k. < m o r ^ gleg >e,A.^ O <3 <^' W § J ^ S r^:; PQ PQ 3 ON ON <,^ Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/dictionaryofseieOObranrich A DICTIONARY SCIENCE, LITERATURE, & ART. ^J^^ London : Printed by A. Spottiswoode, New-Street-Square. A DICTIONARY OF SCIENCE, LITERATURE, & ART: COMFRISIKG THE HISTORY, DESCRIPTION, AND SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES or EVERT BRANCH OF ?l^uman WittoMttist; WITH THB DERIVATION AND DEFINITION OF ALL THE TERMS IN GENERAL USE. EDITED BY W. T. (MANDE, F.R.S. L. & E. PROFESSOR OF CHEMISTRY IK THE ROYAL INSTITUTION OF GREAT BRITAIN; PROFESSOR OF CHEMISTRY AND MATERIA MEDICA TO THE APOTHECARIES* COMPANY; ETC. ETC. ETC. Assisted by JOSEPH CAUVIN, ESQ. THE VARIOUS DEPARTMENTS BY EMINENT LITERARY AND SCIENTIFIC GENTLEMEN. ILLUSTRATED BY NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS ON WOOD. LONDON: PRINTED KOR LONGMAN, BROWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS, liNOSTEI 1842. PATERNOSTER ROW. PREFACE. The advantages of Encyclopaedias are now so universally acknowledged, that it would be wholly superfluous to endeavour to recommend the pre- sent work by dwelling on their peculiar merits. But though the utility of such works be no longer in dispute, it may, notwithstanding, be reason- ably supposed that at a period when so many voluminous Encyclopaedias, and special Dictionaries, have recently issued, and are still daily issuing from the press, this department of literature must be fully occupied, and that there can be no well-founded call for any farther addition to the number. It will be found, however, on a little consideration that this is by no means the case. By far the greater number, or rather, perhaps we might say, all the Encyclopaedias and Dictionaries of modern times, are either too voluminous or too special for ready reference and general use. The Encyclopedie Fran^aise, Reess CyclopcRdia, the EncyclopcBdia JBritan- nicUf the Encyclopcedia Metropolitana, and the Penny Cyclopcedia, are all works of vast extent, comprising many volumes, and embracing an infinite variety of articles, or rather treatises, which, if published separately, would each make a considerable work. Now it is obvious that such voluminous publications, whatever may be their merits in other respects, want that facility of reference and precision of statement which ought to be the dis- tinguishing features of a useful Dictionary. No man can carry about with him any of the great modern Encyclopaedias ; while the extensive plan on which they are compiled renders them at once far too expensive for general circulation, and wholly unsuitable for ready consultation. The supply, indeed, of that concise and authentic information on the various subjects of science, literature, and art, which a book of reference should furnish with the utmost facility to all classes of readers, has been but a secondary object with the compilers of our great Encyclopaedias ; and though it had been otherwise, the length, theoretical character, and frequent ob- scurity of the articles in such works, must have effectually precluded their ever being used for mere purposes of reference. They are valuable as substitutes for libraries, as repositories of the various knowledge connected with the different departments of which they treat ; and being so, they cannot be convenient manuals. Special Dictionaries, on the other hand, though they may exhaust some one branch or department of science, literature, or art, and be invaluable to those engaged in its cultivation, and to those who wish to become acquainted with its details, are not intended to supply information on other branches. A work therefore like that now offered to the public, possessing the com- prehensive character of a general encyclopa;dia without its amplitude, and 588 vi PREFACE. aifording in a convenient form an abstract of the principles of every branch of knowledge, and a definition and explanation of the various terms in science, literature, and art which occur in reading and conversation, appears to be still wanting. May we hope that this desideratum which has been long felt to exist in encyclopedical literature, has been at length supplied ! Such at least will be the case, should the present work answer the expectations of its authors and publishers. They have endeavoured to produce a condensed and com- pendious Dictionary, of a convenient size, and adapted to the wants and means of all classes, that may be advantageously used as a manual or re- ference book in every department of science, literature, and art: and they flatter themselves that by rejecting all discussion and details not indispen- sable to the proper elucidation of the different topics, the work will be found, notwithstanding its comparatively narrow limits, to furnish, in the readiest possible manner, precise and accurate information on the all but infinite variety of subjects which it embraces. Great pains have been taken to make the definitions and explanations correct, clear, and concise. The principles of the most popular and important departments of science, lite- rature, and art are also distinctly though briefly explained; and notices are given of their rise, progress, and present state. Neither must it be supposed that because these articles are for the most part brief and compendious, they are either flimsy or superficial. On the contrary, they have been compiled throughout with the greatest care. Popularity has not been sought for at the expense of science, nor brevity by the sacrifice of useful facts or appropriate illustrations. The work contains not a few new and original views ; and it is confidently believed that in every department it will be found to embody the latest information, and to be on a level with the most advanced state to which knowledge has attained, not merely in this but also in other countries. No statement has been made as to any unusual or doubtful matter, without referring to the authority whence it has been derived ; and when subjects .of general interest and importance are noticed, the reader is referred to the works relating to them in which they are handled with the greatest ability. Not only, therefore, will those who may consult this work have a guarantee for the authenticity of its information, but they will learn the sources to which they may resort with the greatest advantage, should they wish to make farther inquiries. Such, in a few words, is the design of this work ; and, unless its publishers be greatly deceived as to its execution, it can hardly fail to be useful to in- dividuals of all ranks and conditions — to the man of business, and the man of pleasure, the student and the superficial reader, the busy and the idle. Every one who takes any share in conversation, or who dips, how cursorily soever, into any newspaper or other publication, will every now and then find the advantage of having access to the Dictionary of Science, Literature, and Art. In finally submitting the work to the judgment of the public, the publishers may, perhaps, be allowed to say that they have left no means untried that appeared likely to insure the accuracy and excellence of the work. It was distributed into divisions or departments, each embracing a single subject, PREFACE. vu or a class of closely allied subjects ; and these were respectively assigned to gentlemen distinguished by their attention to, and proficiency in, the topics to be treated of. This seemed the most likely means to avoid mere compilation ; to insure accuracy and adequate information ; and to make the work not only a comprehensive and correct, but in some measure also an original, digest and synopsis of human knowledge. List of the principal Authors of the work, with the departments for which they are respectively responsible. General Editoe, W. T. BRANDE, F.R.S.L. &E. Of Her Majesty's Mint ; Professor of Chemistry in the Royal Institution of Great Britain ; Prof, of Chemistry and Materia Medica to the Apothecaries* Company, &c. Assisted by JOSEPH CAUVIN, Esq, 1. Architectuee, Music, and the Fine Arts... Joseph Gwilt, F.S. A. & F.R. A.S. o xir^r^ . xT^ / J- LiNDLEY, Ph.D. F.R.S. L.S. &c. £. iJOTANY .......-{ Professor of Botany in Unirersity College, and in L the Royal Institution. 3. Chemistry, Geology, Mineralogy, Medi-I CINE, AND the Arts AND SCIENCES DE- I- W. T. Brande, Esq. (Editor). PENDING ON Chemical Principles . J 4. Gardening and Agriculture . . . J. C. Loudon, F. L. S. H. S. &c. 5. Law ... .... Herman Merivale, A. M. Late Fellow of Baliol College. 7. Mathematics, and the Arts and Sciences "j depending on Mathematical Princi- > Thos. Galloway, M. A. F. B. S. PLES . J 8. Nautical Science Lieutenant Raper, R. N. &c. 9. Political Economy and Statistics . J. R. M'Culloch, Esq. 10. Theology The Rev. Chas. Merivale, M. A. 11. Zoology, Anatomy, and Physiology . Richard Owen, F. R. S. &c. DICTIONARY SCIENCE. LITERATURE, AND ART. A. The first letter of the Alphabet, in all known lan- guages, with the exception of the Amaric, a dialect of the I'thiopian, in whicj) it is the 13th, and of the Runic, in which it is the 10th. It was called Alpha by the Greeks, and Aleph by the H^l^rews. ABACrSQUS {see Abacus). In Architecture, any flat member. The square compartment of a mosaic pave- ment. . ABA'CK, in sea language, denotes the position of tlie sails when flatted against the mast by the force of the wind. This may happen either by a sudden change of the wind, or an alteration of the ship's course ; or the sails may be laid aback for the purpose of avoiding some im- minent danger. A'BACOT. A cap of state worn by the old English kings. A'BACUS. (Gr. «£«!, a slab.) In Architecture, the upper part or crowning member of the capital of a column. This member alone seems to have constituted the primitive capital. It is an essential and constituent part of the capital. In the Tuscan, Doric, and Ionic orders it is square, and in the Corinthian and composite curved inwards on its plane and truncated at the quoins or angles at 45 degrees with the face of the entablature. The use of the abacus is to give breadth to the top of the column, and present a larger surface of level bed for the reception of the architrave. Abacus. An ancient instrument used for assisting numerical calculations. This term has been variously derived ; from the Greek word, abax, signifying a table ; a Phoenician wotd, abak. signifying sand (because when covered with sand it served for the purposes of writing) ; but its derivation is most probably to be referred to the three first letters of the Greek alphabet. The use of the abacus will be readily understood from the annexed figure. A parallelogram is divided by parallel bars, on which small pebbles or counters are placed. The counters on the lowest bar denote units, those on the se-. cond tens, those on the third hundreds, and so on ; one coun- ter on a superior bar being equal to ten on the bar immediately below it. By means of nine coun- ters for each bar, it is obvious that any number may be thus expressed. But the number of counters may be dimi- nished by placing a counter on the intermediate space be- tween two bars, giving it the value of five on the bar below. When seven bars are used, any number may be expressed under ten millions. The number represented in the figure is 845,398. It will be observed that the artificial value given to the counters, according to the positions which they occupy, is entirely analogous to our numerical system of digits. The form of the instrument admitted of considerable variety. The Grecian abacus 1 • — • • • — • • • ~% « ^_ • •— • — •- — •— -■■• -♦ • • — A BATON. was an oblong frame, having wires stretched across it, strung with perforated beads or little ivory balls. Iix the Roman abacus the counters were slid along grooves. Its use formed an essential part of the education of every noble Roman youth : — Nee qui abaco numeros, et secio in pulvere metcu, Scit lisisse vafer Pert. Sat. 1. 132. The Chinese, like the Greeks, employ wires with beads ; and with them the abacus or Swan-pan is in universal use, as it conveniently adapts itself to their decimal divisions of weights and measures. The abacus continued to be used in European countries during the middle ages. Instead of a board, however, with bars or wires, it became the prac- tice to cover a bench or bank with chequered cloth, on which the counters were disposed. Hence our terms ex- chequer, bailkrupt, &c. A chequered board, such as is still sometimes seen as a sign at the doors of public houses, was formerly used in this country as an abacus. For an excellent account of the abacus, and of palpable arithmetic generally, see the article on Arithmetic, in the Supi)lement to the Encyclopaedia Britaiinica, by Sir John Leslie. ABA'FT, or AFT, in sea language, signifies towards the stern, or hinder part of the vessel. Thus a thing is abail the foremast when it is between the foremast and the stern. ABA'NDONMENT. A term used in insurances, where, before compensation can be demanded, the in- surer must abandon his interest in any portion of the rescued property. It is also used in the language of the customs, to signify the abandonment of an article by the importer to avoid paj^mcnt of the duty. ABA'TEMENT, Plea of, in Law, is pleaded to a de- claration, writ, &c., on account of some defect in form. (See Pleading.) Abatement. In Heraldry, symbols of disgrace in- troduced into arms : mentioned for the most part only by English heraldic writers. A delf, or quadrant spot, is the sign of a revoked challenge : an escutcheon reversed^ belongs to an ungallant person or deserter : a point dexter parted, to a boaster : a point in point, to a coward : a point champain, to one who kills a prisoner of war : a gore sinister, to effeminate persons : a gusset dexter denotes voluptuousness, a gusset sinister intoxication. The only abatement now used in practice is the baston,vi\\icYi belongs to bastards ; it is in the form of the bend sinister, con- tains one fourth of its dimensions, but does not reach quite to the circumference of the escutcheon. A'BATIS. (Fr. abattre, to knock down.) A military term, signifying trees cut down, and laid with their branches towards the enemy, so as to form a defence for troops stationed behind them. Abatis, among the writers of the barbarous ages, denotes an officer in the stables, who had the care and distribution of the provender. A'BATON. (Gr. tnQccTov, an inaccessible place) An edifice at Rhodes so called by Vitruvius, lib. 2., the B ABATTOIR. entrance whereof was forbidden to all persons, because It contained a trophy and two bronze statues erected by Artemisia in memory of her triumph on surprising the city. ABATTOIR. {Tr.abattre, to knockdown.) A build- ing appropriated to the slaughtering of cattle. In Great Britain we have no example of such a structure, our slaughter-houses not deserving the appellation as applied by the French. Paris possesses some fine specimens of this sort of architecture, constructed in 1809 ; the most magnificent is that in the neighbourhood of Montmartre. ABBE'. The French term for the superior of an abbey. Before the Revolution the title was assumed also by a class of persons who had not in all cases received the tonsure, or undertaken to connect them- selves with the church. They held a conspicuous place in society, and generally attached themselves to fashion- able or literary patrons. This anomalous class seems to have taken its rise from the great number of abbeys, the revenues of which were allowed to be bestowed upon laymen, upon condition of their taking orders withm a year after their preferment, which latter clause was fre- quently evaded. A'BBESS. {Fr. Abbesse.) The governess or superior of a monastery or abbey for females. By a decree of the Council of Trent she must be of the age of forty years, and have professed eight years at least. A'BBEY. (Fr. Abbdie.) In Architecture, properly, the building adjoining or near a convent or monastery, for the residence of the head of the house, abbot or abbess. It is often used for the church attached to the establishment. In ecclesiastical history an Abbey was a monastery under the superintendence cf on abbot, maintaining in later times the highest rank among re- ligious houses, and enjoying some superior privileges. A'BBOT. The superior ofa monastery for men. Monas- tic societies, being originally composed of laymen, were obliged to have recourse to the assistance of a neighbour- ing priest to administer the sacraments and perform other clerical functions among them. Afterwards the superior of the society in many cases entered into orders, and exercised the ministerial office for the convenience of his community, under the title of abbot. (Heb. abh^i, father.) From the iDeginning of the sixth century this practice became universal, the abbot having absolute power within his own monastery, but being himself subject to the authority of his diocesan. This subjection, however, the abbots gradually threw off to a great extent, and in many places themselves assumed the titles and authority of bishops. Such were the mitred abbots, and the cro- siered abbots ; the former of whom, to the number of 26, sat in the English parliament with the bishops and two priors in the reign of Henry VIII. Abbots are properly superior in rank to Priors ; the latter being often appointed by the abbot to superintend a dependent foundation. But the distinction docs not appear to have been regularly observed, and there are certain orders whose superiors are always called priors ; — as the monks of Vallombrosa, the Cistercians, Ber- nardists, Feuillants, Trappists, Grandmontanists, and Praemonstraten ses . ABBREVIA'TION. (Eat. brevis, short.) In Arith- metic. The process by which a fraction is reduced to lower terms ; thus the division of the numerator and denominator of ^| by 8 reduces or abbreviates the frac- tion to f . Abbreviation. In Music. A stroke which, placed over or under a note, divides it into quavers if there be only one ; if two, into semiquavers ; if three, into demisemiquavers. Abbreviation, In Writing. Before the inven- tion of printing, a variety of abbreviations were used, most of which have gradually fallen into disuse: they generally consisted in substituting the initials for the words. Of the abbreviations at present in use, the fol- lowing are those which most commonly occur : — inTitles, A.M., Master of Arts. K.C. H., Knight Com- A. B., Bachelor of Arts. mander of Hanover. B. C. L., Bachelor of Civil K. G., Knight of the Garter. Law. LL. D., Doctor of Laws. B. D., Bachelor of Divinity. M. A., Master of Arts. Clk., Clerk or Clergjnnan. M. D., Doctor of Medicine C. B., Companion of the M. P., Member of Parlia- Bath. ment. D.C.L., Doctor of Civil M.,R. I. A., Member of the Law. Royal Irish Acaden:y. D. D., Doctor of Divinity. R. A., Royal Academy. F. R. S., Fellow of the R.E., Royal Engineers. Royal Society. R.M., Royal Marines. G. C. B., Grand Cross of the R.N., Royal Navy. Bath. S.T.P., Doctor of Di- G. C. H., Grand Cross of vinity, or Sanctae The- Hanover. ologiae Professor. K. B., Knight of the Bath. E. I. C, East India Com- K. C. B., Knight Com- pany. wander of the Bath. W. S., Writer to the Signet. 2 ABERDEVINE. Miscellaneous, Diplomatical, &c. A. D., the year of our Lord. A. H., the year of the He- gira. A. M . , the year of the world, i. e., that is to say. ib., in the same place, id., the same. N. B., observe, viz., for videlicet, to wit. L. S., (in a deed) the place of the seal. R. S. and L. S., right and left side. N. S., new style, (since 1752.) O. S., old style, (before 1752, and in the Greek calendar.) A. C. or B. C, the year be- fore Christ. A. U. C, the year from the building of Rome. Nem. con., no one contra- dicting. Nem.dis., no one dissenting. M. S., manuscript. A. M., morning. P.M., afternoon. n.M.S.,His Majesty's ship, or service. D. G., by the grace of God. F.D., Defender of the Faith. H. R. E., Holy Roman Em- pire. U. S., United States of America. ABDICA'TION. {"LdX. abAico, I abdicate.) In Po- litics, the renunciation of an office or dignity by its holder; but it is commonly meant to express the voluntary re- nunciation of supreme power. The most famous exam- ples of this on record, are the abdication of the dictator- ship by Sylla, 75 years U. C. ; of the imperial throne, by Dioclesian, anno 305 ; of the emperor Charles V., in 1556 ; and of Christina, queen of Sweden, in 1654. — Of all the sovereigns who have made voluntary abdications, Dioclesian, is, perhaps, the only one who did not regret the step. Examples of forced or involuntary abdication are too numerous to require to be pointed out. The modern history of France and England furnish some very striking instances with which every one is familiar. The convention parliament of 1688 used the word abdica- tion to express the act of James II. in abandoning the government and kingdom. The word " desertion " was rejected, as implying the possibility of a return. The Scottish convention of estates declared that James had "forfeited" the kingdom. Abdication is said to diHer from resignation, the former being unconditional, the latter done in favour of some other person. ABDO'MEN. (Lat. abdo, / conceal.) The great cavity of the animal body, which is liable to temporary changes in its dimensions, independently of respiration. In entomology it forms, in insects the third, in arachnidans the second, in both classes the most posterior, of the sections into which the body is externally divided, and contains the principal digestive and respira- tory, and the whole of the generative organs. The en- largements of the abdomen, in relation to the activity of the generative functions, is most remarkable in insects ; in some of which, as the white ant, or termite, it constitutes at the full development of the ova an immense propor- tion of the entire body of the female. In vertebrates the abdomen is not divided externally from the thorax ; and only in one class, the mammalia, by an internal partition, or. diaphragm. The abdomen is the first-formed cavity in the develop- ment of the animal body, and is the most constant in its existence throughout the animal series. {See Cranium and Thorax.) ABDO'MINALS. Abdominales. An order of mala- copterygious fishes, including those \vhich have the ventral fins situated under the abdomen, behind the pectorals. ABDU'CTION. (Lat. ab, from, and duco, / lead.) In Law, the forcible carrying away of a woman, for the Eurpose of marriage or defilement. Whore the female as property, or is presumptively entitled to it, such abduction is felony: and in all cases the taking of a girl under sixteen from under the protection of her parents is a misdemeanour. The crime o'" abduction, according to Sir W. Scott (see his Notes and Introduc- tion to Rob Roy), was at one period extremely common on the border of the Scottish Highlands ; it is now an ordinary offence in Ireland : the number of convictions in the last 7 years amounts to 61 ; executions, 5. ABDU'CTOR. Abductor muscles are those which pull back or separate the limbs to which they are affixed. A'BELITES, or Abelians, in ecclesiastical history, a sect mentioned by St. Augustine, in Africa. They are said to have enjoined marriage and virginity, after the pre- tended example of Abel. (ii'eeMosheim, Eng. Trans, i.233.) A'BER. A Celtic term. Implying the mouth of a river; as Aberdeen, the mouth of the Dee; Aberystwith, the mouth of the Ystwith, &c. ABE'RDEVINE, or European Siskin ; (Carduelis spintcs, Cuv.) A small green and yellow finch, belonging to the same sub-genus as the goldfinch of this country. Its song is similar to that of the goldfinch, but is not so sweet, and ends with a harsh jarring note. Its flight is a series of successive undulating courses, accompanied by a chirp, at each propelling motion of the wings, as in other species of Carduelis. 'l"he Aberdevine winters in the south of England, and flies northward in the month of March, to breed in tlie pine forests of Scotland. The ABERRATION. nest Is built among the higher branches of the pine : the eggs are four or five in number ; of a bluish-wliite colour, speckled with purplish-red. They begin to re-appear in the south in the month of September. The Aberdevine resembles in the markings of its plumage the common redpole, {Linaria pusilla, Cuv.) but the colours are different. ABERRA'TION. (Lat. ab,/rom, and erro, / wan- der.) A term used in astronomy, to denote a change in the positions of the celestial bodies arising from the combined effects of the motion of light and the motion of the earth in its orbit. To explain the cause of this remarkable phenomenon, conceive a ray of light to proceed from a star S to an observer at O. If the station of the ob- server were at rest, or if the motion of light were instantaneous, the star would be seen in its true place at S. But neither of these circumstances has place ; the ob- server is carried rapidly forward by the motion of the earth in its orbit, and light occupies a certain time in coming from u i^ /v any,of the heavenly bodies to the earth. Suppose, then, that while a particle of light advances from D to O, the observer has been carried forward by the eai'th's orbital motion from A to O. At O the particles of light will strike the e^e with a velocity proportional to D O, and the eye will impinge against the particle with a velocity propor- tional to A O. Thus a double effect will be produced : first, that of the motion of light proportional to D O, and, secondly, that arising from the motion of the observer proportional to A O. But it is obvious that the question will in no way be affected if we suppose that, instead of the observer having been carried forward from A to O. he had remained at rest in O, and the light had advanced to him in the opposite direction, and with a velocity B O - A O. Thus the eye would receive two simul- taneous impressions in the directions D O and B O of the parallelogram B C D O ; and by the theory of the com- position of velocities the effect would be exactly the same as if the eye had received a single impression from a particle proceeding in the direction of the diagonal C O, and with a velocity proportional to C O. Hence the apparent place of the star will be at S', in advance of its true place at S. The angle C O D is the aberration, and its magnitude can easily be determined when we know the relative magnitudes of D O and B O, and the inclination of those lines ; that is, when we know the relative velocities of light and of the earth, and the relative direction of their motions. It is obvious that the aberration will be greatest when those lines are perpendicular to each other ; when they are parallel it vanishes altogether. From the eclipses of Jupiter's satellites, and other phenomena, it has been ascertained that light is trans- mitted through space with a velocity of 192,000 miles per second. The mean velocity of the earth in its orbit is about 19 miles per second ; we have, therefore, when B O and D O are at right angles, the proportion 192,000 : 19 = D O T B O = rad. : tan. C OD • hence the tangent of COD, or the aberration (or in so small an angle the tangent is equal to the arc), is found by the Trigonometrical Tables = 20"-5. This being the greatest value of the angle, is called the Constant of Aberration. From Bradley's observations the Constant of Aber- ration was determirjpd by Bessel {Fundamenta Astrono- mia;) to be 20"-25. Dr. Brinkley found it =: 20"-37. Mr. Richardson, from a series of 2000 observations made with the two mural circles in the Greenwich Observatory, found the value of this important element = 20"-307. {Memoirs Royal Astr. Society, vol. iv.) The effect of aberration on any particular star depends on the position of the star with reference to the ecliptic. Let A B C D be the orbit of the earth, and S a star in the plane of the ecliptic. When the earth is at A the star will be thrown forward by the effect of aberration to s. When the earth arrives at the opposite point of its orbit C, the star will be thrown back to s'. At B and D the earth is mov- ing in a direction parallel to the ray of light proceeding from the star, and there is, consequently, no aberration. Hence a star situated in the plane of the ecliptic appears to oscil- late backwards and forwards in a straight line, always re- turning to its former position at the end of a year. A ray of light proceeding from a star situated in the pole of the ecliptic, is always at right angles to the direc- tion of the earth's motion ; consequently, a star having this position will appear to describe annually, about the pole of the ecliptic, a circle of which the radius = 20"-3. In any other position the apparent path of a star, so far as depends on aberration, is an ellipse whose major axis = 40 '-6, and its minor axis = 40"-6, multiplied by the sine of the star's latitude. 3 ABIETINiE. The apparent places of the planets are also affected by aberration ; but in this case, as the body from which the light emanates is also in motion, we must consider that the ray of light which enters the eye has proceeded, not from the place which the planet occupies at the instant of the observation, but from that which it did occupy at as j long an interval previously as light requires to traverse the distance between the planet and the earth. To this small variation in the place of the planet must be added the space described by the earth in the same interval ; and it is easy to see that the sum is the apparent or relative motion of the planet during the time which light takes to pass from it to the earth. The aberration was discovered, and its physical cause first explained, by Dr. Bradley. It is the most direct proof which astronomy furnishes of the motion of the earth round the sun. Aberration. In Optics, denotes the deviation of the rays of light from the true focus of a curved lens or speculum ; in consequence of which they do not unite in a single point, but are spread over on a small surface, and form a somewhat confused image of the object. This arises from two causes; 1st, the figures of the lenses or specula ; and, 2dly, from a difference in the physical nature of the rays of light. The surfaces of the lenses or mirrors of optical instru- ments are worked into a spherical form, because there is no practical means of accurately obtaining the parabolic curvature which theory shows to be necessary to collect parallel rays into a single point or focus. Hence the rays meet the axis of the lens at different points, the amount of deviation depending on the magnitude and curvature of the lens. This is called the Aberration of Sphericity, The second cause of aberration arises from the different degrees of refraction which the rays composing a beam of lieht undergo in passing from one medium into another, oil account of this difference of refrangibility, the rays of light are separated, and the colours of the spectrum appear. It was long believed, and even by Newton him- self, that it was impossible to refract, without decom- posing, light ; and hence the attempts that have been made to perfect reflecting telescopes, and adapt them to circular instruments. But it has since been discovered that the refractive and dispersive powers of different diaphanous substances are in different proportions, and that the decomposition of the light may be prevented by combining substances of different refractive powers ; for example, crown and flint glass, in the same lens. {See Achromatism.) ABE'TTOR. (Sax. abedan, /o mc«7e,) Inlaw. An instigator or incitor; a person who promotes or pro- cures the commission of an offence or felony, by his advice or encouragement. If an abettor, or as he is then termed, an aider and abettor, be present at the commission«of the crime, he is treated as a principal ; if absent, he becomes an accessory before the fact. But in almost all cases of felony the abettor is considered as much a principal as the actual felon, especially in the case of murder ; and the abettors of offences punishable summarily by justices of the peace, are subjected to the same penalties as the principals. ABE'YANCE. {Norm. Fr.heyer, to expect.) Inlaw. The fee simple, or inheritance of lands is said to be in abeyance, when there is no person in esse in whom it can vest and abide, although limited and ready to vest when- ever the proper heir appears. Thus, in a grant to A for life, and afterwards to the heirs of B, the inheritance remains in abeyance until the death of B, as there can be no heir to a living person. A peerage descending to co- heiresses is said to be in abeyance. A'BIB, The first month of the Hebrew year, more generally known by the Chaldean name of Nisan. It is first mentioned in the 4th verse of the 13th chapter of Exodus. A'BIES. (Lat. abies, a fir tree.) The name of all those fir trees which, like the spruce, the larch, the cedar of Lebanon, have their leaves growing singly upon the stem, and the scales of the cones round and thin. The wood called by timber-merchants "white deal "is pro- duced by Abies excelsa, and a resinous, or terebintaceous substance by others ; as Canadian balsam by A. balsamea, the balm of Gilead ; Strasburgh turpentine by A . pectinata, the silver fir ; Venetian turpentine by A. larix, the larch. Besides these, the substance called extract of spruce is furnished partly by A. canadensis, and partly by A. nigra. All the species are hardy, and, with the exception of larches, are evergreen, and in cultivation in this country. The most valuable for the timber are, A. Douglasii, A. excelsa, and A. larix ; the most ornamental are, A. cedrus, the cedar of Lebanon, deodara, and larix. The most worthless in Great Britain are, A. canadensis, picea, balsamea, and pectinata ; the three latter form, however, fine trees in favourable situations. The wood of the fir is in very extensive use, and it is, perhaps, the most service- able of all trees. ABIETl'N^. A division in the natural order of co- niferous plants, comprehending the true firs, pines, and B 2 ABJURATION. araucarla-like pines, all which have cones with many rows of scales in which the seeds arc formed. ABJUIIA'TION, Oath of. (Lai. ab. frotn, and juro, / swear.) Introduced by stat. 13 W. III., and regulated by 6 G. III. An oath asserting the title of the present royal family to the crown of England. By this oatli the juror recognises the right of the king under the Act of Settlement; engages to support him to the utmost of his power ; promises to disclose all traitorous conspiracies against him ; and expressly disclaims any right to the crown of England in the descendants of the Pretender. Abjuration of the Realm (in law) signifies a sworn banishment ; or the taking of an oath to renounce and depart from the realm for ever. Abjuration also signifies a solemn recantation of opinion : as, the abjuration of heresy required by the Ro- mish Church. Henry IV. abjured Protestantism at Saint Denis in 1593. Galileo was compelled to abjure his phi- losophical opinions by the Inquisition at Rome, in 1C33. A'BLATI vE case. (Lat. ablatus, taken away.) The sixth case of the Latin nouns implied in English by the preposition /roTW. (See Grammar.) A'BLU'TION. (Lat. ablutio, washing.) A religious ceremony, consisting in bathing the body, or part of it. It constituted a part of the Mosaic ceremonial, and was after- wards practised among the Jews, both by the priests and people. But ablutions are most rigidly enforced by the Mahometans. The term is also applied to the cup given, without consecration, to the laity in the popish churches. ABNO'RMAL. (Lat. ab,/ro7«, and norma, a rule.) Any thing without, or contrary to, system or rule. Thus Horace calls a well-informed sagacious countryman, — Rusticus, abnormis sapieng, crassaque Minervfi. In botany, if a flower has five petals, the rule is that it should have the same number of stamens, or some regu- lar multiple of that number ; if it has only four or six stamens, then, in such a case, the flower would be abnor- mal. ABOA'RD, within the ship ; also one vessel is said to get aboard of another when she gets foul of her. ABORI'GINES. The first, or original (a prima ori- gine) inhabitants of a country, that is, those who occu- pied it at the period when it began to be known, and who either were indigenous to the soil or had immigrated thither before the dawn of history. Some of the ancients supposed they had always inhabited the same soil, and were created from it, as the Athenians, who thence called themselves autochthones, coeval with and sprung from the land. But the Romans and modern nations: use the word Aborigines to designate those inhabitants of a country of whose origin nothing certain is known. Thus the Indians of America ar^ properly called Aborigines, because they were found there at its discoi^ry, and we bave no accounts of their having immigrated from any other quarter. ABO'RTION. (Lat. abortus, miscarriage.) This term is usually applied to the morbid or unnatural expul- sion of the foetus in the human subject after the sixth week, and before the sixth month, of pregnancy. Before the sixth week it is called a miscarriage, and after the sixth month, m-ernature labour. ABO'RTIVE. Is said of parts in plants that do not acquire their usual- state of perfection ; a flower only partially formed, a stamen whose filament has no anther, a seed which contains no embryo, or which consists only of skin, are cases of abortion. The term is also applied to parts which, although perfect in the beginning, cease to grow, and so end in being imperfect ; thus ovules, which are not impregnated, and which shrivel up instead of growing into seed, are called abortive. ABO'UHANNES. An African bird, supposed to be the Ibis of the ancients. ABRACADA'BRA. A celebrated term of incantation : especially used as a spell against fevers. The manner in which it was written and carried for that purpose may be seen in Defoe's History of the Plague at London. The Word seems to be connected with Abrasax or Abraxas ; a name found inscribed on certain stones or amulets, in such characters, together with the figure of a liuman body, with the head of a cat and fe.et of a reptile. Various explanations have been attempted of the object of these curiosities : some from tlie cabalistic and an Egyptian derivation. Bellermann (Berlin, 1817,) and Ne.ujder, have written on the subject of the Abraxas stones. ABRA'DING. In Agr. (Lat. ab, from, and rado, 1 scrape or rub offl) Applied to the sloping surface of banks of earth, which crumbles down from the effects of frost, or the alternate action of drought and moisture. ABRA'MIS. {Abramis, Cuv.) The name of a sub- genus of Malacopterygious or soft-finned abdominal fishes, characterized by the absence of spines and bar- bels ; by the dorsal fin being short and placed beliind the ventrals, and the anal fin being long. The common bream is a species of this genus. ABRA'NCHIANS. Abranchia, Cny . {Or. et, without, fiiciyx'<*"SiUs.) An order (the third in Cuvier's arrange- 4 ABSCISS. ment) of anellidans, so called because the species com- posing it have no external organs of resjiiration ; they are divided into the setigerous abranchians, or worms, and the non-setigerous abranchians, or leeches. ABRA'SION. {TuRt.ahrado, J rub off:) In Numisma- tology, implies the waste of coins, or the loss by wear and tear in the pocket. This forms a considerable item in the expense of a metallic currency ; and various means have been employed to lessen it, by alloying the coins so as to render them harder, by raising the borders so as to lessen the surface exposed to be rubbed, &'C. ABRA'XAS. A genus of Lepidopterous insects, of the family Geometridae ; founded by Dr Leach for the com- mon magpie moth (Abraxas glossulariata) and other allied species. It is the larvae of the Abr. glossulariata which commit the well-known ravages upon the goose- berry trees of our gardens ; consuming the leaves almost as soon as they appear. They feed early in the morning, before the dew is oft' or the sun has much power ; and it is at this time that they should be sought for and removed. ABRIDGEMENT. In Literature. (Lat. abbrevio, I shorten.) A compendious arrangement of the matter contained in a larger work. Before the invention of printing, when manuscripts were valuable, and the la- bour of writing them great, the compiling abridgements of considerable works was an important brimch of author- ship ; and it has been doubted whether we have lost or gained more by the practice : since, on the one hand, the contents of many lost authors are thus partially preserved to us : and, on the other, the abridgement becoming popular may, in some cases, have caused the loss of the original. Among the best known abridgements of antiquity are the History of Justin, being an abridgement of the lost History of Trogus Pompeius : the Natural History of Solinus, chiefly abridged from that of Pliny, &c. Few modern abridgements, taking the phrase in its strict sense, merit peculiar notice, ox have been compiled with any other view tlian that of assisting education. This, however, is not the case with soine of those works called abridgements, intended to exhibit a summary view of some science or department of literature. The Abreg^ Chronologique de V Histoire de France', by the president Henault, is a work of this kind. It has, perhaps, been praised beyond its deserts, but still it possesses uncommon merit. Its success led to the publication of various works of the same kind, of which the Abrege Chronologique de V Histoire de V Allemagne, by Pfeffel, is probably the best. Dr. Robertson drew from it most of his knowledge of the constitution of the German empire. To abridge well requires a thorough knowledge of the subject, with tact to seize upon the prominent points, and ability to state them clearly and succinctly. Tacitus, says Montesquieu, "abridged all because hekiiem all," i)ut Tacitus's are rare. ABROGA'TION. The annulment of a law by com- petent authority. (From the Latin ab, from, and rogo, I ask.) A phrase derived from the practice of the Roman popular assemblies, in which the several tribes, curias, &c. were said rogare suffragia, to demand the suf- frage : whence also the modern word prerogative. {See COMITIA.) ABRU'PT. (Lat.abrumpo,7 6reflA:Q/f:) Atermin Bo- tany, applied to any thing which happens suddenly. A leaf which is suddenly terminated without tapering to a point, a stem which is suddenly bent, a pinnated leaf without a terminal leaflet, are all abrupt. Abrupt. In Ichthyology is applied to the lateral line when divided into two or more parts not contiguous. A'BRUS. (Gr.aQo?, delicate, or elegant.) A West Indian tree with papilionaceous flowers, and pods con- taining bright red seeds with a broad black scar on one side of them. The seeds are often strung into necklaces for children. A'BSCESS. (Lat. abscodo, I separate.) Inflam- mation in the membranous or fleshy parts of the body, attended by the formation of jms, and the consequent separation or distension of the parts affected ; thus the integuments separate from the parts beneath, and form a tumour. A'BSCISS, or ABSCISSA. (Lat. ab scindo, I cut off.) A term used in geometry to denote a segment cut off" from a straight line, by an ordinate to a curve. The position of a point on a plane is perfectly determined when its distances, measured in given directions, from two straight lines given by position, are known ; and as curve lines may be regarded as formed by the continuous motion of a point, their various properties may be inves- tigated b)' means of the relation common to all points of the same curve between the two distances so measured. Thus, let A B and A C be two straight lines given by position, and P any point in a curve XY. Draw PQ parallel to AC, and meeting A B in Q, then P Q is called the ordinate of the point P, and A Q is the absciss. The ab- sciss and ordinate, considered to- gether, are called the co-ordinates ABSENTEE. of the curve, and the point A, where they Intersect, is called the origin of the co-ordinates. For every point of the same curve a certain unavoidable relation exists hetween A Q and P Q, which is called the equation of the curve. In order to represent this equation algebraically, the absciss A Q is represented by x, and the ordinate P Q by y. The co-ordinates may be inclined to each other at any angle, but in general the investigations are much simplified by assuming them at right angles. The origin of the co-ordinates, or the point from which the . absciss is reckoned, may be taken any where in the jilane of the curve. When a particular curve, however, is to be investigated, it is often convenient to place the origin at some point which is related to the other parts of the curve. Thus, if the curve is a circle, the co-ordinates are conveniently reckoned from the centre. ABSENTE'E. In Politics, a word which has received, from usage, a peculiar signification : a landed proprietor who habitually resides at a distance from the district in which his property is situate : especially applied to Irish landlords and clergy. In 1715 a tax was imposed on absentees from Ireland, m all cases where their resi- dence within it was for less than six months in the year; power of dispensation being secured to the crown. But it ceased to be levied in 1753, and has not since been renewed. Whether or not the absence of a landed pro- prietor be injurious to a country, in an economical sense, is a question which has been much debated of late years. See the evidence of Mr. J. R. M'CuUoch before the Com- mittees of the Lords and Commons, to inquire into the state of Ireland, 1825 ; and the controversy occasioned by that evidence, in the Edinburgh Review, No. 85., and Quarterly Review, Vol. 33. See also Mr. M'C.'s evi- dence before the Committee on the state of Ireland in 1830, and Mr. Senior's Outline of Political Economy, EncyclopiEdia Mctropolitana. A'BSIS, or APSIS. (Gr. a4'n, anarch.) In Architec- ture, a word used by ecclesiastical authors to signify that part of the church wherein the clergy were seated, or the altar was placed. This part of the church was so called from its usually being domed or vaulted, and not, as Isidorus imagines, from its being the lightest part, from apta. The apsis was either circular or polygonal on the plan, and domed over at top as a covering. It consisted of two parts, the altar and the presbytery, or sanctuary; at the middle of the semicircle was the throne of the bishop ; and at the centre of the diameter was placed the altar, towards the nave, from which it was separated by an open balustrade, or railing. On tlie altar was placed the cibarium and cup. The throne of the bishop having been anciently called by thi§ name (apsis), some have thought tliat thence this part of the edifice derived its name, but the converse is the real truth. A'BSOLUTE. ABSOLUTISM. In Politics, a govern- ment is strictly said to be absolute when the supreme head is above the control of law, and has unre- stricted power of legislation. "El rey assoluto," is the common watchword of the anti-constitutional party in Spain. Yet in that country, as in almost every other, the theory of absolute sovereignty has some limit : since we find the same party denying the king the right of altering by his single will the fundamental laws of succession to the throne. (See Despotism.) ABSOLU'TION. (Lat. a.h, from, solvo, I loose.) A ceremony practised in various Christian churches. In the Roman Catholic, the priest not only declares abso- lution to the repentant sinner, but is believed to have the power of actually releasing him from his sins : and this authority is declared by the council of Trent to belong to him in its full extent. The Church of England, in the Order for the Visitation of the Sick, has retained nearly the same words ; but her authorities seem not to be exactly agreed as to the force and effect of the absolution so conferred. In the daily service, the words of the ab- solution are merely declaratory. ABSO'RBED. (Lat. absorbeo, I suck up.) In Painting. Sucked up, imbibed. A term applied by the French connoisseurs to a picture in which the oil has sunk into the canvass or ground whereon it is painted, leaving the colour flat, and the touches indistinct. Our picture dealers used the term chilled to express the same thing. It may be remedied by rubbing the picture over with oil, and varnishing, after it has been well cleaned. ABSO'RBENT(Tro?mrf. In Painting. A ground pre- pared for a picture, either on board or canvass, chiefly with disteniper or water-colour mixture, by which expedient the oil is immediately taken or sucked in from the colours, expedition gained, and a brilliancy imparted to the co- lours. AbsorTjents. In Medicine, substances which remove acid at the stomach, such as magnesia and chalk. ABSO'RPTION. In Physiology, is one of the vital organic functions, the object of wliich is primarily to , convey to the circulating organs the due supply ol the i materials for the growth and support of the system ; k and, secondarily, to remove and carry to the same organs ACADEMICS. the decayed and useless parts of the body. See Lac- TBALS. A'BSTRACT (Lat. abstraho, I take away), signifies a general view or analysis of a whole work, or part of a work. It differs from abridgment chiefly in this, that while in the latter it is often necessary to enter into some- what minute details, the former is always confined to a notice only of the leading particulars. See Abridgment. A'BSTRACT MATHEMATICS, or PURE MA- THEMATICS. That branch of science which treats of the relations or properties of magnitudes or quanti- ties, considered generally, and without restriction to any individual magnitude. Thus, the proposition "that the three angles of a triangle are, together, equal to two right angles, is an abstract truth, not confined to an individual triangle, or to a particular species of triangles, but be- longing to all triangles whatever. Abstract mathematics is opposed to jnixed mathematics, wherein abstract pro- perties or relations are applied to sensible objects. ABSTRACT NUMBERS. Numbers considered in themselves, and without reference to any particular thing. The operations of common arithmetic are per- formed on abstract numbers. ABSTRA'CTION. (Lat. abstraho, / draw qffl) In Metaphysics and Logic, the faculty by which, in contem- plating any object, we can attend exclusively to some cir- cumstances or qualities belonging to it, and withhold our attention from the rest. It is by the means of this faculty that we generalise, and arrive at the common terms or predicables {see Predicables) which belong to a number of objects. Thus, in considering a horse, by abstracting mentally the qualities which belong to that particular ani- mal, we arrive at the notion of a quadruped, thence at that of an animal, &c. &c. ; which notions constitute, in logical language, the successive genera and species of the indivi- dual horse. ABSU'RDUM, or REDUCTIO AD ABSURDUM. A term used in geometry to denote a mode of demonstra- tion in which the truth of a proposition is established, not by a direct proof, but by proving that the contrary is absttrd, or impossible. There are many examples of this mode of demonstration in the Elements of Euclid. ABU'NDANT NUMBER (Arithmetic) is a number such that the sum of its divisors is greater than the num- ber itself. Thus, 12 is an abundant number, because its divisors being 1, 2, 3, 4, and 6, their sum, which is 16, is greater than 12. An abundant number is opposed to a deficient number, of which the sum of the divisors is less than the number itself; and to a p«/(?c# number, of which the sum of the divisors is equal to itself. ABU'TMENT. (According to some,* from the French, aboutir, to abut, among whom the learned Spelman ; but according to others, with more probability, from the Saxon abut an, about.) In Architecture, the solid part of a pier from^hich the arch immediately springs. Abut- ments are either artificial or natural. The former are usually formed of masonry or brickwork, and the latter are the rock or other solid materials on the banks of a river, in the case of a bridge, which receive the foot of the arch. It is obvious that they must be of gufficient solidity and strength to resist the arch's thrust. ABU'TTALS. The buttings or boundings of land, showing by what other lands, highways, rivers, &c. they are bounded. , ACA'CIA. (Gr. «»««<«.) A genus of spiny leguminous trees, with pinnated leaves, and small flowers collected in balls or spikes, of a white, red, or yellow colour. They are all inhabitants of the warmer parts of the world; some of them, as A. vera, arabica, &c., yield gum arable ; others gum Senegal : the bark of A. catechu furnishes the astringent substance called catechu, or terra japonica. The flowers of A. farnesiana are exceedingly fragrant, and form one of the principal ingredients in Italian per- fumery. The bark of many species abounds in fanning principles. New Holland, and some other countries, produce great number of species in which true leaves are not formed, but in their stead the branches are liirnished with broad dilated petioles looking like leaves. ACADE'MICS. A name given to a series of philo- sophers, who taught in the Athenian Academy, the scene of Plato's discourses. They are commonly divided into three sects, which go under the names of the Old, the Middle, and the New Academy. 1. The Old Academy, of which Plato was the immediate founder, was repre- sented successively by Speusippus, Xenocrates, and Polemo. These philosophers, as far as the scanty notices remaining of them allow us to form a judgment, seem to have confined themselves to the task of elucidating and defending the doctrines of their great master. {See Pla- TONisM.) A list of their works is given us by Diogenes Laertius, b. iv. To them succeeded Arcesilaus, tha founder of ( 2 ) the Middle Academy. Under his hands, the Platonic method assumes an almost exclusively po-« lemical character. Whatever may have been his belief regarding the positive part of Plato's doctrines, he con^ fined himself in public to the support of the negative portion ; that, namely, which relates to the uncertainty B 3 ACADEMY. of the impressions on the senses, and, consequently, of the judgments founded on them. His main object was lo refute the Stoics, who maintained a doctrine of percep- tion identical with that promulgated by Dr. Reid in the last century. (5ee Perception.) Socrates is said to have professed, that all he knew was, that he knew nothing. Arcesilaus denied that he knew even this. Wisdom he made to consist in absolute suspension of assent ; virtue, in the probable estimate of consequences ; in the latter doctrine combating the ethical dogmatism of the stoics, as in the former the intellectual. He was succeeded by Lacydes, Telecles and Evander, and Hegesinus. 3. The New Academy claims Carneades as its founder. It is not easy to define the limits between this and the Middle Academy. Like Arcesilaus, Carneades appears to have taken up a negative and polemical position. His system is a species of mitigated scepticism. He con- siders probability to be the sole legitimate object, alike in speculation and in practice. The doctrines of this school were adopted by Cicero, more, probably, in consequence of the advantage which, as an orator, he would derive from the practice of discussing both sides of a question, than from any solid conviction. Carneades was succeeded by his disciple, Clitomachus. Charmides, the third and last of the New Academicians, appears to have been little more than a teacher of rhetoric : an accu- sation, indeed, to which the whole school is in no small degree liable. To these three academies a fourth and fifth are added, by some writers : of which Philon and Antiochus are produced as the representatives. The latter was the friend of Cicero and other distinguished Romans. Neither of them can in any justice be named academics, their doctrines being, in fact, in most points, of a diametrically opposite nature. ACA'DEMY. (Gr. a««5»j,w.««.) A society of learned men, associated for the advancement of the arts or sciences. The name is derived from that of a place near Athens, where there was a famous school for gymnastic exercises {see Gymnasium), at which also philosophy was taught, and the sophists gave their lectures. But the first institution of which we read, at all resembling our modern academy, was the society of scholars esta- blished at Alexandria by Ptolemy Soter. The Jews in various cities, the Constantinopolitan emperors, and the Arab caliphs, founded societies of the same de- scription. Charlemagne, among his various efforts for the propagation of literature, collected an association of learned men, who read and compared the works of antiquity, and gave themselves, in their academic intercourse, the assumed names of different ancient authors. But this institution was dissolved at the death of Alcuin ; nor do we find any memorial of a similar society, except a few among artists, chiefly in France, until after the taking of Constantinople by the Turks, when the Greek scholars driven into Italy held literary meetings, which gradually assumed a more regular form. About 1560 a society, called the Academia Secretorum Naturae, was founded at Naples, in the house of Baptista Porta, but was abolished by a papal interdict. It was, however, succeeded by the Academia Lyncei at Rome, of which Galileo was a member, the objects of which, like those of the former, were chiefly connected with the pursuit of natural history. From the beginning of the 17th century academies multiplied in Italy. Among the most eminent of those which bore a philosophical cha- racter, was the A. del Cimento, at Rome, in that century ; the Academy of Orossano, in the kingdom of Naples, &c. : and, in more recent times, the Academy of Sciences at Bologna deserves to be mentioned with honour. But Italy has been most prolific in academies of literature and philology, which form by far the greatest number in the catalogue of 550 such institutions which have been enumerated as existing or having existed in that country. A general and somewhat ridiculous fashion prevailed in the 17th and 18th centuries among literary men of that country, of forming themselves into societies for the promotion of literary objects, to which they gave fanciful symbolic names, every member assuming in his own person some analogous appellation. Some of these societies have done real service to literature, but by far the greatest number have contented themselves with multiplying insipid addresses and sonnets. Among the most celebrated was the A. degli Arcadj , at Rome, of which the meetings were held in a meadow, and the members enacted shepherds and shepherdesses : it was founded about 1690, and still subsists, having various affiliated societies in other places. The A. deg'i Umidi, one of the oldest of these associations, became afterwards the Florentine Academy. The A. degli Intronati (of the Deaf), degli Umoristi (of the Humourists), and many others with similar quaint appellations, have acquired celebrity in Italy. Of her philological academies, the most illustrious is that della Crusca (of the Sieve), at Florence, which, by the publication of its dictionary, established the Tuscan dialect as the standard of the national language; it is now incorporated with the A. Florentina. In France, the Academie Fran^aise was 6 founded in 1635 by cardinal Richelieu. It was an asso- ciation formed for the purpose of refining the French language and style ; and, although in its first period it was chiefly remarkable for the adulation which it be- stowed on its vain though able founder, it became, in process of time, by far the most celebrated and influential of all European literary societies. It consisted of 40 members, and a place among them was eagerly sought after, for a long period, as one of the highest honours which could be attained by an author. Like that of Crusca, it published a dictionary of the French language, in 1694. The Royal Academy of Sciences was founded by Louis XIV., in 1666, and published 130 volumes of me- moirs, up to the year 1793, when it was abolished by the Convention. The Academies of Painting and Sculpture, and that of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres,were the other two principal academies of Paris. The latter was founded by Colbert in 1663, and remodelled in 1701. At the Revo- lution all four were abolished : and, in 1795, at the sugges- tion of Condorcet, the National Institute of France was established in their stead. It consisted of four classes, arising out of the four academies of which it was com- posed. According to its re-organisation by Napoleon, in 1806, these classes were remodelled, and each of them con- sisted of a certain number of sections, each furnished with a specified number of acting and corresponding membefs. The first class, or that of sciences, had sixty-three mem- bers, and 100 correspondents ; that of languages, forty, and 60 correspondents ; that of history and antiquities, forty, and 60 correspondents ; that ofthe arts, twenty-eight, and 36 correspondents. The first, third, and fourth, named each eight foreign associates. In 1816, the Insti- tute was again remodelled by Louis XVIII. The four classes again took the name of academies, and became more independent of each other, their joint property being managed by a commission of eight members, two from each, under the superintendence ofthe minister of the interior. The first academy (that of sciences) re- tained the same number of members. The second and third were reduced to thirty-eight and thirty-seven respectively ; the fourth, increased to forty. The Aca- demy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres, and that of Sciences, had added to them a class of free academicians, of the number of ten, with no privilege except that of attendance ; the Academy of Arts had the right to choose its own number of free members. Of similar institutions in Germany, the oldest was the Academia Naturae Curiosorura, a scientific association, founded in 1652, in Franconia ; afterwards taken under imperial protection, when it received the name of the A. Caesareo Leopoldina. The Royal A. of Sciences, at Berlin, was founded in 1700, by Frederic I. of Prussia: Leibnitz was its first director. The Imperial Academy of Sciences at St. Petersburgh was founded by Catharine I., and endowed by Catharine II. with great munificence, but established on the French model: she separated from it the Academy of Arts. In England, the name academy has been chiefly con- fined to associations for promoting the arts. The Royal Academy of Arts was founded in 1768, and consists of forty members: it has separate professors of painting, architecture, anatomy, and perspective ; and a council of nine is elected annually. The Academy of Ancient Music was founded by private association, in 1710: the Royal Academy of Music, under the patronage of George III., but dissolved shortly after. Our principal literary and philosophical societies, answering in cha- racter to the branches of the French Institute, are, 1 . The Royal Society of London, which is confined to objects of a scientific character. It had its origin as early as 1645, but was established by royal charter in 1662. Its acts have been published, under the name of Philosophical Trans- actions, from 1665 to the present day. 2. Those of the Antiquarian Society, which was established in 1751, are publishedunder the title- of Archaeologia. 3. The Royal Society of Arts originated in 1718. 4. That of Literature, in 1823. Besides these, there are numerous societies which bear the name of the peculiar branch of science to which their exertions are confined. The Royal Society of Edinburgh obtained a charter in 1783, and another, with more liberal provisions, in 1811. Among the most valuable published transactions of academies and similar societies, besides those already mentioned, are those of Colbert's A. des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres (50 vols. 4to. from 1701 to 1793) : those of the Institute, being continuations of the memoirs of the former academies of which it was composed: those of the A. Royale des Sciences and Belles Lettres at Berlin ; at first in Latin, then in French (from its remodelling in 1744 by Frederick the Great), now in German. The " Acta " of the Imperial Academy of St. Petersburgh. The " Commentarii" of the A. of Bologna. The Antichita d'Ercolano, published by the Herculanean Academy of Naples. Academy. In the sense of a place of instruction, is now in this country a term' chiefly appropriated to schools for students in the fine arts. The fourth divi- sion of the Institute at Paris consists of the Academie ACADEMY FIGURE. des Beaux Arts. In London, an Academy of Painting seems to have been established in 1712, under the pre- sidency of Sir G. Kneller, bnt to have shortly after fallen into decay. The present Royal Academy of Arts, founded in 1768, has been already mentioned. In France the old universities were suppressed at the Revolu- tion ; but most of them, with some recent ones, have since been restored under the title of Academies Uni- versitaires. Their collective body, represented by the re-union of their rectors, inspectors, deans, &c., consti- tutes the University of France, at the head of which is the Minister of Public Instruction. Colleges in France are equivalent to high schools in this country. ACADEMY FIGURE. In Painting. A drawing usually made with black and white chalk, on tinted paper, after the living model, ACALE'PHANS, Acalephae. (Gr. a.xxXrncWe.) In Botany, any thing covered with prickles ; that is, with sharp pro- minences which originate in the cellular systetn and have no connection with wood. A C U' L E A T E S . In Z oology, a tribe of hymenopterous insects, in which the females and neuters are provided with a sting, generally concealed within the last segment of the abdomen. ACU'MINATE. (Lat. acumen, the point of any thing.) When a leaf or any other body is very much tapered to a point ; it is thus distinguished from acute, which means sharp-pointed without any tapering. ACUPU'NCTURA'TION. (Lat. acus, a needle, and punctura, a puncture.) Pricking with a needle. In the East this is a common remedy for painful affections of different parts of the body. It has lately been extensively practised here for the cure of chronic rheumatism, a long and sharp needle being thrust into the affected muscles. ACU'TE. The opposite of obtuse. An a-^ute angle is that which is less than a right angle ; an acute-angled triangle is one of which each of the angles is acute; an acute-angled cone is one whose opposite sides form an acute angle at the vertex. Acute. (Lat. acutus, sharp.) In Music, the height or pitch of a sound or tone, in respect of another. It is opposed to grave. AD LI'BITUM. In Music {at pleasure), a term applied to an accompaniment which is not essential, and m;iy or may not be performed without interfering with the composition. AD QUOD DAMNUM. (Ijot. to what damage.) A writ sued before the grant of certain liberties and fran- chises, as a fair, market, &c., which may be prejudicial to the king who grants, or the public ; by it the sheriff is directed to inquire what damage may accrue from the grant in question. ADA'CTYLE. (Gr. a, priv. and ^axrvXes, a digit.) In Zoology, signifies a locomotive extremity without digits. A'DAGE. [Lat. adag'mm, a proverb.) (See Proverb.) The proverbs of antiquity are collected by Erasmus in a work entitled Erasmi Adagia. ADA'GIO. (Ital. adagio, leisurely.) In Music, the slowest of musical time, grave only excepted. (See Allegro.) ADAMA'NTINE SPAR. (Gr. k,without, and Sa:^«^, I break, or conquer.) A variety of crystallised alumina, nearly resembling the sapphire in composition, and of extreme hardness. The finest specimens come from India and China. At Bombay it is called corundum. A'D AMITE S. (Theology.) A sect in the early ages of the Christian church who are said to have professed an exact imitation of the primitive state of innocence. They re-appeured in the 15th century in Bohemia. (Mosheim, I. p.233,&c.) ADANSO'NIA. A remarkable African tree, named after Adanson, a celebrated French botanist and travel- ler. It is called by the negroes Baobab. A'D APIS. A name originally applied by Gesner to the Hyrax or coney of Scripture, and adopted by Cuvier to designate another small pachydermatous quadruped, now extinct, but the existence and nature of which that great 13 ADHESION naturalist detected and deduced from three fragments of the head, which were discovered in that immense de- pository of fossil bones, the gypsum quarries of Mont- martre. The dentition of the Adapis is as follows: — each jaw has four trenchant incisors ; two conical canine teeth, the upper ones straight, the lower inclined ob- liquely forwards ; and apparently fourteen molar teeth, of which the first is trenchant, and the three or four poste- rior ones, on each side, like the posterior molars of the Anoplotheriam. Cuvier supposes the animal to have been about the size of a rabbit, and to have closely approxi- mated the Anoplotheria. A'DDER. (See Viper.) ADDFTION. In Arithmetic. The operation by which a number is found equal to several others taken together. It is the first of the four fundamental rules. Addition, in algebra, is the uniting or incorporating of several alge- braic quantities into a simple or contracted expression. A'DDITIVE. Something to be added, in contradis- tinction to subtractive, which denotes something to be taken away. The terms additive and subtractive are sometimes applied to algebraic quantities, to denote those relations to other quantities which are more com- monly, though less correctly, expressed by positive and negative. ADDU'CTOR. (Lat. adduce, / draw towards.) The adductor muscles are opposed to the abductors : they draw the parts to which they are attached, together. ADE'LPHIA. (Gr. ahXcpo;, a brother.) A collec- tion of stamens into a bundle. Linnaeus employed this term for those plants in which the stamens, instead of growing singly, combine into one or more parcels, or brotherhoods ; thus, monadelphia signified stamens all connected into one parcel, diadelphia into two parcels, and so on. ADE'NOSTY'LE^. (Gr. kii^v, a gland, and owXos, a column, or style.) A subdivision of composite plants, comprehending tussilago, liatris, eupatorium, and some other genera, in which the bran.ches of the style are covered with long glandular hairs. ADE'PHAGANS, ADEPHAGA. (Gr. cl^r,(p6cyos, voracious.) A family of carnivorous and very voracious coleopterous insects. A'DEPT. (Lat. adipiscor, 1 obtain.) A distinctive term applied, to those alchemists who were supposed to have attained the great object of their researches, or to have discovered the philosopher's stone. ADFE'CTED, or AFFECTEB. (See the latter term.) ADHE'SION, (Lat. adhaereo, I adhere,) Is a pro- perty of vegetable matter by which contiguous parts grow together ; and is one of the causes of the great diversity of appearance in the organs of plants. Two opposite leaves grow together and form apparently one, through which the stem passes ; several in a whorl adhere, and form an involucre ; a number of petals ad- here, and thus constitute a monopetalous corolla ; several stamens adJiere, and an adelphia is the result; Some carpels contract an adhesion with one another, and form a compound fruit ; finally, the calyx adheres to the sides of the ovary, and then seems as if it grew from the apex of it. Irregularity in flowers and fruit is also in many cases produced by the unequal manner in which adhesion takes place between similar parts ; of the calyx, two of the sepals adhere into one parcel, and three into another ; the result of which is a two-lipped calyx ; the same thing occurs in the corolla, and elsewhere. Adhesion. (Physics.) A term used to denote the force with which different bodies remain attached to each other, when they are brought into contact. Adhe- sion has often been confounded with cohesion ; but the two terms are essentially distinct. Adhesion is the force with which two bodies of different kinds cling to each other when united ; cohesion is that which unites the particles of a homogeneous body with each other. Thus, the particles which form a drop of water or quicksilver are united by cohesion ; the particles of water which wet the surface of any body are united to it by adhesion. Adhesion may exist between two solid bodies, between a solid and a fluid, or between two fluid bodies. The adhesion of solid bodies is exemplified in the force re- quired to separate two pieces of marble, whose polished surfaces have been brought into contact. The suspen- sion of water above its level in capillary tubes, or between two plates of glass very nearly in contact, shows the adhesion of a fluid to a solid body ; and an instance of the adhesion of two liquids is obtained by covering a plate of glass with oil, and bringing it into contact with the surface of water ; a very sensible force i^ required to raise it perpendicularly from the water. Dr. Brook Taylor appears to have been the first who undertook to estimate experimentally the force of adhe- sion ; and the method which he employed, was to deter- mine the weight necessary to separate fir-boards from the surface of water. This method, however, unless proper precautions are taken, is apt to give inaccurate results. On separating a fir-board from water, the whole ADIANTUM. surface of the board may be observed to be wetted ; that is to say, a thin film of water remains attached to tlie wnod, so that the force by which the separation was edected is not the force necessary to overcome the adhe- sion of the water to the board, but the cohesion of the particles of water to each other. This is fully established by the experimental fact, that, when discs of different substances are applied to a liquid, by which they are perfectly wetted, their adhesion to it is the same, what- ever may be their nature, and exactly equal to the cohe- sive force of the fluid. Discs of glass and discs of copper of the same diameter adhere to water with precisely the same force. The adhesion of discs to the surfaces of liquids is demon- strated by Laplace to be a capillary phenomenon, arising from the action of attractive forces which are sensible only at very small distances. Supposing the diameter of the disc to'be known, and the height to which the same liquid rises in a capillary tube of the same matter, and ol a given diameter, Laplace determined from theory the force necessary to detach the disc. The results of his determination, applied to different liquids, as water, oil of turpentine, and alcohol, at different densities, agreed exactly with the numbers found by M. Gay-Lussac, in a series of very accurate experiments on this subject. The perfect identity of the forces producing adhesion and capillary attraction, is also proved by the following ex- periment : — It is well known that the height to which fluids rise in capillary tubes depends on the angle which the fluid makes with the sides of the tube. But the sur- face of mercury covered with water in a capillary tube is exactly spherical; consequently, the angle which the mercury makes with the sides of the tube vanishes, and the force is reduced to zero. If, therefore, adhesion depends on a force of the same nature, it follows that, on applying a disc of glass to the surface of mercury, and covering them both with water, no force should be re- quired to separate the disc, excepting what is necessary to overcome its weight. Now, this was found by Gay- Lussac to be exactly what takes place. When the mer- cury and disc were covered with water, no resistance was offered to their separation ; without the interposition of the water, a weight of 296 or even 400 grammes was re- quired to overcome the adhesion. (Laplace, Mecam'que Celeste, tome iv. Biot, Traite de Physique, tome iv. p. 464.) The adhesion of the polished surfaces of solid bodies is proportional to the extent of the surface, or to the number of points brought into contact. It was formerly believed that the resistance to separation in this case arises solely from the pressure of the atmosphere \ but the difference of its amount in different substances proves this opinion to be erroneous ; besides, it is found to be the same in a vacuum. {See Capillary Attraction.) ADIA'NTUM. (Or. oiSixvTo;,dry.) A genus of thin- leaved ferns, having their fructification in short marginal lines. The leaflets are usually wedge-shaped and placed upon slender shining petioles. One of the>6pecies (A. capillus veneris) was formerly employed in the manu- facture of syrup of capillaire. ADIA'PHORITES. (Gr. dhoccpo^o;, iiidifferent.) A name given to Melancthon, and the party that agreed with him, in submitting, in things indifferent, to an im- perial edict. The controversy which gave rise to this name had its origin in the imposition by Charles V., in 1548, of an edict, styled the Interim, because it proposed to accommodate for a time the differences of the papists and protestants, until the whole matter could be set at rest by the authority of a council. The opposite side was maintained by Flavius and the primitive Lutherans c and in the debate which followed there were two principal questions : first, whether it is lawful to yield to the ene- mies of truth, even in matters which are not of themselves essential ; and, secondly, whether, granting the affirm- ative, the points in which the Interim required com- pliance, and in which Melancthon yielded it, are properly indifferent. Those points related chiefly to the doctrine of justification by faith, in which Luther and his genuine followers went to a great extreme; while Melancthon, although ostensibly the head of the Lutheran church, after the death of the great Reformer, adopted much more moderate views. Out of this controversy a great variety of other debates were engendered, and from these quarrels many schisms and divisions among protestants derived their origin. A'DIPOCE'RE. (Lat. adeps and cera,/rt< and wax.) A fatty substance produced by the decomposition of the flesh of animals in moist situations,- or under water, re- sembling, in some of its properties, a mixture of fat and wax. A'DIPOSE. (Lat. adeps, fat.) Unctuous, or con- taining fat. Adipose membrane is the cellular membrane in which fat is deposited. A'DIT. (Lat. adeo, / approach.) A horizontal shaft or passage in a mine, either for access, or carrying off water. ADJA'CENT ANGLE. In Geometry, an angle im- 14 ADMIRALTY. mediately contiguous to another, so that one side Is com- mon to both angles. It is more particularly used when the two angles, besides having a common side, have their other sides in the same straight line. In this case, the adjacent angle is the same as the supplemental angle. A'D.JECTI VE. (Lat. ad, to, and jaceo, / lie.) In Grammar, that part of speech which is annexed to sub- stantives, to define more accurately the conceptions in- tended to be denoted by them. See Grammar. ADJECTIVE COLOURS. Colours which require to be fixed by some base or mordant, in order to be ap- plied as permanent dye-stuflfs. ADJOURNMENT, in Parliamentary language, means a postponement of the sittings or proceedings of either House of Parliament from one time to another specified for its re-assembling. Adjournment differs from proro- gation in this, that the latter is an act of royal authority, whereas the power of adjournment is vested in each house respectively, no definite limits being prescribed to it by the constitution. See Prorogation. ADJU'DICATION. In Scottish Law, the diligence {t. e. process) by which land is attached as security for payment of debt. Adjudication for debt is a species of mortgage, redeemable, except in the cases of what are termed general adjudications, or adjudications contra hjereditatem jacentem. ADJU'STMENT. In Marine Insurance, the settle- ment of a loss incurred by the insured. A'DJUTANT. A militarir ofiicer, attached to every regiment, who relieves the major of part of his duty, and performs it in his absence. A'DJUTANT-GENERAL. A staff officer, who is to the army what the adjutant is to a regiment. He assists the general, and distributes his orders. A'DJUTANT-GENERAL OF THE JESUITS. A title given to certain fathers who resided with the ge- neral of the order. A'DJUVANT, (Lat. adjuvare, ^0 A^/jr,.) In Medi- cine, a substance which assists and promotes the opera- tion of others. ADMINISTRA'TION. (In Law.) If a person die intestate as to his personalty, letters of administration are granted by the ordinary {see Law, tit. Ecclesiastical Courts) to such person as is pointed out by the statutes 31 E. 3., and 21 H. 8. These empower the ordinary to grant these letters to the widow, if there be one, or next of kin, at his discretion. Of persons equally near in degree the ordinary may grant to which he please. If none of the kindred take out administration, a creditor may do it. When the will is made without the nomination of any executor, the ordinary grants administration cum testa- mento annexo. Where a person dies intestate, his per- sonal property descends (subject to his debts) as directed by the statute of Distributions, 22 & 23 C. 2. c. 10., ex- plained by 29 C. 2. c. 30. One-third goes to the widow ; the residue in equal proportions to the children, or, if they are dead, to their representatives, i. e. their lineal descendants. If there are none of these, then the widow takes a moiety, and the next of kin in equal degree, and their representatives take the other; if there be no widow, they take the whole. But of representatives none are admitted among collaterals farther than the children of the intestate's brothers and sisters. The order of nearness of kin, with reference to the distribu- tion of intestates' estates, is thus arranged according to the rules of the civil law — children, parents, brothers, grandfathers, uncles or nephews (and the females of each class respectively), and, lastly, cousins. Administration. (Lat. administratio, care of an affair.) In its general sense means the conduct or management of any affair ; but in this country the term is usually applied to the management of the public or national aflairs by the government, which is thence called the Administration. A'DMIRAL. A great naval officer, who has the same power and authority over the maritime forces of a state that a general has over its land forces ; and who also tries himself, or appoints officers to try, maritime cases. There are three ranks of Admirals, the Admiral (or full Admiral), Vice Admiral, and Rear Admiral. Each of these again has three gradations, of red, white, and blue, the colours of the flags they bear The Admiral carries his flag at the main, the Vice at the fore, and the Rear at the mizen mast. Admiral, Lord High. The ninth great officer of state in England. The office has been usually given, at least since the reign of Henry IV., to some of the king's youngest sons, near kinsmen, or of the higher nobility. Since the reign of Charles II. it has been, with occasional exceptions, always in commission, and the commissioners are styled ' Lords of the Admiralty.' It was held by the late sovereign William IV., when Duke of Clarence, from 1827 to the following year. A'DMIRALTY, the Board of Commissioners for exe- cuting the Office of Lord High Admiral, and having au- thority over naval affairs generally. Admiralty, Court cf. In Law, is a court of record, ADNATE. of which the proceedhigs are carried on, at least to a cer- tain extent, according to the course of the civil law ; although, as the judge may have in some cases tlm assistance of a jury, it has also a resemblance to the courts of common law. It has jurisdiction principally for tlie determination of private injurie^s to private rights arising at sea, or intimately connected with maritime sub- jects ; and in most cases, to which its authority extends, it has concurrent jurisdiction, either with the common law courts, or those of equity. Suits may be instituted in this court for assault and battery at sea ; for collision of ships ; for the restitution of goods piraticall5r taken not under colour of war. It has also an equitable jurisdiction between part owners of a ship. It adjudicates in suits for mariners' wages, and for pilotage. It has a peculiar juris- diction In cases ot bottomry bonds, and other deeds in the nature of a mortgage of the ship ; having an exclusive power to grant warrants to arrest the ship itself. It has also jurisdiction in cases of salvage, and incidentally of wreck. The prize court, which decides prize causes in time of war, is a separate tribunal, although usually presided over by the same judge as that of admiralty. To that able and philosophical jurist. Sir W. Scott (Lord Stowell), who sat in these courts (as well as the eccle- siastical) for many years during the late war, and after its close, the country is indebted, not only for the high character and value of these tribunals, but also for the light thrown on the difficult and iTnportant questions of national law, by the most profound and lucid decisions ever applied to that subject. A'DNATE. (Lat. adnascor, I grow to any thing.) Is said when one organ grows to the face of another, and not to its apex, in which case it would be innate. This term is chiefly employed in speaking of anthers. ADO'NIS. In Mythology. A beautiful youth, son of Cinyras, king of Cyprus, beloved by Venus, and killed by a wild boar, to the great regret of the goddess. It is, also, the name of a river of Phoenicia, on the banks of which Adonis, or Thammuz, as he is called in the East, was supposed to have been killed. At certain seasons of the year this river acquires a high red colour, by the rains washing up particles of red earth. The ancient poets ascribed this to a sympathy in the river for the death of Adonis. This season was observed as a festival in the adjacent country. Facciolati, Lexicon ; Calmet, Diclionnaire de la Bible, art. Thammux.) Milton has beautifully alluded to these circumstances : — " ■ Thammuz came next behind. Whose annual wound in Lebanon allured The Syrian damsels to lament his fate In am'rous ditties all a summer's day : While smooth Adonis from his native rock Ran purple to the sea; supposed with blood Of Thammuz yearly wounded." Parad. Lost, I. Y. U5. ADO'NIC. (Gr. 'Aimn, Adonis.) A species of verse consisting of a dactyle and a spondee ; as in Horace, lib. I. Od. ii. v. 5. Terruit ttrbetn, visere monies, &c. It was invented by Sappho, and derived its name from being principally sung at the festivals in memory of Adonis. (Facciolati, Lexicon.) ADO'PTER. A vessel with two necks placed between a retort and a receiver, serving to increase the length of the neck of the former. ADO'PTION. (Lat. adopto, I adopt.) In the Civil Law, signifies the admission of a stranger to the rights and privileges of a son. Adoption was a common custom among the Romans, by whose law a relation, nearly resembling that of master and slave, was constituted between father and son ; so that a child, adopted from one family into another, passed, in effect, from the power of his parent to that of his adopter. Adoption is said, in Justinian's institutes, to be of two sorts : the one, also called arrogation, where a person, independent of pa- rental control, is adopted into a family by virtue of an imperial rescript ; the other, where, by the authority of a magistrate, a child passes from one family to another. But unless the adopter possessed a certain right by blood over the person adopted (as a grandfather), the parental power of the father was not extinguished. Adoption exists in the jurisprudence of various countries, where derived from the civil law ;. as in the German states and in France: in the latter country, the person adopting must be one having neither children nor other legitimate descendants. A'DKAGANT. Gum Tragacanth. ADRl'FT. Not fastened ; as a ship that has parted from her anchor, a boat that has broke from her ship, a gun from the ship's side, &c. A'UVENT. {1j3X. Advemo, I approach.) The holy season, comprising four Sundays before Christmas. It begins on St. Andrew's day, the 30th of November, or on the Sunday next before or after it, according to the day of the week on which the 25th of December falls. ADVENTI'TIOUS. (Lat. adventitius, extraor- 15 ADULTERY. dinary.) In Botany, when any thing appears out of the ordmary course of nature : if a bud appears where buds do not usually appear, it is adventitious. Thifj term must not be confounded with abnormal, which is used when any thing is constructed out of the ordinary course. A'DVERB. A word annexed to an adjective or verb, to define more closely the modifications of the quality or action denoted. See Grammar. ADVE'RSA. Araedallic terra, applied to two heads facing each other. A'DVERSE. (Lat. ad, to, andverto, 7fMr«.) In Bo- tany, leaves are so called when they present their under surface to the sun. AD VE'RTISEMENT. (Lat. adverto, I attend to.) In its general sense, means any information as to any fact or circumstance. But it is more particularly used to designate notices made by competent authority "in the daily papers, and otherwise, of events of local or general interest, as the publication of new books, sales of estates and produce, meetings of creditors, formation and dis- solution of partnerships, &c. Such notices, when in- serted in the gazette, or in newspapers and literary works published in numbers, pay a duty of Is. Qd. each for each time of insertion. ADULA'RIA. A resplendent crystallised felspar, of a pearly lustre. The finest specimens came from Adula, at the summit of St. Gothard. ADU'LT. {l^at. &A\x\t\xs, grown vp.) In' its general sense it means any thing grown up, or arrived at ma- turity. It is that period of human life that extends from youth to old age. ADU'LTERY. (Lat. adulterium, a word of very un- certain derivation.) The sin of incontinence committed by a married person : adultery between two married persons is termed double by some jurists. By the law of Moses, adultery was punished by death. Lev. xx. 10., Deut. xxii. 22. ; and passages in Proverbs (c. vi.) and Ezekiel (xvi. 38, 40.) prove that the law was observed in this respect down to the overthrow of the Jewish mo- narchy, as we know it to have been in the time of our Saviour. The mode of punishment was by stoning ; but it is observable that this mode is not ordained in Deuteronomy, as it is for various other offences. The test or ordeal of adultery is detailed in Numbers v. 11— 3L Under the Grecian and Roman republics adultery was variously treated ; but the celebrated Lex Julia de Adul- terio, under Augustus, punished it with banishment (deportatio vel relegatio). Tacit, lib. ii. Annal. It was not until the reign of Constantino, when some tincture of Judaism had been introduced into the state along with the establishment of Christianity, that the punishment of death was formally enacted for it. This penalty was again mitigated under Leo and Mareian ; and by the laws of Justinian the adulterer was punishable with death, the adultress with flagellation, imprisonment, &c. But about the same period, the gradual increase of episcopal authority in civil cases seems to have drawn crimes of incontinence almost wholly within the cognizance of the ecclesiastical courts ; and the canons contain a variety of directions on the subject of adultery. On the other hand, the jurisprudence of the Northern nations, which visited this as well as other crimes of freemen with very little severity, as mere offences against individuals, re- duced the penalty in most of the Western kingdoms to a mere pecuniary one, sometimes attended with public dis- grace or corporal punishment. The customs of the several French provinces contain a great variety of pe- nalties and fines ; at Castelnaudari, in the fourteenth century, the fine for adultery was fixed at "five sous only J " Such penalties, of course, fell rapidly into dis- use ; and in the sixteenth century we find it observed by a French civilian (quoted by Thuanus), that " it was never heard that any body had been punished for adul- tery in France." This observation is quoted by the historian when relating an event which created great sensation at the time, namely, the capital pimishment at Orleans of two offenders by St. Cyr, the governor, a rigid Calvinist. The protestants of that sect, in France as well as in Scotland and England, made it their en- deavour to introduce primitive severity of manners by severity of punishment. De Thou, the father, appears also to have made some efforts toward putting in force the laws against adultery : but from the time of the religious wars, penal cognizance of adultery may be said to have nearly ceased in France, although, by various arrets (1637, 1701, &c.), besides the civil consequences of an action of adultery by husband against wife, the latter might be condemned to seclusion in a house of cor- rection for two years, or more. In Geneva, Strasbourg, and other places where the reformed religion prevailed, a temporary strictness of law was introduced about the same period, but with little permanent effect. In England, by the old common law, mutilation was the punishment of this as well as other offences ; but under the Plantagenets it became matter of ecclesiastical cognizance (except so far as civil consequences were concerned), and visited ADVOCATE. onJy by the spiritual censure of the church. " The rules of the canon law," says a recent writer," have manifested an indulgence towards this offence which is chiefly to be accounted for by reference to the constrained celibacy of its early compilers." But In 1650 the puritans, under Cromwell, succeeded in obtaining an ordinance by which adultery, as well as simple fornication, was made felony, without benefit of clergy ; an absurd decree, which was soon repealed. In 1694, and again in 1801, the subject of adultery and divorce was discussed at length in par- liament, but without producing any enactment. (See Tebbs's Essay on the Scriptural Doctrines of Adultery and Divorce, and on the Criminal Character and Punish- ment of Adultery, 8vo. Lond. 1822.) For the civil con- sequences of Adulten', see Marhiage, law of. A'D VOCATE. (Lat. advocatus, he who is called in to plead in a court of law the cause of another.) The ori- ginal pleaders of causes at Rome were the patricians, who defended gratuitously their clients : but even before the downfal of the republic, the class had degenerated into a profession, its members receiving rewards for their ser- vices, although still among the most honourable of em- ployments. But from the original gratuitous character of advocates arose the peculiar custom by which, among ourselves, the fees of barristers are still regarded as honorary, and cannot be recovered at law. In the later ages of the empire the advocati appear to have formed a distinct class from the jurisconsulti, or chamber-counsel, and to have much declined in reputation. In France the avocats, or counsel, form a separate order, of which each member is attached to a particular local court. The lord advocate, in Scotland, is a public oflBcer, who prose- cutes crimes before the court of justiciary. ADVOW'SON. (Lat. advocatio, a caWmg.) Properly, the relation in which a patron (advocatus) stands towards the living to which he presents, i. e. the patronage of a church. The earliest provision for divine worship, in Eng- land and in other countries, was derived from the offerings of the laity, which were distributed by the bishop of each diocese among his clergy, whom he sent from place to place to preach and administer the sacraments. By degrees he was enabled, by the bequests of the faithful, and the customary offering of tithes, to subdivide his diocese, or parochia, as it was originally called, into various districts, and to build churches and establish per- manent ministers in each. At the same time it became a common practice among the nobles to build and endow churches for the benefit of themselves and their own dependants ; in which case they were allowed to present to the benefice, subject to the licensing power of the bishop and the canons of the church. Advowsons, in legal phraseology are either appendant, where imme- morially annexed to a manor ; or in gross, where they form separate subjects of property. If the patron of a rectory fails to present within six months after the vacancy happens, the right falls to the bishop ; and by similar neglect on his part, to the archbishop, and thence to the king. The presentation is by letter to the bishop ; institution, by an instrument registered in the bishop's court ; and induction, which completes the incumbent's title, is performed by the archdeacon. A'DYTUM. (Gr. cc^vrov, a recess.) In Architecture, the secret dark chamber in a temple, to which none but the priests had access. It was from this part that the oracles were delivered. Seneca, in his tragedy of Thyestes, says, " Hinc orantibus Responsa dantur certa, dum ingenti sono Laxantur Adyto fata." Among the Egj'ptians, the Secos was the same thing of which Strabo has given a description. The only well preserved adytum of the ancients is in the little temple at Pompeii. It is raised some steps above the level of the temple itself, and is without light, j^'DES. (Lat.) In architecture. A small temple consecrated to a god which was not afterwards dedicated by the augurs, from which circumstance, according to Varro, it was different from the templum. This dis- tinction among the Romans in the early ages was afterwards lost, and the words were used indiscrimi- nately. iEDI'CULA. (Lat.) A diminutive of the preced- ing. iE'DILE. The title of certain Roman magistrates, so called from their care of buildings (aedes). They were divided into two classes, distinguished by the epithets plebeian and curule. The two plebeian aediles were, as their name imports, elected from the commonalty (plebs), and were subordinate to the tribunes of the commons, having jurisdiction over lesser causes, sub- mitted to them by those magistrates. The two curule aediles, so called from their privilege of giving judgment on ivory seats (sellae curules), were originally elected from the patricians, but afterwards from both plebeians and patricians promiscuously. This magistracy was one 16 ^RA. of the most dignified In the state, and was allowed the use of the robe of honour (toga prsetexta), and a certain precedence in the senate. The peculiar office of the a;cliles was the superintendence of public works, markets, &c., in the city. They had also, particulady the curule aediles, to exhibit public games, which the^ften did at a vast expense, in order to court popularity. Julius Caesar added two other plebeian aediles, called cereal, to inspect the public stores of provisions. ^GICE'RE^. (Gr. (i/|, goat, xi^a.;, horn.) A dlvi- slon of myrsinaceous plants, the type of which is the genus aegiceras. It is distinguished by the absence of albumen ; the species grow in maritime swamps in tropi- cal countries, and have the embrj-o germinating within the pericarp, after the manner of mangroves. .S'GIS. (Gr. «/|, a goat.) The mythological shield of Jupiter, which was covered with the skin of the goat Amalthsea, and given by him to Minerva, who, by fixing on it the head of Medusa, gave it the power of petrifj-ing all persons who looked at it. The word is also used sometimes for the breast-piece of a god. iE'GYLOPS. (Gr. «<|, a goat, and d,-4,, an eye.) A sore in the inner angle of the eye, frequently terminating in fistula lachrymalis. Goats were supposed to be very subject to an analogous affection. — Also the name of a kind of grass. -^'NEID. The 6pic poem of Virgil, relating the wanderings of .lEneas after the capture of Troy, and his settlement in Italy. ^'OLIPILE. (Lat. JEolus, the god of the winds, and pila, a ball.) An hydraulic instrument, contrived for the purpose of exhibiting the convertibility of water into steam. It consists of a hollow ball of metal, having a slender neck or pipe, with a very small orifice inserted into it. The ball, having been filled with water, is placed over the fire ; and the heat gradually con- verts the water into vapour, which rushes out of the pipe with great violence till tha whole is discharged. The experiment is not unattended by danger ; for should the small orifice by any accident be stopped, the steam would burst the ball. The aeolipile was known to the ancients, being mentioned by Vitruvius. Descartes and others have used it to account for the natural cause and pro- duction of the wind ; hence its name, JEolipile, that is, pila iEoli, the ball of ^olus, the god of the winds. The aeolipile is sometimes filed with alcohol, and the jet of its vapour being inflamed, it serves the purpose of a blowpipe. ^'OLUS. The god of the winds, who was fabled byr the early poets to have his seat in the floating island of ^olia ; but the Latin and later Greek poets placed him in the Lipari isles. Here the winds were pent up in vast caves, it being the duty of ^olus to let them loose, and to restrain their violence at the pleasure of Jupiter. Vir- gil has described the power and functions of JEolus, in one of the finest passages of the ^neid : — " Hie vasto rex iEolus antro, Luctantes ventos tempestatesque sonoras Imperio premit, ac -vinctis et carcere frcenat. Illi indignantes magno cum murinure montis Circum claustra fi-eraunt. Celsa sedet ^olus arce Sceptra tenens, mollitqiie anlmos, et temperat iras : Ni facial, maria ac terras coelumque pronindum Quippe ferant rapidi secum, verrantque per auras." &netd, 1.1.52. JEOLUS' HARP, or ^OLIAN HART. A well- known instrument, which produces a pleasing combina- tion of sounds, by the action of the wind. Its construc- tion is very simple, consisting of merely a number of catgut or wire strings, stretched in parallel lines over a box of thin deal, with sounding holes cut in the top. The strings being tuned in unison, the effect is produced by placing the instrument in a current of air. The inven- tion of the iEolian harp is generally given to Kircher, by whom it was first described. t JE'O^. See Gnostics. JE'RA, or "ERA. (A word of doubtful derivation.) In Chronology, the term aera,as now;understood, is the period that has elapsed from some fixed point of time, or epoch, called the commencement of the aera — Thus the Chris- tian aera began at the birth of Christ, the Mohammedan asra at the flight of Mohammed from Mecca to Medina, the aera of Diocletian at the coronation of that emperor, &c. ; and the period of the occurrence of any event is as- certained by reckoning from one or other of these epochs. When, for example, it is said that Queen Victoria ascended the throne of Great Britain in 1837, it means that this event took place in the 1837th year of the Christian aera, or of that aera which began with the birth of Christ. It is plain from the above statement that the period of time selected for an aera, or point whence to begin the computation of time, is necessarilyarbitrary; and different nations have adopted different periods coincident with some important event in their civil or religious history. Some have adapted the year of the creation of the world, and this, were its date well ascertained, would be one of the best that could be selected. But the sacred writings are not explicit on this point, and there are great discre- iERARIAN. nicies ill the estimates, as to the period of its occurrence. t he Greeks used to reckon by the aera of the Olympiad {see the word), which began at the summer solstice, anno 776, B. C. The liomans reckoned from the building of the city, generally held to be the 24th of April, B.C. 753. The Julian a;ra dates from the reformation of the calen- dar by Julius Cajsar, B. C. 45. All Christian nations now adopt for their aera the birth of Christ, which took place on the 1st of January, in the middle of the 4th year of the 194th Olympiad, and the 753d year of the building of Rome. The ara of most Mohammedan nations is that of the He- gira, or flight of Mohammed to Medina, corresponding with the 16th July, A. D. 622. The a;ra of Sulwanah, in common use in a great part of India, corresponds to A. D. 78. The sera of Yezdegird, used in Persia, began 16th June, A. D. 632. Subjoined are the names of some of the principal a;ras, with the year of the Christian sera in which they began, and the abbreviations by which they are commonly dis- tinguished. jEras. Commenced Abbreviations Year of the World (Constantinopoli- tan account) - B. C. 5,509 A.M. Const. — (Alexandrian account) 5,492 A.M. Alex. — (Jewish account) - 3,760 A.M. Mra. of Nabonassar - 747 ^r. Nab; Olympiads 776 Olymp. Yearofllome 753 A.U. C. Julian ^ra - - - 45 Jul. Mr. Christian iEra ... A.D. iEra of Sulwanah aTd. 78 Saca. yEraofDioclesian . 284 JEt. Dioc TheHe^ira 622 A.H. TEraofYezdeKlrd - 632 A. Pers. It is easy to deduce from this the year of the Christian ajra corresponding with that of any greater £era. {See further Chronology of History by Sir H. Nicholas, p. 22, &c.) iERA'RIAN. The term applied to a Roman citizen who had been degraded to. the lowest rank compatible with personal freedom. He, however, still paid taxes, but enjoyed no privileges, and could not serve in the army, or, consequently, participate in the distribution of land granted to such classes as did. iERA'RIUM. (Lat.) The public treasury of the Roman people, the care of which was vested in the quasstors. After the fall of the republic the aerarium was kept distinct from the treasury of the emperor, which was called fiscus. The aerarium sanctius, or more sacred treasury, was appointed to provide for cases of extreme emergency, and might not be opened on other occasions. AE'RIAL. (Gr. ir?, «»>■•) In Painting, a term ap- plied to the diminishing intensity of colour on objects receding from the eye. Aerial perspective is the relative apparent recession of objects from the foreground, owing to the quantity of air interposed between them and the si)ectator, and must accompany the recession of the per- spective lines. AERIAL ACID, Carbonic acid. A'ERO-DYNA'MICS.- (Gr. are, and ^v,«.!x.t;, power.) The science which treats of the motion of the air, and of the mechanical effects of air in motion. This is an experimental science, and there are two ways in v.hich it may be investigated. The first is, by ascertaining the effects which air, moving with a certain velocity, that is, wind, produces on a body against which it strikes ; and the second, by ascertaining the resistance which air at rest offers to a solid body rapidly passing through it. The problem is exactly the same, whether the body is considered as moving against the air at rest, or the air is supposed to move against the body with the same velocity. Conceive a body to be moved forward in a straight line, displacing successively the particles of air opposed to it ; the effect which it produces is proportional to the number of particles against which it strikes, and to the quantity of motion communicated to each. Suppose now the velocity of the body to be doubled, the motion communicated to each particle of air displaced will be twice as great as before, and twice as many particles will receive the impulsion in the same time. Hence we infer that the effect will be four times as great, or that the effect is proportional to the square of the velocity. This result of theoi:y agrees tolerably well with experiments made to determine the resistance of the air when the velocity is not very great, or not exceeding eight or nine hundred feet in a second. When the velocity is much greater than this, the effect is modified by circum- stances which require further explanation. When a solid body is moved out of its position, the space which it occupied is not filled with air instan- tanepusU', but only after a sensible, though very short time. Theory, confirmed to a certain degree by ex- r^rience, shows that air, under the ordinary atmospheric sure, rushes into a vacuum with a velocity of between ') and 1400 feet in a second of time. But this velocity • ury speedily checked \ for the instant that any portion 17 AEROLITE. of air is admitted, or the vacuum ceases to be perfect, that portion resists the entrance of more with a force proi)or- tional to its density. Suppose, for example, the air in a receiver to be reduced to one-fourth of its natural density ; the effort of the exterior air to enter the receiver will be reduced to three-tburths of its amount when the receiver was perfectly exhausted ; and consequently the velocity, which is proportional to the square root of the effort or the resistance, will be reduced in the proportion of 1 to v^'f ^ or of 100 to 87, very nearly. In this manner, as the air continues to enter, the velocity will rapidly diminish. Now, conceive a body, for example a cannon ball, to be moving rapidly through the air, but with a less velocity than 1300 feet per second. The air in front of the ball will remain in its natural state, because the con- densation produced every instant by the contact of the ball, is propagated more quickly than the ball moves (the velocity of the propagation being equal to that with which air enters a vacuum). But there is a certain space behind the ball in which the air has not entirely recovered its equilibrium, but remains more or less rarefied, the ball having passed through it in less time than is required for the surroimding air entirely to fill it. In addition, therefore, to the resistance which arises from the communication of motion to the pjirticles of air, there is a pressure on the front part of the ball, not counterbalanced from behind; in consequence of which, we may infer that the resistance will increase in a quicker ratio than the square of the velocity. This de- duction is also confirmed by experience ; for it is found that the resistance continues to increase with the square of the velocity only while the velocity is less than {>00 or 1000 feet per second. Above this velocity the ratio begins to fail ; and when the velocity exceeds that with which air enters a vacuum, the ratio is entirely altered. At a velocity of 1600 feet per second, the resistance is found to be more than twice that given by theory. The reason is obvious: the density of the air before the body is increased by the rapid motion, and, consequently, presses more on the fore part of the body than air in its natural state. The resistance of the air on the mption of projectiles, was first examined experimentally by M. Robins (see his Principles of Gunnery)^ and afterwards by Dr. Hutton, of Woolwich (see his Tracts, vol. 3., and Math. Dictionary), whose experiments were carried on to a greater extent, and varied in a greater number of ways. The following are the principal results deduced by Dr. Hutton, from his experiments on bodies- moving very slowly, not more than 20 feet per second: — 1st, " That the resistance is nearly in the same pro- portion as the surfaces ; a small increase only taking place in the greater surfaces and for the greater velocities. 2d. " The resistance of the air to the same surface with different velocities, is, in these slow motions, nearly as the square of the velocity, but gradually increases more and more above that proportion as the velocity increases. 3d. " The round ends and sharp ends of solids suffer less resistance than the flat or plane ends of the same diameter ; but the sharper end has not always the less resistance. 4th. " When the hinder parts of bodies are of different forms the resistances are different, though the fore parts be exactly alike and equal ; owing, probably, to the dif- ferent pressures of the air on the hinder parts." Dr. Hutton likewise found, that although in slow motions the experimental resistance is nearly equal to that computed by theory, yet, " as the velocity increases, the experimental resistance gradually exceeds the other more and more, till, at the velocity of 1300 feet, the former becomes double the latter ; after which, the dif- ference increases a little further, till, at the velocity of 1600 or 1700 feet, when that excess is the greatest, and is rather less than 2 and 1-lOth ; and, after this the difference decreases ^adually, as the velocity increases ; and at the velocity of 2000 the former resistance again becomes just double the latter." For further information on this subject, see Projectiles, Wind. AERO'GRAPHY (Gr. a-n^, the air, and y^ot. Quid valeant humeri; second, he must constantly labour to improve his taste ; third, nature must be the constant object of his imita- tion ; fourth, he must attain perspicuity, so that his end may be free from ambiguity and obscurity ; fifth, he must elevate his sentiments above all common or common- place objects, by which an expansion of the imagination supervenes and stamps his works with an air of sublimity, which, sixthly, results from a concurrent observance of the fourth and fifth rules. We close this with the fol- lowing observation of Menzel: " Art is not the result of understanding alone; the inspiration of the artist has been, and ever must be, the source of that which gives aesthetic value to his productions." .ffi'STHNA. A name applied by Fabricius to a genus of dragon-flies, characterised by having the wings ex- panded when at rest, and the divisions of the lip equal. AE'THEO'GAMOUS. (Or. ^^,97,?, unusual, and •yot/Aos; marriage.) A name contrived to express more clearly the nature of what are called cryptogamic plants ; it being the opinion of the author of the name that the mode of propagation among such plants was not hidden, but only of an unusual nature. It has been confined by De CandoUe to such as have vessels, as well as cellular tissue, in their organisation. In this sense they are the same as ferns, lycopodiums, mosses, and their allies. ^'THRIOSCO'PE. (Or. caB^io;, clear, and ^ hyponitrous acid. 1 -j- 4 14 -i- 32 z: 40 nitrous acid. 1 + 5 14 4- 40 = 54 nitric acid. This table also shows the nomenclature commonly ap- plied to the compounds ; the termination ous indicating the minimum of oxygen, the termination ic the maximum ; the term oxide implj'ing generally all those combinations of oxygen which are not sour, such being called acids. More frequently the relative proportions of oxygen in the oxides are designated by the first syllable of the Greek ordinal numerals: thus we have protoxides, deutoxides, tritoxides, &c. ; and when the base is satu- rated with oxygen, the compound is termed a peroxide. When the same substance forms three or four acids, the terra hypo is conveniently introduced with the termin- ation Otis or ic, as shown in the following taljle of the acids of sulphur : — Atoms cif Equivalents ({f Equivalents qf t!te sulphur, oxygen. sulphur. oxygen. acids. 1 + 1 16 + 8 = 24 hvposulphurous. 1 + 2 16 + 16 = 32 sulphurous. 14-3 16 + 24 = 40 sulphuric. 20 AGAMA. There is also an acid of sulphur intermediate between sulphurous and sulphuric, composed of 1 atom of hypo- sulphurous acid and 1 of sulphurous acid ; (24 + 32 = 56) or of 2 atoms of sulphur and 3 of oxygen: this is appro- priately called the hyposulphuric acid. The terms sesqui and bi are sometimes used to designate inter- mediate and double compounds of acids, or other bodies with bases : thus,wehavethreecompoundsofcarbonicacid with ammonia, in which 1 proportional or atom of am- monia is respectively combined with 1, 1|, and 2 of car- bonic acid, and these we call the carbonate, sesquicar- bonate, and bicarbonate of ammonia. For a table of the equivalent numbers of the simple substances, see Equi- valents. Change of form and change of properties are the com- mon consequences of chemical affinity. We observe, 1 . Solids forming liquids (ice and salt). 2. Solids forming gases (explosion of gunpowder). 3. A solid and a liquid producing a solid (lime and water). 4. A solid and a liquid producing a liquid (all common cases of solution ; as of salt and sugar in water). 5. Liquids producing solids (solution of carbonate of potassa mixed with mu- riate of lime). 6. Liquids producing gases (alcohol and nitric acid). 7. Gases producing solids (ammonia and muriatic. acid). 8. Gases producing liquids (chlorine and defiant gas). The density of bodies is also materially affected by chemical combination ; the density of a compound is very rarely the mean of its components, but generally increased : thus, almost all gaseous compounds occupy less bulk than their elementary gases in a separate state ; there are, however, cases in which 1 volume of one gas, combined with 1 volume of another, produce exactly 2 volumes of a compound gas, the density of which is, of course, the mean of that of its components ; and again, in the combinations of some of the metals with each other, and with sulphur, the density of the compound is below the mean of its elements. W hen certain liquids are mixed, great and immediate increase of density ensues, and much heat is evolved (sulphuric acid and water). Change of form and of density are often attended by remarkable changes in other qualities: thus, tasteless bodies produce active compounds (oil of vitriol is composed of oxygen, sulphur, and water), and active substances produce inert compounds (sulphuric acid and caustic potash produce the inert salt, sulphate of potash) ; so that it is utterly impossible, by any a priori reasoning, to determine what will be the consequence of chemical combination : useless elements produce useful compounds, and useless com- pounds yield useful elements. Another important and curious consequence of che- mical action is change of colour : the vegetable blues are generally reddened by acids, and rendered green by alcalis ; the alcalis render many of the reds purple ; and of the yellows, brown : chlorine destroys most colours ; so does the joint action of light, air, and moisture (bleach- ing, &c.). AFFI'RMATI VE. In Logic, denotes the quality of a proposition which asserts the agreement of the predicate with the subject. AFFIRMATIVE QUANTITY. In Algebra, denotes a quantity to be added, in contradistinction to one to be taken away. AFFIRMATIVE SIGN, or POSITIVE SIGN. The sign of addition, marked +, meaning plus, or more. Dr. Hutton observes, that the early writers on algebra used the word plus in Latin, or piu in Italian, for addi- tion, and afterwards the initial p only as a contraction ; like as they used minus or meno, or the initial ni only, for subtraction ; and thus their operations were denoted in Italy by Lucas de Burgo, Tartalea, and Cardan, while the signs + and — were employed much about the same time in Germany by Stifelius, Scheubelius, and others, to denote the same operations. A'FFIX. In Grammar, a syllable attached to the end of a class of words, determining their meaning. Thus, a class of adverbs in English are determined by the affix ly; strongly, weakly, &c. Prefix is a syllable so at- tached at the beginning. AFRA'NCESADOS. In Modern History, a denomin- ation given in Spain to the party which attached itself to the cause of the French, or of the intrusive King Joseph, during the war of independence,"1808— 1814. AFT. See Abaft. A'FTERMATH. in Agr. Grass which is mown, after the first crop of hay has been taken away, .nstead of being eaten off by stock. A'GA. A title of dignity among the Turks and Persians, given to various officers : as, the aga of the janissaries, while that corps subsisted ; the capi-aga, or chief eunuch of the seraglio, &c. It is also a common epithet of respect in addressing a distinguished person. AGA'LMATOLI'TE. (Gr. i.yci.Xu.a., image, and xSo;, a stone.') The mineral which the Chinese carve into images. AGA' MA. (Gr. ocy ALBUM GRiECUM. When dogs are fed upon bones, they digest the animal portion, and the earthy parts (chiefly phosphate of lime) are voided in the form of white excrement. This inert matter was formerly used in me- dicine under the above title. ALBU'MEN. A peculiar animal matter entering largely into the composition of animal bodies, such as the blood, muscles, bones, &'C. ; also the chief component of white of egg, to which the term albumen was originally applied, and which well and familiarly illustrates its lead- ing peculiarity, namely, that at a certain temperature it 28 ALCEDO. coagulates into a soft white solid, no longer soluble in water. It may be obtained pure by coagulating the white of egg by alcohol, washing it thoroughly with that fluid, and then carefully drying it at 120°. It then ap- pears as a yellow, shining, transparent and brittle sub- stance composed of — Nitrogen - 1 atom = 14 15-05 Carbon - 8 =48 51-61 Hydrogen - 7 =7 7-53 Oxygen - 3 =24 25-81 I 93 100-00 The albumen of birds' eggs coagulates at a temperature of 145° to 165° ; and when dried, shrinks and becomes brittle and semitransparent, in all respects resembling horn. One hundred parts of the albumen of the hen's egg lose, upon careful drying, about 86 of water, and leave 34 of solid residue. Alcohol, most of the acids, and several metallic salts, also coagulate albumen, and some of the latter are very delicate tests of its presence in ani- mal fluids : subacetate of lead, for instance, renders a solution of 1 part of fresh white of egg in 2000 of water turbid, so that it detects 1 part of dry albumen in 10,000 of water. Corrosive sublimate is also an excellent test of albumen, forming with it a white insoluble compound ; hence white of egg has been proposed as an antidote in cases of poisoning by corrosive sublimate. Albumen. A solid fleshy, bony, or horny substance, secreted in some seeds between the embryo and the seed- skin. It is supposed to be intended for the nutriment of the young embryo when it first springs into life. The part that furnishes the flour of corn, the flesh of the cocoa-nut, the great mass of the seeds of coffee, are albu- men. Botanists have remarked that this substance is never deleterious, however poisonous the plant may be by which it is borne. ALBUMEN OF VEGETABLES. Is a proximate principle, having some of the leading chemical charac- ters of animal albumen. ALBU'RNUM. (Lat. alburnum, s«/}-t^ood.) The newly formed and soft part of the wood of exogenous trees, consisting of empty or nearly empty tubes and cells, the sides of which are thin and not indurated ; however durable the timber of a plant may be, this part of it is in all cases perishable, the vegetable matter of which it con- sists having but little power of adhesion, and readily yielding up its carbon to the oxygen of the atmosphere, the consequence of which is speedy decomposition. It is only when the tissue of this part becomes consolidated by the addition of resins, tannhi, and various other products, which change its colour from a pale yellow to various other deeper colours, that timber really becomes valuable. In some species this is effected rapidly, as in oak, teak, lig- num vitae, &c. ; in others very slowly, or not at all, as in the poplar and willow. Hence the wood of the latter class of trees never acquires any durability. By some writers the alburnum is defined to be " wood only one year old ; " this is, however, erroneous. It is through the alburnum principally that the ascending sap of a plant moves ; the course of the sap is not, however, confined to the alburnum, but is effected wherever the woody tubes are sufficiently open for it to pass. A'LCA. The name of a Linnaean genus of anserine birds, characterised by a short, compressed, vertically extended, convex beak, edged along the upper surface, and generally transversely furrowed ; feet toti-palmate, and wanting the hinder toe. Recent ornithologists have divided the Linna;an awks or penguins into the subgenera fratercula and alca. ALCABA'LA, or ALCAVA'LA. A tax formerly im- posed in Spain and her colonies, consisting originally of 10, and subsequentlyof 14 percent. advalorem,onall property sold, and payable as often as it changed hands. This monstrous impost, by preventing the side and transfer of property, necessarily proved in the highest degree in- jurious." (See Ulloa, Jietablissement des Manufactures d'Espagne, cap. 3.) ALCA'LDE. A Spanish officer of justice ; from the Arabic kadi, 7« J. i Dsal. !^ u short. ^ Iri long. @e E e Ey. n * € ^ He. €: gf;ff F f ; ff Ef ; Ef-ef. J j Wau. Ze. Compound Vowels. ^~ e short. 3^1 o short. ^9 Si Si Gg H h ; ch I i Jj Gey, or Gay. Hau; Tsey-hau. 1? c ^ . sn. r:- Ha. ^.. 3ft- Hi, Yot. e ^ sn. £?^ Kha. ^!; cf K k ; ck Kau; Tsey-Kau. L £■ L 1. Ta. Consonants. SI L 1 El. b li la 1^ Tza. ^ka. ^ jha. gjim M m Em. Ye. Kef. u^ m2 a9 Dhad. 5Tya. ^ ha. ae?: X X Iks. J J A S Kaf. T- ^ ksha. S)9 Yy Ypsilon. J J J J Re. SCTsa. 3* nga. 3s; h Z z ; tz Tset; Tey-tset. U- L^ MM Ad •Sin. ^ sha. ^ nya. a 6 in A A Shin. Te. ^ gha. 5Tna. a uJ ae oe ue ej i^ The. 3T ja. •4 ma. HEBREW AND CHALDEE. | OR EEK. SAX ON. J^ Aleph. Q^ Mem A a Alpha. N V Nu. Ti a P P ^ Beth. P Nun. p Sam( B /S ^ Beta. SI xi. B b Q P J] Gimel. ch. r 7 r Gamma. Omicron. C c R P ■] Daleth. j; Aiq. A S Delta. n^TrPi. D b 8 r n H- P]t3 Phe. V y Tzad ?5 Koph E € Epsilon. P p p Rho. e e T c *l Vau. di. Z ^ ^ Zeta. 2 cr < Sigma. F F U u \ Zain. H ti Eta. T T 1 Tau. n S ID !> p^ Cheth. r 1 ^ Resch. 0^6 Theta. T V Upsilon. P h X X JQ Teth. t Yod. ij^ Sin. J^ Shin ;^ Thau I I Iota. K K Kappa. rent divinities. Those of Jupiter and the celestial gods the highest ; next, those of Vesta and the terrestrial gods ; then the sea gods were to have theirs a little lower, and so on. On festivals they were decorated for the occasion with such flowers and leaves as were sacred to the parti- cular divinity. But besides this casual decoration, the ancient altars furnish us with some of the most elegant bassi reUevi and foliage ornaments that are extant, still serving as models of taste, which have escaped the hands of the barbarian destroyer. According to Vitruvius, their fronts were turned towards the east, though often little regard seems to have been paid to their poiition, as they 37 ALUDEL. were occasionally deposited under the peristyle of a temple, and not unfrequently in the open air. In the larger temples there were often three different altars : the first was in the most sacred part, in front of the statue of the god ; the second was before the door of the temple ; and the third was portable, called anclabris, on which the offerings and sacred vases were placed. Amongst Chris- tians, the altar is a square or oblong table or tablet, placed at the east end of the church, for the celebration of the mass, or, in Protestant churches, for the celebration of the sacrament. These are varied in their form almost as much as those we have already described. The word Altar was adopted by the early Christians, together with the corresponding Greek term ^virioca-- -no^tov, (but not, unless, perhaps, in a single instance, ^mfji.o;,) to express the table of the Lord (1 Cor. x. 21.), But the word altar is stated to have been used by the fathers in four different senses (v. Suicer, in voc. 3-utriociTrr,eiey) : for, I. Christ himself, from Hebr. xiii. 10. 2. The church of Christ in general. 3. Indi- vidual members of the church. 