in editing. Hopefully
as you read this you will hear Henry and not the translator.
As for the mechanics of the process, Hope Nickels retyped the document in French and scanned the illustration using M. King Hubbert's 1969 facsimile of the original. The Babel Fish web software at http://babelfish.altavista.com/cgi-bin/translate? was then used to translate the text sentence by sentence. Finally, Bruno Cateni, Research Engineer, OSU and a French native provided assistance in smoothing out rough spots.
After this work was finished, Allan Freeze's 1983 translation was discovered. (There's no replacement for time in the library.) Dr. Freeze took a different approach and used his "school boy French" to make a more modern version. However, there are no points of significant difference between the two that I am aware of, and some may prefer Freeze's work over this one.
Glenn Brown
Oklahoma State University