4. The Lord's table. It is observed that the fathers of the first three cen- turies universally speak of the altar, and not of the table, although constantly admitting the charge which the heathens made against them of their having no altars, conceiving the term as used by the heathens to imply the offering of a sacrifice upon the altar, and the presence of the statue of the deity to whom the offering is made. From the fourth century the word table is frequently adopted, as by St. Chrysostom, St. Augustin, &c. In King Edward I.'s Book of Common Prayer, the word altar was retained in the communion service : but great opposition being raised against it, especially by Bishop Hooper, on account of the ambiguity of its meaning, and the colour it might seem to lend to the Romish notions of the eucharist, it was abandoned, and table substituted throughout. This, however, did not satisfy the more violent party; and on the restoration of the reformed worship at the accession of Elizabeth, the people pro- ceeded to take the first step towards a real and not a verbal substitution, by pulling down the altars in many churches. Hereupon the queen issued an injunction, wherein she declares that " it is no matter of great moment whether there be altars or tables, so that the sacrament be duly and reverentially administered ; " and directs that where the altars had been pulled down, tables should be erected in the same place. A'LTERATIVES. (Lat. altero, I change.) Medi- cines which cure diseases by slow and imperceptible de- grees, without producing sensible evacuations. ALTE'RNATE. (Lat. alternatus, changed by turns.) In Botany, parts are said to be alternate with each other when one is placed upon the stem a little higher or a little lower than the other ; the word is chiefly applied to leaves, and is used in distinction to opposite, in which parts arise from the same plant on opposite sides of the stem. Alternate. (Geometry.) When two straight lines are intersected by a third, the interior angles on the op- posite sides of the intersecting line are said to be alter- nate. Thus A M N and M N D are alternate angles ; and so also are B M N and M N C. A \M B If the two straight lines A B and C D be parallel, the alternate angles are equal. In proportion, the alter- C W o_ nate terms are the first and third, \ and also the second and fourth, and the terms of a proportion are said to be taken alternately, or by alternation, when the second and third are made td change places : and it is a well-known theorem, that a proportion subsisting among four quantities of the same kind is not disturbed by this change. Thus, \l a -.h :: c : d, then, alternately, a : c : : b : d. A'LTICA. A name applied by Fabricius to a subdi- vision of the Llnnsean Chrysomelae, characterised by the oblong body, bifid lip, and thickened hind legs. A'LTITUDE. (Lat. altus, high, altitudo, height.) In Astronomy, denotes the angle of elevation of a ce- lestial object, or the angle of the visual ray with the horizon. The altitude of a star is apparent or true. The apparent altitude is the angle ascertained immediately from observation ; the true altitude is found by correct- ing the apparent altitude for refraction, parallax, &c. Altitude is frequently used in Elementary Geometry in- stead of height. The altitude of a triangle is measured by a straight line drawn from the vertex perpendicular to the base ; and the altitude of a cone by the straight line drawn from the vertex perpendicular to the plane of the base. ALTO. (Lat. altus, high.) In Music, the counter-tenor part, or that immediately below the treble or highest. It is a word also used to denote the tenor violin. ALTO RILIEVO. See Rilievo. A'LUDEL. A piece of chemical apparatus used in the process of sublimation, and much resembling the ancient alembic. D3 ALULA. A'LULA. (Lat. ala, a wing.) In Ornithology, the group of ill-feathers, attached to the joint of the carpus ; as in the snipe. These are also called the ' bastard wings ' {ala spuria). A'LUM. A salt composed of alumina, potash, and sulphuric acid, and in its usual form containing a large quantity of water of crystallisation. Its octohedral crystals consist of Alumina Potassa Sulphuric acid Water - 3 atoms = 54 - 1 =48 - 4 =160 - 24 = 21G 10-76 9-95 33-74 45-55 Crystallised alum - I 478 100-00 Alum dissolves in about five parts of water at 60*^. The solution has a sweet and astringent taste, and is a powerful styptic. When crystallised alum is heated, it melts, aad, gradually losing water of crystallisation, be- comes a white spongy mass, called burned alum. Alum is largely manufactured for the uses of the arts, especially dying and calico printing. What is termed alum ore, is an aluminous slate containing sulphuret of iron ; it is calcined, exposed to air, lixiviated, and the so- lution so obtained mixed with sulphate of potash, and crystallised. The alum-works near Paisley, and at Wiiitby, in Yorkshire, are the largest in this country. Milk, curdled by stirring it with a lump of alum, fur- nishes alum whey, which is sometimes taken as a remedy for relaxed bowels. Alum curd is made by beating the white of egg with a piece of alum till it coagulates. ALU'MIN A. Aluminous earth ; earth of alum ; argil When a solution of ammonia is dropped into a solution of alum, a white precipitate falls, which, thoroughly washed, dried, and heated, is pure aluminous earth. There are two properties of this earth which render it of great importance in the arts: one is, that it forms a plastic mixture with water, and, though it is not the pre- dominant ingredient in, yet it confers the valuable pro- perty of plasticity upon, all natural clays, which enables them to be moulded into the various forms of pottery and earthenware ; the other is the remarkable affinity of alu- mina for colouring and extractive matter, whence its use in the arts of dyeing and calico printing. In a pure and crystalline form, alumina constitutes the sapphire, one of the hardest and most valuable of the gems. In its common state, aluminous earth is a soft white powder, strongly attractive of moisture ; hence, aluminous fossils are often recognised by adhering to the tongue, and many of them exhale an earthy smell when breathed upon, as we observe in common slate. Alumina consists of 52*94 aluminum, and 4706 oxygen; like the other earths, as they are usually called, alumina, there- fore, is a metallic oxide. Aluminum is with difficulty ob- tained, and in small quantities, by heating chloride of alu- minum with potassium ; it is a grey, difficultly fusible metal, not easily acted on by water, and which, when heated in the air, burns with great brilliancy, and forms alumina by the absorption of oxygen. Alumina has but a feeble attraction for acids, and does not fully neutralise them ; and when it has been heated red hot, or is in an indurated state, as it exists in the sapphire, in corundum, and some other minerals, it is ab- solutely insoluble. The aluminous salts are mostly colourless, soluble in water, and of a sweetish astringent taste. Exclusive of alum, the acetate of alumina is the most important of these salts, being used as a base or mordant by the dyers. (See Dyeing.) It is usually prepared by mixing a solution of 190 parts of acetate of lead with one of 487 parts of alum : a white precipitate of sulphate of lead falls, and acetate of alumina remains in solution. ALU'MINITE. Native subsulphate of alumina. ALU'MINUM, The metallic base of alumina. A'LUMSTONE. A silicious subsulphate of alumina. ALU'RNUS. A genus of coleopterous insects, cha- racterised by having short filiform antennae ; palpi four to six, very short ; maxillae horny and short. ALUTA'CEOUS. (Lat. aluta, tanned leatlier.) A pale brown colour. ALVE'OLAR. (Lat. alveolus, diminutive of alveus, a cavity. ) Belonging to the alveoli, or sockets of the teeth. ALVE'OLATE. In Botany. When the surface is co- vered with numerous deep hollows, as in the receptacle of some Compositae. ALVEO'LITES. a genus of fossil zoophytes, allied to the corallines ; one species of which {Alv. suborbicu- laris) occurs in the Portland stone. A' L V I N E . (Lat. alvus, the belli/. ) A term generally used as relating to the intestinal excretions. A'MLADOU. German tinder ; a fungus found chiefly in old oaks and ash trees. It is boiled in water, dried, beaten, soaked in a solution of nitre, and again dried for use. AMA'IN. A sea term, sigiifying to yield, to let go. AMBASSADOR. Thus, to strike amain is to lower or let fall the topsails, in token of surrender. To wave amain is to make a signal to a vessel to strike its topsails. Amain is also a term used in letting down a thing into the hold or else- where, or in lowering a yard, or the like, to denote that the sailors are to let go that part of the rope which they held before, and let down the thing easily and by de- grees. AMA'LGAM. A combination of mercury with other metals. Medallists apply the term to soft alloys gene- rally. AMALTH^'A. In Mythologj-. The name of a goat in Crete, alleged to have suckled Jupiter : or of the nymph who tended the goat. The cornu Aynalthcece, or horn of the goat in question, was the magic cornu copice, or horn of plenty. A'MARANTH. (Or. i, priv., **«g«iv«, I wither, and kvOos, a flower.) Plants with richly coloured flowers, whose parts are of a thin dry texture, so that they are a long while before they wither. They give their name to the natural order of Amaranthaceae. Amaranthus melancholicus, hj-pochondriacus, caudatus, &c., are the annuals known in gardens by the names of Love lies bleeding. Prince's feather, &c. The name, in composition with other words, is used to designate plants not belong- ing to the same genus, but to the same natural order. Globe-amaranth is Gomphrena globosa. AMARANTHA'CE^. The order which comprehends the amaranthus, and other similar dry-flowered genera. Some of the species are objects of ornament, as cocks- combs {Celosia coccinea), globes (Gomphrena globosa), various species of amaranthus, trichinium, &c. ; but the principal part consists of tropical kinds. The order par- ticipates in the harmless qualities of Chenopodiaceae, from which it is not very different. AMARYLLIDA'CE^. (Amar\-llis, one of its genera.) A natural order of beautiful Endogens, with inferior fruit, six stamens, and six hearly equal segments of the flower. The greater part Consists Of bulbous species in- habiting the Cape of Good Hope, and the tropical parts of both hemispheres. Snowdrops are the most northern form. A few, such as agave and doryanthes, are trees in stature, although only herbaceous plants in duration. A'MATEUR. (Fr.) A person familiar with, and who encourages any particular art or pursuit, without being professionally engaged in it, is said to be an amateur. But the term is usually restricted to those who are skilled in and patronize the fine arts. AMAURO'SIS. (Gr. ocpuiv^o;, dark.) A loss of sight dependent upon defective action of the nerve of vision, and independent of visible injury. It is also called gutta serena : drop serene of Milton. AMAZO'NIAN STONE. A beautiful green felspar, found in rolled masses near the Amazon river. A'MAZONS. (Gr. a,, without, aind/xct^oi, breast.) Fe- male warriors. Tribes, either real or imaginary, belonging to Africa and Asia, among which the custom prevailed for the females to go to war ; preparing themselves for that purpose by destroying the right breast, in order to use the bow with greater ease. According to Greek tradition, an Amazon tribe invaded Africa, and was repulsed by Theseus, who afterwards married their queen. Hence, all female warriors have been called Amazons ; and the river of that name owes its appellation to one of the early Spanish navigators, who fancied he beheld armed women on its banks. The wars of the Athenians and Amazons formed favourite subjects for Attic art : they were depicted in the Poecile or painted chamber of the Parthenon. See Justin, Diod. Siculus, Strabo, &c. AMBARVA'LIA. (Lat. ambire arva, to go round the fields. ) In Roman Mythology, religious fetes to propitiate Ceres ; so called from the victims being carried round the fields (ter circwn ibat hostiafrugeSyVirg. G. i. 345.). These sacred rites were performed by an order of priests, Fratres Ambarvales, twelve in number. They were ce- lebrated in the end of May, when the blessing of the goddess was invoked on the coming harvest. The vic- tims were accompanied by crowds of country people, having their temples bound with oak leaves, dancing, and singing the praises of Ceres, to whom libations were made of honey and wine. (Facciolati ; Adam's Antiq.) AMBA'SSADOR, or EMBASSADOR. In PoHtics, the name of the highest order of foreign ministers. An ambassador is not only the agent of the country which sends him, but also represents personally the dignity of its sovereign. The greater powers of Europe send am- bassadors to each otlier, with tlie exception of Prussia, which never employs ministers of this class. The word ambassador is of very uncertain derivation, but is sup. posed to be derived from the Italian word ambasciare, to solicit. In charters and diplomas of later date than the ninth century, the names of those who had solicited the grants are frequently signed at the foot with the designation of "ambasciatores," or solicitors ; audit may hence be presumed that the title was originally given to envoys who attended at a court to solicit some favour for another party. As to the rights and privileges of ambas- AMBER. sadors in England ; if an ambassador commit any act which is a crime against the law of all countries, as treason, felony, &:c., he is punishable as a private alien. But an ambassador is not criminally liable for such acts as are only mala prohibita against statute or custom ; as, Infringements of the laws of the exchequer. By 7 Anne, c. 12., an ambassador or public minister, and his domestic servants, bona fide registered according to the act, are privileged from arrest ; and the goods of an am- bassador cannot be taken in distress. This statute was passed in consequence of the arrest and ill treatment of Count Matuschef, the Russian ambassador. As to the rights and duties of ambassadors in modern international usages, see the elaborate work of M. de Wicquefort, L'Ambassadeur et ses Fonctions, 2 tomes, 4to, 1746 ; F. von Moshamon {Law of European Embassies, Landshut, 1806) ; and the valuable Manuel Diplomatique of Von Martens (Leipzig, 1&22), may also be consulted. A'MBER. A yellow resin-like substance, found occa- sionally in detached pieces on the sea-coast, but most generally dug up in diluvial soils : it is probably an ante- diluvial resin, and often contains leaves and insects. Its specific gravity is about 1070. It is hard, and becomes strongly electro-negative by friction. It contains a trace of odorous volatile oil, a resin easily soluble in alcohol, a resin difficultly soluble in alcohol, and an insoluble resin, which is its chief constituent (80 to 90 per cent.). When burned, it exhales a fragrant odour. Distilled per se, it yields inflammable gases, water holding succinic and ace- tic acids, and empyreumatic oil in solution (the spirit of amber of old Pharmacy), sublimed succinic acid (salt of amber), and an empyreumatic oil (oil of amber). The acid, when purified, amounts to from 3 to 5 per cent. The residual charcoal amounts to 12 or 13 per cent., and, when strongly heated, yields a little volatile matter re- sembling camphor. A substance resembling amber, called fossil copal, sometimes occurs with it ; it is less soluble in alcohol, and yields no succinic acid. The largest known mass of amber was found near the surface of the ground in Lithuania, about twelve miles from the Baltic ; it weighs eighteen pounds, and is in the royal cabinet at Berlin. The chief use of amber is as an article of ornament, cut into beads for necklaces, and in the manufacture of varnish. A'MBERGRIS. (From arabre, and gris, grey amber.) This substance has been found in the intestines of the spermaceti whale : it is probably a product of disease ; perhaps a kind of gallstone. It has also been found upon the coasts of various tropical countries, in masses of va- rious sizes, of a grey, speckled appearance, and inter- spersed throughout its substance with the beaks of the sepia octopoda, which is the common food of the whale. When genuine, ambergris has a peculiar odour, not easily described or imitated, and which is exceedingly diffusive, especially in solution, so that a very minute quantity of am- bergris is perceptible in perfumes, and is thought to exalt their odour. A grain or two, when rubbed down with sugar, and added to a hogshead of claret, is very percep- tible in the wine and gives it a flavour, by some considered as an improvement. The best ambergris is softish and somewhat waxy when cut ; its specific gravity varies from 780 to 896 : it fuses at 140° or 150°, and at a higher tem- perature gives out a white smoke, which condenses into a crystalline fatty matter. Its chief component (about 80 per cent.) is a peculiar fatty matter (ambreine), which may be obtained by boiling it in alcohol ; as the solution cools, it deposits crystals, which may be purified by pressure in folds of blotting paper. Ambreine fuses at lono; its odour is agreeable, and it rises in vapour at 220O. AMBIDE'XTER. (Lat. ambo, both, and dexter, right hand.) One who uses both hands alike, the left as well as the right. Numerous theories have been advanced to explain the preference so generally given to the right over the left hand ; but, generally, they seem to be more spe- cious than solid. A'MBITUS. (Lat. ambio, I e?ico?)ipass, or ci7-cumvent.) The circumference or extreme edge of any thing ; the en- compassing border of a leaf. Ambitus, n Politics. A term used by the ancient Romans to designate the soliciting and canvassing for offices and honours. It was of two kinds, the one, ambitus popularis, laudable ; as, where a candidate openly avowed his pretensions, publicly stated the grounds on which he solicited the suffrages of the electors, and left them to form their opinion upon his claims with- out privately soliciting their votes. The other, and more common kind of ambitus, was either disreputable or un- lawful. It consisted in using artful solicitations, cajolery, offers of money and preferment, and all those resources for corrupting the free choice of electors, so well under- stood, and successfully practised, in our own times. The bribery of electors was forbidden, although to very little purpose, by repeated acts of the Roman legislature. (Fac- ciolati Lexicon, Adam's Antiquilies, &c.) AMENTUM. A'MBLE, AMBLING, (In Horsemanship, Termedu Mandge.) A peculiar kind of a pace in which a horse'a two legs of the same side move at the same time. AMBLO'TIS. (Or. 6i.f4,Qxu, Hove.) The name of a genus of hymenopterous insects, called sand- wasps. The generic characters are, proboscis conic, inflected, concealing a bifid, retractile, .tubular tongue ; jaws forcipated, 3-toothed at the tip ; antennae filiform in each sex, with about 14 articulations ; eyes oval ; wings plane ; sting pungent, concealed within the ab- domen. AMMUNTTION. In Military Language, signifies all sorts of warlike stores and provisions, but more especially powder and ball. A'MNESTY. (Gr. a^vrj^rrw, oblivion.) In Politics, freedom from penalty, granted by a solemn act to those guilty of some crime. Usually, by an act of amnesty is meant one passed to comprehend a number of individuals guilty of offences of a political nature,- as rebellion, &c. Among remarkable amnesties in modern European history, may be cited, that granted on the restoration of Charles II., from which were excepted those concerned in the death of Charles I. ; that granted on the second restoration of the Bourbons, in January, 1816, from which, besides the regicides, several others were excepted by name ; and the law of amnesty for political offences in France, in 1836. A'MNION. (Gr. a.f/,yo;, a lamb.) The membrane which surrounds the foetus in utero : it includes a thin watery fluid, the liquor amnii. A'MNIOS. In Botany, a thin, semitransparent, gela- tinous substance in which the embryo of a seed is sus- pended when it first appears, and on which the embryo appears to feed in its early stages. Sometimes it is wholly absorbed ; sometimes a portion of it is solidified in the form of albumen ; occasionally, as in the cocoa-nut, a portion is consolidated into albumen, and a portion re- mains always in a fluid state. AMNIO'TIC ACID. An acid supposed to be peculiar to the liquor amnii of the cow, but now known to belong to the liquor of the allantois. AMO'MEiE. (S<7^ly contrived for this purpose ; some of them cutting, and as it were mincing, others rubbing and grinding, whilst a fluid is supplied by the salivarj' glands so as to render the mixture of a proper consistency to be swallowed : this is effected by the organs of deglutition : the food is propelled from the mouth into the tube which conveys it to the stomach, and which is called the . oesophagus ; and is, at the same time, prevented, by an extraordinary and complicated arrangement of the parts concerned, from passing in any other direction, and, more especially from cnteringthe trachea or air-passage into the lungs. In the stomach the food is subjected to the secre- tions of that organ, called gastric juice, which is acid, and by which it is gradually converted into a greyish homo- geneous semi-fluid substance, termed chyme ; so that by the time the food htis reached the right end of tlie stomach, or the pylorus, its original characters are entirely changed ; its separate materials are no longer discernible, and it has acquired distinct properties ; it is, in short. ANATOMY. 'I digested. How these changes are effected we know nof, though many attempts have been made to explain them • upon chemical and mechanical principles. Dr. Hunter, in his Introductory Lecture, has the following apposite remarks, in reference to tliis and similar phenomena, " I must therefore expect," he says, " that you will not hereaftor be surprised, when you find me avowing great ignorance in many of the most considerable questions relating to animal operations, such as sensation, motion, respiration, digestion, generation, &c. In my opinion, all these subjects are much less understood than most people think them. Our vanity deceives us, and per- suades us that we have got the whole as soon as we have acquired a smattering of natural knowledge. Hence it is that the diflferent sects of physiologists have endea- voured to explain animal functions upon such different principles. Hence, for example, to account for digestion, some have made the stomach a mill ; some would have it to be a stewing-pot, and some a wort-trough ; yet, all the while, one would have thought that it must have been very evident that the stomach was neither a mill, nor a stewing-pot, nor a wort-trough, nor any thing but a stomach.'" When the food has been thus far digested in the sto- mach, it passes into the duodenum, or upper end of the intestinal canal ; a tube, the whole length of which is about six times that of the body, and which, therefore, is variously and strangely convoluted to enable it to be packed into the abdominal cavity. Into this portion of the intestines, various vessels and glands deliver their secretions, partly for the purpose of lubricating its sur- face, and i)artly to assist in the further changes which are to be brought about in the chyme. Of these fluids, f two are especially remarkable, from the importance and / size of the glands by which they are secreted, and of the 1 ducts by which they are conveyed ; nameU', the bile, which is of a green colour and bitter taste, ancf is secreted \ in the liver ; and the pancreatic juice, which appears to . resemble saliva, and which is secreted by a gland called i the pancreas. The influence of these fluids upon the chyme is direct and important : the pancreatic secretion probably acts as a diluent merely ; but the effect of the bile is more complicated ; and it appears to be essential to the further change of the chyme into chyle, which is a white milk-like fluid, formed in the upper part of the intestine, and absorbed by a distinct set of vessels which, from the colour of their contents, have been called lac- teals, and which convey the chyle, that is, the portion of the products of digestion fitted for nutrition, into the above-mentioned trunk of the lymphatics, whence it is transmitted into the veins, which open through the me- dium of the right auricle into the right ventricle of the heart. The bitter principle of the bile, and its colouring matter, are obviously not absorbed by the lacteals, but remain with the residue of the food, which is slowly pro- pelled along the whole of the intestinal tube, and, having undergone certain changes in its passage, is ultimately voided as excrementitious. Having now enumerated the various classes of organs in the human body, and adverted to their leading func- tions ; having seen how the bones are united by articula- tions, and connected by ligaments, flesh, and membranes, forming a variety of levers adapted to the motions of the limbs, and supi)orting and protecting the soft parts, as in the skull and spine ; how the brain and nerves are concerned in the sentient energies, and in presiding over and directing muscular motion, and influencing the functions of the viscera; having likewise seen how each part of the body is nourished by the blood, which is sent from the heart by the arteries, and conveyed back to it by the veins ; how the useless and decayed parts are removed by the lymphatics ; how the nutritious part of the food is carried into the blood by the lacteals ; and hpw venous is changed into arterial blood in the course of its passage through the pulmonary vessels ; it only remains to observe, that the whole fabric is as it were protected from external injuries by its integuments. Of these tiie most exterior is a covering, varying in thick- ness and induration on different parts of the body, but every where without feeling, and called the epidermis ; immediately beneath it is a soft mucous substance termed rete mucosum ; and under it the cutis, or true skin. These external coverings of the body are attached to and connected with the parts beneath, by cellular membrane. But though the animal owes much of its general security to these textures, it owes more to the senses, instincts, and appetites, with which it is so miraculously endowed. " By these it is led to pursue what is useful, and to guard agamst danger, inconvenience, and want. Nor is this all; there has likewise been conferred, to a certain extent, upon all living bodies, the power of reproduction, by ■■ which they are frequently able to repair the slighter in- juries to which the different organs are exposed ; and if this power be exceedingly languid in the latter periods of old age, it is because the author of nature never intended that the animal structure should be immortal. He has ' fixi d its bounds, which it cannot pass ; and has measured 4 40 ANCHOR. out the time when the fairest fabric must crumble into dust, and its animating spirit return unto Him, the great Almighty Incomprehensible Being, who first bestowed it." ( See Dr. Barclay's Introductory Lectures to a Courbe of Anatomy ■, and Dr. William Hunter's Two Introductory Lectures, for details respecting the history, uses, and importance of the study of Anatomy.) Anatomy, Comparative. So called because the or- ganisation of the lower animals was first princi- pally studied with immediate reference to that of the human subject. Galen, who visited the schools of Alex- andria at a period when the dissection of the human body was no longer permitted, sought in the anatomy of the ape to acquire a vicarious knowledge of the anatomy of man. Vesalius, after the revival of literature, dis- sected various quadrupeds, and compared their organis- ation with that of man, in order to correct the errors of Galen, and to establish the true knowledge of the pecu- liarities of the human structure. Succeeding anatomists have investigated the structure of the lower animals, to acquire the knowledge necessary for experimenting upon them with success; and still more important discoveries in physiological science have resulted from tracing the modification and disappearance of different organs in the descending series of animals, as the only mfcans by which we can obtain just notions of the uses and relative importance of the different organs in the animal economy, and a perception of the laws which regulate their co-existence in the same individual. Aristotle, Harvey, and Hunter combined the investi- gation of the mature animals of different classes with observations of the different stages of development of the embryo, and their example has been .issiduously and successfully followed by the ablest comparative ana- tomists of the present day, whereby some of the general laws of animal organisation, of development, and of the analogies which apparently difl'orent parts bear to one another throughout- the great scheme, have been dis- covered. A very important application of comparative ana- tomy is to the determination of the relative degrees of complexity in the organisation of different animals, and of the number and value of the points of resem- blance which different species manifest to each other in the totality of their organisation. A study of the ana- tomy of auimals, guided by these views, is essential to the determination of their natural affinities, which is the highest aim of the philosophic naturalist. Lastly, the labours of the comparative anatomist con- tinually tend to bring to light examples of structures, designed with reference to especial purposes, of the most striking and forcible description ; and thus provide for the moralist and divine a storehouse of facts peculiarly adapted to the illustration of the doctrine of final causes. ANA'THOPOUS. (Gr. kvotr^ifrc^, I invert.) Avery common kind of embryo, produced by one side of the ovule growing upon itself, while the other remains im- moveable, till, at last, that part of the ovule which was originally next the apex, is brought down to the hilum, the base of the nucleus in such cases being at the apex of the ovule. The common apple, and the greater part of plants, offer an example of this. A'NCHOll. (Gr. uyxv^ct.) Consists of a straight bar, callcd^the shank, A B, which ends in two arms, B C, B D, on which are placed the triangular plates called flukes, or palms ; the extremity E or F is called the pea (peak) or hill ; the point B is called the crown. At the end A is placed the stock G H, which, when of wood, consists of two pieces of oak, hooped together. When the stock is of iron, it passes through a hole in the end of the shank. The stock is at right angles to the plane of the flukes, and is a little longer than the ghank. At A is the ring, which is of iron, to which the cable is attached, and by which the anchor is lifted or hung. When a hemp cable is used, the ring to which it is bent (fastened in a particular way) is covered first with tarred canvas, and then with pieces of rope secured firmly round it; this is called a puddening, and protects the hemp from the iron. When a chain cable is used, it is shackled to the ring, which is not then jiuddened. Men of war and large ships carry two large anchors of equal size, at the bows, called, thence, bower anchors ; and two others, of the same size, called the sheet and the s])arc anchors ; besides two or three others, which are much smaller, for temporary occasions. The anchor, after being let go from the ship's bow or side, whether the shank be vertical or horizontal when it enters the water, arrives upright at the bottom, in con- sequence of the resistance of the water on the stock, ANCHOR. when it falls over, and rests on the crown, one corner of a fluke, and the end of the stock. From this position of stable equilibrium on three points, forming a long narrow triangle, a small force disturbs it, when the stock, falling flat, one of the bills must pierce the ground, penetrating deeper as the cable pulls, until the arm is partly or entirely buried. Since the security of the vessel depends on the hold the anchor has of the ground, it is evident that the direc- tion of the fluke should be such that the reaction of the soil against it, from the pull of the cable, may tend most effiectually to keep it down. The pressure on the fluke being perpendicular to the surface, take A B to represent the pull of the cable, then the resolved portion of this perpendicular to the fluke is BC or AB COS. ABC; and the effect of this in keeping the fluke down is B D = B C cos. C B D = B C sin. ABC, because A B is horizontal, and " CBD is 90O — CB A, vertical; hence BD = AB sin. ABC COS. ABC, which is maximum when A B C =; 45". The flukes of anchors in general make the angle with the shank much greater than this ; but Lieut. Rod- ger, It. N., has, among other improvements, adopted this angle in his patent anchor, having established the above conclusion by experiment. Anchors are made of broad flat bars Ibrged toge- ther. As the greatest strain upon the shank takes place during the act of weighing, the diameters of the shank are made unequal, the longest being placed vertical. This improvement is, we believe, due to Mr. Pering, on whose plan anchors have of late years chiefly been made. The weight of an anchor in men of war is estimated roughly at about 1 cwt. to a gun ; in merchantmen, about I cwt. for each 15 tons. The weight of the anchor is not strictly proportional to the size of the vessel, as large vessels are less affected by sudden or violent motions than smaller ones are. Large anchors are thicker in proportion to their length than smaller ones are ; that is, the weight increases faster than the cubes of the dimensions. When an anchor is left behind, it is recovered either hy lifting it by the buoy rope, or, where that is not pos- sible, by sweeping for it ; which is dragging a hawser, hung between two boats, slowly over the bottom till it catches the upper fluke, by which the anchor is then weighed. When one anchor is down the ship is said to be at single anchor , when two are down, the ship is generally moored. (S(?e Moored ; Cable ; Buoy.) Ships rarely ride by more than two anchors ; in bad weather a third is often let go under foot, as a precaution in case of one of the cables parting. When the anchor is dragged by the pulling of the cable, it is said to come home. When the cable gets twisted round the anchor or stock, the anchor is said to be foul. The anchor is sometimes hove up without one of the flukes, which has either been fixed in a cleft of the rock and wrenched off by the force of weighing, or been snapped off', as some think, by striking against a point of rock in its rapid descent. When the ship is at single anchor, the wind or tide may carry her over the anchor; if the water is deep, she may so drag the cable as to foul the anchor, in which case it may not hold again ; if the water is very shallow, she may get upon the anchor, the fluke entering the ship's bottom, or she may break the shank by striking upon it. Keeping the ship clear of her anchor is, therefore, an important, as it is also a nice point of sea- manship. When the anchor is lifted out of the ground, it is said to be aweigh ; when hove up to the surface of the water, it is awash. The anchor being hove up by the cable only to the hause holes, is lifted by the ring to the cat- head ; this is called catting it. The fluke next the ship's side is then lifted up to its resting-place, called the bill board ; it is now said to be fished. When the ship is fairly at sea, the ring is lashed close up to the cathead, and the fluke brought close to the ship's side, or inside the bulwark, and the cable and buoy rope unbent f the anchor is then secured. Anchor. In Architecture, an ornament applied to mouldings somewhat resembling an anchor intermixed with eggs, and hy some called a tongue, from the resem- blance it bears to the forked tongue of a serpent. It i» found in the mouldings of all the orders, but is onlj applied to tliat called the echinus or quarter round. A'NCHOllAGR. Ground fit to hold a ship's anchor, 80 that she may ride safely. The ground best suited for this purpose is hard sand, or stiff clay ; and the best position is that which is land-locked, or out of the tide. AN'CHOIIITE. (Lat. anachoreta. Gr. ay*:^'"?'*. I retreat, or ivit/idraw.) More properly, anachoret, a hermit, or person who has retiree! from the world witli the purpose of devoting himself entirely to meditation 50 ANDRON. and prayer. Such was the case with many of the early Christians, beginning, perhaps, with such as fled from the persecutions of Decius and Diocletian, and retired into forests and deserts, at first with a view to security merely, and afterwards continued, from religious mo- tives, the mode of life they had thereadopted. Thcadoption of perfect solitude was essential to the character of an anchorite : but they were not necessarily bound by vows. The origin of this class of religionists preceded that of the Coenobites, or monks living in societies ; but in later times the monks used frequently to leave their monasteries, with the permission of their superior, and devote themselves for a time, or for their whole lives, to the solitude of anchorites. ANCHO'VY. See Engraulis. ANCHYLO'SIS. {Gr. uyxvJ^iw, J bend.) A stiflf, immoveable, or bent joint. A'NCIENT DEMESNE. In Law, all lands which, having been in possession of Edward the Confessor, and from him having passed to William the Conqueror, are named in Doomsday Book as Terra Regis, are said to be held in ancient demesne. The tenure is peculiar, resem- bling copyhold in some respects. A'NCIENTS. (Fr. ancicns.) In the more general sense of the term. Ancients means those who lived long ago, or before the moderns. But the term is now usu- ally employed to designate the Greeks and Romans ^ and if any other people be meant, it is customary to specify them, as the ancient Germans, the ancient Jews, &c. Ancients, Council of. In French History, one of the two assemblies composing the legislative body in 1705. It consisted of 250 members ; and derived its name from each of them being at least forty years of age. It was put an end to by the Revolution of the 18th Brumaire. ANCI'LE. The shield of Mars, which, according to tradition, fell from heaven in the reign of Numa, and was accompanied by an oracle, which declared that, while it remained in Rome, the city could never be taken. Its figure was that of an oval compressed in the middle, so as to be widest near the two extremities. Numa had it preserved in the temple of Mars, to whose priests, the Salii, its care was committed ; and at the same time had eleven more shields made to exactly the same pattern, in order to prevent the genuine one from being distinguished and stolen. Every year, in the month of March, these ancilia were carried round the city by the Salii, with solemn dances and music, for thirty consecutive days, during which time no business connected with war was allowed to be carried on in the city. ANCI'PITAL. Having two opposite edges or angles. ANCI'PITOUS. (Lat. anceps, two-edged.) When any thing is compressed, with the two opposite edges thin. It is chiefly applied in Botany to leaves and stems. ANCO'NES. (Gr. kyxm, the point of the elbow.) In Architecture, the consoles or ornaments cut on the key- stones of arches, or on the side of door-cases. They are sometimes used to support busts or other figures. ANDALU'SITE. A mineral composed of 52 alumina, 58 silica, 8 potass, 2 oxide of iron. It is very hard and infusible, by which characters it is distinguished from felspar. It was first observed in Andalusia in Spain. ANDA'NTE. (Ital. ^eow^.) In Music, .signifies that the notes are to be played distinctly. ANDRjEA'CEiE. (Andrsea, one of the genera.) Little moss-like plants, differing from the mosses in the want of an operculum and peristome, and in having a four- valved theca. A'NDREASBE'RGOLITE. FromAndreasberg.inthe Hartz. A mineralogical name of a species of Harmotome. ANDRE'NA. The name of a Fabrician genus of bees, including those which have the tongue 3-cleft, and the labium cylindrical, with two membraneous bristles on each side. ANDROC^'UM. (Gr.a»»ij, a »«aZ)3 "*■ 1 (1 + r)" and the for* For the sake of abridging, put v ~ 1 T r, mula will become — S = a {v + v~ -^ v^ + »") or S z= at) (1 +w-|-»2-(.t,3 . . . +„„_i) The sum of the series within the parenthesis is J-— ^-„ (1 —v») ; therefore, S = -^^ (1 _ »") ; or, wriU ing-for; S = -(1 _»'■). r 1 — V r ' From this it is easy to see the method of proceeding In all other cases of annuities certain. For instance, let it be required to find the present value of an annuity deferred for three years, that is, not to be entered upon till after the end of three years ; and to continue ten years from that time. It is evident that we have only to find the value of an annuity of the same amount for thirteen years, and also for three years, and to subtract the latter value from the former. The difference is the value of the deferred annuity. Again, suppose that the annuity, instead of being payable yearly, is to be paid half yearly, or quarterly. It"is obvious that an annuity of £100 per annum for ten years, to be paid in half yearly p.iyments, the interest of money being 5 per cent., is the same tiring .as an annuity of £.50 per annum for twenty years, payable yearly, interest being 2J per cent. ; or an annuity of £26 per annum, payable yearly for forty years, interest being IJ per cent. Tlie principle of the calcu- lation is the same in all the cases. r ■p Life Annuities. — "When the annuity is to cease with " the "life of an individual, or any number of individuals, tlie calculation of its value is a little more complicated, as it becomes necessary not only to find the present value of the payment to be made at the end of any given year, but also to take into account the probability of its being received, that is to say, the probability that the indi- vidual or individuals, on the duration of whose lives it depends, will be alive at that period. Let the annuity depend on the continuance of a single life, and let us denote the probability that the life will be in existence at the end of ANNUITY. and, as before, let v ■ 1 + r 4, 5, &c. years, Pi, P5, &c. ; The present value of ^1 , to be received certainly at the end of a year, is v ; but the probability of receiving it is jOi ; therefore, the value of £1 at the end of the year, subject to the chance of the given life being then in existence, is pi v. In like manner, the value of £1, to be received certainly at the end of two years, is v^; and the chance of its being received is P2 ; therefore, the value subject to the contingency is P2 i>2, and so on. Let A denote the value of £1 to be received yearly during the whole continuance of the given life, and we have evidently A = piV + P2V'2 + pz v^ + P4 t)'' + &c. continued till p becomes nothing, or till the extremity of human life. It is now necessary to consider the nature of the quan- tities represented hy p\,p2, pa, &c., and to show in what manner they are to be computed. By the doctrine of chances, the probability of the occurrence of any event is measured by the quotient that arises from dividing the number of chances favourable to its occurrence by tlie whole number of ways in which it can happen. Conse- quently, if n denote the number of individuals living at a given age, W), the number of the same individuals alive at the end of one year, n and so on. The numbers n, n\, nz, &c., are taken from a table of mortality, or a table constructed to show the ratio of the number of individuals who enter upon every given year of life to the number who survive that year, or who die in the course of it. There is no other method of finding the value of the series represented by A than tliat of calculating the value of its different terms separately, and addmg the whole into one sum. Nevertheless, as the object in general is not to determine merely the value of an annuity on a life at a particular age, but to construct a table showing its value for all the different ages of life, there is a method of deducing the value at one age from the value at an- other age, which greatly abridges the labour of calcula- tion. Thus, suppose the age of the individual on whose life the annuity depends to be 40, and the probabilities of a life of 40 continuing 1, 2, 3, &c. years to be pi,p2, p^, Sec, we have, by what is already shown, A = piv + p^v'^ + p^v^ + +/>,»*. Now, let Ai be the annuity on a life of 41, that is, one year older than the former ; and let the probabilities of a life of 41 living over 1, 2, 3, &c. years, be ^i, (j2, 03, qi, &c., we shall have Al - qiv + qsv"^ + qsv'i .... + ^4 w«— 1. But the quantities q\, qi, qa, Sec. are not independent of P\, P2, P3, &c. ; the one set are evidently functions of the other. In fact, the probability that a life of 40 will live over 2 years, is equal to the probability that a life of 40 will live over 1 year, multiplied into the probability that a life of 41 will live over 1 year. This is evident from the manner in which the probabilities are obtained ; for, n, m, n2, being the numbers respectively alive at the ages of 40, 41, and 42, the probability that a life of 40 will live and that it will continue 2 years. In like manner, the probability of a life of over 1 year, is no no ni — or — X — n ni n 40 living over 3 years, is equal to the probability of a life of 40 living over 1 year multiplied into the probability that a life of 41 will live over 2 years ; and so on. Hence, »2 «3 »4 P2 ^Pi 9i> or ?i = ^) 92 = ) ^3 = - , and so on. We pi pi pi have, therefore. (P2« + Pzv'^-\- PiV^ + p.v--^): and,multii)lying both sides by pi v, P\V \i - p^v"^ -^ pzv^ + p\v^ . ' . . + px »». On subtracting this equation from A - p\V -\- p^v"^ -\- pav'^ ->r PiV^ . . . . -^ p%v^ we get A — p\v Ai = piv, whence A = piv (1 + Ai). This formula, which was found by the celebrated Euler, gives the foliowmg rule for determining the value of an annuity on a life at any age from the value of the same annuity on a life one year older, and renders the comput- ation of the whole table not much more laborious than the direct calculation of the annuity on the youngest life. " To the value of an annuity on a life one year older, add unit ; multiply the sum by the probability that the given life will live over one year, and also by the present value of .£1 to be received at the end of a year. The product is the value of the annuity on the given life." The values of deferred and temporary annuities on single lives, are easily found from the table of the values for the whole of life. For example, let it be required to determine the present value of an annuity on the life of an individual now aged 40, but deferred 10 years, that is to say, not to commence till the expiration of 10 years. After the 10 years, if the individual be then alive, the value of the annuity on the "remainder of his life is the annuity on a life of 50 : let this be:called B. The present value of £1 payable at the end of 10 years is f 'o ; and the probability of receiving it in the event of an individual now aged 40 being then alive, is pio ; therefore, the pre- sent value of B subject to the contingency, is /jjo v^^ B. In general, the value of an annuity deferred n years, is pn v An, where An represents the annuity on a life n years older than that corresponding to A. A temporary annuity on a single life for n years, is found by adding together the first n terms of the series Pi V + pzv"^ + pa f', &c. But it is frequently more easy to find it by means of the deferred annuity on the same life for the same term of years ; for it is obvious that the temporary annuity and deferred annuity are, together, equal to the whole annuity. Thus, let A be an annuity for the whole of life. Am a temporary annuity of the same amount for « years on the same life, and Adn the same annuity de- ferred n years, we shall have Am = A — A,ii,. Annuities on Joint Lives — The method of calculating annuities to be paid so long as two or more individuals shall continue to live together, is equally simple. Let the probabilities that A and B wiH live over 1, 2, 3, 4, &c. years be Pi, Pa, Pa, P4, Sec. Qv 92. Qa^ q*, &c. respectively, then the probability that both will live over 1, 2, 3, 4, &c. years will be /> I 5-,, ;>2?2. Pa^a. Piq4, Sec, and the value of an annuity on their joint lives, which we may denote by IB, becomes IB =PiqiV + p^qiV^ + P3 5'3W^ +i»4 5'4"^ + &c., continued till p or q becomes nothing, or to the last age in the table. When more lives than two are involved, the method of proceeding is obvious. Another question of this kind frequently occurs, namely, to determine the value of an annuity on the survivor of two or more lives. Let us suppose two lives only are concerned ; and let A be the value of the annuity on the first life, B that on the second, and IB that on the joint lives {t. e. to be paid till one of the lives shall drop). Let pn — the probability the first will live over x years, and q% — the probability the second will live over x years. We shall then have 1 — px- probability 1st will die before the end of .r years, 1 — q^ — prob. 2d will die before the end of x years, (1 — Px) (1 — ?x) = prob. both will die before end of .T years; and hence the probability that both will not die before the end of X years, is 1 — (1 — pO (1 —g-x), which is equal to p, + gx — px ^-jc. This expression, therefore, is the measure of the probability that a payment will be received at the end of the xth year ; and supposing the annuity to be £1, the present value of that payment certain is z»i. Multiplj-ing this into the above probability, we get the value in present money of the payment to be made at the j-th year, if one or both of the lives survive, viz. px v^ + qxV' — px Ox v. Now, if we substitute successively the numbers 1, 2, 3, 4, &c. for X in this expression, we shall have the value of the 1st, 2d, 3d, 4th, &c. payment, and the sum will be the value of the annuity to continue during the life of the survivor. But it has been shown that Pi v^ + Pz^^ + Pa ^^ + Pi v^ + &c. = A, qi wl + gi t;2 + q^ v^ + 3-4 v* -f- &c. = B, Piqiv^+Piq^v"^ + Paqav"^ + PiqiV^-^ &c. — M; therefore, the value of the annuity is A -|- B — IB; that is to say, the value qf an annuity on the survivor of two lives is equal to the sum of the annuities on each of the single lives diminished by the annuity on the joint lives. (For applications of the doctrine of*^ annuities, see the terms Assurance, Survivorship.) Annuity Tables — In consequence of the numerous and important application of the doctrine of life annuities to commercial purposes, great pains and labour have been bestowed in the formation of tables of tiicir values at all E4 ANNUITY. the different ages of human life. These tables differ very considerably, not from any difference in the methods of constructing them, but from the difficulty of estimating with numerical precision the probable duration of human life. The first table of the kind which we possess was given by Dr. Halley, in a paper inserted in the " Philoso- phical Transactions" for 1693, and founded on observa- tions of mortality made at Breslaw. De Moivre, in a tract entitled " Annuities on Lives," published in 1724, gave a very elegant formula for determining the value of a life annuity at any age, founded on the hypothesis that the annual decrements of life are equal ; or that out of a given number of individuals, equal numbers die every year, till the whole become extinct. In 1742, Thomas Simpson published tables of annuities on single and joint lives, calculated from observations of mortality made in London. These were extended in a supplement- ary work published in 1752. Deparcieux, in 1746, pub- lished his excellent " Essai sur les Probabilites de la Duree de la Vie Humaine,'' with tables of annuities on single lives, calculated from the probabilities deduced from the registers kept in different religious houses, and the lists of the nominees in the French Tontines. These tables were decidedly the best that had then appeared, and even now, when much more extensive observations have been obtained, are of great value. But the tables which acquired the most extensive reputation were the celebrated Northampton Tables, calculated by Dr. Price from registers kept in the city of Northampton. These, till a late period at least, have formed the guide of the transactions of all the assurance offices. The)' give the probabilities of life, and consequently the value of the annuities, considerably lower than all other good ob*. servations have subsequently proved them to be ; but, in proportion as the annuities are too low, the premiums for assurance deduced from them are too high ; and hence they were extremely safe for the offices, though propor- tionally unjust for the assured. In consequence of the competition resulting from the recent great increase in the number of assurance offices, they now transact their business on more equitable terms. An extensive set of annuity tables was given by Mr. Milne in his " Treatise on the Valuation of Annuities and Assurances on Lives and Survivorships," published in 1815. One of these tables, founded on observations made at Carlisle, has acquired considerable reputation, and perhaps gives 9 nearer re- presentation of the value of life at present in England generally than any other which has yet been published. The aniiuities granted by government are now valued according to a table calculated by Mr. Finlaison from the mortality experienced among the different classes of an- nuitants. This table possesses a great advantage over most others, inasmuch as it is founded on observations of the actual numbers \¥ho entered upon and passed through the several years of age among a class of individuals none of which could be lost sight of, so that no uncertainty remains about the accuracy of the data. The values of the annuities are in general considerably higher than those given by the Northampton Table, at the same rate per cent., and approach to those of the Carlisle Table. The observations also indicate a considerable difference between the values of male and female life at the same ages ; a fact which appears to be borne out by all the ac- curate registers of mortality which have been kept in this and other European countries. (See Mortality.) The following table, extracted from Mr. Finlaison's Report to the Lords Commissioners of the Treasury (March, 1829), shows the value of a life anninty of jC'I at all the different ages of male and female life to 90, accord- ing to the mortality among the government annuitants, the rate of interest being 4 per cent. Value of a Life Annuity of .^1, Interest being 4 per Cent. Age. Male. Female. Arc. Male. Female. 1 19-06G6 19-8135 26 16-8675 18-0175 a 19-1912 19-8981 27 16-7730 17-9043 3 19-2f.42 19-9512 28 16-6705 17-7878 4 19'2S80 19-9795 29 16-5606 17-6683 5 19-2699 20-0008 30 16-4438 17-5456 A 19-2162 19-9902 31 16.3202 17-4172 7 19-1324 19-9549 32 16-1904 17-2861 8 19-0284 19-8923 33 16-055i2 17-1526 9 18-9098 19-8070 34 15-9049 17-0171 10 18-7817 19-7014 35 15-7488 16-8795 n 18-6435 19-5794 36 15-5849 16-7439 IS 18-4962 19-4185 37 15-4153 16-6047 15 18-.'S394 19-3159 38 15-2101 16-4607 14 18-1738 19-1848 39 15-0608 16-3113 15 18-0044 19-0594 40 14.8752 16-1560 16 17-8366 18-9587 41 14-6822 15-9927 17 17-6782 18-8663 42 14-4759 15-8229 18 17-5330 18-7797 43 14-2612 15-6461 19 17-4057 18-6962 44 14-0352 15-4615 20 17-2948 18-6130 45 13.7975 15-2686 21 17-1986 18-5230 46 13-5483 15-0661 28 17-1306 18-4298 47 13-2814 14-8543 1 33 17-0683 18-3.329 48 13-0048 14-6331 » ** 17-00,'>9 18-23'^0 49 12-7199 14-4022 |25 I6-94iRt 18-1273 50 12-4299 14-1610 ANODON. Age. Male. Female. Age. Male. Female. 51 12-1385 13-9061 71 6-5042 7-5256 52 11-8571 13-6409 72 6-2400 7-1980 53 11-5789 1 s-se-ie 73 5-9738 6-8762 54 11-3065 13-0816 74 5-6967 6-5655 55 ll-0.'592 12-7904 75 5-4103 6-2640 56 10-7751 12-4952 76 5-1149 ' 5-9590 H 10-5151 12-1946 77 4-7787 5-6707 58 10-2551 11-8888 7S 4-4448 5-4058 59 9-9907 11-5778 79 4-1218 S-lfil7 60 9-7207 11-2609 80 3-8117 4-9.358 61 9-4379 10-9328 81 3-5074 4-7307 62 9-1411 10-5983 82 3-2174 4 -.52 13 63 8-8330 10-2597 83 2-9251 4-2922 61 8-5246 9-9186 84 2-6312 4-0372 65 8-2163 9-5765 85 2.3495 3-7511 66 7-9077 9-2328 86 2-0782 3-4410 67 7-6196 8-8903 87 1-8458 3-1139 68 7-3343 8-5476 88 1-6489 2-7743 69 7-0520 8-2022 89 1-4837 2-4371 70 6-7745 7-8580 90 1-.3346 2-ll.'53 Annuity. In Law. A sum of money paid yearly, and charged on the personal estate, or on the person, of the individual from whom it is due : thus differing from a rent-charge, which is charged on real estate. Annuities are commonly employed as a system of borrowing and lending ; the borrower of the money being the grantor of the annuity, and the lender the grantee. An annuity is either for a term of years, for a life or lives, or in perpetuity ; and the latter, although charged on personal property, may by the terms of the grant desuend as real estate. A perpetual annuity is redeemable by the grantor, subject, however, to conditions in the grant, by which he may preclude himself from redeeming for a certain period of years. An annuity for life or years is only redeemable by consent of the parties, unless it has been rendered redeemable on specific conditions in the original grant. Annuities for life, on account of the risk to which the grantee is exposed, are not within the usury laws : they are, therefore, commonly resorted to as a mode of raising money by loan at high interest. By the stat. 53 G. 3. c. 141., a memorial of every instrument by which annuities for life are granted, must be enrolled in the Court of Chancery, containing the date, names of parties and witnesses, and conditions of contract, and the grantor may have the instrument cancelled, if the consideration money is not bona. fide paid him. This act is intended to relate only to annuities, granted in return for loans. Annuities created by will are general legacies, and subject to abatement, in proportion with other legacies, on a deficiency of the funds of the testator. If a person on whose life an annuity is charged dies |)etween two days of payment, the grantee has no claim pro rata, for the proportionate amount of the yearly or quarterly sum incurred since his death. This act is further explained by 3 G. 4. c. 92. 7 G. 4. c. 75. ' AN'NULAR ECLIPSE. An eclipse of the sun, in which the moon conceals the whole of the sun's disk ex- cepting a bright ring all round the border. {See Eclipse.) AN' NULATE. Formed or divided intodistinct rings, or marked with differently coloured annulations. AN'NULET, (Lat. &nTm\\xs, a little ring.) In Ar- chitecture. A small square moulding which crowns or accompanies a larger. Also that fillet which separates the flutmgs of a column, though improperly used in that sense. It is sometimes called a list or listella ; which see. ANNULO'SA. (Lat. annulus, a ring.) A term used to designate, sometimes a part, sometimes the whole, of the Articulate division of Invertebrate animals. A'NNULUS. (Lat. annulus, « rw^.) This word is used in Botany in several different senses. In the mush- room and some other fungi it is applied to a collar which surrounds the stipes just below the hymenium ; in mosses it signifies a rim external with respect to the peristome ; in ferns it is an elastic rib which girds the theca nearly all round, and which by its contraction tears the iheca open and disperses the spores. ANNU'NCIA'TION, Order of the. Founded m Savoy by Amadeus VI., in 1336, as the order of the Collar: received its present name from Charles III. The reigning king of Sardinia is grand master of the order. Annunciation, Feast of the. A festival of the Chris- tian church, in commemoration of the announcement of the conception of our Saviour to the Blessed Virgin, by the angel Gabriel. (St. Luke i. 26. 38.) It is celebrated on the 25th of March, commonly called Lady-day. ANO'BIUM. The name of a Fabrician genus of Coleopterous insects, characterised by antennse filiform, the last joints larger ; thorax nearly round, not margined! receiving the head ; palpi clavate ;' labium entire. A'NODE. (Gr. kvot, upwards, and ihdt, n way.^ The way by which electricity enters substances through which it passes : opposed to cathode, the road or way by which it goes out. A'NODON. (Gr. a, priv.. oiov;, a tooth.) The name of a genus of Lamcllibranchiate Bivalves, including the common freshwater muscle, the shell of which has no ANODYNE. articular processes, or teeth, at the hinge. The name has also been applied to a genus of serpents, which have the teeth in the mouth very minute, or rudimental : the Anodon, Typus {Cohiber scaler of Linnseus), a South African species of this genus, lives upon the eggs of birds, whicli, by the structure of the moutli above mentioned, it is enabled to swallow entire. The inferior spinous pro- cesses of the cervical vertebrae are prolonged Into the gullet, and there receive a coating of enamel ; thus serving the office of teeth where the brealiing of the egg may take place without the loss of any of its nutritious con- tents. A'NODYNE. (Gr. «, without, and ohvyvj, pain.) A term applied in Physic to medicines which relieve pain. Anodynes are chiefly of vegetable Origin, and generally come under the head of sedatives or narcotics. ANO'LIS. Anoli, anoalli, is the vernacular name, in the Antilles, of the lizard to which the generic term Anolis is applied. This term is restricted in Zoology to those Iguanoid species of lizard which have minute scales on the under part of the last joints of the toes, while the next joints are extended into soft pads transversely stri- ated, but not organised to act as a sucker, as in the Geckos. All the species of Anolis are natives of the warmer parts of the American continent ; all are remarkable for their power of inflating the skin of the throat ; they are light and agile in their movements ; and in the beauty and brilliancy of their colour exceed all others of the Saurian order. ANO'MALI'STIC YEAR. The interval of time in which the earth completes a revolution with respect to any point in its elliptic orbit. The tropical year is measured by the return of the earth to the same equinox ; the sidereal year by its return to the same fixed star ; the anomalistic year by its return to the same apsis or extre- mity of the greater axis of its orbit. The major axis of the" diameter of the earth's orbit is not fixed, but has a progressive motion eastward among the stars. Suppose that when the earth is at its perihelion, or point nearest the sun, the other extremity of the major axis points to a given star ; When the earth, after having completed a revolution, returns to its perihelion, the diameter will point 11" 8 eastward of the same star ; consequently the ano- malistic year is longer than the sidereal year by the time which the earth takes to describe 11" -8 of space. It is still longer than the tropical year, for the line of the equinoxes goes backwards at the rate of 50"- 1 in a year ; therefore, after the earth has completed a revolution with respect to the line of the equinoxes, it has still to describe 50"-I -h ll"-8 = 61"-9, before it overtakes the same point of its ellipse. The time occupied in describing this arc is 25 minutes, and the length of the tropical year is 365 d. 5 h. 48 m. 45 s. ; therefore the anomalistic year is 365 d. 6 h. 13 m. 45 sec. ANO'MALY. {Gt. ccviiifjutko;, unequal, or irregular .) A term used in Astronomy to denote the angular distance of a planet from its perihelion, as seen from the sun. There are three different anomalies ; the true, the mean, and the eccentric. Let kp B be the orbit of a planet, 6 the sun, A B the transverse diameter, and C the centre. Through p draw P Q perpendicular to A B, meeting the circle circumscribed about the orbit \x\ X. On account of its A. S c Q B unequal distances from the sun, the angular motion of a planet in its orbit is irregular : conceive, therefore, that while the real planet moves from A to p, another planet moving in the same orbit, with an equable motion, and performing a revolution in the same time, has moved from A to P. This being supposed, the angle A S p is the true anomaly ; A S P is the mean anomaly ; and A C a: the eccentric anomaly. The mean anomaly is proportioned to the time of description ; to find the true anomaly, is a problem of considerable difficulty, requiring the aid' of the higher mathematics. From the circum- stance of its having been first proposed by Kepler, it is usually called Kepler's problem. Anomaly. In Grammar, an exception from a gene- ral rule. ANO'MIA. (Gr. it, without, vofj^oi, a law; because not easily reduced to the ordinary laws of classifica- tion.) 'Ihe name of a Linnaean genus of the Vermes Testacea, the characters of which, as given in the Sys- icma Nature, apply to the organisation of the soft parts and shell of the modern Terebratulae. In the system of Cuvier the term Anomia is limited to a genus of Ace- l)lialous Mollusca, having two unequal irregular thin valves, of which the flatter one is deeply notched at the cardinal margin. The greatest part of the central niuscle traverses this opening to be inserted into a third piece, which is sometimes calcareous, and sometimes simply horny, but which is always attached to foreign bodies. The rest of the muscle serves to join one valve to the other. The animal has a small vestige of a foot, and is remarkable for the length of its labial ten- tacles. 57 ANTARCTIC. AN'ONA. (Menona, the Malayan name of the cus- tard apple.) A genus of trees found in hot latitudes, with large roundish pulpy fruit, which in some species is used as food. The custard apple, so named from its seeds lying in a whitish sweet cream like pulp, is pro- duced by A. squamosa ; thecherimoyer,the most esteepned of all the fruits in Peru, is yielded by another ; and other kinds are known. ANONA'CE.*:. (See Anona.) An extensive natural order of Exogenous plants, comprehending evergreen trees or shrubs, whose fruit is sometimes eatable, as 'n Anona, more generally dry and aromatic, as in the genera Unona, Habzelia, &c., whose ripe carpels furnished the Piper asthiopicum of the old drug shops. The great mark of Anonaceae is their having ternary (trimerous) flowers, and a ruminated albumen. ^ ANO'NYMOUS. (Gr. kvuwiJios, nameless, from evc/Mi, a name.) In Literature, works published without the name of the author. Those pubhshed under a false name are termed Pseudonymous (iJ/iSSo?, falsehood). The best catalogue of anonymous works is that of Barbier (Dictionnaire des (Euvrages Anonymes et Pseudonymes, 3 vols. Paris, 1822-1824). There is also the great work of Placcius, Theatrujn Anonymorum et Pseudonytnorum^, t. fol. Hamburg, 1708. ANOPLOTBE'RIUM. (Gr. oivturXo;, unarmed, and S^yigm, beast.) The name of a genus of extinct animals of the order Pachydermata, characterised by the shortness and feeble size of the canine teeth, which resemble the incisors, and are consequently unfitted for being used as weapons of ofience. As the canines in this genus do not project beyond the level of the incisors and molar teeth, no vacant interspace is required in the dental series of the opposite jaw for the reception of their pointed extremities, and consequently the series of teeth is uninterrupted in both jaws, — a structure observable in no existing animal save man. The Auoplotherium has 6 incisors, 2 canines, and 14 molars in each jaw. The best known {Anoplotherium commune, Cuv.) is about the size of a wild boar, but longer in the body, with the head of an oblong form, and a tail of consider- able thickness, and as long as the body. Its probable use was to assist the animal in swimming. Another species of Anoplotherium (A. medium) is of a size and form more nearly approaching to the light and graceful character of the gazelle ; a third species was about the size of a hare. All the species, from the form of the teeth, and the absence of claws or horns, appear to have been singularly deficient in defensive organs. ANOKE'XY. {Gr. ct, without, and ogt^if, appetite.) Loss of appetite. ANO'SMIA. (Gr. u,without,sadeir(Mi, smell.) Loss of the sense of smelling. ANO'STOMA. (Gr. ctvat, upwards, and trrof^oc, mouth.) A genus of Pulmonate, or air-breathing Gas- tropods, the adult shell of which presents the following peculiarity, — the last whorl turns upwards towards the spire of the shell. ANOU'RANS, ANOU'RA. (Gr. k, priv., and «if«, tail.) A name applied to a tribe ol Batrachian reptiles, which lose the tail in arriving at maturitv ; as the toad and frog. A'NSERES. (hat. anser, a goose .) In the Linnaean arrangement, the name of the third order of birds, having the bill broad at the top, and covered with a soft skin ; the feet webbed. (See Natatore.s.) ANT. See Formica. A'NTA, JE. plur. (Lat. ante, before.) In Architec- ture, a pilaster or square projection attached to a wall. When they are detached from the wall, Vitruvius calls them parastatae. They are not usually diminished even when accompanjring columns from whose capitals, in all Greek works, they vary. ANTA'CIDS. Medicines which' neutralise the acid of the stomach. ANTA'LGIC. (Gr. «»«, against, and kXyos, pain.) That which relieves pain. ANTANACLA'SIS. (A compound word from the Greek prepositions mvti and tcv/n, and the verb xXxai, I break.) In Rhetoric and Composition, a figure in which a word is repeated, but in a different sense or different Inflection from the first ; which gives a kind of antitheti- cal force to the expression. " Labitur, et labetur in omne volubilis aevuro," The return to the former series of thought and diction after the interruption of a parenthesis, is also termed Antanaclasis. A'NTAPHRODI'SIACS. (Gr. kvTt, against, and A(p^o'htTYi, Venus.) Medicines which quell amorous desires. ANTA'RCTIC. (Gr. kv-ri, against, and kfxTts, a bear.) Opposite to Arctic. Antarctic circle, one of the small circles of the sphere, parallel to the equator, and distant 23° 27^' from the South pole. Antarctic pole, the South pole, or southern extremity of the axis of the earth. (See Auctic.) ANTECEDENT. ANTECE'DENT. In Analysis, the name given to the first of the two terms composing a ratio. Thus in the ratio a: b, ais the antecedent, and b is denominated the consequent. Antecedent. In Logic, the first member of an hypothetical proposition ; followed by the consequent ; as in the following instance : — If we sajr we have no sin (antecedent). We deceive ourselves {consequent). ANTEDILU'VIAN. (Lat. ante, before, and delu- vium, deluge.) Something that existed before the deluge. ANTELOPE. See Antilope. ANTE'NNA. (Lat. a yard arm.) A moveable, tubular, and jointed sensiferous organ situated on the head ; and peculiar to the Condylope Articulata. Certain Annelides carry soft tentacles or filaments upon the head, which have been termed antennae ; but improperly, ac- cording to the above definition, which would restrict the phrase to the jointed antennae of insects and crustaceans. In the latter class the antennae are commonly four in number, consisting each of a ' scape,' a ' pedicel,' of two joints, and a ' clavolet ' ; the latter is setaceous, and divided into a vast number of minute joints. It is simple in the external antennae, but in the internal pair is always composed of two and sometimes of three setaceous fila- ments. The internal pair of antennae are situated before or between the eyes, the external behind, at the outer sides of the eyes. In insects the antennae are always two in number, and situated in the space between or before the eyes ; they consequently correspond to the internal antennae of crustaceans. The cavity or socket in which the base of the antennae is planted is called the ' to- rulus,' or bed. The first, and in many cases the most conspicuous, joint of the antennae is termed the scape. The base of the scape, by which it is articulated with the toirulus, is the bulb. -It often looks like a dis- tinct joint, and is the point upon which the antenna tuins. The pedicellus, or second joint of the an- tenna, in some insects, also acts the part of a pivot in the bed of the scape, in order to give a separate motion to the clavola, or clavolet. This, which includes the remaining joints of the antenna taken together, is occa- sionally terminated by a capitulum or knob ; a term applied to the last joints of the clavolet when suddenly larger than the rest. (For the varieties of antennae with respect to situation, approximation, proportion, direction, figure, termination, and appendages, the reader is referred to the 4th vol. of Kirby and Spence's Introduction to Entomology.) ANTE'NNUL^. (Dim. of antenna.) A term some- times applied to the articulated filaments attached to the jaws or lower Up of Mandibulate insects, and which seem to be endowed with a sensiferous faculty specially adapted to distinguish kinds of food, and applied by the animal to that use : these organs are more commonly called palps, palpi, or feelers. A'NTEPAGME'NTA. (Lat.) In Architecture, the mouldings or architraves round doors ; also the jambs of a door. ANTEPE'CTUS. In Entomology, signifies the under side or breastplate of the manitrunk, and the bed of the first pair of extremities or arms. A'NTEPENU'LT, or ANTEPENULTIMA. In Grammar and Prosody, the last syllable of a word but two. ANTE'RIOR. CLat. Ante, before.) This is said either when of two lobes of a stigma, one, the anterior, is directed towards the front of a flower, and the other, the posterior, towards the back, or in any other similar case. It is also applied to certain stipules, which stand between the petiole and stem of a plant, adhering to the former, as in some Cinchonaceous plants. ANTESIGNA'NI. A class of soldiers in the Roman army, who were drawn up in front of the standards {an/e figna), whence they derived their name. As their post was one that demanded great courage and firmness, they were picked troops. ANTHE'LA. (Gr. kyBriXm, a little flower.) A name given by Meyer to the inflorescence of rushes. ANTHE'LIX. (Gr. ivi-/, against, and -^X^ the helix, or external involute margin of the auricle.) In Anatomy, the outer or external ridge of the auricle ear, which runs nearly parallel with the helix. ANTHELMl'NTICS. (Gr. «»«, against, and Ix- fjt.iy;, a worm.) Medicines which kill intestinal worms, or effect their expulsion. A'NTHEM. (Gr. avT/^v»j, alternate singing.) A piece of music performed in cathedral service by choris- ters who sing alternately. This manner of smging is very ancient in the church ; some suppose it to have de- scended from the practice of the earliest Christians, who, according to Pliny, were accustomed to sing their Hymn to Christ in parts or by turns {secum invicem). A'NTHER. (Gr. ae.v9fifu, a flowery herb.) A hollow case, usually consisting of two parallel cells, and C(nistituting the apparatus that contains the pollen, or male part of a flower. Theoretically considered, an ANTHRAX. anther is the blade of a leaf, in a contracted state, with its two sides hollowed out and its parenchyma converted into pollen, while the midrib in a fleshy state divides the two lobes, and is called the connective. This part is sometimes highly developed, when the lobes of the anther are often placed at a distance from each other, as in Nym- phaea ; or it is altogether absorbed, when the lobes run together, and there is but one cell, as in Epacris. Other modifications produce other striking appearances : one lobe, for instance, disappears, and the connective is ex- panded into the state of a petal, as inCanna; or it is simply lengthened and distorted, as in Salvia; or, the anther remaining in its normal state, it is converted into a fleshy mass, as m Penaea ; and it undergoes many similar trans- formations, either from the same or other causes. What is most curious about the anther, is its property of open- ing to discharge its pollen just at the very time when the stigma is ready to receive the influence of the latter. The cause of this sympathy between two really inde- pendent parts is supposed to consist in an emptying and drying up of the cellules forming the lining of the anther by the absorbent action of the ovary, which is imagined thus by its own efforts to bring about.an action which is necessary to its own complete operation. The cellules lining the anther, when thus dried up, contract, and pull against certain fissures or dehiscent lines in the valves of the anther, which give way, and so form openings by which the pollen escapes. ANTHERPFEROUS. (Lat.anthera, an anther, and. fero, I bear. ) Forming a support to an anther. ANTHERO'GENOUS. (Lat. anthera, and Gr. ;.t/vo- UMi, I am produced.) When, in double flowers, the anthers are converted into horn-like petals, as in the double columbine. ANTHE'ROID. Resembling an anther. ANTHE'SIS. (Gr. kvOrKn;, the generation of flowers.) The period when flowers expand. It is as that time that all the curious phenomena of fertilisation occur ; the parts are all in their most perfect state, and con- sequently it is often necessary to speak of that period. ANTHO'DIUM. (Gr, icydes, a flower, or icyOiuhr.s, full of flowers.) The head of flowers of a thistle or a daisy ; it is the same thing as capitulum, and is ap- plicable to all cases where a number of small flowers or florets are combined in a head, and surrounded by a common involucrum. An anthodium is nothing but a depressed spike. ANTHO'I LOGY. (Gr. kydoXeyiot.) Signifying " a garland of flowers," and metaphorically applied to a col- lection of short pieces of poetry, on amatory, convivial, moral, funereal, &c. subjects, called epigrams ; not in the English sense of the word, which implies a pointed con- ceit, but in the more proper signification of "inscription." The first collection of epigrams known by the name of Anthology was made by Meleager, a Syrian Greek poet, who lived about a century before the birth of Christ ; and to this several additions were made by different hands as low down as the times of the Byzantine empire. A se- lection from the Greek Anthology, translated into Englisli verse by the late Mr. Bland and several friends, has gone through two editions. ANTHO'LYSIS. (Gr. kvdo;, a flower, a.nd \vi^o:,man, andXoyts, discourse.) The science which treats of human nature, both physical and intellectual : any writing on the nature and attributes of man may l)e said to be anthropological. But the term is frequently used to denote the science of Ana- tomy in particular. ANTHRO'POMO'RlPHITES. Persons who conceive the Deity to have naturally the human shape. Such sen- suous conceptions of the nature of God have been always common among heathens. ANTHRO'FOMO'RPHOUS. (Gr. kvepanTo;, a man, and iu,oi)$*i, form.) A name applied to the labellum in some Orchidaceous plants, in consequence of the upper lobes having a fancied resemblance to human arms, and the lower to human legs. ANTHROPO'PHAGI. (Gr. Uvdpanre:, man, and (pxyuv, to eat.) People who feed upon human flesh. ANTUU'RUS. (Gr. itudof, a flower, and eu^ot, a tail.) A spike of minute flowers arranged closely on a long axis, as in the genus Piper. A'NTHUS. The name of a subgenus of Passerine birds, including the pipits. A'NTl. {Gr. otiiTt, against.) This Greek preposition is constantly used as a prefix ; thus, antidote, autibilious, antipathy, &c. A'NTIAR. (See Upas.) A J^jivanese poison. A'NTI-ATTRI'TION. A compound applied to machinery to prevent the effects of friction. It fre- quently consists of a mixture of plumbago with some greasy material. ANTIBRA'CHIUM. (Gr. kvti, against, ^iKxn^v,arni.) The fore-arm, or third segment of the anterior extremi- ties, which is formed, in the skeleton, by the radius and ulna conjointly ; or sometimes by the radius, either alone, or with the ulna partially developed. And the fore- arm articulates, above with the arm, below with the hand. A'NTICHAMBER. (Fr. antichambre.) In Archi- tecture. Any outward chamber adjoining or near a bed- chamber ; also an apartment before any principal cham- ber ; also a lobby or outer waiting room in a palace. A' N T I C H R I S T . ( Gr . ie,yTix§i anther whose lobes are placed facing the style ; or to a petal which is stationed on that side of a flower which is next the eye of an observer as it grows upon its stem. ANTPCUM. (Lat.) In ancient Architecture. The southern porch of a building 4 that which was towards the north being called the posticum. It is also used to signify that part of the temple between the cell and the columns of the portico. A'NTIDOTE. (Gr. «»«, against, and It^ufju, I give.) A remedy or preservative against sickness. A'NTIFPXA, or ANTEFIXA. (Lat. ante, before, and Ago, / fix.) In Architecture. The ornaments of lions' and other heads below the eaves of a temple, through perforations in which, usually by the mouth, the water is cast away from the eaves. By some this term is used to denote the upright ornaments above the eaves in ancient Architecture, which concealed the ends of the harmi, or joint tiles. ANTILPTHICS. (Gr. kvn, against, and kiBa, a stone.) Medicines used in the treatment Of stone in the bladder and urinary gravel. A'NTILO'GARITHM. In its most common accept- ation, denotes the number to a logarithm. Thus, in the common system of logarithms, 100 is the ailiilogarithm of 2, because 2 is the logarithm of 100. Sometimes the term is used to denote the complement of the logarithm, or the difference of the logarithm from the next higher term in the series, 1, 10, 100, &c. ANTILOPMIC. (Gr. kvrt, against, and >.otf/.of, con- tagion, or the plague.) Remedies used in the prevention and cure of the plague. A'NTILOPE. (Gr. «v0«, ornament, and «^J/, eye.) Antelope ; a term which, according to Cuvier, is a cor- ruption of the word " antholops," applied by Eustathius, an ancient naturalist, to the gazelle, in allusion to its beautiful eyes. The name is now given to a division of the hollow-horned Ruminants (see Cavicornia), in which the bony axis of the horn is without cavities or sinuses. Antilopes are further distinguished by suborbital or maxillary glandular pouches, and their light and elegant figure. They are the natives, for the most part, of the wildest and least accessible places in the warmer latitudes of the globe ; frequenting the cliffs and ledges of mountain rocks, or the verdure-clad banks of tropical streams, or the oases of the desert. They traverse the intervening wildernesses in pairs or in troops, with incredible fleet- ness, clearing obstacles, which would impede the course of other quadrupeds, by a succession of agile bounds. The antilopes are now arranged under a number of subgeneric divisions, according to th€ form of the horns, which are peculiar to the male. ANTIMO'NIC ACID. The peroxide of antimony. (See Antimony.) AN'TIMONY. A brittle metal of a silver white colour ; specific gravity, 6-7. Fuses at 810°, or just at a red heat. The principal properties of this metal were first described in the " Currus Triumphalis Antimonii " of Basil Valentine, published towards the end of the thir- teenth century. When heated in an open vessel, it gra- dually combines with oxygen, and evaporates in a white vapour. There are three oxides of antimony. The pro- toxide consists of 65 antimony -H 12 oxygen ; it is a greyish white powder, eminently purgative, sudorific, and emetic \ and as such, of much importance in medicine. It is the active base of emetic tartar and of James's powder. The other oxides of antimony, from combining with certain bases, have been called antimonious and antimonic acid ; they consist respectively of 65 antimony + 16 oxygen, and 65 4- 20. The combination of chlorine and antimony was known to the old chemists under the name of butter of antimony. The principal ore of ailtimony^ is the sulphu- ret : it is met with in commerce, melted into conical ingots, under the name of crude antimony. It is of a bluish grey colour, metallic lustre, and a striated texture; specific gravity 462 ; it is much more easily fusible than the pure metal. Antimony forms brittle alloys with some of the most malleable metals : when gold is alloyed with a two-hundredth part of antimony, the compound is brittle ; and even the fumes of antimony in the vicinity of melted gold are sufficient to render it brittle. Alloyed with lead in the proportion of 1 to 16, and a small addition of copper it forms, the metal used for printers' types : with lead only, a white and rather brittle compound is formed, used for the plates upon which music is engraved. With iron it ANTINOMIANS. forms a hard whitish alloy, formerly called martial re- gulus : 12 parts of tin and 1 of antimony form hard pewter. The white metal spoons and teapots are formed of an alloy of 100 tin, 8 antimony, 2 bismuth, and 2 copi)er. Antimony is the stimmi, or stibium, of the old che- mists. ANTINO'MIANS. (Gr. a»«, against, and io/mi?, law.) Oppugners of the law. In Theology, Antinomlans are such as interpret the law, to which St. Paul refers more especially in the Epistle to the Romans, as includ- ing all moral ordinances whatsoever ; and push the con- trast which the Apostle maintains between faith and the works of the law to an extreme extent, asserting the entire uselessness of good works, in any case, and the sole efficacy of faith. Hence the term Solifidian is applied to the same class of religionists. The name of Antinomian was first given by Luther, as a term of reproach, to the followers of the opinions of John Agricola on this subject, who complained, however, that his notions had been un- fairly represented. Similar doctrines appear to have been held in England by an ephemeral sect in the time of the commonwealth : but antinomianism may now be taken rather as expressing the extreme to which the Calvinistic scheme of theology has the tendency to lead men, than as denoting any distinct sect or congregation, either in this country or abroad. ANTIPiE'DOBA'PTISTS. In Theology. Those who object to the baptism of infants on the ground that they are not capable of understanding the nature of the rite, and of pledging themselves to such a course of life as is required of all such as come to be baptized. {See Bap- tists.^ A'NTIPATHES. A genus of Corticiferous Polypes, or corals, in which the central axis is enveloped by so soft a cortex that it falls off when the specimen is removed from the water. From the colour of the axis, it is com- monly called " black coral." A'NTIPE'DES. (Lat. ante, 5e/ore, pes, /oo<.) In Zoology, the anterior or pectoral extremities. A'NTIPHLOGI'STICS. (Gr. «y«, against, and ^Xoyiarpt-t; , inflammation.) Medicines which allay in- flammatory action. A'NTIPHLOGIS'TIC SYSTEM. In Chemistry, the system opposed to that of Phlogiston. {See Phlogistic.) A'NTIPHON. (Gr. avTiipave^, to sing against, or mutually.) In ancient Church Music, the short verse sung before the psalm and other portions of the Catholic service. {See Anthem.) ANTI'PODES. (Gr. icvn, against, and vovf, the foot.) Denotes, literally, those who stand feet to feet ; that is, the inhabitants of opposite parts of the earth. They live under the same parallels of latitude, on oppo- site sides of the equator, consequently the seasons are re- versed, or, when it is summer to the one, it is winter to the other. Their longitude differs by ISQO, or 12 hours, consequently their days and nights are reversed, that is, when it is mid-day to the one, it is midnight to the other. They have the same climate, in so far, at least, as climate depends on latitude, A'NTIPOPE. One that assumes the title and functions of pope without a valid election. The term more parti* cularly refers to the'popes who maintained themselves in opposition to each other, during part of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. The great western schism was caused by the rival jealousies of the French and Italian parties in the conclave; the French cardinals having been accus- tomed by their numbers, and the influence of the kings of France, to carry the election in favour of French can- didates, while the popes resided at Avignon, a period of about 70 years, from 1305 to 1376. Accordingly, when the Italian party at last succeeded in the election of Urban VI., in 1389, the French cardinals retired from Rome, and there invested with the functions of pope one of their own body, under the title of Clement VII, They at- tempted, in the first instance, to maintain themselves in Italy, and war was proclaimed between the two rivals. After a short struggle, Clement retreated to Avignon ; and there he, and his successor, Benedict XIII., held their court, while Urban, and after him, Boniface IX. and Gregory XII., reigned at Rome. They were supported respectively by different European states, of which France, Austria, Castile, Aragon, Savoy, Genoa, and Scotland sided with the party of the seceders. The schism, how- ever, caused great scandal throughout Christendom, and measures were repeatedly taken, and baffled only by the artifices of the rival claimants, for an adjustment of the difference. There seemed to be three methods of proceed- ing to this end, and each liable to great difficulties : — 1st. By the simultaneous resignation of both pontiffs, and a fresh election. 2tl. By an arbitration between them. And, 3d. By the calling of a general council, to declare the holy see void, and recommend the conclave to fill the vacancy. This last method was finally adopted ; though it has been constantly objected, that such a council could not be lawfully convened except by the summons of a reigning pope; which condition certainly was not fulr 60 ANTIQUITIES. filled in the instance of the council of Pisa. However, in 1409, the rival parties were both declared guilty of heresy and schism, and thereby the validity of both claims greatly disproved. Alexander V. was then elected in due form ; and the antipopes were unable long to main- tain their pretensions against the authority of a general council. A'NTIQUARY. Copiers of old books, especially in convents, 'were termed Antiquarii in the Latin of the middle ages. In modern phraseology, antiquary is defined " a person who studies and searches after monuments and remains of antiquity, as old medals, books, statues, in- scriptions, &c.; " to which may be added those who make the manners and customs of ancient times an especial subject of inquiry. Henry VIII.- gave Leland the title of his " Antiquary.'' The Royal Society of Antiquaries, in Lomlau, was founded under the reign of George II. {See Academy.) ANTl'QUE. In a restricted sense, pieces of ancient art, and by artists usually confined to such as were made by the Greeks and Romans of the classical age. ANTI'QUITIES. Under this term, which has not a very definite meaning in modern European languages, we appear generally to comprehend all memorable things respecting Man in his social state in past time, except the political events, which form more properly the subject of History. Thus, manners and customs, language, litera- ture, topographical details, the monuments of architec- ture, sculpture, &c. of ancient times, all fall under the general cognizance of the antiquary. His science is, as it were, subsidiary to the more general objects of the his- torian. In a more restricted sense, the study of antiqui- ties is confined to the description and interpretation of the existing relics of former times, such as architectural remains, manuscripts, medals, and other objects of cu- rious research. Among classical writers, there is, perhaps, only one who falls exactly within the definition of wliat in modern times we should term an antiquary; viz. Pau- sanias, whose work, written about the period of Marcus Antoninus, is entirely devoted to a description of the monuments of earlier periods then existing in Greece. But about the time of the revival of letters, when the study of classical writers became the main pursuit of literary men, classical antiquities became also a distinct and important branch of research. Besides the writers who employed their antiquarian knowledge in the shape of commentary on classical authors, a great number de- voted their talents to the production of treatises exclu- sively illustrating particular points in ancient customs and usages. To enumerate the chief classical antiquaries of the 16th and 17th centuries would be impossible ; but the following works may be named as among the most comprehensive and general which we possess, containing an immense repository of facts, which the more refined criticism of modern times has sifted and applied with bet- ter success : the treatises of Signonius and Meursius — the latter chiefly on Greek antiquities — are collected in 12 folio volumes, Florence, 1741 ; the vast Thesaurus Antiquitatutn Grcecarum of the Dutch commentator Grffivius (Leyden, 12 vols. fol. 1697, &c.) ; and the still more extensive work of Gronovius ( Thesaums Antiqui- talum Romanarum, Leyden, 13 vols. fol. 1697), to- gether with its contiouations and supplements, by Burmannus, extending in the whole to 45 volumes ; The works of Polenus, Pitiscus, and Gruterus, on the same plan with those two vast collections ; the Avti- quiti Expliquie of Bernard de Montfaupon, extending, with the supplements, to 15 vols, folio, Paris, 1719-24. From these great works our modern Compendia in com- mon use (in English, the Grecian Antiquities of Arch- bishop Potter, the Roman Antiquities of Kennett, Adam, &c.) are chiefly compiled. The names of Boeck {Public and Private Economy of Athens), Heeren {Jlistorij of Ancient Commerce, ^c), Miiller, Niebuhr, Creuzer, Bottiger, Wachsmuth, &c., attest the equal industry and superior critical skill of the classical antiquaries of modern Germany, the only country in which this branch of know- ledge is now successfully cultivated. In that more re- stricted branch of classical antiquities, the description of the monuments of ancient art, among many illustrious names we may mention those of Caylus {Recueil d' Antiquittfs Egyptiennes, Grecques, et Romaines, 7 vols. 4to. Paris, 1752, &c.) and the Abbe Winkelraann. In the peculiar study of Egyptian antiquities, the names of Young, Hamil- ton, and Champollion stand pre-eminent. In ecclesias- tical antiquities, the huge collections of Ugolinus ( The- saurus Jntiqtiitatvm Sacrarum, 34 t. fol. Antv. 1744) and Canisius {Lectiones Antique, edited by Basnagc, 4 t. fol. V. Antv. 1725) may be mentioned among many others. Lastly, the antiquities of the middle ages have received much and accurate attention , especially in France and England, within the last century. Besides the works of Leland and Camden, the fathers of English antiquities, of Dugdale and Hoarne, &c., we may name, in modern times, Fosbrooke {British Monachism, 2 vols. 4to. 1802, and Encyclopaedia of Antiquities), Strutt {Regal and Ecclesiastical Antiquities (if England, 4to. ANTIRRIIINEiE. J773, and many subsequent works), Brand, Lodge, Playfair, &c. &c., besides many who have devoted them- selves to particular branches of the subject ; and, among living authors. Sir Henry Ellis, Sir F. Pal- grave, Sir H. Nicholas, Mr. Petre, &c. In French an- tiquities, the greatest name is that of MontfaUcon ( Mo«m- mens de la Monarchic Fraru;aise, 5 vols. fol. Paris, 1725, &c.) ; while the Italians, among whom the study of na- tional antiquities has been very sedulously cultivated, are peculiarly indebted to the indefatigable Muratori. His principal works are the Antiquitates Italicce MeUii Mui, and Rerum Itaiicarum Scriptores : the whole are said to amount to 41 vols, in folio, besides 34 in 8vo. ANTiRRIIl'NEiE. A small division of Scrophula- riaccous plants, consisting of Antirrhinum (the snap- dragon of the gardens), Linaria, and a few other genera, ANTl'SCll,orANTISCIANS. (Gr.ik7-/,flga?>M^and fmm., shadow.) An old term used in Geography to denote those inhabitants of the earth whose shadows fall in op- posite directions. The inhabitants of the north and south temperate zones are always Antiscians ; those living within the tropics may be Antiscians at one season of the year, and not at another. ANTISCORBU'TICS. Medicines against the scurvy. ANTISE'PTIC. (Or. «v«, against, and trnTUv, to putrejy.) Antiputrefactive. Substances which prevent or check the putrefaction and decay of animal and vege- table ntatter, are called antiseptic. ANTISPASMODICS. (Or. «vt/, against, and e-rcter- (jLt(, a spasm.) Medicines which alleviate or cure cramp and spasm. ANTIS'TROPHE. See Strophe. ANTITHESIS. (Gr. Uvti, and riBtyeu, to set.) In Rhetoric, a figure in which two thoughts, words, or sentences are set in opposition to each other, in order to be more strikingly brought forward by the contrast ; as in the following sentence from Cicero : " Quod scis, nihil prodest : quod nescis, multum obest." " Your knowledge avails you nothing: your ignorance hurts vou much." Quintilian translates the Greek word UvnOitris by the Latin contrapositum. "The following well known passage of Spenser may be cited as an instance of mixed antithesis and accumulation. " Ah ! little dost thou know, that hast not tried. What hell it is in suing long to bide ; To speed to-day, to be put nffto-morrorv : To feed on hope, to pine tvith care and sorrotv : To'have thy prince's grace, yet n-ant her j>eer'i : To have thine asking, yet wait many years : To fawTi, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run. To spend, to give, to want, to be undone." ANTI'TRAGUS. (Gr. ivri, against, r^uyos, the mar- ginal process of the external ear which is immediately in front of the meatus.) In Anatomy, the process of the external ear opposite the tragus,' and behind the meatus auditorius, or ear-passage. ANTl'TROPAL. (Gr. kvri, opposite, and t^i-tuv, to turn.) When in a seed the radicle of the embryo is turned to the end farthest away from the hilum. This, although a comparatively unusual position of parts, is nevertheless the normal position, if the exact nature of the developement of an ovule is rightly understood. A'NTLIA. The oral instrument of Lepidopterous insects, in which the ordinary trophi, or instruments for obtaining, are replaced by a spiral, bipartite, tubular machine for suction, with its appendages. It principally consists of the solenaria, or two lateral subcylindrical tubes, and the fistula, or intermediate subquadrangular pipe, formed by the union of the two solenaria, which in- termediate canal conveys the nectar to the pharynx. Theoretically, the solenaria are the maxillae inordinately elongated, and they support at their bases two minute palpi. Rudiments of the upp«r lip or labrum, and man- dibles, exist above the maxillae ; and below these is the labrum, attached to the head, and distinguished by a pair of large palpi. ANTLIA PNEUMATICA. A constellation of the southern hemisphere. ANTCE'CI. (Gr. ivr;, opposite, and /e). A class of people among the Franks, who were the personal vassals or dependents of the kings and counts. They were not dependent on them by reason of holding lands by their grant : but rather, in consequence of being such dependents, were favoured with donations of land, or benefices ; Vvhich, in process of time, becoming hereditary, assumed the character of Fiefs. {See Feudai. System.) The original word from which Antrustion is derived, was undoubtedly the same with that from which our word trust, confidence, has its descent. ANU'BIS, In Mythology, an Egyptian deity. The seventh, according to the astronomical Theology, of their eight gods of the first class. The Greeks identified him with Mercury. In Egyptian painting and sculpture be is represented as a man with the head of a dog : ^vhence the lines in the 6th book of Virgil's iEneid, describing the conflict of Egypt with Rome: — Omnigenflmque Defim monstra, et latrator Anubis, Contra Neptunum et Venerem, contraque Minervam, Tela ferunt. A'NUS. The cxcrementary orifice of the alimentary canal, which sometimes opens directly on the exterior surface of the animal, as in most Mammals; sometimes into a cavity common to it with the outlets of the urinary and genital organs, called the cloaca, as in most oviparous Vertebrates ; sometimes into the respiratory cavity, as in most Mollusks. In Entomology, it Signifies the two last segments of the abdomen, and includes the podex, hypopy- gium, cuius, ovipositor, and appendices. In most of the Acrites there is but one orifice to the alimentary cavity, which thus combines the functions of mouth and anus. A'ORIST. {Cjr.a.oftirTCi, indefinite.) That inflexion of the verb which leaves the time of the action denoted uncertain. AO'RTA. (Gr. &.Vif,air, and rupt/v, to keep.) The great arterial trunk which issues from the left ventricle of the heart. After death it is found empty ; whence the older anatomists, supposing that it was for the conveyance of air, gave it the above name. It is single in Mammals and birds ; double in most reptiles, and in the Cephalopods ; triple in the Crustaceans. APA'GYNOUS. (Gr. a^rof I, once, and yvvvi, afemale.) When a plant fructifies but once, perishing immediately after it flowers. It is the same as monocarpic, and nearly the same as annual ; only that, like the latter term, it in- cludes such plants as the American agave, whi»h live many years before they fructify. A'PALUS. A Linnaean genus of coleopterous insects, having the antennae filiform ; the palpi equal and filiform ; the maxillas horny and one-toothed; the labium mem- branaceous, truncate, and entire. A'PANAGE. An allowance to younger branches of a sovereign house out of the revenues of the country ; generally together with a grant of public domains. A district with the right of ruling it, when thus conferred, is termed paragium. An apanage, in ordinary cases, descends to the children of the prince who enjoys it. A'PATITE. Native phosphate of lime (from Ufrot.Toe.u, I deceive), having been confounded with other minerals. APATU'RIA. An Athenian festival, which came also to be observed by the rest of the lonians except those of Colophon and Ephesus. Two accounts are given of its origin : one of which derives its name from the Greek word ccroL'ryi, deceit, because it was instituted in memory of a stratagem by which Melanthus the Athenian king over- came Icanthus king of Bceotia ; the other from jr«T»jj, father, and the prefix a, , signifying together, because at this festival children accompanied their fathers that their names might be entered on the public register. The festival took place in October, and continued three days. APE. In the Zoological sense, is restricted to those higher organised species of the Linnaean SimicB which are destitute of a tail. They are included in the modern subgenera, Fithecus, Troglodytes, and Hylobates, or the ourangs, chimpanzees, and gibbons. APE'LLOUS. (Gr. i,priv. and pellis, 5/rm.) Des- titute of skin. APE'TALOUS. (Gr. i,priv.,!«T«X«v, apetal.) When a flower has a calyx only, and no corolla. The term is sometimes extended to those ca.ses in which there is neither calyx nor corolla ; thus, the apetalous plants of Jussieu are either destitute of a corolla only, or of all floral envelopes of whatever kind. A'PEX. The summit or highest point of any thing. Thus, the apex of a cone, of a pyramid, &c. APH^'REUS. (Gr. 'a.q>a.tiuv, to take away.) In Writing or Pronunciation, the removal of a vowel from the commencement of a word ; as, in English, ' it is ' is some- times written ' 'tis,' abide is changed into ' 'bide,' &c. APHANPPTEROUS, APHANI'PTERA. (Gr. i- ^av»7f, obscure, veripov, wing.) The name of an order of Apterous Haustellate insects, having rudimental elytra or wings in the perfect state, and undergoing a metamor- phosis, resembling that of the Tiputidce, or crane-flies. The common flea (Pulex irritans, Lin.) may be regarded as the type of this order. The female flea ( Pulex irritans, Lin.) deposits a dozen eggs, of a white colour and rather APHELION. viscous texture, from which proceed little apodal maggots, which are very active in their motions, winding themselves in a ?iTrpcntine manner through the substance in which they may be deposited : the head of the larva is protected by a firm skin, ana bears two small antennae, but no eyes ; the body consists of thirteen segments, bearing little tufts of liair, and the last is armed vdih a pair of booklets : the mouth presents some small moveable instruments with which the maggot hauls itself along. After having passed twelve days under this form, the larva spins itself a little silken cocoon, in which it passes into the pupa state, and in about twelve days more emerges a perfect flea ; this metamorphosis distinguishes the flea and chigoe from other hlood-3Ucking parasitic Apterous insects ; and they are further distinguished by the number of segments into which their body is divided, and their pentamerous, or five-jointed, tarsi. APHE'LION. (Gr. kvo, from, and r.Xios, the sun.) In Astronomy, is that point of a planet's orbit which is at the greatest distance from the sun . It is opposed to perihe- lion, which signifies the point of the orbit nearest the sun. The aphelion and perihelion of an orbit are consequently the two extremities of its greater axis. In consequence of the mutual attractions of the planets, the positions and figures of their orbits are constantly undergoing a slow variation. The aphella gradually shift their places on the planes of the orbits ; and it is remarkable that these motions are direct, or eastward, in the case of all the planets excepting Venus, the aphelion of whose orbit, when referred to the fixed stars, moves westward at the rate of about 4 seconds annually. Of the old planets, Saturn is that whose aphelion undergoes the greatest annual variation ; it amounts to about 18 seconds of a degree. (See Perihelion, Planet.) APHE'LXIA. (Gr. a^sXxs/v, to abstract.) Absence of mind. APHE'RESIS or APH.^'RESIS. (Gr. i, and ?f principle.) A term used by the old chemists and physicians to imply the occult cause of certain phenomena. Van Helmont and Stahl ascribe certain vital functions to the influence and super- intendence of a spiritus archa^us. A'RCHAISM. (Gr. a.^x.a.ie;, ancient.) In Rhetoric and Literature, the use of an obsolete expression or phr.ise, giving an air of antiquity to the passage in which it occurs. ARCHA'NGELS. A superior order of angels. The term occurs once in Scripture, being applied by St. Jude to Michael. ARCHBI'SHOP, or METROPOLITAN. The pri- mate of a province containing several dioceses. The term first came into use in the fourth century, and was then considered superior to that of metropolitan, and equivalent to patriarch, or bishop of an imperial diocese, such as Rome, Constantinople, Antioch, Alexandria, and Carthage. ARCHDE'ACON. An Ecclesiastical officer, rank- ing next to the bishop. As deacons were originally attendants upon the bishop, so the archdeacon was one selected from among the deacons of several dioceses, His functions were confined to attending upon and assist- ing the bishop in the discharge of his spiritual duties and the management of his diocese, and had at first no juris- diction. There are now more archdeacons than one in each diocese, the whole number in England being sixty ; and they are employed by their bishops in visiting the clergy of the diocese, and in the dispatcli of other matters relating to the episcopal superintendence. ARCH-DUKE. A title originally assumed by various dukes, but in the sequel appropriated to those of the house of Austria by the Emperor Frederic III. in 1453. It is now strictly confined to the younger sons of an Emperor of Austria, A'RCHER. (From the Latin arcus, a bow.) A bow- man ; one who uses a bow. The use of the bow in war may be traced to the earliest antiquity, and to the history of almost every people. The exact time wlien the En- glish long-bow began to be used in war is not exactly ascertained : the Normans brought with them the arba- lest or cross-bow ; but from the reign of Edward II. the long-bow, the favourite national weapon, seems to have been fully established. When fire-arms began to come into use, various attempts were unsuccessfully made, by statute and proclamation, to prevent this ancient weapon becoming obsolete. In France the officers who attended the lieutenant of police were, before the Re- volution, always called archers, although provided with carbines. Artillery is a French term, originally sig- nifying archery, and the London artillery company were a fraternity of bowmen. A'RCHETYPE. (Gr. it.oxi'r^'ros, from kix-^, ori- gin, and TVTo;, type.) The original of that which is represented in a picture or statue ; and, figuratively, the reality which is shadowed out in prophecies or mysteries. Thus, in Theology, the death of our Saviour is said to be the archet\-pe of the Jewish sacrifices, which were insti- tuted as types of that event. {See Type.) A'RCHIL. (A corruption of orseille, French.) A kind of purple dye obtained from the lichens, called Rocella tinctoria and fuciformis. It is chiefly procured in the Canaries. ARCHIMA'NDRITE. a title of the Greek Church, equivalent to abbot ; the word mandia signifying a ino- naMery in the language of the Lower Empire. A'RCHITECTURE. (Gr. i?x»J. beginning, rtxruv, artificer. ) The art of Building, according to certain pro- portions and rules determined and regulated by nature and taste. .Architecture becomes an art at that period only in the history of nations when they have reached a certain degree of civilisation, of opulence, and of luxury. In an earlier state, it can only be reckoned among the trades or occupations necessar j to the wants of mankind ; its application is then very hmited, its use little more than furnishing man with shelter from the waters of the heavens, and protection from the inclement vicissitudes of the seasons. At its birth, however, it assumes a cha- racter in all countries which in the sequel stamps it with such romarkable and distinguishing^ features, that in the summit of its grandeur the traces of its early origin are still discernible. Notwithstanding the interval of so many ages from its origin, we may even trace the general form of architecture to three distinct states of the human race, which necessarily influenced the nature of the ARCHITECTURE. habitations suitable to each, and which ultimately became standard models of the art. People whose dependence for their sustenance was on luinting the beasts of the field, as well as those who lived on the produce of the waters, from the natural indolence induced by those occupations and the little industry called for in such courses of life, would not be at an early period led to the construction of dwellings. They availed them- selves of the natural caverns of the rock, or at most hollowed them out, for shelter and protection. Nations occupied in a pastoral life, through a large portion of the year, obliged, for the sake of fresh pas- turage, frequently to change their abode, and thus lead a wandering life, would find the most suitable dwelling one which they could remove with themselves; hence the use of tents. Agriculture, which requires continued and active in- dustry on the same spot, doubtless induced man to exert his energies in the erection of solid and durable dwell- ings. For his produce no less than for himself were they necessary, and the wooden hut with its sloping roof was the offspring of his wants. It is not, however, to be understood that in every country the art can be traced to a single principle, since among some nations, as will hereafter be seen in relation to I-Lgyptian architecture, more than one will be found to enter into the combination. Causes, independent of the habits of the people, may have had their influence on the formation and taste of different species of architect- ure ; yet will these in their turn be found dependent on the first named. In short, it is to the three states of mankind that we must refer to account for those striking peculiarities which prevent us from confounding the art of. one people with that of another. In some of its details c;i.')rice may have had a share; but in every country the meat leading forms spring from principles dependent on tlu! diftcrent states of life we have just enumerated. Those who have sought for the original tjijes of this art in subterraneous temples and excavations exclusively, have fallen into error. These are found in almost every ((juntry. Many of them, such as the famous ear of Dionysius, and the quarries of Syracuse, had been the 'luarries that furnished stone for their neighbourhoods. (?y the help of history, and an acquaintance with the liiil)its of the nation, by a knowledge of its origin and . ;u!iest mode of life, only, are we able to form a just I'ivinion on its architecture. By the aid of these we recognise the origin of Egyptian architecture. A taste ♦or subterraneous dwellings has existed among the Egyp- tians from the remotest period even to the present hour, riie massive and colossal character of their edifices seems 1 1 ) bear a strong relation to hollow caves of rocks ; and tliough the Egyptians grafted on this at a later period forms and details, whose types may be traced to carpentry, yet it is quite clear that the types of the masses must be found in a far different origin. .The same passion for subterranean works appears in parts of Asia. The climate, and similar physical causes, would seem to have led to it. At Elephanta none of the parts appear to have been derived from imitation of any system of carpentry ; the columns cut out of the rock, the short and massive proportions, the shape of the capitals, and their details throughout, point to an entirely different type for their invention. In the architecture of China we have remarkable indi- cations of timber construction. M.dePauw justly observes, it is impossible to mistake the objects which served as models for the earliest Chinese buildings. In them the tent is the object of imitation, and this is quite in cha- racter with the primitive habits of the Chinese, who, like all the Tartars, were Nomades or Scenita?, encamping with their flocks ages before they gathered into cities. Their cities of the present day exhibit the appearance of a vast encampment, and the great extent of them seems to indicate an insolidity of construction that will not allow of a number of stories above each other. The wooden hut, then, which has been universally assumed as the model or type of all styles of architecture, and among all people, could not have been that cf Chinese or Egyptian, though it unquestionably was that of Grecian architecture. The Greeks, working "upon this, transferred to stone the forms of an assemblage of car- pentry, a construction which gave birth to the members of the orders of architecture which are to this day the ornaments of our buildings. This st^le, be it remem- bered, belongs to a nation wliose chief occupation is agriculture. In pursuing this theory, a few observations only will be needed. The first trees driven into the earth for the purpose of bearing a covering for shelter, were the origm of the insulated columns of the portico of a temple, and became one of the most splendid features of the art. As the trees were wider in diameter at the bottom than the top, so were the columns diminished in thickness as they rose. Scamozzi imagines that the mouldings at the bases and capitals of columns liad their origin in cinctures of iron, to prevent the splitting of the timber ; others, however, think that the use of the former 73 was to elevate the shafts from the dampness of the earth, and thereby prevent rot. The architrave or chief beam speaks its origin. It was the great beam placed horizon- ~ tally on the tops of the columns, and destined to receive the covering of the entire building. The joists of the ceiling lay upon the architrave, the space in height which they occupy being called the frieze, the ends ot the joists in the Doric order bearing the name of triglyphs, from their being sculptured with two whole and two half glyphs or channels. Sometimes the ends of them are sculptured into consoles, as in the composite order of the Coliseum at Rome. The space between the triglyphs was for a long period left open, as we find from a passage in the Iphigenia of Euripides, where Pylades advises Orestes to slip through the metopes in order to get into the temple. These intervals were afterwards filled up solid ; and in the other orders, the whole length of the frieze becomes one plain surface. The inclined rafters of the roof formed a projecture beyond the face of the building, which delivered the rain free of the walls. The ends of these rafters are the origin of mutules and modillions, the former whereof appeared in the cornice with their undersides inclined, as in the Parthenon at Athens. The form of the pediment followed from the inclined sides of the roof, which were regulated in respect of their inclination by the nature of the climate. {See art. Roof.) Here, then, in the skeleton of the hut, may be traced the origin of the different members of archi- tecture, which will be better understood by reference to the subjoined diagram. Figs. 1 and 2 exhibit the parts of Fig. «. Pig. 1. a roof in section and elevation : a a are the architraves, or trabes ; b b the ridge piece, or columen ; c the king post, or columna of a roof; dd the tiebeam, or transtrum ; e the strut, or capreolus ;//the rafters, or cantherii ; gggg the purlines, or templa; hh the common rafters, or asseres. It has been suggested, but with less probability, that the main supports being by degrees placed at greater dis- tances from each other than the strength of the architrave would safely admit, inclined struts were placed from the sides of the columns or supports to the underside of the architrave, to lessen its bearing, and that these gave the first notion of the use of arches in architecture. The subject has been pursued into many more details, on which our limits do not permit us to enter. It is diflScult, perhaps now impossible, to fix the exact period of the invention of architecture in Greece. Every art is perfected by slow degrees, and is the result of the labours of many. In the time of Homer, arcliitecture does not seem to have been in so forward a state as to have been reduced to principles and proportions of a fixed nature. No mention is made by the poet of the use of the orders of architecture. The material seems with him of more importance than the form ; and well selected and polished stones, more than fine proportions, are enumerated as the principal merit of the palace of Alcinous. The Doric order, doubtless the earliest of the orders, remains without testimony which can satisfactorily as- sure us of the period of its invention. Its name is not alone sufficient proof that it was invented by Dorus, the son of Helen, and king of Achaia and Peloponnesus. It is possible it might have acquired its name from having been used at the celebrated temple which that prince built at Argos in honour of the goddess Juno ; or it might have been, that, from the use of it by the Dorians, it obtained introduction into the other parts of Greece. Certain, however, it is that in the time of Alexander the Great the three original orders of architecture had been brought to perfection. Moral as well as physical causes had contributed to bring the arts to this state. Liberty, love of country, and ambition had made Athens the com- mon centre of science and art. The defeat of the Persians at Marathon, with other victories, had restored peace to the country. In the period preceding the Peloponnesian war, there was a general burst of talent in Greece. In it the chisel of Phidias was employed ; philosophy, elo- quence, the military art, the arts and sciences, all con- spired to give the epoch lustre. It was in this age that the Greeks commenced the rebuilding of the temples and edifices that had been destroyed in the Persian war, buildings whose ruins had been carefully preserved, per- haps, for the express purpose of keepinc; alive a remeia- ARCHITECTURE. brance of the danger that constantly menaced them as a nation. It was not, indeed, until after the flight of the general of Xerxes, and the victory of Themistocles, that a general restoration of their monuments was com- menced, and the citv of Athens rebuilt; a city whose edifices might be considered, as M. Quatremdre de Quincy has well observed, as so many trophies of the victory at Salamls. This was the epoch of a pure and grand style of architecture, and, indeed, of art generally. The sculp- ture of that period is marked by the same character of purltv, sublimity, and grandeur ; and the Elgin marbles, fortunately now possessed by this country, exhibit a per- fection which has never been approached by modern art, and which we scarcely conceive can be surpassed. It was in this age that the temple of Minerva, known by the name of the Parthenon (because that goddess preserved her virginity pure and inviolate), was erected; a building which displays, perhaps, the finest model of the Doric order. The Ionic order seems, at this period, to have likewise received the finishing touches of that grace and elegance whereof it was susceptible. This order, passing from Greece to Asia Minor, seems, in that enervating climate, to have acquired elegance and finish at the expense almost of solidity. Whether we are indebted for its in- vention to the people whose name it bears, is of little importance. Upon the relation of Vitruvius no depend- ence can be placed. At the period, however, x)f the erection of the temple of Minerva Polias at Athens, which was about the time we have alluded to, if seems to have been brought to a state of perfection that leaves us nothing to desire. The capitals of this example are splendid specimens of decorated architecture. By a substitution of acanthus leaves for the olive, laurel, and lotus leaves of the Egyptian capital, Calli- machus is said to have invented the Corinthian capital, the feature which distinguishes the Corinthian from the Ionic order. The tale seems an idle one; but though almost threadbare, "we cannot omit it, and will give it in the words of the author who has recorded it. " A Corinthian virgin, of marriageable years, fell a victim to a violent disorder. After her interment, her ^lurse, col- lecting in a basket those articles to whicli she had shown a partiality when alive, carried them to her tomb, and placed a tile on the basket, for the longer preservation of its contents. The basket was accidentally placed on the root of an acanthus plant, which, pressed by the weight, shot forth, towards spring, its stems and large foliage, and in the course of its growth reached the angles of the tile, and thus formed volutes at the extre- mities. Callimachus, who for his great ingenuity and taste was called Catatechnos by the Athenians, happen- ing at this time to pass by the tomb, observed the basket, and the delicacy of the foliage which surrounded it. Pleased with the form and novelty of the combination, he constructed, from the hint thus afforded, columns of this species in the country about Corinth, and arranged its proportions, determining their proper measures by periijct rules." The annexed diagram gives a representation of the circumstance, as usually found in architectural works: the reader, however is at liberty to make his own representation of it, which will most probably be as near the truth as that here given. But few ancient examples of the Corinthian order are extant of so early a date as the age of Alexan- der. Its delicacy and slenderness render it very susceptible of the ravages of time ; and it has been suggested, that the value of the material of which the columns and capitals of this order were made, excited the cupidity of the Romans to remove them. Tlie general opinion runs, that architecture, as well as the other arts, was carried into Etruria by the Pelasgi, at which period Doric was the only order in use in Greece, and was the only one, moreover, as far as can be judged of, adopted by the Pelasgi. But they changed its charac- ter, stripping it of triglj^phs, and adding to it a base The Romans, who borrowed their earliest architecture from the Etruscans, adopted, under the name of Tuscan, this Doric order, thus cheated of its fair proportions, which is in truth but a species of Doric. Rome appears to have been indebted to the people of Etruria for its earliest work of any note. It has always been supposed, that to an Etruscan architect was confided the construction of the immense sewer which drained the city, and in which might be discerned a presage of its fu- ture grandeur. The undecorated and simple art of Etru- ria suited the roughness and austerity of a warlike and then needy people. The art of architecture was long neglected among them. Their temples and palaces for a long period were protected from the seasons by a cover- ing of nothing there than clay and straw. Marble and slavery entered Rome together, under the reign of Augustus. Effeminacy had been induced by tlie riches of the known world which centered In the city, whose in- habitants did not apprehend that slavery would follow in the train of the arts which were bound to the triumphal chariot. Augustus, sensible that the only mode of tranquillising the people, when liberty was no more, would be by intro- ducing the pleasures and luxuries attendant on the arts, exerted himself most zealously for their prosperity: his conduct on this point is sufiiciently exemplified in the boast attributed to him, " That he found the city built of brick, and left it constructed with marble." Livy com- pliments him as the founder or restorer of temples, " Templorum omnium conditorem aut restitutorem." His patronage drew the most skilful Grecian artists to Rome, which now became the capital of the arts, and architecture reached all the perfection it could there attain. It was under Augustus that Vitruvius wrote his work on architecture, the only ancient text-book on the art that has reached us. It has been of late the fashion to decry the utility of this author. Those that have done so know little of the art. Though in matters relating to the history of architecture, our author deals somewhat in fable, the more important parts of his work are in- valuable ; and if one of the most profound architects that ever existed could dignify Vitruvius with the title of " our great master," it ill becomes the small fry of the present age to carp at him. Under Agrippa, the son-in- law of Augustus, the Pantheon was raised ; one of the most magnificent examples of Roman grandeur. Amongst other superb structures he introduced baths, and con- structed a considerable number of fountains, temples, &c. Under the successors of Augustus, the public buildings of the nation continued to increase ; but the art began to degenerate in the reigns of Tiberius, Caligula, and Claudius. It could not be expected, that it would revive under such a personage aj Nero, who deprived the finest statues of their heads to substitute his own portrait on their shoulders. He was, however, a great encourager of buildings on a highly decorated and colossal scale ; witness the Domus Aurea, built for him by Severus and Celer, in which, from all accounts, richness and luxury themselves were exhausted. The wisdom and greatness of character of the emperor Trajan were infused into the buildings of his reign. The triumphal arches, but especially his column and forum, incontestably prove the rise of the art under his auspices, at which time his architect, Apollodorus, who raised the column to liis memory, was highly patronised. Hadrian and the Anto- nines were also much devoted to the art, in which the former himself practised. Marcus Aurclius was so at- tached to the arts, that he became a pupil of Diognetus. Antoninus Pius, at ancient Lanuvium, built a country house, whose ruins at the present day afstonish by their extent : as an index to its magnificence, it may be men- tioned that a cock for regulating the supply of water, of the weight of forty pounds, and formed of silver, has been extracted from its ruins. The art, however, was then in its decline, and soon after disappeared under his suc- cessors. The arch of Septimus Severus is an extraor- dinary falling off from what it had been ; and it is diffi- cult, in such a short period, namely, since the reign of Marcus Aurelius, to conceive how the art of sculpture, more especially, could have become so debased. The details of what is called the goldsmiths' arch indicate the decay of good taste ; its profiles are bad, and the orna- ments overloaded. For a short time architecture was prevented from en- tirely sinking, by the fostering hand of Alexander Seve- rus ; but the fall of the western empire completed its ruin : it is, however, from the reign of Gallienus, whose arch proves to what a state it was reduced, that we must reckon the total extinction of the arts. Architecture was indeed most likely to have survived the general wreck, and perhaps was not completely involved in the universal ruin. In an age when no sculptor existed, the baths erected by Diocletian exhibited a grandeur manifest even in their stupendous remains ; it seems, however, that a bad taste must have reigned in the design of them, inas- much as we learn from history, so overloaded with or- nament was the edifice, that during the public games a great number of spectators lost their lives by the fall of some of the flowers from the ceilings and entablatures. Diocletian's palace at Spalatro is another proof of the enormous efforts made by that emperor, and of what the art could then do. About the same time, or in the time of Aurelian, were erected the extensive buildings in Ccelosyria, at Balbec, and Palmyra : vicious as they are in taste, one is astonished at th'c vastness of the plans, the boldness of the undertaking, and the funds lavished on their construction. There is nothing more instructive to a student on the rise, progress, and decline of Romau art, because the eye can almost cover it at one glance, than an examination of a series of Roman coins ; and it is recommended, as likely to make an impression on the mind much stronger than the most elaborate treatises on the subject. Though architecture, from various causes, was des- r lined to survive the other arts, its protracted existence could not extend beyond the period of the removal of the seat of empire to Byzantium. The endeavours of Con- stantine to erect his city into a metropolis that should rival Rome, which he spoiled of its treasures, were vain ; ;ill his efforts to embellish it with the most splendid monuments only proved how ineffectual are the attempts of kings to subject the arts to their power. That which Constantino left behind him in the eternal city and the rest of Italy fell a prey to the unrestrained fury of the ■ Visigoths. The edifices which they afterwards recon- structed were from fragments of those they had destroyed; but their ignorance or forgetfulness of the stations and proportions in which they had originally been used, in- duced a sad confusion of the different members — entab- latures inverted, and other grotesque arrangements, were to be seen in their buildings. The vast number of columns which the ruins supplied was used as piers for arcades, from which originated, beyond doubt, the plan of the Gothic cathedral, after its passage through various modifications. Quatremdre de Quincy attributes (Enc. Method.) the use of the arch springing from columns to the ignorance of the builders of the period, who knew not, he assumes, the mode of connecting the different lengths of an architrave ; but it seems scarcely probable that they, who so well knew the mode of connecting the voussoirs of an arch, should have been deficient in un- derstanding the principle in question, which is either that of the arch itself or of the simplest joggling. From this period to the restoration of the arts at a late period, all sight of the original types seems to have been lost ; and in the end arose a style under the name of Gothic, which will be separately treated of. Here occurs a con- siderable gap in the history of the art : all is dark on the subject, though the ancient taste does not seem to have passed away altogether. The first glimmer of returning light appears under Justinian, in the church of St. Sophia at Constantinople, in the sixth and seventh centuries. It was the chef-d'oeuvre of the lower empire, and per- liaps, indeed, the only specimen it has left us. The cliurch of St. Mark at Venice rose in the tenth or eleventh century ; it was the work of Greek architects, and is invaluable in tracing the history of architecture : its plan and its beautiful proportions remind the spec- . tator of the magnificence of the ancients. Nearly about the same period other cities of Italy began to exhibit advances in the art. In 1013 the Florentines laid the foundations of the church of S. Miniato ; but the most extraordinary monument of the period was the cathedral at Pisa, erected by Buschetto da Dulichio, a Greek ar- chitect, in 1016 : this building is lined both inside and outside with marble, and the roof is borne on four ranks of columns of the same material. The commerce of the risans enabled them to explore the Levant, the islands on the coast of Asia Minor, Egypt, and Africa, for the- most costly and precious marbles which were used in the work. Pamters and sculptors were brought from Greece to embellisii their buildings, and these contributed to introduce a better taste in the arts. Had Buschetto lived to form a school here, there can be little doubt that ar- chitecture would have been at once re-established ; but such does not appear to have been the case, and the suc- cessful cultivation of it was, consequently, deferred for a time. The falling tower, as it is usually called, or cam- panile, at Pisa, was raised close to the cathedral in the twelfth century ; its inclination evidently arises from a failure in the foundation ; its style evinces but little progress as compared with the cathedral. In the thirteenth century the church of the Virgin of Assisi was erected in Tuscany, and the castel del Ovo at Naples I the first by Lapo, and the last by Fucio, both Florentines. Nicolo da Pisa, their countryman and co- temporary, was employed on several edifices of consider- ation in Bologna, Padua, and Venice. His greatest work was the church at Padua, dedicated to St. Anthony, the sculpture in which is chiefly from his hand. The church, however, at Florence, della santissima Trinita, is his finest work, of which it is no small encomium to say that it was the admiration of so great a man as M. A. da Buonarotti. Arnolfo di Lapo built the church of St. Croce, and designed the cathedral also at Florence of Santa Maria de' Fieri. All the cities of Italy, indeed, at this epoch seemed to be emulous of outvying each other. Btiolo Barbetta was engaged at Venice on the church of Santa Maria Formosa ; many works were in progress at Bologna ; the marble chapel of the church of Santa Maria Maggiore at Rome, about the year 121.6, was executed by Marchione : every effort indicated the speedy restoration of pure art. These scintillations, however, of good taste ■ were confined to Italy ; in the other parts of Europe the Gothic style, — one, mdeed, in some of its monuments, of stupendous grandeur, of which we shall treat in another article, — was prevalent, and soon afterwards in Germany carried to the utmost pitch of perfection. It was in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries that the ^ cathedral at Strasbourg was erected, under the designs of & Jirwin Steinbeck. The fourteenth century produced also I ARCHITECTURE. in France and England some extraordinary Gothic struc- tures. In Italy architecture was fast approaching to a perfect restoration. John of Pisa son of the Nicholas whom we have just mentioned, was employed by his townsmen on the Campo Santo. This public cemetery was in the Gothic style, and is remarkable for the elegant simplicity of its plan and the beauty of its details. It is a singular link of the chain of history of this art: there is no difficulty in discerning the struggle in the mind of the architect to free himself from those Gothic shackles which seemed to hang on it as an impediment to an im- mediate return to the classic taste of the land, which became completely restored in Italy in the fifteenth cen- tury. The troubles throughout Europe were stilled at the time that Brunelleschi appeared as the restorer of genuine art, to which title he has a just and honourable claim. By a diligent investigation of the remains of ancient Rome, with the scale and compasses in his hand, he succeeded in reviving the ancient rules of artj the just use of the orders, and was himself the first to njake a practical application of his discoveries. He well knew how to unite theory with practice, and from a profound acquaintance with the monuments of antiquity was led to the principles of sound construction, without which all other knowledge in architecture is useless. The cathedral at Florence, begun in the Gothic style by Arnolpho, was reserved for Brunelleschi to finish, which he effected with a boldness worthy his genius. He sunnounted the church with the tambour dome, which had, though projected by the original designer, been considered by the artists of the age more as a phan- tom of the imagination than a subject for reality. We have not room here to record the strange schemes that were proposed for carrying the project into execution ; the facility with which the architect effected his object marks him as an artist, in that age, of surprising resources and ability. The erection of the dome and cupola of Santa Maria de' Fiori opened the road for some of the grandest ex- amples of human skill applied to the art : it was the subject - of eulogy from Michael Angelo, and is still the astonish- ment of those who know how to appreciate the difficulties by which it was surrounded. The school formed by Brunelleschi spread by means of his disciples through Italy, and propagated the art in that revived state, which acquired liberal and enlightened protectors in the Me- dicis, the dukes of Milan, and many nobles of Italy, who opened their palaces to its professors, and the learned generally. These latter, who had after the arrival of cardinal Bessarion and other Greeks rendered Italy illustrious by their labours, soon opened the works of Vitruvius to the architect, in which they were con- siderably aided by Leo Battista Alberti, of the noble and ancient family of the Albertis of Florence, who himself did not disdain to practise architecture, as an art. Bold and ingenious as Brunelleschi his predecessor, his de- signs have the further charms of a grace and elegance which the former did not exhibit ; and his work on the art, the only one at that period which could be put jn competition with the ancient master Vitruvius, whose obscurity in many parts left much for experience to dis- sipate, displayed such vast stores of erudition, such a profound knowledge of construction, and so accurate an acquaintance with the works of the ancients, that ii not only contributed to its firm establishment, but left little to desire on the theory and practice of architecture. About the period that Alberti was thus engaged, an extraordinary work in the history of the art appeared from th,e pen of Francesco Colonna (in 1467), under the title of " Poliphili Hypnerotomachia," and published in folio by Aldus. This book is now extremely rare ; it is replete with plates, some of great beauty, from wood blocks, and in it the author, in a supposed dream, pro- mulgates sound precepts, noble ideas, and principles valuable to the amateur and architect. Felibien recom- mends to the artist its perusal, which he considers almost as necessary as that of Vitruvius. Indeed the poetic descriptions in it of pyramids, mausolea, colossal statues, circi, amphitheatres, temples, and palaces, seem to have made more impression at the time than the dry doctrines of Vitruvius, and Italy soon saw realised the poetic dreams of the author. In the period of a century and a half the cities of Italy were embellished with the works of Bramante, 31. A. -da Buonarotti, Raphael, Julio Romano, San Gallo, Baltazar Peruzzi, Giocondo, San Micheli, Sansovino, Serlio, Pirro Ligorio, Vignola, Pal- ladio, Scamozzi, and a long list of others whose names are an honour to their country. It was late before pure art reached this country. In it Inigo Jones ^s the father of architecture, and we, for- tunately, still possess some of his beautiful designs. Ra can scarcely be said to have completely emancipated himself from the trammels of the debased Elizabethan style, as it is called, till the beginning of the reigi, of Charles I., which was a splendid epoch of the arts in this country. From many concurrent causes, the French ARCHITECTURE, CHINESE. school of architecture has exhibited and still exhibits a very high degree of excellence, and may perhaps be fairly considered as holding the highest rank in the present day. Architecture, Chinese. As a description of the build- ings of China would be out of place in a work of this nature, the subject of the present article is confined to a general view of the principles, the character, and the taste of Chinese architecture. To describe its general forms, for the purpose of identifying them, is unneces- sary ; they are universally known. Wlien we reflect on the limits to which in China the arts of imitation have for so long a period been confined, we are led to the conclusion, whatever be the cause, that the Chinese are deficient in that activity of mind which con- ducts other nations by degrees to perfection. In China the rise of the arts seems to have been constantly re- pressed by the state of mechanical drudgery and servitude in which the people are restricted. In their painting, for example, the most exact imitation of plants, fruits, and trees, is thought indispensable. A Chinese painter would think it necessary to count the scales between the head and tail of a carp he was about to represent ; in other words, he is more of a naturalist than an artist. In China every matter relating to building is the subject of regulation by the police, which, rather than theory, governs its architecture. The laws of the empire detail and enforce with the greatest precision the mode of con- structing a lou or palace for a prince of the first, second, or third rank, of a grandee, of a mandarin, &c. A man, unless he hold some oflSce, who acquires a fortune by his own exertions is not allowed to build a house above his rank in society ; his condition has nothing to do with it. According to the ancient law of the kingdom, the number and height of the apartments, the length and height of a building, are all regulated with precision, from the plain citizen to the mandarin, and from the latter up to the emperor himself. Herein alone we have suflScient to account for the poverty and want of invention in Chinese art. In speaking of the principles of Chinese architecture, the word is not applicable in the same way as when we speak of classic architecture, but is meant to apply to those primitive causes which gave birth to it. Character and taste in every species of architecture are the neces- sary results of these elements. M. de Pauw has well described it, in respect of its principles and elements. It is impossible, he says, to be mistaken in the objects which were the models of imitation of their first build- ings : they are imitations of tents, and that is in con- sonance with all our knowledge of the primitive state of the Chinese, who were, like all the Tartar tribes, no- madic. This, beyond doubt, is the true origin of their dwellings. However the missionaries of Pekin may have refuted M. de Pauw upon some inaccuracies, there canbe little hesitation in agreeing with him on this head. One of its strongest proofs is the form of the Chinese roof. Nothing but the form of a tent or pavilion could have given the idea of it ; and though carpentry was for a long period made subservient to this form, reasoning from the progress of all inventions, it would be impossible to believe, where carpentry supplied the architecture, it should all at once have adopted combinations and coverings so light and at the same time so complex. There is another point of analogy with the tent con- struction, which is, that there is nothing like the appearance of a member of wood, similar to our archi- trave, destined to lie on the tops of the columns, and receive and support the remainder of the carpentry. The Chinese roofs, on the contrary, jut out beyond the columns, whose upper extremity is hidden by the eaves : hence the omission of the use of capitals. It is easy to perceive that extreme lightness must result from the imitation whereof we are speaking. The spirit and character of tents carried into the construction of cities might, at least in reality, be lost and altered by a change of materials. The semblance of liglitness might be found in union with essential solidity of construction ; the character would have been intellectually the same. Here, however, identity of material has contributed to the identity of the copy with the original. The Greeks, whose model was carpentry, copied in, as it were, a figur- ative manner, and the change from wood to stone soon removed the appearance of weakness and lightness that was found in the model. In China the material remains the same, and its architecture of wood still copies the model of wood ; hence, the lightness of the original is transferred to the copy. Lightness is the essential character of Chinese ar- chitecture ; but there is another characteristic quality, both of the model and the copy, that is observable in the edifices of China, which is its gayness of appearance. In this respect scarcely any style presents a more pleasing effect. Its roofs, single and double, brilliantly painted, its gaily diapered porticos, the gloss over the whole surface, the harmony of this species of decoration, with the light and flowing forms of the buildings them- 76 selves, produce a sense of pleasure to eyes constantly accustomed to their contemplation, which would doubt- less be .disgusted with our cold and monotonous mode of decoration. It is particularly in ornament and decoration that we are accustomed to investigate taste, which is the result of a combination of all the physical and moral causes that influence art. Yet, as every thing in architecture is connected by a sort of mutual relationship, it is difficult to fix the exact proportion that exists between construc- tion and decoration, and especialljr in Chinese archi- tecture. In speaking of ornament in architecture, one naturally recurs to sculpture for the purpose ; but this is not found in Chinese architecture. With the Chinese ornament consists in varnishing columns, colouring roofs, coating walls with porcelain, and the like ex- pedients. The figures painted on their buildings are connected with their religion, and the merit of the art is secondary. The art of ornamenting in China is a sort of patchwork, yet the parts of Chinese architecture are in unity with each other. A foreign style could never be made to amalgamate with it ; it has been developed in a mode conformable to the wants of the country, and its duration for such a number of ages leads us to conclude that it wilt not lightly be abandoned by the people that have adopted it. Architecture, Egyptian. The preservation of the Egyptian monuments of architecture, in many instances so perfect as they still appear, is highly calculated to excite our surprise and admiration, inasmuch as ancient Egypt ceased to exist in its splendour long before the period of the earliest histories that have come down to us. Almost, as it were, separated from the rest of the world, by seas of sand as well as water, and bordering on the most savage tribes, it seems indebted to' those cir- cumstances for the protection its edifices have received. Had the country received as successors to its early in- habitants a powerful people, if rich and industrious cities had risen on the sites of the old ones, the temples of Egypt would doubtless have been used as quarries ad- mirably suited to the purpose. Arabian hordes, and the almost barbarous and wretched inhabitants of the present day, have indeed Iniilt their villages on some of the ancient sites. The terraces of some of the temples serve as floors to modern habitations ; and at Thebes, a town of two stories, or rather two stories of towns built on the ceil- ings of-these everlasting ruins, indicate that the means of destruction have not been equal to the natural resistance of works of such solidity. No people ever existed whose whole feelings were so much a passion for ever-enduring monuments. Religion, a genius formed by that religion, government, habits, climate, materials, all united to confer on their buildings a durability as great as the power of man can confer ; and the efforts resulting from such causes were successful. In a preceding article we have adverted to the three classes of mankind, whose different wants had an influence on their styles of architecture. It is not a forced sup- position that the primitive inhabitants of Egypt used the excavations with which nature furnished them for pro- tection against the heat of a sultry climate. As the inhabitants of Tyre, Sidon, and Palestine were indebted to their forests of cedar for becoming great workers in wood, so the Egyptians, from their earliest mode of life, from their quarries and the facility they acquired in hol- lowing them out, gained that aptitude for working stone, and that high degree of perfection, so manifest in their works. It is true that their country is not the only one in which excavations abound ; but in most other places these excavations have been caused by working them as quarries, and no trace of architecture or human abode can be perceived in them. In Egypt, on the contrary, where the caverns still furnish dwellings for the inhabit- ants, immemorial custom has assigned them to the use of mankind. The immense subterraneous apartments of Egypt must not be placed to the account of luxury in sepulture. Herodotus tells us, that the priests would not allow him to visit the subterranean apartments of the labyrinth in which they dwelt, and which were considered the most beautiful. Naw, if this species of dwelling was used in the refined times of Egj^it, S fortiori would it have been so in the earlier ages. Throughout Egyptian architecture its origin appears. A simplicity bordering on monotony ; extreme solidity, amounting to heaviness ; are its principal characters. There is entire absence of every thing that can be traced to a type of carpentry, as in the Grecian orders; hence it appears certain, that at least its type was different, and that type was cavern excava- tion. The exception that seems to arise from the use of columns does not militate against the theory ; for decor- ation invariably refers to nature for objects of imitation ; and nothing would sooner occur in decorating pillars in every style than the imitation of trees and plants, without referring to them as a type. The honours of sepulture seem to have been the cause of the most stupendous of the Egyptian monuments Diodorus Siculus tells us, that the kings of Egypt ex- ARCHITECTURE, EGYPTIAN. nended sums xipon their tombs more immense than other kings did upon their palaces. They were of opinion, he observes, that the frailty of the body during life was not worthy of a substantial and solid abode. .They con- sidered a palace like an inn, which is occupied by many in succession, and in which one stops but for a day. Their tombs, however, they considered as the real palace in which the abode was to be perpetual ; hence, they spared no expense in rendering them worthy of such' an object. Some have supposed that the pyramids were but immense cenotaphs, and that the bodies of the kings were interred in some neighbouring subterranean spot ; in short, that these masses of stone were erected to mislead one from the spot which the body occupied. This, however, would not make them the less monuments of sepulture. Some have attributed to the pyramids a mystic, others an as- tronomical, purpose. From Egypt were derived the principal mysteries that passed into other religions, and it was in the darkness of subterranean apartments that those initiations had birth, in which secrecy was the first law. Secrecy was there deified under the figure of Harpocrates. According to Plutarch, the sphinxes with which the entrances of their temples were decorated, signified that Egyptian m3rtho- logy was mysterious and emblematic. The number of vestibules enclosed with a series of doors, prevented the temple itself from being seen. This, which none were allowed to approach, was small in extent, and in it the sacred animal or its image was preserved. It was in the galleries, porticos, and dwellings of the priests, that the large area which the temples covered was occupied. Excepting some varieties in the plans of their temples, a sameness of character and uniformit)^ is observable in them, which pervade their fronts, their general forms, and the details of their decoration ; which latter are mostly of the hieroglyphic species, certainly the most monotonous of all decorations. To give the reader a general idea of the temples of the country, a diagram of that at Esneh is subjoined. With the Egj-ptians, heaviness seemed to be synonymous with strength, height with grandeur, and size or mass with power. Uniformity of plan is universal. The right line and square was never abandoned, and, as M. de Caylus observes, there exists no circular monu- ment in this style. In the elevations the uniformity is still more striking, no division of parts, no contrast, no effect. It would seem that the ideas we have for judging of art, were no guide with the architecture of that country. Uniformity of decoration was an almost ne- cessary result of the institutions of the country: the edifices were destined to receive certain inscriptions in symbolic characters, and were not allowed to be left in that respect to the caprice of the architect. As respects the materials for building which the country afforded, -we shall speak as concisely as possible. Though palm trees are found about the deserts of Lybia, and near Dendera, timber of every sort is scarce ; indeed the soil is not suitable to the growth of trees. The most common next to the palm tree is the acacia ; but, with the exception of the palm tree, most of the trees of Egypt are unfit for building purposes. The oak does not grow in Egypt, and the modern inhabitants import that from Arabia, as well as the fir which they use in their buildings. Brick seems to have been a material used from the earliest date ; it was unburnt, being merely dried in the sun. Pocock says it is made of the mud deposited by the Nile, which is of a black colour, sandy, and mixed with flints and shells. One of the pyramids described by Pocock, was constructed with this species of brick, and unconnected by any cement. Bricks, however, were used after undergoing the heat of the fire at a very early period, as we learn from Scripture, Exod. v. 6., where we find the Israelites condemned to the labour of making bricks without straw to burn them. Stone of almost every description, marbles, and granite, were to be had in profusion ; and these, as we have before observed, the Egyptians were very expert in working. In construction there must have been considerable mechanical knowledge employed, for some of the blocks of stone were of enormous dimensions ; and to form an idea of the quantity used, it is only necessary to mention that the walls of some of their temples extend to the extraordinary thickness of twenty-four feet. Indeed, the walls to the principal entrance of the gate at Thebes are no less at their base than fifty feet in thickness. The stones are all squared inside as well as on the external face ; no rubble-work is to be seen ; another cause of the 77 surprising durability of their monuments. The roofs are all formed of single blocks of stone from pier to pier ; no trace of the arch is any where discoverable. In the pyramids the passages are covered with stones inclined to each other, terminating in a point, one stone lapping over the other. The Egyptian temple, unlike that of the Greeks, which may be almost all taken in at one view both interiorly and exteriorly, consists of an assemblage of porticos, courts, vestibules, galleries, and other apartments com- municating with one another, each of which in size had little relation to the rest of the edifice. They were usually in a spot surrounded with walls ; and those which were not so surrounded were inclosed in front by a wall en- gaged to the columns, and extending in height about a half or a third of the shaft. Strabo says that at the entrance of temples was a large paved court three or four times or even more of its width in length, which the Greeks called the dromos. This was ornamented with sphinxes In rows. Through the dromos was the propylum or fore portico ; thence to another, and from that to a third, the number of them not being fixed. Beyond the propyla was situated the temple itself (or naos), which consisted of two parts, the pronaos or fore temple, and the secos or sanctuary, which in Egyptian temples was very small, and contained a figure of the divinity, usually re- presented under the form of some animal. Some of these temples were of very large dimensions ; that of Jupiter at Thebes was more than 1400 feet long and 300 feet wide, exclusive of the porticos that led to it. The forms of all the plans are either square or rectangular. The art of designing a plan in modern architecture becomes difficult from the necessity of keeping the apartments within such bounds that they may be covered or roofed, and of ar- ranging the decorations, and of counterpoising thrusts ; but the Egyptian architect had no such difficulties to contend with. Columns were brought to the spot and covered at once with masses of stone, all combining with- out much contrivance with the exterior walls: hence, the abundant use of columns in the interior of their buildings. Great regularity appears in their plans. The temple, at Phila;, evidently from its being suited to the form of the island on which it was built, is the only exception to the observation. Their intercolumniations are narrow, rarely exceeding twice and a half the width of the column, and usually not more than a diameter and a half. The elevation is always uniform and monotonous, always of one story, and without columns above columns. The pyramidal form seems to pervade every edifice, and the result must be great soliditjr. Their columns m^y be considered as of two sorts, circular on the plan, and polygonal ; the former differ only among each other by their being sculptured or not with hieroglyphics. Those representing as it were bundles of rods or trunks, are generally encircled at different heights with bands like the hoops of a cask, generally in two or three ranges of three, four, or five each. This part of the arrangement seems to have been quite arbitrary. The polygonal column frequently occurs, but more generally where the edifice has been formed out of a rock or quarry. AH the columns rise from their bases in right lines, diminishing to the top, without any appearance of entasis or swelling. One can hardly say that any precise proportion is pre- served between their height and their thickness. In describing them, we can only say that they were short, thick, and of enormous diameter, the latter in some cases extending to as much as eleven feet. What are under- stood by pilasters are not found in Egyptian buildings, though some quadrangular columns might give that idea, excepting only in the small sepulchral chamber of the great pyramid. Bases are also rarely found; but the capitals of their columns exhibit great variety. In general form they are either square, vase-formed, or swelled; some of them are very elegantly shaped and decorated with the lotus, the palm branch, and other kinds of vegetation, and occasionally with the human head. They are usually without abacus, and are connected to the architrave by a small die or square block out of the same piece of stone as the capital. The entablature rarely, if ■ ever, consisted of more than an architrave surmounted by a huge cavetto, which finished upward with a bead or fillet. This cavetto was frequently ornamented with glyphs and other indentations of the surface, and the wings of the vulture in the centre. The covering of the temple was a flat terrace, though there are no proofs, by the remains of steps to ascend to it, that it was so used. Some years ago a question was proposed by the French Academy of Inscriptions and Belles-Lettres, whether the Greeks borrowed their architecture from the Egyptians ; that question has been well answered by M. Quatremfere de Quincy, in the Encyc. Method., to whom we are indebted for much in this article, and the substance of his answer is as follows: — There is no such thing as general human architecture, because the wants of mankind must vary in different countries. The only one in which the different species of architecture can approach each ARCHITECTURE, GOTHIC. other Is intellectual: it is that of Impressions which the qualities whose effects the building ait accoraijlishes can produce upon the mind of every man, of whatever country ho may be. Some of these impressions result from every species of architecture. Architecture sprung as well from the huts of Greece, as from the subterraneous ex- cavations of Egypt and the tents of Asia, and from several mixed principles to us unknown: thus the use of the word architecture is absurd. We ought to name the species ; for between the idea of architecture as a genus and as a species, there is the same difference as between language and tongue ; and to seek for a simple origin of architecture, is as absurd as a search would be after the primitive language. If so, the hut of Vitruvius would not be an ingenious fable, as some have said, but it would be a ridiculous falsehood if he had pretended that it was the type of all architecture. Vitruvius, however, spoke only of Grecian architecture ; and if in Egypt there exists another tj-pe, that only proves that the hut was not the type of Egyptian art, but that it was that of Greek art, and that theory would be fabulous which pretended to be universal. We will conclude this article by adding that similarity between certain forms of ornament, certain details borrowed by the one from another, prove nothing more than that between the people by whom they were used there was some interchange of commerce or other intercourse, which could not long subsist without some sort of necessary transfusion of the inventions and habits of one of those countries into the habits, manners, and customs of the other. Architecture, Gothic. — To form a correct idea of the Gothic style of architecture, it will be necessary to trace its progress through one very different in its details, though not exactly so in its plan and arrangements. Its type is of a mixed character, and not, as we have seen in the two foregoing articles, founded on the habits of a people. Though a search into the origin of the pointed arch is an idle and useless inquiry, it will be necessary in the end to glance at that as incidental to the style under consideration. The ancient basilica, which derived its name from ba. sileus, king, and oikos, house, was the part of the king's palace in which justice was administered to the subjects. The building for this purpose retained its name long after the extinction of the kingly office, and was in use with the Romans as well as with the Grecians. Vitruvius does not, however, give us any specific difference between those erected by one or the other of those people. He has (ch.i. 1.5.) given the details of its form and arrange- ment, and we refer the reader to his work for the par- ticulars of it. The name was afterwards transferred to the first monuments of Christian worship, not because, as some have supposed, the first Christian emperors used the ancient basilicse for the celebration of their religion, but more probably with reference to the idea of sove- reignty which the religion exercised, though no assertion is here advanced that such a conclusion is necessarily to be drawn. There is no doubt that the most ancient Christian basilicae were constructed expressly for the purpose of that religion, and their architectural details sufficiently point to the epoch in which they were erected. Nevertheless these new temples of religion, both in the whole and in the details, borrowed so much of those of the ancient basilicae, that even on this account it is not surprising that they should have re- tained the name. A general notion of one maybe formed from the annexed diagram, which will immediately show how admirably it was suited to the reception of an extremely numerous congregation. The number- less columns which were at hand, the remains and ruins of ancient edifices, were put in requisition for the con- struction of these basilica?, of which, adopting the former buildings of that name as the type, they proportioned the elevation to the extent of the plans, and in some cases decorated it with the richest ornaments. Instead of con- necting the columns tofiether by architraves on their top, whicli were not at hand as were the former, arches were thrown over, not only to connect them, but that thereon walls might be carried up to bear the roofing. On this 78 sort of substruction, vaults could not with safety have been borne. From these the obvious and natural step was to piers, connected by arches and ornamented with pilasters or columns. The piers underwent a change by being made circular on the plan ; these again, for the purpose of giving the interior a lighter appearance, were made polystylic or in ribs, and ultimately received a vaulting and cross vaultings in character with their plan below. Though the practice of vaulting large areas, and the pointed arch, did not appear till a considerable time after the building of the first Christian basilica, it is to be observed that the Temple of Peace at Home had pre- viously to that period exhiljited a specimen of the profound knowledge of the Romans in the practice of vaulting ; in that example groined vaults of very large dimensions were borne on entablatures and columns. Nor does this knowledge appear to have been lost in almost the last stage of decline of Roman architecture under tlie emperor Diocletian. In the baths of this emperor are to be seen not only groined vaults in three divisions, whose span is nearly seventy feet, but at the back of each springer a buttress, precisely of the nature of a flying buttress, is contrived to counteract the thrusts of the vaulting. If a comparison be made between this large hall (now used as a church), of the baths of Diocletian, with the nave of a Gothic church, the difference will be found to be more such as must result from the nature and employment of the materials, than from difference of style. 1" rom the age of Constantino down to the ninth century, the edifices within the limits of the Roman empire are but degraded specimens of Roman architecture ; and there is no evidence from their remains (few indeed they are) that the Goths and other barbarians who devastated Italy had any other influence on the arts than hastening, perhaps, that fall from which it would seem nothing could have saved them. We quite coincide in the opinion of Mdller, who in the text to his Deukmaehler der Deutschen Baukunst says, " I cannot possibly agree to the opinion of those connoisseurs who ascribe an individual and peculiar style of architecture to the Goths and Lombards in Italy and Spain, to the Franks in Gaul, and to the Saxons in England." The Roman architecture of the fifth and sixth centuries was the model, and the constant correspondence from every part with Rome kept up an influence from thence over the arts and sciences. Fine proportions were lost, and the art completely degenerated Into a servile imitation of earlier forms. The art of con- struction and the preparation of materials did not, how- ever, fall away from solid building. The basement of the palace built, it is supposed, at Terracina, by Theodoric, the Gothic king, who reigned in Italy from a.d. 493 to 525, is in the Roman style. So also is the church of St. Apollinaris at Ravenna ; and the circumstance men- tioned by the writer above named, who up to the period at which we are writing, D'Agincourt excepted, is the only writer of any value on the subject, of the employ- ment by Theodoric as architects of one Aloysius, an architect called Daniel, and the well known BoctiHs, a native and senator of Rome, is a strong corroborative proof that the edifices of the Goths were built by Romans and in the Roman style. Neither does it appear likely that upon the irruption of the Lombards in the year 568, after the sway of the Goths had lasted so long, they should have established a style of their own. They were a rude people, whereas the Goths, we know, had become quite a civilised nation, whose style was suited to the wants and habits of the country. It is true that D'Agin- court ascribes to the Lombards the church of St. Julian, near Bergamo, and some others ; but it has not been proved that the churches in question were really erected . by the Lombards. The appellation of Lombardic to the style of church building which existed in France and 9th to 12th CBNTDRY. AFTKK tub 12THCBKTUnV. Germany stands on too slender an assumption to be admitted; indeed it has been demonstrated by Maffei, Muratori, and Tiraboschi, that neither the Goths nor the Lombards introduced any style in particular, but employed the architects whom they found in Italy. The late learned Mr. Dallaway says, in his Discourses upon Architecture in England, that " at the beginning of the eighth century all Europe formed but one Gothic king- dom;" and it is certain that anterior to a.d. 800, there are very few Gothic remains. From that period to the general introduction and use of the pointed arch in the twelfth century, the leading form of the churches was a I j^Hralleiogram, consisting of a nave, side aisles, a transept ^^^n each side forming tiie arms of a cross, and beyond tlie intersection of tiie transept witii tiie nave was placed a choir, terminated by a semicircular added building called the apsis. The whole of these buildings were constructed with very thick walls, pierced with comparatively small openings. In the vaulting of the nave and aisles, and over all windows and doors, the covering was semi- circular. The nave was lofty, and was mostly constructed with groins. The section A shows the general appearance of the arrangement. The gables were not much inclined, and in the upper part of the building rows of small pillars appe'ptian capitals of this class, are more distin- guishable by their respective heights than by peculiarity of other features. The former, however, has a lightness and elegance which the Egyptian, perhaps from moral and political causes, never attained ; but if even a slight Intercourse between the two countries existed, there would appear considerable proof of the identity of the primitive inventors. Our knowledge of the Greek Corinthian order Is unfor- tunately circumscribed, from the destruction and decay to which from its extreme delicacy it was exposed; nevertheless, uiider even these circumstances, the few examples that remain induce a supposition that it was not in such high estimation as those we have already named, inasmucli as the only examples that have come down to us are those of what is called the Tower of the Winds, and the Choragic Monument of Lysicrates, both at Athens. But the former of these is scarcely to be classed among examples of Corinthian, and the latter (as we now understand the Corinthian order) is in some respects a little outre in the species. In the Choragic Monument the height of the entablature is somewhat less than a fifth of the total height, of the order. The base varies little from that of the Ionic order, excepting in the non-appearance of the horizontal fluting in the upper torus. To the orders enumerated may be added one scarcely to be named here, because apparently under no rules which regulated its proportions, namely, the figures called Caryatides, which were employed for the sup- port of an entablature. For the supposed account of their origin, the reader is referred to the article Carya- tides. The only subject remaining for notice, under this head, is that of the roofs of the Grecian temples. Their roofs consisted, of course, of two inclined sides, which at the ends formed a pediment. From experience it was soon found that the angle at which the sides of a roof should be inclined to the horizon, should be such as effectually to shelter the interior of the building from the inclemencies of the seasons. Hence greatly inclined roofs are indispensable in northern climates ; the reverse as the climate approaches the equator : but this will be more fully explained under the article Roof. Here we shall merely state that, according to the hypothesis, the inclination of the sides of a roof should, for the latitude of Athens, be 16| degrees. The actual inclination of the roof of the temple of Erectheus is 15J degrees, temple of Theseus 15 degrees, the Parthenon 16 degre»s, and that of the Propylea 14|. Comparing the law with the Roman examples, the climate would require an inclin- ation of the sides of the roof with the horizon o*" 22 degrees, and the variation between the examples remain- ing is from 22 to 24 degrees. Th he invention of the arch, does not at present appear to belong to Greek architecture. It was one of the most important inventions in the history of architecture ; but so disputed a point is not to be touched upon in a work of this nature. We incline to the opinion that its inven- tion does not belong to the Greeks, for this simple reason, that they have left us no examples of it that have come to our knowledge. Architecture, Indian — It is very properly observed by M. Quatremere de Quincy, that, in spite of all theories, an infallible mode of estimating the state of the archi. tecture and other arts of any people is by their represent- ations of the human form. Every people, he says, who during a number of ages have persevered in falsely repre- senting the figure void of all proportion, and according to a certain barbarous and ignorant routine, must be convicted of a want of that sentiment which leads to a knowledge of truth, and of that intelligence which knows how to find in nature rules for the choice of forms and arrangements applicable to the art of building. Every people who do not manifest in their works this con- formity to nature must be ignorant of the arts of imita- tion, and all their productions must be the result of an irregular taste. These observations particularly apply to Indian architecture, whose exact antiquity is still a problematical question. In a country abounding with deserted monuments, where are found the traces of an ancient language now no longer spoken, books no longer understood, the vestiges of a religion whose creed and allegories seem to have had some resemblance to those of Greece, one is naturally led to surmise that civilisation existed at a very early period. These opinions would seem corroborated by the extraordinary chronologies which the modern Indians have produced as incontestable au- thorities for their remote antiquity. Tlie chronology, how- ever, of the Hindoos will not bear the test of strict inves- tigation ; neither has any inscription or historic monu- ment been discovered, nor annals found, which give us an idea of the changes, revolutions, or prosperity which the country may have experienced. It is, however, cer- tain, that India has been possessed and successively invaded by several people, and that its creeds, as well as its religious allegories, indicate such great diversity and mixture of opinions as might lead us into every species of error in matters of historical research. It is natural to suppose, that the subterraneous or excavated monuments of India are prior in date to raised or constructed works ; and yet, in point of fact, there are in the former neither less details, less caprice in form, nor less profusion of fantastic ornament, than in the latter. Hence the monuments themselves a^ord us no ARCHITECTURE, INDIAN. clue to their respective antiquities. M. Meiners contends that none of them are more ancient than the vulgar era, whilst M. Langles, a critic of no ordinary sagacity, is of an opinion rather different, namely, that Indian art was brought from Egypt, and that traces of such an import- ation are very distinctly marked, as well as that Greek art is strongly indicated in them. If, however, those monuments, whose date we have good reason for believing is recent, exhibit the same taste as that manifest in those monuments whose date is unknown, we may fairly assume that the same style of architecture existed in this country at a period preceding the conquest of Alexander and the epoch in which this early civilised country had inter- course with the Grecians. Though we have no historical nor chronological guides to enlighten us on the subject of Indian architecture, it is to he recollected that there is some analogy between the irregular taste that prevailed in India, and that of the rest of Asia. Southern India abounds with excavated monuments of art; these are equally found in the centre as well as the sides of the vast peninsula. Throughout the region nature seems to have supplied the first associated inhabitants with excavations, either ready formed or easily converted to the purposes wanted. It therefore appears probable that the origin- ating principal of the building art in India is found in the subterranean dwelling ; and as we find constructed edifices so similar in proportion, form, and details to those that are, as it were, quarried out, it is fair to con- clude that the former are the type of the latter, which are, consequently, of a later date. Construction scarcely seems a term applicable to the greater number of works of Indian architecture. It means the raising of a work composed of divers ma- terials, or of pieces joined together to form amass ; hence it cannot be properly applied to an excavated structure. The edifices of India may be divided into two classes, the quarried and constructed; the last are mostly those towers improperly called pagodas. Of the unconstructed class may be ranked the seven large pagodas of Mavali- pouram, which consist of large masses of stone more or less engaged to the earth, and contiguous to similar masses. These masses were shaped and sculptured ex- teriorly in accordance with their general form, partly pyramidally and partly by irregular zones, in the same style as the jjjTamidal tower of the constructed pagoda. No order is apparent in the respective dispositions of the masses, neither is regularity in the plan and exterior form to be detected. These edifices are extremely small in the interior, being hollowed out of the mass, and remind us of the monolythic temples of Egypt, which were cut out of immense blocks of granite, and, as Herodotus tells us, removed to very considerabledistances» In other respects, there was clearly some resemblance between the art of India and Egypt ; it is found in the excavations of monuments, and in working large natural masses of stone, in their original situation. But to infer from this similarity of taste that there was communication between the two nations, seems too much ; and still more hypothetical would it be to infer a resemblance of style in architecture from a similarity of practice ; for nothing is more unlike the Egyptian than the Indian style of architecture ; and in the end it will be seen that, except in the practice of excavation, there is no similarity at all. The dimensions of the pagodas, as tliey have been called, compared with those of the Egyptian pyramids, no less than their excavated temples, have been much overrated by travellers. Of the latter, the dimensions are generally but moderate, and the difficulty of their execution could not have been very considerable. If the description that comes to us be correct, the latter are hollowed out from quarries of calcareous stone, and the dimensions are on so moderate a scale, that even the celebrated temple at Elephanta is only 130 feet long, 110 feet wide, and but 14 feet 6 inches high. The operation of hollowing out a cavern of this sort can scarcely be dignified with the name of art; but in the pagoda construction we must admit some display of that which at least approaches it. The pagodas are, in many instances, of considerable height ; but to compare them with the pyramids of Egypt is out of the question : these, the only buildings of much height, are pyramidal in general form. Sonnerat, vol. i. p. 217., gives us some idea of them : he says, " Around the most celebrated temples the surrounding walls are thick and much raised. On each side is a gate surmounted by a pyramidal tower, with a curved mass of enormous size. The tower is loaded with figures," &c. &c. If we may trust to the representation of the pagoda of Chillambaram by M. Durocher de la Perigne, given by Caylus in theBlst vol. of the Memoires de I' Academic, the pyramidal form is therein strongly marked. In it the height of the whole is but 120 feet, and at its base it is but 80 feet wide. The ter- mination is not in a point, but is truncated at a height which makes the plan of its summit about 3G feet wide. The pyramid is unequal sided, the flanks being much nar- rower than the faces. But the largest of these monuments is that described by Lord Valentia, namely, the pagoda of Tanjore, which he considers the finest specimen of this 81 species of building. This is 200 feet high, placed on a basement of 40 feet iu height. The pyramidal mass rises by twelve sets off, or bands, sculptured in various ways. Such samples of masonry, however, required no great display of constructive skill for their execution, either in working or transport of the materials. At Chillambaram, for instance, the pyramidal part is constructed to the height of 30 feet only in masonry, the remainder being of brick. The mass is coated with ornaments of stone and of a species of white cement of the country. As in Egypt, none of the monuments of this country exhibit any trace of the arch : the coverings of the apartments are all horizontal, and the dimensions in all are neces- sarily limited by the want of that expedient which, in modern architecture, has been the parent of the most stupendous monuments whereof art was capable. The ceilings in Indian architecture are of enormous blocks of stone, laid on the supports wherewith the buildings are constructed, being the simplest and most inartificial mode of contriving a covering to an apartment. It must be apparent to every one, that the art of India was many degrees below that of Egypt. Though, in the last-named country, art was limited by the habits of the people, yet it is equally certain that their knowledge in the use of materials was of a high character, and that their skill in masonry was carried to great perfection. That which is known to the architect by the term ordonnance, which means, in its most extended sense, the composition of a building and the due arrangement of its several parts, and which the Greeks and Romans practised in their architecture with so much success, is not perceptible in Indian architecture, as far as we are acquainted with it. It seems easy to account for this, for, notwithstanding some of the existing monuments have received the name of palaces, there is little doubt of their being all destined originally for religious purposes. Hence the architects, confined to certain established routines, were not at liberty to exercise their invention and ingenuity ; and even had they been so, the system of castes, in perpetuating uniformity of practice, had a ten- dency to repress them. Again: scarce any system could be conceived less likely to develope talent in ordonnance than the use of subterranean edifices, which admit of no variety of plan, no extent of elevation, nor lead to any of those conceptions, which the taste of the architect generates when he has length, breadth, and materials at his command. In the caves at EUora, a plan of the Indra Subba whereof is here subjoined, if we examine what Urti'Hjrv.r-i. may be called the columns, we find some of them hexa- gonal, without base, capital, or ornament ; some square, with a long cap, like carpentry. The greater number are composed of three parts : a square pedestal, running up more than one half of the total height ; a small portion of shaft, if we may so term it, crowned with a capital of strange form, whereof words cannot give any definite idea. The reader who is desirous of acquaintance with the temples at Ellora, may advantageously refer to Daniel's plates of these curious objects. Decoration, in architecture, consists of large and small details, which receive the name of ornaments. The larger parts are columns and similar masses. In the system of Indian decoration there is no trace of what may be called an order ; but among the larger masses of decor- ations for support, sculptured elephants very frequently occur. In one of the temples at Ellora, for instance, there are three masses of building, on the same line, whose bases are sculptured with elephants, seen in face. Lions are also much used as objects for decoration. From information which Sir C. W. Malet obtained, the works at Ellora were said to be executed about the year 900, by EUoo, the rajah of Ellichpour, who at that period is said to have founded the town : and the late Dr. Heber, bishop of Calcutta, observing that no mention was made of these excavations, even incidentally, in any Sanscrit manuscript, and that the idols were the same as those still worshipped in India, dates them in the 13th century. But all this is conjecture, unsupported by any historical document that entitles it to any weight, and a wide field is open to the traveller and antiquary, in in- vestigating these curious and fantastic monuments, as illustrative of the early history of the art. Architecture, Moorish or Saracenic. When the vic- tories of the Arabians had extended their empire from G ARCHITECTURE, MOORISH —MEXICAN. Constantinople to the confines of Spain, the magnani- mity of their leaders, and the brilliant talents of their caliphs, raised the nation to a pitch of glory and power which exhibited itself in some very extraordinary pro- ductions in the architectural art. In Africa and in Spain, where their empire became firmly established, the edifices they erected sufficiently prove with what success they cultivated the arts and sciences. For the notice here given of some of the most extraordinary edifices for which Spain is indebted to its ancient conquerors, we are assisted from the celebrated work by Murphy, published in 1816, to which the reader who seeks further inform- ation may refer. We do not, in the limited space of such an article as this, think it necessary to extend any Inquiry into the earliest works of the Saracens, such as the original Mosque of Omar, built in C40. Neither of that nor other of their works (few indeed in number) have we sufficient historical evidence to compare them with the architecture of the period in other countries ; but we proceed at once to that period when some of its most dis- tinguishing features were such arches as are here exhibited. The mosque at Cordova was begun by Abdelrahmen, the second king of Cordova, and finished by his son towards the end of the eighth century. Its plan is a parallelogram of 600 feet by 400, formed by an embattled wall with counterforts also embattled ; the height of this wall varies from 35 to 60 feet, and its thickness is 8 feet. This large quadrangular space is divided internally into two parts ; viz. a court, 200 feet long by the length of the edifice, and the mosque itself, which is about 400 feet square. The mosque consists of 19 naves, formed by 17 rows of columns, from south to north, and 32 narrower naves, from east to west. Each of these naves is 16 feet wide, from north to south, by 400 feet long ; the width of them in the opposite direction is less. Thus the intersection of the naves with each other produce 850 columns, which, added to the 52 columns of the court, form a total of near a thousand columns. Their diameter is about a foot and a half, and their mean height about 15 feet, and they are crowned by capitals of a Corinthian or composite species. These columns, which have neither socle nor base, are surmounted by arches from column to column. The ceilings are of wood painted, each range forming on the outside a small roof, separated from those adjoining by a gutter. One of the most striking effects of the edifice is produced by the beautiful marbles whereof the columns are composed. It seems probable that the larger portion of these columns might have been procuredf from the Roman ruins in the city; an opinion which is strength- ened by their being without bases, or such as ill suited the style of the columns or capitals. In the commence- ment of the sixteenth century great changes were made in this mosque, for the purpose of converting it into a Christian church ; these, it is said, ruined the original effect, but enough is left to indicate what it anciently must have been. It is always considered as one of the earliest Moorish buildings in Spain. The decorations throughout are in stucco, painted of diflferent colours, and occasionally gilt, in imitation of the churches of the lower empire. One cannot doubt that its architects were well acquainted with the Byzantine architecture, in which the walls, the arcades, the pavements, in short all the parts were covered with paintings : and it is clear that the Arabians, who really had invented no architecture of their own, spreading themselves in those countries wherein the arts had been established, were thus led to a trial of imitating the old masters. The Alhambra,at Granada, is perhaps the most curious and interesting Moorish edifice in Spain. It served the double purpose of palace and fortress, and is situate on the summit of a rock that commands the town. Accord- ing to travellers who have visited and described this edifice, you may here fancy yourself in a fairy-built dwell- ing. After passing the principal entrance, you arrive at two oblong courts, one of which is called the court of the lions, and is celebrated in Arabian history. A por- tion of the section of this court is given below. Round these two courts, on the ground floor, are disposed all the apartments of the palace; those for state look out towards the country ; the rest, cooler and more retired, have small openings for light under the interior porticos, the whole of which are decorated with painted stucco, porcelain, and the most valuable marbles. There is on a neighbouring hill another palace, called the Generalifi'e, now in a state of ruin ; but its ruins show that it was inferior to the Alhambra neither in size nor splendour. It is precisely in the same taste, and the details are similar, proving that the two edifices are con- temporaneous. Surprising as the works we have just named must be Qonsidered we do not discover iu them that real grandeur 82 which exists in the works of the Egyptians, the Etrurians, the Grecians, or the Romans. The mode of construction, though sufficiently durable, is not scientific, as respects the working of the materials. Brick was the material most in use ; the masonry, where employed, is covered with a coating of stucco, the painting whereof, in dif- ferent colours, is a great source of the admiration these buildings excite. In the combinations of the building art in these edifices, there is nothing to surprise, from the supposition of extraordinary means used in their erec- tion. The domes which crown their apartments are neither lofty nor large in diameter, neither do they exhibit great mechanical skill. The Moorish architects seem to have had no notion of raising vaults from lofty piers. In the mosque at Cordova, the span from pier to pier would have been less than 20 feet, %vhich to vault would not have required very extraordinary skill; yet herein we find timber ceilings throughout. The use of orders seems to have been unknown to them ; they employed the antique columns which they found ready to their hands, or rude imitations of them, without any apparent acquaintance with the tj'pes from which they were derived, their principles or proportions. Hence their columns may be more appropriately termed posts. In the forms of Moorish architecture one does not discover a character of originality arising out of local causes. The Arabians had wandered far from their country, in which they had never cultivated the arts; their architecture was, therefore, necessarily formed upon models which were before them, such as the degenerated Roman and Byzantine. Such elements as these, with the materials which the lower empire afforded, formed their taste and monuments. The form of their arcades, whereof we have given some examples above, is confined to this style of architecture. They may be divided into two classes, both of them vicious in construction, from not affording the necessary resistance to thrust near the abutments. In masonry, failure would follow such forms, if practised on a large scale ; but where arches are formed of brick, the large surface of cement used, if it be good and the centres not struck until the cement is set hard, allows great caprice in their forms. Ifthe pleasure — we might almost use the word sensuality— of the eye be the sole object, it cannot be denied that success attended the efforts of the Arabian architects of Spain. The details of their decor- ation, and the fantasticness of their forms, cannot fail to please the eye; and though they may not satisfy the spectator, they are capable of producing on his mind some of the most seductive charms of which th? art is capable. The embroidery and painted draperies of the East appear to have been transposed to their architecture. The variety and profusion with which they used their ornaments, moreover, give their masses the appearance of a congeries of painting, incrustation, mosaic, gilding, and foliage: much, perhaps, of this was induced by the law of their religion, which forbade the representation of animals or the human figure. If taste be not required to produce a reason for the admission of ornament, nothing can be more splendid and brilliant than the effects that resulted from their. combinations. It cannot be denied that in this profusion of ornament we find the details beautifully executed, and some of their forms extremely fine ; and the mode of piercing domes for light, which they practised by means of star-like formed openings, is attended with an almost magical effect. Architecture, Mexican. From the historian Robert- son we collect, that the cities of Mexico, large and })opu- lous as they are described, were rather the asylums of men just emerged from barbarism, than the peaceable dwellings of a civilised people. Tlascala, according to its descrip- tion, nearly resembles that of an Indian village. It was but a heap of low straggling huts ; according to the caprice of each proprietor, built of turf and stone, and thatched with reeds, the light being received by a door so low that it could not be entered upright. In Mexico, from its peculiar situation, the disposition of the houses was more orderly, but their structure was equally mean. The Mexican temples, and other public edifices, do not appear to have deserved the high praises which Spanish ARCHITECTURE, ROMAN. authors have bestowed upon them. The great temple of Mexico, the most celebrated in New Spain, as far as can be gathered from the obscure and inadequate descrip- lions of it, has been represented as a magnificent build- ing, raised to such a height that the ascent to it was by a flight of 114 steps, yet it was but a solid square mass of earth, faced partly with stone. Its base on each sidB extended 90 feet : it decreased gradually as it advanced in height, terminating at top in a quadrangle of about 30 feet, whereon was placed a shrine of the deity, and two altars on which the victims were sacrificed. All the other celebrated temples of New Spain resembled that of Mexico. The temple of Cholula, which was considered the most sacred in the country, was also the most consi- derable ; yet, according to Torquemada, it was but a solid mound of earth, about a quarter of a league in circuit. The Spanish historians lead us to suppose that the palace of the emperor and the houses of the nobles ex- hibited some elegance of design and Convenient arrange- ment : we have, however, no vestiges of these remaining, and, from the mode in which Cortes conducted the siege of Mexico, it seems likely that all the monuments of any importance were destroyed. Still, as at the period when Robertson wrote his history only two centuries and a half had elapsed, it seems impossible that in so short a time edifices of importance should have left no trace of their existence. The great hillock at Cholula, to which the Spaniards have given the name of temple, is without any steps to ascend it, and without any appearance of stone. Perhaps it has never been more than a natural eminence of the ground In several accounts, though under different names of places, we find descriptions of monuments pyramidal, as well as in steps, of which the ruins are sufficient to furnish a clue to the whole design. The attempt to restore them in drawing was made in 1804, and published at Rome by D. Pietro Marquez, entitled " Due Antichi Monumenti di Architettura." His restor-, ation was founded, we believe, on descriptions published in the Literary Gazette of Mexico, in 1785 and 1791, by D. Gius. Ant. Abzate. The first mommient is at a place called Papantla. Its form is pyramidal, (that is, in ge- neral effect,) being built in steps or stories, of six ranks, one above the other. The lower step is 100 feet long, on the four faces. The other dimensions of the steps are not given, but each had in its height a certain number of square niches, each 3 feet every way ; the lowest con- tained 24 on every side, the second 20, the third 16, the fourth 12, the fifth 10, and the sixth 8. It is presumed there was a seventh step, which had 6 of these niches on every side. Upon one of the faces of this pyramid there were smaller steps, serving as a staircase to mount to the top, whereon, it is supposed, there was a small chapel enclosing the idols to which the sacrifices were made. The author (Marquez) above mentioned gathered from the same documents some ideas upon another Mexican monument, if in architecture may be so called a hill sur- rounded by five or six enclosures of stone, whose object was to retain the earth in its place. This also terminates by a platform at top, which is supposed to have been occupied by a small temple, after the manner of the country. Some writers have thought this last was merely a fortification , but it seems more probable that it was a religious edifice, inasmuch as the basement of it is sculptured with figures supposed to be the hieroglyphics of the country. The name (Xochicalco) of this hill, inter- preted by those who possess a knowledge of the Mexican language, bears out the conjecture that it was used for the last named purpose. Architecture, Roman. It can scarcely be said that the Romans had an architecture peculiar to themselves. That which we understand by the name is a modification, some call it a debasement (we disagree with them), of the architecture of the Grecians. We are ready to admit that the Romans gave to their art the lasciviousness of the courtesan, whilst the Greeks preserved in theirs the modest demeanour of the staid matron ; but our senses may be charmed by the one, though the other rasy make a stronger appeal to the understanding. In strictness, Roman and Grecian architecture are identical. Wherever the Greeks penetrated, their genius, not less than their arms, extended and founded their influence. The reli- gion, the language, the habits, and the arts of the Greeks, appear to have been carried into Italy at a period of very high antiquity. Numerous colonies of that nation estab- lished themselves on the shores of that country, and even in the interior of the peninsula, where they erected cities long before the existence of Rome. Italy, as far as we can trace, had no original arts of its own, nor can any thing be found in it whose origin was not Grecian. Hence, as has been observed, there is, strictly, no such thing as Roman architecture. But as every nation which cultivates the arts, impresses them with a character peculiar to itself, so when we speak of Roman architec- ture, we mean that peculiar character with which Greek art was invested under the Roman empire, — that cha- racter which was manifest in a greater exuberance of 83 ornament m all the parts of the orders, and which changed the sections of the mouldings of an order from profiles formed by the sections of a cone, to those formed by the horizontal sections of a cylinder. An intercourse of very ancient date existed between Etruria and Greece ; in the former of which, at the period in question, the lan- guage and mythology of Greece prevailed to a consider- able extent. From what is known on this subject, we may safely state that Etrurian architecture was identical with that of Greece. History tells that Rome, from its origin, borrowed from Etruria artists to execute their great works, though, afterwards, the city possessed a large number of native architects, which was not the case with the professors of the other arts. That the Romans at this period were not barbarous and ignorant of the arts, more than one memorial of their skill in architecture still attests. Livy records a circus, traced by Tarquin, between the Aventine and Palatine hills, for the celebra- tion of feasts and games to commemorate the victory over the Latins. Tarquinius Superbus soon afterwards encompassed this circus with covered porticos. This was at the epoch of the construction of the great sewer or cloaca. Perhaps in no age were two more splendid undertakings carried on at the same time. This Tarquin, as Dionysius Halicarnassensis asserts, ornamented the Forum, and had centred in it all that could tend to its beauty as well as to its utility. The first Tarquin was a native of the city of Tarquinium in Etruria, and brought to Rome that taste for grandeur and solidity which were the distinguishing features of the arts in the country he had left. He constructed the immense walls of the city in regular masonry, and laid the foundations of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus, which, in levelling the hill on which it stood, was attended with prodigious labour and expense. The temple mentioned, according to Tacitus, was continued by Servius Tullius and Tar- quinius Superbus, the latter engaging workmen from Etruria ; but it was not finished till after the expulsion of the kings. Such was its magnificence, says Tacitus, that all the victories of the Romans added to its wealth and decoration more than to its extent. His words are, " Horatius Pulvillus dedicavit, ea magnificently, qUam immensae postea pOT)uli Romani opes ornarent potius, quam augerent." The description of it by Dionysius brings to mind the Grecian temple, with its two interior ranks of columns, its peristyle and pediment, eulogised by Cicero. It was twice destroyed, and twice rebuilt, on the same foundations. These notices suffice to show that the Romans at an early period were inferior to no nation in those matters of architecture which were neces- sary and useful to a people. Such was the opinion of Strabo, who adds, that in some respects, such as paving their great roads, constructing aqueducts and sewers, the Romans far excelled the Greeks. Usefulness in their enterprises, and solidity in carrying them into execution, were the characteristics of the art among the Romans at a period when magnificence of a high degree was confined to the temple. The necessary materials are wanting to enable us to follow up historically the taste of the art during the ages of the republic. There is scarcely the vestige of a ruin of the period ; it is, however, easy to form, either from the political state of the times, or from the encouragement given to the other arts, and especially to literature, some idea of the extent to which the architecture of the Romans flourished. The conquest of Greece by the Romans produced to their city not only an importation of works of art, but the artists themselves, who, be it observed, can be created only where opulence reigns. In architecture, however, the Romans at this time had erected monuments of such dimensions as were beyond the means of the little and separated states of Greece. The new state of things brought to its aid all that it needed. The great use which at this period was made of the Corinthian order, is one of the proofs of the public and private wealth. From the time of Augustus we see the extent to which richness of detail was carried. A small portion of the Baths of Agrippa, known to us under the name of the Pantheon, one of the most splen- did examples of the art, enables us to appreciate the art of this period, though now despoiled of the bronzes of its pediment, its gilt caissons, and the profusion of sculp- tures that adorned It. In the time of Augustus, Rome was not only the capital of the world, but the world itself; it possessed within itself all the food that was necessary for the hourishment of the art. Private indi- viduals in the city possessed the wealth of kings, military glory created a necessity for monuments, and the amuse- ments of the theatre, the races and fights of the circus and amphitheatre, required accommodation for such multitudes of spectators, that art expanded from the calls to which it was subject. Rome now began to raise monuments of a description unknown to the Grecians — triumphal arches, baths as large as cities, immense por- ticos, amphitheatres, and naumachia. The marbles of all the quarries of the then known world were almost exhausted in supplies, and even Egypt furnished the city G 2 ARCHITRAVE. with means of adding to tiie general magnificence. Ap- plied to such new species of edifices, it would have been indeed surprising if architecture had preserved its original Greek purity. It was the medium for satisfy ing a vanity which knew no bounds, and was ultimately obliged to gain its end more by effect than purity, by richness and exuberance of ornament rather than by harmony, and by grandeur of lines rather than by beauty of forms. Archi- tecture was at all periods a favourite art among the Romans. Not a single name of a Roman sculptor has reached us, and Pliny mentions only two or three painters. From Vitruvius we learn, that before his time several had written on the art. The names of Fussitius, Terentius Varro, Publius Septimius, Cossutius, and C. Mutius are mentioned by him. The luxury in art induced by the sculptor, aided the number of different combinations in the Corinthian capital, which we have above stated to have been a favourite with the Romans ; this was carried to an excess which in the end produced a new order, known by the name of the composite. Thus, Roman architecture having, says Quatremere de Quincy, exhausted all the resources of richness guided by taste in the use of orna- ments, throws aside all sobriety, sacrifices the whole to details and accessaries, covers all parts of the surface without distinction, loads the different members with ornaments and sculptures, like a person who, to decorate a piece of cloth, covers it entirely with embroidery. We close this article with a few observations on the Doric order. This, in Greece itself, at the time of her subjugation, had begun to be affected by change. It had lost much of the primitive simplicity of its character and the severity of its principles. The various wants in edifices less simple in plan, a taste for elegance and richness which was found in the other two orders, contributed to diminish the severity of its forms and profiles. Thus, in the portico of Augustus at Athens it was strangely changed in appearance. In Rome it was adopted with Proportions still more slender, and an aspect infinitely 5SS severe. (For remarks on English Architecture, see the word English.) A'RCHITRAVE. (Gr. cc^x^iv, to govern, and Lat. trabs, a beam.) In Architecture, the lower of the three members of the entablature of an order, being, as its name imports, the chief beam that is employed, and resting immediately on the columns. Its origin is given under the article Architectuke. A French writer has called it the foundation of the head of an edifice. The architrave sometimes receives the name Epistylium, from the Greek words itri, upon, and trruXog, column. A'RCIIIVES. The repositories of the public records of a state or community : sometimes the records them- selves are so called. The word is supposed to be derived from the Greek «§%£/«, used for public registers by Josephus. Tlie following table presents a summary of the prin- cipal metropolitan repositories of English archives, and the character of their contents. It is extracted from the Law Magazine, No. 35. and is professedly compiled from tlie information furnished by the Record Commission. Name of Repository. 2. Chapter House 3. Duchy of LanO caster J 4. Duchy of Cornwall 5. Roll's Chapel 6. Common Pleas 7. King's Bench S 8. King's Remem brancer's Record 10. Pipe Office H. Loni Treasurer's n "mcmbrancei's Office Rerenue -f 13. First Fruits 14. Exchequer of Pleas Waterloo Bridge Somerset House Chancery Lane Carlton Ride Stables Rolls* House, Chan-"1 cery-Iane j CarltonRide Stables,") Temple, ( Tower of Westmin-f ster Hall \ Somerset House Somerset House Carlton Ride, and Spring Gartlens Species of Record. f Chancery Sc Parlia- t mentary ( King's Bench, ) Common Pleas, 1 Parliamentary, ( Miscellaneous Relating to the Duchy Relating to the Duchy r Chancery & Parlia- l mentary Belonging to the Court Belonging to the Court Chiefly Exchequer ( Ecclesiastical Record < respecting dissolu- ( t ion of M on asteries txchequer Records The same fits own department, < and Exchequer Re- I. cords, &c. Its own department. Exchequer. A'RCIIIVOLT. (Lat. arcus volutus, a turned arch.) In Architecture, the ornamented band of mouldings round the voussoirs or arch stones of an arch, which ter- minates horizontally upon the impost. The archivolt is decorated analogously with the architrave, which it may in arcades be said to represent. A'RiniON. (Gr. «{%«v ruler.) The title of the 84 AREOLATE. chief magistrate of Athens. The olHce was originally instituted after the death of Codrus, the last king of Athens, and was vested in one person who enjoyed it for life, and was succeeded by his son. Its duties were tliose of a limited monarchy, accountable to tlie assembly of the people ; its duration was afterwards limited to ten, six, and, finally, one year, when its functions were di- vided among nine persons, taken at first by suffrage, and afterwards by lot, from the nobles. One was chief among them, and was called Eponymus, or, naming Archon, because the year was distinguished by his name. The second, or king Archon, exercised the functions of high priest. The third, or Polemarch (pole- marchos,) was originally the chief military commander. The other six were called Thesmothetae, or setters forth of the law ; they presided as judges in the courts, and the six formed a tribunal which had a peculiar juris- diction. The nine together formed the council of state, on which the whole administration rested ; but this was transferred by Solon to the senate. The exclusive right of the nobles to this o&ce was taken away by the measures of Cleisthenes, who threw it open to the people at large. See especially Bocckh's Public Economy of Athens. A'RCTIC. {Gr.a,^x.To;,ihe bear.) An epithet given to that part of the heavens, in which are situated the constellations of the Great and the Little Bear. Arc- tic Pole, the north pole of the heavens, or the northern extremity of the axis of the diurnal motion. Arctic Circle, in geography, denotes a small circle of the sphere parallel to the equator, and 23^ degrees from the north pole. At this latitude, the sun, at the summer solstice, comes exactly to the horizon at midnight, without de- scending below it. The corresponding circle in the southern hemisphere is called the Antarctic. The arctic and antarctic circles separate the frigid from the temper- ate zones. A'RCTOMYS. {Gr. 0CJXT6S, bear, /j.vi, mouse.) The name of the subgenus of Rodentia, or gnawers, including the marmot. ARCTU'RUS. A star of the first magnitude in the constellation of Bootes, designated in the catalogues as a. Bootes. It has a sensible proper motion. A'RCUATE. (Lat. arcus, a bow.) A part of an ani- mal so called which is linear and bent like a bow. ARCUA'TION. (Lat. arcus, a bow.) An obsolete term for the mode of propagating trees by layers, the shoots being bent. A'RDEA. The name of a Linnaean genus of Grallce, or wading birds, characterised by a straight, sharp, long, subcompressed bill, with a furrow extending on each side, from the nostrils to the aj»ex of the bill. The genus was subdivided by Linnaeus into the Cristatce, corre- sponding to the modern genus Anthropoides ; the Grues. or cranes ; the Ciconice, or storks ; and the Ardece, or herons ; which latter have been subsequently subdivided into Ardets, or herons proper ; Nycticoraces, or night- herons ; and Botauri, or bitterns. ARDISIA'CE^. {Axd^&ia., one of the genera.) Exo- gens, which might, without much inaccuracy, be termed woody primulaceous plants. They form herbs and trees in warm countries, and have a succulent fruit ; but they really differ in scarcely any positive point of structure from primula and its co-ordmates. {See MYRSiNACEiE.) A' RE. See A la mi re. A'REiE. In Entomology, the larger longitudinal spe- cies into which the wing may be divided : they are termed cretal, intermediate, and anal, according to their relative position. ARE'CA. ( Areec, the Malabar name.) An East Indian palm tree, whose nuts are folded in the leaf of the piper betel, and, mixed with a little lime, are chewed by the natives of the country bordering on the Indian Archi- pelago, as a stimulating narcotic. ARE'NA. A Latin word signifying, in its original meaning, sand, but applied in a secondary sense to that part of the amphitheatre in which the gladiators fought, which was covered with sand. The word is sometimes applied to the whole amphitheatre. ARENA'CEOUS. (Lat. arena, sand.) Sandy. ARENA'RIA. (Lat. arena, sand.) A genus of wa- ding birds, wanting the hinder toe : of this genus there is but one British species — the Sanderling. ARENA'RIOUS SOIL. (Lat. arena, sand.) In Agr. and Hort., suil in which sand is the prevailing in- gredient. ARENA'TION. (Lat. arena, sand.) The cure of diseases by sprinkling hot sand upon the body. ARE'OLA. (Dim. of area.) The ring or margin which surrounds the pustule of small and cow pox. AllE'OLiE, in Entomology, are smaller spaces into which the wing is divided by the nervures: they are termed vasal, middle, and apical, according to their relative position. ARE'OLATE. In Entomology, divided mto small spaces, or areolations. Areolate. In Botany, in composite plants, when the florets are placed so completely upon the surface of the AREOLATION. receptacle, that many a pentagonal area, or space, Is left when the ovaries drop off. AREOLA'TION (Lat. area) means any small space, distinctly bounded by something different in co lour, texture, &c. The spaces of parenchyma, which ia leaves are bounded by veins, are areolations. ARECKMETER. (Gr. k^xio;, rare, and /Atr^ev, measure.) An instrument for measuring the density or speciflc gravity of fluids. {See Hydrometer.) AREO'METRY. The science of measuring the den- sity or specific gravity of fluids. AREO'PAGUS. The chief court of judicature at Athens : so called because it met in a hall on an emi- nence, called the hill of Mars {'A^uos troiyo;.) This court, which was of very early origin, was raised to the high character it afterwards enjoyed, by Solon, who ap- pointed that it should consist of the archons who had un- dergone, with credit, the scrutiny they were subject to at the expiration of their office. The areopagus had cognizance of capital crimes, and from it was no appeal to the people, whose decisions it was sometimes known to annul. It controlled all issues from the public trea- sury, and exercised a censorship over the citizens. Its powers were much reduced by the measures of Peri- cles and his partizans. On the subject of this celebrated institution, our best ancient authority is the Ora/to Areo- pagitica of Socrates. See also Meursius, De Areopago ; Du Canaye, Recherches sur I' A., in the Mem. de I Acad. Des Inscr.,8sc. vol. vii. p. 174. : and Petitus, Ad Leges At- ticas. See also Boeckh's excellent work on Athens and her Institutions. A'RGEL. The Egyptian name of the leaves of the Cynanchmn oleafolium, which are mixed with senna leaves. A'RGENT, in Heraldry. (French, argent, silver.) One of the metals employed in blazonry: it is equivalent to pearl among precious stones, diamond among planets. In engraving it is represented by a plain surface. ARGENTI'NA. A Liimaean genus of abdominal fishes, belonging to the salmon family ; characterised by a small mouth, without maxillary teeth ; the tongue armed with curved teeth ; and a transverse row of small teeth on the vomer ; banchiostegal rays, six. The ar- gentines rank in the order Malacopterygia, or soft-finned fishes of Cuvier. The name is derived from the silvery glistening appearance in the scales of these fishes. A'RGENTINE. In Mineralogy, nacreous carbonate of lime, so called from its silvery lustre. ARGILLA'CEOUS SOIL. (Lat. argilla, clay.) Soil in which clay is the prevailing earthy ingredient. ARGOL. The tartar of wine. A'RGONAUT, ARGONAUTA. Applied by Lin- naeus, in the singular number, to the testaceous cepha- lopod, designated by Aristotle and the ancients, nau- tilus, and commonly called at the present day the paper nautilus, from the fragile nature of the boat-like shell in which the inhabiting cephalopod occasionally floats on the still seas of the warmer latitudes. Many modern naturalists limit the application of the term argonauta to the shell, supposing that its true constructor is yet to be discovered, and that the cephalopod which has hitherto been exclusively found m it, is a parasite. {See OcYTHoM.) A'RGONAUTS. The name given to the chieftains " who accompanied Jason in the ship Argo on his fabled expedition " to Colchis, after the golden fleece of Phryx- us. The original facts on which this mythological story is founded cannot now be recalled ; but it is generally supposed to represent the result of some bold commer- cial expedition that overstepped the previous discoveries of its age, or more probably still, the series of enter- prises by which" Greek maritime knowledge was extend- ed to the furthest shores of the Euxine." We have a poem on the subject, which falsely goes under the name of Orpheus, who is said to have been one of the Argonauts himself, and an epic by Apollonius Rhodius, a Greek poet of Alexandria, and likewise one in Latin, by Valerius Flaccus, who flourished in the age of Ves- pasian. A'RGUMENT. In Astronomy, denotes the angle or quantity on which a series of numbers in a table de- pends. For example, suppose a table were formed showing the amount of horizontal refraction at every degree, &c., of altitude ; then the altitude would be termed the argument of the refraction ; and the table is said to be entered with the argument. Argument. In Logic, an expression in which, from something laid down as granted, {i.e. the premises,) something else (?. e. the conclusion,) is to be deduced. In ordinary discourse, argument is very often used for the premises alone, in contradistinction to the con- clusion ; e.g. "the conclusion which this argument is intended to establish, is, &c. &c." This word is also sometimes employed to denote what is, strictly speaking, a course or series of arguments : it is in this sense that we speak of " Warburton's argument to prove the divine legation of Moses." The word argument is frequently ARIANS. used to express what may be properly called a dis- putation : i. e. two trains of argument opposed to each other, as when it is said that A and B had a long ' argument on any sulyect, and that A had the best of the argument. (Vide Whately's Logic, p. 300.) A'RIANS. The followers of the theological opinions of Arius, a presbyter of the church of Alexandria in the fourth century, who denied the equality of the Father and Son, and is generally considered as the author of a system which continued, under various modifications, to exercise the most extensive influence upon the Christian world of any heresy of ancient times. It was in the year 319, that these views were first promulgated at a meeting of the clergy of Alexandria ; and their author, after some delay, excommunicated by the patriarch Alexander. The progress, however, which the opinions continued to make, excited, after a few years, the notice of the emperor Constantine, who addressed a letter to Alexander and Arius jointly, in which he attempted to attain the object for which on other occasions he resorted to more violent methods, that of reconciling the conflict- ing parties upon whatever basis, and securing harmony at all events. At the earnest desire, however, of the ortho- dox party at Alexandria, he convened the general council of Nicaea, which assembled in the year 325, and pro- ceeded to institute a full investigation into the matter in dispute. On this occasion the Nicene creed was drawn up, in which the clause which principally aff'ecis this subject is the assertion of the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father, or the Omoousion. This the Arians would not concede. A middle party arose under Eusebius of Nicomedia, who proposed, but without effect, the term Omoiousios, asserting, not the identity, but the similarity of substance. This, which is generally denominated the Semi-arian scheme, satisfied neither the Catholics nor the Arians, who from their rejection of it acquired the title of Anomoioi. The Catholics tri- umphed, and their opponents submitted to the decree of the emperor which required them to acknowledge the creed propounded for their acceptance. From this time, according to some writers, the Eusebians became a mere political party, who endeavoured to preserve the favour of the prince, for which they had already made the greatest of sacrifices, by a repetition of similar unworthy arts. At this period another Eusebius, the courtly bishop of Caesarea, and celebrated historian of the Christian church, became one of the leaders of this branch of Arianism. His talents and ingenuity are represented as being of singular service to the cause of the heretics, by inducing the emperor, after some delay, to command the restoration of Arius to the church of Alexandria, and the banishment of Athanasius. A day was appointed, upon which Alexander, the aged bishop, should admit the still suspected heretic to the holy communion : his protestations of orthodoxy were such as to satisfy the prelate that God only could discover his real sentiments, and he solemnly declared that in His hands he left the matter. In the midst of the fears and scruples of the one party, and the anticipated triumph of the other, the proceeding was suddenly terminated by the death of Arius : a deliverance of the church, in which the Catho- lics discovered a signal interposition of God, but which the heretics confidently ascribed to assassination by poi- son. Under Constantius, the successor of Constantine, in the East, the Arian party was taken into favour, and the orthodox persecuted and proscribed : and when on the death of Constans, the whole empire fell into his single hands, the cause of heresy began to flourish in the West also, and the " whole world," says St. Jerome, "groaned to find itself Arian." It was at this period, also, that many northern nations, who were just preparing to pour themselves upon the western empire, were converted to the Christian faith, in which they were instructed, ac- cording to the Arian interpretation. This circumstance contributed materially to the permanence of these opi- nions ; for after the orthodox emperor Theodosius had re-established the doctrine of the Nicene creed through- out his dominions, the West was subjected to a second inundation of heresy in the preceding century* The conversion of Clovis to the Catholic faith at the end of the fifth, and of Theodelinda, queen of the Lombards, in the sixth century, combined with the successes of the generals of Justinian, in Italy and Africa, restored the orthodox opinions throughout the greater part of these regions ; and from that period Arianism dwindled away, and all traces of it seem to have been lost for many cen- turies. In modern times these opinions have been revived. The inferiority of the Son to the Father was proclaimed by Servetus, in 1531 : and in Geneva, the very place in which he suffered death, these opinions took root, and have since become very prevalent among the disciples of the church which Calvin founded. The immediate fol- lowers of Servetus removed, upon his death, to Poland. In England, the principal revivors of Arianism, were Whiston and Samuel Clarke, who flourished at the be- G 3 AR.ICINA. gJnning of the 18th century. Their doctrines were em- braced by great numbers of the Presbyterian and Inde- pendent preachers, and gave rise to a great deal of controversy among the members of those communities, and of the church also. It is remarkable that the con- gregations which in modern times have embraced any form of Arianism, whether at Geneva, in Poland, or in our own country, have in almost all cases degenerated into Unitarianism. At the present day, there exist few, if any, churches of professed Arians. It should be remarked, that the terra Arlan, which is vulgarly attributed to those who conceive of the second and third persons, that though inferior to the first, they are, nevertheless, divine, admits of many distinctions and qualifications. Questions arise among sects generally de- nominated Arian, 1st, As to the similarity of substance between the Father and Son : 2d, As to the existence of the Son ; whether he was created before the world ; — whether that creation was from eternity : 3d, As to the relation of the Son and Spirit, concerning whose rank among the Divine personages there are many conflicting opinions. Dr. Clarke, though generally considered to hold Arian sentiments, professed himself a believer in the Tri- nity, and continued a member of the established church. He distinguished the Son from the Father, considering the latter as the primary author of all good, to whom all honour and worship is due: the power which was original in the Father being derivative in the Son, who derives also from him his Divinity and other attributes. The Holy Spirit, he considered to hold a similar subor- dination to the Son. When the question, whether the Father can annihilate the Son, was propounded to Dr. Clarke, he confessed that he had not reflected upon this imputed consequence of his scheme, and declined to give any answer. AUICI'NA. An alkaloid discovered in 1829, by Pel - letier and Coriol, in a bark from Arica, resembling a species of chinchona. A'RIEL. Arilla {inlaw Latin), a piece of red cloth. A membrane, either fleshy or otherwise, originating from the placenta, and growing on a seed either partially or entirely. Instances of it occur in the nutmeg, where it constitutes mace ; and in the Euonymus Europaeus, where it is a red succulent membrane. It is remarkable that this part, the use of which is unknown, never ap- pears till after the young seed is fertilised. A'RIES. (Lat. the Ram.) The first constellation of the ancient zodiac. Aries also denotes the first sign or the first 30 degrees of the zodiac ; the first point of Aries being the point in which the equator intersects the ecliptic, and from which the longitudes are reckoned. In ancient times the signs and constellations of the zodiac coincided ; but owing to the precession of the equinoxes, the twelve signs go backward among the constellations, at the rate of about ."JO" annually, and the first point of Aries is now situate in the constellation Pisces. Aries. In ancient Military Science, the Latin name of the battering ram, an instrument with an iron head used to batter and beat down the walls of besieged places. ARIOSO. See Legato. ARISTO'CRACY. (Gr. cc^tiTTac; the best, &ni. K^aLtuv, to govern.) According to the acceptation in which the word is used by ancient writers, a government in which all the best citizens of the state, i. e. those excelling either in hereditary distinction or in wealth, ruled their fellow- citizens. When the power was in the hands of a small class of these, who had acquired it by chance or usurpa- tion, such a government was said to be an oligarchy. Thus aristocracy is enumerated by Aristotle among the distinct forms of government ;' oligarchy is onl}^ men- tioned as a perversion of aristocracy : and the distinction as taken by him is, that in an aristocracy the governors rule for the public good, and in an oligarchy for their own. In modern times, those governments have usually been termed aristocratic in which a small privileged class of noble or wealthy persons either governed absolutely, or shared the government in various proportions with the sovereign or with the people. Thus the Republic of Venice presented the purest example of an aristocracy among the older governments of Europe: while the govern- ment of the United Provinces, before the French Revolu- tion, might also be cited as an instance of an aristocratic commonwealth ; and Great Britain of a monarchy tem- pered by aristocracy. In a stricter sense, however, the word nas been used by modern speculative politicians to signify any government in which "a minority of adult males" constitute the ruling class. In this sense, the govern- ment of France, that of England both in respect of the House of Commons and of the House of Lords, and, in short, almost every state in which a census is adopted as the qualification of those who elect representatives in the national assembly, must be cited as aristocratic. The word aristocracy is also frequently used to signify a class of persons in the state : the wealthy and noble classes in a body, or the latter class by itself. ARISTOLO'CHIA. (Gr. ot^to-TCt, best, and Xoxua., childbirth.) A genus of exogenous plants, usually having ARISTOTELIAN PHILOSOPHY. twining stems and one-sided bent, yellow or purple varie- gated flowers, the odour of which is often very offensive They are reputed to be powerful stimulants and aro- matics. One species, but not a twining one, is occa- sionally met with wild in England (A. clematitis, com- mon birth wort) : a few are natives of the South of Europe, but the principal part of the genus is tropical. ARI'STOLO'CHIA'CE^. The natural order of which Aristolochia is the type. Asarum (see Asarabacca) is the only other common genus associated with Aristo- lochia ; but there are several tropical forms. The wood of this order is remarkable for growing without forming concentric zones, although undoubtedly exogenous. ARISTOTE'LIAN PHILOSOPHY. In attempting to give an account of the doctrines of Aristotle of Stagira, we feel embarrassed by peculiar difficulties. The pre- judices under which, until lately, the name of this philo- sopher has laboured, and still, perhaps, continues in a great measure to labour, would "seem to render a more than usually detailed account of his writings necessary, in order to justify what, in the view we shall take of their nature and value, may contradict the ordinary opinion. At the sarne time, there is perhaps no ancient philoso- pher, the full comprehension of whose system requires so extensive a knowledge of the works of his predeces- sors in scientific research, and so careful a collation of detached passages in his own writings, which are com- posed for the most part in a fragmentary and unmethodi- cal manner, and an obscure and concise diction. The latter difficulty will be the more apparent, when we state the now unanimous opinion of the learned, that the works of Aristotle which remain to us are entirely of the esoteric or acromatic class, intended, not for public- ation, but to serve as notes to the oral lectures which he delivered to the more instructed of his pupils. It re- quires no more than a cursory glance at the titles and the bulk of Aristotle's writings, to be convinced of the comprehensiveness of his views, and the daringness of his design. He divides the whole circle of knowledge into three great provinces. Metaphysics, or the Philoso- phia prima, including, as its instrument, Logic ; Physics, or the Second Philosophy, under which term, in addition to the sciences ordinarily falling under that denomin- ation, he embraces a great portion of the philosophy of the human mind, as the phenomena of sensation, me- mory, and fancy; and, thirdly. Ethics, or the science which treats of the conduct and duties of man, regarded both as an individual and as a citizen. His Logic is con- tained in his Categories, his treatise on Interpretation or the Nature of Propositions, his former and latter Analj'tics, and his eight books of Topics ; to which may be added his work on the exposure of Sophisms. These form together what has been called the Organism of Aristotle ; and seem intended as a preparatory discipline to the study of his Metaphysics. (See Arist. Metaph. iv. 3.) The common opinion, which attributes to Aris- totle the discovery of the science of Logic, is, we doubt not, substantially correct. The flippant objection of Locke, that this notion would represent God as having made men mere animals, and having left it to Aristotle to make them rational, hardly needs a serious refutation. Natural philosophers might with equal justice be ac- cused of asserting, that Sir Isaac Newton changed the motion of the heavenly bodies, or that Locke himself created the human understanding. The logic of Aris- totle is, what it professes to be, an enumeration of the leading classes, or genera, to which all our notions may be referred ; an account of the various methods by which we arrive at general propositions, and reason from these when formed ; and a body of rules for the conduct of the understanding in gomg through these processes. {See Logic, Category, &c.) Metaphysics is the science of being, as such ; and herein is distinguished from phy- sics, which considers only the modifications of being, and the changes to which they are subject. Each of the physical sciences has its own fundamental axioms, the truth of which it is compelled to assume : it is the pro- vince of metaphysics to verify these assumptions, and to discover their unity and connection. Aristotle's meta- physical system, though it may be said to owe its origin and many of its peculiarities to that of his great prede- cessor, Plato, yet deviates from it in many important | respects. Both the one and the other admit the existence I of a faculty, the sphere of which transcends the objects of sense: they differ as to the method by which this faculty is to arrive at its determinations. Plato doubtless conceived, that in virtue of the necessary connection in which all conceptions stand to each other, we are able, so soon as we have awakened one idea in our conscious- ness, to arrive at the knowledge of all the rest. Aristotle, on the contrary, conceived all deductive science to be \ illusive which does not rest, for the truth of its funda- < mental principles, on a previous induction from par- | ticulars. Agreeably to this conviction, he begins his Ontological speculations with the consideration of the individual, as it presents itself in the world of sense. To the production of each separate existence, four causes are ■ARISTOTELIAN PHILOSOPHY. tessary : the material cause, the formal, the final, and ( moving cause. The three latter, he seems to admit, ( substantially identical, inasmuch as in Nature the end a thing is that very thing itself in its completeness : He the moving cause may be conceived as the type ^existing in the mind of the artificer, which is the same with the form which he communicates to the material. We should greatly misconceive Aristotle's meaning, if, as has sometimes been done, we identified his forms of things with their outward figure, or even with the notion of them apprehended by the understand- ing. The form of a thing may be differently expressed, as the law of its being, the principle of life within it, which animates and gives an individual existence to the matter ; which, on the other hand, without its presence, would remain a mere blank potentiality, destitute of all qualities, and therefore unintelligible and imperceptible. This distinction between matter and form re-appears, under different names, in various portions of the Aristo- telian philosophy, and is with him a solution of most of the difficulties in ontology and physics. He conceives it to be the only mode of explaining the possibility of a thing coming into existence, the difficulty of compre- hending which had led the electic philosophers to deny any reality to qutward phenomena. He himself con- ceives the universe to be eternal. With Plato, however, he strenuously asserts the existence of reason, as some- thing immutable and universal : co-eternal with but unaffected by the shifting phenomena of the world. He differs from that philosopher, in making the universal reason identical with God, instead of being, with its cor- relative being, a creation of the Divine energy. Of Aristotle's strictly physical researches we shall say little. He does not himself seem to conceive that great certainty can be attained in this department of human science. When, however, we remember, that his His- tory of Animals has received very high praise from no less a naturalist than Cuvier, and when we reflect that this was perhaps the only branch of natural science in which he was furnished with experimental data, we shall be inclined to attribute the errors and deficiences of his physical theories rather to the deficiencies of the Greeks in the necessary mechanical apparatus, than to any disqualification in the philosopher himself. In his treatises on the Soul, on Memory and Recollection, and on the Nature of Dreams, he has earned the perhaps still higher praise of having created the science of Psychology, and of having discovered the guiding clue to the ex- planation of our mental phenomena, in the principle of association. The third great division of the Aristotelian philoso- phy, that which regards the relations of man as a " social and political animal," is comprised in the Politics, the CEconomics, the Nicomachean and Eudemian Ethics, and those books entitled the Magna Moralia. In the true spirit of an ancient Greek, Aristotle regards the science of ethics as most intimately connected with that of politics. He repeatedly expresses his aversion from all speculations on merely ideal perfection ; and his con- viction that the practicable, under the existing circum- stances of humanity, is the true object of ethical enquiry. Among the most influential of these circumstances on the conduct of an individual, is the constitution of the state to which he may belong ; in the spirit, and accord- ing to the maxims of which he must act, if he would earn the praise of a good citizen. Not indeed that a good citizen and a good man are necessarily identical terms : they can only become so in the case of one who is a dutiful member of a rightly constituted commonwealth. The question necessarily arises, " How is this perfect form of polity to be determined ?" The answer is, that form of government is the best, which affords scope for the developement of the best part of our nature ; in other words, which produces the best men. Out of this circle, Aristotle cannot be said to have fairly extricated himself. He has in some measure approximated to a definite rule of morality in the doctrine, that every virtue lies between two opposite excesses. It must however be confessed, that a certain degree of vagueness prevails in his ethical speculations : a vagueness of which he was himself con- scious, and apparently despaired of satisfactorily remov- ing. Perhaps the mostvaluable part of his moral writings, is that in which he discusses the much vexed question of the relation of happiness to morality. Pleasure, he de- termines, can never be taken as a measure of actions, inasmuch as it is the uniform concomitant of all natural action whatsoever. {E(h. Nic. I. x.) His politics com- prise a most careful review of the most celebrated Grecian constitutions, and a generalization of the leading possible forms of government, with their various merits and de- fects, built on a careful induction from the great mass of varied facts and instances with which the history of his country supplied him. They are consequently in- valuable, alike to the curious in Grecian history, and to the political theorist ; and traces of their effects are suffi- ciently visible in the writings of perhaps all who have arrived at eminence in the latter department. «7 ARITHMETIC. The best edition of Aristotle's complete works is that of Bekker, 3 vols. 4to. Berlin, 1831. Of the Ethics, that of Michelet, with a commentary, 2 vols. 8vo. Berlin, 1835. Of the Politics, those of Schneider and Gottling. Of the Treatise de Anima, with copious notes, that of Tren- delenburg. Numerous editions of the Rhetoric have been published in Oxford. Of his Ancient Commentators, the best are Ammonius, Alexander Aphrodisiensis, Simpli- cius, and Thomas Aquinas. ARPTHMETIC. (Gr. ig/ff^a?, number.) The science of numbers, or that part of mathematics which is concerned with the properties of numbers. The ele- mentary operations of arithmetic, being necessary in transacting the ordinary aliairs of life, are perhaps as commonly known as the art of reading and writing, and therefore require no explanation ; the principles, how- ever, on which they depend are of a very general and highly refined nature. Every number, according to the definition of Newton, is, properly speaking, only a ratio, or relation. In order to explain this, it may be remarked, that every mag- nitude which we compare with another magnitude is either equal, or greater, or less, and, consequently, has a certain relation to that with which it is compared ; that is to say, it either contains it or is contained in it, in a certain manner. This relation, or manner of containing or being contained, is what we call number: thus the number 3 expresses the ratio which one magnitude has to another smaller than itself, which is taken for unit, and which the gi-eater contains three times. On the con- trary, the fraction ^ expresses the ratio of one magnitude to another greater than itself, wliich is taken as unit, and which contains the smaller three times. Having distinguished the numbers or relations of mag- nitudes, which we have conceived in our minds by par- ticular signs, arithmetic becomes the art of combining these relations with one another ; employing for this purpose the signs themselves by which the numbers are distinguished. Hence, the four operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, include the whole science: for all the different combinations that can be formed of ratios are reduced ultimately to an ex- amination of the excess of some above others, or of the way in which they contain one another. For the pur- pose, indeed, of facilitating commercial accounts, astro- nomical calculations, &c., many other very useful rules have been invented, such as the rules of proportion, in- terest, discount, alligation, position, extraction of roots, progression, &c. ; but, on attending to the operations prescribed by these rules, it is easy to see that they are only different applications of the four principal rules. The particular operations of arithmetic depend in their details on the system of characters by which numbers are represented. Our arithmetic, which is constructed on the denary system of notation, would be entirely changed if more or fewer characters than ten were employed. The Romans used a different notation, and their rules of arithmetic were entirely different from ours. But all arithmetic, in whatever manner numbers may be repre- sented, is ultimately reduced to the four operations or rules already mentioned. Strictly speaking, indeed, the fundamental rules may be reduced to two, addition and subtraction ; for multiplication is only an abridged method of repeatedly adding the same number to itself, and division only an abridged method of repeatedly sub- tracting one number from another. The numeral system of the Romans* was very ill adapted to the purposes of arithmetical calculation ; and, hence, in keeping their accounts, and in all their commercial transactions, they made use of the abacus. The astronomers of Greece contrived an ingenious system, by means of which they were able to perform the most complex arithmetical operations. {See Notation.) The Indian numerals, on which the modern system of practical arithmetic is founded, were received from the Saracens of Spain, and appear to have been partially in- troduced into the other countries of Europe in the four- teenth century ; but there is no evidence of their having come into general use before the invention of printing. The facility afforded by the Indian numerals in the per- formance of all numerical calculations has been one of the main causes of the great and rapid advancement of modern mathematical science. The first complete treatise on practical arithmetic, in which the numerals now in universal use were employed, was written by Tartalea, and published in the year 1556. It consists of two books, the first containing the appli- cation of arithmetic to the purposes of civil life; and the second the foundations of the principles of algebra. A less- perfect treatise had been published by Tunstall in 1526, and another by Stifel or Stifelius, 1544 : since that time works on the science have been almost infinite. Arithmetic acquires several distinctive appellations, from the particular manner in which it is used, or the purpose to which it is applied : thus, Binary Arithmetic. The art of expressing and com- bining numbers by pairs, and by means of two cha- G 4 ARITHMETICAL COMPLEMENT. racters only. A system of arithmetic of this sort was invented by Leibnitz, and also by De Lagni, and traces of it have been found in the early monuments of China. Suppose the two characters to be 1 and ; the zero mul- tiplying any number after which it is placed by 2, as in the denary scale, it multiplies the preceding number by 10, the first ten numbers on the binary scale would be represented thus: l = one, 10=two, ll=:three, 100=:four, 101 = five, 110=six, ]ll = seven, 1000=:eight, 1001=nine, 1010 = ten. Decimal Arithmetic, which requires a series of ten characters, the progression proceeding according to the powers of ten. It is this which is universally employed by modern nations ; the term, however, is generally applied to those operations in which fractions occur, the fractions proceeding according to the descending powers of ten ; that is, the unit is considered as divided into tenths, the tenths into hundredths, and so on. It is very remarkable that the Hindoos, who have so long been ac- quainted with the denary notation, are still ignorant of its application to fractions. The Moors, from whom it was transplanted into Europe, were equally unacquainted with this application. The invention of decimal frac- tions, which has doubled the efficiency of our arith- metical system, is generally ascribed to Kegtiomontanus. Duodecimal Arithmetic, in which the multiples and divisors of unity proceed according to the powers of 12. This is adapted to our system of lineal and superficial measures, in which the foot is divided into 12 inches, the inch into 12 lines, &c., and is accordingly generally used by artificers. Sexagesimal or Sexagenary Arithmetic, which descends by the powers of GO. The system of subdivision was introduced into the Alexandrian school by Ptolemy, for the purposes of astronomical calculation. The partition of the circumference of the circle into 360 degrees, was probably founded on the property that the chord of one- sixth of the circumference is equal to the radius. Having divided the radius into GO equal parts or primes, the angle of the hexagon naturally followed the same di- vision ; hence, one part or prime was equivalent to the 360th part of the whole circumference. The degree was by analogy subdivided into 60 minutes, the minute into 60 seconds, and so on. Ptolemy ascribes the reason of adopting this method of division to the facility which it affords in calculation ; and his commentator Tlieon adds that GO is the most convenient of all numbers, inasmuch as being sufficiently small it has a considerable number of divisors. Political Arithmetic. The application of arithmetic to researches connected with civil government, such as the number of inhabitants of a country, the quantity of food necessary for their consumption, the labour they can ac- complish, the mean duration of life, the produce of the soil, the frequency of fires or shipwrecks, &c. In apply- ing arithmetic to inquiries of this sort, we have three principal objects in view ; the first is to procure precise facts, the second to deduce from the observed facts the consequences to which they lead, and the third to deter- mine the probability both of the facts and the conse- quences. {See Statistics.) Universal Arithmetic. The name given by Newton to algebra, or the calculation of magnitudes in general. The operations of ordinary arithmetic are founded on two distinct classes of principles ; the first are indepen- dent of the particular signs by which numbers are ex- pressed, the second depend on those signs. The general properties of numbers, which are independent of any particular system of notation, form the subject of uni- versal arithmetic. ARITHME'TICAL COMPLEMENT — of a number is what it wants of the next higher decimal denomination. Thus 4 is the arithmetical complement of 6, because it is what 6 wants of 10. In like manner 43 is the arithmetical complement of 57, and 432 of 508 : the number and its complement, when added together, always producing a sum which is expressed by 1, followed by as many ciphers as there are digits in the number. It is used in logarithmic calculation to avoid the trouble of sub- traction: for example, if two logarithms are given, and a tliird is to be subtracted from their sum, the whole operation may be performed at once, by writing the re- ciprocal of the logarithm to be subtracted, and adding the three together. Arithmetical Mean between two numbers is a number such that its excess above the first is equal to its defect from the second, or it is a number equal to half their sum : thus 10 is an arithmetical mean between 7 and 13. An arithmetical mean among any number of quantities is found by adding all the quantities together, and dividing by the number. Thus, let there be six numbers, 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9 ; a mean among them is 5, for their sum is equal to 30, and 30 divided by 6 gives 5. Arithmetical Progressioti. A series of three or more numbers, such that each differs from that which precedes or follows it by the same number: thus, 3,3,7,9, 11, form an arithmetical progression, in which the common ARMINIANS. difference of the terms is 2. The general expression of this progression is a, a + d, « + 'i*f, a-\-^d. Sec. Arithmetical Proportion. Four numbers are said to be in arithmetical proportion, when the difference between the first and second is the same as the difference between the third and fourth : for example, 2, 5, 6, 9. Arithmetical Ratio. The difference between any two terms of an arithmetical progression. ARMA'DA. (Spanish military or naval force.) This name is peculiarly applied in English history to the fleet assembled bv' Philip II. in 1588, for the conquest of England. The Spaniards, with their usual inflation of language, termed it " Invincible." It consisted of 150 ships, carrying 2650 guns, and having on board 20,000 soldiers, besides volunteers, and 3000 seamen. The ac- count of its misadventures and dispersion is well known. The reader who is curious to consult a new and careful relation of this celebrated passage in history, will find it in Southey's Naval History of Great Britain, forming a part of the Cabinet Cyclopaedia. The best Spanish ac- count of the transaction will be found in Herrera. ARMADI'LLO. A Spanish epithet, applied to a genus of small South American macronykous or edentate quadrupeds, characterised by a defensive armour of small polygonal bony plates, which covers the head, trunk, and sometimes the tail. Linnasus applied to this genus the term Dasypus, by which the Greeks, with more propriety, designated the hare and rabbit. AR'MAMENT. (hat. Ar?namentum.) A force equip- ped for war, naval or military. In Roman antiquities, armamenta comprehended the rigging and tackling of a ship, its sails, sailyards, oars, ropes, &c. Hence " Arma " denotes the sails (Virg. ^En. v. 1..55.) and the rudder (ib. vi. 1.353.) of a vessel. ARMI'LLA. (Lat. armilla, a bracelet.) In Ornitho- logy, the coloured circle of the distal naked end of the tibia, above the tarsal joint. ARMI'LLARY SPHERE. (Lat. armilla, a bracelet.) An ancient astronomical machine, composed of an assem- blage of hoops or circles, representing the different circles of the system of the world, as the equator, the ecliptic, the colures, &c. put together in their natural order, and occupying their proper relative positions. ARMENIAN CHURCH. The Arminians are Chris- tians of the Eutj'chian or Monophysite doctrine, which recognises only one nature in the Saviour, viz. the Divine ; and the procession of the Holy Ghost from the Father only. They hold the seven sacraments of the Romish Church, and the doctrine of transubstantiation : their clergy is also divided into secular and regular. From the wide dispersion of the Arminians over the commercial regions of the east, their form of Chris- tianity is also considerably diffused, although it appears to be strictly a national church of which none but Ar- minians are members. Since the last war between Russia and Turkey (1829), the place where the principal of their four patriarchs resides (Etchmiadzine), has been transferred from the latter to the former government. There is also at Constantinople, and in other parts of the Levant, an Arminian Roman Catholic Church, owning the supremacy of the Pope. There is a well known congregation of Arminian monks on the island of San Lazaro, near Venice, who have published a variety of useful works in the language of their country. ARMENIANS. Those who hold the tenets of Ar- minius, a Protestant divine, born in Holland in the year 1.560. They are thus summed up : — 1st. God from all eternity determined to save all who he foresaw would persevere in the faith, and to condemn all who should continue in unbelief. 2d. Christ atoned for the sins of all mankind, but those only who believe partake of the benefit of that atone- ment. 3d. Man is of himself incapable of true faith ; therefore regeneration by the Holy Spirit, given of God through Christ, is necessary. 4th. All good works are to be attributed to the grace of the Holy Spirit, which, however, does not force a man against his own inclination. 5th. God gives to the truly faithful the means of con- tinumg such. With respect to the possibility of a de- fection from this state of grace, Arminius and Ins immediate followers expressed themselves undecidedly ; but it came afterwards to be considered a part of the character of Arminianism to affirm the possibility. The assertors of these opinions in Holland were vehe- mently attacked by the Calvinistic party, which was pre- valent at the time ; and in 1«?, lifting up, Bii/fti, / cut.) The opening of an artery : this operation is occasionally performed upon the temporal artery, with a view of reli4, p., &c. respectively ; also, let r be the rate of interest, and ?.'=-,— :"f:^, and sup- ASSURANCE. pose that the sum assured is to be paid at the end of the year in which the life fails. Now, the value of 1/. to be received at the end of the first year is v, but it will not bo received if the life continues to the end of the year ; and, as the probability that the individual will live over the year is />i, the probability that he will not live over it is 1—/71, therefore the value of 11. to be received at the end of the year, subject to the contingency of the life failing in the first year, is (1— pi,) v. The probability that the life will continue to the end of the second year is p^, and that it will continue one year only, pi, therefore pi — pi is the chance it will drop in the second year ; and tho value of 1/. to be received at the end of the second year is t»-, therefore the present value of 1/. to be received if the life fails in the second year is (pi — p2) v"^. In like manner, the probability that the life will fail in the third year is p2 — pa ; and the value of 1/. to be received at the end of three years is v^, therefore the present value of 1/. to be received at the end of three years, if the given life fails in the third year, is (p2 — Pi) i>^- The same process is continued from year to year, till the probability of living over a year becomes nothing. Now, the whole value of the assurance is manifestly equal to the sum of all its partial values for the different years ; therefore, denoting the value by I, we get I = (1 _p,) V -t- (pi —P2) V^ -I- {Pi—Pi) 1/3 + &c. or, separating this into two series, I = V {\ + pi V -If ;j2 V- -^ p. 1/3 -i- &c.) — iP\ f + y>2 V"^ ■\- p^ V^ + &C.) But it is shown in the article Annuity that the series Pi V -\- p^v^ + ps v^ + &c. denotes the value of an an- nuity of 1/. on a life, the probabilities of the continuance of which are represented as above ; therefore, calling this annuity A, we have I = « (1 -f- A) — A. Since v = j , ^., this formula becomes by substitution i = r^.(i-»-A). The sum now found js what ought to be paid down, in order to receive 1/. on the failure of the given life : but by far the most usual practice is to pay for the assurance by means of an annual premium, the first payment being immediate, and the others at the end of each successive year. Let tr be the annual premium ; then the value oi all the premiums after the first is obviously the same thing as the value of an annuity of the same amount, and is, consequently, equal to !r A. Hence, the value of all the premiums is t + a- A, or a- (1 + A), which is necessarily equivalent to the assurance. We have therefore the equation sr (1 + A) = w (1 -|- A) — A, A whence !r = v — j , ^ This formula is very easily computed when we are in possession of a table of annuities, and it shows at once the annual sum which an individual of any age ought to pay, in order to secure to his representatives 1/. (and, consequently, any other sum) at his death. Temporary Assurances. The values of temporary assurances, or engagements to pay a certain sum in case a given individual dies within a given number of years, are easily found from those on the whole of life. For example, let it be required to fiijd what sum ought to be paid for I/., to be received if an individual now aged 40 shall die within seven years. Let I be the value of 1/. to be paid on the death of a person aged 40, and I7 the present value of the same sum, to be paid on the death of a person aged 47. Seven years after this the value of an assurance of \l. on the death of the person now aged 40 will be 17 ; but the present value of IZ., to be received certainly at the end of seven years is v'^, and the probability that the life v/ill continue seven years is pn ; therefore the present value of I7, on the contingency that the life will not fail within seven years, is p^ z»7 I7 ; subtracting this from I, the value of \L to be received certainly at his death, there remains I — p-j v'^ l7, to denote the value of the tem- porary assurance. This may be expressed by the follow- ing rule. Multiply the assurance on a life seven years older than the given life by the present value of 1/., pay- able seven years hence, and also by the probability that the given life will survive seven years ; subtract the product from the assurance on the given life, and the re- mainder is the value of a temporary assurance for seven years in a single payment. In order to find the equivalent annual payment, it must be recollected that the first payment is made imme- diately, and that seven payments are to be made in all ; consequently, all the payments after the first are equal to a temporary annuity of the same amount for six years, or one year less than the given term ; consequently, if -r represent the annual premium, and A', a temporary an- nuity of 1/. for one year less than the given term, the value of all the premiums to be received is sr -|- sr A' or jr (1 + A'), which by hypothesis is equal to the as- surance ; consequently, to find the annual premium, we have to divide tho value of the temporary assurance iu a single payment by 1 -f- A'. H ASSURGENT. In the same manner, the value of an assurance on any number of joint lives is found : it is only necessary to substitute for A in the above formulas, the value of an annuity on the joint lives. Thus, let M be the value of an annuity, to continue while A and B both live, then V (1 + M) — M is the value of an assurance to be paid at the end of the year in which the first of the two lives shall fail, and the equivalent annual payment M A very important class of assurances comprehends those in which the contract is to pay a sum on the death of one party, provided that another party shall be then alive. The computation of the values of such contracts is somewhat more intricate, and cannot be explained without entering into details respecting the manner of combining the probabilities of life, which our limits will not permit. For assurances on ships and goods, see Insurance. ASSU'RGENT. (Lat. assurgere, to mew/j.) Rising in a curve from a decurved base. A'STACUS. (Lat. astacus, a lobster.) The name of a Fabrician genus of insects, and now the type of a family {Astacidce) of Decapod, Macrourous, or long-tailed Crustaceans ; including the lobsters (Astacus Leach), the craw-fish {Potamobius Leach,) and the cray-fish or spiny lobsters (Palmurius Leach). The distinguishing character is derived from the antennae, the two pairs of which are inserted in the same horizontal line ; the mesial ones having moderate or long footstalks, termi- nated by two filaments ; the outer ones naked, or furnished with a scale, which never entirely conceals the base. A'STERISK. In Diplomatics, a sign in the figure of a star, frequently met with in ancient Latin manuscripts, and seeming to serve various purposes ; sometimes to denote an omission, sometimes an addition, sometimes a passage which appeared remarkable on any account to the copyist. A'STERISM, in Astronomy, denotes a collection of stars. It was formerly used in the same sense as con- stellation, but is now generally appropriated to any small cluster of stars, whether forming part of a particular constellation, or otherwise. A'STEROI'DS. A fantastical name by which the four small and recently discovered planets, namely, Juno, Vesta, Ceres, and Pallas, have been sometimes desig- ASTE'RN. (A, and stern.) A sea term, denoting, in the hinder part of the ship, or behind the ship. ASTHE'N IC. (Gr. x, without, and irdivo;, strength.) Asthenic diseases are those which are prominently marked by great and direct debilitv. A'STHMA. {Gr. Ua-d/^aUu, I breathe hard.) A dis- ease, the leading symptoms of which are difficulty of breathing, coming on at intervals, accompanied with cough, and more or less expectoration. The fit most fre- quently occurs in the night during the first sleep, sud- denly awaking the patient, and lasting for three or four hours or more. It is a terrible, but in itself rarely a fatal, disease, though it often lays the foundation of or- ganic mischief. Its proximate cause has not been very clearly ascertained. A' S T O M O U S. ( Gr. «, without, and g-To/j,ct, a 7nouth.) Certain mosses whose theca has no aperture. A'STRAGAL (Gr. ao-rjayaXsj, a die or huckle bone.) In architecture, a small moulding whose profile is semi- circular. Some have said that the French call it talon, and the Italians tondine ; but this is a mistake, and the word is only properly applied to the ring which separates the capital from the column. The astragal is sometimes cut into representations of beads and berries, and a si- milar sort of moulding is used to separate the faces of ASTRA'GALUS. {Gr. a.j.) In Greek Mythology, the personifi- cation of Revenge, Punishment, or Fatality. See Hom. II. lib. xix. A' TELES. (Gr. i,TtXi;s, imperfect.) A genus of South American monkeys, characterized by the absence or ru- dimental condition of the thumb of the anterior hands. The deterioration of these members as prehensile organs is compensated by a very efficient prehensile tail. ATELLA'NjE FA'BULiE. A species of comedy which had its origin among the Oscan inhabitants of Campania, from a town of which country, Atella, it de- rived its name. It was much in vogue at Rome, and it was not thought disgraceful for persons of gentle blood to take parts in its exhibitions, as was the case in the other species ol drama. The language used in the attel- lanae fabulae was Oscan, and the plots and style of the dialogue, unrestrained by any fixed rules, partook of the nature of comedy, farce, and burlesque, but was not stained by licentiousness, till the degenerate morals of the empire drew them too into the general vortex of cor- ruption. A TEMPO GIUSTO. (Ital. in correct time.) In music*, a direction to the performer, generally after a re- citative, to keep the measure true and correct, which, during the recitative, was performed to suit the action and passion of the scene. ATHA'LAMOUS. (Gr. i, without, and B-eiXet/xo;, a bed.) Lichens whose thallus is not furnished with shields or beds for the spores ; in these the reproductive matter is supposed to be dispersed through the substance of the crust, as in l^praria. ATIIANA'SIAN CREED. A confession of faith, which is described in the rubric of the Common Prayer Book, which appomts it to be read on certain days, as commonly called the Creed of St. Athanasius. That it was really composed by fliat father is more than doubtful : modern divines seem generally to assent to the judgment of Waterland, who considers it to have been written by Hilary. A'THEIST. (Gr.a, tvithout, and ^io;, God; without God.) One who denies the existence of a God, or a Pro- vidence. ATHENiE'UM. (Greek.) In Antiquity, a public place where the professors of the liberal arts held their assemblies, the rhetoricians declaimed, and the poets rehearsed their performances. There were various places of this kind at Athens. The emperor Adrian es- tablished a famous Athenaeum on the Capitoline hill at Rome, and at a later period there was another of nearly equal celebrity at Lyons. In modern times the name has been frequently bestowed upon establishments con- nected with learning, and upon public clubs or libraries frequented for convivial or literary purposes. ATHERI'CF.RA. (Gr. partners, was repealed ; and the issue of notes for less than bl. was also forbidden. The last measure has, no doubt, shut up one of the easiest channels through which the inferior order of country bankers used to get their paper into circulation, and has been in so far advantageous. But abundance of other channels are still open to them ; and the fact that a third nart of all the private banks existing in England and "Wales in 1792 were destroyed during the revulsion of that vear, though no notes for less than 5/. were then in circulation, shows how little the suppression of small notes can do to obviate the mischiefs complained of. Very important advantages were, however, expected to result from the other measure, or that repealing the act of 1708, and consequently allowing the formation of joint stock banks, or banks with any number of partners. But these anticipations have proved to be nearly, if not quite, fallacious. There cannot, in fact, be a greater error than to suppose that because a bank has a considerable number of partners it will necessarily be either rich or well managed. It may be neither the one nor the other. A single mdividual may possess more wealth than a number of individuals associated together ; and the chances are, that if he engage in binking, or any other business, it will be better managed than by a company. Under our present system, and in fact it is impossible to prevent it under any system, the partners in joint stocks, or in other banks, may be men of straw, or persons without property, and unable to fulfd their engagements. It is of the essence of a secure and well established paper currency that the notes of wbich it consists should be of the exact value of the gold or silver they profess to represent, and that, consequently, they should be paid the moment they arc presented. But it is not enough to order that this condition shall be uniformly complied w.th. Such order \i obeyed only by the opulent, prudent, and conscientious banker*, and forms little or no check on the proceedings of those of a contrary character. It is the latter class, however, that it is especially necessary to look after ; and it is needless to say that any system that permits notes to be issued without let or hindrance by speculative, ignorant, or unnrincipled adventurers, must be essentially vicious. The progress of the system oF jomt stock banking, or of banks with more than six partners, since 1826, wlien it commenced, has been as follows : — Banks. In 1833 were registered 9 1834 — 10 1835 _ 9 1836 — 45 7o4 Banks. In 1826 were registered 3 1827 — 4 1828 — 1829 — 7 1830 — 1 1831 — 9 1832 — 7 In point of fact, however, the joint stock banks have each at an average from five to six branches ; and as these branches transact all sorts of banking business, and enjoy the same credit as the parent establishment, from which they are frequently at a great distance, they are to all intents and purposes so many distinct banks. Hence, instead of 104, there were really above 500 joint stock banks in England and Wales in 1836, of which no fewer than 200 were opened in the course of that year! Some private banks have latterly been converted into joint stock bank?, and others have wound up their affairs and ceased to exist ; still, however, their number amounts to about 550 ; so that, in all, there are at this moment nearly 1,100 joint stock and private banking establish- ments in England and Wales. From a half to two thirds of these establishments issue notes. Previously to 1833, the notes of the country banks were made payable in gold ; but it was then enacted that they might be paid either in gold or Bank of England notes, at the option of the issuers. Bank of England notes are now, in fact, legal tender everywhere except at the bank and her branches. The dividends on Bank of England stock from 1767 to the present time have been— from 1767 to 1781, 5i per cent, per annum ; from 1781 to 1788, 6 per cent. ; from 1788 to 1807, 7 per cent. ; from 1807 to 1823, lOper cent. ; and from 1823 to 1838, 8 per cent. The dividends are ex- clusive of the sums occasionally advanced as bonuses : the latter amount since 1799 to 3,783,780/. over and above an increase in the capital of the bank in 1816, which amounted to 2,910,600/. Defects in our present Banking System — Suggestions for its Improvement The issue of notes is of all busi- nesses that which seems to hold out the greatest prospect of success to the schemes of those who attempt to get rich by preying on the public. The cost of engraving and issuing notes is but an inconsiderable item compared with the sums for which they are issued ; and provided they get into any thing like extensive circulation, they become, at once, considerably productive. They are not issued, except on the deposit of bills or other securities yielding a considerable rate of interest ; so that if an individual, or set of individuals, with little or no capital, contrive, by fair appearances, promises, and similar devices, to in- sinuate himself or themselves into the public confidence, and can maintain 20,000/., 50,000/., or 100,000/. in circu- lation, he or they secure a good income in the meantime ; and when the bubble bursts, and the imposture is de- tected, they are no worse off tlian when they set up their bank. On the contrary, the presumption is that they are a great deal better off; and that they have taken care to provide, at the cost of the credulous and deceived public, a reserve stock for their future maintenance : hence, seeing the facilities for committing fraud are so very great, the propriety, or rather necessity, of providing against them. It has sometimes been contended, in vindication of our present system, which allows any individual or set of in- dividuals, how bankrupt soever in fortune and cha- racter, to issue notes without check or limitation of any kind other than the promise to pay them on demand, that they axe e&5cntia\\y private paper ; that the accepting of them in payment is optional ; and that as they may be re- jected by every one who either suspects or dislikes them, there is no room or ground for interfering with their issue ! But every body knows that whatever notes may be in law, they are in most parts of the country practi- cally and in fact legal tender. The bulk of the people are totally without power to refuse them. The currency of many extensive districts consists in great part of country notes ; and such small farmers or tradesmen as should decline taking them would be exposed to the greatest inconveniences. Every one makes use of or is a dealer in money. It is not employed by men of business only, but by persons living on fixed incomes, —women, labourers, minors ; and in short by every class of indivi- duals, very many of whom are necessarily, from their situation in life, quite unable to form any estimate of the BANK. Bolidity of the different banks whose paper is in circula- tion. Such parties are uniformfj' severe sufferers by the failure of banks. The paper that comes into their hands is a part of the currency or money of the country ; and it is quite as much a part of the duty of government to take measures that this paper shall be truly and substantially what it professes to be, as that it should take measures to prevent the issue or spurious coins or the use of false * or deficient weights and measures. Now it will be found, should the circulation of provin- "cial notes be allowed to continue, that there is but one means of making sure of the solvency of the issuers, and of providing for their being paid when presented ; and that is, by compelling all issuers of such notes to give security tor their payment. This, and this only, will hinder the circulation of spurious paper, and afford a sufficient guarantee that the notes the public are obliged to take are really and in fact what they profess to be. The measure", too, is one that might be easily enforced. To carry it into effect, it would merely be necessary to order that all Individuals or companies, on applying for stamps, should be obliged, previously to their obtaining them, to lodge in the hands of the commissioners an assignment to government stock, mortgages, landed or other fixed property, equivalent to the amount of the stamps issued to them, to be held in security for their payment. It has been objected to this plan, that it would be in- jurious,, by locking up a portion of the capital of the banks ; but this is plainly an error. Its only effect in this respect would be to force such banks as issued notes to provide a supplemental capital, as a security over and above the capital required for conducting their busi- ness. But this supplemental capital would not be un- productive. If it consisted of lands, the owners would receive the rents ; and if it consisted of government securities, they would receive the dividends or interest due upon them, precisely in the same way that they are received by other persons ; while the fact being known that they possessed this supplemental capital, or that they had lodged security for the payment of their notes, would, by giving the public perfect confidence in their stability, enable them to conduct their business with a less supply of floating or immediately available capital than would otlierwise be necessary. It is absurd to object to this plan on the ground of its interfering with the private pursuits of individuals. It is the duty of government to interfere to regulate every business or pursuit that might otherwise become publicly injurious. On this principle it interferes to prevent the circulation of spurious coins, and of notes under a certain sum and not payable on demand ; and on the same prin- ciple it is called on to interfere to prevent the act order- ing the payment of notes becoming again, as it has very frequently done already, a dead letter, by making sure that it shall be complied with. The interference that would take place under the proposed measure is not only highly expedient, but would be of the least vexatious kind imaginable. All that is required of the persons applying for stamps for notes is, that they should deposit in the hands of the commissioners a certain amount of exchequer bills, or other available securities, according to their demand for stamps. They are not asked to state how they mean to dispose of these stamps, — to whom or in what way they are to be issued. 1 hey are merely required to give a pledge that they shall be paid, or that they shall not be employed, as so many others have been, to deceive or de- fraud the public. It is little else than an abuse of lan- guage to call this an interference with private affairs. The taking of security in the way now suggested, from the issuers of notes, would effectually provide for their payment when presented. Adventurers without capital, and sharpers anxious to get themselves indebted to the public, would find that banking was no longer a field on which they could advantageously enter. Notes would be made, in fact as well as in law, equivalent to the specie they profess to represent ; and the paper currency would acquire a solidity of which it is at pre ont wholly desti- tute. But though the plan of taking security would com- pletely obviate the risk of loss from the circulation of worthless paper, or of paper issued by parties without the means, and probably also the inclination to pay it on presentation, it would not touch another abuse inherent m the present system; that is, it would leave the currency exposed, as at present, to all those constantly recurring fluctuations in its amount, those alternations of glut and deficiency, by which it has been affected since provincial banks became considerably multiplied, and which are in the last degree injurious. A paper currency is not in a sound or wholesome state, unless, 1st, means be taken to insure that each particular note or parcel of such currency be paid immediately on demand; and unless, 2nd, the whole currency vary in amount and value exactly as a metallic currency would do were the paper currency withdrawn and coins substituted in its stead. The la«t condition is quite as indispensable to the existence of a well-established currency as tlie former ; and it is one that cannot be realised otherwise than by confining the issue of paper to a single source. It is supposed by many that there can be no greater fluctuations in a paper than in a metallic currency, pro- vided the paper rest on an undoubted basis, and be regularly paid the moment it is presented. But this is an error. Wherever there are numerous issuers, there may be, and the chances are fifty to one there will bo, perpetually recurring fluctuations in the amount and value of the currency. An over-issue of convertible paper is not, of course, indicated by any difference be- tween the value of such paper and gold at home ; but it is indicated by a fall of the exchange, and by an efilux of bullion to other countries. If paper were only issued by the Bank of England, or some one source in London, and then only in exchange for bullion, the currency would be in its most perfect state, and would fluctuate exactly as it would do were it wholly metallic. But at present it is quite otherwise. The currency is supplied by hundreds of individuals and associations, all actuated by different and frequently conflicting views and inte- rests. The issues of the Bank of England, though not always are generally governed by the state of the ex- change, or rather by the influx and efflux of bullion, increasing when it flows into and decreasing when it flows out of the country. But it is quite otherwise with the provincial bankers. Their issues are not regulated by any such standard, but by the state of credit and prices in the districts in which they happen to be situ- ated. If their managers suppose that these are good or improving, they rarely hesitate about making additional issues. Hence, when the state of the exchange and the demand on the Bank of England for bullion show that the currency is redundant, and ought to be contracted, the efforts of the bank to effect its diminution are often impeded, and met by a contrary action on the part of the country banks. This is not owing to the ignorance of the latter. Under the supposed circumstances, the country bankers see, speaking generally, that they ought also to contract ; but being a very numerous body, com- prising several hundred, establishments scattered over all parts of the country, each is impressed with the well- founded .conviction that all that he could do in the way of contraction would be next to imperceptible : and no one ever thinks of attempting it, so long as he reels satisfied of the stability of those with whom he deals. Oa the ' contrary, every banker knows, were he to withdraw a portion of his notes, that some of his competitors would most likely embrace the opportunity of filling up the vacuum so created; and that consequently he should lose a portion of his business, without in any degree lessening the amount of paper afloat. Hence, in nine- teen out of twenty instances, the country banks go on increasing their aggregate issues long after the exchange has been notoriously against the country, and the Bank of England has been striving to pull up. The circumstances now stated were strikingly exem- plified in the course of 1836 and the early part bf 1837. The excessive multiplication of joint stock banks in 1836, the great additions they made to the number of notes afloat, and the still greater additions they made to the number of bills, checks, and other substitutes for money, occasioned a redundancy of the currency, a fall of the exchange, and a drain upon the Bank of England for gold. But while the latter was narrowing her issues, by supplying the exporters of bullion with gold in ex- change for notes, the country banks went on increasing their issues I What the former did by contracting on the one hand, the latter more than undid by letting out on the other. The vacuum created by the withdrawal of Bank of England paper was immediately filled up, and made to overflow by the issue of a more than equal amount of provincial paper ; so that had it not been for the rise in the rate of interest, and the other repressive measures adopted by the bank, the probability is that she might have gone on paying away bullion for notes till she was drained of her last sixpence, without in any degree affecting the exchange. But this is not all. Not only do the country banks almost universally increase their issues when they ought to be diminished, but the moment they are compelled to set about their reduction they run headlong into the opposite extreme, and unreasonable suspicion takes the place of blind unthinking confidence. The cry of sauve qui peut then becomes all but universal. It is seldom that ^ recoil takes place without destroying more or fewer of the provincial banks ; and, provided the others succeed in securing themselves, little attention is usually paid to the interests of those they have taught to look to them for help. We have previously noticed the bankruptcy and dis- tress entailed on the country by the over-issue and con- sequent failure of the country banks in 1814, 1815, and 1816, and again in 1825—26, The influence of the re- vulsion in 1792 was similar, and equally disastrous ; and though, owing to the assistance afforded by the Bank of England, the crisis of 1836 was very much mitigated, it BANK, seriously afftictcd the industry and commerce of the empire, and inflicted a blow upon them both from the effects of which they have not as yet (1838) recovered. Although, therefore, the exacting of security for their payment from the issuers of notes would protect the Holders from loss, and be in so far advantageous, it would not hinder that competition among the issuers that is so very injurious, nor prevent the supply of paper being at one time in excess and at another deficient. If we would provide for that unity of action on the part of the issuers, and that equality in the value of money, that are so in- dispensable, it must all emanate from one source. Were one body only entrusted with the issue of notes, it would be able immediately to narrow the currency when bullion began to be exported, and to expand it when it began to be imported ; and it would be easy for the legislature to lay down and enforce such regulations as would effectually prevent the fluctuations in the amount and value of the currency ever exceeding those that would take place were it wholly metallic. But nothing of the sort need be expected so long as it is supplied by more than one source. Everything must then be left to the discretion of the parties. And it will certainly happen in time to come, as it has Invariably happened in time past, that some of them will be increasing their issues when they, should be diminished, and diminishing them when they should be increased ; and that the country will continue to be exposed to the incessant recurrence of the most destructive revulsions. Statement of the Affairs of the Bank of England, February 29. 1832. Dr. To bank notes outstanding To public deposits, viz. — Drawing accounts Balance of audit roll Life annuities unpaid Annuities for terms of years") unpaid - - -j" Exchequer bills deposited To private deposits, viz.— Drawing accounts - . 5,683,870 ? Various other dtbts - - 54,560 f To the Bank of England for the capital To balance of surplus in favour of the Bank l of England - . .J 2,034,790 650,350 85,030 38,560 490,000. 5,738,430 14,553,000 2,637,760 - 3,428,3401 697,000 I 7,600 f ' Exchequer bills on the growing produce of the consolidated fund in the quarter ending 5thof April, 1832 5th of July, 1832 Exchequer bills on supplies') 1825 - . '^'^ -f Ditto for 10,.'500,000?. for 1825 2,000 J By the advances to the trustees appointed-, by the Act 3 Geo. 4. c. 51. towards the ! purchase of an annuity of 585,740/. for ( 4 1 years, from 5th of April, 1823 - --• By other creditors, viz. — Exchequer bills purchased Stock purchased Loans on mortgages London Dock Company Advances on security of various! articles - - -J By cash and bullion ... 6,293,: By the permanent debt due from govern- 1 j^ ggg . 2,700,0001 764,600 500,000 2,951,970 1,452,100 227,600 570,690 10,897,880 9,166,860 Rest, or surplus brought down Bank capital due to proprietors 2,637,760 - 14, 563,000 Account of the Amount of the Notes of the Bank of England in Circulation, of the Deposits in the Hands of the Bank, of all Securities held by the Bank, of Bullion in her Coffers, and of the Rest or Surplus Capital of the Bank, on the last Day of February in each of the following Years. 1778 1779 1780 1781 1782 1783 1784 1785 1786 1787 1788 1789 1790 1791 1792 1793 1794 1795 1796 1797 1798 1799 1800 1801 1802 1803 1804 18a5 1806 1807 1808 1809 1810 1811 1812 1813 1814 1815 1816 1817 1814 1819 1820 1821 1822 1823 1824 1825 1826 1827 1828 1829 18.T0 1831 18.12 7,440,330 9,012,610 8,410,790 7,092,450 8,028,880 7,675,090 6,202,760 6,923,090 7,581,960 8.329,840 9,561,120 9,807.210 10,040,540 11.439.200 11.307,380 11,888,910 10.744.020 14,017,510 10,729.520 9,674.780 13,095,830 12.959.800 16.844,470 16,213.280 15,186.880 15.319,930 17.077,830 17,871.170 17,730,120 16.950.680 18,188,860 18,542.860 21,019,600 23,360,220 23,408,320 23.210,930 24.801,080 27,261.650 27,013,620 27,397,900 27.770,970 2.5,126,700 23,484.110 23,884,920 18.665..-550 18,392.240 19,736,990 20,753,760 25.467,910 21.890,610 21.980,710 19,870,8.50 20.050,730 19,600,140 18,051,710 Deposits. 4,662,1.50 4,358,160 4,723,890 6,796.830 6,130 ,.^00 4,465,000 3,903,920 6,669,160 6,161,660 5,902,080 6,177,0.50 6,537,370 6,223,270 6,364,550 6,523,370 5,.'546,450 7,891,810 6,973,020 6,702,360 4,891,5.->0 6,148,900 8,131,820 7,062,680 10,745,840 . 6,858,210 8,050,240 8,676,830 12,083,620 9,980,790 11,829,320 11,961,960 9,982,950 12,457,310 11,445,650 11,595,200 11,268,180 12,455,460 11,702,250 12,388,890 10,825,610 7,997,.550 6,413.370 4.093^560 5,622,890 4,689,940 7,181,100 10,097,850 10,168,780 6,935,940 8.801,660 9,198,140 9,553,960 10,763,150 11.213,530 8,9.17,170 7,898,292 8,862,242 ! 9,145,659 8.640,073 10.346,055 10.016..'549 7,789.291 7,198.564 6,836.459 7,642,587 7,833,857 8,249.582 8,-^47,387 10.380,358 9.938,799 9,549,209 9,950,756 13,164,172 12,961,812 11,714,431 11,241,3.33 11,510,677 13,975,663 15.958,011 14.199,094 9,417,887 14,684,686 16,889,601 14,813,599 13,452,871 14,149,.501 14,743.425 14,322,634 17,201,800 22,127,253 25.OT6,626 23,6.30,317 27,512,804 19,425,780 25,638,808 26,913,360 22,355,115 21,716,168 16,010,990 12,478,133 13,6.58,829 14,341,127 19,447,588 20,573,258 18,6S5,015 19,818,777 19,7.'56,665 20,038,890 19,927 ..572 18,497,448 3,322,228 2.073,668 1.755.371 2,546,067 3,448.015 2,779,431 3,829.929 4.97.1.926 3,516,781 3,716,463 4,030,653 2,711,108 1,984 7.53 2,222,282 3.129.761 6,456,041 4.57.V94 3,647,168 4.188,028 5.123,319 5,558,167 6,528,353 7,448,387 10,466,719 7,760,726 14,497,013 12,314,284 11,771,889 11,777.471 13,955,589 13,234,579 14,374,775 21,055,946 19,920,.5.50 15,899,037 12,894,324 18,3.59.593 17,045,696 23,9-5,5.T0 8,739,822 3,991,970 9,099,8.85 4,472„?22 4,785,280 3,494,947 4,660,901 4,.5.30,873 5,503,742 12,.346,.'?22 4,844,515 3,762,193 6,648,085 4,165,500 5,281,408 5,S.-56,OJ2 12G 2,010,690 3,711,150 3,581,060 3,279,940 2,157,860 1,321,190 655,840 2,740,820 5,979.090 5,626;690 5,743,440 7.228,730 8,633,000 7.869,410 6,468.060 4,010,680 6,987,110 6,127,720 2,539,630 1,086,170 6,828,940 7,563,900 6,144,250 4,640,120 4,152,950 3,776,750 3,.372,140 6,883,800 5,987.190 6,142,840 7,8.55,470 4,488,700 3,501,410 3,.350,940 2,983,190 2,884,500 2,204,430 2,036,910 •4,B40,S80 9,680,970 10,0.55,460 4,184,620 4,911,0.50 11.869,900 11,057,1.50 l(t,.384,2.30 1.5.8 10,060 8,779,100 2,459,510 10,1.59,020 10,347,290 6,835,020 9,17],0(>O 8,217,0.50 5,29.1,1.50 Rest, or Surplus Capital. 1,128,730 1,276,290 1,347,410 1^676,800 1,792,7.50 1,976,880 2,168,380 2,321,060 2,598,710 2,753,820 2,869,780 2,844,840 2,701,310 2,668,300 2,705,870 2,780,570 2.875,830 2,948,530 3,247,.590 3,357.610 3,383,710 3,511,310 3,661,150 4,105.730 4,067,680 4,321,480 4,616,450 4,590,400 4,867,.350 4,771,300 6,088,730 5,081,090 6,403,080 5,667,420 6,005,960 6,336,340 6.937.800 7,631,510 8,639,680 5.736,090 5,192,270 4,099,.550 3,520,880 3,158,360 3,674,940 3,130,620 2,847,220 2,807,890 2,974,240 2,996,280 2,749,710 2,794,960 2.561,510 2,612,.160 2,6.'?7,760 BANK, Average Quarterly Account of the Liabilities, Assets, and Surplus or Rest, of the Bank of England, as ordered bv theAct3&4 Will. IV. cap.98. ' Notes in Circulation. Deposits. Securities. Bullion. Rest, or Surplus Capital. 1834. January 1. »..'• ■- ■- : September 23. - December 18. 1835. January 15. April 7. - - - June 30. September 22. • December 15. 1836. January 12. Aprils. July 1. September 22. - December 15. 1837. January 10. April 4. June 27. - - - September 19.- December 14. 1838. January 12. L. 18,216,000 19,097,000 18.895,000 19,126,000 18,304,000 18.012,000 18.591,000 18,315,000 18,240,000 17,821,000 17,262.000 18,063,000 17.899,000 18,147,000 17,361,000 17,422,000 18,432,000 18,202,000 18,814,000 J 7,998,000 17,000,000 L. 13.101,000 14,011.000 15.096,000 14,754,000 12,256,000 12,585,000 ll,289,0tl0 10,954,000 13,230,000 17,729,000 19,169,000 14,751,000 13,810,000 14,118,000 13,330,000 14,354,000 ii,i92,oeo 10,424,000 11.093,000 10,195,000 10,992.000 L. 23,596,000 25,970,000 27,593,000 28.591.000 26,362,000 26.390,000 16,328.000 25.678.000 27.888,000 31,048,000 31,954,000 27.927,000 27,153,000 29,406,000 28,971,000 30,365,000 28,843,000 26,932,000 26,605,000 22,727,000 22.606,000 9,948,000 9,431,000 8,695,000 7,695,000 6,720,000 6,741,000 6,329,000 6,219,000 6,261,000 6,626,000 7,076,600 7,801,000 7.362.000 5.71S000 4,545,000 4.287.000 4.071 000 4.750,000 6,303,000 8,172,000 8,895,000 L. 2,207,000 2,293,000 2,261,(X)0 2,506,000 2,522,000 2,534,000 2,677,000 2,628.000 2.679.000 2,624,000 2,599,000 2,914,0(10 2,8(i6,000 2,860,000 2,825,000 2,876.000 3,263.000 3,056,000 3,001,000 2,706,000 2,609,000 N. B. — The rest is found by adtljng together the circulation and deposits, and deducting their amount from the amount of the securitiet and bullion. All Account of the aggregate Number of Notes circulated in England and Wales by Priavte Banks, and by Joint- Stock Banks and their Branches, distinguishing Private from Joint Stock Banks. From Returns directed by 3&4 Will. IV. C.83. ^ Quarters ended Private Banks. Joint Stock Banks. Total. 18.-3. December 28. 8,836,803 1,315,.301 10,152,104 1834. March 29. 8,73.3,400 1,468,427 10,191, 8-;7 June 28. - 8,875,795 1,642,887 10,518,682 September 27. - 8,370.423 1,783,689 10,154,112 8,537,655 2,1-^2,173 10,659,828 1835. - March 28. - 8,231,206 2.188,954 10,420,160 June 27. - - 8,455,114 2,484.687 10,939,801 September 26. 7,912,587 2,508.036 10,420,623 — December 26. 8,."534,863 2,799,551 11.134.414 1S36. March 26. - 8,353,894 3.094.025 11,447,919 - June 25. 8,614.132 5,588.064 12,202,196 — September 24. 7,764.824 3,969.121 11,733,945 December 31. ... 7,753,500 4.258.197 18,011.697 1837. April 1. . . 7.275.784 3,755.279 11.031,063 _ July 1. . . 7,187.673 3.684,764 10.872.437 _ September 30. 6.701.996 3,440,053 10.142,049 — December 30. 7.013,470 3,826,665 0,870,135 Scotch Banks.— The act of 1708, preventing more than six individuals.from entering into partnership for carrying on the business of banking, did not extend to Scotland. In consequence of this exemption, several banking com- panies, with numerous bodies of partners, have always existed in that part of the empire. The Bank of Scotland was established by act of parliament in 1695. By the terms of its charter it enjoyed, for twenty-one years, the exclusive privilege of issuing notes in Scotland. Its original capital was only 100,000/. ; but it was increased to 200,000/. in 1744, and now amounts to 1,500,000/., of which 1,000,000/. has been paid tip. The Royal Bank of Scotland was established In 1727. Its original capital was 151,000/. j at present it amounts to 2,000,000/., which has been all paid up. The British Linen Company was incorporated in 174G, for the purpose, as its name implies, of undertaking the manufacture of linen. But the views in which it origi- nated were speedily abandoned, and it became a banking company only. Its paid up capital amounts to 600,000/. Exclusively of the above, there are two other chartered banks in Scotland : the Commercial Bank, established in 1810; and the National Bank of .'^rotland, established in 1825. The former has paid up capital of 600,000/., and the latter of 500,000/. None of the other banking companies established in Scotland are chartered associations ; and the partners are jointly and individually liable to the whole extent of their fortunes for the debts of the firms. Some of them, as the Aberdeen Town and Country Bank, the Dundee Commercial Bank, the Perth Banking Com- pany, &c., have very numerous bodies of partners. Ge- nerally speaking, they have been eminently successful. An original share, 150/., of the stock of the Aberdeen Banking Company, established in 1767, is now (1838) worth no less, that 2,500/. Their affairs are uniformly conducted by a board of directors chosen by the share- holders. There are very few banks with less than six partners in Scotland. Almost all the great joint stock banks have numerous branches ; so that there is hardly a town or village of any consequence without two or more banks. 127 The Bank of Scotland began to issue one-pound notes as early as 1704, and their issue has since been continued without interruption. With only one exception, all tho Scotch banks issue notes ; and taking their aggregate circulation at from 3,500,000/. to 4,000,000/., it is supposed that from 2,000,000/. to 2,500,000/. consists of notes for 1/. In 1826 it was proposed to suppress one-pound notes in Scotland as well as in England ; but tne measure having been strongly objected to by the people of Scot- land, as being at once oppressive and unnecessary, was abandoned. There have been very few bankruptcies amongst the Scotch banks. This superior stability is to be ascribed to a variety of causes ; partly to the great wealth of the early established banks, which had a considerable influence in preventing an inferior class of banks acquiring any hold on the public confidence ; partly to the compara- tively little risk attending the business of banking in Scotland ; partly to the facilities afforded by the Scotch law for attaching a debtor's property, whether it consist of land or moveables ; and partly and principally, per- haps, to the fact of the Scotch banks being but indirectly and slightly affected by a depression of the exchange and an efflux of bullion. The circumstances now mentioned render it unne- cessary to enforce that suppression of local issues in Scotland which is so indispensable in England, where the system of provincial banking is of a very. inferior description, the risk attending the business much greater, and where any excess in the amount of the currency necessarily occasions a fall of the exchange and a demand for bullion. The commerce and population of Scotland are too limited, and that country is too remote from the metropolis, or from the centre of the moneyed world, the pivot on which the exchanges turn, to make it of importance that her currency should be Identical with that of England. We believe that the Scotch attach much more importance than it deserves to the issue of paper, and especially to the issue of one-pound notes ; still, however, we do not think that the circumstances are at present such as to call for or to warrant any attempt to introduce any material changes in their banking system. BANK FOR SAVINGS. All the Scotch banks receive deposits, even of the low itmnunt of 10/., and allow interest on them at from one to two per cent, below the market rate. But should a deposit be unusually large, as from 5,000/. to 10,000/., a special agreement is usually made with regard to it. This part of the system has been particularly advan- tageous. It, in fact, renders the Scotch banks a sort of savings' banks for all classes ; and their readily receiving all sorts of deposits at a reasonable rate of interest, has tended to diflUse a spirit of economy and parsimony among the people that would not otherwise have existed. The total deposits in the hands of the Scotch banks are be- lieved at present ( 1838)to exceed 25,000,000/., of which fully a half is understood to be in sums of from 10/. to 200/. The Scotch banks make advances in the way of dis- counts and loans, and on what are called cash. credits or cash-accounts. By the latter are meant credits given by the banks for specified sums to individuals, each of whom gives a bond for the sum in his account, with two or more individuals as sureties for its payment. Persons having such accounts draw upon them for whatever sums within their amount they have occasion for, repaying these advances as they find opportunity, but generally within short periods. Interest is charged only on the average balance which may be found due to the bank. The total number of these accounts in Scotland in 1826 was esti- mated at about 12,000 ; and it may now, perhaps, be taken at about 14,000. They are believed to average about 600/. ; few are for less than 100/., and fewer still above 5,000/. It has been contended by no less an authority than Adam Smith, that this species of accommodation gives the Scotch merchants and traders a double command of capital. " Thejr may discount their bills of exchange," says he, " as easily as the English merchants, and have, besides, the additional conveniency of their cash ac- counts." But this is an obvious error. The circulation will take off only a certain quantity of paper ; and to whatever extent it may be issued by means of cash- accounts, so much the less can be issued in the way of discounts. The advantage of a cash account does not really consist in its enabling a banker to enlarge his advances to his customers, but in the extreme facility It.affords of making them. An individual who has ob- tained such an account may operate upon it at any time he pleases, and by drafts for any amount ; an advantage he could not enjoy to any thing like the same extent, without an infinite deal of trouble and expense, were the loans and advances made to him through the discounting of bills. The Scotch banks draw upon London at twenty days' date. This is denominated the par of exchange between London and Edinburgh. Irish Banks The Bank of Iceland was established in 1783, and the same restriction as to the number of partners in other banks that formerly prevailed in England was enacted in its favour. Owing to that and other causes the bankruptcies of private banks have been more frequent in Ireland than in England. In 1821 this restriction was repealed, as respects all parts of the country more than 50 Irish miles from Dublin. Since that period several banking companies, with large bodies of partners, have been set on foot in different parts of the country : of these the Provincial Bank, founded on the Scotch model, is among the most flourishing. The charter of the Bank of Ireland expired in 1838 ; but it will continue to go on till it receive notice to that effect. The Irish as well as the Scotch banks issue notes for I/. For accounts as to Foreign Banks, see the art. " Paper Money and Banks," in the new ed. of the Encyclopedia Brittanica, and the authorities there referred to. BANK FOR SAVINGS. A bank established for the receipt of small sums deposited by the poorer class of persons, and for their accumulation at compound interest. Though not so well calculated as friendly societies to enable jthe labouring classes to provide against sickness and old age, savings' banks are very valuable institutions, and are eminently entitled to the public patronage and support. The want of a safe place of deposit for their savings, where they would yield them a reasonable in- terest, and whence they could withdraw them at plea- sure, has formed one of the most serious obstacles to the formation of a habit of accumulation among labourers. Public b.inks do not generally receive a less deposit than 10/. ; and there are but very few amongst the labouring classes who find themselves suddenly masters of so large a fium ; while, to accumulate so much by the weekly or monthly saving of a few shillings, ajipears at first view almost a hopeless task ; and should an individual have the resolution to attempt it, the temptation to break in upon his little stock at every call of nepessity might be too strong to resist. At all events, the progressive ad- dition of interest is lost during the penod of accumulation ; and it even frequently happens that the chest of the servant or labourer is not safe from the depredations of the dishonest ; while the very feeling of insecurity which such a circumstance inspires must operate as a fatjil check to habits of saving. A similar effect results from I!8 BANKRUPTCY. the instances that have often occurred, where those poor persons who had, in despite of every discouragement, accumulated a little capital, have been tempted, by the offer of a high rate of interest, to lend it to persons of doubtful characters and desperate fortunes, whose bankruptcy has involved them in irremediable ruin. It is plain, therefore, that nothing could be more advan- tageous with a view to the formation of those improved habits that must necessarily result from the diffusion of a spirit of frugality and forethought among the poor, than the institution of savings' banks, or places of safe, convenient, and advantageous deposit for their smallest savings. They are no longer tempted, from the want of facility of investment, to waste what little they can save from their expenditure in frivolous or idle grati- fications. They now feel assured that their savings, and the interest accumulated upon them, will be faitlifuUy preserved to meet their future wants ; and as there are very few who are insensil)le of the blessings of inde- pendence, there is no reason to suppose that they will be slow to avail themselves of the means of accumulation now in their power. All moneys paid into any savings' bank established ac- cording to the provisions of the act 9 Geo. 4. c. 92., aro ordered to be paid into the banks of England and Ireland, and vested in bank annuities or exchequer bills. The interest payable to depositors is not to exceed 2^d. per cent, per diem., or 3/. 8s. b\d. per cent, per annum. No depositor can contribute more than 30/. , exclusive of com- pound interest, to a savings' bank in any one year ; and the total deposits to be received from any one individual are not to exceed 150/. ; and whenever the deposits, and compound interest accruing upon them, standing in the name of any one individual, shall amount to 200/., no farther interest shall be paid upon such deposit. The number of depositors in savings' banks, in England. Wales, and Ireland, on the 20th of November, 1824, amounted to 499,207, and the deposits to 15,309,844/. giving an average deposit of SO/. 16*. to each. As far as we are aware, no return of the Scotch savings' banks has been published. BA'NKEUPTCY, in Law, is a peculiar condition, with reference to legal liabilities and disabilities, into which certain classes of persons only are liable to fall. The word is said to be of Italian origm, and derived from the ceremony usual in some towns in the middle ages of breaking the bench or counter (bancus) occupied in the public exchange by the merchant. The statutes respecting bankruptcy begin at the 34 H. 8., and end with those of the 6 G. 4. and 1 W. 4., in which the principles of the law on this head are now contained. Al! persons engaged in trade, if in other respects capable of making valid contracts, are liable to be made bankrupts. The proof of trading is, buying and selling with a view to profit by dealing generally with the public ; and it is a question of fact for the decision of a jury, whether a party be a trader or no. Acts of bankruptcy are of two sorts. 1. Such as tend to defraud or delay creditors. Such as departing from the realm under suspicious cir- cumstances ; keeping house ; making a fraudulent convey- ance, gift, or delivery of goods and chattels (in which all conveyances without >a consideration, or voluntary con- veyances, are included, and also conveyances or gifts to creditors with a fraudulent preference). 2. Such as are evidence of insolvency : as, for instance, a declaration of insolvency in the Gazette, a petition of insolvency in the Insolvent Debtors' Court, lying in prison twenty-one days after being arrested for a bond fide debt, or compounding under certain circumstances with a petitioning creditor. An assignment of the whole of a trader's effects for the benefit of his creditors is also an act of bankruptcy, on which a commission may be supported either imme- diately, or, under certain circumstances, within six months after such assignment has been made. An act of bankruptcy, concerted between a trader and his creditor with fraudulent views, is a contempt of court, and also an indictable offence. When an act of bankruptcy has been committed by a trader, a commission, or, as it is now termed, 9. fiat in the nature of a commission, maybe sued out (with certain exceptions) immediately, by a creditor or creditors to a stated amount : such creditor is then termed a petitioning creditor. The bankruptcy will then be held to have com- menced at the time when the act of bankruptcy on which the petition is supported was committed. The striking what is termed a docket in the bankrupt office gives priority of petitioning to a creditor. The fiat when issued is opened, and the circumstances necessary to constitute a bankruptcy proved before a commissioner of bankrupts. There are six commissioners, nominated accorsJing to the act of the 1st ye.ir of W. 4. ; and of these three together form a subdivision court for the purpose of acting in concert on questions of difficulty. The assignees of the estate and 90 feet in diameter, octagonal, and covered with a dome. The celebrated bronze gates by Lorenzo Ghiberi, which Buonarroti said were fit to be the gates of Paradise, ciiclo-e it. The baptistery at Pisa, designed by Diot'salv), was finished about 1160. It is octagonal, about 129 feet in diameter, and 179 feet high. We are not aware of any building of this sort having been erected in England. BA'PTISTS. A denomination of Christians, who deny the validity of infant baptism, and maintain the ne- cessity of immersion. These were also the principal tenets of the Anabaptists, or Rebaptizers, with whom, however, the modern Baptists ought not to be confounded. They are subdivided into two classes, the Particular (Calvinist) and the General (Arminian) Baptists. The mo ledging three orders of ministers ; of whom the messengers correspond to bishops, the elders to priests, and minis- tering brethren to deacons. Their churches are congre- gational, and in respect to the election of their own ministers independent. Each denomination has, how- ever, its general assembly, possessing some kind of authority over the whole community. The Baptists are numerous in Holland, where they are known by the title of Mennonites ; and in England they form one of the principal Dissenting bodies. BAR. A shoal often found lying across the mouth of iiver«, and also of harbours ; thence called bar harbours. Ai the sea breaks on these places. In bad weather the passage of a bar Is generally oangerous. 130 BARBER. Bar, Confetjekation of. In Politics, was an asso- elation of a few influential Polish nobles, formed at Bar, a small town of Podolia, in the year 1767, for the pur- pose of freeing their country from foreign influence. Their efforts, however, were eminently unsucccessful : the small bands of the patriots were annihilated one by one ; and their defeat gave rise to an event almost unprece- dented in history, — the partition of Poland by the three neighbouring powers. Bab. The bar or place in the courts of law where barristers or advocates plead : also where prisoners ac- cused of felony are stationed for arraignment and trial. Bar. In Heraldry, a kind of ordinary, resembling the fess, but containing only the fifth part of" the field, W here two bars are borne in an escutcheon, they are so arranged that the whole field appears divided into five parts. A field divided by horizontal lines into four, six, eight, ten, or twelve equal parts, with alternate tinctures, is termed barry of four, six, eight, &c. Bar. (Sax. Beop^an, toiar.) In Music, a line drawn vertically across the lines of the staff, including a certain quantity or measure of time, varying as the music is either triple or common. Bar, Eloquence of. See Eloquence. BA'RBA. (Lat. barba, a beard.) In Mammalogy, signifies the long tufl of hair dependent from the under jaw. In Ornithology, the same term is applied to the setiform or simple feathers, which in some species of birds depend from the skin covering the gullet or crop. In Ichthyology, a kind of spine, with the teeth pointing backwards. Barba. A beard; a terra used in Botany to denote any collection of long loose hairs into a tuft or crest, as on the petals of the iris. BARBA'DOES leg. A disease indigenous to Bar- badoes, in which the limb becomes tumid, hard, and misshapen. BA'RBARISM. (Gr.) In Rhetoric, an offence against purity of style or language, which consists in employing uncouth or antiquated expressions, or in assigning to terms a different signification from that which usage has con- ferred on them. BA'RBASTELLE. a small indigenous bat; Plecotus barbastellus, Lisson. B A'RBE L. An indigenous fresh-water fish ( Cyprinus barbtis, Linn.) which takes its name from the processes termed Barbels. BA'RBELLATE. (Lat. barba.) When the pappus of composite plants is bearded by short,stiff, straight bristles, as in Centaurea. Barbellulate is used when the rough- ness of the pappus is caused by extremely short points, as in Aster. BA'RBELS. Small cylindrical vermiform processes appended to the mouth of certain fishes, and subservient to the sense of touch. BA'RBER. (Lat. barba.) A person who makes a trade of shaving and dressing the hair of other people for money. It would seem that it is only where a state has made considerable progress in civilisation that this art begins ta flourisli. If we believe Varro, for instance (Plin. 7. .56.), it was not until the 454th year of the city that Ticinius Mena first imported barbers into Rome from Sicily. Their shops (Tonstrinae) soon became the resort of fashionable loungers and idlers ; and Horace, to indicate the extreme notoriety of a story, says that it was "omnibus et lippis notum et tonsoribus." Even the poorest citizens, according to the same author, sought refuge from their ennui in making a round of the barbers' shops : — Mutat coenacula, lectos. Balnea, tonsores. That the Romans paid great attention to this depart- ment of the toilet, is obvious from the ridicule thai was excited against any citizen whose hair bore marks of being cut " inaequali tonsore " (by a bungling barber). But besides shaving the beard, to the barbers of the Romans was assigned the delicate task of trimming the nails. Hence Plautus, Aulul. ii. 4. 33 — " Quin ipsi pridem tonsor ungues dempserat ; " and TibuUus, 1. 9. 11 — As early as the time of Hippocrates, some surgical operations were considered as degrading to physicians, and consequently fell to be performed by barbers. In France the council of Tours, m the year 1163, prohibited the clergy, who then shared with the Jews the practice of medicine in Christian Europe, from performing any bloody operation ; and from that time the barbers re- mained for some centuries in uninterrupted possession of the practice of surgery. In England also, early in the 16th century, the barbers were incorporated with the surgeons of London (32 Hen. 8. c.42.) ; but at the com- mencement of last century, when a new impulse was given to the science of surgery by the attainments and ability of many practitioners throughout Europe, th« i, BARBERRY. barbers were degraded from their honourable associa- tion with surgeons. (18 Geo. 2. c. 15.) In Holland and Germany to this day the barbers are wont to wield the lancet and the razor alternately. Nowhere, however, in these countries is the business of haircutting carried on by the barbers, but by a distinct and superior class, the friseurs. The barber's pole has given rise to many speculations and ingenious absurdities. The fact is, that the pole was the distinguishing characteristic of a few only, being a mark of superior skill, and indicated on the part of him who possessed it surgical as well as tonsorial ability. (For some curious remarks on the barbers of Edinburgh, vide Creech's Statistical Account of Edin- burgh.) BA'RBERRY. See Berberry. BA'RBICAN. A watch tower for the purpose of descrying the enemy: also the outer work or defence of a castle, or the fort at the entrance of a bridge. Apertures in the walls of a fortress for firing through upon the enemy are also called barbicans. Authors have ascribed to this word a French, Italian, Spanish, Saxon, and Ara- bic origin. BA'RBITON. An ancient musical instrument, some- what resembling the lyre. BAR'BULA. (Lat. barba, a beard.) A finely divided beard-like apex to the peristome of some mosses, as in the genus Tortula. BA'RC AROLLE. A song sung by the Venetian gon- doliers. A boat song (from the Italian barcarola). BARDS. The ancient poets of the Celtic tribes are so termed by the Roman writers. The etymology of the word is uncertain. According to the ancients, they ap- pear to have been the priests as well as the instructors of these tribes, and regarded with peculiar veneration. Lucan expressly mentions the doctrine of the immortality of the soul as one of their most characteristic tenets. After the introduction of Christianity the importance of tlie bards in society diminished ; but in Wales, Ireland, and other Celtic districts, they continued to be held in much honour. The most ancient compositions of Welsh bards which we possess (those of Taliessin, Aneurin, and Lvwarch) are supposed to be of the sixth century. BARE POLES. The masts without any sails upon them, the ship being at sea. Under bare poles, in general, implies that the wind is so high that no sail can be ex- posed to it. BA'RGAIN. See Contract. BARGE. (Gr. /Sa^;?, a kind of ship.) A general name given to flat-bottomed craft of a certain size employed on rivers and canals. Also one of the larger boats of a man of war, between 30 and 40 feet long. Barge is also a general term for boats of state or pleasure. BARGE BOARDS. (Sax. pypsan, ^o iar.) In Ar- chitecture, the inclined projecting boards placed at the gable of a building, which hide the ends of the hori- zontal timbers of a roof, and are frequently carved with trefoils, quatrefoils, flowers, and other ornaments. BARGE COURSE. In Architecture, that part of the tiling of a roof which projects beyond the external face of the gable of a building. BARI'LLA. The name given in commerce to the impure carbonate of soda, imported from Spain and the Levant. It is made by burning certain plants that grow upon the sea shore, especially the salsola soda, to ashes, which are fused into gre^ porous masses. (For an account of the places where it is produced, the quantities ship- ped from them, and the uses to which it is applied, see Af' Culloch's Commercial Dictionary. ) BA'RITONE. (Gr. /3«j«,-, heavy, and «>«;, a tone.) In Music, a high bass, which, in the ancient church music, is written with the F clef on the third line of the staflf. By the French it is called basse-taille. BA'RIUM. The metallic base of baryta; it is of a grey colour, more than twice as heavy as water, and is instantly oxidized by air and by water. BARK. (Ger. bergen,'*^ "'"*l''''*y "^1 agreeable sprightliness or ^iy&city. (Diet. Aca. Franc.) 110 BELLES-LETTRES. BE'LFRY. (Sax. bell, and Lat. ferre, to carry.) In Architecture, a tower or other place in which bells are hung. See Campanile. BE'LIAL. A Hebrew word, signifying wicked, worth- less, and unprofitable. In Scripture, the sons of Eli are called sons of Belial, for their idolatrous and criminal conduct (1 Sam.ii. 12.) ; and likewise the inhabitants of Gibeah, who abused the prophet's wife. ( Judg. xix. 22.) The apostle Paul (2 Cor. vi. 15.), in order to indicate in the strongest terms the high degree of virtue after which the Christian should strive, places Christ in direct oppo- sition to Belial. Our own epic poet has immortalized the infamy of Belial, by assigning, him a promineht place in his Pai-adise Lost. A fairer person lost not heaven ; he seemed For dignity composed, and high exploit. But all was false and hollow, though his tonpfue Dropped manna, and could make the worse appear The better reason, to perjjiex and dash Maturest counsels, for his thoughts were low : To vice industrious, but to nobler deed's Timorous and slothful, &c. ^ In the Paradise Regained, Milton represents even Satan as fired with indignation at the impiety of Belial, and as administering to him a sharp rebuke. ( Vide Addi- son's Critique on Milton in the Spectator.) To these quotations may be added an allusion to Belial by Wierus. (Pseudom. 919.) "Sunt quidam necromantici qui asserunt ipsum Salomonem, quodam die astutia cujusdam mulieris seductum, orando se inclinasse versus simulacrum Belial nomine." BELL. A vessel or hollow body of cast metal, formed to emit sound by the act of some instrument striking against it. Bells are probably of very ancient origin ; they are mentioned as worn upon the high priest's robes, in the book of Exodus (ch. xxviii. ver. 3.) They were used among the Greeks in camps and garrisons. Church bells are said to have been invented by Paulinus, bishop of Nola in Campania (whence the term Campana), about the year 400. They are first mentioned in England by Bede, towards the end of the seventh century. BELLA DONNA. {Atropa bella donna.) The deadly nightshade : it is an acro-narcotic poison. The name bella donna {handsome lady) is said to have been given from its having been used to improve the complexion. It contains the alkaloid atropia. BELLE'ROPHON. (Gr. ^iXU^txpovm; ; called also Hipponous.) In the fabulous history of Argos, the son of Glaucus, and grandson of Sisyphus {Pans. 2. 4.), who was obliged to flee from Corinth for the murder of Bellerus, and seek refuge at the court of Proetus. There Antasa, the wife of Proetus, conceived a violent attachment for him, which he requited as Joseph did the advances of Potiphar's wife. Nor does the analogy be- tween the cases end here ; for Antsea forthwith accused him to her husband of attempts on her virtue. Proetus, however, unwilling to violate the laws of hospitality, sent him to Tobates, king of Lycia, his wife's father, with a letter desiring him to put Bellerophon to death, and mentioning the cause. (Hence, a letter unfavour- able to the bearer was called " Literae Bellerophontis.") "With this view, Tobates sent him on various perilous expeditions : first, against the Chimaera, a dreadful monster, which continually vomited flames (Lucre, v. 902. ; Virg. Mn. vi. 288. vii. 785.), and which at that time devastated the country of Lycia, having the head of a lion, the middle of a goat, and the tail of a serpent. {Ovid. Met. ix. 646.) This monster, however, Belle- rophon succeeded in destroying by the aid of a winged horse called Pegasus {see Pegasus), which he had caught while drinking at the fountain Pirene in Corinth. In his next expeditions against the Solymi and the Amazons, he was equally successful {Horn. II. vi. 155.), and conse- quently obtained the forgiveness of Tobates. Elated by his success, Bellerophon tried to fly to heaven on Pe- gasus ; but Jupiter, enraged at his presumption, frus- trated his attempts by sending an' insect (oestrum) which stung the horse so violently that he became restive and threw his rider. Though maimed and shattered by the fall, Bellerophon was not killed ; but he never per- fectly recovered, and continued during the rest of his life to wander up and down in sorrow and dejection. {Horn. II. vi. 201.) Bellerophon, we may add, was cele- brated for his skill in horsemanship {llor. Od. iii. 12. 7.), and is said to have flrst taught the art of riding. {Plin. iv. 56.) Bellb'rophon. A fossil shell, the animal of which was probably allied to that of urgonauta. The genus belongs to the carboniferous and older strata. BELLES-LETTRES. (Fr.) Polite Literature. Almost all authors concur in censuring the vague and indefinite character of this term, as at one time every branch of knowledge has been included under this de- nomination, at another, excluded from it. Sometimes we are told that by the belles-lettres is meant a know- ledge of the arts of oratory and poetry; sometimes that the true belles-lettres include natural philosophy, BELLES-LETTRES. geometry, and other essential parts of learning ; and one author, in treating of the belles-lettres, introduces a discourse on the seven sacraments of the Romish church. In the division of the departments at the Lyceum of Arts, established at Paris in 1792, the belles-lettres compre- liended general grammar, languages, rhetoric, geography, history, antiquities, and numismatics ; whilst philosophy and the various branches of the mathematics were called, in contradistinction, sciences. Rollin and Rosenstein, who professedly treat of the belles-lettres^ comprehend under the term all those instructive and pleasing branches of knowledge which chiefly occupy the memory and the understanding, and do not form part either of the supe- rior sciences or of the mechanical professions. Belles- lettres, says Blair (after pointing out the tendencies of logical and ethical disquisitions), consider man as a being endowed with those powers of taste and imagination which were intended to embellish his mind, and to sup- ply him with rational and useful entertainment. All that relates to beauty, harmony, grandeur, and elegance — all that can soothe the mind, gratify the fancy, or move the affections, belongs to their provmce. In an inquiry of this kind, reference must necessarily be made to Hume, who, both from the nature of his pursuits and the bent of his mind, was well qualified to give an opi- nion. Paraphrasing the well-known passage of a classic author, — Ingenuas didicisse fideliter artes Emollit mores, nee sinit esse feros, — he asserts, that the belles-lettres improve our sensibility for all the tender and agreeable passions, at the same time that they render the mind incapable of the rougher and more boisterous emotions. Still the difficulty is not removed ; for while all those writers concur in awarding a distinguished place in the category of learning to the " ingenuffi artes," the " literae humaniores," as the belles- lettres are called, they have, if not thrown a veil of ob- scurity over the precise definition of the term, at least not condescended to remove it. If we have recourse to the Germans, we shall find that they comprehend under the denomination belles-lettres every branch of learning that is not cultivated with an ulterior view to pecuniary emolument ; but their adoption of the term belletristic, to express all that relates to works of taste or aesthetics, does not appear to coincide with the definition above given by their professed lexico- graphers. But though it would appear difficult to reduce this term within the limits of a precise and accurate defini- tion, there can be little doubt that there are few terms which present so distinct a meaning to each individual mind. The influence of the belles-lettres has been felt and acknowledged in all ages. The beautiful tribute paid to them by Cicero in his defence of Archias is fami- liar to all. But we shall advert to the sentiments of another Roman, with whom we are more likely to sym- pathise, as he at least cannot be charged with special pleading. In the beautiful letter to Msecenas, who was afflicted with some mental distemper, Horace first advises his friend to have recourse to the study of polite litera- ture in particular, — Sunt verba et voces quibus hunc lenire dolorem Possis, et magnam morbi deponere pcirtein ; and then concludes in these general terms,— Invidus, iracundus, iners, vinosus, amator. Nemo adeo ferus est, ut non mitescere possit. Si modo culturoE patientem commodet aurem. But the high importance with which the same accom- plished author has invested polite literature may be still better perceived in another of his epistles, — Trojani belli scriptorem Prseneste relegi, Qui, quid sit pulchrum, quid turpe, quia utile, quid non Flanius et melius Chrysippo et Crantore dicit. In this passage Horace pronounces Homer to be the most instructive teacher of moral and political philosophy ; and indeed the tribute of respect which all the European nations pay to the Greeks in general, and to Homer in particular, as the authors of their refinement, sufficiently corroborates the opinion of the poet. It would greatly exceed our limits to give even a cursory view of the belles-lettres in the decline and fall of the Roman empire ; but we refer the reader to SchlegeVs History of Literature, and to Hallatn's Introduction, &c., for full information on this head. It may, however, be remarked, that during the long period of the middle ages (which has been often, though erroneously, consi- dered as a blank in the history of the human mind) learn- ing was almost wholly confined to the church ; and though there was little original genius displayed in the province of imagination, yet here was preserved the germ of the future polite literature of Europe. As early as the 14th century, the spirit of polite literature, that had long been slumbering, was reanimated by the genius of Pe- BELLOWS. trarch, and burst forth like a meteor in the Italian re- publics. Its genial influence was soon felt on this side the Alps ; and in the year 1400, as Mr. Hallam observes, Spain, France, England, and Germany were in possession of a national literature. The traces of this spirit, how- ever, were soon obliterated, and its effects gradually swallowed up in the wars that everywhere ensued, and in the all-absorbing taste for metaphysical and theolo- gical disquisitions that subsequently prevailed. It is to the Reformation that may properly be ascribed the origin of polite literature in modern times ; though, to use the words of Schlegel, the authors of that mighty spiritual revolution probably contemplated no other re- sult from it than the emancipation of Europe from eccle- siastical bondage. Among the first-fruits of its effects upon the interests of the belles-lettres in England, it may suffice to mention the names of Spenser, Shak- speare, Dryden, and Milton, who have embodied in their writings all the riches of the English language, and whose works are of theirtselves sufficient to furnish any nation with a polite literature of which it might justly be proud. In France, too, shortly afterwards, literature assumed a novel and substantial form ; and in the age of Louis XIV. there arose a mighty host of literary stars, which were only ec^ualled in brilliancy by a contemporaneous galaxy of British genius. The close of the last and the dawn of the present century may be regarded as an era in the history of polite literature throughout Europe. Never at any former pe- riod were the true nature and object, the wide extent and dignity, of the belles-lettres so universally appre- ciated. While, on the Continent, Goethe and Schiller were scattering from their rich and inexhaustible stores "thoughts that breathe, and words that burn," England could at the same time boast of the brilliant produc- tions of the Great Unknown, whose influence on polite literature has been well compared to that of the bright luminary on the terrestrial globe. The rapid strides, too, that have been made in the art of criticism, the esta- blishment of reviews in every country on a more com- prehensive plan than was ever previously adopted, and the general ability with which these are executed, have greatly contributed to the formation and confirmation of a literary taste. In his admirable Essay on the Rise of the Arts and Sciences, Hume has remarked, that nothing is more favourable to the rise of politeness and learning than a number of neighbouring and independent states connected together by commerce and policy. Now, if we apply this observation to the various classes of society in the same country, and contrast the present state of society with that which existed even in the time of Hume, we may perhaps find another clue to the wide spread and cultivation of polite literature among us. At no very distant period, a broad line of demarcation was drawn between the literary and commercial classes of the com- munity ; in fact, literature and commerce stood separated like two different worlds revolving in different spheres. But the scene is changed ; the framework of society has become more artificial and complicated; and we may now see the learning of the philosopher, the acuteness and promptitude of the man of business, and the earnest- ness and enthusiasm of the solitary artist, all brought into actual contact, and shedding each its influence upon the rest. SchlegeVs History of Literature. (,See art. LiTEHATURE in this work, and the authorities there re- ferred to.) BELL METAL. An alloy of 80 parts of copper and 20 of tin. The Indian gong metal is a similar alloy. An English bell metal analysed by Dr. Thomson was found to consist of 800 copper, 101 tin, &6 zinc, and 43 lead. Small shrill bells generally contain zinc. BELLO'NA. (Lat. bellum.) In the mythology of the ancients, was the wife or sister or the sister wife of Mars, and was especially worshipped by the Romans as the goddess of war. She possessed a temple, built and dedicated to her by Appius Claudius, which stood in the Circus Flaminius, near the Porta Carmentalis. It was here that the senate granted audiences to foreign ambas- sadors, and received generals On their return from abroad. In front of this temple also stood the pillar against which the javelin was hurled, the usual preliminary among the Romans to a declaration of war. Bellona is generally depicted as the charioteer of Mars, with wild dishevelled hair, bloody garments, and a torch in her hand. Though the Romans were her chief worshippers, there were many temples dedicated to her service in Cappadocia and Paphlagonia. The priests of this god- dess, who were termed Bellonarii, consecrated them- selves by incisions in their bodies, and sacrificed to her honour the blood which flowed from their wounds. BE'LLOWS. A machine contrived to propel air through a tube or orifice. It is used for blowing fires, supplying the pipes of organs, and other purposes, and is constructed according to various forms, but the principle is the same in all of them. The dimensions of a space in which air is confined are contracted ; the air, being permitted to escape only at a small opening, rushes out BELLU^. with a velocitv proportional to the pressure aiid to the smallness of the opening. BE'LLU^. iL.At.bellvm, any great beast.) The term by which Linnaeus designated an order of Mammalia, nearly corresponding to the Pachyderms of Cuvier. BE'LOMANCY. (Gr. ^iXo;, javelin, and f^xvnict, prophecy.) Divination by the flight of arrows, common lo various oriental nations, and especially observed by the Arabians. It has been performed in various modes ; one of the most common is, to let fly arrows, with Inscriptions on labels attached to them, and take for a guide the contents of that belonging to the arrow first found. BEL'TANE, or BE'LTIN. (Said to be the "fire of Bel" or Belus.) May- day, and the traditional Celtic customs attached to it. The month of May is thus called in the present Irish language. This day is particularly celebrated by the herdsmen in the Highlands of Scotland. The Beltane-fire, Beltane-cake, &c., are all observances of this day. BELTS. A name given to the zones or bands which appear on the disk of the planet Jupiter. They are si- tuated near and parallel to the equator of the jjlanet, and are supposed to be produced by clouds in its at- mosphere arranged in parallel strata, by currents of wind, which, by reason of the rapid rotation of the planet, must in the equatorial regions blow always in the same direction. BELVEDE'RE. {\t.afine prospect.) In Architecture, a small building at the top of a house or palace, con- structed, as the name implies, to obtain a view of the country. BELVISI'EiE. (Belvisia, one of the genera.) In Botany, a natural order of monopetalous Exogens, in- habiting Africa on the west side. Scarcely anything is known of the species, and its affinities are quite unsettled. One of the species was called Napoleona imperialis by its discoverer, Falisot de Beauvois, after whom the genus typical of the order is now named. BE'MBEX. A genus of H3mienopterous aculeate insects of the tribe Fossores, or burrowing sand-wasps ; raised by Dr. Leech to the rank of a family {BembecidcB), and including the genera Bembex proper, Monedula, and Sttzus. Head transverse, with the upper lip exposed ; tongue long, legs short; the brachiaof the female fur- nished at the sides with very strong spines for burrowing in the sand. For the habits of this family, see Fossores. BEMBl'DIUM. A name applied by Latreille to a genus of Coleopterous insects, of the tribe Carabidte. Now raised to the rank of a family {Bembidiidw), includ- ing the genera Lymneujnl, Cillenuml, Tac/iys S, Pki- lochthusQ, Ocys'i, Peryphus 16, Notaphus 9, Sopha 11, Tachyptis 9, Bembidium proper 4 : the figures refer to the number of indigenous species in each of the genera. The common characters of the group are, cubits notched, elytra rounded at the extremity, abdomen not pedicellate, external maxillary palpi terminated by a very minute and acute joint, antennse sub-elongate. The Bembidiidce afe generally found in low and damp situations, are of very small size, and glitter with polished metallic colours. BEND. In Heraldry, an ordinary bounded by parallel lines, equalljr distant from the line joining the dexter base to the smister chief. It contains thfe fifth part of the escutcheon if charged, and the third if not charged. The bend sinister, descending from the sinister chief to the dexter base, is the well-known difference which denotes bastardy, being borne on the paternal escutcheon of the bastard. To Bend. The general sea term for fastening any thing ; as to bend one rope to another, the cable to the anchor, a sail to a vard or gaff. Certain knots are called bends ; as a carrick bend, a fisherman's bend, &c. BENDS, called also WALES. A certain number of thick planks of the ship's side, from the water upwards. BENEDICTINE MONKS. An order of monks that followed the rule of St. Benedict, which, as early as the 6th century, had extended itself through Italy, France, Spain, Germany, and England. The rules of Benedict, although founded no doubt on the old monastic institu- tions of Cassian (Cassiani Opera, Lips. 1733), were of a much more rational and comprehensive character. Avoiding the extreme rigour of the Eastern systems, he not only exacted a promise from all who entered a convent that thev would remain for life, and strictly observe its rules (Marten. Commen. in Regulas Bened. Paris, 1690), but prescribed to them a variety of suitable employments. 1 his system .soon made rapid progress, and the monks began to be useful to society in various ways : reclaiming waste lands, promoting zealously the cause of education, preserving the history of the times in their chronicles, and multinlying the treasures of antiquity by their copyists. Under Charles the Great this order of monks ^^, l^\^u"^^y^° ^^'^""y °^'^'"' ' »"^ the spirit of inquiry which they then called into existence was perpetuated by the depth of their enthusiasm and the extent of llielr learning. To give even a cursory history of this orUef would far exceed our limits, as it embraces perhaps BENZAMIDE. the palmiest days of ecclesiastical domination. (Vide Gieseler's Kirchen-geschichte ; a work of great learning, and, as a book of reference, incomparable.) As is univer- sally known, it is to the Benedictine monks that England (A. D. 596) Is indebted for its conversion from idolatry. This order has produced a vast number of ancient writers and men of learning. Among others, Placidius Maurus founded the school of Germany ; Alcuinus the university of Paris ; Guido invented the scale of music ; Dionysius Exiguus completed the collection of papal decrees (a.d. 510) ; and the most learned man of his time, the admiration of the whole Western world, the Venerable Bede, belonged to this order. BE'NEFlCE. (Lat. beneficium.) A word denoting a certain class of church preferments, viz. rectories, vicarages, perpetual curacies, and chaplaincies ; and dis- tinguished from a dignity, under which title are com- prehended bishoprics, deaneries, and prebends. Under the Romans, certain grants of lands made to the veteran soldiers were called beneficia ; and the same term was applied at the commencement of the feudal system to estates conferred by the sovereign and held under him : which afterwards assuming a hereditary character be- came "fiefs" properly so called. In the middle ages the popes assumed the feudal right with reference to ec- clesiastical " patronage," and the term beneficium was hence applied to livings, &c., on the assumption that they were held under the pope as a superior lord. It was the assertion of this claim by Innocent III. and his suc- cessors which roused the jealousy of the European sovereigns, especially those of England and France ; and from the contentions consequent upon this the first opening was made to the cause of Reformation. BE'NEFIT OF CLERGY. In Law, originated in the immunities from municipal jurisdiction enjoyed in many states of Europe by the Roman Catholic clergy during the middle ages. W^hen a person Indicted for certain offences (most of those subjecting the offender to capital or corporeal punishment, excepting high treason) pleaded that he was a clerk or clergyman, and claimed privilege, he was demanded by his ordinary : a jury was summoned, and he was tried : and, according to their verdict, delivered to the ordinary as acquit or convict, to undergo canonical purgation, and to be dis- charged or punished according to the result of such purgation. "The proof of clergy, at first strictly required, was at last so relaxed, that it was only necessary lor the offender to show that he was able to read. The bishop's commissary was present, to decide whether or not he passed the test satisfactorily. This loose mode of ac- quiring the privilege was first restricted by the stat. 4 H. 7. c. 13., which provided that offenders who had been allowed their clergy should be " burnt in the thumb," and If they claimed It a second time, be required to give proof of being actually In orders. By 18 Ellz. c. 7., the second trial by compurgation before the ordinary (which had become a mere fiction) was abolished, and the judges were empowered to Imprison the person who had benefit of clergy for a year. If they thought proper. By various subsequent statutes, the burning In the hand was commuted for transportation, whipping, &c., at the discretion of the judges ; and the benefit was taken away altogether from a number of statutable felonies. By 5 Anne, c. 6., the ceremony of reading was abolished, benefit of clergy being granted Indiscriminately to all entitled to It ; and finally by one of the enactments com- monly called Peel's Acts (7 & 8 G. 4. c. 28. s.6 ) benefit of clergy was abolished altogether. BENE'VOLENCE. (Lat.) In English History, a species of tax levied by the sovereign. As Its name Implies, it was nominally a gratuity ; but was, in point of fact, exacted as a forcecl loan, with or without the condition of repaj-ment, under the reigns of the Plantagenet kings. By a statute of Richard III. benevolences were declared illegal ; but they were again exacted by Henry VII., and occasionally, by means of circulars under the privy seal, by his successors. By 13 C. 2. stat. 1. c. 4. no voluntary aid can be raised on behalf of the king without the authority of parliament ; and the general illegality of levying money for the use of the crown without such authority was declared In 1688 by the Bill of Rights. BEN NUTS. The seeds of an Arabian plant called Moringa aptera; they yield an oil, called oil of ben, and have been employed in syphilitic diseases. BEN, OIL OF. The expressed oil of the nut' of the Moringa aptera. This oil is remarkable for not be- coming rancid by age ; and as it Is perfectly Insipid and inodorous. It Is used for extracting the fragrancy of certain flowers, such as jessamin, orange, &c. The same tree furnishes the Lignun nephriticum, supposed to be useful in certain affections of the kidneys. BENT GRASS. A species of Agrostis, the bent and creeping stems of which are very difficult to eradicate. BENTS. The withered stalks of grass standing in a pasture after the seeds have dropped. BE'NZAMIDE. A compound, obtained by exposing chloride of benzulc to ammoulacal gas. BENZOIC ACID. BENZO'IC ACID. This acid forms a constituent of many balsams ; it is generally obtained by heating ben- zoin, and collecting the acid vapours which are evolved and condense in brilliant acicular crystals. It is a com- pound of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen ; its equivalent being 120. Its combinations are called Benxoates. BENZO'IN. The resinous exudation of tjie Styrax benzoe, a tree which is a native of Sumatra. Benzoin is a combination of resin and benzoic acid. It has a mottled or amygdaloid texture, and is composed of a mixture of brown and white parts. It has a fragrant odour. BENZULE. {From henzoin, and llkyi, principle.) A compound of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, regarded as the base of benzoic acid. BERBERA'CE.a:, or BERBERIDE^. A natural order of plants, named after the genus Berberis, which is in fact the most important genus it contains. It is the only one whose fruit is succulent and eatable ; that of the others is dry and hard. BE'RBEREN. A yellow bitter principle, contained in the alcoholic extract of the root of the barberry tree. BE'RBERRY. (Lat. berberis.) A spiny shrubby plant, bearing yellow flowers, and succulent one-celled fruit growing in racemes. It is one of a genus in which the fruit is universally fleshy and acid, although often less so than in the common kind {Berberis vulgaris). Some of the species have pinnated leaves, many are ever- greens, and several have a black fruit ; even the common sort has a variety of this description, as well as others with pale yellow and stoneless fruit. There is an idea among people in the country that a berberry bush brings blight to a wheat field ; but the parasitical lungus which attacks the berberry is altogether different from that which produces the mildew of wheat, which cannot pos- sibly be communicated by the one to the other. BE'RGAMOT, ESSENCE OF. The essential oil of the rind of a small pear-shaped fruit, the produce of the Citrus limetta bergamium. It is much used as a per- fume, and apt to be adulterated with the oils of orange and lemon peel, and with alcohol. BERO'SUS. In Entomology, a genus of Coleopterous insects of the family HydrophilidUs. They inhabit ponds, in which they may often be seen swimming in an in- verted position. BE'RYL. A mineral allied to the emerald, composed of 6S silica, 15 alumina, 14 glucine, '2 lime, 1 oxide of iron. It is usually transparent, pale green, and in beautiful crystals, much larger than those of the emerald. It i& the aquamarine of the jewellers. The finest comes from Dauria, on the frontiers of China, from Siberia, and from. Brazil. BESI'MEN. An obsolete term for the spores or seeds of the lowest kinds of plants, especially of Algae. BE'TEL. The leaf of the betel or Siriboa pepper, which is chewed by the Inhabitants of many parts of India along with a nut of the areca palm tree and lime ; which substances are wrapped in the betel leaf. It is acrid and narcotic, and stains the saliva red. BETHY'LUS. In Entomology, a genus of Hjrmenop- terous insects of the family Proclotrupidce. BETRO'THMENT. A mutual compact between two parties, by which they bind themselves to marry. Be- trothraent was a legal contract by the Roman law, as it now is in that of various continental countries. In Ger- many, betrothments are either public, with the consent of relations an'd presence of witnesses ; or private (clan- destine), which in some countries are void, in others, although valid as contracts, punishable as misdemeanors. Public betrothment induces the obligation to marry. But according to modern practice an action for damages is almost the only way of enforcing it ; a small fine or imprisonment being the utmost criminal penalty for the violation of the engagement. BETULA'CEiE. (Betula, one of the genera.) A small natural order of plants, containing the birch, after which it takes its name, and the common alder. The order formed part of what were formerly called Amen.^ tacecB. BE'VEL. (Lat. bivium, 5ra«c/jmg-roarf.) In Archi- tecture, an instrument for taking angles. One side of a solid body is said to be bevelled with respect to another when the angle contained between their two sides is greater or less than a right angle. BEVEL. ANGLE. A term used among artificers to denote an angle which is neither a right angle nor half a right angle. BEVEL GEER. In Mechanics, a species of wheel- work, in which the axles of two wheels working into each other are neither parallel nor perpendicular, but inclined to one another in a certain angle. Wheels of this kind are also called conical wheels, because their teeth may be regarded as cut in the frustrum of a cone. See Wheel. BEY, or BEG. A Turkish and Tartar title of dignity, used with no very accurate application for lord, prince, or chief, and frequently subjoined to the proper names of persons of rank. 143 BIBLE SOCIETY. BEZA'NT. A gold coin struck at Byzantium (Con- stantinople) : they varied in weight and in value. Bezants appear to have been current in England from the tenth century to the time of Edward III. Some of them weighed about twenty grains. According to Camden, a piece of gold which was anciently offered by the king on high festivals was called a bizantine, and valued at 15/. There were also white or silver bezants. Bezant. In Heraldry, a circle, or. The name is derived from the gold coins of the Greek empire, termed bezants, or byzantines, by the people of the West. It was probably introduced into coat armour by the Crusaders. BE'ZOAR. A Persian word implying destructive of poison, and applied to certain intestinal concretions of animals, called bezoar stones, and supposed to possess such powers. BI. (Lat. bis, twice.) Signifies, when attached to other words, two, twice, or double; as bicarbonate of potash, a compound of potash with two atoms of car- bonic acid ; bilocular, two cells ; bivalve, two valves, &c. BIARTI'CULATE. (Lat. bis, articulus,^-om/.) Ap- plied in entomology to the antennae of insects when they consist but of two joints, and also to the abdomen under the same circumstances, as in the Nycteribia biarticu- lata. BIAURI'CULATE. (Lat. bis, auricula, an auricle.) In Comparative Anatomy, signifies a heart with two au- ricles, as in most bivalve molluscs, and in all reptiles, birds, and mammals. BI'BLE. (Gr. /S/gXa?, a book;' from whence the word came to be applied emphatically to the volume of the Old and New Testaments.) The sixth article of the English Church enumerates the books of the Old Testament, which it considers of canonical authority ; in which it follows the canon re- ceived by the Jews in the time of our Saviour. The apocryphal writings, which are accounted authentic by the Roman Catholics, are of undoubted antiquity, being comprised in the Septuagint edition of the Scriptures ; but their authority has never been acknowledged by the Jews, who reckon twenty-four canonical books ; nor are their originals found in the Hebrew language. The canon of the New Testament is now received without variation, we believe, in all Christian commu- nities. In the early period of the church, the authen- ticity of particular books was frequently disputed, and heretical sects attempted to foist other apocryphal wri- tings into their place. The general consent, however, of the orthodox church may be inferred from catalogues extant in the writings of many of the Fathers throughout the first four centuries, anc^ the express declaration of the council of Laodicea and others. Some latitude of opinion seems, however, to have been allowed in early times respecting the book of Revelations ; and some of the Fathers confess that the genuineness o6 St. Paul's Epistle to the Hebrews, of that of James, of the second of^ Peter, and two last of John, was held by some to be undecided. BIBLE SOCIETY. THE BRITISH AND FO- REIGN. A society established in England in the year 1804, "with the sole object," as it is expressed, im its regulations, " og encouraging a wider circulation of the Holy Scriptures without note or comment." The society took its rise from the circumstance of the complaints which had been made in Wales for some years previous, respecting the great deficiency of Bibles in the language of the Principality — a want which, it was urged, the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge had very imperfectly supplied. Tho earliest promoters of this institutionweretheRev. Mr. Charles of Bala, Mr. Hughes, and Mr. Steinkoff, minister of the German Lutheran Church. Among its principal patrons may be mentioned Lords Teignmouth and Gambler, Messrs. Wilberforce, Granville Sharp, and Charles Grant. This society has now auxiliary establishments connected with it not only in all the principal cities of the United Kingdom, but throughout Europe and North America^ The principle upon which the Bible Society acts has always been regarded with jealousy by the high church party in this country. In the first place^ it is looked upon not only as a rival to the venerable Society for Pro- moting Christian Knowledge, which, had been in action since the year 1699 ; but as casting some slur upon the latter as ineflBcient in its operation and erroneous in its principles. The younger society also admits as mem- bers the adherents of every religious denomination, and in its proceedings maintains an absolute neutrality among them — which, its opponents consideir incompatible with the profession of true churchmanship. Accordingly many controversies have been carried on between the champions of the two institutions : in the course of which, however, it would seem that the Bible Society has gained ground in the favour of the established church, from whence a large proportion of its subscribers are now derived. Among them are the names of several bishops, and many other dignitaries. In the report for 1840, we find the total number of BIBLICAL HISTORY. Bibles and Testaments issued by this society since its foundation to be 12,3'iJ,471. The number issued during the year ending March, 1840, was 776,3G0. The income of the society for that year was 111,449/. 13». Id. BI'BLICAL HISTORY and LITEKATUKE. The accounts of the books of the Jewish Scriptuies ante- cedent to the captivity are few and indistinct ; but they are referred to under the titles of " the law," " the boolcs of Moses," and " the books of the law of Moses," by Daniel (ix. 11.), Ezra (vi. 18.), and Nehemiah (viil. 1.): there are also other passages from which it may be inferred, in- dependent of the internal evidence of the books which wepossess, that there existed such from an early period. The canon of the Old Testament appears, however, to have been settled, and the limits of inspired Scripture determined about 50 years after the return from the cap- tivity, by the authority of Ezra and the prophets of his day J the books of Nehemiah, Malachi, and Ezra himself bemg subsequently added. The sacred writings which came in later times to be incorporated in the collection of the Jewish Scriptures are known by the name of Apo- crypha, or secret : they were undoubtedly held in respect by the Jews, and by the Christians afterwards ; but Pro- testants deny that they were ever held to be inspired, or their authority placed on the same footing as that of the canonical Scriptures. At a later period we find passages in the New Testament, in Philo, and most distinctly in Josephus, to prove the fact of this collection of the Scriptures into a volume. The books themselves are first specified by Origen, who enumerates twenty- two, in which number he coincides with Josephus. His list embraces all that we consider ca- nonical, and rejects the Apocrypha. The early versions which illustrate the question of the an- tiquity of the Hebrew Scriptures are the Samaritan Pen- tateuch, and the Septuagint or Greek translation. It is not to be supposed that the Samaritans would have adopted and translated the books of the Jews, unless they had been received prior to the separation and enmity of the two peoples, the period at latest of the return from the cap- tivity. The Samaritan Pentateuch now extant is said to be a version from the earlier Hebrew Samaritan into the more modern Samaritan, and was made before the time of Origen. The part of the Septuagint which comprises the Pentateuch was made about the year b. c. 285 ; the translation of the other book into Hellenistic Greek ap- pears to be of different and somewhat later dates. Next in order to these may be mentioned the versions of the OldTestament in the earliest periods of Christianity, which are important, not as assisting us to ascertain the antiquity of the original, but as contributing to our know- ledge of the genuine text. These may be divided into three classes. I The Oriental, comprising — The Syriac or Peschito (literal), from the Hebrew, about the end of the first century — embracing both the Old and New Testaments. The Coptic, from the Septuagint — between centuries two and five. This embraces also the New Testa- ment. The Ethiopic, from the Septuagint — in the fourth century : embraces the N. T. n. The Latin, or Western : — Tlie Italic, from the Septuagint, in either the first or second century ; ouly fragments remain : it embraced also the New Testament. The Vulgate, made from the Hebrew by Jerome, A. D. 390. This translation is considered an ultimate authority by the church of Rome. The Gothic version of Ulphilas, which was made from the Greek of both the Old and New Testaments, in the fourth century, has not come down to us entire. Only a small part is in print. III. The Greek, compiising — The version of Aquila. of Theodotian. — ^ of Symmachus. All translated from the Hebrew ; all of or near the second century ; all exist only in the fragments of the Hexaple or combination of six versions by Origen. The genuineness of the Hebrew text was preserved after the destruction of Jerusalem by the sedulous care of learned academies which flourished at Tiberias, Babylon, and other places, from the first to the twelfth centuries. The date of the Masora is generally fixed about the fifth century. This work consisted of a most minute enume- ration of the sections, verses, words, and letters of the Scriptures ; which has been so successful in fixing the genuine reading, that although there were discovered upwards of 800 discrei)ancie8 between the Oriental and Occidental Recensions, they all relate, with one single flxception, to vow«l points, and are of no kind of im- | BIBLIOGRAPHY. portance. For an account of tn their converts ; and also with the character of the Greek fathers, who present much greater exactness and uni- formity in their quotations of the New Testament than the African. On the other hand, the Alexandrian copies have been written with a considerable degree of careless- ness, and do not appear to have been intended, even in their own country, for reading in public service. They are said to partake in the rash and speculative spirit of the theologians of the Alexandrian church. The former of these recensions has been adopted in the Syriac, Gothic, and Sclavonic versions. It is that also which forms the basis of our modern texts. The latter was followed by several Latin, the Coptic, and Ethiopic translations. Eras- mus conceived the idea of the Greek text having been purposely corrupted to suit the Vulgate, and assigns the council of Florence in 1439 as the authority by which this transaction was effected. This opinion continued to be held under the title of the Foedus cum Grsecis, with more or less discussion till modern times, by which it seems to be very generally rejected as untenable. It is known, on the contrary, that in the compilation of his translation, which bears the name of the Vulgate, the existing Latin version was corrected by Jerome from the Greek. BIBLIO'GRAPHY. (Gr. /S/gX/ov, a book, and y{«^«, I describe.) The science of books. The know • ledge which is required to classify books, according to the various subjects on which they treat, has been termed intellectual bibliography ; that of the external peculiarities of books, their editions, &c., material bibli- ography. The first branch borders closely on the pro- vince of criticism ; for the most valuable bibliographical works, being what are termed in French " catalogues raisonnees, " are those in which the lists of books are accompanied with some remarks on the character of their contents. The second branch of bibliography has been of late years cultivated with all the ardour attached to a fashionable and somewhat eccentric pursuit. The lovers of rare editions and curious copies of works, from being, to borrow a French term, " bibliophiles, " have formed of late a peculiar sect entitled " bibliomaniacs," with whom the fancy for books has become a passion, like those of Dutch speculators for tulips and pictures. Many works of novel and curious research in this de- partment of literature have been recently produced to guide their taste, and gratify their appetite. For the purposes of the common student, BruneVs Manuel du Libraire, although by no means complete, is still the most useful index to general literature. Many books of a similar character exist in English, but none that can be recommended as generally valuable ; although some of those devoted to particular branches of the subject, especially to the learning of early editions, display much curious research. Watt's Bibliotkeca Briiannica, al- though useful, from its double arrangement according to subjects and authors, is a very imperfect work. The following list contains a selection from among the most valuable works which we possess, in different de- partments of bibliography. But many of them, from the critical matter which they contain, may be considered to belong to the history of literature, as well as of books and editions. I. Introductory Works on the Science of Bibliography. Peignot, Manuel Bibliographique, 1800. Pcignot, Dictionnaire Raisonne' de Bibliologie, 3 vols. 8vo. Achard, Cours de Bibliographic, 3 vols. 8vo. Marseilles, 1807. Home, Thomas Hartwell, Introduction to the Study ot Bibliography, 2 vols. 8vo. Lond. 1814, Denis, Einleitung zur Biicherkunde, 2 vols. 4to. Vienna, 1796. Boulard, Traite Elementaire de Bibliographic. II. Bibliography of the Oriental and Classical Languages. Clarke, Dr. Adam, Bibliograi)hical Dictionary and Miscellany, 8 vols. l2mo. Lond. 1802-G. BIBLIOGRAPHY. Lc Long, Bibliotheca Sacra, 2 vols. fol. Paris, 1723. Fabricius, Bibliotheca Grseca, edited by Harles, I2tom. 4to. Hamburg, 1790. 1809. Fabricius, Bibliotheca Latina. By Ernesti. 3 vols. 8vo. 1773-74. Fabricius, Medite et Infimse ^tatis. By Manso. 3 vols. 4to. Patav. 1759. HarwooiTs View of the various Editions of the Greek and lloman Classics, 1775. Dibdin's Introduction to the Knowledge of rare and valuable Editions of the Classics, 2 vols. 8vo. 1827 (last edition). 3/oAs's Manual of Classical Bibliography, 2 vols. Svo. 1825. Degli Autori Classici Biblioteca Portabile (Boni and Garaba), 2 vols. 12mo. Venice, 1793. III. Bibliography of particular Sciences and Branches of Literature. Lipenius, Bibliothecae (Theologica, Juridica, Philo- sophica, Medica), G vols. fol. The Juridica by itself has been reprinted, with supplements, &c. in 4 vols. Leipsic, 1775-89. The whole collection passes under the title of Bibliotheca Realis, Meusel, Bibliotheca Historica. Bibliotheque Historique de la France, 5 vols, folio, 1768, 1778. Bridgman's Legal Bibliography, Svo. Lond. 1807. JV/wrAard, Bibliotheca Mathematica. Dryander, Catalogus Bibliothecas Historise Naturalis Josephi Banks (a general account of books on natural history). Lalande, Bibliotheque Astronomique, 4to. Paris, 1803. Boucher de la Richarderie, Bibliotheque de Voyages. 6 vols. Svo. Paris, 1808. IV. Bibliography of Modern Nations. Watt's Bibliotheca Britannica, 4 vols. 4to. Edin. 1819. This very laborious work contains a mere catalogue of works, arranged alphabetically, first Under the head of writers, and then of subjects. A more com- plete, and more critical work on English Biblio- graphy, is among the greatest desiderata of the present day. Dr. Watt's work contains many foreign articles ; but is chiefly devoted to English literature. Querard, La France Litteraire ; a very valuable catalogue of French works, in all departments of literature. Paris, 1828. Mazxuchelli, Autori d' Italia; a work containing li- terary history and biograpliy, with bibliographical science. 2t. fol. Brescia, 1753-G3. Foppen, Bibliotheca Belgica, 2 vols. 4to. 1739. V. Bibliographical Works on rare Books, Typographical Antiquities, early Editions, S^c. Vogt, Catalogus Librorum Rariorum, Svo. 1732. GerdesiuSi Florilegium Librorum Rariorum, Svo. 1731. Clement, Bibliotheque Curieuse, ou Catalogue Raisonne des Livres Rares, 4to. 1750-60. A minutely critical work. Bauer, Bibliotheca Librorum Rariorum Universalis, 7 vols. Svo. 1770-91. Maittaire, Annales Typographic! ab Artis invents Origine, 5vols. 4to. Hamb. 1719-41. Several sup- plements have been published. Panzer, Annales Typographici abArtis inventse Origine ad Annum 1500. (It is, however, carried down to 1536.) 11 vols. 4to. Nuremb. 1793. 1803. Afnes's Typographical Antiquities, first edition, 1749 ; republished by Mr. Huhet in 3 vols. 4to. 1790 ; and again by Dr. Dibdin. Dibdin, Bibliotheca Spenceriana (a catalogue of books in the Spencer library, printed before 1,500), 4 vols. Svo. 1814. Well known, like most of the other worksi of this distinguished bibliographer, for the minute- ness of its research and extreme beauty of embel- lishment. La Serna Santander, Dictionnaire Bibliographique Choisi du Quinzieme Siecle, 3 vols. Svo. 1805. De Bure, Bibliographie Instructive, ou Traite de la Connaissance des Livres rares et singuliers, with sup- plements, in all 10 vols. Svo. Paris, 1713, 1782. The most practically useful work on the subject. Osmont, Dictionnaire des Livres rares, 2 vols. Svo. Paris, 1768. Raynouard, Historie de 1' Imprimeur des Aides. See Aldine Editions. VI, General Bibliographies, and Miscellaneous Works. Dictionnaire Bibliographique, 3 vols, Svo. Paris, 1790. Brunei, Manuel du Libraire, 3rd and enlarged edition. 4 vols. Svo, 1820. A work of the greatest utility. Two supplementary volumes were published in 1832. Morhof, Polyhistor Literarius, Philosophicus et Prac- ticus, first edition by Fabricius, 2 vols. 4to, 1747. Saxii Onomasticon Literarium, 8voIg. 4to. 1759. 1803. 145 BILDSTEIN. BICA'LCARATE. (Lat. bis, calcar, a spur.) When a limb or part is armed with two spurs. BICE. In Painting, a light blue colour prepared from smalt. From it, by a mixture with yellow orpiment, another colour is formed of a green hue, bearing the same name. B I'CEP S . (Lat. bis, twice, and caput, head. ) An ana- tomical term, applied to muscles having a double inser- tion, or which arise by two heads. BICG'LLIGATE. (Lat. bis, twice, colligo, / bind together.) In Ornithology, a term signifying the con- nexion of all the anterior toes by a basal web. BI'COLOR. (Lat. bis, color, colour.) W^hen an animal or part is of two colours. BICO'RNIS. (Lat. bis, cornu, a horn.) In Zoology, when an animal or part has two horns, or two horn-like processes. In Anatomy, when the uterus has two divisions, like horils, as in most quadrupeds. BICU'SPIS. (Lat.) A tooth with two points. BIDE'NTATE. (Lat. bis, dens, a tcoth.) When an animal has but two teeth, as the Delphinus bidens i or when a part has two tooth-like processes. BIE'NNIAL. {Biennis, of two years' duration.) A term applied to plants which grow one year and flower the next, after which they perish ; they only differ from annuals in requiring a longer period to fruit in. Most biennials, if sown early in the spring, will flower in the autumn, and then perish, thus actually becoming an- nuals. BIESTINGS. The name given to the first milk yielded by a cow after calving. BIFA'RIOUS. (Lat.) Arranged in two rows. BPFORATE. (Lat. bis, foro, I pierce.) Having two perforations, as the anthers of a Rhododendron. BFFORINES. Singular bodies lately discovered in the interior of the green pulpy part of the leaves of some Araceous plants. They are minute oval sacs, tapering to each end, where they are perforated; they are apparently composed of two bags one within the other, the space be- tween the bags being filled with a transparent fluid, and the inner bag itself with fine spiculse. When the bi- forine is placed in water it discharges its spiculse with considerable violence, first from one end, and then from another, recoiling at every discharge, and eventually emptying itself, when it becomes a flaccid motionless bag. Nothing is known of the nature, use, or origin of these bodies. BIFU'RCATE. (Lat. bis, furca, a /orA.) When a part has two prongs like a fork. BI'GAMY. (Lat. bis, twice^ and Gr. yauo;, mar- riage.) The offence of contracting a second marriage during the life of the husband or wife> which, by the law of England, is felony» punishable by transportation for seven years, or imprisonment for two. Bigamy, by the canon law, signified a second marriage after the death of the first wife, or a marriage with a widow ; and incapacitated the party contracting. See Marriage, Law of. BIGHT. Part of a rope between the ends ; bight is also a shallow bay or hollow in the line of sea coast. ' BIGNONIA'CEiE. (So called from Bignon, a French man of letters, and the friend of Tournefort, > A natural order of Didynamous plants, usually having a twining stem, large trumpet-shaped flowers, and a pod-like cap- sule with winged seeds. Some of them are trees of considerable size, and furnish timber valuable in the countries where it is produced ; but the greater part are interesting only for the beauty of their flowers, in which respect this order yields to no other. Bignonia venusta, Fandorce, aquinoctialis, cherere, and grandijlora, are probably the handsomest twining plants known. BI'JUGATE. (Lat. bis and jugum, a^oAre.) Com- posed of two pairs of any thing ; a term applied to leaves pinnated with two pairs of leaflets. BIKH, A deleterious plant inhabiting Nepal, and used by the natives of that country to poison their wells when the British troops invaded it. The Aconiium ferox has been ascertained to be this poison, which, like that of all other Ranunculaceous plants, is volatile ; and although highly dangerous when fresh, soon loses its activity when exposed to the air. BILA'BIATE, (Lat, bis and labium, a Z?JB.) When a flower has all or any of its parts collected into two sepa- rate parcels or lips. Thus a calyx having two of its sepals collected into one parcel, and the others into a second parcel, or a corolla with its five petals adhering two and three together, are bilabiate. BILAME'LLATE. (Lat, bis, lamella, w/j/fl^e,) When a part is divided longitudinally into two lamellae. Bl'LBERRY. A small bush inhabiting the northern parts of Europe in mountainous situations, and bearing small black berries, which are eaten by country people, and are a favourite food of deer. It is the Vaccinium wyrtillus of Botanists. BILDSTEIN. (German.) A mineral composed chiefly of silica and alumina, with a little oxide of iron. It is commonly seen carved into Chinese figures. L BILGE. BILE. (Lat. bills ; said to be derived from bis, twice, and lis, contention, as being the supposed cause of anger and dispute.) A fluid secreted in the liver, of a yellow colour, and a nauseous taste, compounded of sweet and bitter ; it sinks in water, and mixes with it in all proportions ; it is slightly alkaline, and feels soapy, it contains a peculiar bitter principle, which has been called picromel, and a little free soda and saline matters. Accorcflng to Berzelius, the solid constituents of bile amount to about one tenth of its weight. BILGE. The lower or flat part of the bottom of a ship on which she rests when aground. — Bilge of a cask, the middle part between the ends, in which the bung- hole is placed. BILGED. Having the bottom stove in. BILGE WATER. The water that collects in the bottom, by leakage or otherwise. It has usually a pecu- liar and offensive smell. When a ship is tight the bilge water when pumped up is dark ; in a leaky ship, it comes up quite clear. . , . , ^ BI'LIARY CALCULI. Are concretions which form in the gall-bladder (gall stones) or bile-ducts. They are generally composed of a peculiar crystalline fatty matter, which has been called cholesterine. BILL. A legislative measure introduced into par- liament is so called until it has acquired the force of law bv receiving the royal assent. Bills are either public or private ; a distinction founded rather on usage and pre- cedent, than on any exact definition. The immediate parliamentary consequence of the distinction is the pay- ment of certain fees to the officers of the house, which are due by custom on private bills. According to Hat- sell, this difference between private and public bills was recognised as long ago as 1607. It is a general rule of parliamentary proceeding, that the same bill or question cannot be twice offered in the same session. But at every stage of a bill, the whole of it is supposed to be before the house ; and consequently if words have been inserted by way of amendment, the sense of the house may again be taken respecting them at a subsequent stage. See Parliament. BILL OF SALE. In Law, a contract under seal, by which a man passes his interest in goods and chattels to another, and which does not require either valuable consideration or actual transfer of tne goods to support it, as between the vendor and vendee ; although as between the vendee and the vendor's creditors the absence of such consideration and transfer would in general be held indicative of fraud, and invalidate the contract. BILL OF HEALTH. A certificate or instrument, signed by proper authorities, delivered to the masters of ships at the time of their clearing out from all ports or places suspected of being infested by particular disorders, certifying the state of health at the time that such ships sailed. Bills of health are of three kinds— cfean,/o«/, and suspected, which are self-explanatory terms. BILL OF LADING. A memorandum, subscribed by the master of a ship, acknowledging the receipt of goods intrusted to him for trauM^iortation, and binding himself (under certain exceptions) to deliver them to the person to whom they are addressed, in good condition, for a certain remuneration or freightage. Of bills of lading there are usually triplicate copies ; one for the party transmitting the goods, another for the person to whom the goods are addressed, and the third for the master. BILL OF EXCHANGE. See Exchange. BILL OF RIGHTS. In Law, the declaration de- livered by the two houses of parliament to the Prince of Orange, February 13. 1688, at the period of his suc- cession to the British throne ; in which, after a full specification of various acts of James II. which were alleged to be ill^al, the rights and privileges of the people were asserted. BI'LLET. InHeraldry, a bearing of which the origin is very uncertain ; represented of an oblong square form, sometimes showing the thickness, and always with a flat surface. Billetty, or semee of billets, signifies that the escutcheon or charge is strewed over with these bearings, without regard to particular number or station. BI'IiLlON. In Numeration, denotes a million of millions, and is expressed by 1,0000,0000,0000. The French use the same word to denote a tliousand millions. The term is probably a contraction of bis and million ; whence the English signification, a million of millions, appears more according to analogy. Thus biquadratic means the square of a square, or the product of two quadratics. BILLS OF MORTALITY, are accounts of the number of births and burials within a certain district in every week, month, quarter, or year. These were first compiled in London, after the great plague of WXi ; and ten vears afterwards began to be returned weekly. Se- veral of the parishes now included within the metropolis (as Marylebone and Pancras) are not within the bills ot mortality. See Mortality. BI'LOBATE. (Lat.bis,lobus,a/o6e.) Whenapart is divided into two lobes, or obtuse processes. 146 BINOCLE. BILO'CULAR, (Lat. bis, locula, a cell.) Having two cells. BIMA'CULATE. (Lat. bis, macula, « 5/>o^) When an animal, or part, is marked with two spots. BI'MANA. (Bimana, two-handed.) The term ap- plied by Cuvier to the highest order of mammalia, of which man is the tjrpe and sole genus. BIME'DIAL. In Geometry, when two lines com- mensurable only in power (for example, the diagonal and side of a square) are joined together, the sum is irrational with respect to either of the two lines, and is called by Euclid a bimedial. BI'NARY ARITHMETIC. (Fr. binaire, frombinus, dvMl, or hyttvos.) A species of arithmetic, proposed by Leibnitz, and founded on the shortest and simplest progression ; namely, that which terminates with tlie second cipher. In the binary notation, therefore, only two characters are required, 1 and 0, the zero having the power of multiplying the number it follows by two, as in the common notation it multiplies by ten. The num- ber one is represented by 1 ; two, by 10; three, by 11 ; four, by 100 -^five, by 101 ; six, by 110 ; seven, by 111 ; eight, by 1000 ; nine, by 1001 ; ten, by 1010, &c. This method of notation, though it may be applied with ad- vantage in the investigation of some properties of nvun- bers, would be inconvenient for common purposes, on account of the great number of characters required, even when the numbers to be expressed are small. We will give an example from the Encyclopedic Methodique of the method of expressing a number by the binary scale, and of finding the value of a number so expressed. It is convenient to begin with forming a table of the powers of 2, namely, 20, 2', 2^, 2^, &c. They are 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128. Suppose, now, it were required to express the number 230 by the binary scale. Seek in the table the greatest power of 2 contained in 230 ; it is found to be 1 28, which is the 8th number in the table; hence the expression will contain 8 ciphers, and the first on the left hand is 1. Subtract 128 from 230, there remains 102 ; the highest power of 2 contained in this is 64, which is the .seventh number in the table. The second cipher will therefore be also 1. Subtract 64 from 102, and there remctins 38. But the sixth number in the table is 32, which is contained in 38 ; therefore the third cipher in the expression is still 1. Subtract 32 from 38, there remains 6; but the fifth number in the table is 16, which is not contained in 6 ; therefore the fourth cipher of the expression is 0. The fourth number in the table is 8, which is not con- tained in 6 ; therefore the fifth cipher must also be 0. The third number in the table is 4, which is contained in 6 ; therefore the sixth cipher will be 1. Subtracting 4 from 6 there remains 2 ; but the second number in the table is 2, therefore the seventh cipher is 1. The last difference is zero ; therefore the last cipher in the expression is 0. Collecting all these results, we find the number 230 is expressed in the binary scale by 111001 10. Next, suppose it were required to determine the value of the expression 110101 in the binary scale. As there are here six ciphers, we look for the sixth number in the above table, and find 32, which is the value of the first cipher. The following cipher represents the fifth number, and is consequently equal to 16. The third cipher is 0, and its value nothing. The fourth cipher corresponds to the third number in the table, and represents 4. The fifth cipher is 0, and its value nothing. The last cipher corresponds to the first number of the table, which is 1 . The whole expression, therefore, 110,101, is equivalent to 32 + 16 -V- 4 -J- 1 = 53. It has been imagined, though on very slight grounds, that traces of the binary notation are discernible among the early monuments of China. For information on the subject of arithmetical scales, see Leslie's Philosophy of Arithmetic. BINARY MEASURE. (Lat. binarius, belonging to iu>o.) In Music, that in which the raising the hand or foot is equal to that of falling, usually called common time. The Italians are accustomed after a recitative to use the phrase a tempo giusto, to indicate that the measure is to be beat true and correct, which is otherwise con- ducted in the recitative in order to express passion, &c. BI'NAT. (Lat. bis and natus, born.) When two bodies of the same nature spring from the same point, as often happens in the segments of leaves. BIND. (Ger. binden, to fasten together.) In Music, the same as a ligature or tie for the purpose of grouping notes together. Bind. The indurated clay of coal mines. Binding in agriculture is tying up sheaves of corn. BINE'RVATE. (Lat. bis, nerva, a nerve.) In En- tomology, when tlve wing of an insect is supported by only two nerves. Bl'NNACLE. The case or stand in which the steering compass is placed ; it is fixed near the tiller or wheel. At night the compass is illuminated by a lamp placed over it. BI'NOCLE, or BINOCULAR TELESCOPE. (Lat. binus, double, and oculus, the eye.) A telescope to which both eyes may be applied at once, and in which, conse- 62 + BINOMIAL. quently, an object may be observed with both eyes at the same time. BINO'MIAL. (Lat. bis, twice, and Gr. vafMs, law.) In Algebra, signifies a quantity composed of two terms, connected together by the signs + or — ; thus, a + b and c — 5 are binomial quantities. BINO'MIAL THEOREM. A formula discovered by Newton, of singular use in algebra, by which a binomial quantity may be raised to any power m, the exponent m being either a whole number or a fraction, positive or negative. The formula is this : — (a + b) z=a +— a b+ — I: '-a m (?n—l) (tm — 2) m-3 ,, . m(m — l) {m-~2) (to— 3) • a O'* + — 12 3 12 3 4 a"*-^b^ + &c. And the mere inspection of the terms will give a better idea of tlie manner in which they are successively formed than any explanation. When the exponent m is a whole positive number, it is evident that the series has a finite number of terms ; suppose, for example, m zz 3, then »i — 3 =: ; and all the terms into which m — 3 enters as a co-efficient become equal to zero, or vanish. But on looking at the series, we find m — 3 entering the fifth term, and it will continue in all the succeeding ; therefore, when tw = 3 the series can only have four terms; and, generally, the number of terms of the series exceeds the exponent by one. When »» is a fractional number, or is negative, the series does not terminate, and will only express approximately the value of (a + 6)"* when it is convergent ; that is to say, when every individual term of the series is greater than that which succeeds it. For example, let the expression to be developed be (xx + t/)\ which signifies the square root of the binomial (x^ + y). Comparing this with the above formula, we have evidently — (XX + y)}t = x^i + ^ xxi-iy a series which goes on for ever ; but which, supposing x greater than unity, approaches nearer and nearer to the true value of the root of x^ -|- y, as the number of terms included becomes greater. In order to determine whether in any given case the series is convergent, we have only to compare two suc- cessive terms of the development of (a + 6)'". For ex- ample, take the fourth and fifth ; rejecting the common factors, the fourth is to the fifth as a"*"' : -—^aT-^b', m — 3 b that is, as 1 to — ^ •- ; therefore the fifth will be smaller than the fourth, or the series will be convergent if (m~3) b is smaller than 4 a. In general, let n be the order of any term in the development of (« + &)'": this term will be to the succeeding in the ratio of 1 : : — ; and n a the terms will always go on decreasing, or the series will be convergent when (/n — w + 1 ) 6 is smaller than n a. The principal use of the binomial theorem is to find approximate values of the roots of quantities by expand- ing them into series. The demonstrations which have been given of it are very numerous, and one or other of them may be found in any work on algebra. For one of the neatest and most concise we refer to the article " Algebra " in the Encyclopedia Britannica, 7th edition. BIO'CELLATE. (Lat. bis, ocellus, an eyelet.) In Entomology, when an insect's wing is marked with two eye-like spots. BIO'GRAPHY. (From the Greek word/3/«f, life, and •y^oKfii}, I describe.) The history of the life of an indi- vidual. Biography, in the progress of literature, ap- pears to be nearljf coeval with history itself. It has been ingeniously described as " history teaching by example ;" and this mode of instruction was perhaps peculiarly ap- propriate to early and simple times, in whicn the relative importance of individual men to the society in which they lived was greater than it can ordinarily be in periods of more advanced civilisation. But, although we have notices of many biographical writers among the classical authors of Greece, none of their works have been pre- served to us (if we except the short narrative of the exploits of Agesilaus by Xenophon, for his celebrated Memorabilia of Socrates are rather in the form of a col- lection of sayings and anecdotes than a memoir) of earlier date than the Roman Empire. It is to a comparatively late age that we owe all the more interesting works of this description which antiquity has bequeathed to us, some of which are among the most popular relics of the classical ages — the Lives of Illustrious Men, by Plutarch and Cornelius Nepos ; the Lives qf the Ccesars, by Suetonius, a L 147 BIQUADRATIC EQUATION. work of which the details are strictly biographical j and the Lives of the Philosophers, by Diogenes Laertius. Biography may be said in strictness to differ from history not merely in the extent of the subject, but also, and per- haps more characteristically, in the mode in which that subject is treated. Thus, in classical literature, the works of Quintus Curtius and Arrian, although devoted ex- clusively to the actions of a single individual (Alexander), are not usuallj^ termed biographies ; not only because the individual in question was the leader and foremost character in a course of great public events, but also because those public events form the subject matter of their works, and not the more peculiar details of the personal life of their heroes. They are therefore more accurately denominated histories than biographies. On the other hand, the Lives of the Twelve Ccesars by Sue- tonius form, as has been said, a series of biographies, although the persons who furnish the subject were, like Alexander, arbiters of the destinies of a great part of mankind ; because the details which they contain are chiefly of a private and personal nature. It is the object of history, among its other lessons, to make us acquainted with the influence which the actions, the characters, and the thoughts of individual men have produced on the course of events affecting society in ge- neral : conversely, it appears to be the province of the bio- grapher to detail the effects which have been produced by external occurrences and circumstances on the charac- ter and conduct of individuals. See Memoir. BIPE'CTINATE. (Lat. bis, pecten, a cowfi.) When a part has two margins toothed like a comb. BI'PELTATE. (Lat. bis, pelta, a ftwcA/er.) When an animal or part has a defence like a double shield. BIPU'PILLATE. (Lat. bis, pupilla, a jDM7J«7.) In Entomology, when an eye-like spot on the wing of a butterfly has two dots or pupils within it of a different colour. BIQUADRA'TIC. In Algebra, denotes the power im- mediately succeeding the cube ; that is, the square of the square, or fourth power. BIQUADRA'TIC EQUATION. Is an equation in which the unknown quantity rises to the fourth, but not to a higher power. An equation of this kind, when complete, is of the form x^ + Ax^ + Bx2 -j- Cx -h D = o, where A, B, C, and D, denote any known quantities whatever. Lewis Ferrari, an Italian geometer, and a pupil of the celebrated Cardan, made the discovery that the resolution of a biquadratic equation can always be reduced to that of a cubic equation. Of the varioas ways in which this reduction can be effected, the following, pro- posed by Euler, and explained at length in his Algebra, is perhaps the simplest. The first step of the process is to transform the given equation into another in which the second term is wanting. This can always be done by assuming y -^ J A = x, and substituting it for x in the pro- posed equation; anew equation will result, having the form t/^ + py^ + qy ^r - o, (1) and it is only to the solution of this that our attention need be confined. Assume y = v'« + \/^ + y/c, and suppose a, b, c, to be three roots of the cubic equation x^ + Pa;2 .^ q^ — K — o. By the theory of equations the co-efficient of the second term is the sum of all the roots with their signs changed ; the co-efficient of tlie third is the sum of the products of the roots combined by pairs ; and the last term is the product of all the roots jvith the signs changed. We have therefore a + h + c~ — V, ab + ac + be — Q, and ab c — R. From the assumed equation y — t^a -^jx/i + ^/c, we get by squaring y^ = rt -t- 6 -t- c + 2 {>^ab -f \/ac -f »^bc) ; whence, substi- tuting — P for a •>(■ b + c, and transposing «^2 + p ::: 2 {>Jab + \/ac + \/bc). Squaring this equation also, we get after reduction y^ -f- 2 P2^2 + pa = 4 (flfe + ac -I- 6c) -»- 8 VoTc (\/a + V* + ^/c), which, on substituting R and y for their values . given above, becomes y^ 4- P«/2 -f P2 = 4 Q + 8y\/R. and by transposing y4+ 2Px/2-8yVR+ P2-4Q =0. (2) Now, one of the roots of this biquadratic equation is y =.■ ]^a -I- \/b -f \/c ; and a, b, c, are the three roots of the cubic equation, 7? + P«2 + Qx — • R = o ; conse- quently, by resolving the cubic we get the values of o, b, c ; and thence y, the root of the biquadratic, becomes known. To apply this solution to the proposed equation (1), the co-cfificients P, Q, R, of the resolved equation (2), must be determined in terms oip, q, r. Comparing the two equations, y* +py^ + qy + r = 0, (1) j/4 -I- 2 P 3^2 - 8\/Ry -I- P2 — 4 Q = o, (2) we find 2 P = p, — (i\/R - <7, P2 — 4 Q = r ; whence P = J-£, Q =.P!ziir, R = 9^. It follows, therefore, a 16 64 L 2 BIRADIATE. that the roots of the proposed equation are expressed generally by 1/ = xfa + Vl> + Vc, where a, b, c denote the roots of the cubic equation "^ + 2 ^ 16 64 . , ^ . All the four roots of the biquadratic are involved m the expression y = ^/a + V* + a/c; i» order to dis- cover each of them in particular, it is necessary to con- sider the changes of sign of which they admit. As the square root of any quantity a may be either + v« or — V«. each of the three quantities, y/a, \/h, ^/c, may have either the sign + or — prefixed to it ; whence the formula will give eight different expressions. But as the product of the three roots, \/a, \/b, \/c, is equal to VR or to — I q, it is obvious that when q is positive, their product must be negative, and this can only be the case when either only one or all three of them are nega- tive. When q is negative the product must be positive, which can only be the case either when all three are posi- tive, or two of them negative. There are consequently only four different expressions for q positive, and four for q negative, which in either case form the four roots of the biquadratic equation. The co-etficients of the equation (3) involve fractions ; but these may be removed by assuming w = 4 a, and sub- stituting for as its value in terms of v. It then becomes, more simply, t/3 + 2 p t;2 + (p2 _ 4 y) t, _ gr2 = 0, (4) the roots of which are ^ a, 4 b, ^c. The rule for the resolution of a biquadratic equation is therefore as follows : — Let y^ -{■ py"^ + qy + r = o be the proposed equation, wanting its second term. Form the cubic equation v^ + 2pv^ + (p'^ — Ar) V — q"^ — o, and find its roots, which call a, b, c. Then the roots of the proposed biquadratic are, when q is negative, y = ^ ( Va + v/6 -I- Vc) y= i(V«-'V/6-V'elled the fancied attributes and false charms of these ovely beings, and has restored to them their wings and feet. The latter, indeed, are remarkable for their ro- bustness : they have three toes in front and one behind, as In other Passeres of Cuvier, with the middle toe shorter than the tarsus, the outer toe united to it at its base, and the inner one joined to it for half the length of the first phalanx. The form of the beak corresponds with that whiiih characterises the tribe Conirostres of Cuv. ; and their true food, which consists not only of the fiulpy and farinaceous parts of fruit, but also of worms, nsects, the eggs and young of smaller birds, and even carrion, caiiscs them to be ranked with the family of Omnivores, Cuv. In fact, they closely resemble in their 148 BISHOP. habits our magpies and jays. The principal species of the genus Paradisea are tlie Great or Common Bird of Paradise {Par. apoda of Linnaeus) ; the Royal Bird of Paradise (Par. regia) ; the Red Bird of Paradise {Par. rubra) ; the Magnificent Bird of Paradise {Par. mag- nifica) ; the Six-threaded Bird of Paradise {Par. sexe- setacea), which is characterized by three long and thread- like feathers, which grow from each, side of the body ; the Superb Bird of Paradise {Par. superba), which is smaller than the preceding, but perhaps the most beau- tiful of the genus; the Small Bird of Paradise (Pwr. minor), which measures about nine inches from the point of the bill to the end of the tail; and, lastly, the White Bird of Paradise {Par. alba). BIRD PEPPER. The small Capsicum, a species of the plant which affords Cayenne pepper. BIRDS. In Heraldry, are said to be rising, displayed, close, volant, &c. according to the different postures in which they are represented. Birds of prey, and cocks, when beaked and legged of a different tincture from the body, are said to be arm^d of that tincture. BIRD'S EYE VIEW. In the Fine Arts, a terra used to denote a view arranged according to the laws of perspective, in which the point of sight or situation of the eye is placed at a very considerable height above the objects viewed and delineated. In architectural repre- sentations, it is used chiefly for the purpose of exhibiting the disposition of the different courts or quadrangles and roofs of a building. It is a useful method of re- presenting battles, as also of giving a general notion of a small district of a country. As before observed, it is entirely dependent upon the same principles as those detailed in the article Peuspective, which see. BIRD'S MOUTH. In Architecture, an interior angle or notch, cut across the grain at the extremity of a piece of timlser for its reception on the edge of another piece ; as a rafter, for instance, is received on a pole plate. Bird's mouth signifies also the internal angle of a polygon, its external angle being called a bull's nose. BIRTH, EVIDENCE OF. By the French code civil it is required that a declaration shall be made of every birth to the proper officer, within three days, with production of the child. The " act of birth, " setting forth the time and place of the event, sex and name of the child, and description of the father, is then immediately drawn up in the presence of two witnesses. It is entered on the register, and a copy kept by the parent. {Code Civil, art. .55.) In England by the 70th Canon, and statutes of 6 & 7 William 3. and 4 G. 4. c. 76., the minister of every parish is required to keep a register of births. But now, by the recent act for registering births, deaths, and marriages, 6 & 7 W. 4. c. 86., it is enacted that the parent, or occupier of a house in which a child is born, may, within 42 days after the birth, give notice to the district registrar ; and shall give such information on being requested by the district registrar within the same time. After 42 days, the birth may be registered only in presence of the superintendant registrar, and on a peculiar declaration. After six months, registration of a birth cannot take place. Certified registers of births, as well as deaths, are to be forwarded after a certain time to the superintendant registrar, and copies of registers to the general register office. (Sects. 19. 21, 22, 23. 33, 34.) BIRTH,orBERTH, OF A SHIP. The ground orspace in which she is anchored, and which is said to be ?igood birth, or a bad birth ; also, an apartment, as the midship- man's birth ; also, the space allotted a seaman to sleep or hang his hammock in. BIS. (Lat. twice.) In Music, a word placed over passages which have dots postfixed to one bar, and pre- fixed to a subsequent bar, signifying that the passage between the dots is to be twice played. BI'SCUIT. (Fr. bis, twice, and cuit, baked.) In Sculpture, a species of porcelain, of which groups and figures in miniature are formed, which are twice passed through the furnace or oven. It is executed without glaze upon it. In Pottery, this term is applied to earthenware and porcelain, after it has been hardened in the fire, and before it receives the glaze : in this state it is permeable to water. BISE'TOUS. (Lat. bis, seta, a bristle.) In Zoology, when an animal or part is furnished with two bristle-like appendages. BISE'XUAL. (Of two sexes.) Is a term applied to flowers which contain both stamens and pistil within the same envelop : it is the same as the word hermaphrodite in botany. BI'SHOP. (A word contracted from the Greek Ijt/V- xovoi, Lat. episcopUs, signifying literally an overseer.) In all denominations of Christians which admit the epis- copal form of government, the bishop is the superior of the three orders, standing In rank and office distinct from the presbyter or priest. (5t't' art. Episcopacy.) This distinct office consists in the power of ordination, con- firmation, and consecration, none of which ceremonies may be performed by an inferior clergyman. The clergy of a diocese are subjected also to the ecclesiastical authority BISMUTH. of their bishop, who alone institutes to benefices, licenses curates, and has considerable discretionary power in requiring the residence of his clergy on, their cures, and in superintending the discharge of their duties in them. The mode of the appointment to bishoprics varies in different establishments. In early times the bishop was generally elected by his clergy. In the middle ages the pojje assumed in most cases the absolute nomination, which claim has been given up in later times in many Catholic countries, where the king or clergy recommend, and the holy father only ratifies the appointment. In England the appointment is virtually in the hands of the sovereign, who upon the demise of the bishop receives from the dean and chapter intimation of the event, with a request for permission to supply the vacancy. The king accords his permission to that effect, and at the same time recommends a person to their choice — a recom- mendation which is equivalent to a command, as it cannot be waived without incurring the severe penalties of a praemunire. BI'SMUTH. A brittle, yellowish- white metal, of a crystalline texture. Its specific gravity is 10' ; it fuses at 47C<^, and at a red heat it sublimes in close vessels. It conducts heat less perfectly than most of the other metals. When strongly heated it burns with a bluish white flame, and is rapidly oxidized. Its equivalent upon the hydrogen scale is 71 ; and it forms only one salifiable oxide, the equivalent of which is 79. When nitrate of bismuth is dropped into water a white powder is thrown down, formerly cajied rnagistery oj bismuth or pearl white : it is a subnitrate. A brown peroxide of bismuth is obtained by fusing the protoxide with caustic f)Otash. Some of the alloys of bismuth are remarkable or their fusibility : a compound of 8 parts of bismuth, 5 of lead, and 3 of tin, melts in boiling water, and is commonly called fusible metal. The ores of bismuth are not common ; but it occurs native, and combined with oxygen, sulphur, and arsenic. The Germans call it wismuth. BI'SON. The trivial name of certain species of the Linnaean genus Bos, which differ from their congeners ill having fourteen {Bos bison), or fifteen (Bos Ame- ricaniis), instead of thirteen pairs of ribs. The common bison of the north of Europe {Bos bison), and the Ame- rican bison, or bonassus {Bos A7nericanus), are the only known existing species of this group. BISPINO'SUS. (Lat. bis, spina, osjome.) Whenan animal or part is armed with two spines. BISSE'XTILE. (Lat. his, twice, and sextilis, s?>«.) The name given to the year which contains 366 days. The calendar used in all European countries is founded on that of the Romans, as reformed by Julius Caesar. In the calendar of Casar, the length of the year was fixed at 365i days ; and in order that the year should always begin with the beginning of a day, it was directed that every fourth year should contain 366 days, the other years having each 365. The additional day, which thus occurred every fourth year, was given to February, the shortest month, and was inserted in the calendar between the 24th and 25th days. In the peculiar method of reckoning the days of the month adopted by the Romans, namely, of reckoning backwards from the 1st of the suc- ceeding month, it would have been very inconvenient to have interrupted the order of numeration ; accordingly the 24th^ which was called* sexto Calendas Martii, was reckoned twice, and the supernumerary or repeated day called bis sexto Calendas. Hence the term bissextile. In English, leap year has the same signification. In the Julian calendar every fourth year was bissextile ? but this supposes the year to be 365J days, which errs in excess by 11 minutes 10-35 seconds. Accordingly, in the course of a few centuries, the error will amount to days, and cause the commencement of the year to change its place with respect to the seasons. When the Julian calendar was introduced, the equinox fell on the 26th of March ; in 1582, when the calendar was reformed by Pope Gregory XIII., it had fallen back to the 1 1th ; and as it was then supposed that the error of the Julian calendar amounted to three days in 400 years, it was ordered that the intercalary day should be omitted in all the years which terminate centuries, excepting those which are multiples of 400. The Gregorian rule of intercalation is therefore as follows : — Every year of which the number is divisible by 4 is a leap jear ; ex- cepting the centesimal years, which are only leap years when divisible by 4 after suppressing the two zeros. Thus 1600 was a leap year ; but 1700, 1800, and 1900, which would be bissextile in the Julian calendar, are common years in the Gregorian. This regulation, though it would for a long time pre- serve the commencement of the year at the same place in the seasons, is not yet quite forrect. It supposes the length of the year to be 365 days 5 h. 48m. 12 seconds, which is too great by 22-38 seconds ; an error which amounts to a day in 3866 years. As this number 3866 approaches to 4000, it was proposed by Delambre to correct the Gregorian rule by making the year 4000 and BLACK LETTER. all its multiples common years. Should our present calendar continue to be in use 2000 years hence, posterity may then begin to consider whether they will adopt this suggestion. See Calendar. Bl'STORT. The root of the Polygonum bistorta, an indigenous plant ; it is used in medicine as a powerful astringent. BI'STRE. In Painting, a dark brown colour, made, from the soot of dry wood, whereof for this purpose beech is preferable. BKSULCATE,. (Lat. bis, twice, sulcus, a fissure.) In Mammalogy, a[ term signifying a foot resting upon two hoofed digits. BIT. That part of the bridle which goes into the mouth of a horse, Bl'TTER PRINCIPLE. This term has been applied to certain products of the action of nitric acid upon animal and vegetable matters of an intensely bitter taste. See Carbazotic Acid. BI'TTERN. 5eeARDEA. Bittern. The residue of sea water after the common salt has been separated by evaporation . It contains muriate of magnesia, which gives it a bitter taste. BITTER SALT^. Sulphate of magnesia, or Epsom salt. BITTER SPAR. A Mineralogical term, generally ap- plied to certain crystallized varieties of dolomite, or double carbonates of lime and magnesia. It occurs in rhomboidal crystals, consisting of about 55 per cent, of carbonate of lime and 45 o£ carbonata of magnesia, sometimes with traces of iron aijd manganese. BITU'MEN. {FrormrtTv;, the pitch tree ; because it resembles pitch.) A variety o£ inflammable mineral substances, which, like pitch, burn with flame in the open air, is included under this term : such as naphtha, pi- tr oleum, and asphaltum. Bitumen. Mineral pitch. BITU'MINOUS SHALE. An argillaceous shale im- pregnated with bitumen : it commonly accompanies coal. BlVA'LVES. (Lat. bis, two, and valva, a valve.) A term commonly applied to the Lamellibrarichiate Ace- phalous Molluscs,on account of the structure of their shell, which consists of two parts or valves, joined together by an elastic ligament at the cardo, or hinge. The testa- ceous covering of the Palliobranchiates is also composed of two valves or shelly pieces ; but these are never joined by elastic ligament. BI'VOUAC. (Fr.) A term in the Military art, em- ploj'ed to denote the system by which soldiers on a march, or in expectation of an engagement, remain all night in the open air, in contradistinction to the systems of en- campment and cantonment. This word is derived from the Lat. bis, twice, and the German wache, a guard, and signified originally the guard which was selected from the body of a regiment to keep watch during the night. BIXA'CE.S:. A small natural order of plants, so called after the genus Bixa, the genus which produces the sub- stance called arnptto, with which English cheeses are dyed of their peculiar reddish ochre colour. The species are all trees or shrubs inhabiting the tropics. BLACK. (Sax. blac) In Painting, the darkest colour of all ; whereof the different sorts are lamp black, ivory black, Frankfort black, Spanish black, and Hart's black. BLACK BIRD.' See Turdus. BLACK CAP. This term is generally applied and understood to signify a species of frugivorous warbler {Curruccu atracajtilla of Bisson) ; but it is also occa- sionally given to the great titmouse {Parus fringillago), the marsh titmouse {Parus palustris), the black-headed bunting {Emberixa schcemilus), the stonechat {Rubetra rubicola), and even to the black-headed gull. BLACKCOCK. Thenameof a native species of grouse {Tetrao). BLACK FLUX. A mixture of carbonate of potash and charcoal, obtained by deflagrating tartar with half its weight of nitre. BLACK JACK. A term applied by the miners to certain sulphurets of zinc : the ore is also called blende. BLACK LEAD. See Plumbago and Graphite. BLACK LETTER. Is the name now applied to the old English or modern Gothic letter, which was intro- duced into England about the middle of the fourteenth century, and became the character generally used in MS. works before the art of printing was publicly practised in Europe. On the application of that art to the multiplying of books, about the middle of the fifteenth century, the block books, and subsequently those printed with moveable types, were in this character, to imitate writing, and were disposed of as manuscripts ; and so perfect was the imi- tation, that it required great discrimination to distinguish the printed from the written. The first printed Bible, known as "the Mentz Bible without date," was an in- stance of this. Fust, the printer, sold copies in Paris as manuscripts ; and as the demand increased on account of their beauty and correctness, he not only promptly supplied that increased demand, but even lowered the price : this L 3 BLACK WASH. oxcited suspicion ; and on comparing the copies they were found to be perfect facsimiles of each other, and being produced with such rapidity it was held to be totally im- possible for the most expert scriptores to execute them with equal accuracy and despatch ; and Fust was accused of producing them by means of magic. To avoid punish- ment for this crime, he was obliged to reveal the process by which they were produced. Books printed before the year 1500 are generally in this character, and are styled black-letter books. BLACK WASH. A lotion composed of calomel and limewater. BLA'N'CHING. In Gardening, is the whitenmg of the stems, stalks, or leaves of plants by tying them together, or earthing them up, so as to exclude the light, and thus to diminish the intensity of their native properties. BLA'NK VERSE. In some modern languages, the heroic verse of five feet without rhymes. Blank verse is peculiar to the Italian, English, and German languages ; having been imported into the two latter from the first. In Italian the line is of eleven syllables ; and is used in- variably in the drama, and frequently in serious poetry, epic or didactic. In English it was also first adopted by the dramatists, and transferred to epic poetry by Milton. The Miltonic verse is constructed with closer attention to the melody of the cadence and caesura than the dramatic : it admits also less frequently of the eleventh syllable, which in English poetry must be regarded as a sort of license; while Shakspeare and other dramatists occa- sionally double the short syllable at the end, and thus extend the number to twelve. BLAPS. A Fabrician genus of Coleopterous insects, now the type of a famny(Blapsidce), characterized by the absence of wings ; maxillary palpi terminated by a large hatchet-shaped joint ; body oblong and oval. All the species are of a dark or black colour, and have the elytra soldered togetJier, and bent down at the sides of the abdo- men so as to embrace that part. There are throe British species of the genus Blaps proper, which are known by the trivial names of "darkling" or " church-yard beetles,*^* and are regarded by the vulgar of this and other countries as insects of evil omen. BLaS'PHEMY. (Gr./3x«(rvct, slime.) In Ichthyology, a genus of Acanthopterygious fishes, of the family of Gudgeons {Gobioidce), remarkable for the quantity of mucus secreted from the skin, and for the viviparous generation of some of the species, of which the Blennuis pholis, a species common along the shores of Britain, is an example. BLE'NNORRHCE'A. (Gr. /SXiyras, mucus, and fm, I flow.) An inordinate discharge or secretion of mu- cus. BLE'PHARITES. (Gr. ^MifSagw, the eyelid.) In- flammation of the eyelids. BLIGHT. A term in common use for supposed at- mospherical injuries received by plants. Before effects were traced to their causes with'the same care that they are at present, the sudden discolouration of the leaves of plants, their death, or their being covered with minute insects or small excrescences, was called by the general name of blight ; and this blight was attributed to some mysterious influence in the air, to the east wind, or to thunder, because these states of the atmosphere com- monly accompanied the phenomena alluded to. It is now found that what is called blight is in some cases the effect of insects, to the progress of which the dry state of the atmosphere produced by east wind is pecu- culiarly favourable ; while in other cases, it is caused by parasitical fungi. The appearance of these fungi on corn crops is frequently designated by farmers as the fire blast ; while on neach and other trees in gardens it is called mildew. The sudden death of plants, and also the withering and dr3nng up of part of their leaves and branches, to which appearance the term blight should perhaps be restricted, are produced by the transpiration of water from the leaves taking place with greater ra- pidity than it can be supplied by the abson^tion of the roots. In very hot weather in summer, branches of fruit trees trained against walls, or of gooseberry bushes on espaliers, are sometimes withered up in a few minutes from this cause. What countrj-men call the blight on standard apple or other fruit trees in orchards is com- monly nothing more than the injuries done the leaves BLIND WORM. and buds by the caterpillars of certain moths ; that on thorn hedges, by the caterpillar of the saw fly, or of the ermine, or of some other moths ; and that on roses, by the aphides or green fly. BLIND WORM. An ophidian or serpent-like reptile, which is the type of the genus Cecilia (see that word). The term is also sometimes applied to the slow-worm. See Anguis. BLl'NKERS. Expansions of the sides of the bridle of a horse, to prevent him from seeing on either side, but at the same time not to obstruct his vision in front. BLIS'TER-FLY. See Cantharis. BLOCK. (Teutonic.) In Architecture, a large un- worked mass of marble or other stone. It is also vulgarly used to denote a modillion in a cornice. Block. In Navigation, the case that contains the wheel or sheeve of the pulley (which last term is not used at sea). Two or more blocks, with the rope, constitute a tackle (pronounced tacle). Blocks are also the pieces of wood and iron on which, piled up, the ship's keel is supported when she is in dock. BLOCKA'DE. In International Law, the right to blockade the ports of an enemy ia war, and to exclude neutrals, is limitedby the following recognised principles : 1. The blockade must be substantial, by means of a suffi- cient force to prevent the entry or exit of vessels ; other- wise a neutral IS not bound to respect it.' 2. It is essential that the neutral should have notice of the blockade ; otherwise his ship cannot be justly condemned. A counter notice should also be given by the blockading power when the blockade has ceased. In England, a blockade is pro- perly declared by the king in council. BLO'CKING COURSE. In Architecture, a finishing course of masonry above a cornice. BLOCK TIN. Tin cast into blocks or ingots : it is generally less pure than grain tin. BLOOD. The fluid which circulates in the heart and blood-vessels. When viewed under the microscope it appears to consist of very minute red globules or spheroids floating in a colourless fluid. The average quantity in an adult man is estimated at about 28 lbs. : it is of two distinct colours in the arterial and venous systems ; florid red approaching to scarlet in the former, and dark crim- son in th^ latter. Its specific gravity is between TOSO and 1-070. When drawn from its vessels it gelatinises or coagulates in the course of a few minutes of common temperature, and soon separates spontaneously into serum and caagulum. The serum is a yellowish soapy- feeling fluid, of the specific gravity of about r030. It exhibits a slight alkaline reaction upon test papers ; when heated it becomes opaque, and ,at 156<^ it co- agulates. It is also coagulated by alcohol, and by most of the acids ; acetic acid and ether do not coagulate it ; solutions of corrosive sublimate, of subacetatp of lead, and of chloride platinum occasion precipitates in it, even when considerably diluted with water. These properties of serum are dependent upon the presence of a peculiar proximate animal principle called albumen; the same substance, and with very nearly the same properties, con- stitutes the white of egg, the coagulability of which by heat is well known. Besides the above there is another most delicate test of albumen in solution, which consists in adding to the liquid suspected, to contain it a little strong acetic acidy and afterwards a few drops of fer- rocyanate of potash. If albumen be present, a white cloud is produced. This is even a more accurate test than corrosive sublimate. White of egg is coagulated by ether, while serum is not. According to Marcet 1000 parts of serum of human blood are composed of water 900, al- bumen 86-8, muriates of potassa and soda. 6-G, muco- extractive 4, carbonate of soda 1"65, sulphate of potass^ 0-35, earthy phosphates 0-60. The coagulum of the blood is of a more or less firm texture, and has a greater specific gravity than the serum. It contains the colouring particles of the blood ; and when carefully washed, these are carried out of it, and a tena- cious whitish mattes remains, which has been termed fibrine, but which, in all essential points, has tlie proper- ties of coagulated albumen. The colouring matter of the blood, heematosine, may be obtained by evaporating its aqueous solution at a tem- perature below 100° i it then appears almost black, but resumes its red colour when dissolved in water. It is soluble in acids and in alkalies : these solutions are dark- coloured ; but when mixed, so as to become neutral, the hajmatosine fall* of a bright red colour. Accordingly, when the clot of blood is put into acids it becomes brown or blackish, and is very similarly discoloured by alkalies ; but most neutral salta render it florid. Dr. Stevens has shown that carbonic acid in venous blood is the pro- bable cause of its dingy hue, and that the saline matter of the serum confers the florid red upon arterial blood ; and that by washing the saline matters out of the bright coagulum of arterial blood it gradually loses its brilliancy and resembles venous coagulum. The following table shows the results of an analysis of human blood by Lecanu(^n«fffc*de Chimieet Physique, BOAT. vol. xlviii.) ; considered quantitively , it must only be taken as a mean or approximate result. Water Fibrine Colouring matter Albumen Fat and oily matter Extractive matter Albumen combined with soda Chloride of sodium potassium Carbonates ") ^f „„^„^„„ Carbonates of lime -^ magnesia I Phosphate of lime I magnesia j iron j Peroxide of iron J Loss - - - 1 su } 780-145 2-100 133-000 65-G90 3-740 1-790 1-265 8-370 2100 2-400 1000-000 BLOOD ROOT. The root of the Sanguinaria cana- densis, the juice of which is of a red colour. BLO'ODSTONE. A dark green silicious mineral, variegated by red spots (heliotrope). BLO'WPIPE. An instrument by which a small jet of air is directed laterally into the flame of a lamp or candle, so as to divert it in a long slender cone upon a piece of charcoal or other substance so placed as to receive It. When a flame is thus urged by the blowpipe the extreme heat is just at the tip of the outer white flame, where the combustion is most perfect, and where substances are rapidly burned or oxidized; whilst the interior blue flame, in consequence of its excess of combustible matter, abstracts oxygen from, or reduces^ substances. So that several metals, when thus heated before the blowpipe, are alternately oxidized and deoxidized by being placed in the outer and inner flame. The blowpipe is of important service to the chemist in enabling him to ascertain easily and quickly the effects of intense heat upon a variety of substances ; and he frequently has recourse to it in order to distinguish metallic and earthy minerals from each other, and to ascertain in a general way the nature of their component parts : it is, in fact, a most important auxiliary in all cases of qualitative analysis. Several treatises have been written on the use and indications of the blowpipe : the reader is especially referred to Faraday's Chemical Manipulation, Sect. IV. §3. BLU'BBER. The cellular membrane in which the oil or fat of the whale is included. See Whale. BLUE. (Germ, blau.) In Painting, the colour of the sky. It is one of the seven original colours, and is of many sorts, whereof the principal are ultramarine, Prus- sian blue, blue bice, and indigo. BLUFFS. High banks presenting an abrupt form to- wards the sea or river. BO'A. A genus of serpents, with the transverse scuta; of the abdomen and tail in a single row, and without a rattle or spur at the end of the tail. Some species attain an immense size ; but the large serpents brought to this country, and called boa constrictors, are generally Pythons, and natives of Asia. The true boas are from South America. BOARD. (Equivalent to the French bureau.) A word applied usually to certain individuals in a collective capacity, who are intrusted with the management of some public office or department. Thus the Commissioners of Customs, the Committee of the Privy Council for the Affairs of Trade, the Commissioners of Excise, &c., when assembled to transact the business of their respective offices are styled the Board of Customs, the Board of Trade, the Board of Excise, &c. But the term Board is used also in a more general seqse, being applied to any in- dividuals appointed by competent authority to delibei^te on or superintend the operations of any private business or speculation. Board. (Sax. bopb.) In Architecture, a piece of timber of undefined length, more than four inches in breadth, and not more than two inches and an half in thickness. The section of a board is, however, sometimes triangular, or rather trapezoidal, one edge being very thin. This is called a feather-edged board. BOA'TSWAIN. The second of the three warrant officers of a man of war ; he has charge of the boats, rigging, anchors, and cables. It his duty to turn the hands up, or summon the whole crew, whenever they are required for any duty. He should from the nature of his duties be an active man, and a thorough seaman. The boatswain's mates assist the boatswain, summon the watches or other portions of the crew to duty, and inflict punishments. BOAT. (Sax. b8Bt.) A term used in a general sense to denote any small ship or vessel, whether open or decked, and which ra^s be propelled by oars, or by BOBSTAYS. sails, or by steam . They are accordingly of very different forms and constructions, according to the different pur- poses they are intended to serve. Under this term are comprehended barges, cutters, pinnaces, yawls, &c. See Ship ; Steam Navigation. BO'BSTAYS. Stays or strong ropes to keep down the bowsprit during the plunging of the ship, and against the upward actien of the head sails (jibs, fore-staysail, &c.), and to sustain the action of the stays or ropes, which keep the foremast, fore-topmast, &c., and there- fore the main-topmast, from falling aft. They are necessarily very strong ; they are attached to the bow- sprit by collars placed about % of its length outside, and to the hull of the ship, by passing through holes in the cutwater or projecting head, and make an angle of about 30° more or less with the axis of the bowsprit. They are often made of chains. BO'DY. In Physics, is a torm applied to any portion of matter of which the existence can be perceived by any of our senses. According to the Peripatetics, body is composed oi matter, form, and privation. In modern physics, bodyis regarded as an agglomeration of material particles. According to the different forms in which matter exists, bodies may be solid, liquid, or gaseous. In Geometry, body is synonimous with solid. Thus we say the five regular bodies, or five regular solids. See Solid. BOG EARTH. A soil consisting chiefly of silicious and vegetable fibre ; it is often accumulated in con- siderable quantity where waters have deposited the mud of boggy places. Many American shrubs and other plants and flowers will only thrive in such or similar soils, so that bog earth is in great request for such pur- poses. It may, to a certain extent, be artificially imitated by mixing the cuttings of grass with the mud of ponds and a sufficient quantity of sharp sand. BOHE'A. A species of black tea. 5ee Tea. BOI'LING POINT. The temperature at which liquids are rapidly converted into vapour with the phenomena of ebullition. Thus the boiling point of water is 212° ; of alcohol, 176° ; of ether, 96° ; of oil of turpentine, 316° ; and of mercury, 662° ; these being the respective temperatures at which these bodies con- tinuously pass into the state of vapour. BO'LDNESS. (Sax. balb.) In the Fine Arts, that fearlessness which an artist exhibits in his designs, arising from, and grounded on, a thorough knowledge of the principles of his art. Its antagonist is tameness or insipidity. BOLE. {Gr. ^lukos, a mass.) An argillaceous earthy mineral, generally reddened by oxide of iron ; as is the case in the Artnenianbole, which is used in tooth-powder, and to give colour to the fish sauce called essence of anchovies. BOLE'RO. A pe'^uliar species of dance very popular in Spain, and so called from the name of its inventor. BOLE'TIC ACID. An acid contained in the juice of the Boletus pseudo ignariics. BOLE'TUS. (Gr. /3«Xa,-, a mass,) A genus of fungi, numerous large species of which spring from the sides of trees when the rind is decayed, forming firm fleshy masses, which are generally smooth on the upper side, and pierced witli holes on the lower. The spawn of such plants often forms what is called drj'-rot, insinuating Its fine delicate filamentous ramifications between the tubes' of the wood, forcing them asunder, and so de- stroying the cohesion and solidity of timber. Boletus igm'arius and fomenturius are the fungi which, when cut into thin slices, dried, .and prepared with saltpetre, form common amadou, or the German tinder of the shops. B. tuAerosus is used in Sweden, as a substitute for cork. B. bovinus is said to be a favourite food of oxen, deer, swine, and some other animals ; it is even used for human food. BOLOGNE'SE SCHOOL. In Painting, sometimes called the Lombard school of painting. It was founded by 4he Caracci, and its object was to unite the excellencies of the preceding schools {see Painting) ; hence it is oc- casionally called the Eclectic school. Among the prin- cipal painters which it numbered were Doraenichino, Lanfranco, Corregio, Guido, Schidone, Caravagio, Zam- pieri, Primaticcio, &c. BOLO'GNIAN STONE. A sulphate of baryta, found near Bologna, which, when heated with charcoal, becomes a powerful .solar phosphorus. BO'LTHEAD. A globular flask with a tubular neck, used in the chemical laboratory. BO'LUS. (Ijatin, a mass.) A very large pill ; or a medicine formed into an olive-shaped mass, not too large to be swallowed. BOMB. In Artillery, a hollow ball or shell of cast- iron, having an orifice through which it is filled with gunpowder, and into whi<-h, when filled, a fusee is insortocl, so adjusted that when the bomb falls at the place intended, the fusee ignites the powder in the shell, and blows it to pieces. The havoc which is thus produced in a besieged t07/n or the ranks of an enemy is often very great. BOND. Bombs, or shells, as they are more frequently called, are of all sizes, from about 18 inches downwards, and are in general thrown from mortars or howitzers ; sometimes from cannon. They appear to have been first used as part of the regular materiel of an army about the year 1634, in the wars of the Netherlands. The principal art in throwing shells is to make them fall at or near a given point. For this purpose the distance is calculated, and the charge of powder and elevation of the mortar re- gulated accordingly. Theoretical rules are of no great use. They must be derived from experiment and practice. BO'MBARDIERS. See Brachinus. BO'MBAX. (Bo^(3«|.) A genus containing many species of very large trees, whose capsules are filled with a fine cottony substance enveloping the seeds. It gives its name to the natural order Bo7tibaceee, allied to Malvaccous plants, where it is associated with the cele- brated Baobab, and many more gigantic inhabitants of tropical forests. The bombax trees are remarkable for forming on their sides next the ground liuge buttresses, projecting so far from the parent trunk as to be capable of screening many men. The quantity of cotton yielded by these trees is enormous, and often covers the earth around the roots to the depth of several feet ; it is un- fortunately of too short a staple to be used for manu- facturing purposes. BO'MBAZINE. {Bofx-fiyl, a silk worm.) A fabric of which the warp is silk and the weft (or shoot) worsted. It is chiefly made in black, and as an article of mourning for female dress. The capital employed in Norwich, during the most flourishing period of the bombazine trade, amounted to 300,000^., but at present it is below 100,000/. BOMB VESSEL. A ship of war, intended for the bombardment of a town or place situated on the sea coast. They are of about 350 tons burthen, and carry one 13-inch and one 10-inch mortar, together with two 6-pounder guns, one 12-pounder, and eight 24-pounder carronades, having a crew of sixty-seven men, with the usual complement of officers, and a detachment of marine artillerymen for the purpose of working the guns. See Spearman's British Gunner. BO'MBIC ACID. The acid contained in the silk- worm, especially in its chrysalis state. It is supposed to resemble formic acid. BO'MBYCI'LLA. A genus of omnivorous Passerine birds, of which the Bohemian wax-wing {Bombycilla gar- rula) is an example, and an occasional winter visitor of Britain. BOMBY'LIUS. A Linnaean genus 6f Dipterous in- sects, and now the type of a family {Boynbyliidce), cha- racterized by the great length of the oral instruments, which form a long and slender proboscis ; body thick, short, hairy ; thorax gibbous ; wings extended hori- zontally ; halteres exposed ; antennae short, approx- imate, composed of three joints, the last the longest, thickened and terminating obtusely ; legs long and slender. The insects of this family have a rapid flight, and are very active ; they subsist entirely on the nectar of flowers. They are of small size, and mostly exotic, af- fording types of many genera, of which only Bombylius proper and Pthiria afford British examples. BO'MBYX. A Linnaean geiiusofLepidopterous insects, now the type of a family {Bombycidce), including many genera of nocturnal and post-meridian moths. These have been arranged under the following sub-families : — UepialidiE,Notodoxtidce,Arctiidee, and BombycidiS proper. BONA DEA. In Roman Mythology, a goddess con- cerning whom a great diversity of opinion prevails, even among the writers of antiquity. On the authority of C. Labeo, she is represented by Macrobius, who treats at length upon her nature and worship, as synonimous with the Grecian Rhea or Cybele. The Bona Dea had two temples at Rome ; but her rites were generally solemnised in the house of the consul or prajtor. In the celebration of these rites only women participated, thereby indicating the peculiar chastity of the goddess. But a perusal of the ancient writers will convince the most sceptical that the exclusion of men from the solemnities of the Bona Dea was purely nominal, and that in the course of time the grossest licentiousness was practised during their celebration. (See Cic : pro Milone : Juv. Sat. VI.) BONA'SSUS. See Bi.son. BOND. (Sax. bonb.) In Architecture, the con- nection of one stone or brick with another by lapping them over each other in carrying up work, so that an inseparable mass of building may be formed, which could not be the case if every vertical joint was over that below it. Bond. In Law, a deed whereby the obligor, or party binding himself, obliges himself, his heirs, executors, and administrators, to pay a certain sum of money, called the penalty, to another (the obligee) at a day appointed. There is a condition added, that if the obligor does some particular act tlic obligation shall be void, or else remain in full force. In case this condition is not performed, the bond becomes forfeited or absolute at law, and charges tiie obligor while living ; and after BOND. his death the obligation descends on the heir, who (in default of personal assets in the hands of the executor or administrator) is bound to disharge it, provided he have real assets by descent. The condition is usually (although not necessarily) included in the same deed, and at the foot of the obligation. A bond without a condition is termed single (or sim- plex obligatio) ; and it becomes single by forfeiture, on non-performance of the condition. At law, the whole penalty mentioned in the bond was recoverable on such non-performance. But by the interposition of equity the obligee was discharged from paying more than the sum to which the obligor was reasonably entitled : viz. his principal, interest, and expenses, if the bond was for pajTnent of a debt ; or the damages accruing to him, if it was for the performance of a stipulated act. But by 4 & 5 Ann. c. 16. it was enacted that in case of a bond conditioned Ibr payment of money, the payment of the sum due, with interest and costs, even though the bond be forfeited, and suit commenced thereon, shall be a full satisfaction and discharge ; and on this footing the law now stands. i A bond on which neither principal nor interest has I been demanded for twenty years will be presumed to 1 have been satisfied ; but length of time is not, strictly, a \ legal bar, but only a ground for the jury to presume i satisfaction. i In a bond where several are bound severally, the ob- ligee may, at his election, sue all the obligors together, or all of them apart, and have several judgments and executions : but he shall have satisfaction but once ; for if it be by one only, that is sufficient to discharge the debt. Bond, English. In Architecture, that disposition of bricks in a wall wherein the courses are alternately com- posed oi headers, or bricks laid with their heads or ends towards the faces of the wall, and in the superior and inferior courses of stretchers or bricks, . — , — i — _ with their lengths parallel to the faces ■[ ' ' | ' ' | ^ ■ of the walls, as in the margin, in which ~^ the upper is called the heading, and the lower the stretch- ing course. Bond, Flemish. In Architecture, that disposition of bricks in a wall wherein each course — j ^—. has headers and stretchers alternately, I I I'l — as in the margin. Bond or Lap of a Slate. In Architecture, the dis- tance between the nail of the under slate and the lower edge of the upper slate. BOND STONE. In Architecture, a stone running through the whole thickness of a wall at right angles to its face, for the purpose of binding the wall together in the direction of its thickness. BOND TIMBER. In Architecture, timber worked in with a wall as it is carried up, for the purpose of tying it together in a longitudinal direction while the work is setting. BONE. An important organ in the higher orders of animals {see Anatomy), forming the solid support of their fabric, and protecting the vital organs, such as the brain and the heart and lungs, from external pressure and injury. In the human skeleton there are commonly enumerated 260 distinct bones. They, liowever, admit of classification under three heads ; namely, lun^ or cylin- dricathones, such as those of the extremities ; broad and flat bones, such as those of the skull ; and short, square, irregular, or solid bones, such as the vertebrae, and those of the wrist and instep, and the patella or knee-pan : the first bones are generally filled with marrow, and are admirable specimens of strength of structure with the least possible weight. The bones are covered by a mem- brane called periosteum, by v/hich the ramifications of blood-vessels and nerves pass into the bone. In the growth of a bone, the gelatinous or cartilaginous portion, as it has sometimes been called, is first formed, and the earthy or indurating part is afterwards deposited. We are indebted to Mr. Hatchett for our principal information respecting the proximate chemical components of bone. {Phil. Trans. 1799 and 1800.) The soft parts consist of gelatine and albumen ; and the hard portion is composed of phosphate of lime and carbonate of lime, with small quantities of other salts. The animal matter of bones amounts on an average to about half their weight, or, when dried, to between 30 and AQ per cent.; so that they contain a large relative proportion of nutritive matter. Ihe bones, including their animal matter, are the most durable parts of the animal fabric ; hence the proposal of storing th for not onh of storing them up, as occasional sources of nutriment ; ly is thi " ■ - ■ - in bones which have been kept dry for many years, but it le cartilaginous portion unimpaired, has even been found perfect in bones of apparently an- tediluvian origin. The best mode of extracting the nutri- tious part of bone for human food consists in grinding it fine, and subjecting it with water to a heat of about V20C' in a digester ; or the earthy part may be removed by dilute muriatic acid. When dogs and some other animals devour bones, the nutritive part is abstracted bv 163 BOOK-KEEPING. their gastric juice, and the earthy part is voided in their excrement, forming what was formerly called album gr cecum. When bones are submitted to destructive distillation, the gelatine and albumen which they contain is abun- dantly productive of ammonia ; hence a copious source of that alkali and its compounds ; the residue is a mixture of the earthy part of the bone with charcoal, commonly termed ivory or hone black. BONE DUST, or ground bones, has recently been used with the best effect as a manure. It is usually ap- plied to light or turnip soils, which it has rendered in no ordinary degree productive. For further details on this curious and interesting subject, see article "Agriculture" in M'Culloch's Statistics. The importation of bones from distant countries to be used as manure is now carried on to a great extent. BONE EARTH. The residue of bones which have been calcined so as to destroy the animal matter and carbon, and become converted into a white porous and friable substance, composed chiefly of phosphate of lime. According to Berzelius, 100 parts of human bones are composed of 51 • 04 phosphate of lime, 11-30 carbonate of lime, 2 fluoride of calcium, 1-20 soda and chloride of sodium, 1-16 phosphate of magnesia, and 33. 30 animal matter. Albumen, gelatine, and fat constitute the animal part of bone, the greater part of which remains in the form of a tough cartilage when bones are steeped in dilute muriatic acid. BONI'TO. The name of a species of Scomberoid fishes {Thynnus pelamis, Cuv.), common in the tropical ocean, and well known to voyagers from its persecution of the flying-fish {Exoccetus volitans), and nying squid {Loligo sdsittata). BO'NZES. The priests of the religion of Fo are so called by Europeans ; especially in China, the Birman Empire, Japan, and other districts of Eastern Asia. BO'OBY. The English nameof agenus oi Pelecanida; they are also called gannets, noddies, and soland geese. BOOK. (Ger. buch.) " The general name of almost every literary composition, but in a more limited sense applied only to such compositions as are large enough to form a volume. ' ' Short and fugitive pieces are denominated pamphlets, in contradistinction to books, which are of greater length, and embrace more general or permanent topics. To the various sizes and forms in which books ap- pear appropriate appellations have been given ; as folio, quarto, octavo, duodecimo, &c. The materials of which books have been composed have been extremely different in different nations, and in different periods of the progress of civilization. Platesof lead and copper, bricks, stone, and wood were anciently employed for this purpose. At a later period the bark of trees formed the chief ma- terial in the composition of books, as is indicated by the original signification of the term book itself, and its equivalent in some some other languages. The materials of books were afterwards derived from the Egyptian plant papyrus ; but as the demand for books increased, more durable materials were sought for, and leather, made chiefly from the skins of goats or sheep, was em- ployed for this purpose. Next followed the use of parch- ment, on which the ancient MSS. were chiefly written : but all these systems were swallowed up by the inven- tion of paper {quod vide), which took place about the 13th century, and facilitated the circulation of knowledge to an incalculable extent. The first books were in tlie form of blocks' and tablets; but A^hen flexible materials came into use, it was found more convenient to roll them up in scrolls, called by the Greeks xovrot^, and by the Romans volumen. BOOK-KEEPING. In Commerce, the art of re- cording, in a regular, concise, and systematic manner, the transactions of merchants, traders, or other persons engaged in pursuits connected with money. It has not only the authority of experience to recommend it, but that of some of the sagest observers of human afl'airs ; Dr. Johnson remarks, " that the counting-house of an accomplished merchant is a school of method, where the great science may be learned of ranging particulars under generals, of bringing the different parts of a transaction together, and of showing at one view a long series of dealing and exchange. Let no man (the Doctor adds) venture into large business while he is ignorant of the method of regulating books ; never let him imagine that any degree of natural abilities will enable him to sup- ply this deficiency, or preserve a multiplicity of affairs from inextricable confusion." There are two modes of keeping books of account ; the one by what is termed Sin-glc axiA the other by Double Entry. Both are in very general use. The system of single entry is chiefly con- fined to the business of retail-dealers ; it is much the simplest method of book-keeping, consisting only of a day- book and a ledger. In the day-book the dealer enters his sales and purchases, and in his ledger he carries the former to the debit of his customers, and the latter to the credit of the merchants who supply him with goods. By making at any time a list of the sums due to him by his customers, BOOK-KEEPING. and of those due by him to wholesale merchants, the retail dealer may, after adding to the debts due to him the value of his stock on hand, arrive at an approximation to the real state of his debts and assets. This, however, is but an imperfect and unsatisfactory mode of book- keeping ; and, therefore, in the case of wholesale and mercantile business, where extensive and multifarious transactions have to be recorded, recourse is had to the system of double entry. This system possesses all the advantages of single entry, besides being so complete and comprehensive in its principles, and so certain in its results, as to admit of universal application. It may with equal advantage be adopted in the most limited as well as in the most extensive, in the most plain and simple as well as the most intricate and complicated concerns. No very authentic accounts exist of the origin of book- keeping. The double entry system appears to have been first practised towards the latter part of the fifteenth century, in Venice and other towns in Italy, then the great emporium of the mercantile world, and from this circumstance It acquired the name of the Italian method qf book-keeping. The advantages of the system, and the soundness of the principles on which it is based, soon became apparent ; for we find it was adopted in England and France early in the sixteenth century, and has con- tinued to be more and more practised down to the pre- sent day. The great objects of a good method of book-keeping are to exhibit transactions as they occur, in the most minute detail, and ultimately in the most condensed form ; ad- vancing from the earliest stage to the latest by such clear and lucid steps as at all times to admit of every fact being traced in its progress, and security being obtained at every step against omission or error. For tlis attain- ment of such important objects, no mode of book-keeping has hitherto been devised at all approaching to the per- fection of the Italian system by double entry. Every transaction in business is twofold ; there can be no receipt without a payment, and no purchase without a sale, and consequently by presenting tht> same event or fact on both sides of the books, whence the name of double entry, the entries being simultaneous, become corroborative of each other. The circumstance of every transaction being entered on both sides of the ledger afTords one of the most valuable results derived from the system of double entry, namely, a test of accuracy ; inasmuch as the entries on the credit side must be equal to the entries on the debit side, otherwise the books will not balance. The three principal books required under the Italian system of double entry are, a cash book, journal, and ledger. In the first of these every transaction is recorded where money forms one of its elements, and in practice these transactions are by some book-keepers carried direct from the cash book to the ledger without being passed through the journal at all. The journal, however, forms a most important part of the system. It exhibits a narrative of every transaction of which an actual transfer of money does not form one of the elements, ar- ranging the facts in as simple and condensed a form as correctness and intelligibility will admit of, and the results of those entries in the journal are afterwards in- troduced into the ledger, which thereby becomes a sort of key to the detailed history of every transaction ; whilst at the same time it furnishes a luminous compendium of the whole. In like manner when the cash transac- tions are passed through the journal they are at stated periods classed and arranged in a condensed form, and thence transferred to the ledger. This plan of intro- ducing the cash transactions Into the journal is con- sidered much the best system, though attended with a little more trouble to the book-keeper, as it affords great facilities in balancing the books and testing the accuracy of the ledger, more particularly when the recent improvements upon the form of the journal, which were originally suggested by the late Mr. Jones, are adopted. By the plan referred to, the journal is advantageously ruled with four cash columns, two upon the left hand side for entries debtor, and two upon the right for entries creditor; and all the transactions being connected either with personal and property ac- counts or nominal accounts, such as charges, profit and loss, and so forth, they are classed accordingly in the columns on the Dr. or Cr. side of the journal respec- tively ; and as the debit entries are at all times equal to the credit entries, the aggregate of the two colmnns on the Dr. side must tally with the aggregate of the two on the Cr. side of the journal. This too is found in practice to be a most useful check against posting the entries to wrong accounts in the ledger ; for on balancing the books, by takmg the amounts Dr. and Cr. posted to personal and property accounts, and the amounts Dr. and Cr. posted to noinmal accounts in the ledger, and comparing them with the total amounts in the corresponding columns of the journal, it will be seen whether they agree : if they do not, it demonstrates that some entries must have been erroneously posted, which can then only be discovered BORASSUS. by collating the books ; but if the amounts do agree, then it affords at least strong presumptive evidence that the whole of the entries have been carried to the proper accounts. Experience and practice are occasional^ sug- gesting minor improvements upon the forms of the cash book, journal, and ledger, to suit particular cases, as well as upon the subsidiary books required for gathering to- gether the facts preparatory to their being transferred in a condensed form into the journal ; and indeed an in- telligent book-keeper may accomplish much by a judicious classification of the facts in the auxiliary books ; but the fundamental principles of the Italian system of book- keeping, notwithstanding such occasional facilities and improved arrangements in the working of it, remain per- fect and unchanged ; and after the length of time they have successfully withstood all attempts at innovation or change, it may safely be affirmed that the system is the best hitherto discovered, and is deserving of the utmost confidence and general adoption. We have already stated that the Italian system of book-keeping admits of universal application ; and we may now observe that it is not confined to merchants' accounts, but is equally applicable to government accounts. In evidence of its being so, we may instance the East India Company, where the double entry system is used with the most perfect success in all the branches of that great and well-conducted establishment, financial as well as commercial. One great desideratum in a svstem of book- keeping for government accounts is centralization, which can alone be attained by a proper and well organized me- thod of condensing the facts or elements of the accounts ; and the Italian system unquestionably affords the most ef- ficacious means of collecting and grouping the widely scat- tered elements of government accounts in a concise and intelligible shape, and ultimately exhibiting them in the clearest and most perfect state of centralization admitted of. Several of Ihe ablest ministers of France from the days of Sully downwards, convinced of the necessity of a good system of book-keeping in the management of the public money, and satisfied of the efficiency and soundness of the principles of the Italian method, successively at- tempted to get the government accounts kept on that system. But it was not till the present century that it was successfully introduced. It has since, however, fully realized all that was anticipated of it by those great men; and has been found to answer so completely that it has been universally adopted in all the different departments of the state. Equally beneficial effects have resulted from the adaptation of the system to the public accounts in Holland, and confirmed the advantage of its applica- tion to government business. Similar laudable attempts have been more recently made in this country by some of our ablest practical statesmen (among whom Sir Henry Pamell deserves particular notice), to introduce theltalian mode of book-keeping in the government offices ; and from the signal success with which the experiment has been crowned, it is to be hoped that in a few years the whole of our public accounts will be placed on one uniform plan of book-keeping by double entry, and be thereby rendered as clear and intelligible as the accounts of any merchant in London, instead of being wrapped up, as formerly, in impenetrable obscurity and useless mysteiy. BOOM. (Dutch boom, a tree.) A nautical term, sig- nifying a long pole run out from any part of a ship to stretch the bottoms of particular sails; v/hencB jib-boom, main-boom, studdingsail-boom, &c. Boom. In Marine Fortification, signifies a strong chain or cable stretched across the mouth of a harbour or river, to prevent the enemy's ships from entering, and having a number of poles, bars, &c. fastened to it ; whence the name. BOOPS. A genus of fishes of the order Acantho- pterygii : most of them occur in the Mediterranean. BOO'TES. (Gr. /3owf, an ox.) One of the constel- lations. BORA'CIC ACID. See Boron. BORACI'TE. Native borate of magnesia. BORA'GINA'CEiE. Plants resembling the genus Bo- rago, after which they are named. They usually have a mucilaginous sap, in which nitre exists in small quan- ties ; wherefore they decrepitate when thrown upon the fire. It is found that liquor into which borago itself is plunged when fresh becomes cooled, and hence the Borago officinalis was the principal ingredient in what was called a " cool tankard." Boraginaceous plants have usually pretty, and sometimes very handsome flowers, arranged in a gyrate manner. Forget-me-not (Myosotis), Bugloss (Echium), Arichusa, and various species of Lithospermum are well-known favourites either among wild or culti- vated plants. Most of them have their leaves covered with asperities, whence their old name of AsperifoliiB f and some, as Anchusa tinctoria, Lithospermum tinctorium, and several others, yield a deep purple dye from their roots. BORA'SS U S. ( BoPKirtros, the skin of the date. ) A genus of palm trees, usually called fan palms, because their gigantic leaves arc formed of plates radiating from the BORATES. top of the petiole, and folded up after the manner of a lady's fan. Borassus flabill?yor?nis is an Indian species, with a trunk from thirty to fifty feet high, and leaves with from seventy to eighty rays. The Hindoos consider it the king of trees. A most intoxicating liquor is obtained by fermenting its sap, which is also capable of yielding sugar in considerable quantity under proper management. BORA'TES. Salts of the boracic acid. BORAX. Tills salt is found native in some of the lakes of Thibet and Persia, and is imported from India under the name of lineal, which after purification forms the refined borax of commerce. Of late years borax has been obtained by combining native boracic acid with soda. Borax forms hexaedral prisms, slightly efflorescent, and requiring 20 of cold and 6 of boiling water for solution. When heated, water of crystallization is driven off, and the residuary salt fuses into what is called glass of borax. Crystallized borax consists of 68 boracic acid + 32 soda + 90 water. It has upon some tests an alkaline reaction, and has hence been called sub-borate of soda. Borax is chiefly used by workers in metals as a flux : it is also em- ployed in medicine. BO'RDER. In Gardening, a marginal space, always connected with a walk or some other object, to which it forms an accompaniment. Border, or Bordure. In Heraldry, according to French heralds, an honourable ordinary, which should occupy a third part of the shield. In English blazonry, it has generally been considered as a mark of difference to dis- tinguish one branch of a family from another. It sur- rounds the field, is of equal breadth in every part, and occupies one fifth of the field. When there is a chief on the coat, the bordure is supposed to run under the chief ; but it passes over other ordinaries, as a fess, &c. BORE. A word used to express the sudden rise of the tide in certain estuaries. BO'REAS. In Grecian Mythology, the son of Astrasus and Aurora, and usually worshipped as the god of the north wind. There are few of the minor Grecian divini- ties of whom so strange and multifarious exploits are re- corded as of Boreas ; and it is interesting to trace to its source the allegory of all his adventures and achievements, and thence to elucidate the causes of his deification. The assiduity, for instance, with which the worship of Boreas was cultivated at Athens proceeded from gratitude, the north wind having on one occasion destroyed the fleet of the Persians when meditating the invasion of Attica. A similar cause induced the inhabitants of Megalopolis to consider Boreas as their guardian divinity, in whose honour they instituted an annual festival. With his usual partiality for mythological allusion, Milton has given Boreas a place in his Paradise Lost : — Now from the north Of Norumbeea, and the Samoed shore. Bursting their brazen duiiKeon, armed with ice And snow, and hail, and stormy gust and flaw, Boreas and Ceecias and Argestes loud. And Thrascias rend the woods and seas upturn. Boreas was usually represented with the feet of a serpent, his wings dripping with golden dew-drops, and the train of his garment sweeping along the ground. BO'RON. The base of boracic acid, discovered by Davy in 1807. It may be procured by heating dry boracic acid with potassium. Itis a dark olive-coloured substance, a nonconductor of electricity, insoluble in water, infu- sible, and of a specific gravity = 2. Heated to redness it burns into boracic acid, which consists of 20 boron -^ 48 oxygen. Boracic acid is found in .the hot springs, and amongst the volcanic products of the Lipari islands, and in the waters of Sasso in the Florentine territory ; it also occurs in some minerals. It may be obtained by adding excess of sulphuric acid to a strong solution of borax. Its specific gravity is 1"48. In its usual state of scaly crystals it is a hydrate, composed of 68 dry acid -f 27 water. In this state it requires about 30 parts of cold and 3 of boiling water for its solution. It dissolves in alcohol, and the solution burns with a characteristic green flame. It reddens litmus ; but renders turmeric brown, like an alkali. When its water is driven off by fusing it at a high heat, the anhydrous acid concretes into a glassy substance of the specific gravity of 1-8. It is a useful flux, and was formerly used in medicine under the name of Homberg's sedative salt. BO'ROUGH. A town possessed of certadn municipal institutions, of which the name is derived by some from the Saxon word burg, meaning an inclosed place ; by others from another word of the same language — borg, meaning pledge, which was applied to some of the asso- ciations for mutual liability established by the Saxon law. Boroughs, in the sense of the definition above given, must have, in some shape, existed very early in this as well as in other countries ; but the origin as well in con- stitution as in name of the existing municipal system in England can be traced no higher than Saxon times, and the general and connected history of English boroughs does not begin before the Conquest. 1.55 BOROUGH. According to Doomsday Book there were in England at that time eighty-two boroughs, including cities, differine considerably in the extent of their franchises as well as in their customs and mode of government ; but agreeing in this general character, that they were communities established chiefly for the purposes of trade, endowed to that effect with certain franchises, such as that of a fair or market, and possessing as boroughs a special jurisdiction exercised in the the borough court-leet, and exclusive of the jurisdiction of the hundred, with which in the political scale a borough was co-equal. Some of them then held, and all were capable of holding, lands in common ; and in respect of such land they held, as did also each burgess in respect of his own tenement, of some lord, by a species of tenure called burgage tenure, which was in fact only the ancient tenure in common socage, t. e. tenure by rent or service certain, which continued to prevail in boroughs after the general imposition upon other lands of the feudal or military service. The lordship of the land of the borough, and of the different tenements which it con- tained, must have belonged in the first instance to the lord of the manor within which it was situate ; but all boroughs, in contemplation of law, held their franchises of the king. Great obscurity prevails as to what was originally the internal constitution of boroughs, and as to how far it was popular or not, and how far also it was or was not uniform. It is certain that as early as the date of Doomsday Book the proportion between the number of burgesses and that of other inhabitants was very dif- ferent in different boroughs ; though the fact maylae re- conciled with the notion of a system originally popular (which has all along prevailed in some boroughs), upon the supposition that the franchise had either been usurped on the one hand, as has frequently happened in the case of larger communities, or abandoned on the other hand as of little value, on account of the liability that attached to it of contributing to the common charges. Much per- plexity also arises on this subject from the intermixture m the same place of the guild and borough franchises (see Guild), which prevailed to that extent that the guild-merchant, which appears to have been an incor- poration, or an association by licence of all trades within the borough, is by some considered as identical in its con- stitution with the borough itself ; and it is certain, at any rate, that the guild-merchant, though it did not in the first instance constitute the borough, yet in many places usurped its franchises and government, and finally as- sumed its name ; so that, with the exception of burgage tenure, which still prevailed in some few places, and of birth, which was common to both institutions, the other modes of obtaining the freedom of a borough, — f. e. those of apprenticeship, purchase.or gift,— were introduced into the municipal system from the guild-merchant. Dis- tinct from this in their relations and contests with the community of the borough at large were the guilds of particular trades, which succeeded m London in engross- ing and parcelling among themselves, under the name of liveries, the whole of the municipal franchises. All borough rights, being exceptive, rested either upon charter, or upon prescription, which supposes a charter. Some few of such charters were granted by Saxon kings : but they became much more frequent after the Conquest, the style and purport of these early documents being simply that of a grant to the men and burgesses of such a place of certain franchises, whether relating to trade, as that of a fair or market, or exemption from toll, or to jurisdiction, such as a commission of the peace and the right of holding sessions, which was first granted to any borough by Richard II. In the reign of Henry VI., a re- markable alteration took place in the style of these royal grants, it being then first that were granted, as it is said, charters of incorporation, strictly so called ; though pre- vious to that time boroughs, or the governing bodies that represented them, enjoyed all the privileges of a corpo- ration, and since that time many have continued to enjoy them without any such special grant. From that time forth, however, the history of boroughs becomes identi- cal, except as to the parliamentary franchise, with that of municipal corporations. These charters of incorpo- ration did not, any more than did those which preceded them, pretend to regulate the internal constitution of boroughs. This very generally assumed the form of a government by a small and in great measure self-elected body, which had in most cases succeeded in engrossing not only the whole administration, and in a great degree the enjoyment also of the borough franchises and pro- perty, but the right also of granting, according tof rules more or less arbitrary, admission into the subordinate body of burgesses or freemen. And even that body, where it existed, which was not always the case, was small in proportion to the whole number of inhabitants. It was the great object of the charters granted by the Tudor sovereigns to sanction and confirm the usurpations, if such they were, of these municipal oligarchies, with the view apparently of throwing the representation of boroughs (a right which had been conferred in the first BOROUGH ENGLISH. Instance by Edward I., had since been extended by fresh grants, and was then becoming of considerable import- ance) into the hands of such as were most likely to be easily guided or controlled, either by the crown itself or by the great lords upon whose support it reckoned, and with whom it became usual about the same time to con- nect themselves with the boroughs in the neighbourhood of their possessions, under the honorary title of high stewards. The exclusive system of municipal government, which attained its height during the Stuart dynasty, continued unimpaired till the present time, when it was effectually put an end to.by the Act for the Regulation of Municipal Corporations, passed in the year 1835. For an account of which, as well as of the other remarkable in- cidents in the history of our municipal institutions, which happened from the time of the Tudors to the present period, see title Municipal Corporations ; and for an account of the representation of boroughs, and particularly of the reform in their representation, see title Parlia- ment. The account above given of English boroughs, both as to their origin and constitution, applies in all its general' features to Scotch boroughs ; with this qualification, that the government by close corporations was in the latter country more thoroughly and more generally prevalent until the reform in them, which preceded by a year the Municipal Regulation Bill applicable to this country ; and resembled it in almost every thing but this, that it made the qualification for burgesship identical with that re- quired to give a vote in the election of members, namely, Uie occcupancy of a house of the yearly value of 10/. In Ireland the municipal system, as it now exists, is of considerably later origin than in Scotland or in Eng- land. It was transplanted, and gradually introduced from the latter country; and though with the same names and form of constitution as then existed there, had much more in it of a political character, being intended in the first instance as a support to the English against the Irish, and in later times to the Protestant against the Catholic, and was so used to the neglect of functions more properly municipal, which have therefore in many in- stances been intrusted to other hands by local acts of parliament. These distinctions of religion and birth aggravated also in other respects the vices of a close and exclusive system, which was there, as in Scotland, more generally and thoroughly established than it ever was in this country. A measure for the reform or abolition of the existing municipal corporations of Ireland is now pending before the legislature. BOROUGH ENGLISH. In Law, is a customary mode of descent of lands in some ancient boroughs and manors, by which estates descend to the own ar's youngest son ; or It he has no issue, to his younger brother. See Descent. BOS. (Lat. bos, an ox.) A genus of ruminating mammals, which is one of the most Important in relation to the necessities and conveniences of man. To this genus belongs the domestic ox, in all its various breeds and varieties. With respect to the wild original of our numerous herds there is yet some obscurity ; less, how- ever, than hangs over the origin of other domesticated species. The wild cattle which approach nearest to the tame are those which inhabit the forests of the north-east of Europe ; and the white cattle, which are still preserved in a state of purity at Craven, at Chillingham Park, and in Scotland. These are both referred to the species called Bos taurus, or Bos urus, or Urtis Scoticus ; but there is much reason for supposing this species to have been the domestic ox reverted to a state of nature. Another well-marked variety of this species is the Brahminy bull ; characterised by the hump on the shoulders and the pen- dent dewlap. The other Known wild species of ox are the Gayal of India {Bosgavceus) \ the Yak of the mountains of Cen- tral Asia (lios grunniens) ; lastly, there are the Buffaloes, which, though anatomically less distinct than the Bisons from the typical Bovcs, yet differ from the oxen as a group in many points. They have larger liorns, which sometimes form a horny covering of great thickness to the whole frontal region ; and they approach the Pachy- dermata in the thickness of the skin and the thinly scat- tered coarse hair. They frequent marshy grounds, and feed on a ranker and coarser herbage than the ox. The flesh of buffaloes is rank and coarse, and they are used chiefly as beasts of draught or burden. The two best marked species are the Indian or Arnee buffalo (Bos arnce), a.nd the South African buffalo (Bos caffi;r). BO'SSAGE. (French.) In Architecture, any projec- tion left unwrought on the face of a stone for the purpose of afterwards sculpturing thereon, the sculpture beinff usually the last thing finished. BCSTKICHUS. A genus of Coleopterous, Xylopha- gous, or wood-boring insects, now raised to the rank of a family (nosfnchidu.-), including amongst its numerous genera three -^hich contain .species whose ravages have called forth the attention of the legislature Wbth in this and other-countries in consequence of the extensive IX BOTANY. destruction of valuable timber caused thereby. The species in question are the Bostrichus ligniperda, Scolytlus destructor, and Tomicus typographus; but the two latter are the most mischievous, and astonish by the amount of damage which is produced by insects of so small a size. The elm tree is the object of attack to the S. destructor ^ while the T. typographicus restricts its operations to the fir. The females attack the crevices of the bark, and perforate it in diverging lateral channels, in which from sixty to eighty eggs are deposited. At the end of fifteen days the larvae are hatched, and forthwith commence the work of destruction, each gnawing a ser- pentine gallery between the bark and the wood, and gradually enlarging its burrow until the period when it is ready to pass into the pupa state ; when, having finally become a perfect beetle, it directly bores through the portion of the tree which remains between the wood and the outer bark, and escapes through a small circular aperture in the latter. This emergence of the perfect insect takes place in the month of May ; and in seasons favourable to their development thev appear in swarms, and rise to a height exceeding that of the trees, and may be carried by the wind to another and distant part of the forest. The impregnation of the female takes place in the air ; so that wherever they alight they are ready to recommence the work of destruction. The chief precau- tions and remedies which experience has suggested are to cut down the trees which are once attacked, immediately to bark them and to burn the bark, and to remove all felled timber without delay. BOSWE'LLIA. A genus of Indian trees belonging to the natural order Burseracece, one species of which, B. thurifera, )rields the resin called Olibanum, which seems to be a corruption of Luban, the name given by the Hindoos to this plant. BOT. The name of the larvae of the Dipterous insects of the family (Estrtdce (which see). BO'TANY. (Gr. fioTocyyi, herb or grass.) Thatbranch of natural history which relates to the vegetable kingdom ; not merely including the nomenclature and classification of plants, as some have supposed, but embracing all the phenomena of vegetable life in their widest extent. Looking only at the first principles of the science, it is generally divided into the following heads : — Organography, or the Structure {organization) of Plants.— This is a most important department ; it com- prehends whatever relates to the various forms of tissue of which plants are anatomically constructed ; it explains the exact organization of all those parts through which the vital functions are performed ; and it also teaches the relation that one part bears to another, with the de- pendence of the whole upon the common system. With- out a perfect knowledge of Organography no systematical arrangement can be understood ; for, being that part of science in which the laws of the sjTiimetry of parts is comprehended, it must necessarily be the basis of all theory of classifications : and as to Descriptive Botany, which may be called the language of the science, it can- not have any logical precision, or be intelligible, unless the mind is distinctly impressed with the fundamental laws of this branch of study. Physiology itself, the highest branch all natural science, depends so absolutely upon an exact knowledge of the structure of parts, that any attempt to investigate the important laws of ve- getable life must necessarily be abortive without a strict acquaintance with the more important details of organiz- ation. And by this is not meant merely a general idea of external form, or a vague notion of internal anatomy, but the most precise knowledge that the nature of the subject will admit. Connected with this branch of study is what German botanists call Morphology, but which others think it better to consider a section of Organography. The word Morphology signifies literally the " science of changes or transformations." As applied to botany, it embraces a very interesting subject of inquiry, and one which, to all those who know the importance that attaches to compa- rative anatomy in the animal kingdom, cannot fail to be peculiarly interesting. Within the last thirty or forty years it has been clearly made out that all those parts which are familiarly known under the name of leaves, flowers, and fruit, are constructed, in all cases whatsoever, upon a simple uniform plan, out of one single organ in different states of modification and combination ; and that there is no other difference between the flower of a rose and that of a nettle than what arises from modifications and combinations of this organ — which is the leaf. If it be doubted whether, considering the anomalous character of some of the lower orders of plants, all vegetables are with- out exception formed upon one and the same plan, it is impossible not to admit that, at least in all Phcenogamous plants, the flowers are composed of the same elements ; that these elements are arranged in conformity to a few simple laws, far less variable than their appearance seems to indicate, and the study of which constitutes the basis of the theory of botany. These laws are so evident in a great number of cases, that one scarcely pays attention BOTANY. to them ; but curiosity is at once excited when they seem to be violated. Exact observation, however, shows tliat in such cases they are only masked ; that^is to say, an unusual application of two or three diflerent laws pro- duces an apparent anomaly, which is easily explained by a reference to the numerous cases of degeneracy, abortion, and cohesion with which the vegetable kingdom abounds. In such instances as this the botanist may be compared to the mineralogist, who discovers the primitive forms of crystals by means of their secondary forms. We are so accustomed to talk of plants bearing leaves and flowers and fruit, and it is so evident to our senses that extremely different organs really do exist under such names, that it seems inconceivable that parts so very dissimilar should all be only leaves in different states ; that the pure white petals of the lily, the rich red flowers of the rose, the sweet-smelling blossoms of the jasmine and the orange, or the long trumpet-shaped corollas of the honeysuckle, should all be leaves ; that the stamens in which the fer- tilizing powder is locked up, the pistils which are destined to receive the influence of^ the pollen, the ovula that they contain, and, finally, that the fruit which is the result of the action of the two last, are all so many parts formed out of one common organ, which in a particular and very fre- quent state is what we call a leaf. Botanists do not mean to Bay tliat he who eats an apple, or an orange, or a peach, is in a state of mental delusion, and that while he fancies himself to be enjoying the pleasure of gratifying his palate by the most delicious flavours he is really only chewing the leaves of these plants ; but they assert that those append- ages of a plant which are commonly called the leaves have a peculiar anatomical structure, and a certain relation to the stem on which they are borne, and being developed according to certain fixed laws, are always arranged upon a certain and uniform plan with respect to each other ; and that all the other organs, whether calyx, corolla, stamens, pistils, or fruit, have an anatomical structure essentially the same, bear the same relation to the axis that they grow upon, are developed according to the same laws, are arranged upon the same certain and uniform plan with respect to each other, and, finally, are constantly becoming transformed into leaves of the ordinary appearance, thus losing the condition in which they are usually found, and reverting to their structural type. The admission of such propositions as these does not render our notions of the distinctions between the various organs more obscure than it was before, as some would assert ; but on the contrary it enables us the better to understand the real nature of the organization of any part, and the plan upon which the most complicated arrangements of these organs have been effected. For example, who is to explain how it happens that buds occasionally spring from the axillae of petals or sepals, that anthers are found having ovules, that branches push forth from the centre of pistils, that petals become an- theriferous and stamens petaloid, unless the proposition is admitted that all those apparently different parts are formed upon a common plan, the type of which is a leaf, and are all therefore convertible into each other ? Another branch into which the science separates is Physiology, or the department which treats of the vital actions of plants. "While organography is applicable to objects whether living or dead, physiology solely re- fers to them in a state of vitality. There is scarcely any part of natural history more diflicult than this, if rigorous demonstration is required, nor, at the same time, one upon which there was in former days a greater degree of mere speculation. Like many other of the higher departments of natural philosophy, hypothesis E receded experiment; so that in the earlier history of otany we find scarcely a trace of those ideas which modern observation has certainly developed in a very re- markable manner. In vegetable physiology it is not as in animal — w^e have not our highest order of beings endued with reason which we can study by aid of our own personal feelings and sensations, and from our knowledge of which we can proceed in a descending series to the determination of the vital functions of all other tribes. On the contrary, we are in the same position with regard to plants as a new and totally distinct race of animated beings would be to moUusca and the lowest orders of existing things, sup- posing such a race to have no knowledge whatever of animal economy beyond what could be learned from the study of mollusca themselves, to have a class of sensations and a structure wholly unlike our own, and finally to deduce its notions of the anatomy and vital system of mollusca, not from a comparison of them with other beings gradually and perhaps insensibly rising in perfection of organization till the relation of one part to another and the uses of all become more manifest, but wholly from the abstract consideration of the mollusca themselves. In such a case, speculation would most likely precede ex- perimental observation, as was actually the case with plants. It was not till after the invention of the microscope that even an imperfect knowledge of vegetable anatomy t could be gained ; and only when this great step was taken vegetable physiology began to establish itself upon a sure foundation. Consequent upon this discovery has been the accumulation of a considerable amount of po- sitive knowledge of a world of organized beings having nothing in common with the race of man; with which we cannot communicate in the slightest degree ; that have no volition by which we may occasionally regulate our judgment ; whose texture is so frail that we cannot anatomise them without the destruction of life ; whose functions are performed within an opaque dense covering that excludes every thing from our view ; and which finally are so exceedingly simple in their organization, have so few different organs with which to execute their functions, that we are lost in amazement at effects so complicated and forms so various being brought about by means that are seemingly so inadequate. The world has learned from the vegetable physiologist, not only that plants breathe, feed, and digest, and how the functions of breath- ing, feeding, and digesting are carried on ; the^ have as- certained by what means an increase in their dimensions are brought about, how their want of locomotive power is compensated for, and by what precise means their re- production and multiplication are so wisely ordained as to be placed beyond obstruction by any natural impedi- ments. In short, the exact use of every part of every plant, various as their forms and uses doubtless are, has been ascertained ; and we are now entitled to say of plants as of animals, that their kingdom is rendered subject to the power, not only of man's physical energy, but of his mental resources. Perhaps no part of the creation illus- trates more forcibly than the vegetable world, the ad- mirable skill and foresight with which all the phenomena of the universe have been adapted by the Great Author of our being to the accomplishment of the objects for which they have been severally intended. lake, for example, vegetable tissue. What can be conceived more wisely prepared ! The cellular, ca- pable of great extensibility, possessing also prodigious compressibility, its particles cohering either firmly or loosely according to circumstances, its sides composed of a most delicate membrane, through which fluid and gaseous matter passes readily in every direction, is des- tined to form the principal mass of the vegetable, and to execute all those functions with which absorption and respiration are connected ; — the fibrous tissue, com- posed of myriads of threads compactly combined into bundles, dispersed through the cellular substance, how admirably does it supply the place of bones and nerves in the animal economy, affording strength and solidity and elasticity to the most delicate parts ! While the vascular tissue, exclusively intended for the reception and rapid transmission of gaseous matter or of highly attenuated fluid /rom the roots to the extremities, how wisely is it contrived by its greater size and length, and how carefully is it prepared by its spiral structure, for extending and turning, as the cellular substance develops, to those parts where the peculiar matter that it contains is most required ! Here there is no confusion of oflices to perform ; each has its peculiar part assigned it, for which it has been especially destined, and for which it is alone adapted. Look at the leaves. The leaves are the organs in plants that correspond with the stomach in animals ; that 18 to say, it is in them that the fluid matter taken up by the roots and injected into them from the stem, is digested and inspissated, and separated into the nutritious and ex- cremental portions. To the naked eye the leaves ap- pear to be merely flat plates of cellular substance traversed by veins ; but examined with a microscope they are at once seen to be constructed upon a most simple plan — of any that can be conceived the most perfectly adapted to the end in view. Digestion takes place in leaves chiefly by the absorption of carbonic acid and the respiration of oxygen, and by the evaporation of water ; if this process were to be carried on without any provision against the variations which are constantly occurring in the state of the atmo- sphere, it is easy to conceive that in excessively dry weather leaves would lose all their moisture and con- stantly become parched up, while in wet weather they would be so gorged with moisture as to burst from dis- tension. In order to prevent the occurrence of this, nature has enclosed leaves in a cuticle scarcely pervious either to air or moisture ; and in this cuticle she has placed numerous mouths, called stomata, which have the power of opening and closing, according to the state of either the atmosphere or of the leaf itself, to regulate the absorption or respiration of either water or air. And in order to expose the tissue lying beneath this cuticle to the greatest possible atmospheric influence, the leaf is not a solid mass, as it appears to be, but is traversed in all directions by passages terminating in the mouths, and opening into cavities, where the air both of absorption and exhalation can freely circulate, and pass in or out so long as the mouths permit it, Nor is this all. Many leaves are constantly submerged beneath the surfece of BOTANY. water, where they are never exposed to atmospheric vicissitudes, can never evaporate, and being cut off from the air, can neither absorb carbonic acid from the air, nor discharge oxygen back into it in return. It is therefore obvious that the curious provision that has been made for the regulation of the action of aerial leaves would be useless in submersed ones ; and accordingly we find that the latter have neither cuticle, nor mouths, nor cavernous parenchyma, but are thin but solid plates, the whole sur- face of whose cellular substance is m direct contact with the water, from the air contained in which the leaves must exclusively derive their nutriment. The employ- ment of the same kind of organ, in different forms, for the purpose of efffecting the varied objects that are to be provided for in the vegetable economy, is another and a most remarkable instance of the consummate wisdom and wonderful simplicity that are discoverable in all these things. Upon the birth of a plant one or two leaves are developed, which feed the infant until it is strong enough to develop one or two more ; these last, not only like the first proceed without exception from opposite sides of the stem or body, but are so placed as to alternate with the first ; and this goes on with unvarying uniformity, as long as growth continues ; so that view a plant in whatever way you will, whether in its earliest state, or at the most advanced period of its existence, it will always be seen to exhibit the same beautiful symmetry as the most highly developed animals : one side coun- terpoises the other; whatever is discoverable on one side, equally exists upon the other. If it is necessary that a protection should be formed for securing the young and tender buds against cold, the leaves surrounding the buds suddenly contract into hard scales, perhaps exude some resinous or gummy matter, or clothe themselves in a deep covering of wool, and an impenetrable living shield is thus interposed between the bud and danger. A plant is to be rendered more beautiful to the eye — its leaves again contract, the spaces that usually separate them are obliterated, new colours are assumed, and pe- tals are created resplendent with brilliant hues or ex- haling the softest perfumes. Propagation is to be effected — the petals contract into stamens, their central substance becomes disintegrated in the form of pollen, and the interior of each grain of the latter is resolved into that living matter of which in a state of cohesion all nature is composed. A few leaves are rolled together in the form of pistillum, the apex of the midrib becomes denuded, and young buds are developed at the margins. A grain of pollen, the disintegrated tissue of the flowering leaf, falls upon the denuded apex of the fructifying leaf, ab- sorbs moisture from it, distends, and finally produces a tube of inconceivable fineness, which abstracts from the pollen its impregnating matter, some of which descends the midrib into the womb of the leaf, and thence entering the young buds that are developed at its margins, is finally hatched, and appears at last in the form of embryo plants. Such is the simplicity of the arrangements that are observable in the most perfectly formed, the most ela- borately constructed plants. In the lower orders, the mode of formation, development, and propagation is still more simple. A vesicle elongates and distends un- til it becomes a tube ; from the end of this tube more are generated that themselves give birth to others, and tlms a simple branching plant is formed. In the in- side of each tube by degrees a green matter is deposited ; and after a certain period has elapsed is emitted in the form of little green vesicles, like that from which the plant originally sprang, and themselves capable of de- veloping as new plants. In certain tubes, this dissolution takes place in a much more astonishing manner ; not into inert green matter, but into moving particles having all the properties of spontaneous motion and animal existence. Soon, however, the moving particles elongate ; thus losing their power of motion and becoming plants, to whose laws of life they ever after submit. Turpin has seen the Monema comoides resolve itself into navi- culae ; Desmazieres has shown the plants called My- codermata, or what we name the mothery film of fermented liquor, to consist of monads growing end to end (Ann. des Sc. x.); and Treviranus (Ann. des Sc. x.) has detailed with exactness the metamorphoses in the life of the compound plant called Batrachospermum glomeratum. In this the filaments discharge a green matter and become colourless ; the green matter consists of mvriads of infusoria, of a round or elliptical figure : the latter collect by fives or sixes into a kind of star, become motionless, lengthen, and finally are transformed into young individuals of this undoubted plant. These are far from being all the divisions into which Botany, or the study of the vegetable kingdom, may be subdivided; although they are no doubt among the inost interesting. Besides these there is Taxonomy, or the principles of classification. It would be of little use that a man should know anatomy, and structure, and comnarative organization, and have informed himself of all the leading principles of physiology, if he were un- acquainted with the names of the objects ho had been 168 studying, and were consequently incapable of commu- nicating his knowledge to others. At least, of whatever use it miglrt.be to himself, it could not be of advantage to any one else. But if he is acquainted with the names of known objects, and if he understands the rules of classification, he can then render his infor- mation available to others as well as to himself. And in like manner he can at all times determine what is known about any particular plant that he may have been studying ; or if it be a kind previously unknown, he can find its place in the system, and by publishing a description of it, he can fix it there for the information of others. But there is another way of looking at the utility of classification, which shows that what may to some ap- pear but a dry and barren subject, is in reality one of the most important branches of the science. No man can know all things relating to such a science as this, — few men can learn many things ; for this reason it is of importance that a means should be discovered of j udging of what is unknown by what is known ; and that by judiciously selecting a moderate number of objects for particular study, the inquirer may have a ready and by no means burthensome means of forming a clear know- ledge of the whole vegetable kingdom. This is not difficult, if attention be paid to the doctrine of afiinities. Every one must have seen that some species of plants are more like each other than they are like different species; without considering the matter botanically, every one must, for example, have remarked that a radish is more like a turnip than it is like a currant bush, that a pea is more like a bean than an apple, and that a cherry blossom is more like an apple blossom than a horse chesnut. These are rude instances of aflBnity on the one hand, and discrepancy on the other ; but they are nevertheless perfectly explanatory of what is meant. Botanists find that classification may be founded upon a consideration of general resemblances and differences ; and that by carefully examining the characteristic organs of plants, those species may be classed most nearly together which have the greatest de ■ gree of resemblance and the most Iperfect constitutional agreement. Now this being the case, it follows that a knowledge of one species is to a great extent a know- ledge of many ; and that a correct idea of a single in- dividual of a group in the classification, provided that individual is well selected, amounts ta a knowledge to a considerable extent of all the other species of the same group. For example, in the tribe of Cruciferce, consisting of about 900 species, the study of the common radish, the mustard, or the cress, will give the student a very accurate general knowledge of the remaining 899, because they are all close modifications of the same forms. Again the common potatoe, rightly understood, re- presents the greater part of Solanacece, or at least of some hundred species belonging to that tribe ; while the dead nettle, Lamiuni album or rubrum, stands as the repre- sentative of some 15 or 1600 species called Labiatce. This would be of eminent importance if its advantage stopped here ; but when it is considered that the properties of plants also accord in a very remarkable manner with their structure, and that those which are most closely approximated in a classification will most nearly resemble one another in their sensible properties, the advantages to be derived from a study of the laws of affinity cannot fail to be clearly perceived. For example, to use the same illustrations as before, any person acquainted with Cruciferce would know that there is no instance of a poisonous or deleterious plant in the tribe, a point of great importance to be aware of ; on the contrary, he would know that if they had succulent roots, they might be emploj'ed like the radish, and that their leaves are antiscorbutic; but ifhe met with an unknown plant,which, from its resembhmce to the potatoe, he knew belonged to Solanacece, he would at once reject it as poisonous, or at least suspicious, unless it had tubers filled with fiECula, when he would except that portion, because all faecula is wholesome, however poisonous the trees or plants may otherwise be that produce it, provided the deleterious matter that lies among it is removed by wash- ing, or volatilized by the action of heat. It is not, however, any kind of classification that leads to such ends. All artificial systems, as for instance that of Linnasus, are unproductive of such results. It is only the natural system of botany from which these important advantages are to be derived. A fourth division of the science is the meaning of the terms employed in the science ; or what was formerly called Terminology, and now more correctly Glossology. This is the least interesting part of the subject ; but at the same time it is too important to be passed over lightly, because it is impossible either to understand the writings of botanists, or to m.ike oneself intelligible to others, without bring correctly informed of the meaning of the terms peculiar to the science. The state of Ter- minology at any given time may indeed be safely taken as indicative of the state of the whole science ; for in proper- BOTANY. tion as ideas are multiplied and knowledge rendered exact, are the terms required to express those ideas multiplied and their application rendered definite. A curious exem- plification of this is tos. be found in the Historia Plan- tarum of Fuchs, a learned botanist of the 16th century. In the glossary prefixed to that work are comprehended only 132 terms of all kinds, many of which refer to measures, and are therefore not appertaining to botany ; and of the remainder 29 belong to modifications of stems, 15 to differences of inflorescence, 6 to the fruit, but not one to any other part of the fructification. In the pre- sent state of botany, the terms that relate to the seed alone are probably as numerous as the whole that are comprehended in Fuchs' Glossology. Another and very distmct branch of inquiry is into the rules to be observed \x\ describing and naming plants ; or what is called Phytography, The great object of descriptions in natural history is to enable any person to recognise a known species, after its station has been discovered by classification, and also to put those who may not have had the opportunity of examining a plant themselves" into possession of all the facts necessary to acquire a just notion of its structure and affinities. It is therefore important that such descriptions should be drawn up according to certain conventional well-known rules, and not according to the caprice of individuals ; and this not only for the sake of ensuring a uniformity of language, and in all cases the same order of treating the subject, but also to prevent descriptions being too general, to ensure attention to the most important points of structure, and at the same time to prevent their being more prolix than is really necessary. The rules of description are more especially intended to guard against the latter evil ; for no mistake can be more common than to confound prolixity with precision. The last branch into which the study of the science may be divided is the application of the preceding subjects to the art of discriminating species. This may be called the Practice of Botany, as the former belonged to its theory, and is by far the most difficult part of the subject. There is no difficulty in becoming acquainted with the fundamental principles of the science, because they naturally arise out of each other, and are dependent upon the just appreciation of a few simple laws ; the various combinations of which, upon principles that it is easy to comprehend, constitute the differences that exist between organs themselves and their numerous modi- fications. But the practice of botany, although its study is essentially facilitated by an acquaintance with fundamental principles, and indeed cannot be usefully pursued without, yet it has peculiar difficulties of its own. It is often difficult to recognise organs in con- sequence of the manner in which they are masked by the modifications thej^ have undergone ; their combinations are frequently so intricate that great experience is ne- cessary to enable an observer to judge of them correctly ; their minuteness is often such as to render indispensable a use of the microscope, which requires peculiar dexterity and a good deal of practice ; and finally the number of species is so great, that to bear in mind, their distinctions is a heavy tax upon the memory. Difficulties of this nature are almost insurmountable by a student who is unaided by the experience of a teacher. At what period of the world botany first began to be studied as a science, has not been satisfactorily ascertained. By some it has been referred to the highest ages of an- tiquity. We are assured that Moses and Solomon and other Jewish writers, especially the last, were botanists, and that traces of much knowledge of the science are to be found throughout the scriptures ; but it seems difficult to assign Botany any such antiquity. That in the most remote ages man had his herbs and his roots ; that he was acquainted with the properties of one plant, and the uses of another ; that he gave them names, and that poets derived many of the beauties of their language from them, — was natural enough ; but this had nothing to do with botany. The first dawn of that science broke from out of the deep investigations of the nature of matter and mind by the philosophers of Greece. How much they knew we have no accurate means of judging ; but that they knew a great deal of vegetable physiology is obvious from their famous pa- radox, that plants are only inverted animals, — a sen- timent which, however strangely it may sound, could only have arisen from an extensive knowledge of the vital phenomena of Vegetation. Nor could the doctrine of Aristotle, that all organic matter exhibits a series of successive degrees of development, have been conceived or promulgated, unless the philosophers of his day had possessed a practical acquaintance with vegetation much beyond that of the ages that succeeded. Happy had it been for those ages if, instead of retro- grading in the path of science, or rather stepping out of it altogether, they had only pursued the course com- menced by Theophrastus 350 years before Christ. By that naturalist the beginning was made of applying par- ticular terms to particular modifications of structure ; he demonstrated the absence of all philosophical dis- tinction between trees, shrubs, and herbs, — a distinction upon which his successors were fond of insisting ; he speaks clearly of the parenchyma and woody fibre of wood, the former of which he calls the flesh ; and he described accurately the difference between palm wood and that of trees with concentric layers ; so that in point of fact the discovery of the difference between Dico- tyledonous and Monocotyledonous wood was made by Theophrastus above 2000 years ago, although it was never applied to the purposes of systematic division till about thirty years since. Subsequently to this period, botanists almost disappeared for a long season. Those who have been dignified by historians with that title were either pharmacologists, like Dioscorides; or compilers, who, like Pliny, knew little themselves, and misunderstood those they copied ; or poets, who drew much of the beauty of their language from the charms of nature ; or geopom'cal writers, who were acquainted with those parts of hus- bandry which relate to physiological botany. With whom the curious arts of budding and grafting, and striking plants by layers, or propagating them by taking advantage of the divisibility which distinguishes the vegetable from the animal kingdoms originated, is now unknown ; but there is reason to believe that the greater part of the modifications of those processes was in the classical ages as well understood as now. That grafting was extensively undertaken, is obvious from these lines of a well-known poet of the Augustan age : — Et ssepe alterius ramos impunfe videmus Vertere alterius, mutataq. insita mala _^ Ferre pyrum, et prunis lapidosa rubescere coma. But, what is much more curious, the delicate process of budding was as scientifically performed at that period as by the most skilful gardener of the present century. Nothing can be more precise tiian the following elegant description of Roman budding : — Nee modus inserere, atque oculos imponere simplex. Nam qua se medio trudunt de cortice gemmae, Et tenues rumpunt tunicas, angustus in ipso Fit nodo sinus ; hue aliena ex arbore germen Includunt, udoque docent inolescere libro. Again of crown grafting : — Aut rursum enodes tninci resecanlur, et alte Findttur in solidum cuneis via : deinde feraces Plantee immittuntur : nee longum tempus et ingens Exiit ad coelum ramis felicibus arbos, Miraturque novas frondes et non sua poma. A cessation of all philosophical inquiry into the na- ture of vegetation endured about 1700 years, during the whole of which time scarcely a single addition was made to the stock of knowledge left behind him by Theophrastus. But with the revival of letters a new direction was given to researches in natural history. Men ceased to content themselves with blindly copying the writers of antiquity, and set themselves in earnest to examine the objects of nature that surrounded them. The woods, the plains, the rivers, the ocean, the valleys, and the mountains, were investigated with an ardour that soon made amends for ancient indifference. The first consequence of this was a discovery of the worth- lessness of the greater part of those writers to whom the world had so long been bound in servile obedience. The spirit of inquiry once excited, men speedily learned to estimate rightly the greater value of facts than of assertions ; one discovery produced another, and in a few years a new foundation was laid of that imperfect but beautiful science which constitutes modern botany. In the early part of the sixteenth century, John Manardi, a native of Ferrara^ described the real nature of the anther. He was followed by a long train of writers of various merit, who at first indeed applied themselves exclusively to the collection of new species, but subsequently to an examination of the physiological characters of plants, and to the laws applied by nature to the government of the vegetable kingdom. Up to the middle of the seventeenth century, vege- table physiology had been grounded upon observations entirely independent of anatomical investigation. But about this time the accurate inquiries of two natural- ists, one an Englishman and the other an Italian, gave a new feature to the study ; and what was vague or ima- ginary in the opinions entertained upon the vital func- tions of vegetables gave way to conclusions precise, and supported upon the firm basis of careful observation. The nature of cellular tissue, of spiral vessels, of ducts, of woody tissue ; the composition of the internal parts of plants, and the functions of the whole — excited inquiry, and received reasonable if not accurate explanations. Collections of facts and of ideas accumulated on all hands, and the confusion that had once been caused by igno- rance threatened again to overwhelm the science, in consequence of the rapid addition of new matter which BOTANY. there was no means of keeping in order. Hence si/s- tematisti sprung up ; a race of inquirers to whose labours the present advanced state of botany is no doubt much U) be ascribed. Tliat the efforts of the earliest of those writers should liave proved unsuccessful, will excite no surprise : with little Knowledge of vegetable physiology or anatomy, for it must not be forgotten that for a long time, and even now, vegetable physiology and systematic botany were considered as distinct sciences, and with scarcely any notion of the laws of affinity and meta- morphosis, they could not be expected to succeed. We should rather wonder at what they did, than at what they omitted to do. Many of them had great merit, especially John Ray, an English deprived clergyman, and Joseph f itton de Tournefort, a professor of botany at Paris, who flourished in the end of the seventeentii cen- tury, and upon whose systems the modern arrangement according to natural orders is essentially founded. This, however, and all others, was for a time eclipsed by another, better adapted to tlie circumstances of the times, and emanating from a writer who, having the courage and talent to carry reformation into every branch of natural history, imparted a lustre to his pecu- liar system of classification which has only now, after the lapse of a century, fallen into disuse among men of science. Charles Linne, or Linnseus, as he is usually called, was a person exactly adapted to the science of the time in which he lived. The various departments of natural history had not at that time any thing like their present extensive range, and migl.t without diiSculty be investigated by a single naturalist. They were all eoually in need of revision and improvement ; they all wanted a settled code of laws to reconcile the fluc- tuating and jarring opinions which at that time prevailed, and above all things the nomenclature of natural history required to be reduced to one uniform standard. For this Linn£eus was peculiarly well adapted. Nature had gifted liim with a logical accuracy of reasoning, and a neatness and perspicuity of expression, which carried with them a cliarm that the world was not slow to ap- preciate ; and these produced the stronger impression, because naturalists had previously been but little ac- customed to them. The opinions of Linnaeus were re- ceived as if oracular, and their faults were lost in the splendour which they threw over the whole of the or- ganic world. But unfortunately Linnaeus knew nothing of vegetable physiology. His opinions upon this subject are amon^ the most worthless which are recorded in the history ot science ; and consequently his writings lost much of the permanent value which the originality of his ideas and the acuteness of his perception would have otherwise insured them. But notwithstanding this defect, he not only established his famous method of arrange- ment, which for a long time susperseded all others, but laid the foundation, although upon imaginary principles, of the curious laws of morphology, upon which modern botany founds one of its greatest claims to perfection. The notion that all the parts of plants are mere modifications of leaves, faintly shadowed forth by Linnaeus in his Species Plantarum, hecaxne the subject of a special and most original dissertation by the German poet Gothe, in 1790. This doctrine was believed by the botanists of that day to be worthy only of the poetical fame of its illustrious author ; but he lived to see his opinions re- ceived, almost without change, by every botanist of reputation. After the artificial system of Linnaeus followed the natural system of Jussieu. Vegetable anatomy became an important branch of inquiry in the hands of "kieser ; the researches of Knight and others gave a new character to vegetable physiology ; and the early part of the present century has seen the science by these and other means assume an entirely new appearance. Our knowledge of the vital functions of plants reposes upon the sure basis of exact observation and careful experiments ; the theory of the plan upon which the organs of vegetation and fruc- tification are severally combined into so many numerous forms is settled upon the clearest evidence ; and classifi- cations, to a great degree freed from the trammels of prejudice or narrow views, have assumed that position in science to which their importance, when rightly studied, entitles them. The only two botanical arrangements now in use are the Linnaean and the Natural. The former is an attempt at classifying plants according to their agreement in some gmglc characters, without reference to their resemblances or differences in any other respect, just as words are arranged in a dictionary by the accordance of their Initial letters ; the other is a scheme for placing next each other all those plants which have the greatest re- semblance, and at the greatest distance those which are most dissimilar. To effect this, every kind of structure that plants possess is made use of ; distinctions derived from great physiological peculiarities are considered fun- damental, and form classes ; subordinate to them are cha- racters derived from diversities of external structure, 160 and they are valued according to their permanence or frequency, &c. The final result being the making up of the vegetable kingdom into associations, called natural orders, which arc supposed to consist of genera more closely allied to each other than to any thing else. For an explanation of the details of these two kinds of classi- fication the reader is referred to the separate works that have been published on the subject ; space can be given in this place only to a very general account of them. The sexual system of Linnaeus depends upon the num- ber and relative position or degree of combination of the stamens and styles. It has been so often explained, and is so rapidly falling into disuse, that we shall content our- selves with the shortest possible description of the classes and orders. Class I. n. III. IV. V. VL VIL VIII. IX. X. XI. XII. stamen 1 - Stamens 2 - - - Stamens 3 - - - Stamens 4 - - - Stamens 5 - - - Stamens 6 - - Stamens 7 - - Stamens 8 - - - Stamens 9 - Stamens 10 - - - Stamens 12—19 Stamens 20 or more, inserted into the calyx XIII. Stamens 20 or more,inserted into the receptacle XIV. Stamens 2 long and 2 short - XV. Stamens 4 long and 2 short - XVI. Stamens united by their fila- ments into a tube XVII. Stamens united by their fila- ments into two parcels - XVIII. Stamens united by their fila- ments into several par- cels XIX. Stamens united by their an- thers into a tube XX. Stamens united with the pistil XXI. Stamens and pistils in sepa- rate flowers, but both growing on' the same plant XXII. Stamens and pistils not only in separate flowers, but those flowers situ- ated upon two different plants XXIII. Stamens and pistils separate in some flowers, united in others, either on the same plant, or two or three different ones XXIV. Stamens and pistils either not ascertanied, or not to be discovered with any certainty, insomuch that the plants cannot be referred to any of the foregoing classes Monandria. Diandria. Triandria. Tetrandria. Pentandria. Hexandria. Heptandria. Octandria. Enneandria. Decandria. Dodecandria. Icosandria. Polyandria. Didynamia. Tetradynamia Monadelphia. Diadelphia. Polyadelphia. Syngenesia. GjTiandrla. - Moncecia. Polygamia. Cryptogamia. The characters of the orders depend upon the number of the styles, or of the stigmas, if there be no style, in the first thirteen classes ; such are accordingly named, — Monogynia style 1 Di^nia - 2 Trigynia . . - 3 Tetragynia - 4 Pentagj-nia - 5 Hexagyiiia 6 HeptagjTiia - 7 Octogynia 8 Enneagynia - 9 Decagynia - 10 Dodecagynia - 12 Polygynia - more than 12. lo the 14th class, DidjTiamia, the orders depend upon the nature of the ovary. In Gymnospermia, the first order, the ovary is divided into four lobes, from the base of which proceeds a single style, and within each of which is contained a single seed. In Angiospennia, the 2nd order, the ovary is not lobed, and is usually two-celled, and many-seeded, In the 1.5th class, Tetradynamia, the orders are cha- racterized by the form of the fruit : SiliquoscE have along pod ; Silictdosce have a short one. The orders of the 16th, 17th, and 18th classes, Mona- delphia, Diadelphia, and Polyadelphia, depend upon the number of the stamens, and have the same nomenclature as the thirteen first classes. The orders of Syngenesia are determined by the ar- BOTANY. rangemeut of their flowers, and by the sex of their florets : thus — Polygamia has flowers crowded together in heads. 1. Poli/gamta cequalis has each floret hermaphrodite, or furnished with perfect stamens and pistil. 2. Polygamia superjiua has the florets of the disk her- maphrodite ; those of the ray female only. 3. Polygamia frustranea has the florets of the disk hermaphrodite ; those of the ray sterile. 4. Polygamia necessaria has the florets of the disk male, of "the ray female. 5. Polygamia segregata "has several florets, either simple or compound, but with a proper calyx, included within one common calyx." Monogamia has the flowers separate, not crowded in heads. This order is generally abolished by Linnasan botanists, but for no good reason. The orders of the 20th, 21st, and 22nd classes are dis- tinguished by the number, &c. of the stamens. The two orders of the 23rd class depend upon whether the genera are monoecious or dioecious. The last class, Cryptogamia, is divided into orders ac- cording to the principles of the natural system, namely, 1. Filices ; 2. Musci ; 3. Hepaticae ; 4. Algae ; 5. Fungi. With regard to the natural system of botany, that formed by Jussieu out of the views of Ray, Tournefort, and others, in combination with very numerous observ- ations of his own, is the basis of what is at present under- stood by that name. It has, however, been much modified by succeeding systematists, and will undoubtedly undergo many more changes in its details. The view taken of the subject by De CandoUe, the learned professor at Geneva, is thus stated by himself: —"I have established in my Theorie Elemcntaire, that the proof of a classification of plants being natural is furnished when similar results are arrived at, whether from considerations drawn from the reproductive organs or from those of vegetation. Considered with reference to the organs of reproduction (orfructification),thevegetablekingdom has been divided by Linnaeus into two grand series, the Phanerogamous and the Cryptogamous. These series are not merely dis- tinguished because in the first the sexual organs are visible to the naked eye, and in the latter are microscopical. Such a difference, which might depend only upon the absolute size of the organs, could be in itself of little mo- ment ; but it is connected with a real difference of struc- ture. Phanerogamous plants have their organs of fruc- tification arranged upon a more or less symmetrical plan, and surrounded by integuments themselves also arranged symmetrically. Cryptogamous plants have the sexual organs disposed without order, and surrounded by integu- ments scarcely perceptible, and still more disorderly ; or they have no sexual organs that have been proved to be 60." Phanerogamous plants have long been divided into Dicotyledons, or plants whose embryos present cotyledons opposite or verticillate upon the same plane, and whose minimum is consequently 2 : and into Monocotyledons, whose cotyledons or earliest leaves are alternate, so that the minimum is 1. or that the first, when there are two, is more particularly intended to nourish the young plant. Cryptogamous plants should in like manner be divided into two classes, the JEtheogamous andthe Amphigamous. For the first I take the name of JEtheogamous, invented by Beauvois, but limiting its application. This term, which signifies plants with unusual fructification, suits well enough the class here indicated, and which is characterized by having sexual organs distinct and visible under the microscope, but formed upon a plan totally different from that of Phanerogamous plants ; such are Equiset.iceae, Ferns, Lycopodiaceae, Mosses, and Hepaticae. I give the second class the name of Amphigamce, to indicate the doubtful nature of their fructification ; some authors have called them Agamae, but that is, 1 think, to assert more than is quite certain. The character of Amphigamae is to pre- sent to view no sexual organ, even under the microscope ; but we cannot affirm that the spores that they produce have not received a sort of impregnation in the very cells •which generated them. It is for the sake of expressing this doubt that I employ the word Amphigamae. Thus with respect to their organs of reproduction, plants are clearly divided into four great classes. Let us next ex- amine them with reference to their organs of vegetation. The first division that may be established is deduced from the absence or presence of vessels ; and in this view 1 separate plants into two series — the vascular, which have vessels and stomates manifest during their whole life ; and cellular, or those which consist of no- thing but cellules either throughout their life or in their first foliaceous organs. Vascular plants are divided into Exogens, of which the wood increases by the ad- dition of new layers placed on the outside of the older ; and Endogens, whose trunk increases by the addition of new fibres to the centre of the cylinder already formed. Cellular plants, in like manner, are subdivided into setni-vascular and cellular. Under the first of these IGl names I comprehend the orders which grow with leafy cotyledons, but composed of cellular tissue only, and des- titute of stomates. Eventually they assume organs in which vessels and stomates exist : this development, which gives them some resemblance to Endogens, takes place rapidly in Equisetaceae, Ferns, and Lycopodiaceae ; and the observations of anatomists have shown that the same thing occurs, but later and less perfectly, in Mosses and Hepaticae ; so that it is a matter of some doubt whether they ought to be referred to the semi-vascular or suc- ceeding class. Cellular plants have long been known to be destitute of both vessels and stomates, and to present only a homogeneous mass, where the distinction of stem, leaves, and roots can only be established analogically. Looking back at this explanation, it is obvious that the vegetable kingdom may be represented by the following table. • Divisions formed by the Organs of Fructification. I. Phanerogamous, Class 1. Dicotyledons, 2. Monocotyledons, II. Cryptogamous, 3. -iEtheogamous, 4. Amphigamous, Or, if it is preferred, in this equally regular: — I. Sexual, being furnished with sexual organs. Class 1 . Dicotyledons, 2. Monocotyledons, 3. ^theogamous, II. Without distinct sexes, 4. Amphigamous, Divisions formed by the Organs S'^^^S ^°"f> ^ foot.) An order of Crus- taceans, in which the locomotive extremities fulfil the functions of gills. BRANCHIO'STEGANS, BRANCHIOSTEGI. (Bf«y%een kept for a short time in rather » warm place, so that fermentation may have begun, it is subjected to the process of baking in a proper oven. Carbonic acid is generated ; and the viscidity or texture of the dough pre- venting the immediate escape of that gas, the whole mass is puffed Up by it, and a light porous bread is the result. Along with the carbonic acid traces of alcohol are at the same time produced, but so insignificant and impure as not to be worth notice ; hence the attempts which have been made to collect it upon the large scale have entirely failed in an economical point of view. Other flour besides that of wheat will, under similar circumstances, undergo panary fermentation ; but the result is a heavy, unpalatable, and often indigestible bread ; so that the addition of a certain quantity of wheat flour is almost always had recourse to. It is the gluten in wheat which thus peculiarly fits it for the manufacture of bread, chiefly in consequence of the tough and elastic viscidity which it confers upon the dough. It is well known that home-made bread and baker's bread are two very different things : the former is usually sweeter, lighter, and more retentive of moisture : the latter, if eaten soon after it has cooled, is pleasant and spongy ; but if kept for more than two or three days, it becomes harsh and unpalatable. The cause of this dif- ference may perhaps be obvious from the following de- tails of the operations of the wholesale baker. In making his dough he takes the water, or part of it, which he intends to use, and having slightly warmed it, dissolves in it a certain portion of salt ; then he adds the yeast, and then a certain quantity of flour. This mixture is set aside in a warm place, where it soon begins to fer- ment. This process is called setting the sponge ; and ac- cording to the relation which the water in it bears to the whole quantity to be used in the dough, it is called whole, half, or quartern sponge. The evolution of car- bonic acid causes the sponge to heave and swell ; and when the surface bursts it subsides, and then swells again, and so on ; but the baker is careful to use it before this fermentation has communicated sourness to the mass. He then adds to the sponge the remaining quantity of flour, water, and salt which may be required to form dough of proper quality and consistence, and incor- porates the whole by long and laborious kneadings till the entire mass acquires uniformity, and is so tough and elastic as to bear the pressure of the hand without ad- hering to it. It is then left for a few hours, during which fermentation goes on ; and the inflated mass is again kneaded, so as to break down any lumps or portions which had accidentally escaped diffbsion in the first operation, and to confer perfect uniformity on the whole. The dough is then weighed out into loaves, which are shaped, and put aside in a warm place for an hour or two, during which they swell up to about double their original size ; they are then put into the oven and baked ; during which operation they again enlarge considerably in bulk, in consequence of the dilatation of the previously generated carbonic acid pent up in the dough ; for, as soon as the mass is exposed to the heat of the oven, the fermentation is put an end to. If we compare the baked loaf with the flour of which it is composed, we shall find that panary fermentation has produced a considerable change in the latter. The gluten and the starch, which (exclusive of a trace of sugar) were the components of the flour, have mutually acted upon and altered each other ; the toughness and viscidity of the gluten is gone, and the starch no longer forms a gelatinous mixture with hot water ; a little sugar is generally formed, as well as alcohol ; but the principal cause of the change in the characters of the flour 18 the evolution of carbon and of oxygen in the form of carbonic acid, the production of which is in- dependent of the presence of external oxygen (or of air). Small quantities of alum are also, it is said, invariably used by the London bakers, with the view of whitening or bleaching the bread ; for it may be observed, that whatever may be the quality of the flour which is used, home-made bread is always of a comparatively dingy hue. According to Mr. Accum {On the Adulteration of Food), the requisite quantity of alum for this purpose 100 BRECCIA. depends upon the quality of the flour. The mealman, he says, makes different sorts of flour from the same kind of grain. The best flour is chiefly used for biscuits and pastry, and the inferior kinds for bread. In London no fewer than six kinds of wheaten flour are brought into the market ; they are called fine flour, seconds, middlings, coarse middlings, and twenty-penny. Beans and peas are also, according to the same authority, frequently ground up with London flour. The smallest quantity of alum used is from three to four ounces to the sack of flour of 240 pounds. Another article occasio'iiall;^ employed in bread making is carbonate of ammonia. As it is wholly dissipated by the heat of the oven, none remains in the baked loaf. Jt renders the bread light, and perhaps neutralizes any acid that may have been formed (exclusive of carbonic acid) ; but it is too dear to be much employed. To some kind of biscuits it gives a peculiar shortness, and a few of the most celebrated manufacturers use it largely. The French chemists have accused the bakers of employing sulphate of copper or blue vitriol, for the purpose of im- proving the colour of the bread ; but so dangerous and easily detected an addition can scarcely be supposed to be common. According to Mr. E. Davy, bread, espe- cially that of indifferent flour, is materially improved by the addition of a little carbonate of magnesia, in the pro- portion of twenty to thirty grains to the pound of flour ; It requires to be very intimately mixed with the dough. The most nefarious adulteration of bread consists, how- ever, in the addition of certain insipid and colourless earthy substances, with a view of increasing its weight ; such as pipe-clay, porcelain-clay, chalk, and plaister of Paris. These, however, are probably very rarely resorted to ; though in one instance the writer of this article had occasion to examine a quantity of biscuits, which were adulterated with gypsum to the amount of 10 per cent. BREAK. (Teut. brache.) In Architecture, any pro- jection from the general surface of a building. BREA'KERS. Waves that break, or fall over, from the shallowness of the water. In a gale, the tops of the seas generally break in this way more or less, from the progressive motion of the water at the surface before the wind, which is exceedingly dangerous for open boats. This is never confounded with the falling over of the whole wave, as the surf falls over on the beach. BREA'KING JOINT. In Architecture, that dis- position of stones and bricks in their courses by which vertical joints are not allowed to fall over each other. See Diagrams to Bond, English and Flemish. BREAKWA'TER. An artificial bank of stones, or the hull of a vessel, sunk to break the sea before its entrance into a roadstead or harbour. The breakwater at Plymouth is a great work of this kind. It is built across the sound, which it completely defends from a very heavy sea from the channel in south-westerly winds, and which formerly caused the loss of many ships. It is composed of large stones dropt from vessels constructed for the purpose. The sea, which for a time offers serious obstacles to the construction, works the stones together, and washes up shingle and sand, which, with the growth of sea-weed, consolidate the whole. The outer mole of the harbour of Civita Vecchia, still in good repair, was formed by the Emperor Trajan exactly in the same way as the breakwater at Plymouth. (Plinii Epist. lib. vi. ep. 31.) The breakwater at Cherbourg, constructed by Na- poleon, is one of the greatest modern works of this class. BREAM. The name of a soft-finned fish, common it many of the lakes and rivers of England, and one that breeds freely and thrives in ponds, if there be suflicient depth of water. It is the type of a particular subgenus of the Carp family {Cyprinidte), which Cuvier has cha- racterized under the name of Abramis, See Abramis. BREA'MING. In Nautical language, signifies cleaning the bottom of a vessel by fire. When the vessel is aground, fire being applied to the bottom loosens the pitch, or composition of sulphur and tallow, with which the bot- tom is sometimes covered to defend it from the worms, and which is then scraped off, together with the bar- nacles, grass, weeds, &c. that adhere to it. BREA'STING. Breasting up a hedge is cutting the face of it on one side, so as to lay bare the principal upright stems of the plants. BREAST PLOUGH. A kind of spade or shovel, with a cross piece at the extremity of the handle, which is applied to the breast, and by which the operator skims off a thin slice of turf from a grassy surface, as if he were ploughing. Turf thus obtained is chiefly used in thatching. BREA'STSUMMER. (From Sax. bneofr, and summer ; aua;re, trabs summaria ?) In Architecture, a beam whicn supports an exterior wall, the beam itself being carried by wooden or iron posts. BREAST-WORK. In Fortification, an elevation of earth thrown up round a fortified place to protect the garrison from the enemy's fire. BRE'CCIA. (It.) A rock composed of an agglu- tination of angular fragments. BREECH OF A GUN. BREECH OF A GUN. The solid part behind the bore. BRE'ECHING, or BREECH BAND. Part of the harness of a carriage horse, by means of whicli he is enabled to push the carriage to which he is attached backwards, or to support its pressure in going down a hill. BREEZE-FLIES. See CEstridje. BREHON LAWS. The ancient laws of the Irish are so termed, from an Irish word signifyingjMrfffes. It is supposed that some of the numerous written collections of these laws which still exist are of great antiquity ; as old, perhaps, as the earlier ages of the Christian era. Prior to the Anglo-Norman invasion, Ireland was en- tirely governed by these laws. For an account of the nature of these laws, see Lord Lyttleton's Henry II, vol. V. p. 28., and the authorities there referred to. BRE'NTUS. A Fabrician genus of Coleopterous insects, belonging to the Weevil tribe, or Curculionidas ; now the type of a family, called Brenthid/B, including about eight genera and seventy species. These insects are peculiar to hot climates : only one species, the Brentus Italicus, is found in Europe, and this has been referred by Germar to a particular sub-genus, Arrhenodes, all the other species of which are natives of the new world. BRE'TTICES. In coal mines, wooden plankings to prevent the falling in of the strata. BREVE. (Ital.) In Music, a note formed thus 1=1 without a tail, and equivalent to two semibreves, or four minims. It is also that measure of quantity contained in two beats of the hand up and two down, but this only in common time with the mark (^. BRE'VET. In the French, signifies a royal act in writing conferring some privilege or distinction ; as brevet d'invention, a patent. It is applied, in England, to a commission giving nominal rank higher than that for which pay is received ; thus, a brevet major serves and draws pay as captain, &c. BRE' VIARY. A book containing the offices of daily prayer according to the usage of the R. C. church. The offices are seven ; viz. matins, lauds, first, third, sixth, and ninth vespers, and the compline. Anciently all Catholics were required to recite the breviary daily. The injunction is now confined to the clergy ; of whom it is still strictly exacted. BRE'VIPENNATES, Brevipennes. (Lat. brevis, short; penna, quill; short-quilled.) An epithet ap- plied by Cuvier to distinguish the first family of his order GralUs (Echassiers) ; the ostrich is the type of this family. See Cursores. BREWING. See Fermentation. BRI'BERY. In English Law, is a term compre- hending the offences of judges, ministerial officers, &c., receiving rewards or considerations to act contrary to their respective duties, which are severally misde- meanors at common law, and also punishable under several statutes. But in its most ordinary signification, it is the giving or receiving money to procure votes at parliamentary elections, or elections to public offices of trust. The statutes which at present "chiefly regulate the offence of bribery at parliamentary elections are 2 G. 2. c. 24., and 49 G. 3. c. 118. The latter statute im- poses a penalty of 1000/. on any one (if not returned, in- capacity to serve in parliament for that place if returned) who " shall give or cause to be given, directly or indi- rectly, any sum of money, &c., upon any engagement that the person receiving shall procure, or endeavour to procure, &c., the return of any member," and imposes a fine of 800/. on the person receiving the bribe on such a promise or agreement. The former makes it an offence in any person " to procure or corrupt another to vote ; " and it has been recently held, that the corruption is com- plete, as far as the corrupter is concerned, by the act of giving the money, whether the voter intend or not to act according to the wish of the briber. BRICK. (Dutch bricke.) In Architecture, amass of clay earth, sometimes mixed with coal ashes, chalk, and other substances, formed in a mould, and burnt in a kiln or clamp. The earth used for this purpose is of two sorts. The one a stiflF clay, with little or no ex- traneous mixture, which produces a hard red bfick ; the other a yellowish-coloured fat earth, called loam, which produces a grey-coloured brick. The clay is usually tempered in a clay mill. For the sea coal ashes that are mixed with it in London, they substitute in the coun- try a light sandy earth. In making the paste as little water should be introduced as possible. In moulding them, which is done in a wooden mould, a clever work- man will mould about five thousand in fifteen hours. The kiln in which they are burnt is a large building, about 13 feet long, 10 feet 6 inches wide, and 12 feet high, fur- nished with a proper furnace. When otherwise burnt, the clamp, as it is called, is formed of the bricks themselves, generally oblong on the plan, and the foundations made with place bricks. Each course of bricks is laid on a layer of breeze or cinders ; and flues are formed, filled with coals, breeze, and wood. The burning continues 167 BRIDGE. from twenty to thirty days. The size of bricks, when burnt, is required by the statute to be 84 inches long, 2A inches thick, and 4 inches wide. The different varieties of bricks are, malms, which are of a yellowish uni- form colour and texture ; seconds, not quite so uniform in colour and texture as malms ; red and grey stocks, the former being burnt in kilns, both of a quality rather inferior to seconds ; place bricks or peckings, sometimes called sandel or samel bricks, which are those furthest from the fire, and rarely well burnt, — these should never be used in a building where durability is required ; burrs or clinkers, which are masses of several bricks run together in the clamp or kiln from the violent action of the fire ; fire bricks, of a red colour, about 9 inches long, 4J inches broad, and an inch and a half thick, — they are made for use in furnaces to resist the action of the fire, and from having been formerly manu- factured in the neighbourhood of Windsor, they are some- times called Windsor bricks ; paving bricks, made for the purpose their name implies ; compass bricks are cir- cular on the plan, chiefly used in walling wells, and the like ; Dutch clinkers or Flemish bricks, chiefly used in stables; the Dutch clinker is 6 inches long, 3 inches broad, and 1 inch thick. BRICKLA'YING. In Architecture, the art of build- ing with bricks, which is of very great antiquity. Pau- sanias mentions many structures in Greece which were built of bricks ; and in Rome such buildings were very common. The walls of Babylon, attributed by Herodotus to Semiramis, were also of brick. BRICKNO'GGING. In Architecture, brickwork car- ried up and filled in between timber framing. BRICK TRIMMER. (Sax. cpimman, to build.) In Architecture, a brick arch abutting against the wooden trimmer in front of a fireplace, to guard against acci- dents by fire. BRI'DEWELL. A house of correction for offenders is commonly so called in England. The name is derived from the locality of the ancient London house of cor- rection, which was an hospital, founded Iw Edward VI. on the site of St. Bride's well, in Black Friars, a well- known object of pilgrimage in Roman Catholic times. The original Bridewell is under the control of the lord mayor, and used as a receptacle for vagrants, place of punishment for apprentices, &c., within the jurisdiction v)f the city. BRIDGE. (Sax. bpiSSe-) In Architecture, a structure for the purpose of connecting the opposite banks of a river, gorge, valley, &c. &c., by means of certain materials, forming a roadway from one side to the other. It may be of stone, brick, iron, timber, sus- pended chains or rbpes ; or the roadway may be formed by means of boats. Long previous to the introduction of bridges constructed upon geometrical principle's, the modes of crossing rivers by throwing the trunks of trees across them, or by suspension of ropes, or twisting to- gether the branches of trees from bank to bank, were so obvious that they must have been resorted to at an early period. The former method, however, could only have been practised over narrow streams, whilst the latter might have been carried to almost any required extent. Mungo Park found this mode employed in Africa ; and in South America rope bridges of bujuco, or thongs made from the hides of oxen, are in use at the present day. Don Antonio de Ulloa tells us, that over some of the rivers of Peru the bujuco bridges are of such dimensions that loaded mules in droves pass over them, and especially on the river Ajjurimac, forming the high road for the trade carried on between Lima, Cuzco, and other places to the southward. Though such bridges are the contrivance of man in a less civilised state, they are the only means by which many streams whose cur- rents are deep and rapid can be crossed ; and the stu- pendous suspension bridges of the present day are but improvements on the simple scheme of the untutored architect of a savage tribe. W^hen a stream is neither deep nor rapid, its breadth seems to present no obstacle to forming a roadway over it. Large stones placed across at intervals, on which other stones or beams of timber may be laid horizontally, would be the first step. Of this species appears to have been the bridge which, according to Herodotus, Nitocris constructed" at Babylon over the Euphrates, and which is said by Diodorus Siculus to have been five furlongs in length. Of this sort also are many of the bridges in China. The bridges of the Chinese, however, appear to have been rather too highly extolled in the accounts of Du Halde and the missionaries, as may be gathered from the information obtained of the Foo-chow-foo bridge, during the voyage of the ship Amherst in 1832. It appears, from the testimony of Captain Parish, that the use of the arch with wedge-shaped stones converging towards the centre of the curve must have been known to the Chinese at a very early period. In tracing the history of bridges among different nations, we shall see that local causes had great in- fluence on the species of construction adopted by them. M 4 BRIDGE. A nation may have reached the highest point of art in its other public monuments, and have nevertheless done nothmg worthy of our admiration in the con- struction of a bridge. In Egvpt, for example, inter- sected as it is by a large and wide river subject to periodic inundations, the construction of bridges would have been as difficult as it would have been useless. All the in- tercourse which commerce required was easily carried on by the assistance of boats ; and as respects the passage over the canals which abounded in the country, their depth and breadth were so small as to require none but the most simple expedients for connecting their opposite banks, nor any which involved the employment of science. In Greece, no vestige of a bridge occurs whose date is anterior to its occupation by the Romans ; but this, had they even been acquainted with the use of the arch, might be accounted for on reasons directly the reverse of those which operated in Egypt. Greece is intersected by no river of any magnitude ; and even those which seem to have some title to the name, are rather mountain tor- rents than those Immense sheets of water, swelled in their course by innumerable tributary streams, that are to be found in other parts of the world. Here scarcely more could be wanted than a single arch, whose abutments would be found in the solid rocks which the stream sepa- rated. Following up the history of bridges into Italy, we find a country much watered by large rivers, where the architecture of bridges became a necessary study, not only for the accommodation of the cities with which it abounded, but also for the service of the frequent military expeditions of the restless conquerors who oc- cupied its lands. Rome, from its earliest foundation, must have put in requisition considerable skill in bridge architecture over the Tiber, rapid and subject as it is to sudden floods. The earliest bridges here were of timber ; such was that which joined the Janiculum to the Mons Aventinus, and was called the Pons Sublicius, from the sublicce (stakes) of which it was formed. {Liv. i. 33.) Without enumerating the bridges of Rome, some of which are still standing to attest the science of their architects, we must mention the Pons Narniensis, on the Flaminian way, near Narni, and about sixty miles from Rome. It was built by Augustus ; and vestiges of it remain to the present day, one arch above 150 feet span and 100 feet nigh being still entire. But of works of art, perhaps the most wonderful ever raised was the bridge built by Trajan over the Danube. It consisted of twenty piers, whose height from their foundation was 150 feet, and 170 feet apart ; its breadth being sixty feet. This stupendous work was demolished by Hadrian, the successor of Trajan, under the pretence that it miglit serve as a passage for the barbarians, if they became masters of it ; but some writers have said it was through envy of the fame that attached to its founder. Over the Tagus-in Spain an ancient Roman bridge, near Alcantara, is still partly standing. It consisted of six arches of eighty feet span, extending altogether COO feet in length, and some of the arches 200 feet high above the water. Of the temporary bridges of the Romans, the most famous was that of timber thrown by Caesar over the Rhine. From the fall of the Roman Empire to the revi- val of the arts, the history of bridge architecture is, with the exception of the Moorish works in Spain, of no interest. It appears from Gautier, who uses the authority of Mag. Agricola of Aix, that when the arts began to revive in Europe an order was founded by St. Benezet, under the title of Brethren of the Bridge ; and that under them was begun, in 1 176, the bridge at Avignon, consisting of eighteen arches, and about 3000 feet in length. During the contentions of the Popes in 1385 some of its arches were destroyed, and in 1602 three others fell. In 1670 the ice destroyed all but the third pier, which, with the Chapel of St. Nicholas upon it, still remains. In 1354 a bridge of three arches was con- structed at Verona, the roadway sloping from the city : the largest of its arches, which are segmental, is 160 feet span ; but a still larger arch was built at Vielle- Brioude in France, over the Allier, in 1454, of nearly 184 feet span, which is the largest stone arch upon record. Among the most celebrated bridges of Italy, is that of the Rialto at Venice, whose span is 984 feet. It was begun in 1588, and finished in 1591, from the designs of Antonio dal Ponte {Sansovino's Venice), though by most authors absurdly attributed to M. A. Buonarroti. In this city alone there are no less than 339 bridges ; but they are mostly of sm.nll spans. We must not omit in this place the bridge Delia Santissima Trinita at Florence, by Ammanati, which, as Milizia truly observes, has not been surpassed since the revival of architecture. It is of three arches, the middle one of 96 and the two side ones of 86 feet span, the width of the piers being 26 feet 9 inches ; the breadth of the carriage and footways between the parapets is 33 feet. It has been usual for writers to call the form of the arches of this bridge cycloidal ; hut from our own measurements and most particular in- vestigation, we can assert that they are not of that form. They are very slightly pointed, after the fashion of what is called the 1 udor arch of this country ; the point at the summit, which is extremely obtuse, being hidden by the ram's head sculptured on the key-stones. During the two last centuries, the French have advanced their bridge architecture to very great perfection ; but more par- ticularly in the latter part of the last century, in which appeared Perronet, the father of the modern system of the art, whose elegant designs have not since been im- proved upon either in France or any other country. His is the beautiful bridge of Neuilly over the Seine. It consists of five arches, each about 128 feet span and 32 feet rise : it was finished in 1774, and remains a splendid monument of the powers of its architect. Some of the more modern specimens of their bridges do great honour to the French school, in which beauty of form is united with sound engineering. In England, the progress of bridge architecture has kept pace with that of the Continent ; and if our bridges cannot boast the elegance in design of our lively neighbours, we are fully equal to them in bold- ness of conception and execution of the work. In- deed, if the designs of the late Messrs. Telford and Rennie had been equal to their engineering skill, no coimtry in the world would have been able to com- pete with what we should have been able to exhibit. And here must not be forgotten the bridge over the river Taaf, near Llantrissart, in Glamorganshire, cele- brated for its great span ; the work of William Edwards, a country mason, in 1755. The chord line is 140 feet, and the versed sine 36 feet. As we can allow but short space for an account of the bridges which within the last eighty years have been built in this country, we must be content with the mention of that over the Thames, called the Southwark bridge, which is a stupendous exhibition of engineering skill, and far better in design than many of the other works of the late Mr. Rennie. This bridge is of cast-iron, and consists of three arches, the chord of the centre arch being 240 i^et, and its versed sine 24 feet, or one tenth of its span. The frame-work of the arch at the vertex is 6 feet in height. We are not aware of any cast-iron bridge whose dimensions exceed those of this bridge, and do not think it therefore neces- sary to mention minor ones, of which there are many fine specimens in Great Britain. Of timber bridges the boldest and most ingeniously constructed in Europe was that at T Schafl'hausen, in Switzerland, destroyed by the French in 1799. It was designed and executed by Ulric Grubenmann, a common carpenter of Tueffen, in 1758. The total length of this bridge was 364 feet, but it was relieved by a pier in the middle of the river. In America are some extraordi- nary specimens of timber bridges. Such is the Trenton bridge, over the Delaware, built in 1804, by Burr: its chord line is 200 feet, and its versed sine 32 feet, the height or thickness of the timber framing at the crown being only 32 inches. The bridge called the Colossus at Philadelphia, over the Schuylkill, is 340 feet span, with a versed sine or rise of only 20 feet, and the thickness of the timber at the vertex only 7 feet. It is the work of a person named Wernwag. Besides these two, there are many other timber bridges in America worthy the notice of the reader, which we regret we have not space to notice. We shall close this portion of our subject by a short account of the suspension bridge over the Menai Strait, by the late Mr. Telford, as being the giant of its species, and rendering unnecessary any enumeration of others. It consists of one opening of 560 feet between the points of suspension, the height between high water and the under side of the roadway being 100 feet. The platform is 30 feet in breadth. The whole is suspended from four lines of strong iron cables by perpendicular rods 5 feet apart. On the tops of the pillars the cables pass over iron rollers, and are fixed under ground to iron frames, which are retained in their places by masonry. The weight of the whole bridge between the points of sus- pension is 489 tons. In Suspension bridges it has been found that the most trying circumstances under which they can be placed, as affecting the stability of their equilibrium, is the heavy and measured tread of a long line of infantry, whose feet drop at the same instant of time. In the building of bridges, where piers are re- quired in the stream for the support of the arches, it is important to place them as nearly as possible at right angles to the stream or current ; and the piers should be made convex towards the stream, for their better re- sistance to floods. The position of a bridge moreover, should not be in a narrow part, nor one liable to swell with tides or floods, inasmuch as the contraction of the waterway increases the depth and velocity of the current, and may thus endanger the navigation as well as the bridge itself. It is usual to construct bridges with an odd number of arches, and this on several accounts ; among which are, that the stream being usually most BRIDGING JOISTS. powerful in the middle, an egress through that part is best provided for by having a central arch ; and again, if the bridge be not perfectly horizontal, symmetry is gained by rising from the sides to the centre, and the whole roadway may be made one continued curve. When a bridge is equally high throughout, much saving of centering is made, because the arches being all equal two sets of centres will be sufficient. If, however, the bridge be higher in the middle than at the extremities, the arches on each side the centre one must diminish similarly, so as to be respectively symmetrical ; and by this arrangement beauty is gained, and the centering for one side equally suits the other. It is desirable to con- struct a bridge with as few arches as circumstances will allow, that there may be a free passage for the water, as well as for the vessels that have to pass up and down, not to mention the saving of materials and labour where there are fewer piers and centres. When a single arch can be compassed, no more should be permitted. (For the mode of estimating the equilibrium of an arch, see the article Arch.) The piers siiould be of sufficient solidity to resist the thrust or push of the arch, independent of other arches, so that the centering of an arch may be BRIEFS. struck without danger of overturning the pier left naked; and the piers should also be spread as much as possible on their bases, and diminish gradually upwards from their foundations. The method of laying the foundations in a river is now usually by means of coffer-dams, which are large enclosures, made by piling round the space to be occupied by the pier, so as to render it water-tight, and then pumping out the water, and keeping the space dry till the pier is built up to the ordinary level of the water ; but if the ground about be loose, this method cannot well be practised, and recourse is had to caissons, which are a species of flat-bottomed boat, in which the pier is built up to a certain height, and then sunk over the place where it is intended to remain, the bed of the river being dredged out to receive it, or piles driven on which it may lodge when the sides of the chest or caisson are knocked away In constructing the centres great care must be taken to make them incapable of bending or swerving while the arch is being turned, otherwise the form of the arch will be crippled. We here sub- join a table of some of the most celebrated bridges in Europe, chiefly in reference to their dimensions, and the relative spans and heights of their arches. STONE BRIDGES. Widest Arch. Name of Bridge. River. Place. Curve. Architect. Span. Height. Ft. /». Ft. In. Vielle-Brioude AUier Brioude 183 3 70 3 Segm. of circle Grenifr & Estone 1454 Ulm Danube 181 2 22 3 Segm. of circle Wiebeking 1806 Castle Vecchio Adige Verona 159 10 63 3 Segm. of circle Unknown 1354 Lavaur Lavaur 159 10 64 Ellipse Unlfnown 1775 Claix D?ac Grenoble 150 2 62 3 Segm. of circle 1611 Taafe 140 35 Segm. of circle Ellipse Edwards 1755 Neuilly Seine Near Paris 127 10 31 10 Perronet 1774 1 Mantes Seine Mantes 127 10 38 3 Ellipse Hupeau & Perronet 1-65 AVaterloo Thames London 120 32 Ellipse Rennie 1816 Tongueland Kirkcudbright 118 38 Segm. of circle Telford 1806 Rhone Languedoc 108 7 26 6 Segm. of circle Unknown 1305 Isar Munich 102 3 17 Segm. of circle Wiebeking 1814 Orleans Loire 106 7 29 9 Ellipse 1760 Sarah Liffey 106 22 Ellipse Stevens 1791 102 25 6 Ellipse 1805 Vicenza Bacchiglione Vicenza 101 2 29 9 Segm. of circle Unknown Blackfriars Thames London 100 41 6 Mylne 1771 Rialto Canal 96 10 20 7 Segm. of circle Ant. da Ponte 1591 Holy Trinity Pont de la Con- Arno Florence 95 3 11 10 Pointed Ammanati 1569 corde Seine Paris 93 9 9 8 Segm. of circle Peronnet 1791 Saine 91 6 10 9 Segm. of circle La Mande 1815 Sisto Tiber Rome 83 4 41 8 Semicircle Unknown 1-174 Ponte Molle Tiber 77 8 3S 10 100 B.C. St. Maxence Oise St. Maxence 76 8 6 3 Segm. of circle Perronet 1784 TIMBER BRIDGES. Name of Bridge. Colossus Piscataqua Bamberg Trenton Writtenghen Pont Louis Freysingen Elsingen Pont de la Cit Schuylkill Piscataqua Regnitz Delaware Isar Isar Wertach Lech Seine Germany Pennsylvania Switzerland Freysingen Bavaria Elsingen Near Augsburg Paris Span. Ft. 3-10 250 208 200 198 164 153 139 114 104 Height. Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Wemwag Palmer Wiebeking Burr Grubenmann Wiebeking Wiebeking Wiebeking Wiebeking Dumoutier 1813 1794 1809 1804 1808 1809 1808 1802 IRON BRIDGES. Name of Bridge. Span. Height. Southwark Sunderland Buildwas Austerlitz Bristol Thames Wear Severn Seine Avon London .Sunderland Buildwas Paris Bristol Ft. 240 240 130 106 100 Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Segm. of circle Rennie Wilson Telford Lamand^ Segm. of circle Jessop BRI'DGING JOISTS. See Joists. BRIEF. (Lat. brevis, short.) A word applied ori- ginally to a small written scroll ; but it is used at pre- ent in several significations. In modern German the word brief signifies a letter. I. In Ecclesiastical Law, letters addressed from the pope to temporal princes or communities on subjects of discipline or public affairs, are termed apostolical briefs. The name appears to have originated either in the con- cise formula with which they begin (" dilecto filio salutem et apostolicam benedictionem "), or in the difference that exists between this smaller kind of instrument and the ample bullae (bulls) of the popes. Apostolical briefs are usually written upon paper, though sometimes parch- ment is used. They are sealed in red wax with the seal of the Fisherman (sub annulo Piscatoris), which is a sym- bol of St. Peter casting a net into the sea. {Ciampini, Dissertatio de Abbrev. Munere, cap.iii.) 169 2, In Law, the term brief is applied to an abridged nar- ration of the facts of a case prepared for trial, with or without a reference to points of law involved in it, drawn up for the preliminary instruction of an advocate. 3. The term brief is applied in England to king's letters, issued to the archbishops, bishops, clergy, magis- trates, and parochial officers, to authorize collections of money af the doors of the several churches and chapels throughout the country, in individual cases wherein ap- plication has been made for such assistance towards the building or repair of a particular church. This custom is supposed to have commenced after the disuse of papal briefs consequent on the Reformation. Within the last few years this practice has been dropped, and a king's letter is sent round at certain intervals to collect money for the use of the Incorporated Society for the Building of Churches generally throughout the country. The last collections were made in 1829, when something more BRIG. than 40,000/. was received ; and in 1834, when the sum collected amounted to rather more than 30,000/. BRIG. The general term for a vessel having two masts, with a boom mainsail, being otherwise square- rigged ; that is, having her sails brought to yards hung horizontally by the middle. BRIGA'DE. This term either implies the union of two or more regiments or battalions in one corps, or of a certain number of men or guns in one subdivision. A brigade of infantry may consist of from one to six bat- talions, and abrigade of cavalry of two or three regiments. Six pieces of ordnance form a brigade of artillery ; and the horse artillery consists of twelve troops, to each of which is attached one such brigade of guns. A brigade of sappers consists of eight men. The commander of a brigade is called a brigadier-general. BRI'GANTINE. A name often applied to a small brig of a foreign nation. BRIGHT. (Sax. beopC-) In Painting, shining with light ; a. term applied to a picture in which the lights preponderate over the shadows. BRILLA'NTE. (Ital.) In Music, prefixed to a move- ment, denotes that it is to be played in a gay and lively manner. BRI'MSTONE. See Sulphur. BRI'STOL STONES, BRISTOL I/IAMONDS. These are small and brilliant crystals of quartz, fouiwi in the vicinity of Bristol, and occasionally used for orna- mental purposes. BRI'TISH GUM. When starch is exposed to a tem- perature of about 600° it becomes of a brownish colour, and so far altered in its chemical characters as no longer to form a blue colour with iodine ; it is also soluble in cold water. In this state it is used, under the above name, by calico printers. BRO'ADCAST. Sowing seeds by casting them or scattering them abroad, so as to distribute them evenly over the entire surface of the soil, in opposition to sowing in drills or rows. The operation of sowing broadcast is generally performed by the hand, the operator carrying the seeds in a bag or sowing sheet, or in a basket. There are also machines for sowing broadcast, but they are not much in use. In general, all corns and grasses are sown broadcast ; while pulse, and broad-leaved plants grown for their roots or leaves are sown in drills or rows. The term is sometimes applied to planting, but it is more generally restricted to sowing. BRO'ADSIDE. A nautical term, signifying the dis- charge of the whole of the artillery on one side of a ship of war. BRO'KEN-BACKED. A ship is said to be broken- backed when, in consequence of being loosened from age or injury, her frame droops at either end. BRO'KEN-WINDED. A ruptured state of the air cells, chiefly on the edges of the lungs, in the horse, in consequence of which the expiration occupies more time than the inspiration of the air, and is laboriously and generally spasmodically effected. It is a disease which may admit of palliation, but not of core ; the animal becomes gradually less capable of exertion, and if urged on, he drops and dies. BRCKER. In Mercantile Law, a person employed about contracting for the disposal of property without being put in actual possession of it, as is the case with a factor. (See Factor.) But all agents answering to this definition are not brokers, nor has the term any very exact legal signification. Particular classes of brokers are, bill or exchange brokers, stock brokers, insurance brokers, pawnbrokers, and brokers who sell or appraise household furniture for rent. By 8 & 9 W. 3. c. 20. brokers in the city of London must be licensed by the mayor and alder- men, and grant a bond with a penalty of 500A on their admission. According to mercantile usage, if goods within the city of London are sold by a broker to be paid for by a bill of exchange, the vendor, if not satisfied with the solvency of the purchaser, has a right within a rea- sonable time to annul the contract. BRO'KERAGE. The per-centage paidthe broker for his trouble in effecting a sale, or in negotiating any par- ticular business. BROME'LIA'CE^. (Bromelia, one of the genera.) A natural order of Endogenous plants inhabiting the tro- pical parts of the world, where they grow in the rich vege- table soil of forests, or upon the branches of trees, to which they cling by their twisting slender roots. They usually have hard leaves covered with a scurfiness easily rubbed off, and are so arranged as to be able to hold the water that lodges in their centre. Many of tliem will grow for months, and flower, when suspended in the air, after being severed from their roots. Their flowers are usually white, crimson, blue, or purple, and often exceedingly hand- some. In the genus Ananassa the bracts and flowers are so fleshy, that they all grow together into a solid mass, and thus form the well-known fruit called the pine apple. Tillandsia usneoidcs is a curious species of this order hanging down in long grey threads from the branches of trees Jn American forests, and so seldom flowering that it BRUCHUS. might DO taken for some species of lichen ; it is easily dried, and then used for stufling mattresses, &c. BROMINE (Gt.^^uuo;, a strong odour.) Ari un- decompounded substance discovered in 1826 by M. Balard of Montpelier. In its general chemical habitudes it much resembles chlorine and iodine, and is generally associated with them. It exists, but in very minute quantities, in sea-water, and in the ashes of marine plants. It is usually extracted from bittern by the agency of chlorine. At common temperatures it is a very dark reddish liquid, of a powerful and suffocating odour ,and emitting red vapour. Its specific gravity is about 3. It boils at 116*^, and con- geals at 4°. The density of its vapour is 5-5 ; 100 cubic inches at mean temperature and pressure weighing 167"25 grains. It is an electro-negative ; it has bleaching powers, and it is very poisonous. Its equivalent number IS about 78 ; it combines with hydrogen to form hydro- bromic acid gas, 100 cubic inches of which weigh 84-7 grains. With oxygen it forms the bromic acid. Its combinations are termed bromides; they have not hi- therto been applied to any use, but some of them are probably possessed of powerful medical qualities. BRO'NCHIA. {Gr.l3^o'yxo;,tfie throat.) Thesmaller ramifications of the windpipe. BRONCHl'TIS. Inflammation of the bronchia. BRONCHOCE'LE. (Gr. i3eoyxos, the throat, and xrXr,, a tumour.) A tumour on the fore part of the neck, being a morbid enlargement of the thyroid gland. From its prevalence in Derbyshire it is sometimes called the Derbyshire neck, and it Is a very common disease among the inhabitants of mountainous districts, especially of the Alps. It has been attributed to some peculiarity of the water of those districts, but upon no satisfactory evidence. Iodine has lately been administered successfully in the cure of this and other glandular enlargements, but it is a medicine requiring to be used with caution. BRONCHO'TOMY. (Gr. /3?«y;tO'. and n/xviu,! cut.) The operation of making an opening into the trachea in order to prevent suffocation. BRONZK. (It. bronzo.) In Sculpture, a material used for casting statues, groups, &c., in a mould similar in principle to that wherefrom all plaister casts are pro- duced. From the extraordinary dimensions which involve the chief difl'erences between the operations of casting in brass and plaister, much intelligence and care on the part of the sculptor is necessary to produce the fac-simile of the work on which his labour has been expended. The material employed for the purpose is a compound chiefly consisting of copper, tin, and other metals. The process of procuring the cast depends on circumstances requiring much nice arrangement ; but the reader will immediately conceive that though the difficulty of making such a mix- ture insinuate itself into every part of the often colossal mould is great, it is no more in reality than many of the large cast-iron foundings which are every day effected; though, from the nature of the human and other animal forms, it is difficult to conduct such an operation with any thing like a degree of certain attainment of the object without extraordinary means. BRO'NZITE. A variety of diallage of a metallic or bronze colour. BROOM. The Spartium scoparium or Cytisus scopa- rius of botanists, is an evergreen, green-branched shrub, native of sandy soils throughout Europe. It is sown ex- tensively in this country as a shelter for game, and among the other plants in young plantations as a screen from the wind and a protection till the more important species can establish themselves. Its branches, which are tough, are made up into brooms, to which they have given their name. BROWN. (Sax. bnun.) In Painting, a dark dusky colour inclining towards red, of various degrees of depth, of which there are many sorts. BROWN COAL. An imperfect kind of coal, which burns with a peculiar bituminous odour resembling that of peat. Its ligneous structure is sometimes so distinct that it has been called bituminous wood. BROW'NISTS. The followers of Robert Brown, who in the year 1581 seceded from the English church, and established a sect upon the principle that every congre- gation should form a church independent (in matters of discipline and doctrine) of all others. In matters of doctrine he did not differ from the church ; to which in- deed he returned, and took preferment after some years. The Brownists underwent great persecution under Eliza- beth, and retired in considerable numbers to Holland. From them, however, have sprung the Congregational Brethren and Independents, a very powerful sect in Eng- land at the present day. See Independents. BROWN SPAR. A magnesian carbonate of lime tinged by oxide of iron and manganese. BRU'CIIUS. A Linna;an genus of Coleopterous in- sects, of the tribe lihyncophora, now the type of a family {Bruchid(E),vi\i\\ the following characters : — upper lip distinct ; head produced anteriorly into a broad flattened snout ; palpi filiform ; antenna; filiform or serrate ; ryes notched ; wing-sheaths not covering the extremity of the BRUCIA. f Hpody. The insects of this family deposit their eggs in She young grains or seeds of leguminous plants ; the time of the hatching of the eggs is when the seeds have approached to maturity, and then the larvae begin to feed voraciously upon them. One species, the Bruchus grana- rius, infests our peas ; and the ravages of this insect, and the Bruchus pisi, have been so extensive as to call for legislative inteference : in France, for example in the year 1780, the sale of peas in the market was prohibited, in consequence of the damaged and unwholesome condi- tion of those vegetables through the operations of the species of Bruchidce above cited. BRU'CIA. A vegeto-alkaloid, discovered by Pelletier and Caventou in the bark of the Brucea antidysenterica; and also associated in small relative proportion with strychnia in the nux vomica and St. Ignatius's bean. It is very bitter and poisonous. BRU'NSWICK GREEN. A pigment obtained by exposing metallic copper to the action of muriate of am- monia. It is a compound of chloride and oxide of copper. Is is also generated by the action of sea water upon cop- per, as in the green matter which incrusts the copper sheathing of ships. BRUSH. (Fr. brousse.) In Painting. See Pencil. BRU'TA. The term by which Linnaeus designated an order of Mammals, including the elephant, manatee, and walrus, with the quadrupeds now forming the order Edentata of Cuvier. BRYO'NIA. A bitter and somewhat poisonous prin- ciple, extracted from the root of the Bryonia alba. BR'YONY. (Gr. ^^vot, I grow rapidly.) A wild climbing plant belonging to the Cucurbitaceous order, with a large woody perennial root, and annual stems, which resemble those of a gourd, except that they are more slender, clinging to bushes by means of their twist- ing tendrils. The berries are scarlet, with a disagreeable odour when bruised. The leaves have five angular lobes, and are three or four inches broad, with many callous tubercles . The roots are violently purgative: they are now disused. It has been known to produce violent vomiting, tormina, profuse watery evacuations, and fainting. Cases are mentioned by Orfila and others where over doses have proved fatal. Bryonine, an active extractive principle, is among the most dangerous of vegetable poisons. BU'BO. (Gr. fiovQatv, the groin.) A tumour very frequently occurring in the glands of the groin, and also in the arm pit. It is often the result of local absorption of irritating matter, as in venereal buboes ; or is sympto- matic of constitutional disease, as in the plague, scrofula, and some fevers. BUBONO'CELE. (Gr. fiovZcJv, the ^roin, and tty,Xy„ tn?nour.) A rupture forming a tumour m the groin. BU'CCANEE'RS. (Fr. boucanier, from boucan, a word of the Cara'ib Indians, signifying meat preserved in a particular manner, which was adopted, together with the custom, by the French in the West Indies.) The pirates who infested the coasts of the West Indies and South America during the 17th and 18th centuries were so called. The association of these pirates is said to have commenced as early as the middle of the 16th ; but in 1625 they obtained possession of St. Kitt's, and after- wards of Tobago, which thenceforward became for a long time the head quarters of the buccaneers, who formed a sort of seafaring republic, composed chiefly of English and French adventurers. Their chief object was war against the Spaniards, and plunder of their ships and settlements. After the peace of Ryswick, in 1<)97, they gradually disappeared from the seas. The History of the Buccaneers of America, by James Burney, is a well known and entertaining work. By -French writers these pirates are commonly called Flibus tiers, apparently a corruption of .the English word free- booters. BUCCINA'TOR. (Lat. buccina, a trumpet.) A muscle of the cheek called into action in various motions of the mouth, and especially in blowing a wind instru- ment. BU'CCINUM. (Buccinum, a trumpet or shell-fish.) The name of a Linnaean genus of Vermes Testacea, cha- racterized by having a shell with a smooth non-plicated columella, and with a fissure or short respiratory canal inflected towards the left. The mollusca with shells corresponding to this character are ranked amongst the Pectinibranchiate Gastropods by Cuvier, and have been subdivided into the following subgenera : — Buccinum proper, Brug., of which the whelk, Buc. undatum, is an example ; Nassa, Lam. ; Eburna, Lam. ; Ancillaria, Lam. ; Bolium, Lam. ; Perdix, Mart.; Harpa, Lam. ; Purpura, Brug. ; Monoceros, Lam. ; Ricinula, Lam. ; Concholepas, Lam. ; Cassis, Brug. ; Morio, Montf. ; Terebra, Brug. BU'CCO. (Lat. bucca, cAfc/.:.) Ths name of a genus of Lygodactyle birds, called barbets. The scientific term relates to the tumefaction of the sides of the base of the bill ; the trivial English name is derived from the bristly feathers which surround the base of the bill, and project beneath the chin like a beard. Tlie genus is now the BUFFALO. type of a family, including the barbets proper (Bucco), the Brazilian barbets or tamatias (Tamatia), and the barbicans of Buffon, which are limited to the warmer parts of India and Africa. BUCENTAU'R. (Gr. Bcvf, an ox ; xmrotveos, a cen- taur.) A mythological monster, half man and half ox, as the Greek etymology of the word imports. This was also the name of the state galley of the Venetian doges, in which they annually sailed over a portion of the Adriatic on Ascension Day, and, dropping a ring into the sea, es- poused it in the name of the republic, with the words, " Desponsamus te, mare, in signum veri perpetuique dominii." BU'CEROS. (Gr, ^ous, an ox, and xi(»s, a horn.) A genus of Syndactylous Insessorial birds, remarkable for the prodigious size of the mandibles, the superior of which in some species supports a large horn-like pro- tuberance. The birds of this genus are commonly called horn-bills ; they are peculiar to the old world, and per- form the same offices in wild nature as the toucans of America. BU'CKA. A strong-smelling leaf imported/rom the Cape of Good Hope, and used medicinally as an anti- spasmodic. It is produced by Diosma crenata and some allied species. BU'CKWHEAT. (A corruption of beech wheat.) A kind of grain, produced by the Polygonum fagppyrtnn of botanists. It has a triangular form, and is not ujilike beechmast. In some countries it is cultivated as food for man, and even in this country its flour is said to enter into the composition of the thin cakes called crumpets ; but its chief value is as food for pheasants, which are so fond of it that they may be decoyed from their preserves by its employment. It is said that some estates have been rapidly stocked with this description of game, at the expense of the neighbouring coverts, by the aid of a few fields of buckwheat. BUCO'LICS. The Greek term for pastoral poems, meaning literally the songs of herdsmen (fiovKoT^ct). We have considerable remains of this species of poetry in the poems of Theocritus, Bion,and Mogchus, and the Eclogues of Virgil. The metre universally employed is the hex- ameter or heroic ; but in pastoral poetry an easier flow of the lines was studied than in epics, and this was gene- rally accomplished by introducing a larger proportion of the metrical feet called dactyls in the former than in the latter ; but no rules were laid down on this point. This species of poetry has been cultivated also by most modern nations, and in England, France, and especially in Ger- many, with great success. Indeed, the last-mentioned country can boast among others of a Gessner, whose Idyls have been pronounced by some modern critics to be models of pastoral poetry, combining the most finished harmony of numbers with a simplicity and tenderness of sentiment and expression worthy of Theocritus himself. BU'DDHISM. A religion which prevails over a great part of Asia ; and, according to the estimates of some geographers, has a much greater number of worshippers than any other form of faith among mankind. China, the peninsula beyond the Ganges, Japan, and various Indian islands, are chiefly peopled by Buddhists. The founder of this religion, according to tradition, was an Indian prince, to whom the title of Buddha, or " The Sage," is assigned by his worshippers. The period to which his life is assigned is variously estimated, according to a variety of oriental traditions ; but several of them coincide in referring it nearly to the tenth or eleventh century before Christ. Buddhism was expelled from India by the persecutions of the Brahmans, between thi- fifth and seventh centuries of our, era. The doctrines of the Buddhists seem mainly to rest on the principle, that the world, and sensible objects contained in it, are mani- festations of the Deity, but of a transient and delusive character ; that the human soul is an emanation from Deity ; that after death it will again be bound to matter, and subjected to the miseries and accidents of this life, unless the individual to whom it belongs by the attain- ment of wisdom through prayer and contemplation suc- ceeds in liberating it from that necessity, and secures its absorption into that divine essence from which it sprang. BU'DGET, in a general sense, means a condensed statement of the income and expenditure of a nation, or of any particular public department. In this country, however, the term is usually employed to designate the speech made by the chancellor of the exchequer when he gives a general view of the public revenue and expen- diture, and intimates whether government intend to pro- pose the imposition or repeal of any taxes, &c. BU'FFALO. (Lat. bubalis.) A term originally applied to a species of antelope ; but afterwards transferred, in theage of Martial, to different species of the ox. In modern zoology theBuffalocs, or the "Bubaline group" of the genus Bos, include those species which have the bony core of the horn excavated, with large cells or sinuses communi- cating with the cavity of the nose ; the horns are flattened, and bend laterally with a backward direction, and are consequently less applicable for goring than in the Bisons, BUG. or Taurine group of oxen: the head is large, with a narrow but convex forehead, and terminates in a broad muzzle. The Buffaloes are of large size, but low in proportion to their bulk ; they have no hunch on the back, and only a small dewlap on the breast: the hide is generally black ; the tail long and slender. The Buflfeloes occupy the warm and tropical regions of the earth ; they avoid hills, and prefer the coarse vegetation of the forest and swampy regions to those of open plains ; they love to wallow and lie for hours sunk deep m water ; they swim well, and cross the broadest rivers without hesitation ; their gait is heavy, and they run almost always with the nose horizon- tal, being principally guided by the sense of smelling. In their combats, they usually strike or butt with the fore- head, and when their opponent is thrown they endeavour to crush him with their knees ; they trample on the body; and their vindictive fury is so lasting, that they will re- turn again and again to glut their vengeance upon the same inanimate corpse: they herd together in small flocks, or live in pairs, but are never strictly gregarious in a wild state. The females bear calves two years following, but remain sterile the third ; they propagate at four and a half years old, and discontinue after twelve. Their extreme aversion to red colours has been re- marked both in India and at the Cape. The Arnee Buffalo (Bos Arm) is the species in which the horns attain the greatest size: there is a pair of horns in theBritish Museum considered by Col. Smith (from whose excellent descrip- tion of the Ruminantia in the translation of the Am- mal Kingdom of Cuvier the preceding observations are chiefly derived) to be of the true or Great Arnee : each of these horns measures along the curve from base to tip, six feet three inches ; circumference at the base, eighteen inches. BUG. See Cimex. BU'GLE HORN. (YvovcvhwcuU, a heifer.) A mu- sical wind brass instrument, latterly improved by keys, so as to be capable of all the inflexions of the scale. BUHL. Ornamental furniture, in which tortoise-shell and various woods are inlaid with brass. The name is derived from its inventor. BULB. (Gr. /SawSof.) A collection of fleshy scales, arranged like those of a bud, of which the bulb is a slight modification, separating spontaneously from the stem to which it belongs, and emitting roots from its base. It is usually found underground, as in the hyacinth ; but some- times upon the surface of the stem in the axils of the leaves, as in the bulbiferous lily. The old botanists used to distinguish two sorts of bulbs, the tunicated and the solid : the former is the only one to which the name is now applied ; the latter is the cormus, as in crocus. BULBO'DIUM. A kind of underground stem, re- sembling a rhizoma. BU'LBOGE'MMA. A name for those bulbs which grow on the stems of plants, as in the tiger lily and other species of that genus. BU'LBOTU'BER. That kind of stem which the old botanists called a solid bulb, and the moderns more ge- nerally a cormus. It is a round solid underground stem, clothed with the withered remains of leaves, and pro- ducing buds on its surface, as in crocus. BU'LE, (Gr. fiouXn, a council.) By this name the Athenian senate was designated, the constitution of which wa« as follows : — When the people were divided into four tribes, each of these, according to the regu- lation of Solon, elected 100 representatives, thus making in all a deliberative body of 400 members. But when Cleisthenes increased the number of tribes to ten, the complement of the senate was raised to .500, fifty of which were sent by each tribe ; when the tribes were finally increased to twelve, 100 more senators were added. All free-born Athenian citizens above thirty years of age were eligible to this office; but they were obliged to undergo a strict examination of their characters and morals. The senate was originally instituted by Solon to be a check on the assembly of the whole people (ixxXTKrict), before which, according to the Athenian constitution, no measures were allowed to be brought before they had first met with its approbation. See Phytanes. BULI'MIA. (Gr. /Set;, a syllable denoting greatness in compound words, and Xi/Jt*t, hunger.) A morbid appe- tite for food. BULKHEAD. The sea term for any partition, as of wood, canvass, or other material. BULL, PAPAL. (Lat. bulla.) An instrument, ordinance, or decree of the pope, equivalent to the pro- clanj^tions, edicts, letters patent, or ukases of secular princes. Bulls are written on parchment, to which a leaden seal is affixed, and are granted for the consecration of bishops, the promotion to benefices, and the celebration of jubilees, &c. The publication of papal bulls is termed fulmination ; and it is done by one of three commis- Bioners, to whom they are usually addressed. The bull IS thus described by Matthew Paris : —Anno Dom 1287. In bulla domini Papae stat imago Pauli a dextris crucia in medio bullae figurata, et Petri a sinistris, 173 BURETTE. Bull, Golden. In German History, a term applied particularly to a statute or enactment of the emperor Charles IV., published a. d. 1356, in two dietS held in succession at Nurimberg and Metz, for the purpose of fixing the laws in the election of the emperor, and of regulating the number and privileges of the electors. (Churfiirsten.) The original copy of this instrument (which was long regarded as the Magna Charta of the German Empire, and continued in operation till its dissolution in 1806) is preserved at Frankfort on the Maine, and has a seal of gold appendant ; whence the appellation Golden Bull is derived. BU'LLA. (Lat.) A stud or boss, but more parti- cularly an ornament in the shape of a heart, worn round the neck by noble Roman children till they were seven- teen years old ; when they assumed the manly dress of the toga, and suspended the bulla as a consecrated offer- ing to the lares or household gods. Bu'lla. (Lat. bulla, a bubble.) A genus of Acerous Gastropodous Mollusks, the shell of which is more or less globose, or inflated like a bubble ; having no visible or projecting spire, which is concealed by the large ex- ternal whorl, which is elevated above the rest. The columella makes a convex prominence, which gives a crescentic form to the aperture of the shell ; the animal breathes by gills, but has no respiratory tube or siphon, and consequently the margin of the aperture of the shell is entire, or without a fissure or canal. All the species of bulla are remarkable for a shelly apparatus of three pieces which converts the stomach into a gizzard or triturating cavity. These gastric calcareous pieces have been described as a bivalve shell of a new genus. BU'LLET-IN. (Mod. Lat. bulleta.) In Diplomatics, a term equivalent to schedule, and variously applied to different sorts of public acts. In modern times, this name has been applied, especially in France, to reports of a state of facts issued by authority ; as bulletins of health, bulletins of military events, &c. BU'LLION. Uncoined gold and silver. BULL'S EYE. In Architecture, a small circular opening or window. BULL'S NOSE. In Architecture, the external angle of a polygon, or of two lines which meet at an obtuse angle. BU'MBOAT. A boat allowed to attend a ship regu- larly to supply the sailors with articles of provisions, clothing, &c. BUOYS. Vessels formed of wood, cork, or some light substance, moored or anchored so as to float over a certain spot, in order to indicate the situation of a shoal or sand bank, and mark out the course a ship is to follow. When used for this purpose, buoys are usually close vessels in the form of a cone, of large dimensions, in order that they may be seen from a distance ; and gene- rally painted of some particular colour, in order that they may be more readily distinguished from one ano- ther. Public buoys in this country are placed by warrant of Queen Elizabeth under the management of the Cor- poration of the Trinity House, and the amount of reve- nue annually collected for their usS is between 11, 000^. and 12,000/. Private buoys are used for the purpose of indicating the situation of ships' anchors (to which they are fastened by a rope), in order that the ship may be prevented from running foul of the anchor, and that the anchor and cable may be recovered when the latter hap- pens to be broken, or has been cut. BU'PHAGA. {Gr. ^ev;, ox ; 0oe,'yu, I eat.) A genus of Conirostral Passerine birds, of which theAfrican beef-eater {Buphaga Africana) is the sole example. It derives its name from its habit of sedulously extracting from the backs of cattle the larvae of aestri and other Dipterous insects which are deposited therein. The French name of this bird, "pique-bceuf,"or "cattle-picker," more correctlyde- notes the peculiar habits of the bird than the scientific generic term. BUPRE'STIS. (Lat. buprestis, a noxious insect.) The name of a Linnaean genus of Coleopterous Serri- corn insects, now the type of a family {Buprestidce) , in- cluding the most splendid and brilliant beetles. Of this family upwards of a thousand species are known : by the French they are termed " Nichards." BU'RDEN. (Fr. bourdon, a staff.) In Music, the drone or bass in some musical instruments, and the pipe or string that plays it. The bass pipe in the bagpipe is so called. Hence, that part of a song that is repeated at the end of every stanza is called the burden of it. BUREAU'. (Fr.) Originally a writing table ; after- wards applied to the office of any public or private functionary where business is transacted. BUREAU'CRATIE, or BUREAUCRACY, is the system by which the business of administration is carried on in departments, each under the control of a chief, in contradistinction to those systems in which the officers of government have a co-ordinate authority. BURE'TTE. An instrument occasionally used in the chemical laboratory, and in the assay office, for the purpose of dividing a given portion of any liquid into 100 BURGAGE TENURE. (r 1 000 equal parts . {Gay Lussac, Instruction sur VEssai Ics Chlorures de Chaux.) BU'RGAGE TENURE. In Law, an ancient tenure •roper to boroughs ; under which tenements are held »f the king, or other person, at a rent certain. In several (oroughs such holdings conferred the electoral franchise )revious to the Reform Act. BU'RG-GRAVE. (Germ, burg, castle j graf, count.) n the German Empire, a castellan or lord of a castle, laving the right of private justice, imposing taxes, &c. BU'RGHERS and ANTIBURGHERS. In Eccle- iiastical History. Owing to an undue exercise of patron- ige, which took place under the authority of the church )f Scotland, or to the induction of a clergyman into a jarish (Kinross) against the declared sentiments of the jongregation, a schism took place in the church, which jccasioned a secession ffom that establishment, and ulti- nately led m what is called the Burgher and Antiburgher ienominations. Several clergymen, after years of pain- :ul discussion, having protested against the violent pro- cedure in question, and having thrown off subordination ;o the ecclesiastical authorities, were deposed (1740) 'rom the office of the ministry and their parishes declar- jd vacant. {Gtllan's Acts of Assembly, sect. Patronage.) These clergymen, eight in number, though cut off from ill connection with the church, enjoyed the unabated confidence of their respective congregations, who almost to a man adhered to them. Previously to their final se- paration from the establishment, namely, in 1733, four of that number had virtually proclaimed their independence, and had constituted themselves into an ecclesiastical court, called the Associate Synod. To the deposed mi- nisters and their adherents the name of Seceders was applied ; and hence the origin of the Secession Church in Scotland. And so rapidly did this body increase, that so early as 1745, they formed themselves into a synod, which consisted of three different presbyteries. But while their numbers were thus augmented, and while the sphere of their influence was rapidly extending, a breach took place among themselves, which was characterized by as much I agitation and violence as that which had recently caused '' their ejection from the established church. The Seces- ^ sion Synod having instituted an inquiry into the lawful- ! ness of certain oaths, not imposed by parliament, but I generally practised, a question arose as to the nature of I the oath imposed in royal burghs on persons when ad- mitted to the privileges of a burgess. The great point of debate was, whether it was lawful for a Seceder to swear tiie following clause: — " I profess and allow with my heart the true religion presently professed within this realm, and authorized by the laws thereof. I shall abide thereat, and defend the same to my life's end, renouncing the Roman religion called Papistry." The Synod was divided into two parties on this subject. The one con- tended, that though they had condemned the manner in which the established church was at present administered, they had not expressed and did not feel any objection to her standards ; that, in seceding, they had not set up a new religion, but that, on the contrary, they had merely endeavoured to maintain in their original strictness and purity her constitutional principles both theological and ecclesiastical. The other party took a totally different view of the question, and insisted that the oath, being administered by members of the established church, must necessarily be taken ift the sense in wliich it was understood by them; namely, as including all the corrup- tion and inconsistencies that attached to that establish- ment, and as consequently incompatible with Seceding principles and the solemn testimony they had raised against her errors and backsliding. This dispute, which commenced at the meeting of the Synod in 1745, con- tinued to be maintained with increasing acrimony for two years, or till 1747. The party that were in favour of the oath were called Burghers j the party that opposed it were termed Antiburghers. In vain did the Burghers offer to agree to a declaration discharging Seceders from swearing the oath as inexpedient under existing circum- stances. TheAntiburghers peremptorily refused any com- promise, and insisted on an act being passed by the Synod declaring it sinful for a Seceder to adopt the oath. Nay, to such an extent was the controversy carried, and so violent were the opinions entertained on the side of the Antiburghers, that the ministers of this party had mean- while made the oath a test of church communion, and had debarred from the Lord's Table such as maintained its lawfulness. At the spring meeting of the Synod inl746, the party just named succeeded in carrying a vote to the effect that the oath was subversive of Secession prin- ciples. The Burghers protested against this decision. But at a meeting of the Synod in the subsequent year, the Antiburghers, being in aminority in a division on the same subject, withdrew in a body ; Mr. Mair, one of their number, having previously protested that " hereby the Burghers had forfeited all their synodical powers, and that the whole power of the Synod devolved on himself and his party and such as clave to them." Next day, the Antiburghers held a synod composed exclusively of their 173 BURLESQUE. own adherents, twenty-two in number, includingministers and elders, constituted themselves into a distinct and separate sect of Christians, and refused all connection or conference with the opposite party, except on the con- dition that the latter should appear as penitents at their bar. Nay, they libelled and cited them to this effect ; but as the one party did not recognize themselves as re- sponsible to the other, nothing resulted from the step ; and the two bodies, followed by their respective con- gregations, constituted themselves into separate and in- dependent churches. {Brown's Hist. Ace. of the Rise and Progress of the Secession.) But, while the Secession was thus divided into two con- flicting parties, the Burghers andAntiburghers, they both continued their separation from, and condemnation of, the established church. "They adopted, it is true, her standards, namely, the Westminster Confession of Faith, the Catechism, Larger and Shorter, the Directory for Public Worship, and form of Presbyterian government ; but they abrogated patronage unconditionally, and vested the choice of a minister exclusively in the members of each separate congregation. Indeed, the chief practical difference that obtained between the church of Scotland and the Seceding bodies consisted in the one cleaving to patronage, and in the other having abolished that system, and introduced popular election in its stead. Besides, though the church has always been governed by kirk sessions, presbyteries, synods, and a general assembly, the Burghers and Antiburghers, owing to the comparative paucity of their numbers, never adopted a general assem- bly. With them the synod was the supreme court, whose authority was final in all religious and ecclesi- astical matters. The Seceders also were stricter Cal- vinists, and adopted more rigid discipline as to admission to church-membership, and to scaling ordinances (bap- tism and the Lord's Supper), than the church party had perhaps ever done. {lb.) Both the Burghers and Antiburghers continued each as rapidly to increase after their separation as the Secession had done when it formed one body ; and the animosity which had characterized their disjunction gradually sub- sided. Indeed, by the time that the generation which witnessed this unhappy schism had passed away, all traces of hostility or opposition had disappeared. Tlie burgess oath, too, which had been the cause of their dis- union, fell into desuetude or had ceased to be imposed. The views of the two parties being otherwise identical, and both coinciding in their opposition to the established church, it is not to be wondered at that a wish became general among the members of both parties for a re-union. Overtures to that effect were accordingly made by their respective synods ; and after having had many confer- ences and much discussion on the subject, this happy re- sult was, without any compromise on either side, effected in 1820 ; and the two bodies, now united, assumed the denomination of the United Associate Synod of the Seces- sion Church. At that time, the Burgher persuasion com- prehended 10 presbyteries, embracing 120 congregations; and the Antiburghers 11 presbyteries, consisting of 141 congregations. Since their union, their conjoint influence and extension have been considerably on the increase ; so that at this date (1841) the Associate S}'nod comprises no fewer than 360 congregations, with an equal number of ministers. They have not hitherto introduced a general assembly ; nor do we hear that they intend to do so. But as tney form a numerous, so they are a most respectable body of Christians ; and their clergy are eminent not more for professional assiduity than for learning and talents. They are hostile tO the establisli- ment of a national church, and are in favour of what is now denominated voluntaryism. They nominate pro- fessors of divinity within their own body for the instruc- tion of young men intended for the ministry ; but these young men pursue their philosophical and literary studies at any of the Scottish Universities. Their curriculum of study, like that of the established church, extends to eight years. {M'Culloch's Stat. Ace. of the British Em- pire, vol. ii. pp.425 — 7.) BURGH MOTE. (Borough meeting.) A Saxon term for the borough court. Bergh mote is the title of a court of miners, held in Derbyshire. BU'RGLARY. (Lat. burgi latrocinium, robbery com- mitted in a burg or fenced place.) In Law, is the breaking and entering the dwelling-house of another in the night time, with intent to commit a felony. If the goods were actually stolen, it is usual to add a count for larceny in an indictment for burglary. This offence is punishable by transjjortation or imprisonment. BU'RGOMASTER. (Germ, burgermeister, chiffof the citizens.) The usual title of the chief municipal officer in German and Dutch towns. In the German free cities, the president of the executive council is styled burgermeister ; but in many towns of importance, the title stadt-director (town-governor) has been recently substituted in its stead. BURLE'SQUE. (Ital. burlare, fojVsif.) The Italian poesia burlesca signifies merely comic or sportive poetry ; BURNET. but the term, in French and English, is more commonly restricted to compositions of which the humour consists in a ludicrous mixture of things high and low : as high thoughts clothed in low expressions ; or, vice versa, ordinary or base topics invested in the artificial dignity of poetic diction. The humour of parody or travestie isee Parody) arises from the burlesque. Burletta, a slight comic musical drama, is derived from the same origin. BU'RNET. A British plant, whose leaves have been used as a food for sheep. It grows on poor calcareous soils, where few other plants will succeed ; and in this its principal value consists, together with its being peren- nial and remaining green all the winter. It is the Pote- rium saneuisorba of botanists. BURNING GLASSES and BURNING MIRRORS. The name given to glasses or mirrors so formed as to collect the sun's rays which fall on them into a point or small surface, and thereby produce an intense heat, and set fire to combustible substances. The point at which the rays meet, and where the greatest heat is produced, is called the focus or burning point. The rays of light or heat may be concentrated either by refraction or re- flection : in the former case they must pass through a transparent refracting substance, as glass formed into a proper shape ; in the latter they fall on a concave polished surface of silvered glass or bright metal. Re- flectors made of glass are usually termed mirrors, those of metal speculxr. In preparing a burning glass, the first thing to be con- sidered is the figure necessary to collect all the rays into the smallest possible space. Descartes, in \\% Optics, showed that a disk of glass, convex on the one side and concave on the other, the convex side being a portion of an elliptic surface, and the concave a portion of a sphere, would cause parallel rays falling on its convex side to converge in a single ppint ; but the practical difficul- ties of forming a glass accurately into this shape are insuperable : both sides are therefore ground into por- tions of a sphere. In a refracting mirror the focal length depends on the curvature, or the radius of the sphere, and the refractive power of the substance of which the lens is formed ; the focal length in a double convex lens of glass is exactly equal to the radius of curvature. The true form of the reflecting mirror is parabolic, and this form is frequently attempted in metal, which can be cast or hammered nearly into the proper shape ; but, as in the case of the refractor, it is the spherical form only which Is attempted in glass. The focal distance is equal to the radius of the concavity at the centre of the mirror. Although the forms given by theory could be obtained in practice with mathematical precision, the solar rays could not even then be collected into a single point ; the focus would still have a sensible magnitude. The reason of this is, that the rjiys which fall on the lens or mirror are not all parallel. Those which come from different parts of the sun's dijk are very sensibly convergent, forming an angle of 32 minutes of a degree, equal to the appa- rent diameter of the sun. Hence the focal image must be of such a magnitude that lines drawn from its opposite edges to the centre of the lens or mirror must form an angle of 32'. Supposing, therefore, the glass or mirror to have a proper form, the space covered by the focus will be proportional only to the focal distance, and entirely independent of the magnitude of the lens or mirror. Hence it follows, that if a portion of the exterior edge of the lens or mirror were covered, the magnitude of the focal image would remain unaltered. The figure of the image is also always circular, independently of the shape of the lens ; for example, if one half of the lens were covered, the image would be round as before, though the intensity of the light would then be reduced to one half. In preparing telescopes or microscopes, where distinct- ness of vision is the most essential object, it is indis- pensable that the figure of the lens or mirror be perfectly true. In burning glasses perfect accuracy of figure is not so much required : it is only necessary that the rays be concentrated, the confusion of the image being of no consequence. The effect, however, depending on the number of rays that are brought within the limits of the focus, will necessarily be diminished by the aberration as well as imperfection of figure. When the lens is accu- rately constructed, and all the rays fall within the focus, the heating power of the solar rays is increased in the proportion of the square of the diameter of the lens to the square of the diameter of the focus. But it is found that, supposing the concentration the same, a much greater effect is produced by a focus of considerable mag- nitude than a very small one. A glass, for instance, of two inches diameter, with a concentrating power of 300, will produce a much feebler effect than another six inches diameter of the same power ; the latter will in- flame paper in two or three seconds, while the for- mer will hardly inflame it at all. The reason is that when the heat is concentrated in a very small space it is rapidly dispersed into the surrounding mass ; as the 174 BURSARS. focus is increasedihe accumulation increases in a greater ratio than the dispersion, and the temperature rises. Hence a body in a mass of charcoal, or other substance of very slow conducting power, is fused much more readily than when exposed on all sides to the atmosphere, or imbedded in metal. The method of exciting heat or producing fire by the concentration of the sun's rays was known from remote antiquity ; but the most famous recorded achieve- ment of this kind is that of Archimedes, who is re- ported to have burned by means of mirrors the Roman fleet in the harbour of Syracuse. CQpsiderable doubts have prevailed respecting the truth of the relation, chiefly grounded on the circumstance that although the setting flre to the fleet is positively aflSrmed by Dion, Diodorus Siculus, Pappus, and others, no mention is made of it by Livy, Polj'hius, or Plutarch, who are other- wise minute in detailmg the mechanical contrivances of Archimedes, and who were not likely to pass over so notable an occurrence without notice. Descartes went so far, indeed, as to treat the whole relation as fabulous, affirming the thing to be impracticable. Its practicability was, however, experimentally demonstrated by the celebrated Buffbn, who, by a combination of plane reflecting mirrors, produced results which must be re- garded as of still greater difficulty. With 168 mirrors, each about 6 inches square, he set fire to planks of beech 1 50 feet distance, and with the faint rays of the sun at Paris in the month of March. It is not necessary to suppose that Archimedes could not place his apparatus within that distance of the fleet of Marcellus ; besides, by multiplying the number of glasses, the concentration of the rays may be increased almost to any extent. All this, however, does not prove the actual fact related of Archimedes. Buffon, with all the resources afforded by the advanced state of the arts in the middle of the 18th century, and after a number of experiments, succeeded, with considerable diflSculty, in constructing an apparatus by means of which he could inflame combustible sub- stances at a considerable distance. The low state of the arts in the time of Archimedes must have rendered the undertaking considerably more difficult. The silence of those historians who have detailed his other mechanical contrivances can hardly be accounted for, supposing the relation to be true. It seems, therefore, that though some- thing of the kind was contemplated, and to a certain ex- tent practised, the effect has been much exaggerated. Among those who have amused themselves, in modern times, with the effects of burning glasses or mirrors, are reckoned Baron Napier, the illustrious inventor of the logarithms, Kircher, Dr. James Gregory, Sir Isaac New- ton, and numerous others. The most powerful solid lens ever constructed was the work of Mr. Parker, an ingenious London artist. It was made of flint glass, was 3 feet in diameter, 3a inches thick at the centre, its focal distance 6 feet 8 inches, the diameter of the burning focus 1 inch, and its weight 212 pounds. The rays refracted by this lens were received on a second, the diameter of which in the frame was 13 inches, and its focal length 29 inches. The diameter of the focus of the combined lenses was half an inch ; consequently, by the addition of the second lens, the burning power was increased four times- With this lens some of the most refractory substances were fused in a very short space of time : for example, 10 grs. of common slate in 2 seconds ; 10 grs. of cast iron in 3 sec. ; 10 grs. of lava in 7 sec. ; 10 grs. of jasper in 25 seconds, &c. This glass was afterwards carried to China by one of the oflBcers who accompanied Lord Macartney, and left at Pekin. (For detailed information on this subject, the reader may consult the article Burning Glasses in the Enct/. Brit. 7th edition.) BU'RSARS. (Lat. bursa.) Originally clerks or treasurers in convents : in more modern times, persons enabled to prosecute their studies at a university by means of funds derived from endowments. It is a sin- gular circumstance that the latter acceptation of this term originated among the Poles, who, even in the 14th cen- tury, were accustomed to supply young men of talent with the means of travelling to Germany, and there studying philosophy under the guidance of the monks. This prac- tice was soon adopted by other nations ; and, there is now perhaps, no civilised country in which it does not exist, imder the name of bursaries, fellowships, exhibitions, scholarships, &c. These endowments are of two kinds : either furnishing the student with the means of pro- secuting his studies during the academical curriculum ; or enabling him to devote himself, without distraction, to literary pursuits even after the expiration of this pe- riod. The Scottish and the Continental universities have adopted the former method ; but at Oxford and Cam- bridge both kinds prevail. The following statistical ob- servations on this subject, in reference to the principal universities of England and Ireland, are extracted from a paper compiled by the Rev. H. L. Jones, M. A., from the most authentic private as well as public documents, and read at Newcastle in August 1838, before the British As- sociation for the Advancement of Science : — In Oxford BURSCHE. there are 24 heads of colleges with a revenue of 18,350/. ; 557 fellows with 116,560/. ; 393 scholarships with 6,030Z. ; 199 college officers with 15,650/. ; 885 benefices and incum- bents with 136,500/. The revenues of Cambridge, con- taining 17 colleges, are for an equal number of heads 12,650/. ; 431 fellows, whose revenue is 90,330/. ; 793 scho- larships with 13,390/. ; 179 college officers with 17,750/. ; 252 prizes of the value of 1,038/. ; 591 benefices and in- cumbents with 93,300/. In Dublin the head of Trinity College receives 2,000/. ; 25 fellows, 25,400/. ; 70 scholars, 2,100/. ; 10 college officers, 20,000/. ; 62 benefices and in- cumbents, 9,300/. These honours, however, are not open to general competition, being restricted in most cases, by the will of the testator, to natives of certain countries, or to the alumni of particular schools. At Edinburgh University there are but few bursaries. George Heriot's Hospital (the most wealthy institution in Edinburgh) grants ten bursaries of 20/. per annum each, for four years, to individuals not connected with the hospital, who, after a comparative trial before a com- mittee of the governors of the institution, are found duly qualified. There are, besides, a few bursaries of 7/. and 10/. each, given by the city of Edinburgh to students in the first year of their academical course ; two of 10/. each to students named Stewart in the second year, and one of 100/. to a student selected from those called M'Pher- son in the fourth year. To these may be added two ancient bursaries instituted for the benefit of Poles re- sident in Scotland, which, after lying dormant upwards of a century, were discovered and brought to light in 1837. At St. Andrews, there are several bursaries in the gift of the university ; and at Aberdeen, besides the interest of 7000/. devoted to the maintenance of certain students at that university, there are a few valuable exhibitions to Cambridge. At Glasgow the most important en- dowments of this kind are a few exhibitions to Oxford ; and those left by Dr. Williamson for Englishmen not connected with the established church. In France and Italy there are no bursaries allowed for the maintenance of students ; but any individual, on the payment of a trifling sum, may frequent all the lecture rooms of the professors, who of course are maintained by govern- ment. But it is in Germany that the system of bursaries is in full vigour. There every faculty in the different universities, every public academy, every cloister (for cloisters are still maintained even in the Protestant parts of Germany, though not for the education of priests), every noble family of importance, have bur- saries, or, as they are called, Freytische (free tables), at their disposal. These vary in value from 10/. to 40/. a year, and cease at the expiration of the literary curri- culum. As the different bodies or individuals in whom the presentation to these emoluments is vested may select the beneficiary at pleasure, little regard is paid to the real merit or the necessitous condition of the latter. Whether endowments tend to the promotion of science and learning, is a question that is often discussed, but has not hitherto been solved. Those who maintain that en- dowments are prejudicial found their arguments on tlie well-known axiom of Smith, — that in no employment ought the competition to be increased beyond what it Daturally demands. Now, as endowments allure into the learned professions, and particularly into the church, a host of individuals who would otherwise have adopted a different occupation, the unavoidable consequence is that the market is glutted, and the supply becomes greater than the demand. Besides, there are and ever will be sufficient numbers to work of their own accord in the accumulation of learning, and this spontaneous industry will be sufficient to keep up an adequate supply to be distributed throughout the country ; for supply always equals demand, and demand is always commen- surate with the real wants of the people. On the other hand, the advocates of endowments, while they admit the correctness of the above-mentioned axiom as a gene- ral rule, maintain that there are many exceptions. In every scientific occupation, they allege, the profits should be proportioned to the time and the labour bestowed in its prosecution. Now, from abstruse studies, such as the higher branches of mathematics, metaphysics, and clas- sical literature, no adequate remuneration results ; so that none but the wealthy can pursue these studies, and a reference to history will prove that this class has not been the foremost in classical or scientific attainment. Hence external encouragement is necessary at once to compensate for that want of remuneration to which such studies are exposed, and to divert into this channel a mass of applicable talent which would otherwise be turned to pursuits of more immediate profit and attraction. BU'RSCHE. (Germ.) A youth, especially a student at a university. BU'RSCHENSCHAFT. A league or secret associ- ation of students, formed in 1815, for the purpose, as was asserted, of the political regeneration of Germany, and suppressed, at least in name, by the exertions of the governments. 175 BUTTERFLY. BURSCHEN COMMENT. The codeof laws adopted by the students for the regulation of their demeanour amongst themselves, &c. BURSERA'CEA. A natural order of fragrant trees and shrubs inhabiting the tropical parts of the world. They all are resinous and fragrant, although related botanically to Rhamnaceous plants which have no such properties. Indian frankincense, olibanum, colophon, the balsams of Acouchi, Gilead, and Mican, gum elim, and other similar substances, are obtained from plants of this order ; besides oil, pitch, and turpentine, resembling the vegetable secretions bearing those names in Europe. They all have alternate unequally pinnate dotless leaves, and racemes or panicles of small green flowers. Their fruit is usually a drupe. BURTHEN, or BURDEN, OF A SHIP. The weight of merchandise, &c. she is intended to carry. Hee Tonnage. BU'SHEL. An English measure of capacity, con- taining 8 gallons. By act of parliament, 5 George 4. c. 74., the Imperial gallon is declared the standard measure of capacity, and is directed to be made such as to contain 10 lbs. avoirdupois of distilled water, weighed in air at the temperature of 62° of Fahrenheit's thermometer, the barometer standing at 30 inches ; or to contain 277 cubic inches and 274 thousandth parts of a cubic Inch. Con- sequently the Imperial bushel contains 80 lbs. of distilled water, or 2218-192 cubic inches. By the same act the bushel is declared the standard measure of capacity for coals, culm, lime, fish, potatoes, or f7-uit, and all other goods or things commonly sold by heaped measure, and is prescribed to contain 2815 cubic inches ; the goods to be heaped up in the form of a cone to a height above the rim of the measure of at least three fourths of its depth. The Winchester bushel, used in this country from the time of Henry VII. to 1826, contained 2150.42 cubic inches. The Imperial bushel is therefore to the Win- chester bushel as 2218-192 to 2150-42, or as 1 to -969447. Hence to convert Winchester bushels into Imperial, multiply by -969447. See Measures. BU'SHMEN. {I)utct\,Bosiesmaxmen, men of the wood.) A name given by the Dutch colonists to some roaming tribes akin to the Hottentots, in the vicinity of the Cape of Good Hope. The description given by Governor Janssens of this people is very interesting. So deep are they sunk in barbarism as to be unacquainted even with the construction of huts or tents : " the burning sky being their canopy, and the scorching sand their bed." They are of a dark copper complexion, small in stature, and of a singularly malicious, wild, and intractable dis- position. BUSI'RIS. In Egyptian Mythology, a fabulous per- sonage, of whose origin, exploits, and character Apollo- dorus, Herodotus, Diodorus Siculus, and other ancient writers have given a most discrepant account. His his- tory is so intimately blendea with that of Osiris, that we must refer the reader to that article for further parti- culars. BU'SKIN. (Probably bootikin, or little boot.) A species of covering for the leg, or rather for the ancle and foot : generally used by English writers as a translation of cothurnus, caliga, and various other Greek and Latin words denoting different kinds of boots, &c. Hence buskin, in the sense of cothurnus, stands for the tragic drama, that species of dress having been worn in antiquity by tragic actors, in contradistinction to soccus, the boot or sock worn by comedians, and used for the comic drama. Great Fletcher never treads in busking here. Nor greater Jonson dares in tocka appear. Drydbn. BUSTorBUSTO. (It. busto.) In Painting and Sculpture, the head, breast, and shoulders of the human figure. BU'STARD. See Otis. BU'TTER. (Gr. {Sovrv^ev, from jSeui, a cow, and rv^et, cheese or coagulum.) The oily part of milk : 100 parts of cream contain about 4*5 of butter and 3-5 curd ; they are separated by the process of churning, during which the butter aggregates. Butter soon becomes sour and rancid, unless purified by melting and straining it so as to separate adhering curd ; it is generally preserved by the addition of salt. Its elain or oily part has been called butyrine. When converted into soap it is said, in addition to the usual products, to afford three odorous volatile compounds, which have been termed by Chevreul the butyric, ca- pric, and caproic acids. BU'TTERFLY. The common English name of an extensive group of insects, as they appear in their last and fully developed state, when they constitute the most beautiful and elegant examples of their class. These in- sects belong to the order Lepidoptera, and to the section Diurna of Latreille, or the genus Papilio of Linnaeus. (Sec those words.) The changes of an animal form produced by the pro- gressive expansion of the inclosed organs of .the body, BUTTER TREE. and the guccessive shedding of the outer case or skin, are in no instances so striking or so extraordinary as in the present group of insects. These changes or metamor- phoses, as they are commonly but incorrectly termed, have been a favourite theme to the divine and the poet, and a most attractive subject of research to the natu- ralist. The transition of the humble grub to the gorgeous imago is the subject of the following beautiful passage in the classical work (the Introduction to Entomology) of Kirby and Spence : — " Were a naturalist to announce to the world the discovery of an animal which for the first two years of its life existed in the form of a serpent ; which then, penetrating into the earth, and weaving a shroud of pure silk of the finest texture, contracted itself within this covering into a body without external mouth or limbs, and resembling more than any thing else an Egyptian mummy ; and which, lastly, after remaining in this state, without food and without motion, for three years longer, should at the end of that period burst its silken cere- ments, struggle through its earthy covering, and start into day a winged bird, — what, think you, would be the sensa- tion excited by this piece of intelligence ? " The subter- raneous locality of the insect in its passive state, and the silV.en shroud, are, indeed, less applicable to the butter- flies than to other insects ; but the circumstances attend- ing the transformations of these beautiful objects are not less remarkable than those of the beetles and moths. The eggs of the butterfly are deposited on such plants as afford the nutriment Inost appropriate to the cater- pillars that are to be excluded from them ; thus the com- mon white butterfly iPieris brassicce, Latr.) and other species oviposit upon cabbages, and hence have been termed Brassicariee : the gaudy peacock-butterfly lays her eggs upon the nettle. The eggs are coated with a glutinous secretion as they are excluded from the parent, Snd thus provided with the means of adhesion to the leaves or stems of the plants selected. The larvae are long and cylindrical, and consist of thirteen segments, including the head ; they have ei^ht feet, and nine spiracles on each side. Those feet which are attached in pairs to the first three segments of the trunk inclose the parts which are developed into the permanent legs of the future butterfly ; the remaining five pairs of feet are membranous, short and thick, and are finally lost with the moultings of the skin, whence they are called " pro-legs " by Kirby. The sides of the head are studded with twelve simple globular eyes, extremely minute, and very unlike the single large compound eye of the perfect insect. The mouth is provided with an ap- paratus characteristic of the mandibulate class of insects, having a pair of large and strong horny jaws working in a horizontal plane, and representing the " mandibulae; " beneath these a pair of smaller and softer jaws or " max- illae," and a fleshy lower lip or " labrum" united to the latter, and which is perforated by the outlets of the ducts of the complicated apparatus for secreting the silk. Such a condition of the " instrumenta cibaria" or mechanism of the mouth is in perfect harmony with the habits of the caterpillar, and with the part assigned to this larva or masked Lepjdopterous insect in the great theatre of na- ture. It is "there destined to crop and devour the solid succulent parts of the otherwise too luxuriant vegetation, and must have aws arad teeth to perform its task. In its subsequent and final character the butterfly luxuriates on the exquisitely elaborated juices of the flower, and has the power to raise itself above the dull earth, and to transport itself through aerial space. AVhere he arriving round about doth flv From bed to bed, from one to other border ; And takes survey, with curious busy eye. Of every flower and herb there set in order. Now this, now that, he tastcth tenderly. Vet none of them he rudely does disorder ; Ne with his feet their silken leaves deface. But pastures on the pleasure of each space. SPINIBK. But to exchange a solid for a fluid diet, the instruments of mastication must be converted into those of suction, and the mandibulate insect be transfoiined into the haus- tellate one. This is effected by an excessive elongation of Che maxillae, which are grooved each on that side which is turned towards its fellow ; and, by the union of their opposed margins, these grooves are converted into a capillary canal, by which the nectar is pumped up into the mouth. When not in action, this siphon is coiled up in a series of spiral turns, and is protected by the other parts of the mouth, which retain their rudimental con- dition. The nymphs are almost always naked, and of an angular form ; they are generally suspended by the tail, and reflect more or less of a golden lustre, whence they are termed chrysalides and aurelite. . Reaumur has given the best account of the singular operations by which the butterflies attach their aurelian cases to the points of suspension, and afterwards extricate themselves from these cases when their transformation is completed. Some butterflies have all their six feet in the imago state well developed, and alike in both sexes ; and the chrysalis, in addition to the ordinary terminal or posterior 176 BYSSUS. attachment, is looped up in a horizontal position by a silken band or sling passing round the body. The in- ternal margin of the hinder lower pair of wings is concave or folded, and the tarsal hooks or spurs are well developed. These are the butterflies proper, the Papiliones equites of Linnajus. Those " knights " which bear red spots on thechest are the"Trojans" of Linnaeus, and those without' red spots on the chest bear the name of the Grecian heroes. Some of these butterfly-knights have the anterior pair t)f feet remarkably shorter than the others ; and this arrest of development would seem to be compensated by greater powers of flight. The butterflies of the section thus characterized, or the Nymphalidce, are also remarkable for the brilliancy of their colouring. Nume- rous other sections and subdivisions liave been founded by modern entomologists upon characters afforded by modifications of the antennae, palpi, and other parts. In the "Plebeian" butterflies of Linnseus the larvae are oval, the chrysalides short, and the tarsal spurs of the imago are extremely small. BU'TTER TREE.) A remarkable plant found by Park in the interior of Africa, especially in Bambarra, yielding from its kernels, by pressure, a white, firm, rich butter, which, even in that climate, will keep well for a year without salt. Another species is the 'Phulwara tree of India {Bassia butyracea), whose seeds produce a firm, agreeable, buttery substance, of about the consistence and colour of hog's lard ; it is used medicinally in rheu- matic affections. The Illupie tree of Coromandel (Bassia longifolia), and theMadhuca tree of Bengal (Bassia lati- folta), are other species having similar properties. They are 'large tropical trees, belongiqg to the natural order Sapotacece, and their timber is Sometimes of excellent quality. BU'TTERS, MINERAL. A name given by the old chemists to i ome of the chlorides on account of their soft butyraceous texture when recently prepared ; such as butter ^antimony, of arsenic, and ^bismuth. BU'TTERS, VEGETABLE. The concrete fixed oils, such as those of the cocoa and chocolate nuts, of the nutmeg, &c., which are solid at common temperatures, are often distinguished by the above term. BU'TTON. The round mass of metal collected at the bottom of a crucible after fusion, or which remains in the cupel in the process of assaying, is called by this name. BU'TTRESS. (Fr.aboutir, to lie out.) In Archi- tecture, a mass of brickwork or masonry, built to resist the horizontal thrust of another mass. Buttresses are much used in Gothic architecture, tq resist the thrust of the vaulting which covers the naves ^nd aisles of cathe- drals. When open they are called flying buttresses. BUTTS. Short ridges of different lengths, which necessarily occur in the angle of a field when the direction of the ridges is not parallel to one of the sides. BU'ZZARD. See Falco. BY'ARD. A piece of leather crossing the breast, used by the men who drag the sledges in coal mines. BY-LAWS, or BYE-LAWS. (The first syllable from the Danish By, town or hamlet.) Orders and con- stitutions of corporations, courts-leet and courts-baron, commoners, or inhabitants of vills, &c., of which the effect is to impose obligations not enforced by common or statute law. The validity of by-laws rests on the autho- rity of the parties making them, established either by immemorial custom, or by their corporate character ; for the power of making by-laws is inherent in a corporation. But the superior courts of law have the power of an- nulling a by-law, if it be unreasonable, or m restraint of trade, or imposing a charge without any apparent beneSt to the party, &c. By the Municipal Corporations Amend- ment Act (5 & 6 W, 4. c. 76. ^, 90.) by-laws are to be made by the town council of the 'borough, and to be valid unless disallowed by the king in council within forty days. BYRE. A word used in Scotland for a cow house. BY'RRHUS. A Linnaean genus of minute Clavicorn Coleopterous insects, now the type of a family, including those pests of museums which feed in the larva state on bird-skins, preserved insects, &c. The genera in this family are Bi/rrhus propej*, SimplocariOj Ootnorpfius, Syncalapta, Nosodendron, Aspidiphorus, Trinodes, and Anthrenus. Of the latter genus there are six British species, of which the Anthrenus tmisteorum may be re- garded as the type. BY'SSIFERS, Byssifera. (Lat. Byssus, and fero, / carry.) A family of Lamellibranchiate Aceplialous Mollusks, comprehending those species which are at- tached to foreign bodies by means of a byssus. BY'SSOLITE. (Gr. ^v(nro;,flax, and Ai^w, a stone.) A sort fibrous mineral from the Alps. BY'SSUS. {GT.&vcr(rc;, fine flax.) A fasciculus of shining semitransparent horny or silky filaments, secreted by a gland at the base of the foot in certain Lamellibran- chiate Bivalves, and serving as an organ of adhesion to submarine rodis or other foreign bodies. Byssus. A name formerly given to all those fila- mentous plants which inhabit cellars and other under- BYZANTINE HISTORIANS. ground close places, and on which no fructification is found ; it was also applied to vegetation of a similar kind when found growing in the air. It is now certain that a large number of these supposed plants are merely the young state of certain kinds of fungi, or other plants of •a low organization ; and, although a few species are still retained in the genus, as Byssusfioccosa, and others, it is by no means certain that they are really of a different nature. BYZA'NTINE HISTORIANS. A series of Greek historians and authors, who lived under the Eastern Em- pire between the 6th and the 15th centuries. They may ' be divided into three classes : 1. Historians whose works form a continuous history of the Byzantine Empire from the fourtli century of the Christian era down to the Turk- ish conquest of Constantinople. They are nearly thirty in number, with various shades of literary merit ; but their works constitute the almost only authentic source of the history of that eventful period. 2. General chro- niclers or historians, whose works, embracing a wider range than those of the former, treat chiefly of the chron- ography of the world from the oldest times. 3. Authors who confined their attention to the politics, statistics, an- tiquities, manners, &c. of the Romans. These two classes combined amount also to about thirty, and their writings give an excellent illustration of the times of which they treat, whether as historians, chroniclers, antiquaries, or politicians. The works of the Byzantine historians, &c. were collected and published by order of Louis XIV. in 36 vols, folio, Paris, 1645-1711. ' Another and more com- plete edition was published at Venics in 1729 and the following years. Besides these many of the Byzantine historians were published separately at different places. But all that had previously been done to evince the importance of these historians, by the publication of their works, was destined to be eclipsed in our own times. The late professor Niebuhr of Bonn, eminently fitted for the task by his attainments both natural and acquired, projected a new edition of the Byzantine His- torians ( Corpus Scriptorum Historice Byxanlince. Editio emendatior et Copiosior, 8vo. Bonnae, 1828), which he superintended till his death. Upwards of 34 volumes have already appeared ; and the editorial management of the work is entrusted to Becker, Diudorf, and other dis- tinguished philologists. c. C, the third letter of the English and most other European alphabets, is borrowed immediately from the Latin alphabet, in which it first appears ; but is derived originally from the « or y of the Greeks. In English it is pronounced like s before e and i, and like k before a, 0, u, and may consequently be considered as superihious in the alphabet. According to orthographers there are few letters so susceptible of interchanges as this letter, and much ingenuity has been expended in exhibiting its con- vertibility. As an abbreviation, C is used in ancient MSS. for Caius, Caesar, Consul, Civitas, &c. ; and as a numeral for a hundred. It was the symbol of condem- nation in the Roman tribunals (being abbreviated for Condemno) ; andwasconsequentlytermed/rtera^rw/?*, in contradistinction to A (used for Absolvo), symbolical of acquittal, and thence called litera saiutarts. C. In Music, the name of one of the notes in the'scale. It is a character also used for the signification of the time. See Music. CAA'BA. The famous square stone in the temple of Mecca, the object of the adoration of the entire Moham- medan world. According to the tradition of the Arabs, it is the first spot on earth which was consecrated to the worship of the Deity, having been presented by the angel Gabriel to the patriarch Abraham on the occasion of the building of the temple. As is well known, Mohammed enjoined all his followers to visit the shrine of Mecca once in their lifetime ; and to preserve continually on their minds a sense of their obligation to perform this duty, he directed that in all the multiplied acts of devotion which his religion prescribes, true believers should always turn their faces towards this holy place, called Kebla. It may be added, that the eastern authors frequently designate the temple in which the square stone is concealed, with all its appendages, as Caaba. CABA'L. (Fr.) In History, was applied originally to the five cabinet ministers of Charles II Clifford, Ashley, Buckingham, Arlington, and Lauderdale — whose initials happened to form the word ; and it has since been used for a junto of individuals, who, too insignificant in point of numbers to form a party, endeavour to effect their pur- poses by underhand measures. CA'BALA. A Hebrew word signifying the oral tra- dition which the Rabbins conceive to complete the system of scriptural interpretation. They maintain that it was delivered in the first instance to Adam, and again to 177 CABLE. Abraham and Moses, by direct revelation ; but that since the time of Esdras the memories of the priests and elder? have BuflSced to preserve it in all its purity. As the Masora details the literal explanation of the language of scripture, so the Cabala reveals the hidden truths of which it is the symbol. Every sentence, word, and letter of the inspired volume contain, according to these inter- preters, a figurative as well as a direct sense. The former IS also not uncommonly manifold ; and a word may be interpreted according to the arithmetical power of the letters which compose it, which species of cabala is called sematria ; or according to the meaning of each individual letter, the entire word thus constituting a sentence, which is called notaricon ; or finally according to certain transpositions of the letters, which is denoted by the term themurah. What the mysterious doctrines of the cabala which were thus discovered actually were, is not very clearly ascertained ; but the system seems to have been an invention of the philosophising Jews of the latter centuries preaeding our era, with the view of accommo- dating the speculations of the Gnostics to the religion of the Old Testament. The Christian cabalists in later times practised a kind of magic under this name, pretending to the power of divination by certain combinations of scriptural cha- racters. CABA'LLUS. In Mythology. See Pegasus. CAB I A' I. In Zoology, the name under which the Capibara or water-hog {Hydrochorus capibara, Erxl.) is described by Buffon. See Capibara. CA'BINET. In Politics, the governing council of a country: from the cabinet or apartment in which the ruler transacts public business and assembles his privy council. In England a few of the /ninisters only are ex officio members of the cabinet. The ministers who are raised to this honour are styled by way of eminence Cabinet ministers, and are more immediately responsible for the acts of the sovereign, as well as for public mea- sures. The distinction between the king's cabinet minis- ters and the rest of his privy council seems not to have been established in public usage in England before the reign of William III. CAB'IRI. In Pagan Mythology, sacred priests or deified heroes, venerated by the Phoenicians originally as the founders of religion. Various opinions have been entertained concerning the nature and origin of the Cabiri ; but from the multiplicity of names applied to them, together with the profound secrecy observed in the celebration of their rites, an almost impenetrable veil of mystery has been thrown around their history. They seem to have been men who, having communicated tne art of melting metals, &c., were deified by a grateful posterity. Their worship was chiefly cultivated in the island of Samothracia, whence it was afterwards transferred to Lemnos, Imbros,and certain towns of Troas. (Strabo, x. 473.) They were styled the offspring of Vulcan, though their name was derived from their mother Cabera, daughter of Proteus. Their number is variously given. Those who were initiated in their rites were held to be secured against all danger by sea and land . Their distin- guishing badge was a purple girdle. An ingenious account of the Cabiri has been given by Professor Miiller of Gdt- tingen, in a dissertation appended to his work on Orcho- menus, wherein he rejects the Phoenician or oriental origin of the Cabiri, and regards their worship as purely Pelasgic, and down to a certain point theprincipal religion of the Greeks. CA'BLE. (Gr. xctirXidv, a rope.) The rope or chain by which the anchor of a ship is held. Cables in Europe, until within a recent period, were usually made of hemp, but of late years iron chains have come much into use. A hempen cable of 12 inches girth, and length 120 fathoms, weighs 3075 lbs. Since the weights of two cables of equal lengths will be as their sections, or squares of the girths, it is easy to deduce the following rule for the weight of any hempen cable : — Multiply the square of the girth in inches by 21 '3 (or 21 nearly enough), the product is the weight in lbs. Since also as the breaking strain, or resistance against the force to part the cable, will be as the section, it will be as the weight, and will be found nearly by dividing the weight in lbs. by 100 ; the quotient is the breaking strain in tons. This rule is of course liable to great uncertainty from the quality or wear of the cable. Chain cables possess great advantages over hempen cables ; they are not liable to be destroyed by chafing on rocky grounds, nor to become rotten and in- secure from alternate exposure to the air and water ; and by reason of their greater weight the strain is exerted on the cable rather than on the ship. In order that the ship may be enabled to let slip her cable in case of necessity, chain cables are furnished with bolts at distances from each other of a fathom or two, which can be readily with- drawn. A chain of which the section is 1 inch in diameter breaks with 16 tons ; such a chain is equivalent to a lOinch hemp cable nearly. And the dimensions of the chain cable corresponding to any hemp cable are therefore easily found by merely dividing the circumference of the hemp N CABLED. cable by 10. The strength of every part of the chain is IMTOved before it leaves the manufactory. • The first patent for a chain cable was taken out in 1808 by Mr. filater, a surgeon in the Royal Navy. CA'BLED. In Architecture, the filling up the lower part of the flute of a column with a cylindrical piece like a cable. CABCKMBE^.. ( Cabomba, the name of one of the genera. ) In Botany, the name given by Richard to the natural order now called Hydropeltidece. CA'CHALOT. In Ichthyology, a name for the sper- maceti or sperm vih3\e{Physetermacrocephalus,'L\xm.). CACHE'T, LETTRES DE. In France, under the ancient government, letters signed with the private seal (cachet) of the king. As warrants for the detention of private citizens, they appear to have been rarely em- ployed before the 17th century. In the reign of Louis XIV. their use became frightfully common. Butin other respects they had been not unfrequently made use of, even in earlier times, to interfere with the course of justice; as, by way of injunction to a party not to exer- cise certain authority, or pursue certain legal steps, &c. Lettres de cachet were never so multiplied as under the administration of Cardinal Fleury : not less than 80,000 are said to have been issued, without any legal judgment, in the proceedings against the Jansenists. Fifty-nine are said to have been issued against the family Mirabeau in the reigns of Louis XV. and XVI., of which twenty- two against the famous count himself. So scandalously were they abused, that there is an instance of a countess obtaining one for the imprisonment of her maid, who had repeated some scandal against her ! They were abo- lished Jan. 15. 1790. CACHE'XIA. (Gr. »«.xo(, bad, and 5|/;, a habits A bad state or habit of body ; whence the term cachexice, or cachectic disorders. CA'CHOLONG. A milk-white chalcedony, ori- ginally found on the borders of the river Cach in Bucha- ria. Cholong, in the language of the Calmucks, is said to signify a stone. CACHU'NDE. A celebrated Chinese medicine, composed chiefly of aromatic stimulants. CA'COD.a:'MON. (Gr. xa.x»l(x,ifjt,uiy, an evil spirit.) See DiEMON. CACO'PHOlJfY. (Gr. xot»os,bad, andipArvii, a sound.) In Rhetoric, a defect of style, consisting in a harsh or dis- agreeable sound produced by the meeting of two or more letters or syllables, or by the too frequent fepetition of the same letters or syllables -.e.g. And oft the ear the open vowels tire. — Popb. CACTA'CEiE. (Cactus, one of the genera.) A small natural order of Exogens, remarkable for their gay and large flowers, and for the grotesque forms of some of the species. They are found wild in hot dry countries, in arid situations, where they are enabled to exist because of the thickness of their skin, which allows very little moist- ure to be lost through it. Many of the species are like succulent Euphorbias, from which they aie however known by their not milking when wounded. All the species are harmless ; some have ipatable fruit ; and one, the Opuntia cochinillifera, is the favourite haunt of the cochmeal insect. CA'CUS. In Fabulous History, the son of Vulcan, a robber of Italy, whose dwelling was in the Avantine wood. His exploits form the subject of a fine episode in the 8th book of the Mneid. He was represented as a frightful monster of enormous strength, who, after a long life of crime, was at length slain by Hercules, from whom he had stolen some oxen. To express his gratitude for his victorv, Hercules erected the Ara Maxima; and Evander, with his infant colony of Arcadians, performed divine honours to Hercules as their benefactor. CA'DDICE-WOKMS, or CASE-WORMS. The larva? or grubs of the Trichopterous insects are so called, on account of being inclosed in a sheath or case. This is always composed of extraneous substances glued together by a cement excreted from the skin of the grub ; and different species of the caddis-worm protect themselves by means of different materials thus joined together. Some, which pass their larva state under water and creep along the bottom, combine bits of sticks or ruslies with small pebbles or shells, to make their cases heavier than water ; others, which float on the top and gather their food from thence, form a slight and slender tube of a narrow slip of grass, which is rolled round the body in a spir.ll direction, with the edges so nicely fitting as to seem but one piece. In every case tlie worm adheres bv a pair of hooks at its hinder extremity to the bottom o'f the shcatli, and only protrudes the head and two follow- ing segments, the skin of which is harder than that covering the rest of the body. Those which creep at the bottom drag themselves along by means of their man- dibles. At the conclusion of their existence as grubs, they moor their case to some large stone or other fixed and submerged body, and close the outlet by a net-work of silken threads, which prevents the entry of any CADET. inimical intruder, but admits the water necessary for re- spiration. They then cast their outer skin, and for a while remain in the usual passive condition of a pujja ; and now the organizing energy is vigorously effecting the wonderful changes which lead to the full perfection of the insect. But, as it would be obviously dangerous to the air-breathing imago to be excluded in its first feeble state under water, the pupa here exhibits a loco- motive power which is without a parallel in other orders of the metamorphotic insects : being provided with a pair of small and sharp hooks at the head, it cuts the threads with which in a previous state it had confined itself, and creeping out of the water casts off its pupa skin, and emerges a May- fly or Phryganea. CA'DENCE. (Ital. cadenza, a /rtWmg'.) In Music, the conclusion of a song, or of some parts thereof, in certain places of the piece, dividing it as it were into so many numbers or periods. The cadence takes place when the parts fall or terminate on a note or chord naturally expected by the ear, just as a period closes the sense in the paragraph of a discourse. A cadence is either perfect or imperfect. The former when it con- sists of two notes sung after each other, or by degrees conjoined in each of the two parts, the harmony of the fifth preceding that of the key note ; and it is called perfect, because it satisfies the ear more than the lat- ter. The latter imperfect ; that is, when the key note with its harmony precedes that (Jf the fifth without its added seventh. A cadence is said to be broken or in- terrupted when the bass rises a major Or minor second, instead of falling a fifth. C ADE'T. ( Fr.) A pupil in a military academy, whose aim is to qualify himself, by a due course of study, to enter {he service of Her Majesty or that of the East India Company as an officer of the line, artillery, or engineers. In this country there are three grand institutions for the education of cadets : Sandhurst for the British line ; Woolwich for the artillery and engineers ; andAddiscombe forthe Indian army, both line and artillery. The academy at Sandhurst was instituted by George 111 for the purpose of affording general and professional instruction to the sons of private or military gentlemen, with the view of their obtaining commissions in the British army without purchase. Before the commission is conferred, the cadet must undergo an examination before a competent board in the classics, mathematics, military drawing, &c. The expenses of this academy were formerly defrayed by go- vernment ; but a change was recently introduced, by which the sons of private gentlemen must pay an annual sum of 12.5/., and the sons of general or other oflicers less sums in proportion to their rank. The academy at Woolwich was established with the view of qualifying cadets for the artillery or engineers ; and to this institution the master-general of the ordnance has the sole right of granting admission. As the nature of the establishment at Woolwich requires the prosecution of a more strict and professional course of study than at Sandhurst, the attention of the cadets is specially di- rected to geography; general history, ancient and modern; modern languages ; military drawing and surveying ; ma- thematics ; engineering and fortification. After the lapse of four years, generally, the cadets undergo an examination in the above-mentioned branches of science ; when the most distinguished are selected for the engineers, the others for the artillery. And here it may be observed, that not merely the cadet academy, but the whole vast establishment at Woolwich, its arsenal, its repository, its laboratory, are component parts of one and the same great school of military science. As the college of Addiscombe is established for the education of officers oT the line, artillery, and engineers for the Indian anny, the plan of instruction pursued there combines the two systems adopted at Sandhurst and at Vt'oolwich. In order to become a cadet in this institu- tion, it is necessary to have the promise of a commis- sion from a director of the East India Company ; and after a prescribed examination, an appointment is ob- tained in one of the branches of the Indian army, ac cording to the merit or pleasure of the cadet. We may here incidentally remark, that no cadet, even after being thoroughly versed in the theory of military science, is suffered to join the engineers either of the Queen's service or that of the E. I. Company, before he has gone through a regular course of practical instruction in sapping, mining, and the whole processes of a siege, as well as in other departments of field engineering, pontooning, the construction of military bridges, &c., in the admirable establishment for these purposes at Chatham. ( United Service Jour.) In France the academies for cadets which existed pre- viously to the French Revolution have been merged in the Polvtccnic schools. The Dutch possess two institutions of this nature ; one at Breda, the other at Delft. In the United States there is one on nearly the same principle as that at Addiscombe. In Germany every small state has a military school ; CADI. while those at Berlin, Vienna, and Munich are on so ex- tensive a scale as to challenge a comparison with any similar institutions in Europe. In Germany, too, the word cadet has a wider signification than in this country, being applied to those persons who, without having fre- quented a military school, join the army in the expectation of obtaining a commission when they have gained a com- petent knowledge of the service. In Russia there is a famous academy for cadets, which was instituted by Anna at St. Petersburg in 1732 ; and since its foundation has afforded Instruction in military science to upwards of 9CO0 pupils, many of whom have acquired celebrity in the annals of Russian literature. CA'DI. (In Arabic, a judge.) Among the Turks the inferior judges are styled Cadi. The Spanish Al- cayde or Alcalde is derived from the same root. CA'DMIUM. A white metal, much like tin ; it fuses and volatilizes at a temperature a little below that at which tin melts. Specific gravity about 9. Its ores are as- sociated with those of zinc. It was discovered in 1818 by Professor Stromeyer of Gottingen. Its equivalent number is 56. It forms a yellow salifiable oxide, composed of 66 cadmium + 8 oxygen = 64 oxide , of cadmium. Its scarcity prevents its employment in the arts, but the oxide has been used as a pigment. CADU'CEUS, In Antiquity, a rod of laurel or olive with a representation of two snakes twisted round it. It was the symbol of peace, and formed the chief badge of the Grecian heralds, whose persons were held sacred. In Mythology, the Caduceus was the symbol of Mercury, thence called Caducifer, to whom it was said to have been presented by Apollo in return for his invention of the lyre. CADU'CIBR'ANCHIATES. (Lat. caducus,/arfm^'y branchiae, gills.) Those Batrachians which undergo a metamorphosis, and lose their branchial apparatus before arriving at the period of maturity j as the frog, toad, sala- mander, and newt. CADU'COUS. (Lat. cado, //fl«.) In Botany, when a part is temporary, and soon disappears or falls off. C^E'CA. (Lat. caecus,6/mrf.) In ComparativeAnatofpy, the blind processes of the alimentary canal are generally so called. Those in fishes occur at the beginning of the in- testines, where they are often numerous and long, repre- senting the pancreas. In birds they are found near the termination of the intestines, and are generally two in number. In mammals the caecum is commonly single, and situated at the beginning of the large intestines ; it is of enormous size in the herbivorous species with simple stomachs. In the lower animals the intestinal glands which communicate with the intestines generally retain their primitive form of casca. CiE'CUM. (Lat. c»cus, blind.) In Human Anatomy, the first portion of the large intestines, in which the ileum terminates by a valve. The caecum is a kind of appendage to the intestinal canal, open at one end only, whence the name blind gut; it has a small process at- tached to it, called the appendix cceci vermiformis. CiE'SAR. This title, originally the nafne of a branch of the Julian family at Rome, was assumed as a mark of dignity by the emperors after Nero. It became subse- quently the title of the presumptive heir to the empire, and the next title of dignity after Augustus ; but was superseded in the Greek empire under Alexis Comnenus by that of Sebastocrator. In the West, it was assumed by the emperors of Germany; and, in German " Kaiser," is now the peculiar title of the emperor of Austria, who has succeeded to several of the dignities of the former. C/ESA'REAN OPERATION. The extraction of the child from the womb by an operation. Julius Ceesar is said to have been thus brought into the world. CiESU'RA. (Lat. caedo, / cut.) In prosody, a metrical break in the verse, occasioned by the separation of the first syllable of a foot, forming the last of a word, from the next syllable, forming the first of another. In the Latin hexameter the principal caesura, without which the line is unmusical, occurs generally after the tenth, sometimes not until after the fourteenth time (each long syllable containing t>yo times, each short syllable one: see Rhythm) ; thus, Arma virumque cano | Trojse qui primus ab oris . Speluncae vivique lacus | at frigida Tempe. The slight pause which follows the syllable at which the interruption takes place is termed the ca;sural pause. In English verse a line is frequently musical without any caesura at all j i. e. in which the pause takes place always at the end of a foot. But a caesura in the middle of the third, and in the middle of the fourth foot of an heroic verse, are by no means uncommon, and parti- cularly appropriate in blank verse, in which they re- present the two common caesurae of the Latin hexameter. 1 sing the sofa i I who lately sanp Of man's first disobedience | and tlie fruit. In the first of these lines the caesura is in the third, in the latter in the fourth foot. 179 CALATHIUM. CAFFE'IN. A bitter crystallizable substance con- tained in coffee. A portioa of it volatilizes during the rgasting of coffee. It has not been applied to any use. CAIHE'R. (I'"r.) Derived by some from the Lat. codex, by others from quatcrnio. It signifies in its proper sense a number of sheets of paper loosely tied together. In French history, it denotes the reports and proceedings of certain assemblies ; as those of the clergy, the states general, the notables, &c. The famous cahiers presented by the states general to the king of France at their convocation on the 24th of June, 1789, contain the best ac- count of the then state of France. They were systematized and condensed in a book in 3 volumes, called. " L'Esprit des Cahiers," to which the reader is referred. CAI'NCIC ACID. A peculiar acid discovered by Pelletier and Caventou in the bark of the cainca root, a Brazilian shrub employed for the cure of intermittent fever. CAI'NITES. A strange sect of heretics, who ap- peared about 159, A.D. They probably originated in some of the various schools of Manicheism ; and, if their doctrines are truly reported to us, they are said to have asserted that the power which created heaven and earth was the evil principle ; that Cain, Esau, Korah, the people of Sodom, and others whom the Old Testament represents as victims of peculiar divine judgments, were in fact children of the good principle, and enemies of the evil. Some of them are said to have published a gospel of Judas on the same principle. The Quintilianists, so called from a lady named Quintilia, of whom Tertullian speaks, were an offset of this sect. CA IRA, CA IRA. (Literally, it (the Revolution) shall go on.) The burden of a famous revolutionary song, which was composed in the year 1790 in denunciation of the French aristocracy. The tune and sentiments of this song were much inferior to those of the Marseillaise Hymn (" AUons enfans de la patrie"), the object of which was to rouse the French to defend their country against foreign aggression. CAIRN. A word of Celtic origin, used to denote the piles of stones of a conical form so frequently found on the tops of hills, &c. in various districts ; erected probably, as Sir R. C. Hoare observes, in general, for the mere pur- pose of memorials, although some have assigned tathem a peculiar character, as receptacles for the bodies of cri- minals burnt in the wicker images of the Druids, &c. Ac- cording to some antiquaries, cairn is distinct from car- nedd, the Welsh name for heaps of stones on the tops of high mountains (Carnedd David, Carnedd Llewellyn, &c.), which are said to have been sacrificial. Some cairns are undoubtedly sepulchral. In common language, a cairn is distinguished from a barrow, the former being a heap of stones, the latter a mound of earth ; but in all probability they had for the most part the same object, and the difference of materials was merely occasioned by local circumstances. See Barrow. CAIRNGO'RM STONE. A yellow or brown variety of rock crystal or crystallized silica, from the mountain Cairngorm in Scotland. CA'ISSON. (Fr.) In Architecture, a sunken panel in a flat or vaulted ceiling, or in the soffit of a cornice. In ceilings they are of various geometrical forms, and often enriched with rosettes or other ornaments. Caisson, in bridge building, is a large chest or vessel in which the piers of a bridge are built. This sinking as the work advances, its bottom at last comes in contact with the bed uf the river, when the sides are disengaged, its con- struction being such as to admit of their being thus de- tached without injury to the floor or bottom. CA'JEPUT OIL. A volatile oil obtained by distilling the leaves of the Melaleuca minor, a shrub abundant in Amboyna and Borneo, whence the oil is imported. This oil is of various shades of green, highly pungent and aromatic, and powerfully stimulant and diaphoretic. It has been much extolled as a remedy in the Asiatic cholera, but other essential oils are probably as effectual. CA'LAMARY. (Calamus, a pen; theca calamaria, the pen-fish. ) A Cephalopod ; so called because it has a horny substance shaped like a quill in its back, and con- tains an ink-bag in its visceral sac : it is the Loligo vul- garis of Cuvier. CA'LAMINE. A native carbonate of zinc, Lapis calaminaris. It is a zinc ore used in the manufacture of brass. CA'LAMUS. {Gr.ttoiK(x.fjt.os,areed.) A name occa- sionally employed in botany for such simple fistular stems, without articulations, as occur in rushes and similar plants. CA'LAMUS AROMA'TICUS, The rhizomaof the Acorus calamus, common over the whole of Europe in moist situations ; it is usually known under the name of sweet flag. An infusion of the root is a good aromatic tonic. It yields a very small portion of essential oil when distilled with water (scarcely exceeding a thou- sandth part of its weight), which is used by perfumers. CALA'THIUM,orCALATHIDIUM. {Gr . xoiXttdoi , a cup.) Is a botanical term, employed by some German N 2 CALATRAVA. . botanists to denote tliat kind of depressed contracted In- florescence which is found in composite flowers. It is in reality an umbel with all the flowers sessile. 4^ CALATRA'VA, ORDER OF, IN SPAIN, so de- nominated from a castle taken from the Moors, was in- stituted by Sancho III. King of Castile, in 1158. The kings of Spain are perpetual grand masters of this order of knighthood. CA'LCAR. (I,at. calcar, a spur.) This term is applied by botanists to all hollow prol(mgations down- wards of leaves or the parts of a flower. The long hollow horns which hang down from one of the sepals of a Tro- pcelum, or from the labellum of an Orchis, or the curved bodies enclosed within the hood of an Aconite flower, are described by this name. CALCA'REOUS SOIL. (Lsit. ca.\x, lime.) Soil of which lime forms a principal component part. Kirwan alleges that no soil will continue long fertile that does not contain some proportion of lime ; and this has been subsequently proved by what takes place in North America. See Ri{ffin's Essay on Calcareous Manures. CALCEOLA'RIA. {Ca\ceQ\\is, a small slipper.) A genus of beautiful herbaceous or shrubby plants with yellow, or orange, or purple flowers, the lower half of which is shaped something like an old-fashioned slipper. They naturally inhabit rocks, rich plains, and woods, in Chili, Peru, or New Grenada. In this country many of them are hardy enough to live in the open air in summer ; and some will even endure our winters, if not very severe. They are, however, all cultivated with most success if regarded as greenhouse plants. CALCINA'TION. The reduction of substances to cinder or ash. The term is derived from the Latin word calx, quicklime, which, as is well known, is prepared by the action of heat upon limestone ; and hence the old chemists employed the word calcination to express any supposed analogous change, metallic substances being apparently converted into earthy matter by calcination. CA'LCIUM. The metallic base of lime, discovered in 1808 by Davy. This substance has hitherto been ob- tained in such small quantities, that its properties have not been accurately investigated. It is probably a bril- liant white metal, highly inflammable, and more than twice as heavy as water. Combined with oxygen it forms lime, which consists of 20 calcium-f-8 oxygen= 28 lime. CALC-SI'NTER. (German. From kalk, /mc, and sintern, to drop.) The calcareous deposit of certain springs. CALC-SPAR. Calcareous spar, or crystallized car- bonate of lime. CA'LCULA'TION, CA'LCULUS. (Lat. calculus, a small pebble, the Romans having made use of pebbles in casting up accounts.) In modern language, the term ciUculus is employed to denote any branch, or any operation of mathematics, which requires or may involve numerisal calculation ; and therefore may be applied to the whole of the mathematical sciences, excepting pure geometry. Thus that part of algebra which treats of exponents is called the experimental calculus. In like manner the phrases calculus of definite integrals, calculus of functions, calculus ofvariations,&c.,a.Te used to denote certain branches of the higher mathematics. See Dif- ferential Calculus, Integral Calculus, Variations, CA'LCULUS. (Dimin. of calx, a limestone.) In Physiology, the general term for inorganic concretions of various kinds, formed in various parts of the body, and bearing in shape or composition a general resemblance to stones. The term calculus is, however, generally confined to urinary concretions. See Ukine. CALDA'RIUM. (Lat.) In Ancient Architecture, by some authors used in the same sense as Laconicum, was an apartment in the baths heated for the purpose of causing perspiration. Vitruvius, however, used the word to signify a hot bath. CALEA'NTHUM. Pliny's term for copperas. CA'LEMBOURG. A French expression for that kind of witticism which in English is denominated a pun. A certain Westphalian Count Calemberg (Kah- lenberg), who visited Paris in the reign of Louis XV., and was famous for his blunders in the French language, is said to be the person immortalized bvtheemploj'ment of his name tn designate this species of jeu de mots. CA'LENDAR. A distribution or division of time into periods adapted to the purposes of civil life ; also a table or register of such divisions, exhibiting the order in which Ihe seasons, months, festivals, and holidays succeed each other during the year. The word is derived from the ancient Latin verb calare, to call. In the early ages of Rome, it was the custom for the pontiff's to call the people together on the first day of <;ach month, to apprise them of the days that were to be kept sacred in the course of it. Hence dies calendce, the calends or first days of the different months. The calendars in use throughout Europe are borrowed from that of the Romans. Romulus is supposed to have first undertaken to divide the year in such a manner that certain epochs should return periodically after a revo- CALENDAR. lution of the sun ; but the knowledge of astronomy wa« not then sufficiently advanced to allow this to be 'done with much precision. He placed the commencement of the year in spring, and divided it into 10 months — March, April, May, June, Quintilis, Sextilis, Septem- ber, October, November, and December. March, May, Quintilis, and October contained thirty-one days eacli ; the other six contained only thirty. The names Quin tills and Sextilis remained in the calendar till the end of the republic, when they were changed into July and August ; the former in flattery of Julius Ciesar, and the latter of Augustus. The year of Romulus contained onlj;304 days. Numa added two months ; January to tlie beginning of the year, and February to the end. About the year 452 b. c. this arrangement was changed by the Decemvirs, who placed February after January; since that time the order of the months has remained undisturbed. In Numa's )'ear the months consisted of 29 and 30 days alternately, to cor- respond with the synodic revolution of the moon. The year would therefore consist of 354 daj's ; but one day was added to make the number odd, as being more lucky. In order to produce a correspondence with the solar year, Numa ordered an intercalary month to be inserted every second year between the 23rd and 24th of February, con- sisting alternately of 22 and 23 days. Had this regulation been strictly adfiered to, the mean length of the year would have" been 3G5i days, and the months would have continued for a long time to correspond with the same seasons. But a discretionary power over the intercalary month was exercised by the pontiffs, who frequently abused it for the purpose of hastening or retarding the days of the election of magistrates; and the Roman calendar continued in a state of uncertainty and confusion till the time of Julius Caesar, when the civil equinox differed from the astronomical by three months. Under the advice of the astronomer Sosigenes, Ca;sar abolished the lunar year, and regulated the civil year entirely by the sun. He decreed that the common year should consist of 3G5 days ; but that every fourth year should contain 366. In distributing the days among the different months, he ordered that the odd months, that is, the first, third, fifth, seventh, ninth, and eleventh, should contain each 31 days, and the other months 30 ; excepting February, which in common years was to contain only 29 days, but every fourth year 30 daj's. This natural and convenient arrangement was interrupted to gratify the frivolous vanity of Augustus, by giving August, the month named after him, an equal number of days wit« July, which was named after the first Caesar. The in- tercalary day, which occurred every fourth year, was inserted between the 24th and 25th of February. Ac- cording to the peculiar and awkward manner of reckoning adopted by the Romans, the 24th of February was called the sixth before the calends of March, sexto calendas. In the intercalary year this day was repeated, and called bis -sexto calendas ; whence the term bissextile. The corresponding, English term, leap year, appears less correct, as it seems to imply that a day was leapt over instead of being thrust in. It may be remarked, that in the ecclesiastical calendar the intercalary day is still inserted between the 24th and 25th of February. The Julian year consisted of 365i days, and consequently differed in excess by 11 minutes 10"35 sec. from the true solar year, which consists of 365 d. 5 h. 48 m. 49-62 sec. In consequence of this difference the astronomical equinox, in the course of a few centuries, sensibly fell back towards the beginning of the year. In the time of Julius Caesar it corresponded to the 25th of March ; in the sixteenth century it had retrograded to the Uth. The correction of this error was one of the purposes sought to be obtained by the reformation of the calendar effected by Pope Gregory XIII. in 1582. By suppressing 10 days in the calendar, Gregory restored the equinox to the 21st of March, the day on which it fell at the time of the Council of Nice in 325 ; the place of Easter and the other moveable church feasts in the ecclesiastical calendar having been prescribed at that council. And in order that the same inconvenience might be prevented in future, he ordered the intercalation which took place every fourth year to be omitted in years ending centuries ; that is to sayii on the iOOth, 200th, &c. ; excepting on the 400th, and the years which are multiples of 400. The Gregorian rule of intercalation may therefore be ex. pressed as follows : — " Every year of which the number is divisible by 4 without a remainder is a leap year, excepting the cen- tesimaKyears, which are only leap years when divisible by 4 after suppressing the two zeros." Thus 1600 was a leap year ; 1700 and 1800 were common years ; 1900 will be a common year, 2000 a leap year, and so on. The Gregorian method of intercalation thus gives 97 intercalations in 400 vears; consequently 400 years contain 400 x 365+97 = 14'6097 days, and therefore the length of one year is 365-2425 days, or 365 d. 5h. 49m. 12 sec, which exceeds the true solar year by 22-38 sec, an error which amounts only to one day in 3866 years. CALENDAR. If an astronomer were required, without any reference to established usages, to give a rule of intercalation by wliich the commencement of the civil year, while it always coincided with the commencement of a day, should deviate the least possible from the same instant of the solar year, he would proceed as follows :— The length of the mean solar year being 365- 242241 days, the excess above a whole number of days is "242241, which converted into a continued fraction becomes l-f.&c. Whence the following series of approximative fractions is derived. 281 1160, Of these the first gives an intercalation of 1 day in 4 years,which supposes the year to be 365| days. The second gives 7 intercalations in 29 years, and supposes the length of the year to be 365 d. 5 h. 47 m. 35 sec, which is some- what too small. The third fraction, ^, is remarkable, as giving a year which dififers in excess from the true solar by 1538 seconds ; so that by intercalating 8 times in 33 years, or 7 times successively at the end of every fourth year, and once at the end of the fifth year, the difference between the civil and solar year would only accumulate to a day in about 5600 years, while in the Gregorian calendar the error amounts to a day In 38G0 years. Nevertheless theGregorian rule has this advantage, that leap year is always readily distinguished. TheGregorian calendar was received immediately or shortly after its promulgation by all the Roman Catholic countries of Europe. The Protestant states of Germany, and the' kingdom of Denmark, adhered to the Julian calendar till 1700; and in England the alteration was successfully opposed by popular prejudices till 1752. In that year the Julian calendar, or old style, as it was called, was formally abolished by act of parliament, and the date used in all public transactions rendered coin- cident with that followed in other European countries, by enacting that the day following the 2nd of Septem- ber of the year 1752 should be called the 14th of that month. When the alteration was made by Gregory it was only necessary to drop 10 days ; the year 1700 having intervened, which was a common year in the Gregorian but a leap year in the Julian calendar, it was now necessary to drop 11 days. The old style is still ad- hered to in Russia and the countries following the com- munion of the Greek church ; the difference of date in the present century amounts to twelve days. Ecclesiastical Calendar — The adaptation of the civil to the solar year is attended with no difficulty ; but the church calendar for regulating the moveable feasts im- poses conditions less easily satisfied. The early Christians borrowed a portion of their ritual from the Jews. The Jewish year was luni-solar ; that is to say, depended on the moon as well as on the sun. Easter, the principal Christian festival, in imitation of the Jewish passover, was celebrated about the time of the full moon. Differences of opinion, and consequently disputations, soon arose as to the proper day on which the celebration should be held. Inorder to put an end to an unseemly contention, the Council of Nice laid down a specific rule, and ordered that Easter should always be celebrated on the Sunday which immediately follows the full moon that happens upon, or next after, the day of the vernal equinox. In order to determine Easter according to this rule for any particular year, it is necessary to reconcile three periods ; namely, the week, the lunar month, and the solar year. To find the day of the week on which any given day of the year falls, it is necessary to know on what day of the week the year began. In the Julian calendar this was easily found by means of a short period or cycle of 28 years {see Cycle), after which the year begins with the same day of the week. In the Gregorian calendar this order is interrupted by the omission of the intercalation in the last year of the century. But to render any cal- culation unnecessary a table is given in the prayer books, showing the correspondence of the days of the year and the week for the current century. {See also Dominical Letteh.) The connection of the lunar month with the solar year is an ancient problem, for the resolution of which the Greeks invented cycles or periods, which re- mained in use with some modifications till the time of the Gregorian reformation. {See Metonic Cycle, Golden Number.) Theauthor of the Gregorian calendar, Luigi Lilio Ghiraldi, or, as he is frequently called, Aloysius Lilius, employed for the same purpose a set of 181 ' CALIPER COMPASSES. numbers called Epacts (for an explanation of the use of which see Epact). It is to be desired that this compli- cated system of rules and tables were rendered unneces- sary by abolishing the use of the lunar month, and causing Easter to fall invariably on the same Sunday of a calendar month ; for example, on the first or second Sunday of April. New French Calendar — A new reform of the calendar was attempted to be introduced tn France during the period of the Revolution. The commencement of the year was fixed at the autumnal equinox, which nearly coincided with the epoch of the foundation of the re- public. The names of the ancient months were abolished, and others substituted having reference to agricultural labours, or the state of nature in the different seasons of the year. But the alteration was found to be incon- venient and impracticable, and after a few years was formally abandoned. (Cycle, Era, Hejira, Year.) CA'LENDER. A machine lor pressing and smoothing cloth and other articles, which when so prepared are said to be calendered. It literally means hot-pressing ; from color, heat. CA'LENDS, in the ancient Roman calendar, were the first days of each month. The Roman month was divided into three periods by the Calends, the Nones, and the Ides. The Calends were invariably placed at the beginning of the month ; the Ides at the middle of the month, on the 13th or 15th ; and the Nones {novetn, nine) were the ninth day before the Ides, counting inclusively. From these three terms the days were counted backwards, in the following manner : — Those days comprised between the calends and the nones were denominated dat/s be/ore the nones; those between the nones and the ides, days before the ides ; and those from the ides to the end of the month, days before the calends. Hence the phrases pridie calendas, tertio calendas, &c.; meaning the second daj- before the calends, or last day of the month, the third day before the calends, or last but one of the month (the calends or first day of the following month being included in the reckoning), and so on. In the months of March, May, July, and October, the ides fell on the 15th day, and the nones, consequently, on the 7th. In all the other months the ides fell on the 13th, and the nones, consequently, on the 7th. The number of days receiving their denomination from the calends depended on the number of days in the mouth and the day on which the ides fell. For example, if the month had thirty-one days, and the ides fell on the 13th (as Iiappened in January, August, nd December), there would remain eighteen days after the ides, which, added to the first of the following month, made nineteen days of calends. Hence the 14th day of January was stj'led the nineteenth be/ore the calends of February ; the fol- lowing day, or 15th of the month, was the eighteenth b^orc the calends, and so on. CALE'NDULIN. a mucilaginous substance or species of gum obtained from the marigold. CA'LENTURE. (Lat. caleo.) A delirious fever, produced by the sun, in which it is common for the pa- tient to imagine the sea to be green fields. CA'LIBER, or CALIPER. (Fr. calibre.) The thickness or diameter of any round or cylindrical body, as of the bore of a gun or of its ball. CA'LICO-PRINTING. The art of producing figured patterns upon calico ; they are transferred to its surface by blocks, copper plates, or engraved cylinders, by wliich the colours are directly printed, or by which mordants are so applied that when the calico is immersed in a colouring bath, the colour only adheres or is produced upon the parts to which the mordant had been previously applied. See Dyeing. CA'LIDUCT. (Lat. calidus, /20#, and ductus, a con- veyance.) In Architecture, a pipe or flue for the dis- tribution of heat in an apartment or house. CALIGl'DiE. A family of parasitic Entomostracous Crustaceans, belonging to the order Siphonosto-ma, cha- racterized by having the mouth organized for piercing and suction. The parasites of this family prey almost exclusively upon fish, and are commonly called fish-lice. Gold-fish are sometimes infested to an almost incredible extent with a species, the Monoculus foliaceus of Lin- naeus, which is nearly aquacter of an inch long, having the body covered with a broad round transparent shield, notched behind to give free motion to the tail. The first pair of legs are shaped like a cupping-glass, and for the purpose of holding on ; the four last pairs are formed for swimming, and terminated each by two long and feathered filaments, probably subservient to respiration. CA'LIPER COMPASSES, or simply Calipers, are compasses with curved legs, for measuring the caliber or diameter of cylinders, balls, or other round bodies. Calipers of the best sort are made with a scale having different sets of numbers engraved on it, like a sliding rule, for the purpose of exhibiting at once various relations depending on the magnitude of the diameter of the body- measured. Thus, as the weights of balls of the same metal are in a constant ratio to the cubes of their diam.ctcrf N3 CALIPH. the scale may be so graduated and numbered that the observer may read off either the diameter in inches, or the weight in pounds. Other numbers having a less im- mediate application are also frequently attached : for example, the degrees of a circle, the proportions of troy and avoirdupois weight, tables of the specific gravities and weights of bodies, &c. It is obvious that these may be varied infinitely, according to the purposes proposed to be accomplished. This word is probably derived from the Greek xkXXuw, I leave behind. CA'LIPH. (Arab, khalifah.) Originally a deputy or lieutenant, but afterwards applied chiefly to the suc- cessors or representatives of Mohammed, who exercised the highest spiritual and temporal jurisdiction over the " Faithful." At first there was little difficulty in deter- mining the right of succession to the caliphat, as it devolved on the immediate descendants or relations of the prophet: but in the course of time violent disputes arose upon this point among several Mohammedan dynasties, and led to the establishment of the caliphats of Africa (Fatimide), and of Spain ( O may zade), which were contemporary with that of the Abassides of Bagdad. The splendour of the empire founded by Mohammed reached its highest pitch towards the beginning of the ninth century, under the famous Haroun al Raschid. The period of its decline may be dated from the com- mencement of the tenth century ; and for the last 200 years the appellation of caliph has been swallowed up in S/iah, Sultan, Emir, and other titles peculiar to the east. CALl'PPIC PERIOD. In Ancient Chronology, is a correction of the Metdnic cycle proposed by Calippus. The Metonic cycle was a period of nineteen solar years, at the end of which time the new moons return again on the same days of the year. The period contained exactly 6940 days. Now 6940 days exceeds 23o lunations by only seven hours and a half. At the end of four cycles, or 76 years, the accumulated excess of 7| hours amounts to one whole day and six hours. Calippus therefore pro- posed to quadruple the period of Meton, and to deduct a day at the end of it by changing one of the months of 30 days into amonth of 29 days. (See Metonic Cycle.) The period of Calippus is sometimes referred to as a date by Ptolemy. CALI'XTINES. One division of the Bohemian Re- formers, who in the 15th century protested against the errors of the church of Rome, and maintained their independence by force of arms. After the death of Huss, his followers split into two principal parties, under the names of Taborites and Calixtines ; of which the latter were the most moderate, and held out chiefly on the ground of the refusal of the cup (calix) to the laity, whence they derived their name. Their hostility was at length propitiated by indulgence on this point: thechurch of Rome declaring expressly at the same time that the giving or withholding of the sacramental wine is a matter of ecclesiastical ordinance merely, and neither the one nor the other essential to the reception of the benefits of the eucharist. The council of Basle (1431) says,— Sive sub una specie sive duplici quis communicat, secundum ordinationem seu observationem ecclesise, proficit digne communicantibus ad salutera. The same name is given to the followers of Calixtus,a German divine of the 17th century, who proposed a re- conciliation between the Roman Catholics, Lutherans, and Reformed church, on the basis of the Apostles' Creed. CALLI'GRAPHY^ (Gr. «aXAo?, beauty, and ypai^a, / write. ) The art of beautiful writing. The scribes who made a profession of copying manuscripts, before the invention of printing, have been termed Calligraphers. Their art consisted not merely in writing, but also in embellishing their work with ornamental devices, al- though illumination (which see) was also practised as a distinct emplopnent. Among the MSS. of the early part of the middle ages which we possess, there are some sumptuous specimens of the art, written in letters of gold, vermilion, &c. and on leaves of different colours, but that fashion went early out of use ; and in general it may be said, that the current writing of calligraphers diminished in beauty and in laborious minuteness, especially in Italy, during the centuries immediately preceding the inven- tion, of printing. CALLIO'NYMUS. (Gr. xxXXes, beauty, and evcfMt., a name.) A genus of beautiful spiny-finned fishes, with very small gill openings ; ventral fins under the throat, and larger than the pectorals ; head oblong, flattened ; eyes placed near to each other, and directed upwards ; no teeth on the palate ; intermaxil- larics capable of considerable protrusion. They have no air bladder. The gemmeous, or golden dragonet ( Callio- nymtis lyra), is a British example of this genus. CALf/I'OPE. (Gr. xctXXos, beauty, and e-^', the voice.) In Mythology, one of the Muses usually associated with Homer in the statues of antiquity, and thence considered a« the patroness of heroicpoetry. CALLI'TRlClIA'CE.'E.(Callitriche,theonlv genus.) A araall cluster of imperfectly organized water plants, the na.tural relation of which is unsettled. By some they are 182 CALVINISTS. considered allies of Urticaccce, by others of Naiadacece, and others Monocotyledons; CALLORHY'NCHUS. 5ee Chim/EUA. CA'LLUS. In Osteology, the matter which unites the divided ends of broken bones : it is a secretion of new bony matter, CA'LOMEL. The old chemical name of chloride of mercury. The word is perhaps derived from xu.Xos,fair, and /juXois, black. It is prepared by rubbing mercury with corrosive sublimate, which forms a black mixture, which, by the application of heat, yields awhite sublimate of calomel. It is much used in medicine, especially as a purgative. It consists of 200 mercury -h 36 chlorine = 236 chloride of mercury or calomel. CALO'RIC. (Lat. caleo, / atn warm.) A term ap- plied by the French chemists to designate the matter of heat, it being assumed that the phenomena of heat are dependent upon the presence of a highly attenuated, mobile, and imponderable form of matter. See Heat. CALORI'FIC RAYS. A terra applied to the in- visible heating rays which emanate from the sun, and from burning and heated bodies. CALOR'IMETER. (Lat. calor, heat, and metrum, a measure.) An instrument for measuring the quantity of heat given out by bodies in passing from one temperature to another, CALORIMO'TOR. (Lat. calor, heat, a.ndmo\eo, I put in motion.) This term has occasionally been applied to a peculiar form of the voltaic apparatus composed of one pair of plates of great extent of surface, the electricity of which, when transmitted through good conductors, pro- duces intense heat. CA'LOSO'MA. {Gr. xaXos, beautiful; eiuiJi.»,body .) A genus of most splendid Coleopterous insects, belongmg to the family Carabidcs, or ground beetles. In this genus the jaws are toothless, or rather devoid of notches ; the maxillary palpes terminate in a large joint, and the abdomen is broad. There are two British species : Catoso?na sycophanta, so called because its grub insinu- ates itself into the nests of gregarious caterpillars, and feeds upon them ; and Calosoma inquisitor. In specula- ting on the exception which the Calosomes present among the Carabidcs, in the brilliant colours which are developed in them, an explanation seems to be afibrded by a difference in their habits : they frequent trees, and are more exposed to the light than their hole-and-corner congeners, the ground-beetles. CA'LOYERS. Monks of the Greek church, who follow the rule of St. Basil. CALP. An argillo-ferruginous limestone. CALU'MBA. The root of the CoccmZma- «flZOTflt ■^-Nt A X a8*_6^ CAMERONIANS. CA'MERATED. fLat. camera.) A term applied to the shells of certain Cephalopods which are divided by transverse partitions into a series of chambers which are traversed by a siphon. Most of the species are now extinct. CAMERO'NIANS. The strictest sect of Scottish Presbyterians ; so called from the Kev. Richard Cameron, one of the most eminent of their leaders. The origin of this sect is briefly told. Charles II., on his restoration in 1660, found presbytery to be the existing national church ; and though he had, at one time, sworn to maintain that faith, yet thinking it incompatible with monarchical government, he lost no time in superseding it, and establishing episcopacy in its room. This he did in direct opposition, not merely to his own solemn obli- gations, but to the principles and predilections of his Scottish subjects. And the result was such as might have been anticipated. The presbyterian clergy, though driven from their parishes and deprived of their incomes, continued to preach and hold meetings, or conventicles, as these assemblages were contemptuously called, for the celebration of religious ordinances ; and their influence with the people seemed to increase in proportion as means were taken to silence or crush them. Under these circumstances, Charles, finding that rigour failed in producing the effect at which he aimed, and the number of episcopalian ministers being insufficient to fill the vacancies that had been occasioned by his violent change of the national religion, had recourse to a plan, ostensibly liberal and mild, but which did by no means realize the views which he had anticipated from it. In 1669, he granted what he called an indulgence, or permission to such of the ejected ministers as had meanwhile " lived peaceably and orderly," or, in other words, who had not signalized themselves by holding conventicles, to return to their several parishes (if these were vacant), or to accept presentation to such other parishes as were vacant. A similar indulgence was issued in 1672 ; but both of them were marked by restrictions and conditions which were any thing but agreeable to tender consciences. ( Wodrow's Church Hist. 8vo ed. vol. ii. p. 130-31.) This indulgence emanated solely from the king, and had not been submitted to the consideration of the church, and was, in consequence, regarded by many as tantamount to a recognition of the royal authority in matters ecclesiastical as well as civil, and as subversive both of the national covenants {Acts of Assemblt/, apud an. 1649), to which they had sworn, and of presbytery itself, which acknow- ledged no head but Jesus Christ. Some of the more moderate of the clergy, however, did not think it in- consistent either with their vows or principles to accept it; others complied with it, regarding it as an en- croachment on their religious rights, but satisfying their conscience by giving an open testimony against it and the ecclesiastical authority assumed by the king ; while there were some who preferred principle to ex- pediency, and peremptorily refused compliance on any terms, and resisted every effort to procure their ac- quiescence. These were the persons who were afterwards denominated Cameronians. ( IVodrow, iii. 202.) The Cameronians were influenced in the line of conduct which they pursued solely by conscientious motives. Rather than acknowledge the authority of the king in matters ecclesiastical, or abate one iota of their indefea- sible rights and privileges, they were willing to separate from their conforming brethren, and to encounter all the evils and disabilities which such a step had evidently a tendency to produce. They became at once the object not only of the disapprobation of their indulged brethren, but of the vindictive and cruel rage of a tyrannical go- vernment. On the principle that " oppression drives a wise man mad," they pushed their views to the utmost extremity; and, while they vilified the Presbyterians whose opinions, both religious and ecclesiastical, were rnore moderate than their own, they stigmatized the king and government as unscriptural and Erastian. In short, while they arrogated to themselves absolute liberty of conscience and of judgment, they exhibited the greatest intolerance towards others who entertained different sen- timents. When persecuted and proscribed, when many of them were imprisoned, and not a few of them suffered martyrdom, they began to consider their king as a tyrant ; and they publicly declared, that "by his perjury in violating his covenanted vows, by his arbitrary govern- ment, and his usurpation over their civil and religious liberties, he had dissolved their allegiance and forfeited all right and title to the crown." (Laing's Hist, of Scot. vol. iv. p. iii.) They also protested against the succession or his brother, on account of liis popery and his breach of covenant to God and the church. To these sentiments Cameron, their leader, and a party of about twenty others, all armed, gave public utterance in a declaration read at Sanquhar, and affixed to the market-cross of that town. ( Wodroiv, iii. 312.) This was the signal for more prompt and decisive measures on the part of government. The party were soon after (20th July, 1680) surprised at Airsmoss, a morass on the confines of the counties of 185 Ayr and Dumfries. Cameron and his brother fell on the field ; while sixteen were taken prisoners, and soon after perished as traitors on the scaffold ; the remainder of the party, with some peasants tvho had joined them, fled. But their spirit was not intimidated, nor was their enthusiasm abated. Cargill, who was now their leader, and who was shortly after apprehended and publicly ex- ecuted, pronounced at a public meeting of the party at Torwood, near Stirling, a solemn excommunication against their persecutors, including the Duke of York and the king himself. {Hind Let Loose, passim j Lai7ig,iv.U2-]3.) Meanwhile, the Cameronians had formed themselves into a more regular body; and, in 1681, agreed to hold quarterly or more frequent meetings, and took the name of The Societies United in Correspondence. They thus acted more in concert ; and their fortitude and zeal became, if possible, more intense. They were now altogether alienated from the indulged ministers and the general public ; and their meetings for religious worship and for the celebration of ordinances were, for the sake of safety, confined to the mountains, or to sequestered and remote spots. They still continued the objects of the most ruthless persecution. But while proscribed and chased like beasts of prey by the government, no respect being shown to age or sex or condition, and while numbers of them, including their most popular ministers, perished on the scaffold or at the stake, they began to disagree among themselves. Some of them having been dissatisfied with the language of the SanquharDeclaration, certain portions of it liad been amended or explained. A considerable number took ofiTence at the violence of Renwick, now at the head of the party ; and not only se- parated from them, but published testimonies against some of their proceedings. The one party were averse to unite with such as would not go to the same extreme as themselves ; while the other, more moderate in their principles, were for making common cause with all who held the same general sentiments, and were exposed to the same persecutions. It was at this period (1687) that Renwick drew up their Informatory Vindication, wliich in spirit was the same as the Sanquhar Declaration. But the breach was never healed. It is unnecessary, however, to give a more minute account either of their proceedings or their sufferings. Renwick, who was beheaded in 1688, was the last Scottish martyr. The revolution put an end to the sufferings of the Cameronians, and to persecution for ccmscience' sake. ( Scotch Worthies, § Renwick, Hackston of Rathillet, &c. ; Hind Let Loose.) The services of this proscribed party at this crisis were of an important kind. Suffering as they had long done at the hand of a sanguinary government, and alive as they were to the value of civil and religious liberty, they espoused the cause of the Prince of Orange with an en- thusiasm and bravery worthy of their character. A regiment of 800 Cameronians was speedily raised ; and their heroism as displayed at Dunkeld and other places has extorted the praise of history. A regiment bearing the name still exists. {Laing, iv. 194. 208. 232.) But the Cameronians, though they occupy a promi- nent place in the history of the reigns of Charles, and of James II. his successor, never formed a very numerous body. After the revolution, when they were allowed to worship God according to their conscience without fear or danger, they gradually became an obscure as they were a small sect. Nor did they think of forming themselves into a regular church till 1743, when, under the direction of the Rev. M. M'Millan* and other leaders, they "formed and established a presbytery in the name of Christ, the alone king and head of the church, under the title of the Reformed Presbytery." As they became more nu- merous, they took the title of the Reformed Presby- terian Synod. But at this moment (1841) the synod consists only of six presbyteries, embracing thirty-five congregations, most of them being very small. The nature of the tenets and doctrines of the Came- ronians may account for their never having become a numerous sect. They denied the authority of civil rulers, unless these had sworn and subscribed the national covenants ; and of course they refused to include the names of such rulers, even that of the sovereign himself, either in their public or private prayers. They contended that the civil magistrate is bound to suppress error, and to encourage the true religion ; and that the covenants are binding on all posterity. These opinions, however, they have gradually modified or abandoned. They now pray for the sovereign and civil magistrates, and have virtually renounced the covenants. They are also in favour of a national church ; and would have no hesitation to unite with the present established church of Scotland * They are often caUethe centre of gravity, but intersecting it below that point. 3. The bore or cylindrical cavity. This in several sorts of cannon is made of smaller diameter towards the breech, thus assuming the shape of two cylinders united by a portion of a spherical surface. The smaller part of the bore is of such a length as to receive the maximum service charge of gun-powder, and is called the chamber. The entrance of the bore, c, is called the mouth or muzzle. Cannon are made either of cast iron or brass, the CANNON BONE. latter being an alloy of copper and tin in the .proportion of about 10 parts of copper to 1 of tin, and called gun- metal. This has a, greater tenacity than iron, but is objectionable on account of its greater density and higher price, besides being liable in rapfd service to souen and droop at the muzzle, whereby it is rendered unserviceable. Since the advantage of using smaller charges of gun-powder was discovered, cast iron, though possessing less tenacity than gun metal, has been substi- tuted for ship, garrison, and battering guns. But the the smaller species of cannon (field-pieces) continue to be made generally of brass ; for by reason of the rapid cooling of the iron in small masses its strength is con- siderably impaired, so that it is difficult to be procured of the requisite quality. Cannon were formerly cast with a cave or hollow, but they are now always cast solid ; experience having shown that when cast solid they are stronger, and less liable to burst ; that the metal is freer from honeycombs ; and that the bore can be rendered more perfect, and its axis made to coincide more accurately with that of the piece, hi boring cannon, the gun itself is made to re- volve about the bit or borer, the size of which is suc- cessively increased. In service cannon are mounted on carriages, by which they may be removed from place to place. They are supported on the carriage by the trunnions, about which they move as on an axle i and the form of the carriage is such as to admit of their being elevated or depressed a few degrees above or below the horizontal plane. See Gun, Gunnery, Howitzer, Mortar. CA'NNON BONE. In Farriery, signifies the single metarcarpal or metatarsal bone of the horse. CA'NNON METAL. Bronze; an alloy of copper with eight or ten per cent, of tin. CANOE'. A boat made of a single trunk of a tree hollowed out. Some are made of pieces of bark fastened together ; these should be properly called boats. They are of various sizes, and are generally propelled by one, or if large by two or more paddles, like wooden shovels. CA'NON. {Gr. xccvtu)!, a rule.) A word of various sig- nifications, of which we can only enumerate the principal. 1. In cathedral and collegiate churches there are canons who perform some of the services, and are pos- sessed of certain revenues connected with them. These are, strictly speaking, i-esideniiart/ canons : fo7-eign canons are those to whom collegiate revenues are assigned with- out the exaction of any duty. 2. J'he laws and ordinances of ecclesiastical councils arc called canons. 3. The canon of scripture signifies the authorized and received catalogue of the sacred books. The canon of the Old Test., as received by the Romanists, differs from that Of the Protestant churches in regarding as inspired those books which we reject under the ferm Apocrypha. The catalogue received by the Jews themselves, which we adopt, was first enlarged by the Council of Carthage tc the extent in which it is held by our opponents, and that decision was formally confirmed by the Council of Trent. In the canon of the New Test., however, the agreement of Christian churches may be considered unanimous. There exist a series of enumerations of the sacred books of the latter covenant in the writings of the first four centuries, the general agreement of which, and thesatis- factorjr reasons which can be assigned in most cases of omission — there are no additions — distinctly mark the universality of the judgment of the early churches in this matter. Ca'non. In Music, a perpetual fugue. The original method of writing this was on one line, with marks thereon, to show where the parts that imitate were to begin and end. This, however, was what the Italians more particularly call canoyie chhtso (sliut), or cano7ie in cor no. CA'NONESS. A description of religious women in France and Germany. Their convents were termed colleges. They did not live in seclusion. The college of llemiremont was the oldest establishment of this order in France. Similar noble monasteries still exist in Germany, and the revenues and dignities of some belong to Protest- ants. CANO'NICAL HOURS. Stated times of the day set apart, more especially by the Romish church, for de- votional purposes. In England the canonical hours are from 8 to 12 in the forenoon, before or after which the ceremony of marriage cannot be legally performed in any parish church. CA'NON IZA'Tl ON. A ceremony in the Romish church, by which holy men deceased are enrolled in the catalogue of saints. The privilege of canonizing ■was originally common to all bishops, and was first confined to the Pope by Alexander III, in 1170. Wheii it is proposed to canonize any person, a formal process is instituted, by which his merits or demerits are investi- gated. Hereupon the beatification of the person in question is pronounced by the Pope, and his canonization follows upon the production of testimony ;to miracles 191 CANZONE. performed at. his tomb or by his remains. The day of his death is generally selected to be kept in his honour, and is inserted as such in the calendar. The last instance of canonization took place in 1803. CANO'PUS, or CANOBUS. (Gr. Kctve^as, the name of a place in Egypt.) A bright star of the first mag- nitude in the rudder of Argo, one of the southern con- stellations. As its declination is about 624° south, it is not visible in our hemisphere beyond the 40th degree of latitude. CA'NOPY. (Gr. xuvonm.) In Architecture, an ornamented covering over a seat of state, and in its extended signification any covering which affords pro- tection from above. CANT. In sea phrase, to turn over or round; a cant is also a piece of wood laid on the deck for the support of a bulk-head. CANTA'TA. (It. cantare, to sing.) In Music, a song or composition intermixed with recitative, usually for a single voice with a thorough bass. CANTHA'RIDES. (,Gr. xocydccios, a beetle.) Spanish flies. The Cantharis vesicatoria, or blistering fly. These insects are chiefly brought from Astracan and Sicily : they should be free from mould and dust, of a peculiar but not very strong or nauseous odour, and of a brilliant golden green colour. These flies furnish us with the only ready and certain means of raising an effective blister upon the skin, for which purpose they are reduced to powder, mixed with ointment or lard, and spread thinly upon a piece of leather, which is then applied to the part affected. Their operation is very different in different habits and constitutions : sometimes they pro- duce much local pain and inconvenience, and great gene- ral excitement and irritation of the urinary organs ; at others they are comparatively quiet in their action ; and the blister being applied at bed-time, is found in the morning to have raised the cuticle with a large quantity of serous fluid underneath it, and the patient has scarcely been aware of its agency. The object of applying a . blister is generally to transfer internal inflammatory*^ action to the surface ; and in deep-seated inflammations, and painful affections of the viscera and larger joints and muscles, they are often astonishingly effective. But blisters should not be incautiously applied : they some- times produce troublesome sores, and are followed by erisipelatous inflammation. Care should also be taken to confine then, by a margin of adhesive plaster or other means, to the part upon which they are intended to operate, as they sometimes are displaced, and give rise to awkward accidents. When cantharides are taken internally, they are violently stimulant to the urinary and generative organs. CA'NTHUS. (Lat.) The comer of the eye, where the upper and under eyelids meet. CANTILE'VER. (Probably from canterii labrum, the lip of a rajter.) In Architecture, a piece of wood framed into the front or side of a house, and projecting from it, to sustain the eaves and mouldings over them. CA'NTO. See Soprano. CA'NTO-FE'RMO. (\td\. firm song.) In Music, the subject song. Every part that is the subject of counter- point, whether plain or figured, is called by the Italians cantofcrmo. CA'NTON. In Heraldry, an ordinary formed either at the- dexter or sinister chief of the escutcheon, by two lines meeting at right angles, proceeding from the top or sides of the shield. By the word canton is always understood a canton dexter, unless otherwise expressed. Canton. (Gr. xavOos, an angle; or Lat. centum, a hundred.) In Geography, originally a quarter of a city regarded as separated or detached from the rest; but applied chiefly at present to the twenty-two districts of which Switzerland is composed, and which, though forming a confederate union like the United States of America, are governed each by a separate judicature and particular laws. CANTO'NMENT. In the art Military, that distinct situation which soldiers occupy when quartered in dif- ferent parts of a town, for want of barracks or caserns to contain them. CA'NVAS. (Ital.) A very clear unbleached cloth of hemp or flax, woven regularly in little squares, chiefly used to make sails for shipping. Besides serving for various domestic purposes, such as for the ground of tapestry work, canvas forms the cloth on which painters usually draw their pictures. CANZO'NE. (Latin, Provencal, and Italian, cantare, to sing.) A kind of lyric poem. Adopted, with some alter- ation, from the poetry of theTroubadours, it found its way into Italy in the thirteenth century. It is divided, like the Greek strophic ode, into stanzas, in which the number and place of rh3Tnes and-metre of verses respectively cor- respond. The last stanza, commonly shorter than the others (the epodus of the ode), is called congedo, or ripressa (in old French V envoy), and consisted, generally, of a valedictory address to the canzon itself. This form of poetry was adapted by Petrarch to the expression of CANZONETTA. many different veins of thought — sonorous, elevated, and heroic. The Pindaric ode, somewhat more regular than the canzon, was introduced by Chiabrera. The canzonet was a sort of canzon in short verses, a favourite form with the poets of the fifteenth century. CANZONE'TTA. (Dimin. of canzone.) In Music, a short song. The Neapolitan canzonet has two strains, each of which is, like the French vaudeville, sung twice over. The Sicilian canzonet Is n a species of jig-time, with six or twelve quavers in the bar. Sometimes both are rondeaus, and repeat the first strain for an ending. CAOU'TCHOUC. This curious substance is the inspissated juice or sap of several plaots : the principal supplies are from South America, and are derived from the Siphonia elastica (Hevea caoutchouc), and probably from other Euphorbiaceous plants. It is often termed gum elastic and Indtan rubber. Its general properties and uses are well known. Among its more recent appli- cations are those of elastic wove fabrics, formed of caout- chouc stretclied into threads and covered with cotton ; and various water-proof clothing, which is made by interposing a laver of caoutchouc between two folds of the cloth, and then forcibly uniting them by pressure. For this purpose the caoutchouc is dissolved by coal naphtha, and in that state brushed over the surfaces which are to be united. Caoutchouc is a compound of carbon and hydrogen ; when heated it fuses, and afterwards remains viscid ; when subjected to destructive distillation at a high tem- perature, it yields four fifths of its weight of a highly in- flammable and very light volatile oily liquid (hydro- carbon), which has been called caoutchoucine, and which is a good solvent of the unaltered caoutchouc. Washed sulphuric ether dissolves caoutchouc, and it is also soluble in several essential oils ; but of these latter solutions the greater number leave it in a sticky state on evaporation. CAPA'CITY FOR HEAT. Experiment shows that different quantities of heat are required to raise different _. bodies to the same temperature, and those substances • which require the largest quantity of heat to be raised to a given temperature are said to have the greatest ca- pacity for heat. See Specific Heat. ^ CAPE. (Lat. caput, a head.) In Geography, is the term used to indicate the extreme point of a promontory, or of that portion of land which juts out into the sea beyond the general line of the coast ; as Cape Taenarus or Matapan, the most southern part of Europe ; the Cape of Good Hope, the most southern part of Africa; Cape Horn, the southern extremity of America, &c. On rocky and much indented coasts capes generally termi- nate in acute angles, whence they are sometimes denomi- nated «oe»ltey and if the portion of the land which pro- jects is small or not high, the appellation ness in Eng- land, and in Scotland that of mull, is assigned to it, as Sheerness, the Mull of Galloway. C APE'LLA. A star of the first magnitude in the left shoulder of Auriga. CA'PERS. The buds or unexpanded flowers of the Capparis spinosa, in common use as a pickle. CA'PIAS AD RESPONDENDUM. In Law, a writ for the commencement of personal actions to arrest a party who is at large or already in custody of a sheriff. CA'PIAS AD SA'TISFA'CIE'NDUM. Shortly called ca. sa.) In Law, a judicial writ of execution which issues out on the record of a judgment, where there is a recovery in the courts of Westminster, of debt, damages, &c. By this writ the sheriff is commanded to take the body of the defendant in execution. This is the highest execution which can be had against a defendant, and no other can be afterwards had against his lands or goods, unless he die in custody. CAPI'BARA. The largest known Rodent quadruped. It is of aquatic habits, and frequents the rivers of South America. It is the type of the genus Hydrochcerus, signi- fying" water-hog," by which name it is sometimes known. CAPILLA'IRE. Simple syrup flavoured with orange flowers, or orange flower water, generally goes under this name, which is derived from the mucilaginous sjTup directed in old Pharmacopoeias to be made oftheAdiantum capillus veneris. CAPI'LLAMENTUM. (Lat. capillus, n Aa»-.) An old n.-xme of the filament of a flower. See Filament. CAPI'LL ARY. Long and slender, like a hair. CAPPLLARY A'CTION. (Lat. capillus, a hair.) When a very narrow glass tube, open at both ends, is inserted in a vessel containing water, the water imme- diately rises in the tube, and remains suspended at some height above its level in the vessel. If the same tube is plunged into mercury, the mercury in the tube stands at a lower level than in the vessel. These effects are most sonspicuous when the width of the bore of the tube is so email as to resemble a hair ; whence the cause of the phenomena has been termed capillary action, from the Latin capillus, which signifies a hair. The operation of the same forces which cause the elevation of water and depression of mercury in glass tubes, gives rise to a multitude of other phenomena with 192 CAPILLARY ACTION, which every one is familiar. If a piece of sugar, or sponge, or blotting paper, is brought into contact with water at one extremity, the fluid immediately passes through it and moistens its whole substance. A mass of wetted thread or cloth, hanging over the edge of a basin from the water within it, will empty it as a siphon would. The rise of the oil in the wick of a lamp, of the sap in trees, the functions of the excretory vascular system in plants and animals, depend on the same causes. Ca- pillary action is, in short, only an instance of the operation of that species of attraction which is exerted among the elementary particles of matter within very small or in- sensible distances, which is called molecular attraction, and which gives rise to some of tlie most important phenomena of the physical world ; such as the vibrations of solid bodies, the refraction of light, and chemical actions of all kinds. The phenomenon of the elevation of water in narrow tubes began to attract the attention of experimental philosophers about the beginning of the last century ; but neither the method of calculating the effects of the forces exerted amongthe elementary molecules of matter, nor their mode of operation, was then understood, and consequently no satisfactory theory was proposed. Two facts, however, of considerable importance were esta- blished by Hauksbee. The first is, that the ascent of the liquid is quite independent of the thickness of the tube ; and the second, that if two rectangular plates of glass having their edges joined in a vertical line, and forming a very acute angle with each other, are dipped into water, the fluid which rises between them takes the form of the equilateral hyperbola. On considering the phe- nomenon attentively, it was easy to see that as the height of the fluid between the plates at any point in the curve was inversely proportional to the distance of the plates at that point, it must follow that in capillary tubes the ascent would be inversely proportional to the diameter of the tube. The theory of the phenomenon, however, still remained unexplained. Dr. Jurin ascribed the ascent of the liquid to the at- traction of the ring of the tube immediately above it. But this was merely a vague explanation, and is now known to be altogether erroneous. Clairaut, in his celebrated work on the Figure of the Earth, was the first who analyzed exactly the different forces which concur in elevating the liquid in a capillary tube, and reduced the phenomena to the ordinary laws of the equilibrium of fluids. Some of his suppositions respecting the nature of the forces in action were erroneous ; for example, he supposed the attraction of the internal surface of the tube on the liquid to be exerted not only at a sensible distance, but to extend even to the dia- meter. He failed to prove from theory that the ascent must be inversely proportional to the diameter of the tube ; but he showed that several hypotheses might be made with respect to the law of attraction from which that law of ascent would follow ; and he demonstrated a very re- markable result, namely, that if the attraction which the particles of the tube exercise on the fluid and the at- traction which the particles of the fluid exercise on each other follow the same law, and differ from each other only in intensity, the fluid will rise in the tube when the first of these attractions exceeds half the second. The error of Dr. Jurin's hypothesis was first clearly pointed out by Professor Leslie, in a paper inserted in the Philo- sophical Magazi7ie, in 1802. Mr. Leslie's argument was shortly this : If the ring of the tube immediately above the liquid in a capillary tube attract it upwards, how does it happen that the ring immediately below the surface does not attract it downwards, in which case the forces would be balanced, and there would be no elevation ? The fact is, that as the action of the molecuTes of the tube is confined within very narrow limits, its direction must be at right angles to the sides of the tube. Nor is it difficult to conceive how a lateral action may yet cause a perpendicular ascent. It is a fundamental property of fluids, that any force impressed in one direction is propagated equally in every direction ; the tendency of the fluid, therefore, to approach the glass will occasion it to spread over the internal cavity of the tube, and conse- quently to mount upwards. Mr. Leslie's explanation, though correct in principle, served in no way to advance the theory ; indeed little notice appears tohave been taken of it till its importance was pointed out by Mr. Ivory. Another important fact was discovered by Dr. Young, who showed, in a paper on the Cohesion of Fluids, in the Phil. Trans, for 1805, that the angle made by the surface of the fluid with the sides of the tube is invariable, the fluid and the materials of the tube remaining the same, and being supposed homogeneous. But a complete exposition of the theory of capillary phenomena was reserved for Laplace. In twoSupplements to the Mecanique Celeste, published in 1806 and 1807, Laplace, assumingthe force of molecular action to extend only to insensible or imperceptible distances, determined the" separate influences of the cohesive attraction of the molecules of the fluid to each other, and the adhesive CAPILLARY ACTION. force with which they cling to the tube. This analysis of the forces by which the capillary phenomena are pro- duced conducted him to an equation in which the whole theory is included. It consisted of two parts : the first belonging to those points of the surface of the fluid whose distance from the sides of the tube is greater than the radius of the sphere of molecular action ; and the other belonging to those points of the surface which are in im- mediate contact -with the sides of the tube, or at least within the sphere of the action of its molecules. The first term is general, and the same for all surfaces ; the other varies with the curvature in each particular case. . Mr. Ivory afterwards showed that of the two quantities which enter into the formula of Laplace, the one denotes the direct pressure caused by the attraction of a fluid mass bounded by a plane ; and the other the derivative force acting laterally, which is a necessary consequence of the direct pressure. {Ency.Brit. art. "Capillary Action.") The latest and most important work on capillary action is by Poisson, Nouvelle Theorie de F Action Ca- £iUaire, 1831. Its object was to correct the theory of aplace by suppljang an important omission in the phy- sical data, namely, the rapid diminution of density which takes place near the free surface of the fluid, and near the sides of the tube. Now this circumstance, though it had been entirely overlooked by all former inquirers. Is not only essential to the right investigation of the effects of capillary action, but it is demonstrated by Poisson that if there was no diminution of density near the superficial parts of the liquid, the surface would remain plane and horizontal, and there would neither be ele- vation nor depression in the capillary tube. The mole- cular forces, therefore, which produce the capillary ohe- nomena, are modified not only by the curvature of the surface, according to the previous theory, but also by the particular state of liquids at their surfaces. The power of supporting the fluid column depends en- tirely on the width of the tube at its upper extremity. If the tube bulge out below, the water will not rise in it spontaneously ; but if plunged into a basin till the water reaches the capillary part, and then lifPed up, the water will remain suspended at exactly the same height as in a tube having the same capillary bore throughout. The lower and wide part of the vessel may consist of metal, or any other substance, different from glass. It is sufficient that the cavity terminate above in a capillary glass tube. The phenomenon of the depression of mercury in capil- lary tubes may be considered as the inverse of that of the elevation of water. The molecules of water have a greater attraction for glass than for each other ; those of mercury, on the contrary, attract each other more power- fully than they are attracted by glass. If a drop of mercury, adhering to the edge of a plate of glass, is pre- sented to a mass of the same fluid, it immediately leaves the glass and unites with the mass. When a plate of glass is plunged into mercury, the mercury is depressed, and forms a convex surface on both sides of the plate. In a glass tube the surface of mercury is always convex, provided the4nside of the tube be perfectly clean, and the mercury free from impurities. All these phenomena clearly indicate the excess of the mutual attraction of the particles of mercury above their adhesion to the sides of the glass. From some experiments made by Casbois at Metz, it appeared to result, that mercury purified with great care forms a concave surface in the interior of a glass tube, and consequently rises above the level, like an aqueous fluid. It is now generally admitted, however, that these experiments were fallacious, inconsequence of the inner surface of the tube having been lined with a slight, and perhaps imperceptible, oxydation produced by the boiling of the mercury. In preparing barometers, it has been the custom to boil the mercury in the tube ; when this operation is performed, great caution is requisite to prevent the oxydation from taking place. The form of the surface of the fluid in the tube indi- cates the relation of the cohesive force of its particles to their attraction for the tube. The attraction of water to glass is superior to half the cohesion of the aqueous particles to one .another ; consequently water within a capillary tube assumes a concave surface, and rises. Mercury, on the other hand, assumes a convex surface, and is depressed ; because its molecules attract one another with a force more than double that with which they adhere to glass . The radius of curvature of the bounding surface at the middle point is proportional to the width of the tube. It is stated by Professor Leslie as the result of his experiments, that the depression of mercury in capillary tubes may be estimated at unity divided by G8 times the diameter expressed in inches. Hence if the width of the bore is one fourth of an inch, the depression of the mercury is one seventeenth of an inch. On this account it is necessary, in accurate barometric observ- ations, to apply a correction for capillary action, which is less in proportion as the diameter of the tube is greater. The best treatises on this subject have already been re- ferred to ; viz. that of Laplace, in the Mecanique Celeste, 193 CAPPARIDACEiE. tome iv. ; of Mr. Ivory, in the EncyclopMia Britan- nica i and of Poisson, h'ouvelle Thiorie de I' Action Capil- lairc. CAPI'LLARY VESSELS. (Lat. capillus, a hair.) Anatomists give this term to the minutest i^amitications of the arteries and other vessels. CAPILLl'TUM. (Lat. capillus, o ^am) A kind of purse or net in which the spores of Trichia and similar fungi are retained. CA'PITAL. (Lat. caput, a Aeac?.) In Architecture, the head or uppermost member of any part of a building ; but it is generally applied in a restricted sense to that of a column or pilaster of the several orders, as in the figures here given, in which it will be seen that the Tuscan capital (No. 1.) consists of an abacus or square shelf at the top, and thereunder an ovolo or quarter round, and under that a neck terminated by an astragal or fillet, which latter is always considered as part of the column itself. The Roman Doric capital (No. 2.) here given has an abacus, ovolo, and neck like the last ; and also in addition three annulets under the ovolo, and a cyma or ogee with its fillet over the abacus. The Grecian Doric, however, has only a square abacus, ovolo, and small fillets. The Ionic (No. 3.) capital consists of three leading parts : an abacus, composed of an ogee and fillet ; a rind, which forms the scrolls ; and an ovolo and astragal at the lower part. The Corinthian and Composite capitals (Nos. 4. and 5.) consist of an abacus {see Abacus) of peculiar form, and are decorated with leaves. Ca'pital. In Political Economy, that portion of the produce Df labour saved from immediate consumptiott? which is employed to maintain productive labourers, om to facilitate production. {See Political Economy.) In Commerce, and as applied to individuals, capital is un- derstood to mean the sum of money which a merchant embarks in any undertaking, or which he contributes to the common stock of a partnci'ship. CAPITA'TION. (Lat. caput, //eaaf.) A tax imposed on the population by the head ; e. g. on every one, or"" every male, every one above a certain age, &c. {See Poll- Tax.) In France, the ancient capitation is now replaced by personal and other direct contributions. CA'PITE. In Law, tenure in capite ( Ang. in chief) sig- nifies in the language of feudal law a direct holding of the king, the ultimate sovereign, without the intervention of any mesne lord. In England, tenants in capite were either by knight-flervice or socage ; which were converted into common socage by the act 12 Ch. II. c. 24., abolishing feudal tenures. CA'PITE CENSI. In Roman Antiquity, the lowest rank of Roman citizens ; so called because they were rather counted by their heads than by their estates. {Aul. Gell. lib.vii. cap. 13.) CAPI'TULA'TION. In its origiaal sense, a writing drawn up in several capitula or heads. In the language of Military Law, the articles of surrender, when a garrison or other force surrenders to an enemy on terms, and not at discretion. In Ecclesiastical History, articles sworn by bishops and other prelates on admission to their dig- nities were styled capitulations. So also was the oath tendered first to Charles V., and then to the emperors of Germany who succeeded hun, by the electors, termed the election capitulation (wahl capitulation). CA'PNOMA'NCY. {Or. xoc^tvog, smoke ; u.u)inia,, prophecy.) Divination by smoke was practised among the ancients, both by throwing on the fire seed of popny and other herbs, and observing the figures which might be fancied in the smoke ; and by observing the smoke of sacrifices. CA'PNOMOR. (Gr. xot-trve;, smoke, and fjtcieo; part.) An oily substance of a pungent and rather agreeable odour obtained from the tar of wood. CAPONNIE'RE. In Fortification, a passage leading from one work to another, protected on each side by a wall or parapet, generally of earth, sloping to the bottom of the ditch. When a passage is thus protected on one side only, it is called a demi-caponniere. CAPPA'RIDA'CEiE. (Capparis, one of the genera.) A natural order of Exogenous plants, consisting of an- nuals, perennials, bushes, and trees, inhabiting the warmer parts of the world. They have all a powerful pungent or even acrid taste, and have been in some cases used as substitutes for the common mustard ; in others they have proved severe poisons. In general their flowers are very beautiful, on account not only of their size, but of their ~ long silken stamens, which are often gaily coloured. The common caper-bush, a native of rocky places in the North of Europe, is a species of the genus Capparis, and CAPRELLA. yields the flower-buds which, pickled in vinegar, are sold in the shops as an agreeable sauce for various flishes. . , . CAPRE'LLA. A geaus pf Crustaceous animals be- longing to the order Lamodipoda, found commonly on sea-weed. Montague, who describes a species of this genus in the seventh volume of the Linncean Trans- actions, says the female differs in possessing several plates or valves beneath the body, situated between the two pairs of fins, the use of which is to carry and pro- tect its eggs or young ; at which time they extend very considerably, and form a kind of pouch distended with ova, fifteen or twenty of which are easily distinguished between the transparent plates. In this part a very strong pulsation is visible. While examining a female under a water-microscope, the author was surprised to observe not less than ten young ones crawl from the abdominal pouch of the parent, all perfectly formed, and moving with considerable agility over the body of the mother, holding fast by their hind claws and erecting their heads and arms. The characters of the genus, or rather family iCap)-eUid(e), are, body of narrow linear form ; eyes composite, and placed behind ; legs long and Blender, and variable in number, the last joint of the second pair being often toothed on the under side. CAPRE'OLUS. (The tendril of a vine.) The old botanical name of the tendril of a plant ; the term cirrhiis is now preferred. CAPRI'CCIO. {lihl. whim, fancy.) In Music, a term applied to certain pieces, wherein the composer gives way to his fancy, without confining himself to particular measures or keys ; called also Fantasia. CA'PRICO'RNS. (Lat.capricornus.) The name of one of the three divisions of Tetramerous beetles; including those which have the antennse filiform or setaceous, and generally exceeding the length of the body ; eyes lunate, and enclosing the base of the antennae ; jaws very robust, with short palpi ; thorax often spined at the sides ; the three basal joints of the tarsi dilated, and cushioned on the under surface ; the third deeply cleft at the ex- tremity, and receiving the minute ball at the base of the slender and long terminal joint. This division compre- hends four great families, — Prionidce, Ccrambycidce, La- miidis, and Lepturida: ; and corresponds very nearly with the Linnaean genera Cerambyx, Necydalis, and Lep. turn. The offices of the Capricorn beetles in the economy of nature is to restrain the excessive multiplication of vegetable species in the warmer climates of the globe. The larvae reside within the wood or beneath the bark of trees. CA'PRICCyRNUS. (Lat.) The Wild Goat. The tenth sign of the Zodiac, which the sun enters about the 21st of December, at the winter solstice. The parallel circle passing through the first point of this sign is called the Tropic of Capricorn. CA'PRIFO'LIA'CE^. (Caprifolium, one of the ge- nera.) A rather large natural order of plants, consisting of twining and erect shrubs, and herbaceous or woody plants, and even of trees, with simple or pinnated leaves, and flowers of most dissimilar forms, but all monope- talous. The most common plants belonging to this order are the woodbine, the St. Peter's wort, the Tartarian and fly honeysuckle, the numerous species of viburnum, and the elder-tree. These all agree with the natural order Cinchonacecs in most respects, except the absence of stipules at the base of the leaves. CAPRIFO'LIUM. (Lat. capra, a goat, and folium, a leaf.) Is the genus to which the wild honeysuckle (C.periclymenum) belongs. It consists of twining shrubs inhabiting the northern hemisphere exclusively, and in most cases having long tubular flowers of singular sweet- ness. Many species are known to botanists, the most interesting of which are those from the north of India, China, and Japan, the fragrance of which is superior to that of all others ; of these C. fiexuosum, now common in gardens, is the best. CA'PROIC ACID. (Lat. capra, a goat.) One of the acids formed during the saponification of butter ; it has a rank goat-like odour. CA'PROMYS. ( Gr. xata-f a? , a boar, and /mis, a tnouse.) The name of a genus of Rodent Mammalia, exclusively confined to the island of Cuba, where they go by the name of Houtias. They have four molars on each side of each jaw, in which the enamel is so folded as to form three angles on the outer margin and one on the inner, in the upper teeth ; the reverse in the lower teeth. The liver is re- markably subdivided in the rodents of this genus. CA'PROS. (Gr. xocfr^o;, a boar.) A name applied by Lacipede to a subgenus of Acanthopterygious fishes, which he separated from the dories {Zeus), and of which the boar fish {Zeus apcr, Linn.) may be regarded as the type- A specimen of this fish has been taken at Mount's Hay, and another near Bridgewater, but is rare as a Bri- tish species. CA'PSICUM, (GT.xxrrtu, I bite; from its pun- gency.) The berry or seed-vessel of different species 194 ^ ' CAR. of capsicum. The larger pods of the Capsicum annuum, and the smaller ones of the C. baccatum or bird pepper, when powdered, form the Kyan pepper of commerce, so well known as a powerful condiment, and often useful as a stimulating medicine. Kyan pepper is often grossly adulterated with common salt, and occasionally red lead and earthy powders are said to be added to it : it often has a disagreeable rancid odour, owing to its being sprinkled with oil to prevent its dust affecting those who powder and sift it. CA'PSTAN, sometimes called CAPSTERN. (Fr. cabestan.) A strong massive piece of timber, in the form of a cylinder or truncated cone, round which a rope is coiled ; and being turned by means of bai s or levers, it affords an advantageous mode of applying power to over- come an obstacle. The capstan is chiefly employed in ships, where it is used for weighing anchors, hoisting sails, &c. It IS generally placed vertically, the lower end being let down through the deck of the ship, and the levers inserted in holes in-the head or top; so that the force of the men can be exerted continuously, and that there may be no necessity for removing the levers from one hole to another, as is the case when it is placed horizon- tally. The power of the capstan may be greatly increased by adapting an arrangement of wheel work to it — an im- provement which has been adopted for several years past m the royal navy. CA'PSULA. (Dim. of capsa, a box.) This word is generally applied by botanists to all dry fruits which are dehiscent, whether they are many-seeded or few-seeded, simple or compound ; and in such cases some expletive is added to indicate the particular nature of the fruit. Thus Capsula circicmscissa is cut round by a circular line dividing it into two parts ; C. siliquiformis is long and taper, like the pod of a mustard-plant ; C. baccata is when the pericarp is succulent ; C. tricoccea, when a dry capsule bursts into three separate closed pieces. Some- times, for specifrt carpological purposes, the word cap- sula is limited in its application to such dry compound fruits as open by valves, and have an indefinite number of seeds ; as in Digitalis, Scrophularia, the common lilac, xtv»s, a cancer.) A can- cerous tumour. CA'RD AMOMS. Seeds of the Alpinia cardamomum. These seeds are imported from Bengal : there are several varieties ;but those pods which are small, short and thick, and heavy, are preferred. The seeds themselves are very pungent and aromatic ; the containing capsule is quite msipid. Their chief use is in medicine, especially in combination with cathartics and bitters. They yield an essential oil by distillation, to which their virtues are to be ascribed. CA'RDIAC. {GT.xctihKt, the heart.) Belonging to or connected with the heart. The superior opening of the stomach is called the cardia, or cardiac end, from its proximity to the heart. CA'RDIA'CEANS.orCARDIACEA. (Lat. cardium, 19C CARINARIA. a cockle.) A numerous and beautiful family of Lamelli- branchiate Dimiary Bivalve Mollusks, including those species in which the mantle is open anteriorly for the foot ; and also has two distinct orifices, one for respiration, the other for excretion, as in the cockle ( Cardium edule). The shell is characterized by having at the hinge irregular primary teeth, both in form and situation, and generally accompanied by one or two lateral teeth. The genera composing this tamily are Isocardia,Hiatella,Cypricardia, Cardita, Cardium. CARDIA'LGIA. (Gr. xet^ltec, and «Xy»;, pain.) Anxiety and pain about the region of the stomach, fre- quently attended by a sense of gnawing and heat, and hence called heartburn. It is a common symptom of indigestion, and accompanied by salt and acid eructations. After excess in eating and drinking, a fit of heartburn may often be prevented by a teaspoonful of carbonate of magnesia, taken in cinnamon or in soda water, at bed time ; 20 or 30 grains of bicarbonate of soda in cold chamomile tea is also an eftective preventive. M'here the disease is symptomatic of organic mischief, these antacid remedies must be cautiously administered. CA'RDINAL. (Lat. cardo, a hinge.) An epithet implying importance ; in which sense it is applied to the principal virtues, the four points of the compass, &c. ; and in theological language originally to parish churches, as distinguished from chapels and oratories ; from whence it was transferred to the clergy who ministered in such churches. In later times the epithet was restricted to the seven bishops of Rome, and the sees within its ter- ritory, and the clergy of the eight and twenty principal churches of that city : from whence the college of cardinals takes its origin. The number of which this college consisted has varied in the course of time. It has for some centuries been limited to seventy ; of whom six are bishops, fifty presbyters, and fourteen deacons ; and the election of the pope, which is performed by these personages assembled in conclave, is thus concurred in by the three orders of clergy through their representa- tives. The period at which this election was confined to the cardinals is variously stated. Some have asserted that such was the case as early as 1058 ; others not before 1562. It is now understood that the pope must be chosen from among this body. The cardinals are distinguished by a scarlet hat, and a short purple mantle worn over the rochet. Their rank is next to that of the pope, to whom they form a political and ecclesiastical council. For fur- ther details on the duties of cardinals, see Consistorium and Conclave. CA'RDINAL POINTS. (Lat. cardo, a hinge.) In Geography, the east, west, south, and north points of the horizon. In Astrology, the cardinal points are those of the rising and setting of the sun, and the zenith and nadir. (Compass.) CA'RDIOID. (Gr. ssa^.'^/a, heart, and ulci,form.) An algebraic curve, so called from its resemblance to a heart. CARDI'TIS, Inflammation of the heart. CARDOO'N. A kind of artichoke. The Cynara cardunculus. CARDUE'LIS. (Lat. carduus, a thistle.) A genus of Conirostral Perchers (Insessores) or Passerine birds, of the finch tribe {Fringillida:), including the goldfinch ( Car- dueliselegans), aberdevine (Carduelis spinus), and other British siskins, the habits of which are less arboreal than in the true finches, and which feed principally on the seeds of the thistle and other composite plants. CAREE'NING. The laj-ing of a ship over to get at leaks or injuries in the bottom. This is commonly called heaving down. To careen implies also to heel or lie over generally. Heaving down is never practised with a large ship, except where there are no docks, as the great forces which must be applied to the mast heads to get her over are liable to strain the hull. CA'RET. (Ij&t. careo, I am wanting.) In Grammar, a character in this form a, denoting that something has been omitted, and is interlined. CARIA'MA. See Dicholophus. CA'RICATU'RE. (It. caricare, to load or charge.) In Painting, an exaggerated representation of any object, in which any natural defects are overcharged, so as to make it appear ridiculous. CARI'CHIUM. (h&t.carex, sedge.) A genus of land- snails, so called from their habitat among sedge, wet leaves, grass, &c. Of these sedge-shells, Carichium mini- mum is British, and may be found about Acton. CA'RIES. A decayed bone or tooth. CARI'LLON. A tune performed upon bells. CARI'NA. (Lat. carina, the keel qf a boat.) In Botanical language, is the sharp thin bark of any organ ; the back of a leaf folded up if thin and sharp, the winged rim that occupies the back of certain fruits, the sliarp- backed part of a glume or bract, all bear this name. It is also applied to the two anterior petals of a Papilionaceous flower, which adhere by their lower edges into a body something like a boat. CARINA'RIA. (Lat. carina, a keel.) A genus of CARINATE. Heteropodous MoUusks, characterized by having the viscera, as the heart, liver, branchiae, generative organs, &c., protruded from the body, and encased in an extremely fragile, beautiful, sub-transparent, symmetrical, com- pressed shell. The summitofthe shell is slightly involuted, but never enters the aperture ; the convexity of the shell is terminated by a single keel. CA'RINATE. {hat. carina, a keel.) In Zoology, when a surface has a longitudinal elevated line, like the keel of CA'RMELITE. See Orders, Mendicant. CA'RMINE. A brilliant lake, made of the colouring matter of the cochineal insect combined with alumina and a little oxide of tin. CA'RMINATIVE. (Lat. carmen, a verse or charm.) Medicines which allay flatulency, and pain of the stomach and bowels arising from it. , CARNA'TION., (Lat. carneus, /lesh-coloured.) A favourite florist's plant, obtained by art from the wild Dianthus caryophyllus. Its flowers are deliciously fra- grant ; and although in the unimproved state they are a uniform deep red, they have been rendered beautifully striped and variegated by successive changes in the hands of the gardener. The most succesful cultivators of car- nations are the Germans, who possess some hundred varieties, and supply the principal part of the seed used in other parts of Europe. These varieties are arranged in three classes, ^aAcs, bixarres, and piccotees : the first have ten colours in their flowers, and broad stripes ; the second have irregular spots and stripes, and not fewer than three colours ; the last are spotted or dotted with scarlet, red, purple, &c., upon a white or yellow ground. CARNA'TION-GRASS. (Lat. caro, fleth.) Any coarse species of carex is so named in the north of Eng- land and Scotland. CARNA'TIONS. (Lat. caro, ;f^sA.) In Painting, the parts of a picture which represent the naked limbs, &c. CARNE'lA. {Gr.xK^vu/x..) A festival observed in most of the cities of Greece, and especially at Sparta, in honour of Apollo, surnamed Carneius. The festival ' lasted nine days, and was conducted in imitation of the method of livmg in camps ; for nine tents were erected, in each of which nine men of three different tribes lived nine days. CARNE'LIAN. A red or flesh-coloured calcedony. The finest specimens come from India, and are in great request for seal-stones, beads, &c . CAR'NEONS. (Lat. caro,flesh.) A soft fleshy sub- stance. CA'RNIVAL. (Lat. carni vale, farewell to meat.) A festival celebrated with much merriment and revelry in Catholic countries, and especially at Rome and Venice, during the week before the commencement of Lent ; deriving its Italian name from the farewell to flesh or meat which introduces the great fast of the church. CARNrVORA. (Lat. caro, flesh^ndiy or o, I devour.) The second tribe of Cuvier's order FercB {Carnassiers), including those species of which the teeth are peculiarly adapted for destroying living prey, and for tearing, dividing, or bruising flesh. They have incisors in each jaw, two long and pointed canines ; and the molars are never beset with small conical points or tubercles, as in the insectivorous tribe of the same order. The carnivo- rous tribe is divided into those which tread on the sole of the foot {Plantigrades), and those which run on the last joints of the toes {Digitigrades) . CAROCO'LLA. (Lat. caro,fiesh ; and Gr. xo\\vi,glue.) A genus of land-snails, so named from the tenacity with which their fleshy foot adheres to limestone rocks. The variegated carocoUa {Car.lapicida, Lam.) is a native species, and has been found on Juniper Hill, Box Hill, Surrey. CA'ROMEL. Sugar melted till it acquires a brown colour and exhales a peculiar odour. CARO'TID. An artery of the neck. There is one on each side of the cervical vertebrae which supply the head with blood. If these vessels are tied, the animal becomes insensible ; hence the term, from )ca.^cai, I put to sleep. CARP. See Cyprinus. CA'RPADE'LIUM. {Gr. xoc^^og, fruit, and S^Xo,-, plain.) A little-used name, applied in botany to all indehiscent, many-celled, inferior fruits, with a single seed in each cell ; as in Umbelliferous or Apiaceous plants. CA'RPEL. {Gr. xotfiTos, fruit.) A name contrived by modern botanists to denote the separate pistils out of which a fruit, consisting of more pistils than one, is com- posed. In its most simple state a fruit consists of a one- celled ovary, and a style and stigma, united into a pistil, as in the plum ; but in most cases several such pistils are formed within the same flower, and are united in various ways into one compound body, to which the name of pistil is also applied. In the latter case the single pistils are called carpels. The pistil may nevertheless consist of one carpel only. The theory of the structure of the fruit of plants turns upon the relative position which carpels bear to each other in their united state ; and upon their 197 CARTESIAN PHILOSOPHY. correspondence in this respect with leaves, of which they are undoubtedly modifications. CA'RPENTER. The third warrant oflicer on board a man of war. He has the charge of the boats. It is his duty, with his mates, to attend constantly to the state of the well, in order that a leak may be immediately re- ported. CA'RPENTRY. (Lat. carpentum, carwed wood.) In Building and Architecture, an assemblage of pieces of timber connected by framing or letting them into each other, as are the pieces of a roof, floor, centre, &c. It is distinguished from joinery by being put together with- out the use of other edge ^tools than the axe, adzo, saw, and chisel ; whereas joinery requires the use of the plane. Tlie leading points to be attended to in sound carpentry are, 1st, The quality of the timber used ; 2nd, The disposition of the pieces of timber, so that each may be in such direction, considered with reference to the fibres of the wood, as to be most capable of performing its ofiice properly ; 3rd, The forms and dimensions of the pieces ; 4tn, Ihe manner of framing the pieces into each other, or otherwise uniting them by means of iron or other metal. CA'RPET. An ornamental covering for the floor. The manufacture of carpets is carried on in great per- fection in this country. The principal varieties are the Brussels, Axminster, Wilton, Kidderminster, and \'e- netian. They are generally composed of linen and worsted. In some the pile is cut so as to give the carpet the character of velvet ; as in the W ilton carpets. Kidder- minster or Scotch carpets are entirely fabricated of wool. CA'RPET WAY. Any strip or border of green sward left round the margin of a ploughed field. CA'RPOBA'LSAMUM. (Gr.^ac^jre?, fruit, and jSocX- g-oc.fjt,w, balsam.) The exudation of the fruit of the Amysis Gileadensis ; a variety of balm of Gilead. CA'RPOLITES. (Gr.»«{!re?,yj-Miif, and Xidog, astone.) Fossil fruits and seeds. , CARPO'PHORUM. {Gr. xx^re?, fruit, a\\d(f^a>, I bear.) The name of the central column, which, in the fruit of the Geranium, the Euphorbia, or Apiaceous plants, bears the ripe carpels, and holds them together when they attempt to separate at maturity. C A'RREL, or QUARREL. The arrow used in cross- bows, the head of which was four-sided ; a cross-bow bolt. CA'RRONADE. A kind of short iron gun, which is attached to its carriage by a joint and bolt underneath the piece, instead of trunnions. It is only in this respect and in its dimensions that it differs from other guns or howitzers. The name is derived from Carron, a village in Stirlingshire, where this gun was first made. CARSE LAND. Alluvial soil in a state of aration. CART. An open box, placed upon two or more wheels, and constructed with shafts, so as to admit of being drawn by one or more horses. In agriculture, carts are used for carting or carrying from one point to another soils,jnanures, and produce. For this purpose there are the close cart, single or double, that is, for one or for two horses ; the corn cart, single or double, con- structed of open work, and used for carrying hay, and for conveying corn in the sheaf from the field to the rickyard, &c. ; and the stone or quarry cart, consisting of a strong bottom and low wheels, for conveying large stones. Be- sides these, there are the three-wheeled cart, with low wheels, for carting soil, stones, &c., to a short distance ; the timber cart, which is nothing more than two pairs of wheels and axles joined by a pole, and used for conveying large trunks of trees from the place where they have been felled to the place where they are to be manufactured ; and the box cart, or cart with close bottom and sides, which is used for conveying soils, manure, and small articles, commonly constructed so as to admit of* discharg- ing the load by elevating one end of the box and lowering the other ; and to carts having this contrivance the term coup cart is applied in Scotland, and till cart in England. CARTK BLANCHE. (Fr.) A paper containing no- thing but the signature of the party who grants it, in order that the party to whom it has been delivered T(\ay insert such conditions as he chooses to prescribe. This term is used in a general sense to express an unlimited au- thority delegated by one individual to another : thus a general is said to have carte blanche, when his sovereign has granted him permission to use his own discretion in conducting the operations of war. CA'RTEL. In Military language, an agreement for the exchange of prisoners. Also, a challenge to fight a duel. A cartel ship is one commissioned, in time of war, to carry proposals of any kind between belligerent powers , CARTE'SIAN PHILOSOPHY. The philosophical system of Rene des Cartes (born 1596), anative of France, perhaps the most original thinker that country has produced. Des Cartes was the contemporary of Bacon, and exercised an equally powerful influence, though in a manner widely different, on the progress of philosophy in Europe. Both equally undertook the task of demolishing the old scholastic system, and of substituting in its place a more comprehensive method and a more living O 3 CARTHAMUS. spirit of philosophising. But what Bacon strove to ac- complish by calling men's attention to experiment and observation of nature, Des Cartes proposed to attain by the search for a first and self-evident ground of all knowledge. This he finds in the art of consciousness, involving necessarily the idea of self or mind. ( Cogito ergo sum.} Consciousness is the act of thought, constitutes the essence of the soul, and is that which distinguishes it from matter. The ideas or objects of consciousness are of three kinds,— acquired, compounded, and innate. Of the last sort is the idea of God, or the Absolute Being, which, as being the ground of all reality, is itself its own demonstration. God, the Author of theuniverse, upholds it in its course by his perpetual co-operation, or, in Carte- sian language, assistance. All physical phenomena Des Cartes endeavoured to account for by his celebrated vortices —motions excited by God, the source of all mo- tion. The singular mixture of philosophical depth and ex- travagant hypothesis that prevails in the writings of this philosopher obtained for him, as might have been ex- pected, a large number of warm adherents, and of equally violent opponents. Among the former may be enume- rated the celebrated Pascal, Malebranche, and Spinoza. The two latter deviated indeed in many important points from the views of^es Cartes ; but the main features of his philosophy are preserved alike in the religious mys- ticism of the one and the systematic pantheism of the other. CA'RTHAMUS. See Saffi.ower. CARTHU'SIANS. In Ecclesiastical History, a re- ligious order, instituted by St. Bruno in 1086 : so called from their original seat. Chartreuse. They followed the rule of the Benedictines (quod vide), with the addition of various austerities, and employed themselves in the same literary and mechanical pursuits. Soon after their institution the Carthusians were introduced into England, where in the lapse of time they succeeded in establishing nine houses of their order, among which was the Charter- house in London. ( See Histoire des Ordres Monastiques, ^"cA'RTILAGE, CARTILAGO. (Lat. caxo, flesh.) A white elastic substance, intermediate between bone and ligament, and having the chemical properties of condensed albumen. It is commonly called gristle. CARTILAGI'NEANS, CARTILAGINEI. A sub- class of fishes, in which the endo-skeleton never passes beyond the primitive condition of gristle or cartilage. See Chondropterygii. CARTOO'N. (It. cartone.) In Painting, a sketch made as a pattern for tapestry. The name is also given to large sketches on coarse or other paper for fresco sub- jects ; in which case, when the stucco is setting the out- lines are pricked through on to it so that a correct outline may be expeditiously obtained. We subjoin the following account of the cartoons of Raffaelle at Hampton Court. — These celebrated works, originally thirteen in number, are a magnificent series of coloured designs, re- presenting the origin, sanction, economy, and progress of the Christian religion. They were made originally for the copies in tapestry, still, we believe, annually exhibited in the colonnade of the Vatican, wrought at Arras by command of Leo X. at an expense of 7000 crowns of gold. These were carried off at the plundering of Rome in 1527 by the Spanish army ; but Montmorenci, the French general, found and restored them to their former station. In our own days they were again carried off when the French seized the government of Rome, and were after- wards purchased by that excellent pontiff Pius VII. Seven of the original pictures were purchased by Charles the First, and are now preserved at the royal pa- lace at Hampton Court. Richardson ( Theory of Painting) gives an historical and critical description of them, and considers them better calculated to convey a true notion of the genius of Raffaelle than even the loggia of the Vatican. The object that Charles had in view when he purchased the seven cartoons above mentioned, was to supply the manufacture then at Mortlake with subjects of a higher character than Francis Cleyre, its superintendant, could himself invent ; and there is evidence that some of them were actually copied there, and that they are still preserved, probably at Petworth* In whatever light, say? Fuseli, we consider their in- vention — as parts of one whole relative, to each other, or independent each of the rest and as single subjects,— there can be scarcely named a beauty or a mystery of which the cartoons furnish not an instance or a clue. They are poised between perspicuity and pregnancy of moment : the Death of Ananias, the Sacrifice at Lystra, Paul on the Areopagus, will furnish us with conclusions for the remainder. In Paul announcing his God from the height of the Areopagus, the same sagacious critic observes that enthusiasm and curiosity make up the subject. Sim- plicity of attitude invests the speaker with sublimity; t^e parallelism of his action invigorates his energy ; situation gives him command over the whole ; the light in which he is placed attracts the first glance ; he appears the organ of a superior power. The assembly, though selected CARYATIDES. with characteristic art for the purpose, are the natuial offspring of the place and moment. The involved me- ditation of the Stoic, the Cynic's ironic sneel", the incredu- lous smile of the elegant Epicurean, the eager disputants of. the academy, the elevated attention of Plato's school, the rankling malice of the Rabbi, the magician's myste- rious glance, repeat in louder or in lower tones the novel doctrine ; but whilst curiosity and meditation, loud de- bate and fixed prejudice, tell, ponder on, repeat, reject, discuss it, the animated gesture of Dionysius and Damaris announce the power of its tenets, and — what the artist chiefly aimed at — the established belief of immortality. We have selected the above as a specimen of the critical examination which the reader may apply to the remaining six of this extraordinary series of pictures, in which the power of combining the drama with pure historic fact has never been surpassed. The cartoons have been several times engraved ; first , byGribelin in the reign of Queen Anne ; then by Dorigny; and afterwards by inferior aitists, most probably from the engravings themselves of those that preceded them. They were likewise engraved on a small scale by F^ittler, and more recently in a superior style by Holloway. The late Prince Hoare, Esq., secretary for foreign correspond- ence to the Royal Academy, was possessed of a very fine cartoon by Raffaelle, the subject of which was the Murder of the Innocents. CARTOU'CH. (It. cartoccio.) In Architecture, the same as modillion (which see), except that this term is used almost exclusively to signify the blocks or modillions applied at the eaves of a house. Some have used the term to denote the ornament of the key-stone of an arch, which seems to represent a scroll of paper partly unrolled. CARTOU'CHE. A Military term, signifying a strong case or box for holding balls. CA'RTRIDGE. A case of paperor pasteboard holding the exact charge of a firearm. Those of cannon and mortars are sometimes of tin or wood, but most frequently flannel, bags of this material being found the most con- venient. CARU'NCLE. (Dim. of caro, Hesh.) A naked soft fleshy excrescence, often ornamenting some parts of the head of birds ; as, e.g. the caruncle on the cere of the king vulture {Vultur papa, Lin.). CARU'NCULA. (Dim. of caro, flesh ; a little piece of flesh.) A small protuberance found near the hilum upon the seed of Euphorbia lathyris and other plants. CA'RYA. {Gt. }td.^vo)),anui.) The genus of plants which includes the hickory nut of North America ; a tree of the greatest value, for its tough elastic wood, as well as for the puts, which resemble walnuts, except that their shell is not furrowed, and which are much eaten and pressed for their oil in their native country. There are several species of Carya ; but C. alba, the white hickory, a hardy ornamental tree in this country, is the most valuable. CARYA'TIDES. (Gr. »«gi;«, a nut tree.) In Archi- tecture, figures used instead of columns to support an entablature. The origin of them, according to Vitruvius, is as fol- lows — " Carya, acity of Pelopon- nesus, took part with the Per- 2 sians against the Grecian states. When the country was freed from its invaders, the Greeks turned their arms against the Caryans, and upon the capture of the city put the males to the sword, and led the women into captivity. The architects of that time, for the purpose of perpetuating the ignominy of this people, instead of columns in the porticos of their buildings, substituted statues of these women, faithfully copying their ornaments, and the drapery with which they were attired ; the mode of which they were not permitted to change." The writer of th« articles on art in this work was the first author on architecture who endeavoured to show the want of truth in this account, and that on two grounds: — first, because the circumstance is not mentioned by any of the Greek historians ; and secondly, because long previous to the time assigned by Vitruvius, figures of men, women, and animals were em- ployed for this purpose. They appear to have acquired their name from their emploj-ment in temples to Diana, by whom the Lacedsemonians are supposed to have been made acquainted with the story of Carya, turned into anut tree by Bacchus, who at the same time transformed her sisters into stones, and thence worshipped under the name of Caryatis. From their employment in temples dedicated tothe goddess, they were used in other buildings as representations of the nymphs who assisted at the mys- teries of the patron goddess. The figure No. 1 . above given is a Caryatid, from the Pandroseum at Athens ; No. 2. is a Canephora (sec that word). When figures of the male sex are used they are called Persians. « CARYOCAIl. CARYO'CAR. {Gr. xoc^utv, a hard-shelled fruit.) A gonus of trees inhabiting the forests of tropical America, especitUy Guayana ; one of them, found m woods near Mariquita, is said to attain the height of 240 feet. The Saouari (vulgarly called Sawarrow) nuts of the shops, a delicious fruit, with a large soft buttery kernel, are the seeds of Caryocar glabrmn and other species. Pro- perly the name Saouari applies to Caryocar butryosum, CA'RYOPHY'LLIA. See Madrepore. CA'RYOPHYLLA'CEOUS (Lat. caryophyllus, ^Ae garden pink), is sometimes said of corollas consisting of petals having long claws dilating into a broad limb, as in the garden pink. CA'KYO'PSIS. (Gr. xx^vtv, a nut, and o^i;, resem- blance.) The technical name of the grain of com. It is an indehiscent one-celled fruit, with a membranous peri- carp adhering firmly to the seed. CASCARl'LLA. (Span. dim. of cascara, bark.) a^he bark of the Croton eleutheria, imported for medical use from Jamaica and the Bahama Islands. It is bitter and aromatic, and when burned it diffuses an odour much resembling that of musk. CASE. (Lat. casus ; from cado, I fall.) In Grammar, that modification of a noun which designates the relation in which a substance is conceived to exist in regard to some other substance. This end is commonly attained in language by changes in the termination of nouns. In English there are but three cases ; the nominative, the genitive or possessive, and the accusative or objective case ; the last only in pronouns. All other varieties of relation are expressed by prepositions. See Grammar. Case. (Fr. casse.) Is the receptacle for the types, from which the compositor gathers them separately, and arranges them in lines and pages to print from. They are always in pairs ; one of which is styled the upper case, and is divided into ninety-eight boxes or recesses of equal size, in which are deposited the capitals, small capitals, accented letters, figures, &c. ; the other is styled the lower case, and is divided into fifty-three boxes or recesses of unequal size, containing the small letters, spaces, &c., the letters most in use having the largest boxes assigned to them. The cases are two feet nine inches long, one foot four inches and a half broad, and a full inch in depth. CA'SEICACID. A peculiar acid extracted from cheese. CA'SEMATE. In Fortificafion, a vault or arch of stonework in the flank of a bastion, serving as a battery. CA'SEMENT. (It.casamento.) In Architecture, a portion of a window sash hung on hinges. It is used also to denote the moulding called a scdia, which see. CASE'RNS, or C AZERNS. Huts erected on the ram- parts, or between the ramparts and the houses, of fortified towns, serving as temporary lodgings for the soldiers on duty. CASE-SHOT, or CANISTER-SHOT, signifies mus- ket balls, stones, pieces of iron, &c. put into cases or tin canisters, and discharged from pieces of ordnance. CA'SEUM. (Lat.) The basis of chease. The purified curd of milk. CASH. In Commerce, the ready money, bills, drafts, bonds, and all immediately negotiable paper in an indi- vidual's possession. CASSAMU'NAR. A root brought from the East Indies, and formerly used in medicine as a warm bitter. CASSA'TION, COURT OF. The highest judicial institution in France ; so termed from possessing the power to quash (casser) the decrees of inferior courts. It is a court of appeal in criminal as well as civil cases. The tribunal of cassation was first introduced, as a court wholly independent of the king and his council, in 1790. This court has a president, and threepresidents of sections ; but the minister of justice, as keeper of the seals {garde des sceaux), has the right of presiding in cases where it sits on appeal from the cours royales. The three sections are, — 1 . Des requetes, which decides on the admissibility of petitions of appeal in civil cases ; 2. De cassation civile ; 3. De cassation criminelle. The decision of the court of cassation has the effect of sending back the case to the inferior courts. If, after a decision has been reversed, a second court decides the same case in the same way, on appeal being entered again the court of cassation must either repeat its reversal by the unanimous consent of all the three sections, or it must request an authentic explan- ation of the law from the government ; and, after a third conflicting decision, such authentic explanation becomes absolutely necessary. The inferior judges of the three sections of the court of cassation are styled counsellors. CASSA'VA. A species of starch obtained from the roots of the Jatropha manihot. CA'SSIA. (From the Arabic.) The bark of the Laurus cassia ; its flavour somewhat resembles that of cinnamon, and it yields an essential oil, which is pungent and stimulant. CASSl'DEOUS. (Lat. cassis, a Ae/we^) When the upper petal of a flower is dilated into a broad helmet- shaped leaf, as in the genus Aconitum. CASS I'D ID^. (Lat. cassis, a helmet.) A family of 199 CASTE. Tetramerous Coleopterans, generally known by the name of tortoise-beetles, distinguished by having straight short filiform antenna;, inserted close together in the upper surface of the head ; mouth situated on the under surface of the head, with strong and broad mandibles ; legs short, with the tarsi flattened, the third joint deeply cleft, re- ceiving between its lobes the terminal joint,- margins of the thorax and elytra much dilated, so as to give the insects the appearance of small tortoises The larva of the CassididcB is remarkable for an apparatus, or anal fork, by which it collects and forms of its excrements a kind of parachute, or defensive covering. The genera oiCassididce are, Alurmis, Hispa, Chalepus, Inuitidium, and Cassida ; the latter is the only indigenous genus, and of this the most common example is the Cassida equestria of Fabricius. CA'SSIOPE'IA. One of the constellations of the northern hemisphere. CA'SSIS. (Lat.) A genusof GastropodousMollusks, separated by Lamarck from the Linnsean genusBuccinum, and including the species of which the shells are com- monly called " helmets." The nacreous or inner layer of these shells are exquisitely sculptured by Italian artists in imitation of antique cameos ; the dififerent coloured strata resembling the onyx and other precious stones. CA'SSIUS, PURPLE OF. So called from its inven- tor. A beautiful purple used in porcelain painting, and for staining glass. It is formed by immersing tin in a solution of gold. It is probably a mixture of oxide of tin and finely divided gold. CA'SSOWARY. (Casuarius, from the Malay word cassuwaris.) A genus of Coursers or Struthious birds, inhabiting the island of Java, in which the wings are shorter than in the ostrich, and are armed with strong spines, for the purpose of combat or defence. The head is surmounted by a bony protuberance covered with horn. CASSYTHA'CEiE. (Cassytha, the only genus.) A most singular natural order of plants, having the fructi- fication of Lauracece, and the manner of growth and general appearance of a Rhipsalis, or rather a Cuscuta. They inhabit the tropical parts of the world. CAST. In Sculpture. See Moulding. CASTA'NEA. (Castana,a city of Thessaly.) A genus of trees or shrubs, related to the oak, and producing for fruit the seed-like nuts called chesnuts in this coun- try. The common Spanish chesnuts, of which upwards of 20,000 bushels are apnually imported from the south of Europe, are the fruit of C. vesca ; a much smaller nut is obtained in North America from the C. pumila, or the Chinquapin chesnut. The timber of the common Spa- nish chesnut is good and durable, more so than that of the oak, when the latter is young ; but it is a mistake to suppose that the ancient roofs and beams occasionally found in buildings of the Norman era, and which car- penters call chesnut, are the wood of this tree. Such instances all belong to the kind of oak called Quercus sessilifiora. The genus Castanea differs from Quercus, among other things, in having the nuts enclosed in a spiny closed-up cup, instead of a shallow open one ; but in the East Indies, where both oaks and chesnuts assume very remarkable forms, the two approach each other sometimes so nearly in this particular, that it is difficult to distin- guish them. CA'STANETS. (Fr. castagnettes.) Small wooden or ivory musical instruments, played by being tied to the fingers, and thus rattled by dancers to the time of the music of the dance. They are chiefly used in Spain. CASTE. A term borrowed from the Portuguese settlers in India, which is used to denote the hereditary classes into which the population of Hindoostan is divided, according to the religious law of Braraa. The origin of these classes is detailed in the sacred book which contains the ordinances of Menu. According to this authority, the Brahmin, the Cshatriya, the Vaisya, and the Sudra sprang respectively from the mouth, the arm, the thigh, and the foot of Brahma. 1. The class of Brahmins, or priests, whose name signifies scripture, are far exalted above the rest in honour and privilege, and should be de- voted entirely to prayer and meditation, or at least to the most exalted concerns of life. Many Brahmins, however, do in fact engage in secular pursuits, not only as ministers of sovereign princes (an office for which, according to the ordinances above cited, they are indeed peculiarly fitted), but also, in Guzerat and other parts of Western India, as merchants, or in the lower employment of messengers and porters ; while many enter the Com- pany's service as private soldiers. These, however, are Brahmins of the first and second classes (Brachmachari and Grihast'ha), youths or married men who as yet live in the world ; from which the two higher classes, Vana- prastha and Sunnyassi, are wholly divorced : from these spring the various orders of fanatics with which India swarms. 2. The Kshatriya, or soldier caste, whose name indicates protection. To this belong not only the high military classes, but in some parts of India whole, tribes, as the Seikhs, &c. 3. The Vaisya, or commercial class {wealth). 4. The Sudra, or caste of tillers of the soil O 4 CASTELLATED. labour). These are deeply degraded below not only the Brahmins, but. the other two castes ; and even the reading of the Vedas or sacred books is forbidden to them. Be- sides these four grand divisions, the Hindoos have many subdivisions of caste, and no fewer than thirty-six are reckoned which are all inferior to the Sudra. These descend, according to the mythological history of the Hindoos, from the " Burren Sunker " or mixed class, pro- ceeding from the confusion of castes which took place under the reign of a wicked and irreligious monarch. Finally, tlie Pariahs and some other races are considered as having no caste at all, and mere outcasts from human- ity: Traces of the system of caste, which confines em- ployments to hereditary classes, are to be found in the institutions of many countries, and in the history of many more. That the Egyptian nation was thus divided, is well known ; and it is supposed that similar institutions prevailed in the ancient Assyrian empires. If Plato can be relied on as an authority, the Athenians in the first ages of their commonwealth were divided into five classes of the same description — priests, handicraftsmen, shep- herds and hunters, ploughmen, soldiers. And it is said that the Cretans were divided, according to the laws of Minos, in the same n^anner as the Egyptians. CA'STELLATED. (Lat. castellum, a castle.) In Architecture, a building in the style of a castle. CA'STING. (Dan. kaster, to throw.) In Archi- tecture, a term used to denote the bending of the surfaces of a piece of wood from their original state, caused either by the gravity of the material, or by its being subject to unequal temperature, moisture, or the uuuniform texture of the material. Called also Warping. Casting. In Foundery, the running of liquid metal Into a mould prepared for that purpose. See Foundery. CA'STING OF DRAPERIES. In Painting, the dis- position of the folds of the garments wherewith the figures in a picture are clothed. Carlo Maratti thought that the disposition of drapery was a more difficult art than even that of drawing the human figure, and that a student might be more easily taught the latter than the former. Inferior painters enter into the minute discriminations of quality in drapery ; but, as Sir Joshua Reynolds has well observed in his Fourth Discourse, with the historical painter " the clothing is neither woollen nor linen, nor silk, satin, nor velvet : it is drapery ; it is nothing more." CA'STING OFF COPY. In Printing, is to ascertain accurately how many pages in print a given quantity of manuscript copy will make ; or how many pages a given quantity of printed copy will make when the size of the book and the type are changed ; also when a given quantity of manuscript copy is delivered, with directions that it is to make a certain number of pages in print, to determine the size of the page and the size of the type. This is usually done by composing a line or two of the copy, when, sup- posing a line and a half of it makes a line of print, it becomes a mere arithmetical question. Supposing there are 1 2,000 lines of copy, it will make 8,000 lines in print, which, at 24 lines to a page, will be 333 pages, and with the title, short pages, &c. equal 14 sheets in 12mo. ; about the general quantity in a volume of modern novels. CA'STLE. (Lat. castellum; or Sax. cartel-) In Architecture, a building fortified for military defence ; also a house with towers, usually encompassed with walls and moats, and having a donjon or keep in the centre. The principal castles of England at present are, the Tower of London, Dover, Windsor, Norwich, &c. ; but at one time those of Harwood, SpofTord, Kenilworth, Warwick, Arundel, and others might have vied with them in importance. The characteristics of a castle are its valla (embankments) and fossae (ditches) ; from the former of which the walls rise, usually crowned by battle- ments, and flanked by circular or polygonal bastions at the angles formed by the walls ; these latter were pierced for gates with fixed or draw bridges and towers on each side ; the gates, which were of considerable strength, were further guarded by descending gratings, called port- cullises ; all the apertures were as small as they could be made, consistently with internal lighting. The com- ponent parts of a castle were, the foss or mote, with its bridge ; the barbican, which was in advance of the castle, being a raised mound or tower, the outer walls having terraces towards the castle, with their bastions, as above mentioned; the gate-house, flanked by towers, and crowned with projections, called machicolations, through which heavy materials br molten lead were dropt on the assailants entering the gateway ; the outer ballium, or area within the castle, which was separated from the inner ballium by an embattled wall with a gate-house, and in which the stables and bther offices usually stood ; and the inner ballium, for the residence Of the owner or governor and his retinue ; this, at one corner, or in the centre, had a donjon or keep tower, which was the strong hold of the place, wherein was a state apartment ; a well and a chapel ; the former usually , and the latter frequently, are founn in ancient castles. For further information on the subject the reader is referred to King's Mun. Antiq. fol. 4 vols ; the Arclueo- 200 CATALEPSY. logia in several places ; Leland's Collect, vol. ii. ; Wool- noth's Ancient Castles of England and JVales, &c. &c. CA'STOR. The generic name of the beaver. {Castor fiber, Linn.) Ca'stor. a peculiar concrete substance, contained in oval pouches situated near the anus of the Castor fiber or beaver. There are four of these pouches ; two contain a species of fat ; while the two larger ones include in their membranous cells a viscid fetid substance, which is the castor of the Materia Medica. It is imported from Russia, Prussia, and Poland, and from Canada : the latter, known in trade under the name of 'New England cantor, is very inferior. It is said to be an antispasmodic. CA'STOR AND PO'LLUX. The name given to a meteor which sometimes appears at sea, attached to the extremities of the masts of ships under the form of balls of fire. When one ball only is seen, it is called Helena. The meteor is generally supposed to indicate the ces- sation of a storm, or a future calm ; but Helena, or one ball only, to portend bad weather. CA'SUA'RINA'CEiE. (Casuarina, one of the genera.) A curious natural order of plants, inhabiting New Holland, some parts of India, and the South Sea Islands, with long slender creeping branches,resembling those of Equisetum, and bearing scales only in the place of leaves. The order is nearly allied to Myricancece, and belongs to the most im- perfect forms of Exogenous vegetation. CA'SUIST, CA'SUISTRY. In Theology, a ca- suist is a doctor charged with the decision of cases of conscience. The Jesuits were distinguished for the cul- tivation of this mixed subject of theology and ethics ; which was admirably calculated to promote the crafty policy of that order. The science of casuistry, however, has been cultivated in the Protestant as well as the Papal church ; and until very recently there was a professor of casuistry at Cambridgo. (See Mayer's Bibliotheca qf Casuists.) CAT. See Felis, or Feline. Cat. a ship employed in the coal trade. Cat. Tackle by which the anchor is raised to the cat- head. See Falconer's Diet. CA'TABA'PTISTS. (Gr. xotrct, against, and ^ccr- «?<", I baptize.) In Ecclesiastical History, a general term to designate all the sects which have denied the necessity of baptism generally, or have opposed infant baptism. See Baptists, Quakers, Socinians, &c. CA'TACA'USTICS. (Gr. xctT»»ccia,, 1 burn.) In Optics or Geometry, are the eaustic curves formed by the reflection of the rays of light, and so called to dis- tinguish them from the diacaustic, which are formed by refracted rays. See Caustic. CA'TACHRE'SIS. (Gr. »«t«, in the sense of beside, and xi'^^'ij use.) In Rhetoric, a figure by which a word is used in a sense analogous to its own. See Metaphor. CA'TACLE'SIUM. (Gr. xctrot, against,»nd xXuai, I enclose.) A name applied sometimes to such fruit as that of Mirabilis, which consists of a membranous inde- hiscent pericarp enclosed within a hard pericarp-like tube of the calyx. C A'T ACLY' SM. ( Gr. xa.ret.xXvtrtJi.o;, an inundation, a deluge.) Geologists apply the word to signify the various great inundations which they conceive to liave occurred at different periods in the history of the globe. CA'TACOMBS. (Gr. xecrot,, against, and xv/jcZos, a hollow place.) In Architecture, subterraneous places used for ijurying the dead. The Jiypogaea, crypta, and cimeteria of the ancients were used for the same purpose. In some cities those vast excavations were made use of for other purposes than those of sepulture ; at Syracuse, for instance, the same cavern served for a prison as well as a public cemetery. It lias been said that in the early ages of Christianity they also served as places of devotion. The most celebrated for their extent are those of Jlome, Naples, Syracuse, &c. ; and the more' modern ones of Paris, which have been formed by quarrying for the stone with which the city is built. CA'TACOU'STICS, or CATAPHO'NICS. (Gr. Kotroc, about; uxevv, I hear; (painu, I speak.) The science of reflected sounds ; or that part of acoustics which treats of the properties of echoes, or in general of sounds which do not come to the ear directly but after having been reflected by some substance. See Echo and Sound. CA'TAFA'LCO. (Ual.ascqffbld.) In Architecture, a temporary structure of carpentry, decorated with painting and sculpture, representing a tomb or cenotaph, and used in funeral ceremonies. That used at the final interment of Michael Angelo at Florence was of the most magnificent description, and perhaps unequalled as to the art employed on it by any used before or since. CA'TALE'CTIC. (Gr. xoctuXtixtixos, deficient.) In Greek and Latin poetry, a verse wanting one syllable of its proper length : acatalcclic, a verse complete in length ; hypercatalectic, having one syllable too many ; brachy- catalectic. wanting two syllables. CA'T.\LEPSY. (Gr. xcc.Tx\etiu.$xvt>i, I seize.) A disease in which the functions of the organs of sense and CATALOGUE RAISONNE. motion are suspended, whilst the heart continues to pulsate. The. patients are said to be in a trance ; and in tliis state they remain for some hours, or even days. Animoniacal and etherial stimulants are the most effec- tual restoratives. CATALOGUE RAISONNE'. In Bibliography, a catalogue of books, classed under the heads of their several subjects, and with a general abstract of the contents of works where the title does not sufficiently indicate it ; thus serving as a manual, to direct the reader to the sources of information on any particular topic. The want of alphabetical arrangement is supplied by an index at the end. The catalogue of the French Bibliothcque Rouale (10 vols. fol. 1739—53) is said to be the best work of this description, as far as it extends. CA'TAMARA'N. A sort of raft used chiefly by the Indians on the Coromandel coast for the purposes of fishing. It is composed of three pieces of wood lashed together, the middle piece being longer and broader than the others ; and it is almost the only kind of boat that can live in the surf that prevails on that coast. Catamaran was also the name given to the floating batteries with which the French at the commencement of the present century meditated the invasion of England. CATAME'NIA. (Gr. xxtk, according to, and /*»jv, a month.) The monthly uterine evacuation. CA'TAPE'TALOUS. (Gr. xoirct, against; mrctXcv^a petal.) "When the petals of a flower are held together by stamens which grow to their bases, as in the mallow. CA'TAPHRA'CTED. (Gr. xa,roc(f^xKr»s .) Covered with a hard callous skin, or with horny or bony jilates or scales closely joined together. Among the ancients, cavalry equipped with complete defensive armour were termed equites cataphracti. CA'TAPLASM. {Gr. xec'retvXa.a-iroi.) A poultice. CA'TAPULT. (Gr. xcctoc, against, and trtXrvi, a shield.) A military engine used by the ancients for throwing stones, long darts, or javelins. The catapult is often confounded with the balista ; but the latter engine seems to have been chiefly used for the purpose of pro- pelling stones, while the former more frequently was em- ployed with other missiles. Their size and construction were various, but the principle of action was the same in all ; namely, the elastic force with which twisted rope uncoils itself. CA'TARACT. (Gr. xxrxpMta-tru, I confound.) An opacity of the crystalline lens of the eye, producing con- fused or indistinct vision, or total blindness, according to the less or greater extent of the thickening : it is some- times rapid, and often very slow in its progress. It is dis- tinguished from eutta serena by the visible opacity of the lens, and by tne iris contracting upon exposure of the eye to light. This disease is curable either by depress- ing or extracting the lens, operations which are per- formed with wonderful dexterity by some of our oculists. CATA'RRH. (Gr. xa.r»ppia>, I flow down.) The complaint commonly called a cold m the head, generally attended by running from the eyes apd nose, sneezing, hoarseness, and commonly ending in cough. It is pro- duced by sudden changes of air or temperature, ana by exposure to draughts of air. In its usual form domestic remedies relieve it, — diluents, mild aperients, and absti- nence from wine and animal food ; but when attended by fever, headache, tightness about the forehead, and diflicult breathing, it often requires mor§ serious attention, for, if neglected, it may lead to much mischief. CA'TARRHINES, Catarrhina. (Gr. «aT«, a/, and pv, nose.) A tribe of Quadrumanes, including those whicl. nave the nostrils approximated, and the intervening sep- tum narrow ; as in the apes of the old world. CATA'STROPHE. (Gr. xot.7«.n-Tiifi-2 : R2 I R2 r2 T2 • fi therefore, T2 : <2 : : R3 : ,.3 ; or the squares of the times are as the cubes of the radii. This remarkable property was discovered by Kepler to belong to the planetary orbits. See Kepler's Laws. When a point is urged by one accelerating force only, constantly directed towards a fixed point, the path will be a plane curve, and the areas described around this point by the radius vector are proportional to the times employed in describing them. Suppose the time to be divided into equal portions, and that in the first portion of time the body, in virtue of the projectile force impressed on it, describes the line A B. If no other force acted upon it, in the second portion of time it would describe B C = A B ; therefore, on drawing the radii AS, B S, C S, to the centre of force, the triangles A S B and B S C would be equal. But suppose the central force acting on the body while it would move from B to C to act in- stantaneously at B, so as to cause the body to descend through B V : draw V D parallel and equal to B C, and join B D, then at the end of the second portion of time the body will be at D. Now as the cen- tral force acts in the direction B V in the plane of A S B,, the body must continue to move in that plane ; and on joining C D and S D, the triangle B D S, on account of the parallel lines, is equal to B C S, and therefore equal to A B S. In like manner it may be proved that if E be the point at which the body arrives at the end of the third instant, the triangle D E S is equal to A B S. Suppose, therefore, the number of the triangles to become infi- nitely great, and their areas infinitely small, the path of the body will become a curve line ; and the elementary spaces being proportional to the elements of the time, their sums or integrals must continue to have the same proportion. (Newton's Principia, Sect. II.) From this proposition it follows, that when a body describes a curve in virtue of a central force, the centri- fugal force at every point varies as the cube of the dis- tance from the centre, whatever the nature of the force by which it is attracted to the centre may be. For let A B and o 6 be the two arcs described at different points of the curve in the infi- nitely small time t,theu, by the proposition just demonstrated, A S B=: a S b. But make B C and b c respectively perpen- dicular to S A and Srt, then A S B=4A Sx BC, and aSb-laS x bc\ hence A Sx B C=a S X be, and B C2 : 6c2 : : a S2 : AS2. Now BC2 = 2ASxAC (the square of A C being neglected as infinitely tc^=n2aSxac; therefore, A S X A C : « S a S2 : A S2, and consequently But A C is the measure of the centrifugal force at A, and a c is its measure at a; therefore, denoting the distances at these points by R and r, we have the centrifugal force at A to the centrifugal force at «, as ttj : — . Hence we may perceive the reason why a body in moving round a centre of force may alternately approach to, and recede from, that centre, as the planets in describing elliptie orbits about the sun. Suppose the attractive force, like gravity, to vary inversely as the square of the distance 206 1 CENTRE OF GRAVITY. from the attracting point: if the planet approached 10 times nearer to the sun, the attractive force would be augmented 100 times ; but the centrifugal force would become 1000 times greater, and consequently there must be some point at which this force will overcome the former, and determine the planet again to recede. The doctrine of central forces has its principal appli- cation in astronomy. By the comparison of a great number of planetary observations, Kepler discovered that each of the planets, while its distance from the sun is variable, inoves in such a manner that a straight line drawn from it to the sun describes equal areas in equal times. But this is the law by which bodies move under the influence of a central force (as is demonstrated above). It follows, therefore, that the force by which the planets describe their orbits is a central force, and di- rected to a point within the orbit. Newton demon- strated that the velocities of a body at different points of the curve which it describes about a centre of force, are inversely as the perpendiculars drawn from the centre to the tangents at these points. The comparison of this proposition with the elliptic motion of the planets leads directly to the conclusion that the forces by which the planetary motions are sustained are directed to the centre of the sun, and vary inversely as the squares of the distances of the planets from that body. Mathematicians have investigated the orbits which bodies must describe under various hypotheses respect- ing the law of the central force, and they have found that there are only two cases in which a system of bodies like the sun and planets, mutually attracting each other, could permanently exist. One of these is an imaginary case, in which the force varies directly as the distance of the body ; the other is the case presented by nature, in which the force follows the inverse ratio of the square of the distance. In all other cases the mutual action of the bodies would produce permanent derangements, which at length would of necessity subvert the system. When the force varies inversely as the square of the distance, the orbit which is described about a fixed centre must necessarily be one of the three conic sections ; but it will depend upon the velocity with which it is at first projected whether the orbit be an ellipse, a parabola, or an hyperbola. If the central force were supposed to vary as the inverse cube of the distance, a body would describe a circle in one particular case, namely, when the velocity of projection is equal to that which would be acquired by falling from an infinite distance, and then applied in a direction at right angles to the radius vector. In all other cases it would describe a spiral. If the central force diminishes more rapidly than the inverse cube of the distance, the orbit would in all cases describe a spiral ; so that if the solar force acted according to a law of this sort, every planet would at length either fall into the sun, or fly off to an infinite distance. {Principia, Book I. See also HersckeVs Astronomy, Cab. Encyc.) CE'NTRE. (Lat. centrum.) This term has nu- merous applications in Geometry and Mechanics : thus, centre of a circle, or of an ellipse, is the middle point of any diameter ; centre of a curve is the point where two diameters intersect' each other ; and in mechanics we speak of centres of attraction, conversion, equilibrium, gravity, percussion, oscillation, &c. Ce'ntre of Attraction, also called Centre of Gravi- tation, is the point to which bodies tend in consequence of the action of gravity. Ce'ntre of Conversion is the point in a body about which it turns when a force is applied to any part of it, or unequal forces to its different parts. For example, suppose a rod laid on a table to be struck near one ex- tremity in a direction perpendicular to its length ; the rod will turn round, but there will be one point in it which remains at rest, or about which, as a centre, the other points turn . This point is the centre of conversion. Ce'ntre of Equilibrium of a system of bodies is a point such that if the system were suspended from it, the whole would remain in equilibrium. Thus, the ful- crum or point of support of a lever is its centre of equi- librium. Ce'ntre of Gravity. A term employed in Me- chanics to denote a certain point in the interior of a body, or system of bodies connected with each other ia an invariable manner, so situated that any plane what- ever which passes through it divides the body into two segments of which the weights are exactly equaL Hence, if the centre of gravity of any body or system of bodies be sustained, the whole will remain at rest ; for the weights on both sides of a vertical plane passing through the point of support being equal, the body can have no tendency to angular motion. Let there be a system of bodies A, B, C, D, E, placed horizontally in the same straight line, S A B O C D E and connected with each other in an invariable manner ; and suppose O to be the centre of gravity of the system : CENTRE OF GRAVITY. by the definition of the centre of gravity, if the system is supported at O, the weights on both sides of O, or the effbft which the bodies make to turn about that point on opposite sides of O, will exactly counterbalance each other, and the whole will remain at rest. But the effect of A in turning the system about O depends on the quantity of matter in A, and its distance from O, or the length of the arm of the lever at the extremity of which it acts. The whole effect of the body A is therefore proportional to the mass of A multiplied into the length of the line O A. The same reasoning obviously applies to each of the other bodies, B, C, D, and E ; conse- quently, taking these letters to represent the masses of the bodies respectively, we have, by the definition, AO A + BOB=COC + DOD + EOE. Now suppose it were required to determine from this property the position of the centre of gravity of the united bodies, or its distance from a given point S in the same straight line : on making SA = a, SB = 6, SC = c, S D = d,, S Errf, and the unknown distance S 0=.r, we shall have O A = .r — o, OB=x — b, O C=ic — x, 0D = d — x, and O E = e — ar. Therefore by substitution, A (x-a) + B (x-b) = C (c-jr) + D {d-x) + E(e-x) ; and by transposition, (A+B + C + D + E) x=a A + 6B + cC + dD + eE; A+bB + cC + dB + eE A+B+C+D+E ' whence x = S p| that is to say, the distance of the centre of gravity of the given system from a given point is equal to the sum of the products of all the masses into their distances from the point divided by the sum of the masses. It is obvious, from the equation now given, that the effect of all the bodies to produce motion about the point S, is the same as if they were all united in their common centre of gravity O. It is also obvious that the form of the equation will be exactly the same, whatever may be the number of bodies belonging to the system ; and as every body may be regarded as composed of elementary particles, the reasoning which applies to a system of particles, connected with one another in an invariable manner, also applies to solid bodies of any kind. The bodies composing the system have been supposed to be arranged in a straight line ; but the centre of gravity will be found precisely in the same manner, whatever their relative situations may be. Suppose them to be situated all in the same plane, and that their centre of gravity is O, the position of which it is required to find. Let P Q be any straight line, in the same plane with the bodies, passing through O ; then in order that there may be no ten- dency to motion about the line P Q, the sum of the products of all the bodies on one side of P Q into their respective distances from that line, must be equal to the sum of the products of all the bodies on the other side of P Q into their respective distances. If, therefore, & T be a straight line parallel to P Q, and if the distances of A, B, C, &c. from S T, be denoted respectively by a, b, c, &c., and the distance of O from the same line by x, then we shall have as before, ^_ aA + &B+cC + &c. A + B + C + &c. ' This does not yet give us the centre of gravity ; but it gives its distance from a given straight line S T, and conse(juently gives the position of the straight line P Q, in which the centre of gravity is situated. If then we draw another line S' T', and denote its distances from A, B, C, &c., by a', b', cf, &c., respectively, and put x' equal to its distance O Q from O, we shall have ^> ^ g' A +y B + c^ C + &c. . A + B + C + &c. * and consequently the position of another straight line 9'rS^^*'"^ through the centre of gravity, and parallel to S' T'. Therefore, the centre of gravity is given by the intersection of the two straight lines P Q and P' Q'. Lastljr, suppose the bodies composing the system not to be situated all in the same plane. In this case, the situation of each of the given bodies must be referred to three planes given in position ; and it is most convenient to assume three planes which intersect each other at right angles ; one of them horizontal, and consequently the other two vertical. Let the distances of the given bodies A, B, C, &c. from the given horizontal plane be respectively a, b, c, &c. ; their distances from one of the vertical planes a', b', &, &c. ; and from the other, a'' b", c", &c. ; then, if we take ^ _ a A+ 6 B + c C + &c. A + B + C + &c. ' the centre of gravity is in a horizontal plane, at the dis- tance X from the given horizontal plane. CENTRE OF GYRATION. Take also x' = "' ^/ /^.V^fl^/ ^'S and the cen- A + B + G + &c. tre of gravity is in a plane parallel to the first of the two given vertical planes, and distant from it by the line x". In the intersection of these two planes, tals.e a point distant from the second vertical plane by a quantity a:"= fl" A + 6" B+ c" C + &C. ... . ^ .„ ,_ , — A■^B■^c■^&c. '• *^'' p°*"* ^'^^ ^^ ^^^ ''^''^'^ of gravity of the given bodies. In the notation of the differential calculus, these for- mulas are expressed as follows : — Let dm 'be the element of the mass, the co-ordinates of which, referred to three rectangular planes, are x, y, % ; and let the distances of the centre of gravity of the mass from the same planes be respectively X, Y, Z ; then the position of that centre IS determined b^ the three equations ; ■y^_ r xdm^ _n ydm ^_^ p xdm The determination of the centre of gravity of solids in general requires the application of the integral calculus, and is sometimes effected with considerable labour ; there are, however, many particular cases in which it is known immediately, and requires no calculation. Thus, the centre of gravity of a sphere or ellipsoid is evidently at the centre of the figure ; that of a parallelopiped is a"t the common intersection of its four diagonals ; that of a cylinder with parallel ends at the middle of its axis. The centre of gravity of a circle or ellipse is also at the centre of the figure ; and that of a parallelogram at the intersection of its diagonals. The centre of gravity of a straight line is at the middle of the line, whence we easily find that of the perimeter of any polygon. " When the body can be divided into two parts, their common centre of gravity may be found by dividing the distance between the centres of gravity of the two parts in the reciprocal proportion of their weights. This principle may be ex- tended to bodies which are more complex. Thus the centre of gravity of two portions being determined, they may be conceived to be united in .that point, and con- nected with a third portion, and the centre of the three portions found. All these again may be supposed col- lected in this last point, and made to balance against a fourth portion, and their common centre of gravity com- puted. In this way the process may by successive steps be carried to any extent, and whatever order is followed the result will be always the same." {Leslie's Elements qfNat. Phil.) The centre of gravity of a triangle is in the straight line drawn from any one of its angles to bisect the op- posite side, and at the distance of two thirds of the whole line from the vertex. The centre of gravity of a pyramid is in the straight line drawn from the vertex to the centre of gravity of the base, and at three fourths of the distance of this line from the vertex. The centre of gravity of a hemisphere is in the diameter, and at the distance of five eighths of the radius from the summit. The centre of gravity of irregular bodies may be found mechanically in various ways. If the body be poised in two different positions on a sharp edge, the vertical drawn from the point of intersection will pass through the centre of gravity. Or if a loose thread or string have its ends fastened to two distinct points of the body, and the body be thus suspended in two different positions from a fixed point, the verticals let fall from this will cross in the centre of gravity. It is a remarkable property of the centre of gravity, that if a plane figure be generated by the revolution of a given line, or a solid by the revolution of a given plane figure, the area in the first case, or the volume in the second, is equal to the product of the generating quantity into the length of the line described by its centre of gravity. This property, which is frequently of use in determining the quadrature of curves and the cubature of solids, is called Guldin's theorems though it is found in the Collections of Pappus. Another elegant geometrical property of the centre of gravity is, that in any given plane the sum of the squares of the distances of any number of physical points from their common centre of gravity, is less than the sum of the squares of their distances from any point in the circum- ference of a circle described about that centre, by the square of the radius multiplied by the number of those points. Hence it follows that the sum of the squares of the distances of any number of points from their common centre of gravity is always a minimum. For a complete explanation of the method of applying the calculus to the determination of the centre of gravity of bodies, we refer to the Traits de Mecanique of Poisson, tom. i. The subject necessarily occupies a part of every work on statics. Ce'ntre of Gyration of a body, or system of bodies, is a point in which if the whole mass were collected, a force applied at any distance from the axis of suspension would communicate to the mass thus collected the same CENTRE OF OSCILLATION. angular velocity that it would have communicated to the system in its first condition. It is evident from the definition that the point in question must have this property, that if the whole mass ■were united in it, the moment of inertia, or tlie power of resisting the effort of any force, will be the same as the moment of inertia of the body in its first state. Let, therefore. A, B, and C be a system of bodies, connected in an invariable manner, and turn- ing about an axis P. Let a, b, and c be the respective distances of A, B, and C from P ; and conceive X to be another body placed at a distance x from the axis, such that its mo- ment of inertia is equal to the moment of inertia of A. Then, by the principles of me- chanics, the moment of inertia of A is A* a^, and that of X is X-*2 ; therefore, by hypo- thesis, X-j;2= A"a2. In like manner, conceive another body Y to be placed at the distance x from the axis, such that its moment of inertia is equal to that of B, or such that Y-ar2= B-fi^ ; and let a third body Z be placed at the same point, such that Z-x2= C-c2. Taking the sums of these equals we have (X-J- Y+ Z)x2 = A-a2 + B*62 -J. c-c2. Now in this equation we are at liberty to give either to X -h Y + Z or to j: any value we please. Let us then suppose X+Y-HZ=A+B-l-C (which is evidently the same as supposing all the matter in the system united at the point whose distance is x), and we shall have _ / Aa2-HB-62 + C-c2 \| V A-j-B + c ; to express the distance of the centre of gyration from the axis. Centre of Oscillation is that point in a body, os- cillating about a fixed axis, into which if the whole mass were collected, the body would vibrate through a given angle by the force of gravity in the same time as in its first condition. In order to find the point having this property, con- ceive the weights A, B, and C fixed to a slender in- flexible iwd, vibrating about the point S, the centre of oscillation being at O. In every position of the system, the tangents to the arcs which the bodies respectively describe make equal angles with the horizon ; conse- quently the bodies are all urged by the same proportion of the total force of gravity. But if tne bodies had not been connected with each other, their descent through similar arcs, A E, B F, C H, in the same interval of time, would require the accelerating forces to be proportional to those arcs, or to SA, SB, Let S O, therefore, represent the accelerating force ; then A O and B O will denote the excess of the force by which A and B are respectively accelerated, and C O the excess of the force by which C is retarded. But the effects of these forces on the motion of the system must be proportional to the weights of the bodies ; and by the principles of the lever, they must also be propor- tional to the respective distances of the bodies from the point of suspension. They are consequently represented by A • S A • A O, B • S B • B O, and C • S C • C O. But the accelerating action at the centre O must necessarily be equal to that of retardation ; consequently A • S A • AO + B-SB-BO=C-SC-CO. Now let S A = ff, S B = 6, S C = c, and S O =/, and the equation becomes by substitution A • a {f—a) + B-6(/-6) = C-c (c-/), or (A-a + B-6 + C-c)/a»A-a2 + B-62 + C • c2 : whence A-a + B- b+ Cc that is to say, the distance of the centre of oscillation from the point of suspension, or the length of the simple pendulum which vibrates in the same time with the compound body, is found by taking the sum of the pro- ducts of the weights into the squares of their distances from the axis of the pendulum, and dividing this sum by the sum of the products of the weights into their distances simply. Though the system has here been supposed to be formed of separate bodies, the principle is universal, and applies to bodies of any form. Let dm represent an elena ement of the body, and x its distances from the point of /j2dm jlc~'dm " suspension, then /= It may be remarked, that the denominator A • o + B • 6 -I- C • c is equal to ( A -»- B + C) • S G, the point G being the centre of gravity of the bodies. Now if we denote the distances of A, B, and C from the centre of gravity G by », JB, y respectively, and make S G = A, we shall have fl = A — «, b = h— fi, and c = A + y ; whence by invo- lution and substituting in the numerator, and observing that A« + B/3-Cy = 0,we shall find A • a2 + B • i2 4. CENTRIFUGAL MACHINE. C • c2 = A2 (A + B + C)+ A • «2 + B • /32 + C • y2 ; there- fore, since O G = S O'— S G -f— h, A • «2 -H B • /32 + C • y2 OG = (A -t- B -I- C) S G an equation which gives the distance of the centre of os- cillation from the centre of gravity. This last equation indicates a very remarkable property of the centre of oscillation. As the two quantities O G and S G may change places without disturbing the equality, it follows that the centre of oscillation and the point of suspension are interchangeable ; in other words, if the system were suspended from O, it would vibrate exactly in the same time as when suspended from S. This property was noticed by Huygens, and was first practically applied to the purpose of finding the length of the seconds' pendulum by Captain Kater. The ap- plication is made as follows : — Let a bar of iron, for ex- ample, about four feet long, be suspended from a point A, at the distance of four or five inches from one of its extremities, and observe the number of vibrations it makes in a given time. Then suspend it from another point B, near its other extremity, and let the point of suspension B be moved backwards or forwards till it makes exactly the same number of vibrations in a given time as when suspended from A. Then the distance between A and B is the length of the Isochronous simple pendulum. On comparing the three expressions for the centre of gravity, the centre of gyration, and the centre of oscil- lation, it will be seen that the distance of the centre of gyration from the axis is a mean proportional between the distances of the centres of gravity and oscillation. The method of determining the centre of oscillation of compound pendulums was first given by Huygens in his celebrated work Horologium OsciUalorium. His demonstration, however, was founded on an indirect principle, which was rather assumed than proved. It consists in this, that if several weights attached in any manner to an inflexible rod or pendulum descend by the action of gravity, and if at any instant they were detached or disengaged from each other, each of them, in virtue of the velocity it had acquired during its descent, would mount to such a height that the common centre of gravity of all of them would reach exactly the same height as that from which it descended. The first direct demonstration on the principle of the lever was given by James Bernoulli, in the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences of Paris for 1703, An interesting history of this problem may be found in the first volume of Lagrange's Mecanique Analytiqne. Ce'ntre of Percussion. The point in a solid body, or system of bodies, into which, if the whole matter were supposed to be collected, the efffect produced by striking against another body would be the greatest possible ; or it may be defined to be the point in the axis of a moving body at which, if stopped by an immoveable obstacle, the body would rest in equilibrio, without inclining to either side, or acting on the centre of suspension. When the percutient body revolves about a fixed axis, the centre of percussion is at the same point with the centre of oscillation ; but when it moves with a parallel motion, the centre of percussion is the same as the centre of gravity. Ce'ntre of Pressure, of a fluid against a surface, is that point at which if a force were applied equal to the pressure, and acting in an opposite direction, the surface would remain at rest. Ce'ntre of Rotation. The point about which a body circulates. It is the same as the centre of motion. Ce'ntre of Spontaneous Rotation. The name first applied by John Bernoulli to the point about which a body, all whose parts are at liberty to move, and which has been struck in a direction not passing through the centre of gravity, begins to turn. CENTRI'FUGAL. (Lat. centrum, and fugio, /rr- treat. ) A term employed in describing th e inflorescence of plants, when, in a head of flowers, the central one opens first, and those of the circumference last. It is also used by carpologists in describing seeds when the apex of an embryo is turned away from the centre of a fruit. CENTRI'FUGAL FORCE. The force by which a body in rotation tends to recede from the centre of motion: Centripetal Force, that by which a body in motion is -] urged towards a centre, and compelled to describe a ! curve instead of a straight line. See Central Force. i CENTRI'FUGAL MACHI'NE. A machine moved by the centrifugal force of water; frequently called, from its inventor. Barker's Mill. It consists of a hollow metal cylinder or pipe of metal placed upright, and resting on a pointed steel pivot at A. The pipe is widened or ex- tended into a funnel shape at the top B, and is kept in its position by a vertical steel axis C D, passing through a frame at the top. Towards the lower extremity, two or more small pipes A E, A F, with closed external ends, are inserted at right angles to the axis. In the side of I CENTRING. each of these an orifice is made as near as possible to the end, and on opposite sides, so that water from them may spout horizontally in opposite di- rections. Water is conveyed into the funnel at the top, through the pipe G, in such quantities that the tube is kept constantly full, while the dis- V/ charge is going on at the orifice near '•^ the extremities of the horizontal pipes. In this state of things the resistance or reaction generated by the water issuing from the side holes is such as to throw the vertical pipe, with its arms and axis, into rapid rotatory motion ; and tnis axis may commu- nicate its motion or power to wheel- work or machinery, or to a mill-stone connected with its upper end. (See Librari/ of Usqf'ul Knowledge, " Treatise on Hydraulics ;" also Ferguson's Lectures, by Brewster ; or Lardner's Cabinet Cyclopedia, " Hydrostatics and Pneumatics.") A machine of the same construction, but having the arms at the upper end, and turned rapidly by means of a wheel and pinion, was in- vented by a Mr. Erskine for raising water. Centrifugal Machine is also used synonymously with Whirling Ma- chine. CE'NTRING. Se« Centering. CENTRI'PETAL. (Lat. centrum, and peto, I seek.) A term employed in describing the inflorescence of plants, when, in the unfolding of a head of flowers, those at the circumference open first, and those in the centre last. It is also used by carpologists in describing seeds when the apex of an embryo is directed towards the centre of a fruit. CENTRl'SCUS. {Gt. xivr^ti, aspine.) A genus of Acanthopterygious fishes, having the foremost dorsal placed far backwards, and with its first spine remarkable for its length aiid strength ; the mouth is slender and elongated, whence they have obtained the name of " sea- snipes." CE'NTRUM. {Gr.xDiT^ov, centre.) A term applied by Fries technically to designate the typical division of the groups of species and genera, in his circular arrange- ment of Fungi. Many generic names are compounded, having this word for their root, as Centrogaster, Cen- trolophus, Centropristis, and Ccntronotus, all genera of spiny-finned fishes ; Centropus, a genus of birds, allied to the Cuckoos, &c. CENTU'MVIRL In Ancient History, Roman judges chosen three from each of the thirty-five tribes, so that properly there were 105 ; but they were caXledcentumviri, or the hundred, from the round number. The principal causes that came under them were those concernmg testaments and inheritances. In the time of Augustus they formed the council of the praetor ; but aft.erwards their number was increased to 180, and they were divided into four councils, which, however, were sometimes com- bined into two courts, or even into one. Ten persons {de- cemviri) were appointed, five senators and five equites, to assemble these councils and preside in them in the ab- sence of the praetor. CE'NTURIES. (Lat. centuriae.) In Ancient History, the divisions in which the Romart" people voted at the Comitia Centuriata. They were instituted by Servius TuUius for the purpose of throwing political power into the hands of the plebeians. The patricians were repre- sented by six centuries of knights, and twelve centuries of knights were added to these from the plebeians. The rest of the plebeians and clients were divided into five classes, according to the amount of their property ; the lower limits of each being respectively 100,000, 75,000, 50,000, 25,000, 12,500 asses. The first of these classes was subdivided into eighty centuries ; the next three into twenty each ; and the last into thirty. The cen- turies of each class were again separated into two equal numbers of old and young. By this distribution the preponderance was given to property, though the rich classes were of course outnumbered by the poorer. Besides these centuries there were divisions in other bodies that went by the same name, as in the array half a maniple was called a century. CENTU'RION. In Ancient History, an officer in the Roman army, who had the command of half a maniple, or one sixtieth part of a legion. The word centurion signifies the commander of 100 men ; but this number was in fact seldom complete, as the legion generally fell far short of its full complement. One of the two centurions of each maniple had a precedence before the other ; and the centurion of the first century of the first maniple of the Triarians presided over all the others, and had the charge of the eagle or chief standard of the legion, which gave him the privilege of ranking with the knights. The badge of a centurion was a vine rod, CEPHALA'NTHIUM. (Or. xi;|), was the pa- troness of tillage. She was the daughter of Saturn and Rhea, and, by Jupiter, mother of Proserpine. The most remarkable thing connected with this goddess was the 210 CESTOIDEANS. celebration of the Eleusinian mysteries, over which she presided. CE'REUS. (Lat. cerA, wax.) In Botany, a colour, surface, or texture which resembles that of wax. CE'RIN. The portion of wax which dissolves in boiling alcohol. Also a peculiar waxy substance obtained by boiling grated cork in alcohol. CERI'NTHIANS. Followers of Cerinthus, a heretic of the first or second century, who embraced certain gnostical views respecting the natures and relations of God the Father and Son. He conceived the supreme God to be the father or originator both of the Deity from whom proceeded the O. Test, andof Christ ; that the God of the Jews was also the creator of this world ; and that his dominion over it was superseded by the mission of Christ, who was a son of the supreme Deity residing in a human body. See Gnostics. CE'RIO. A term invented by Murleel to denote the fruit called a Caryopsis, which see. CE'RITE. A silicious oxide of cerium. CE'RIUM. A metal named after the planet Ceres, and discovered in 1803 by Hisinger and Berz.elius in a Swedish mineral termed cerite, and since found by Dr. Thomson in Allanite, a mineral from Greenland. It is said to be a white brittle metal, very difficult of fusion, and volatile when intensely heated ; but we are scarcely acquainted with it in its metallic state. Its equivalent number appears to be 48, on the hydrogen scale. CE'RINUS. (Lat. cera, t/^fl;?.) In Botany, waxy yel- low; a term used in describing colour, to denote a dull yel- low with a slight mixture of reddish brown. CERO'MA. {Gr. xi^ufjkoi,.) In Ancient Architecture, the apartment in a bath or g}'mnasium in which persons anointed themselves with a composition of oil and wax. CEROPLA'STIC. (Gr. xn^o;, wax, and ^Xaca-rixYt rixv*i, the art of the modeller or carver.) The art of modelling in wax, one of very high antiquity. From the testimony of Pliny we learn that Lysistratus, the brother of Lysippus, was the first that used wax for modelling the human figure. He lived in the time of Alexander the Great, and was a native of Sicyon. CEROSTRO'TUM, or CESTRO'TUM, {Gr. xy^^o?, wax, and o-T^turo;, spread.) A species of encaustic painting, executed chiefly on horn or ivory with a par- ticular sort of stylum called a cestrum, which was pointed at one end and flat on the other. The cestrum was heated, and with it the lines of the subject were burnt in, andwax introduced into the furrows made by the heated instrument. (See Pliny, lib.xi. cap. 37., also lib. xvi. cap. 48. ; also Salmds. ad Solin. p. 231.) Doors were sometimes ornamented with this species of painting. Ausonius, Epigr. 26. v. 10 Ceris inurens Januarum limina, Et atrioruiii pegmata. CE'RTHIA. (Gr. xi^Bu;, part, of xuioi, I clip or shear.) A genus of Anisodactyle or uneven-toed Te- nuirostral or slender-billed Passerine birds, commonly known by the name of Creepers. The common tree- creeper (Ccrthia fayniliaris, Linn.) is a well-known native species. CE'RTIORA'RI. In Law, is an original writ issuing out of Chancery or the King's Bench, directed to the judges or officers of inferior courts, commanding them to certify or return the records of a cause depending before them. By this writ indictments and many other pro. ceedings may be removed from any inferior court of jurisdiction into the King's Bench. It lies generally in all judicial proceedings in which a writ of error does not lie ; but not, in common cases, to remove a cause out of an inferior court after verdict. CE'RULIN. Indigo which has been dissolved in sulphuric acid. CERU'MEN. {L&t.cera, wax.) The secretion which lines the external auditorycanal. It consists of albumen, an oily matter, a colouring matter, soda, and phosphate of lime. CE'RUSE. (Lat. cerussa.) Carbonate of lead, the basis of white oil-paint. It is commonly called white lead. CERVI'NUS. (Lat. ccrvus, a stag.) In Botany, fawn-coloured. CE'RVIX. (Literally the lower part of the neck.) An obsolete botanical term, superseded by that of Rhi' xoma, which see. CE'SSIO BONO'RUM. In the Civil Law (and in the modern jurisprudence of France, Spain, Holland, and Scotland), a yielding up on the part of an insolvent trader of his estate and effects to creditors, under the authority of the competent court ; analogous tcr the as- signment of estate and effects under a fiat in bankruptcy in England. See as to the several regulations respecting the cessio bonorum in these different countries, Burge's Commentaries on Colonial and Foreign 7.aM'S,iii. 890. &c. CE'STOI'DEANS, Cestoidea. (Gr. xio-tos, etnbroi- dercd, and uio?, likeness ; ribaitil-likc. ) Tlie name of an order of Sterelmintha, or Parenchymatons Entozoa, in- cluding those which are commonly called tape-worms. CESTRACEJE. CESTRA'CE^. (Cestrura, one of the genera.) Ill ]}otany, a very small group of plants, most usually com- bined with Solanacect', but by some botanists separated on account of their straight embryo, foliaceous cotyledons, and valvate corolla. Some of the species have fragrant flowers, especially at night ; others emit an uni)leasant odour. Some are astringent, others are said to be poi- sonous. CESTRA'CION, (Gr. xnrrexioi, the name ofajish.) In Ichthyology, a genus of sharks, characterized by having two kinds of teeth, disposed in oblique subspiral rows ; those at the anterior part of the jaws are pointed, and adapted for seizing or grappling shell-fish, &c. ; those at the middle and back part of the jaws are flattened for crushing the same : the fishes of this genus are also remarkable for the large spine placed in front of the first dorsal fin. Only two existing species of this genus are known, one of which is called " the Port Jackson shark ;» the fossil remains of Cestracions are numerous. CE'STRUM. (Lat.) In Painting, a tool used by the ancients in executing the species of pictures called cerostroti. See Cerostrotum. CETA'CEANS, Cetacea. (Gr. xnrei, a whale.) An order of Mammals living in the sea or large rivers, and shaped like fishes for moving habitually in the watery element, having the posterior part of the spine disencumbered of a sacrum and hinder extremities to allow the tail to have a due freedom and extent of motion. They breathe air, have warm blood, and a double circulation, like the rest of the class to which they belong ; they are consequently compelled to resort to the surface for the purpose of respiration ; and the tail-fin is accordingly horizontal, and not vertical, as in true fishes. CE'TE. (Gr. unrti, a whale.) The name of the sixth order of Mammalia in the Syste7ncE Naturce of Linneeus, containing those marine species which are devoid of hinder extremities. The group corresponds with the carniVbrous group of the modern Cetacea, the manatee being associated in the Linnaean system with the elephant. CE'TIC ACID. The result of the action of alkalis upon cetine. CE'TINE. Pure spermaceti. CE'TUS. (Gr. xnrot, the whale.) One of Ptolemy's forty-eight constellations, in the southern hemisphere. CE VA'DIC ACID. An acid contained in the seed of the Veratrum sabadilla. CEVADI'LLA. See Sabadilla. CE'YLANITE. A mineral found in rounded grains or small crystals, nearly opaque, and of a dark blue or black colour ; it was first observed in the sand of the rivers of Ceylon. CHABA'SIE. A variety of zeolite. (From a Greek word signifying a particular kind of stone.) CHAC0''NE, or CIACONE. (Spanish.) In Music, a kind of dance resembling a saraband, of Moorish origin. The bass of it consists of four notes, which proceed in conjoint degrees, whereon the harmonies are made with the same burden. Some have derived this dance from cieco, a blind man, its supposed inventor. CHAFF. The husk or withered calyx of grasses, and more especially of the bread corns. The term is also applied to straw or hay cut into very short lengths, and used for mixing with corn, roots, or other food for horses or cattle. 1 his kind of chaff, in greater lengths, is also used for mixing with mortar on some parts of the Continent, more particularly in Germany and Russia ; and it is used as a substitute for hair in making plaster for rooms. Both stubble and cut hay were used by the ancient Egyptians in making bricks. CHAFF OF THE RECEPTACLE. A term used by some botanists to denote the bracts which are stationed upon the receptacle of Composite flowers, between the florets ; they have generally a membranous texture, and no colour, and are usually called Paleae. CHA'FFY, PALEACEOUS. When a surface is co- vered with small, weak, erect membranous scales, re- sembling the chaff of corn, as the receptacle of many Composite plants. CHAI'LLETIA'CE^. (Chailletia, one of the ge- nera.) A natural order of shrubby arborescent Exogens, £ laced by De Candolle between Homaliaccce and Aqui- xriacecB -y agreeing with the former in the presence of glands round the ovary, but differing in its superior ovary, with the placenta in the axis, and in many other characters. Its affinity, however, appears to be greatest with Rhamnacece, with which it agrees in habit. It inhabits the hotter parts of the world, and some species are said to be poisonous. CHALA'ZA. (Gr. ;^aX(x?o6, inthesenseof« A:«o6.) In Botany, the vascular disk caused by the expansion of the vessels of the raphe, upon reaching the base of the nu- cleus_of an ovule, after passing up the side of the latter. CHALA'ZiE. (Gr. ;t<«^*?«» /'«'^-) A name applied ^) the two membranous twisted chords attached to ir the poles of the yolk of an egg, and serving to 211 • CHAMBERLAIN. maintain it in such a position that the cicatricula shall always be uppermost, and consequently nearest the source of heat during the process of incubation. CHALCE'DONY. A semitransparent sillcious mi- neral, apparently formed by the infiltration of silicious matters originally in a state of solution. It is of various colours, and often banded. The finest specimens are said to have been originally found at Chalcedon in Asia, CHALCI'DICUM. (Lat.) In Ancient Architecture, according to Festus so named from Chalcis, a city in Euboea. A term used by Vitruvius to denote a large building appropriated to the purpose of administering justice, or according to others the tribunal itself. CHALCO'GRAPHY. (Gr. ;t;-*'' pincers.) The first pair of forcipated. extremities of the crab, lobster, and other crustaceans. CHE'LICERES. (Gr. v»jX»), pincers, and *j{«?, a horn. ) The term applied by Latreille to two appendages of the head of the Arachnidans, or spiders and scorpions, which appendages he considers as representing the me- sial antenna; of the Decapod Crustacea, here converted into manducatory organs. CHELO'NIANS, Chelonia, (Gr. ;ts^*'i"i, a tortoise.) The order of Reptiles, including the tortoises, terrapenee, CHEMISTRY. And turtles; characterized by the body being inclosed between a double shield or shell, out of which extend the head, tail, and four extremities. The land tortoises have the power of retracting all these parts within the shell. CHEMISTRY. (The word is probably derived from the Coptic root chems or hhems, signifying obscure or secret. The German word geheim is apparently of the same origin.) Chemistry is a department of science, the objects of which are to investigate the nature and properties of the elements of matter, and their mutual actions and com- binations ; to ascertain tlie proportions in which they unite, and the modes of separating them when united ; and to inquire into the laws and powers which preside over and affect these agencies. As an art, chemistry may be traced to a very remote period ; but it can scarcely be said to have existed as a science previoui to the com- mencement of the seventeenth century : and in tracing its early history we shall find the principal materials upon which it is founded in the works of Bacon, Boyle, Hooke, Mayow, and Newton. As induction from experiment is the exclusive basis of chemical science, little progress could be made in it til' the futility of the ancient philosophical systems had been exposed,, and their influence annihilated, and till the necessity of that form of severe experimental inquiry had been established which "first procures the light, and then shov/s the way by its means." Upon such foun- dations, laid by Bacon, the other philosophers whose names have been mentioned proceeded to bring together and arrange the materials which had been furnished by their predecessors, and were thence led into that train of true philosoi)hical reasoning and research which served as an emulatory example to their immediate successors, and which has led in our times to the gigantic results of modern discovery. It is well known that the alchemists had accumulated a number of valuable but isolated chemical facts, and that they had explored with considerable diligence the abstract properties and rauti»i agencies and relations of the greater number of natur?^^ products ; but, with few exceptions, they neglected their useful and obvious ap- plications, and wasted their labours upon unattainable and chimerical projects. Their discoveries and inventions, as Lord Bacon justly and forcibly observes, "are well represented in the fable of the old man who left an estate to his children, buried, as he said, in his vineyard, which therefore they fell to dig and search for with great dili- gence ; whereby, though they found no gold in substance, yet they received an abundant vintage for their labour. So assuredly has the search and stir to make gold pro- duced a great number of fruitful experiments." Alchemical speculations, including the attempts at the conversion of mercury into gold, and the search after an- tidotes and universal remedies, were vigorously carried on during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries ; and many amusing accounts of the professors and adepts of those periods have been handed down to us by the che- mical historians of the time. Those who are curious upon these subjects may consult Mangetus, BibliothecaChemica, and the Theatrum Chcmicum of Elias Ashmole : the latter contains " several poeticall pieces of our famous English philosophers, who have written the hermetique mysteries m their owne ancient language," but their perusal is labour lost ; not so, however, with Basil Valentine, Pa- racelsus, Van Helmont, and Glauber, in whose writings we not only find the materials so happily worked upon by Hooke and Mayow, but which also abound in an- nouncements of important practical discoveries, and in hints to which many of the improvements of modern times may be plausibly traced. Basil Valentine of Erfurt was born about the year 1400 ; his writings, although tinctured with the follies of alchemy, are full of shrewd and inteUigent remarks : he was the discoverer, apparently, of nitric and of sulphuric acid, and of many antimonial preparations, which are fully described in his Triumphal Chariot. Philip Hochener, more commonly known under the name of Paracelsus, and who died in 1541 at Saltzburgh, in the forty-third year of his age, is chiefly celebrated for the boldness and assiduity with which he introduced chemical preparations into the practice of medicine ; he did little, however, as a discoverer. Van Helmont, one of the soundest writers of his period, was the first who seems to have paid attention to the nature of gaseous bodies, and to the dis- tinction between permanent gases and vapours : the word gas first occurs in his works ; and under the term gas silvestre, he seems to allude to what was afterwards tervaed fixed air. None, however, of these early practical chemists come into competition with Glauber. He was an active experimentalist, and an acute reasonfir ; and in reference to his discoveries we may enumerate among them the distillation of muriatic acid from a mixture of sulphuric acid and common salt ; the purification of the residuary sulphate of soda, which he termed sal mirabile, and which still bears his name ; the production of am- monia by the distillation of bone, and its conversion into 217 sal ammoniac by the addition of spirit of salt ; the pre- paration of sulphate of ammonia, which he terms secret sal ammoniac ; the formation of blue vitriol by the action of sulphuric acid upon the green rust of copper ; the composition of numerous earthy, alkaline, and metallic salts ; and lastly, the evolution of vinegar during the destructive distillation of wood, for which he describes and delineates the distillatory apparatus, under the name of "a press for extracting the juice of wood," and the uses of which, together with those of the oil of tar and other products,he describes at length,closing his discourse with a statement of his apprehension that he shall be by many disbelieved ; but " it contented me," he says, " that I have written the truth, and lighted a candle to my neighbours." Glauber also published a pamphlet, entitled " The Consolation of Navigators ; in which is taught how they who travel by sea may preserve themselves from hunger and thirst, and also from those diseases which are wont to happen in long voyages : written for the health, comfort, and solace of all those who travel by water for the good of their country." The sensible plan of em- ploying extract of malt as a portable vegetable diet, and diluted muriatic acid to quench thirst, is here recom- mended ; and many of the medicinal uses of that acid are dwelt upon, among which are some that have been claimed as recent discoveries. On the whole, there is no author, contemporary with Glauber, who has written so much to the purpose, and who, as it were, anticipated so many of our modern scientific improvements. Reverting to the names of Boyle and his eminent associates, we are reminded of the origin of the Royal Society qf London for the Improvement of Natural Know- ledge, which was incorporated by Charles II. in the year 1662, and of which Boyle and Hooke were active and dis- tinguished members. Boyle died in 1G91. His station in life, his mild and prepossessing disposition, his strict honour and integrity, and the unaffected earnestness with which he promoted experimental inquiry, tended to shed a lustre on his piysuits, to elevate their character with the world, and to draw into their precincts many who without such an example would have passed their lives in that listless inactivity then too common with those upon whom fortune smiled : among these Mr. Boyle made many converts. Boyle's Essays on the successfulness and unsuccess- fulness of Experiments, and the Preface to his Philoso- phical Writings, are in the genuine spirit of experimental research ; but the new and important aspect assumed about this time by such pursuits is perhaps chiefly due to Dr. Robert Hooke (born in the Isle of Wight in 1635, and died in London in 1702). Among his views and dis- coveries which bear upon the progress of chemical phi- losophy, the most important are those relating to the phenomena of combustion, and to the part which the air performs in that process ; his notions upon these subjects are remarkable for their boldness as differing from the prevailing theories of the day, and for their correctness as superseding the objections to which those theories were liable. From the hints contained in the writings of the alchemists, it appears that the phenomena of combustion were referred to a subtile and highly volatile principle, which, agitated and expanded by heat, pro- duced flame and fire. When metals were exposed to the action of heat the greater number of them were observed to alter their appearance, and, losing their brilliancy, became converted into an earth-like powder or calx. It was generally admitted that in this process the particles of the combustible were thrown into violent vibrations, and in that way transformed into heat and light. But it had been also remarked that in certain cases of com- bustion, and especially as regards the metals, the phe- nomenon was attended by an actual increase of weight in the burning body, and that this result was incompatible with the theory which assumed the conversion of the combustible into heat and light, or the evolution of that principle of inflammability which by Beccher and Stahl and the chemists of that school was termed phlogi.iton. About the year 1630 a remarkable tract appeared in France relating to this subject, by Jean Rey, a physician of Perigord. Le Brun had pielted two pounds six ounces of lead, and found that in six hours the whole had been converted into calx ; but that instead of having lost phlogiston, or any other ponderable matter, it had actually increased in weight to the extent of many ounces. Puzzled by this result, he consulted Rey as to its cause, who immediately undertook an experimental in- quiry, which led him to refer the increase in weight in this and similar cases to the fixation of air. This in- ference was amply supported by the researches of Boyle and of Hooke : the former found that no combustible would burn under the exhausted receiver of the air- pumj), and consequently that the presence of air was requisite ; and Hooke, finding that however intensely charcoal was heated, it would not burn when air was excluded, infers " that air is the universal dissolvent of in- flammable bodies, and that this dissolution generates heat, which we call^'jr." But he went a step beyond this, and CHEMISTRY. attributes the power of supporting combustion to a principle in the atmosphere, " like unto, or the very same as, that which is fixed in saltpetre; " for he had observed the power of that salt as a supporter of combustion. His words are as follow : — " The dissolving parts of the air are but few, and hence the atmosphere is like those spirits which have much phlegm mixed with them, and become soon glutted ; whereas saltpetre abounds more in those solvent particles, and hence a little will dissolve a great sulphurous body quickly and violently ; and as other solvents, though but weak, quickly consume the dissoluble body if the supply be renovated, so air applied to a shining body by a bellows will dissolve it as rapidly as saltpetre." From all which he concludes that there is no element of fire, but that flame results from the mutual chemical action of the combustible upon a part of the atmosphere. (Hooke's Mt'crographia.) Hooke also alludes to the part performed by ah- in the process of respiration ; and in his LampnSy published in 1677, has given a beautiful explanation of the burning of a candle. He attributes the light and heat to the action of the air upon the combustible matter of the flame, and shows that the interior of the flame is not luminous, by the simple expedient of viewing its section through a thin piece of glass or of mica. These doctrines of Hooke were further illustrated by John Mayow (born in Cornwall 1645, died in London 1679), who not only experimentally corroborated them, but pointed out the connection between combustion and respiration, and showed that that part of the air con- cerned in the support of flame was also essential to the life of animals. He placed a candle under a bell-glass, and when it would no longer burn, he found that on rekindling it it was immediately extinguished by the same air ; he then placed a mouse in a confined portion of air, and it soon manifested the want of its renewal ; he then put the mouse under the same bell-glass with the candle, and found that it only lived half the time that it had survived without the candle ; he then reversed the experiment, and endeavoured to burn a candle in air which had been breathed, and finding that it went out, he concluded that the " nitro-aerial particles" of the air were as essential to respiration as to combustion, and that they were in both cases absorbed ; and he even refers anifnal heal to the influence of the air upon the blood. But Mayow's claim to a distinguished place in the history of chemistry is not merely founded upon the sagacity with which he followed up these views ; he was the first who distinctly expounded the nature of chemical qfflniti/, and who taught its independence of those me- chanical forms of the particles of matter to which it had been referred, and showed, contrary to the prerailing tenets, that in cases of combination the particles of the acting bodies were not annihilated, but that they still existed in the compound, and might again be elicited from it with all their former powers and properties. These notions he illustrates by a series of extremely apposite experiments ; and proceeds to explain decom- position upon the principle of inequality in the respective attractive forces of the acting bodies, a doctrine which was afterwards verified and further explained by Newton, whose masterly sketch of a theory of chemical attraction, given in the queries to the third book of Optics, is nearly in the language and .entirely in the spirit of his pre- decessor. The theory of combustion and of affinity, thus established upon the basis of experiment by Hooke and Mayow, constitute the foundation upon which most of the superstructure of modern chemistry rests ; the former was extended and embellished by Lavoisier, and the latter has gradually risen into the atomic and equivalent doctrine. There are three principal points connected with the vast extension and importance of chemical science as we now find it, to which it becomes necessary therefore to allude ; namely, the investigations relating to the philosophy of heat, those connected with pneumatic chemistry, and those establishing the con- nection of electrical with chemical phenomena. It was not till towards the middle of the seventeenth century that such perfection was given to the construction of the thermometer as to enable it to be used as an accurate and comparative measure of temperature. Dr. Halley seems to have been the first who applied the uniform temperature of boiling water to obtain one fixed point for its graduation ; the constant temperature of water in the act of freezing seems also to have been noticed about the same time by the Florentine academicians, and by Newton ; and these two points being thus determined and ascertained, together v.ith the causes of their oc- casional discrepancies, the graduation of the thermometer became easy, especially when the advantages of mercury had been pointed out by Halley, together with the mode of sealing it in the thermometer tube. {See Theumometer.) But the great and important step in the philosophy of heat was the consequence of Dr. Black's discovery of the state in which heat exists in liquids and vapours, and upon which he founded his beautiful theory of latent heat. This theory gave a satisfactory solution of a mul- 218 titude of natural and artificial phenomena previously unexplained or unobserved, and laid the foundation of those wonderful improvements in the theoretical and practical construction of the steam engine which were soon afterwards carried into effect by Watt. Dr. Black was born in 1728 on the banks of the Garonne, and educated at Belfast, and afterwards at Glasgow : in 1766 he was appointed to the chemical chair in the university of Edinburgh, where he died in 1799. He not only made the grand discovery of the latency of heat, but he enriched chemistry with other discoveries ; among which that of the presence of carbonic acid in the mild earths and alkalies, and the cause of their causticity, was especially perfect and important. These facts, including abo the discovery of carbonic acid, or, as it was then called, Jued air, were first published in 1756 ; his ideas respecting the combinations of heat with ponderable matter were perfected in 1764. Another and distinct series of inquiries, having im- portant bearings upon the philosophy of heat, had its origin with the Florentine academicians towards the end of the seventeenth century, and was afterwards saga- ciously followed up by Scheele, Leslie, and others ; it relates to the phenomena of radiation, to the manner in which heat is propagated through space, and to those of its emanation from luminous and incandescent bodies, and to its connection with light. Pneumatic Chemistry had its origin in the experiments of Hooke and Maj-ow, and was subsequently extended by Hales, and more especially by Priestley. Mayow ob- tained hydrogen gas by the action of iron on dilute sulphuric acid, and observed the formation of nitrous gas during the action of aquafortis upon the same metal ; but it was not till the commencement of the last century that the distinctive characters of the gases and their im- portance as chemical agents began to be duly appreciated. Connected also with this subject is the rise and progress of the chemical physiology of vegetation. Dr. Stephen Hales was born \n Kent in 1 677, and died at Teddington in 1761. He began the communication of his researches to the Royal Society in 1717, and in 1727 published his " Statical Essays, containing an essay totvards a natural history of vegetation, of use to those who are curious in the culture and improvement of gardening; also a specimen of an attempt to analyse the air by a great variety of chemico-statical experiments, which were read at several meetings before the Royal Society." In 1733 a second volume of these Essays was published, containing " Hcemastutics, and experiments on the stone of the kidney and bladder." In his various experimental researche"s detailed in these essays, Dr. Hales describes many curious facts, and shows much ingenuity in the con- trivance of apparatus ; but he furnishes a striking instance of the facility with which the mind is led away from the true path or discovery by preconceived opinions ; for having predetermined that the various gaseous products which he obtained were mere modifications and con- taminations of common air, he missed much that was fairly within his grasp. He observed, for instance, that air was absorbed during the combustion of phosphorus in close vessels, but he examined none of the products ; he collected the air evolved during the destructive dis- tillation of wood, and found it fatal to animals ; from Newcastle coal he obtained one third of its weight of gas; and from nitre, 180 times its bulk ; but he did not leisurely examine any of these products. He found that iron filings and oil of vitriol would not evolve gas unless water was present ; but instead of stopping to examine the properties of the hydrogen gas which he thus obtained, he hastens on to irrelevant observations, being more eager to multiply experiments than to examine their results. In the same way he details with minute ac- curacy the quantity of air generated during the dis- tillation of blood, tallow, sal ammoniac, and many other substances, without drawing a single useful inference. In his experiments on respiration too, he obtained results of extreme interest, and is often upon the verge of most important discoveries ; but instead of being incited bv the novelty of his results, and the extent of the field of in- vestigation opened by his researches, he drops them upon the occurrence of the slightest difficulty. His examin- ation, however, of the motion of the sap in vegetables was pursued upon a more regular and satisfactory plan ; he ascertained the quantity of matter imbibed and perspired by several plants and trees ; the proporticm daily lost by the leaves, and their influence upon the absorptive powers of the root ; and the relation of various states of the atmosphere as to temperature and moisture upon these functions. He endeavoured to confer different flavours upon fniits by impregnating the soil with per- fumed waters, and he found that the odorous particles were rejected by the living vessels, but that they affbcted the dead parts of the tree ; he compares the functions of the leaves of evergreens with those of deciduous shrubs and trees ; he notices the effect of cutting a ring of bark off' the branch of a tree in promoting the growth of its leaves and fruit ; and, lastly, shows that air is some- CHEMISTRY. times absorbed or inspired by plants, and gives some in- teresting views relative to the germination of seeds. When it is recollected that Hales wrote at the com- mencement of the last century, that few models of good scientific composition were then extant, and that a pom- pons and obscure style was prevalent among most of his contemporaries, we must admire the perspicuous and unadorned manner in which he details his facts and ob- servations. He has in this respect all the merit which belongs to Boyle without his diffusiveness ; and aplea.eing vein of sound and unafl'ected morality accompanies his arguments, and leads him, whilst endeavouring to unveil the mysteries of nature, to direct our attention with becoming modesty to the extreme penury of man's wisdom, when compared with the admirable adjustments of causes and effects discoverable in the lowliest works of the Creator. But although Mayow, Hooke, and Hales had done much towards establishing the interest and importance of gaseous chemistry, it is to Dr. Joseph Priestley (born at Fieldhead, near Leeds, 1733; died in Pennsylvania, 1804) that we owe the principal progress in this branch of our science. He directed his attention to it with a degree of activity and skill then peculiarly his own, and in the number of his discoveries left his contemporaries far behind, while he certainly rivalled them in their interest and importance, which is the more surprising when we reflect that he generally seems to have con- sidered his philosophical studies as subordinate to his more severe and serious occupations. He first turned his attention to chemistry about the year 1768. He used to amuse himself with experiments on fixed air and on artificial mineral waters ; and one experiment, as he says, leading to another, he soon collected those materials which he laid before the Royal Society in 1772, under the title of Observations on different Kinds of Air. It was on the 1st of August, 1774, that he made the great discovery upon which so much of the subsequent progress of che- mical science has depended, namely, that of oxygen gas. He obtained it by exposing a quantity of red precipitate of mercury to the action of the sun's rays concentrated upon it by a lens ; the red precipitate was contained in a flask filled up with mercury, and inverted in a basin containing the same metal. " I presently found," he says, " that by means of thi? lens air was expelled from it very readily. Having got several times as much as the bulk of my materials, I admitted water to it, and found that it was not imbibed by it ; but what surprised me more than I can well express was, that a candle burned in this air with a remarkably vigorous flame, very much like that enlarged flame with which a candle burns in nitrous air exposed to iron or liver of sulphur : but, as I got nothing like this remarkjible appearance n-om any kind of air besides this particular modification of nitrous air, and I knew no nitrous acid was used in the preparation of the mercurius calcinatus, I was utterly at a loss how to account for it." He then goes on to show that red lead and 7iitre also afford oxygen at a red heat, and calls it, consistently with the theory of combustion which was then prevalent, dephlogisticated air, regarding it as com- mon air deprived of phlogiston, and consequently pos- sessed of a powerful affinity for that imaginary principle. Shortly after the discovery of oxygen, Priestley as- certained that plants had the power of purifying air which had been vitiated by the respiration of animals, and that oxygen was evolved by aquatic plants in water containing carbonic acid. Nitrous and nitric oxide, muriatic acid, and ammonia were also amongst his gaseous discoveries. In 1772 Dr. Rutherford had demonstrated that a large portion of the atmosphere consisted of a peculiar gas differing from fixed air, yet, like it, extinguishing flame and unfit for respiration ; to this component part of the atmosphere Dr. Priestley gave the name of phlogisticated air, and pointed out the means of ascertaining its relative proportion to the oxygen of the air by the agency of nitrous gas. Another celebrated name connected with the progress of this department of chemical science is that of Caven- dish. In 1776 he presented the Royal Societv with a dissertation on inflammable, fixed, and nitrous air. The two latter gases had been well described by his con- temporaries ; but nothing very precise was known re- specting inflammable air, till its sources and properties were described in Cavendish's masterly paper. He found that it was the lightest known substance, and in con- junction with Watt he showed that by combustion with oxygen water was the only result ; hence the term hydrogen subsequently applied to this gas. Cavendish also discovered the composition of nitric acid ; and by passing a succession of electric sparks through common air, and through artificial mixtures of oxygen and ni- trogen, he succeeded in effecting their combination, and m producing that acid. Two capital and extremely important steps were thus made in chemical science, chiefly by the joint labours of Priestley and of Cavendish -, namely, the composition of the atmosphere and of water ; and about the same time 219 Scheele (born at Stralsund in 1742, and died at KOpIng near Stockholm in 1786), in his dissertation on Manganese, made known the existence of chlorine, or, as he then termed it, of dephlogisticated muriatic acid gas. Ui» " Observations and Experiments on Air and Fire," and on " Heat and Light," are also masterly productions, and contributed, in conjunction with the labours of his eminent contemporaries, to invest chemistry with a degree of interest and importance which gave it an entirely new and distinct aspect, and an elevated rank in physical science. It was at this period that Lavoisier and his associates in Paris undertook that celebrated reform of chemical nomenclature which ended in the banishment of phlo- giston, and introduced a logical precision before unknown into the precincts of chemistry. Lavoisier experimented upon a magnificent scale, and with a degree of statical accuracy which stamped his researches with a new and valuable character. By a series of beautiful experiments he determined the relative proportions of the elements of the atmosphere and of those of water ; he" rejected all supporters of combustion except oxygen, and regarded it as the sole source of the heat and light evolved during that process ; he endeavoured to prove that gases were constituted by the union of ponderable bases with caloric, or the matter of heat, and examined, upon a splendid scale and with princely apparatus, the results of the combustion of sulphur, phosphorus, carbon, and the metals ; he inferred that oxygen was the universal acidifying principle ; and by a series of well conceived researches he demonstrated the identity of charcoal and the diamond, and showed that when burned in oxygen they yielded carbonic acid gas. Lavoisier was also the first who examined with requisite accuracy the products of the distillation of animal and vegetable substances ; he also inquired with more success than any of his pre- decessors into the phenomena of fermentation, and, by examining the contents of certain vegetable juices, pre- vious to and after that process, he drew some curious and important conclusions respecting the changes that take place : he also extended and corroborated Scheele's views as to the importance of the chemical agencies of light. These, and a variety of other details, are embodied in Lavoisier's Elemensde Chimie, which appeared at Paris in 1789 ; a work which eminently displavs the extent and perspicuity of his views as a theoretical and experimental philosopher, and which contains a masterly refutation of the phlogistic doctrines. The abstract facts, however, upon which this refutation rests may be traced to Mayow, Hooke, Priestley, and Scheele. It has been stated that the prominent features of the French theory were its explanation of the phenomena of combustion and of acidification, the presence of oxygen being deemed es- sential in both cases. That air is the food of fire was known at a very remote period ; that it causes the increase of weight sustained by metals during their calcination was shown by Key early in the seventeenth century ; that a part only of"^ the atmosphere, identical with a matter contained in saltpetre, is concerned in the support of flame, was explained by Hooke in 1667 ; and that the vital, or igneous spirit, as he terms it, con- tributes to the formation of acids was asserted by Mayow in 1674. Here, therefore, without even infringing upon the eighteenth century, we have, in explicit detail, the principal facts and arguments requisite for the con- struction of the French theory ; and if to these we add the discovery of oxygen by Priestley, and of the com- position of water and of nitric acid by Watt and Caven- dish, what then becomes of its title to originality ? The influence of the researches connected with the philosophy of heat, and of those relating to the pro- duction, properties, and constitution of the gases, upon the improvement and extension of chemistry, will now be apparent ; but one of the most fertile sources of its recent progress is of a distinct and remarkable origin, namely, the discovery of the chemical influences cf elec- tricity. In 1790 Galvani of Bologna ascertained that certain spasmodic or convulsive contractions might be produced by the action of electricity upon the nerves of a recently killed animal ; and that if the sciatic nerve of a frog be laid bare and touched with a piece of zinc, whilst at the same time the muscle is touched with gold, similar effects to those of electricity are produced whenever the metals were brought info contact, or connected together by conductors of electricity ; if nonconductors were used, no spasm ensued. He accounted for these and similar effects by assuming that the nerves and muscles were in opposite electrical states, and that the spasms were the consequence of their annihilation or discharge. Volta, on the other hand, finding that two different metals were essential, referred the phenomena to the electro- motive power of the metals ; and following up this idea, he soon succeeded in producing that extraordinary form of electro-generative apparatus which is now known under the name of the Voltaic pile or battery, consisting of al- CHEMISTRY. ternatlons of two metals with an intervening fluid : zinc, copper, and diluted acids are the substances now generally resorted to. It has lately been shown by Faraday that chemical action is the exclusive source of the electricity of these Voltaic arrangements ; but their history and the theory of their phenomena will be given elsewhere. In theyear 1800 the chemical powers of the Voltaic pile were first observed in regard to the decomposition of water and certain saline solutions, by Messrs. Nicholson and Carlisle ; these were more accurately investigated in 1803 by Hisinger and Berzelius ; and in 1806 Sir H. Davy com- municated his celebrated lecture " On some Chemical Agencies of Electricity" to the Royal Society. He had previously (1801 ) given a paper to the Society containing an account of some galvanic combinations formed by the arrangement of single metallic plates and fluids, analogous to the galvanic apparatus of Volta ; but it was not till the publication of tne Bakerian Lecture above alluded to that the importance of electro-chemical science could be appreciated. It contains a masterly outline of the subject; and its details present a fine specimen of experimental inquiry, especially in reference to the manner in which he traces out the decomposing powers of an electrical current in effecting the separation of the elements of water, the skill with which the conflicting results of other experimentalists are examined and explained, the caution with which he proceeds from experiment to theory, and the sagacity with which he employs theo- retical views as the source of new experimental inquiries. Following the path which he had thus opened for himself, it led him on to the most important and extraordinary results, among which were the decomposition of the alkalis and earths, and the discovery of an entirely new class of metals. But the eradicfrtion of established errors is perhaps a more difficult task than the promulgation of new theories ; and in this Davy rendered a memorable service to che- mistry by his several papers on " Oxymuriatic Acid," in which he successfully establishes the views of Seheele re- garding its nature, and refutes and subverts those of the Frencli school, and which had been sanctioned by the chemists of Europe : he demonstrates the existence of acids without oxygen, and lays the foundation of the theory of the hydracids. lo these masterly researches Davy added a third series, of equal if not superior importance ; those relating to the safety lamp. His first paper upon this subject is printed in the Philosophical Transactions for 1815, and was followed by four others. Finding that flame would not recede through tubes of very small diameter, the idea occurred to him of constructing a lamp which should have no connection with the surrounding air except by capillary tubes ; and he inferred from previous "experi- ments that such a lamp might safely be employed in coal mines infested by fire-damp. He then endeavoured to ascertain the extent to which the tubes might be shortened without interfering with this principle of safety, and was thus led to cut them down, till their transverse section resembled a series of meshes . This approached so closely to wire-gauze that he was induced to try how far that tissue would prevent the passage of flame ; and finding it efiectual, he employed it in the construction of his lamp, and ultimately adopted the simple and efllicient arrangement now in general and successful use. During the experimental investigations upon which the dis- covery of the safety lamp was founded, Davy ascertained a number of curious facts respecting the constitution and temperatureof flame, which, with other parts of his general inquiry, are riot less ingenious than original. In No- vember, 1820, Sir H. Davy became president of the Royal Society, and continued to contribute papers as heretofore, some of them upon subjects of much interest, ably and philosophically discussed : among them the essays on the modes of protecting the copper sheathing of ships deserve especial notice ; they have furnished hints for the pre- servation of iron and other corrodible metals from the influence of air and water, and promise to lead to results of great practical importance. In the course of the year 1827 his health became seriously impaired ; he passed the greater part of the year 1828 in Italy, and terminated his memorable existence at Geneva in May, 1829, in the fifty-second year of his age. We have now briefly sketched the principal circum- stances in the history of chemistry bearing upon its origin and progress as a science, without, however, adverting to the labours of contemporaries ; it remains to add a short uotice respecting the art of Analysis, and the important consequences of which the prosecution of that branch of the science has been productive. Analysis was first scientifically pursued by Bergman of Sweden. He was born in 1735, and died in 1781, in con- sequence, as is said, of too intense application to his studies. The use of tests for the discovery of certain substances held in aqueous and other solutions, is first particularly dwelt upon by Boyle. He used vegetable colours for the detection of acids and alkalis, and noticed the cloudiness produced by nitrate of silver }n solution of common salt. In 16G7 Du Clos undertook an examination of the mineral waters of France, and in 1C86 Hierne published some clever experiments upon the same subject in Swe- den. In 1726 Boulduc used spirit of wine to preci- pitate the salts insoluble in that menstruum ; in 1765 Venel pointed out the existence of fixed air in the waters of Selters, Spa, and Pyrmont ; Lane, in 1769, showed the method ot imitating chalybeate springs ; and in 1772 Priestley published directions for saturating water with fixed air. The above and other tests were particularly ex- amined, their accuracy compared, and the best modes of applying them pointed out by Bergman : his dissertations on the waters of Upsal, on sea-water, and on the arti- ficial preparation of medicated waters, each exhibit proofs of his skill as an analyst, and accuracy as an experimenter. He also turned his attention to the analysis of minerals ; his essay, entitled De Minerarum Docimasid Humidd, must be considered as the parent source of that branch of analytic chemistry so successfully followed up, though upon a limited scale, by Seheele, and in the improvement and extension of which Klaproth passed his long and laborious life. Klaprothwas born at Wernigerode in Prussia in 1743, and died at Berlin in 1817. Hepublished 207 essays in his " Contributions towards the Chemical Knowledge of Mineral Substances." Another eminent name among chemical analysts Is that of Vauquelin, who died at an advanced age m Paris in 1829. He was originally a pea- sant boy in Normandy, and afterwards was employed in Fourcroy's laboratory, where he not only acquired great dexterity in the ordinary duties of his situation, but became an expert and original analyst. He afterwards rose to high eminence in his profession ; and his numerous and important contributions and discoveries are lasting monuments of his skill and industry. Among the improvers of analytical chemistry in this country Chenevix, Howard, and Tennant deserve par- ticular mention ; but to none is this part of the science more deeply indebted than to Dr. WoUaston. With him and Davy all that is practically useful in the theory of definite proportionals, or, as it is often called, the Atomic Theory, may be said to have originated ; though the facts upon which it is founded were chiefly furnished by the German analysts, and by Higgins of Dublin. We have in another place given some account of this Important subject, and have endeavoured to explain the facts upon which it is founded, and the results to which it leads : its promulgation with us is mainly at- tributable to WoUaston's suggestions contained in his paper " On a Synoptic Scale of Chemical Equivalents," brought before the Royal Society in November, 1813. Many years previously he had established the import- ant doctrine of multiple proportions in a paper " On Superacid and Subacid Salts." He now showed the practical applications of which the theory was susceptible ; and, by connecting the scale of equivalents with Gunter's sliding rule, has put into the hands x)f the chemist an instrument infinite in its uses, and equally essential to the student, the adept, and the manufacturer. There remains to be noticed a distinct branch of che- mistry of extreme interest and importance, but beset with peculiar difficulties ; namely, that relating to organic substances. Some progress was made in it by Seheele ; but it has chiefly been enriched by the labours of modern and contemporary philosophers, and in their hands has assumed an entirely now aspect. The composition of organic bodies may be viewed in two ways ; either as relates to their ultimate elements, or to their proximate groups. The former are remarkably few in number, and are almost exclusively confined to four ; namely, carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. These, by their varied and extraordinary union, give rise to innumerable secon- dary products or proximate principles. That the same elementary forms of matter should give rise to such infinitely varied products, merely in consequence of the varying proportions in which thev are combined and the circumstances under which they have been presented to each other ; tliat food and poisons, alkalis and acids, sweets and bitters, and, in short, the most opposite and dissimilar qualities, should arise out of such causes — is extremely remarkable ; and although every day is adding to our information, and clearing difficulties from this department of chemistry; it is but in its infant state. In looking at the present state of chemistry, it must be allowed that it exhibits a most promising aspect ; the study of its abstract principles is calculated to keep the curiosity constantly on the alert, and awaken an intense and peculiar interest ; and it is quite impossible to glance at its recent progress, and at the extraordinary discoveries which are daily rewarding the labours of its skilful cul- tivators, without anticipating most important conse- quences. Should its progress during the ensuing century only equal that of the past, it must lead to results deeply affecting the interests and welfare of niiinkind ; but as it has hitherto acquired strength with its progress, its wonders may be expected to accumulate in a much higher ratio. We already seem to be on the brink of some great discovery connected with those powers and CHEMISTRY. properties of matter which we call electrical. Their association with, and convertibility as it were into, heat, light, and magnetism, and their identity with the cause of chemical atfinity, have already been turned to great account ; and it is only necessary to assume the possession of a more unlimited command that we at present enjoy over the production or evolution of this extraordinary agent, less dependent and scanty means of summoning it into existence or activity, and a more intimate acquaint- ance witli its forms and qualities, to confer the highest interest upon our speculations. Its chemical powers would then be perpetually called into action as a sub- stitute for the more sluggish or circuitous and difficult methods of ordinary decomposition. Its single application to the evolution of oxygen and hydrogen from water would alone work wonders ; whilst the facility of its con- veyance and transmission, its ubiquity, and its varied attributes in those different states which for want of more explicit knowledge of their cause have been termed quantity and tension, seem to point it out as of unlimited application to human uses. Through its instrumentality telegraphic communication has not only been accelerated, but rendered independent of weather, and equally facile by night as by day ; and even in the present state of this invention there seems no reason against such convej;- ance of our thoughts, wants, and wishes, so as to transmit them over the globe with a rapidity as much beyond all previous experience, as the travelling on a rail-road exceeds that of a common carriage. Connected, therefore, with the progress of the higher departments of chemical science, and indeed intimately interwoven with it, is the advancement of its application to all the arts of life. It is often supposed that the suc- cessful applications of chemistry to the arts have been rather the results of accident or chance than the con- sequence of those apparently abstract studies, and curious rather than useful discoveries, as they are called, in which the truly philosophical chemist is engaged, and in which his labours terminate ; but experience justifies no such conclusion. There can be no doubt that Black's re- searches into those effects of heat which are connected with changes in the state and form of bodies, and es- pecially with the constitution of vapour, led Watt into that train of reasoning by which his improvements in the steam engine were ultimately effected. Most of the won- ders of modern chemistry must be referred to Galvani's experiments on a dead frog. They led Volta to the construction of the electric pile ; and, in the hands of Davy and his successors, what important conquests have been attained, and what extraordinary consequences are daily flowing from a source so apparently unpromising and irrelevant ! Independent of the new agents which have been placed in the hands of the experimentalist, and of the new and important theoretical considerations which arise out of them, the whole aspect and character of a great department of physical science has been won- derfully changed, extended, and improved ; the cause of magnetism has been developed ; and a power no less extraordinary and applicable to human uses than light and heat, perhaps indeed the parent of both, is gradually showing us its mysterious relations. Of two great prac tical consequences have these inquiries already been productive ; namely, the electrical telegraph, and the preservation of metals from corrosion. That others are upon the eve of their development cannot be doubted ; and in proportion as our knowledge of this agent and consequent power over it is extended, those ends must certairdy be attained which we have above ventured to anticipate. From other departments of this science we are con- stantly acquiring similar benefits : the progress of gas illumination, the great improvements in metallurgic operations, in the arts of dyeing and calico-printing, in the manufacture of cements, in the preservation of timber from dry-rot, in gilding and silvering the metals, are only a few of the cases in point ; even '.he difficult and apparently isolated researches into the relative pro- portions of the ultimate elements of the proximate or- ganic products, and the application of the atomic theory to those researches, have not been fruitless, considered in reference to what are termed their practical results and popular and useful applications. The brewer and the distiller are reaping the benefits of such inquiries ; the conversion of starch, and even of wood, into sugar, are the practical consequences of theoretical inferences ; from the destructive distillation of ligneous matter we are already furnished with our chief supply of vinegar, and with a liquid which, as a combustible and a solvent, has to a great extent superseded the use of_^alcohol, and may possibly take its place at no very remote period as an intoxicatmg stimulant : the saw-dust of certain woods has been shown susceptible of conversion into nutriment ; and the analysis of bone points it out, when properly prepared, as almost equal to its weight of flesh as an article of human food. In short, of the arts of life the greater number are dependent upon chemical principles ; many of them, and perhaps the most important, are 221 exclusively so ; others, though apparently mechanical, mvolve chemical principles : hence the great and growing importance of chemical science as a branch of genersu education bearing upon political economy, and upon the prosperity of the arts and manufactures. Having given this outline of the rise, progress, uses, and applications of chemical science, we must refer to other articles for more explicit information upon the different heads that have been alluded to. In reference to further details respecting the history of this depart- ment of knowledge, especially as relates to alchemy and to the history of chemical inventions, we m^ refer to Dr. Thomson's History of Chemistry, and to the pre- fatory chapter of Mr. Brando's Manual. The extent necessarily occupied by chemistry in a map of human knowledge will be evident from the brief definition of the science given at the outset of this article ; for it not only leads us to inquire into the com- position of every product of nature and of art, but to ex- amine the elements of all the forms of matter, and the laws which govern their mutual actions and reactions. The questions which a chemist propounds to himself, in examining any newly discovered substance, involve therefore a long train of inquiries, which can only be an- swered and worked out by multiplied experiments'; for it is impossible to move onwards in this science except upon the basis of experimental research. Accordingly, when a body of unknown nature is presented to us, we endeavour, first to ascertain whether it be a simple or a compound substance. If simple, to what class of elementary bodies does it belong ; is it combustible or incombustible ; is it electro-negative or electro-positive ; how is it affected by heat ; what are its relations to other forms of matter ; what its powers of combination ; what are the propor- tions in which it unites with other substances ; what are its characters and those of its combinations as a che- mical and physiological agent ; what are its uses in the arts and in medicine ? If it be a compound substance, we inquire into the nature and number of its component parts : are they new, or are they known elements ; in what proportions are they combined ? We also, as before, examine its thermal and electrical relations, and its use- ful applications. These, and many other questions which arise in the course of chemical investigation, involve as it were several distinct branches of inquiry, and lead us to contemplate chemistry under two points of view; namely, as an independent science, which embraces the whole field of chemical knowledge, and investigates the che- mical relations of bodies without reference to any ex- traneous considerations — this is pure, theoretical, or philo- sophical chemistry ; and secondly, as a science having certain objects in common with others, as with minera- logy, medicine, physiology, and the arts — this being ap- plied chemistry. In a subject then so extensive and complicated as che- mistry, systematic arrangement is of the utmost impor- tance to the teacher and student. In the broad principles of arrangement most writers agree ; but in minor details each generally pursues a path of hfc own. It would be useless, even if it were possible, to enumerate the details of these arrangements as adopted by the leading didactic writers on chemistry ; but the basis upon which they are founded deserves a few words of explanation. The objects of chemistry are all included under one or other of the following heads ; namely, — 1. The general powers and properties of matter. 2. The chemistry of elementary substances. 3. The chemistry of compounds. And each of these require several subdivisions. Thus, un- der the first head, we include attraction and affinity, heat, light, and electricity ; under the second head are included the chemical history and properties of the pon- derable elementary substances, and their mutual reactions, which of course leads on to the third head ; namely, to the chemical history and properties of compound bodies. To render the systematic arrangements of the elements and their compounds intelligible, it will be necessary to enumerate the former, and point out such of their cha- racters as are connected with their classification. Every substance upon our globe contains one or more of the following fifty-four elementary or simple bodies : some of them are of extremely rare occurrence, others abundant and always with and about us. It will be ob- served that by far the greater number of them come un- der the denomination of metals j of the others, oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, and nitrogen, are by far of most fre- quent occurrence, as will be obvious when it is recol- lected that air and water and all vegetable and animal products include two or more of the last-mentioned sub- stances. The equivalent or combining proportions of these elements, although mentioned under individual sub- stances in this work, are here subjoined (see the articles Affinity, Atomic Theory, and Equivalents), and also the symbols by which they are represented. CHEMISTRY. Table of the Simple Substances, with their Symbols and Equivalent or Combining Weights. , Equiva- Symbol. Symbol. (Berze- Equiva- lents, Hy- (Brande.) lents, Oxy- drogen =1. lius.) gen =1. 1 Aluminum - 10 al. Al. 1-25 2 Antimony 65 ant. Sb. 8-125 3 Arsenic - - 38 ar. As. 4-75 4 Barium - 69 ba. Ba- 8-625 5 Bismuth - - 72 At. Bi. 9- 6 Boron - 20 bo. B. 2-5 7 Bromine - - 78 b. Br. 9-75 8 Cadmium 56 cad. Cd. 7- 9 Calcium - - 20 cal. Ca. 2-5 10 Carbon - - 6 car. C. 0-75 11 Cerium - 48 ce. Ce. 6- 12 Chlorine 36 c. CI. 4-5 13 Chromium 28 chr. Cr. 3-5 14 Cobalt - - 30 cob. Co. 3-75 15 Columbiura - 185 col. Ta. 23-125 16 Covper - - 32 cu. Cu. 4- 17 Fluorine - 18 f- P. 2-28 18 Glucium - 18 g'- G. 2-25 19 Gold 200 au. Au. 25- •20 Hydrogen I h. H. .9'^^ 21 Iodine - - 125 i. I. 1 5025 22 Iridium 96 ir. Ir. \r 23 Iron 28 fi- Fe. 3-5 24 Lead - - 104 t Pb. 13- 25 Lithium 10 L. 1-25 26 Magnesium 12 mag. Mg. 1-5 27 Manganese 28 Mn. 3-5 2S Mercury 200 h^"' ^o. 25- 29 Molybdenum - 48 rml. 6- 30 Nickel ' - 28 nic. Ni. 3-5 31 Nitrogen 14 n. N. 1-75 32 Osmium 100 0*. Os. 12-5 34 Pafladiirm 8 0. O. 1- 54 vol. Pd. 6-75 35 Phosphorus 16 P- P. 2- 36 Platinum 96 pla. P4. 12- 37 Potassium - 40 po. K. 6- 38 Rhodium 45 rh. R. 5-625 39 Selenium 40 *e. Se. 5- 40 Silicium 8 ti. Si. I- 41 Silver 110 ?, the hand, and ecygct, a seizure.) Gout in the hands. CHI'ROGRAPH. (Gr. x^'?, and y§a(?)«, I write.) In Diplomatics, a species of instrument contrived for the purpose for which indentures were devised ; viz. the enabling different parties to retain authenticated counterparts of the deed.. Some word (commonly the word chirographum, whence the name) was written be- tween the two copies on the same sheet, and cut through lengthwise when they were divided. CHIRO'LOGY. (Gr. x^k^ and Xoyos, discourse.) The language of the fingers ; sometimes called dactyl- ology, from Set,KtvXvas added to the original martial impress of national usages, and the compound system of chivalry were thus produced, it is not easy to ascertain. It has been said that the investiture of the knight was purely military until the reign of Charlemagne ; and it may be supposed that the wars of the Franks against the Saracens first blended the ardour of war and religion together, and that the Crusades completed the union. At the latter period were instituted the two celebrated military orders of monks, the Templars and Hospitallers (see those arti- cles), the code of whose government combined monastic and knightly usages. After valour and devotion, the third characteristic feature of chivalry was gallantry to the fair sex ; and the source of this sentiment also has been traced to the habits and feelings of the Northern tribes, among whom woman was looked on with a much more exalted sense of her dignity than in the most civilized countries of antiquity. It is needless to add, that this romantic feeling, however high its precepts may have sounded in theory, degenerated into licentiousness in actual life. M. de Sainte Palaye, the learned French historian of the usages of chivalry, has brought instances enough to prove the extreme depravation of manners which prevailed, even in those courts and at those periods in which the spirit of chivalry was most prevalent. If the Crusades communicated to chivalry its devotional character, it is in the poetry of the Troubadours about the same period, in the 12th and 13th centuries, that we find its peculiarity of devotion to the female gex first developed. But in their verses it does not appear clothed with the romantic purity with which it was afterwards invested by the.writers of the heroic tales of chivalry ; and still less in those of the contemporary French writers of the Fabif'aux, from whose compositions we draw the most authentic monuments which we possess in this curious branch of antiquarian research. The knight, or even the esquire, was bound to follow a single lady and dedicate himself to her service ; but little delicacy is either CHIVALRY. intimated or enjoined in the relations which subsisted between them, and his devotion to lier was considered as entitling hira to every recompence love could bestow- The 14th century was the brilliant period of chivalry ; when its usages, originally formed in the manners of the people, had become fixed and embellished by the fictions of the writers of romances ; and when princes and chief- tains, forming their idea of tlie institution rather from the descriptions contained in them than from real life, .sought to bring back their courts and camps to the like- ness of those ideal models of perfection. It may be more truly said that the romances of chivalry were the pro- totypes of that state of courtly society which existed in the reigns of our Edward III. and Richard II., and of which Froissart has left us such accurate and lively repre- sentations, than that existing manners and sentiments furnished the subject-matter of those romances. These fictions, of which the heroes were taken from among a long list of fanciful personages, in whose history a little tradition of past events was blended with a much larger proportion of fable, represented the knight not only as devoted to the service of his religion, his lord, and his mistress, but also as consecrated to the general service of the oppressed and maintenance of right all over the world. There can be little doubt that the peculiar cere- monies which, in the 14th and 15th centuries, accom- panied the creation of a knight, — the vow of chivalry, the watching, prayer, and fasting, &c — were borrowed by ro- mantic imaginations from such fabulous recitals, which were read and related in every courtly company. In the reign of Edward III., the romantic part of cliivalry, as we have said, was more closely transfused into real manners than at any period either preceding or subsequent. Before that period, the manners of the knights and dames had exhibited but little of that polish and refinement, their sentiments but little of that generosity, which were the subjects of so much imaginary description ; and, in later times, chivalry gradually decayed. Its usages were main- tained with even more of magnificence than before ; its various rites, titles, and distinctions subsisted for a long period in most European countries, and partly remain to this day; but the spirit of feudal devotedness was quenched by the multiplication of mercenary troops ; adherence to a feudal lord was superseded by the more general feelings of national patriotism (which, singularly enough, was almost wholly omitted in the chivalric code), and the ex- travagances into which che imaginary point of honour had led its votaries fell into discredit and ridicule. It is, therefore, to the I4th century, and especially to that part of its chronicles preserved by the true annalist of chivalry, Froissart, that we must look for the period when the line between real society and that represented in romances was most nearly broken down. "When the usages of chivalry were most flourishing, all men of noble birth (except the highest) were supposed to pass through three orders or gradations. They first lived as pages in the train of nobles and chiefs of high rank; next, as esquires, they attached themselves to the person of some individual knight, to whom they were bound by a strict law of obedience, and for whom they were bound to incur every danger, and, if necessary, sacrifice their lives ; and, thirdly, they were promoted to the rank of knighthood. (For the different orders of knighthood see Knight.) It is suflBcient to observe here, that however great the dis- tinction might be between knights in point of rank and wealth, custom established a species of equality among all of the same order, which may be said to subsist among gentlemen of ihe present day. They formed, all over Europe, a common corporation, as it were, possessing certain rights, and owing each other certain mutual duties and forbearances. They were united, not by the ties of country, but by those of feudal obedience, which attached every knight to the banner of his liege lord, from whom he held his fee ; but little or rather no dishonour attached to knights who were under no such feudal tie, if they chose their own chieftain wherever they thought fit : they were free adventurers, whose order was a passport in every service ; and, in the actual conflict, the hostility of knights was moderated by usage. Thus, it was dishonourable in any knight to take a knight's life if disarmed, and not to set him free when a prisoner on receiving a fitting ransom. Manny and Chandos, the two most celebrated of Edward III.'s knights, were at- tached wholly to the banner of their sovereign, and not to that of their country; and although the French con- stable Duguesclin, the third among these mirrors of chi- valry, appears to have been devoted to the cause of France as well as that of his master, this double loyalty found few imitators. In peace, also, knights of all countries were welcome visitors at the courts of chivalric sove- reigns ; and all enjoyed the privilege of presenting them- selves at the tournament, and contending there for the prize. With regard to the point of honour, which forms the most important feature in the usages of chivalry, see some details under the article Duel. The principal objects to which it related were, religious belief; fealty 22.5 CHLORIDES. to the feudal superior ; devotion to some one selected lady ; and, finally, the general character for honour and courtesy which it was incumbent on a knight to main- tain ; for although his imaginary duties, as a knight errant, to avenge wrong and succour the oppressed on every occasion, were not of course very strictly put in practice, yet his vow to perform those duties attached to his character a certain degree of sacredness which it was necessary to maintain. Chivalrous honour was chiefly supported in two ways : first, by the single combat or duel, whether on account of serious provocation or by way of trial of strength ; secondly, by the performance of vows, often of the most frivolous and extravagant nature. These latter were generally undertaken for I the honour of the ladies. Many historical instances of i these absurd yet daring follies are preserved by Frois- ; sart. They, with other usages of knighthood, were I long preserved among those who aimed at the reputa- tion of chivalry, after these usages had ceased to form a part of the ordinary customs of society. Thus, the instances which Froissart relates of knights riding alone up to the barriers of fenced cities, &c., were imitated in after times, and at no less personal hazard, by such romantic personages as Lord Herbert of Cherbury, whose feats performed in rivalry with the French champion Balagny are mentioned in his Memoirs. But the vows did not only relate to martial achievements, but to others of a more extravagant and grotesque character. "We need only refer to Monstrelet's narrative of the company called " Galois" of knights and ladies, who bound themselves, for love of each other, to follow a particular code of usages ; of which a part consisted in wearing thick clothes in summer and thin in winter, to show that the power of their love rendered them insensible to the difference of seasons ; a vow which was maintained with such perse- verance, that the greater part of the devoted company actually died of cold. (See also the History of the Vow of the Heron Sainte Falaye, vol. iii.) The commence- ment of such extravagances, however, was rather a sign of the decline of the true spirit of chivalry. It decayed with the progress of mercenary armies and the decline of feudal institutions through the 15th century ; in the iCth, it was little more than a lively recollection of past ages, which knights such as Bayard and sovereigns such as Francis I. and Henry VIII. strove to revive ; and, finally, it became extinguished amid religious discords, leaving as its only relic the code of honour, which is still considered as governing the conduct of the gentleman. CHLA'MYPHORE, Chlamyphorus. (Gr. x>^«-f^''i' a cloak, and (p^m, I carry.) A name given to a small species of Armadillo, which is covered by its coat of mail as by a cloak. The animal is not above 6 inches long, and, like the rest of its genus, inhabits exclusively the continent of South America. It is interesting from the analogy of its skeleton and coat of mail to those of the gigantic extinct megatherium. CHLENA'CEiE. {Gr.x>-»tvet,acloak. All the names belonging to this order are compounded of this word, used in a figurative sense for an involucrum.) A natural order of shrubby or arborescent Exogens, allied to Alal- vacecB, on account of their monadelphous stamens and in- volucrated flowers, but referred by Jussieu to the vicinity of Ebenacece ; it, however, appears, from their imbricated calyx, regular flowers, and albumen, that they have the greatest affinity with Cistacece. They are all natives of Madagascar ; beautiful in their flowers, but of no known use ; and are, in fact, but little known even to botanists. CHLO'RAL. (From the first syllables of chlorine and alcohol.) A liquid composed of chlorine, carbon, and oxygen, obtained by the action of chlorine upon alcohol. CHLORANTHA'CEiE. (Chloranthus, one of the genera.) A small natural order of apetalous Exogens, nearly allied to Saururacece and Piper acece; from both of which it differs in wanting a sac to the embryo, and in having a pendulous ovule and opposite leaves with inter- mediate stipules. Blume places these plants near to Opercular iiiecB. They are natives of the hotter parts of the world, and appear to possess stimulating properties of great importance. Chloranthus officinalis and brachy- stachys, although not officinal in Europe, are believed to be among the most powerful of stimulating agents. CHLO'RATES. Combinations of chloric acid with salifiable bases. Of these salts the chlorate of potash is best known ; it was formerly called oxymuriate of pot- ash. "When mixed with combustibles, such as sulphur or charcoal, and some of the metals, it forms highly ex- plosive compounds, which ignite by a blow or by friction, or upon the contact of sulphuric acid- A mixture of this salt with sugar, or with sulphuret of antimony, is used for tipping the matches which inflame when dipped into sulphuric acid, or when briskly drawn through a piece of emery paper. Chlorate of potash consists of 76 chlorine acid -I- 48 potassa = 124 of the chlorate. CHLO'RIDES. Combinations of chlorine, corre- sponding with the oxides. Common salt is a chloride of sodium; that is, a binary compound of chlorine and sodium. Where there are two chlorides of the same Q CHLORINE. base, the relative proportions of ciilorine in them are almost invariably as 1 to 2 ; hence the terms p7-otochloride and bichloride. Calomel and corrosive sublimate are the protochloride and bichloride of mercury. The latter is frequently termed perchloride. In calomel 200 of mercury are combined with 86 of chlorine, and in cor- rosive sublimate with twice 36 or 72. CHLO'IIINE. (Gr. x^^i^^^ green.) This gas was discovered in 1774 by Scheele, who called it dephlo- gisticated muriatic acid ; the French nomenclaturists afterwards termed it oxygenated muriatic acid, conceiving it to be a compound of oxygen and muriatic acid. This erroneous view of its nature was corrected in 1809 "by Sir H. Davy, who gave it the present name, indicative of its colour. Chlorine Is a simple substance, existing at common temperatures and pressures in the gaseous state ; but when subjected to a pressure of about four atmo- spheres it Jbecomes condensed into a yellow transparent liquid, which is a non-conductor of electricity. 100 cubical inches of chlorine, at mean temperature and pressure, weigh between 76 and 77 grains : water absorbs twice its volume, and acquires a yellow colour, and the peculiar suffocating odour of the gas. When humid chlorine is exposed to a temperature of 32°, it assumes a crystalline form ; this hydrate of chlorine consists of 1 equivalent of chlorine = 36 + 10 of water = 9 X 10 or 90. Chlorine is not only unrespirable, but very injurious when breathed, even if largely diluted : a taper burns in it with a red smoky flame, and is soon extinguished. Some of the metals, -when finely divided, spontaneously take fire in chlorine, such as brass leaf, or powdered antimony. A remarkable property of chlorine is its power of destroying almost all vegetable and animal colours ; hence the im- portant application of this gas and of some of its com- binations to the art of bleaching. It also destroys the putrid odour of decomposing vegetable and animal sub- stances, and infectious effluvia of all kinds, whence its use in fumigation, and in preventing the spread of infectious and contagious matter, and purifying noxious atmospheres. The great natural source of chlorine is common salt, which contains it in the proportion of about 60 per cent. It is procured by decomposing common salt by the joint agency of sulphuric acid and peroxide of manganese. The best proportions are 3 parts of salt and 1 of oxide of manganese ; these are well mixed, and put into a retort with 2 parts of sulphuric acid previously diluted with 2 of water. Chlorine is evolved, and its extrication is quickened by the application of a gentle heat. Chlorine may also be obtained from a mixture of muriatic acid with half its weight of black oxide -of manganese. The gas may be collected over water, and should be preserved in bottles with glass stoppers ; if left in the contact of water, it is soon absorbed. See Muriatic Acid. CHLORI'ODINE, or CHLORIO'DIC ACID. A compound of chlorine and iodine. CHLO'RITE. (Gr! s^Xagflj.) An earthy mineral of a green colour, often found in the cavities and veins of slate rocks. CHLO'KO. (Gr. ;c^4i{«f .) A term used in the com- position of botanical and other scientific words formed from the Greek, to indicate a clear lively green colour Without anv mixture. CHLtD'ROCARBO'NIC ACID. A compound formed by exposing a mixture of chlorine and carbonic oxide to the action of light. CHLO'ROQYA'NIC ACID. A compound of chlorine and cyanogen. CHLORO'METER. (Gr. %X«€«r, and A^STgev, amea- sure.) An instrument for the purpose of testing the decolouring or bleaching powers of chloride of lime, by which the relative values of different samples of that important bleaching and disinfecting compound may be ascertained. CHLO'ROPHAITE. (Gr. x^^'^i's, and ^»^«f > and (fxiva,, I shine.) A species of fluor spar, which, when heated, shines with a beautiful pale green light. CHLOROPHYLL. (Gr.x>^a>iof, and s), or ETIOLATION. In Botany, is a species of constitutional debility ; the affecte>^v, and hxof^oti, I re- ceive.) One of the ducts of the liver is called the ductus communis choledochus. CHO'LERA. (Gr. ^eXij, and piai, I flow.) A disease accompanied by vomiting and purging, with great pain and debility, and apparently arising from excess or acrimony of bile : it is most common at the close of summer and beginning of autumn, and seems to be produced by cold, suppressed perspiration, indigestible fruits, &c. It generally commences with a sense of pain about the bowels, fever, thirst, an irregular pulse, and severe vomiting and purging of bilious matter: in favour- able cases these symptoms subside in a few days with the aid of opiates, mucilaginous diluents, and mild aperients followed by tonics ; but in severe cases great exhaustion ensues, attended by depression of spirits, anxiety, hurried respiration, cold sweats, hiccup, low and fluttering pulse, and the patients rapidly sink, and are sometimes carried off within twenty-four hours. In such cases warm fo- mentations sometimes relieve the pain, and effervescent saline draughts check the sickness, and enable the sto- mach to bear large doses of opium. Cno'LERA, AsiA'Tic. The term Asiatic or Spasmodic Chol^a has been applied to a new .-wid most appalling form of pestilential disease, which seems to have been but indistinctly known prior to the year 1817. It made its appearance in August that year at Jessore, after having -previously raged to a formidable extent in the south of Bengal, and thence it spread over a great part of Asia, carrying off millions of human beings. In 1823 it broke out at Astracan, but did not at that time extend further into Russia; in 1828, however, it appeared at Orenburg, and during the autumn of that year and the spring of 1829 it spread over a considerable part of the Russian dominions. It raged at Moscow in Sep- tember, 1830 ; and having been apparently carried by the Russian army into Poland, it propagated itself through he " ■ object here i^ briefly to describe the cljaracteristic fea- tures of the disease in their unalloyed form, we shall omit all unnecessary details, and place before our readers a short account of its effects in its worst and by no means uncommon form. The first circumstance that strikes us in regard to the attacks of this disease is their suddenness. A person in apparent health feels slightly giddy, chilly, or sick, apd in the course of two or three hours sinks into a state of extraordinary and alarming debility ; the countenance assumes a deadly paleness, and the skin feels and 'look* like that of a corpse ; the pulse falls, flutters, and is al- CHOLERA, ASIATIC. . most imperceptible ; a livid circle surrounds the sunken e3cs ; the tongue is slightly furred, and the breath cold. Under this excessive and extraordinary prostration the patients sometimes die in the course of a very few hours ; otherwise it is succeeded by vomiting and purging, the voided matters resembling turbid whey, and being in fact a serous fluid with floating shreds or flocculi of coagu- lated albumen ; and now cramp assails the extremities, and afterwards the abdomen, producing spasms of varying but sometimes of extreme violence ; great pain and heat about the region of the stomach, and intolerable weight and anguish round the heart are complained of, with much thirst and anxiety ; the voice faulters, and the un- fortunate sufferer asks frequently, in plaintive and broken whispers, for cold water ; the secretions of urine, bile, and saliva appear, in this state of things, as if entirely suspended ; the evacuations have a singular fcetor, and the breath and perspiration have that peculiar odour which announces the rapid approach of death. Towards the ?^v> <^^ string of a lyre.') In Music, a combination of two of more sounds heard contempora- neously, forming a concord or a discord between them. Chord. In Geometry, is the straight line which joins the two extremities of the arc of a curve ; so called from the resemblance which the arc and chord together have to a bow and its string, the chord representing the string. The chord of an arc is equal to the size of half the arc ; hence, to find the length of the chord of any given arc, multiply the diameter by the sine of half the arc. Tables of chords are given in some of the older works on trigo- nometry ; but they have been superseded by the tables of sines, which are much more convenient for trigono- metrical calculations. CHOREA. (Gr. -jce^K, a chorus i the ancient accom- paniment to dancing.) The disease commonly called St. Vitus's dance. It shows itself by convulsive motions of the limbs, face, head, and trunk, varying extremely In extent and violence ; the speech is often more or less affected, and frequently the mental energies become grievously impaired. It is most common in early life, as from the age of ten or twelve to puberty ; and makes its approach gradually in persons chiefly of debilitated con- stitutions : the appetite is generally ravenous at first, and the bowels costive; various convulsive motions then ensue, and only cease during sleep, which, however, is seldom sound. This is one of those diseases which require es- pecial attention in its early stages, and which even in its slightest forms, when once habitual, is very difficult to manage. The leading treatment consists in the judicious administration of aperients and brisk purges, so as to clear the stomach and bowels thoroughly of all irritating matters; the constitution may at the same time be strengthened by tonics and chalybeates, with occasional stimulants ; and some of the more urgent spasmodic symptoms may be sometimes cautiously encountered by opium, camphor, henbane, and ether. Cold bathing also has its advantages when circumspectly resorted to ; and the mind must be diverted by change of air and scene. The diet should be very regular, nutritive, and never in excess. In this complaint much will depend upon the exertions of the patient himself, who, though relieved of the more urgent symptoms, will often retain relics of his disorder through a long life. CHO'REPI'SCOPI. (Gr. ;^, I describe.) The description of a district, in contradis- tinction to geography (the description of the earth or of countries) and topography (the description of particular spots) CHO'ROID MEMBRANE OF THE EYE. The second tunic of the eye lying under the sclerotic, with which it has a vascular connection : it commences at the optic nerve, and passes forward with the sclerotic to the beginning of the transparent cornea, where it firmly ad- heres to the sclerotic by a cellular membrane, forming a white fringe called the ciliary circle ; it then recedes from the sclerotic and cornea, forming a round coloured disc called the iris, and its posterior surlace is termed uvea. The choroid membrane is very vascular, and its external stellated vessels are called vasa verticosa. Its internal surface is covered by a black piginent. CHO'ROID PLE'XUS. A plexus of blood-vessels situated in the lateral ventricles of the brain. CHO'RUS. Gr. ;t«f»»-) A band of singers and dancers who performed odes in honour of the gods, par- ticularly Bacchus. The chorus formed an Important part of the Greek tragedies and early comedies, which were interspersed with odes. There were likewige se- veral other choruses besides these, as the Dithyrambic ; and the exhibition of these was one of the public burthens imposed on the richest private citizens of Athens. It was called the choregia,(x«5-';j'/«). See Drama, and Choragic Monument. I 228 I CHRISTIANITY. Chorus., In Music, the joint performance of music by the whole of the members of the orchestra. CHOU'ANS. In French History, the royalist in- surgents on the right bank of the Loire during the re- volution when the Vendeans rose on the left, were thus popularly named ; according to some, from the cry of the screech-owl {chat-huant), an imitation of which was a signal during their nightly meetings. They were for the most part brigands, and their object rapine rather than civil war. After the revolution of 1830, they made a transient reappearance in the neighbourhood of Nantes and Le Mans. CHREMATI'STICS. {^Gr. x^r./jM^a., wealth.) The science of wealth ; a name given by Continental writers to the science of political economy, or rather to what in their view constitutes a portion of the science. They consider ^political economy as a term more properly ap- plicable to the whole range of subjects which comprise the material welfare of states and citizens, and chrema- tistics (by which they mean nearly the same science which M'CuUoch and most other English writers describe as political economy) as merely a branch of it. See espe- cially M. de Sismondi, Etudes sur VEconomie Politique, See also Chrysology. CHRESTO'MATHY. (Gr. xi^'^'^os, useful, and a*«i.- Satva, I learn.) According to the etymology, that which it is useful to learn. The Greeks frequently formed com- monplace books by collecting the various passages to which, in the course of reading, they had aflSxed the mark x (;t?'; ""'■*?)• Hence books of extracts chosen with a view to utility have received this name. CHRISM. (Gr. xi''«ff. time.) Diseases of long duration are termed chronic, in opposition to those of more rapid progress, which are called acute. CHRO'NICLE. In Literature, an historical register of events in the order of time. Most of the historians of the middle ages were chroniclers who set down ths Q4 CHRONICLES. pvents which happened within the range of their infor- mation, according to the succession of years. CHRO'NICLES. The name of two books in the canon of scripture. They consist of an abridgment of sacred history from its commencement down to the return of the Jews from the Babylonish captivity, and are called by the Septuagint ■rtx.^ocXu^rofjt.ivce. (lit. things omitted), because they contain many supplemental re- lations omitted in the other historical boolis. It has been generally supposed that the Chronicles were com- piled by Ezra, though circumstances are not wanting to diminish the probability of this conjecture. Eichhorn (Einleitung, vol. ii.) gives as his reasons for attributing them to Ezra their similarity in point of style, idiom, and orthography to the books of Kings and Ezra ; while the opponents of this view base their opinion on the discrepancies that occur throughout Chronicles and Kings, in regard to facts, dates, numbers, names, and genealogies. (For a learned exposition of this subject, see the Penny Cyclopcedia, and the authorities there re- ferred to.) CHRO'NOGRAM. (Gr. ^gava^ , time, and y^a.^os, and ironu. Intake.) Organs concerned in the formation of chyle ; hence the stomach, duodenum, and liver are termed chylopoietic viscera. CHYME. (Gr. x^l^os, juice.) The pulpy layer of nutritious digested matter which adheres to the inner surface of the intestine, and yields the chyle by admixture with the biliary secretion. CIBO'RIUM. (Gr. xtSen^iov.) In Architecture, an insulated erection open on each side, with arches, and having a dome of ogee form carried or supported by four columns. It is also used to denote the coffer or case which contains the Host. CICA'DA, (Lat. a grass-hopper.) The name of a Linnaean genus of insects, celebrated in all ages for their powers of song or shrill chirp. Et cantu querulae rurapent arbusta cicadee, [Georgics, ili.) sings Virgil ; which Dryden renders, When creaking graat-hoppers on shrubs complain : although it is evident that Virgil alluded to the insects of the present genus, which habitually frequent shrubs and trees, and feed on their juices, having a peculiar ap- paratus for piercing the bark and sucking out the juice. They are therefore more accurately described by Lord Byron, as The shrill Cicadas, people of the pine. The manna of the shops is the inspissated juice of the Fraxinus ornns, poured out from the wounds inflicted by the Cicada orni. The organ of sound is peculiar to the male, and is situated on each side of the under and an- terior part of the abdomen. The insects referable to the Linnaean genus Cicadce are now separated into three families — Cicadidce, Fulgeridce, and Cercopidce. CICA'TRIX. (Lat.) The scar which remains after the skinning over of a wound. CICERO'NE, (Ital.) A name originally given by the Italians to those persons who pointed out to travellers the interesting objects with which Ital v abounds ; but applied universally at present to any individual who acts as a guide. This application of the term Cicerone has pro- bably its origin in the ironical exclamation, " E un Cicerone" (he is a Cicero), being elicited from the tra- veller by the well-known garrulity of the Italian guides. CICHORA'CE.ffi. (Gr. xi-)(,u^rt, name of the herb Cichory.) One of the four divisions of Compositce, a very extensive order of herbaceous or shrubby Exogens. The plants belonging to this division have a milky juice, and form a connecting link between ComposittB and Catnpa- nulacece. They inhabit the whole world, and are charac- terized by all the florets of the flower-heads being alike and ligulate. Lettuce, succory, and endive are familiar examples of Cichoracece, which are generally bitter, with a soporific quality resembling that of opium. CICI'NDELA. (Lat. cicendela, a glow-worm.) A name applied by Linnaeus to a genus of beetles, which is placed at the head of the order Coleoptera, from the circumstance of the outer lobe of the maxillae being con- verted into an additional pair of feelers, called internal maxillary palpi. The mandibles are very strong, and armed with strong teeth ; the maxillae are terminated by a moveable spur ; the eyes are large and prominent ; and the wings generally well developed. Endowed with such powers of perception, locomotion, and destruction, it may be readily inferred that these insects are a cruel and predatory race. Like the carnivora of a higher class, they are remarkable for the beauty of their colours, and were termed by Linnaeus the tigers of the insect world. The species referable to the Linnaean Cicindela are extremely numerous, and are divided into twenty sub- genera ; of which one only is British, and to this the term Cicindela is restricted. CICISBE'O. (Ital.) A word synonymous with cavalier servente, and applied to a class of persons in Italy who attend on married ladies with all the respect and devotion of lovers. Formerly the establishment of a fashionable lady was not considered complete without a cicisbeo, whose duty it was to accompany her to private parties and public amusements, to escort her in her walks, and .in short to be always at her side ready for her commands. This practice is now, however, on the decline. Though CICONIA. the office of a dcisbeo has been the subject of frequent invective, it has not been without its advocates and ad- mirers. Among others, Baretti has taken great pains to vindicate this custom in his Account of the Manners, 8;c. of Italy, vol. i. c. 8. He ascribes it to a spirit of gallantry derived from the ages of chivalry, and much heightened and refined by the revival of the Platonic philosophy in Italy about the 13th century, and by the verses of Petrarch and his numerous imitators. CICO'NIA. (Lat. a stork.) A genus of wading birds of the tribe Cultrirostres of Cuvier ; including the white stork (C2co»?a alba), the black stork ( C/co»m nigra), and the American stork {Ciconia magnari). CID. (Arab, seid, lord.) The name given to an epic poem of the Spaniards which celebrates the exploits of their national hero, Roderigo Diaz, Count of Bivar. It is supposed to have been written in the 13th century, about 150 years after the hero's death ; but unfortunately the author's name has not been transmitted to posterity. (See Southey's Chronicle of the Cid.) CI'DER. A fermented liquor made from the juice of apples. Cider is made in all the temperate climates of the world which are not sufficiently warm for ma- turing the grape, and where the cold is not so great as to reduce the inhabitants to only the beer produced by a fermented decoction of grain. Cider is formed by grinding or crushing the apples when ripe, either in a circular stone trough by a stone roller turned by a horse (which is the common practice in Worcestershire, Herefordshire, &c.), or between fluted or spiky, and af- terwards between smooth rollers of wood or iron, driven by men (as practised in Devonshire, and in most places where cider is made on a small scale). The apples, in- cluding the core and the seeds, being reduced to a pulp bv crushing or grinding, the mass is put into a hair- cloth and powerfully pressed ; and the liquor which runs from it is put into casks, where it is allowed to ferment, the casks being freely exposed to the air in the shade ; the progress of the fermentation is then carefully watched, and as the sediment has subsided the liquor is racked off; on the proper time being chosen for doing this depends the excellence of the cider. The best cider, other circumstances being the same, is that in which the fermentation has gone on slowly, and where the vinous fermentation has hot gone so far as to become acetous. The check to 'fermentation consists in racking off from one cask to another. Before winter the casks are re- moved to a cellar, and by the following spring the liquor is fit for use, or for bottling. The principal cider coun- ties in England are Worcestershire, Herefordshire, and Devonshire. The Worcestershire and Herefordshire cider will keep from twenty to thirty years ; while the best Devonshire cider will rarely keep more than five or six years. CI'LIA. (IjdA,. ciWnxa, an eyelaih.) The hairs which grow from the margin of the eyelids ; the term is also applied to microscopiQ filaments or plates which project from animal membranes and are endowed with quick vibratile motion. In most of the lower animals the re- spiratory function is effected by means of the vibratile cilia ; many animalcules and the gemmules of the Acrites move by a similar mechanism ; and it has recently been ascertained that vibratile cilia have a share in the per- formance of some important functions in the highest classes of the animal kingdom, where they have been de- tected on the membrane lining the female generative and respiratory passages, and the ventricles of the brain. Cilia. In Botany, long hairs situated upon the mar- gin of a vegetable body, as on the leaves of the Semper- vivum tectorum. CI'LIARY. (Lat. cilium.) The ciliary ligament ol the eye is the circular portion that divides the choroid membrane from the iris, and which adheres to the scle- rotic coat. The ciliary processes are the white folds at the margin of the uvea in the eye, which proceed from it to the crystalline lens. CPLIATED, (Lat. cilium.) A term used in de- scribing the surface of an organ, to denote the presence at the margin of fine hairs resembling the eyelash, as in the leaves of Luzula pilosa. CI'LIOGRADE, Ciliograda. (Lat. cilium and gradior, I proceed.) The name of a tribe of Acalephans or sea- nettle?, comprehending those which swim by means of cilia. CI'MEX. (Lat. cimex, a bug.) A Linna?an genus of Hemipterous insects, now subdivided into the following families, — Pantatomidce, CoroidcB, J.ygoida, Cypridce, CitnicidiB, Rcduviidee, AcanthidcE, Hydrometride ; while in the eastern part of the Continent each degree of latitude, according to Humboldt, produces a variation of l'I° Fah. in the mean temperature. A small island, a tongue of land, or an indented coast, in contact with a great mas^ of water, which preserves in winter a considerable portion of the heat acquired du- ring the summer, possesses a more moderate climate, milder winters, and fresher summers, and in the higher latitudes a somewhat higher mean temperature, than the interior of great continuous masses of land under the same latitude. The diminution of the mean annual tem- perature from the western shores of Europe to beyond the meridian of the Caspian is remarkable. Amsterdam and Warsaw are situated very nearly under the same parallel of latitude, that of the first being 52° 22', and that of the second 52° 14'; but the mean annual temperature of Amsterdam is 53*4° Fah., while that of Warsaw is only 46-48°. The latitude of Copenhagen is 55° 41', and that of Kasan 55° 48' ; but the mean annual temperature of Copenhagen is 45*7°, that of Kasan 37'6°. The climate of a country is influenced not only by its horizontal configuration, but also by its relief, or vertical confi- guration. Mountains affect the climate of the adjacent plains in various ways — by the reverberation of heat from naked rpcks ; by affording shelter from certain predominating winds ; and by giving rise to descending currents of cold air from the higher regions of the atmosphere, in consequence of the disturbance of the equilibrium of heat produced by the radiation from their sides and summits. The local exposure of a country also, or its inclination to or from ihe equator, which may be included under the title configuration, has a powerful influence on its mean annual temperature. Generally speaking, the local exposure is connected with CLIMAX. and depends upon Ihe position of the mountain chains, and both conspire to increase or diminish the mean tem- perature at the same time. For example, when the general inclination of an extensive tract of country is towards the south, the northern side is bounded by ranges of mountains ; so that while the sun's rays fall upon it at a less oblique angle, it is sheltered from the cold winds blowing from a higher latitude. Climate of Europe In a general view, Europe may be regarded as a peninsular prolongation of the ancient continent, broken and intersected by numerous arms of the ocean , and by inland seas. The predominating winds are from the west ; and these, for the whole of the western portion, are sea winds, greatly softened by blowing over a mass of water, of which the superficial temperature, even in the month of January, at the parallels of 45° and 50O, does not fall below 48° and 51° of Fahrenheit. It is placed directly north of an immense tract of tropical land (Africa and Arabia), which by its diurnal radiation contributes powerfully to elevate the temperature. On the northern side the cold belonging to the latitude is mitigated by numerous favourable circumstances. A very small portion of land lies within the polar circle ; and the whole of the northern extremity is separated from the polar ice by a zone of open sea, the temperature of which is maintained at a considerable elevation in conse- quence of its communication with the Atlantic ocean, and of the existence of the gulf stream, which conveys a portion of the temperature of the gulf of Mexico into the polar seas. Climate of Asia The circumstances which contribute to render the climate of Europe mild and temperate are nearly all reversed in respect of Asia. Its northern boundary extends beyond the parallel of 70°, and in some places reaches to 75°. In every part it extends to the winter limit of the polar ice, and only a very narrow zone of water is interposed between the ice and the land during the short summer of these high latitudes. The north winds, not obstructed by any chain of mountains, blow with unmitigated severity over an icy plain, extending northward to the pole, and eastward to the point of maximum cold, which appears to be situated near the meridian of Behring's straits. The refrigerating in- fluence of these winds is not counteracted by arid deserts on the southern side of the continent. From the meridian of the Ourals to that of Cape Tchoukotski, through 140 degrees of longitude, there is no land under the equator, excepting the inconsiderable portion formed by the islands of -Sumatra, Borneo, Celebes, and Gilolo ; conse- quently the Asiatic countries situated in the temperate zone are not warmed by ascending currents of heated air, such as those which rise from the deserts of Africa and are so beneficial to Europe. The position of the great mountain chains and the general elevation of the country also powerfully contribute to diminish the tem- perature. The Himalaya and Kuen-lun, through a great extent of the continent, present an effectual barrier to the warm winds which come from the equator. Elevated plains and groups of lofty mountains accumulate, and preserve the snow till late in the summer, and give rise to descending currents of air which cool down the temperature of the circumjacent countries. Lastly, Asia being bounded on the western side by Europe, the west or predominating winas are land winds for the greater part of the continent, and their severity is in- creased by the great enlargement of the land towards the north. {Humboldt, Fragmens Asiatiques ; Daniell's Meteorological Essays; Murray's Ency. of Geography .) CLI'MAX. (Gr. xXii^x.^, gradation.) In Rhetoric, a figure by which several propositions, or several objects, are placed before the mind of the hearer or reader in such an order that the proposition or object calculated to produce the le^st impression shall strike it first, and that the rest shall follow in regular gradation. Anti -climax is the converse figure, in which the ideas sink in suc- cession. This forms a principal cause of that vice of composition of which so many ludicrous illustrations have been given under the name of Bathos. CLINAN'THIUM. (Gr. xXm, a bed, and nvBoi, a flower.) A term used to express the receptacle of a com- posite plant. It i? the dilated apex of a flowering branch covered over by small flowers enclosed within an in- volucre. CLI'NICAL. (Gr. K\m-) This term is generally used medically; a clinical lecture ^.ior instance, is the instruction which the teacher gives his pupil at the bedside of the patient. CLI'NIUM. (Gr. xXivr^.) A terra occasionally used in botany to denote the summit of a floral branch, of which the carpella are the termination. It is the same as the torus of the modern French school, and one of the parts called receptacle by Linnaeus, as in the strawberry. CLI'NKERS. See Bricks. CLI'NOID. (Gr. xXivn, and uioi, likeness.) This term has been improperly applied to certain processes of the sphenoid bone. CLINO'METER. (Gr. xXito), I bend, and fUT^ov, a CLOUD. measure.) An instrument for measuring the dip of mineral strata. {Geol. Trans, vol. iii.) CLI'O. {Gr. xXuu, I celebrate.) In Mythology, the muse who was usually supposed to preside over history, though she sometimes invaded the province of her sister Calliope, the goddess of epic poetry. In his magnificent ode (Book 1. Ode 12.) addressed to Augustus, Horace invokes Clio as the patroness of the flute or the Ijte, or in other words of lyric poetry : — Quern virum aut heroa lyra vel acri Tibia sumes celebrate, Clio, &c. Clio. In Zoology, applied by Linnaeus to a genus of Vermes, and by Cuvier to a genus of Pteropodous Mol- lusks ; one species of which, the Clio borealis, abounds in the northern seas ; and although not exceeding an inch in length, it forms a great proportion of the food of the whalebone whale, Balcena jnysticetus. CLOA'CA. (Lat.) The excrementory cavity in which, in birds, reptiles, many fishes, and some mammals, the intestinal canal, urinary ducts, and genital passages terminate. CLOCK. See Horology. CLOI'STER (Lat. claustrum.) In Architecture, an arcade or colonnade round an open court. CLOSE. In Music. See Cadence. Close. A small field, enclosed or hedged about. CLO'SE-HAULED ; that is. the tacks close down, the sheets aft, the yards braced sharp up, and the bowlines hauled, the ship making her progress as near the direction of the wind as she can. CLO'SERS. In Architecture, the pieces (or bats), less or greater than half a brick, that are used to close in the end of a course of brickwork. In English as well as Flemish bond {see Bond), the length of a brick being but nine inches, and its width four inches and a half, in order that the vertical joint may be broken at the end of the first stretcher, a quarter brick (or bat) nuist be interposed to preserve the continuity of the bond ; this is called a queen closer. A similar preservation of the bond may be ob- tained by inserting a three-quarter bat at the angle in the stretching course ; this is called a king closer. In both cases a horizontal lap of two inches and a half is left for the next header. CLOUD. A visible mass or collection of minute par- ticles of water suspended in the atmosphere. Clouds differ from fogs or mists only in occupying a more elevated position ; in all cases the origin is the same, namely, the vapours which rise from collections of water, and indeed from the whole surface of the earth. These aqueous vapours are condensed in the higher and colder regions of the atmosphere, and thus lose their transparency and become visible. Clouds differ very greatly in respect of form, magnitude, density, &c. These differences depend on the quantity of vapour of which they are composed, and the situations which they take as they unite with one another ; and are determined in a great measure by the direction and velocity of the motion communicated to them by the wind. The height at which they float in the atmosphere is determined by their specific gravity, and consequently varies with their density. Thin light clouds are observed higher than the summits of the loftiest mountains, while those which are dense and thick rise only to a small distance above the surface of the earth. It is very difficult to determine their average elevation : it is supposed to be between two and three miles, but it varies at different times of the year. Clouds were distributed by Mr. Luke lioward into three primary formations, — the Cirrus, the Cumulus, and the Stratus. But besides these he admitted four other varieties, — the Cirro-cumuhis, the Cirro-stratus, the Cu- mulo-stratus, and the Cutnulo-cirrostratus or Nimbus. The Cirrus consists of fibres or curling streaks, which diverge in all directions. It occupies the highest region, and is frequently the first cloud which is seen after a con- tinuance of clear weather. The Cumulus is a convex ag- gregateof wateiTparticles,increasing upwards from a hori- zontal base, and assuming more or less of a conical figure. The Stratus consists of horizontal layers, and com- prehends /ogs and mists. It is the lowest of the clouds, its under surface usually resting on the earth or water. The Cirro-cumulus is intermediate between the cirrus and cumulus, and is composed of small well-defined masses closely arranged. The Cirro-stratus, intermediate between the cirrus and stratus, consists of horizontal masses separated into groups, with which the sky is some- times so mottled as to suggest the idea of resemblance to the back of the mackarel. The prevalence of the cirro- stratus is usually followed by bad weather. The CumtUo- stratus, or twain cloud, partakes of the appearance of the cumulus and stratus or cirro-stratus. The Ni7?ibus, or rain cloud, is that into which the others resolve them- selves when rain falls. The above nomenclature is sufficiently fanciful ; never- theless it enables the meteorologist to convey more precise ideas in describing the diversified forms under which masses of clouds present themselves and their connection with the changes of the weather. These CLOUTED CREAM. forms are, however, frequently so indefinite and shapeless, that it is difficult, if not impossible, to refer them to any one of the preceding modifications. A tendency, how- ever, to one or other of them may in general be traced. (.Howard's An-angement and Nomenclature of Clouds, in the IGth and 17th vols, of the Philosophical Magazine ; Foster on Atmospheric Phenomena ; Murray's Encyclo- pedia of Geography, p. 168. ; Companion to the British Almanac for 1830, &c. See also Dalian's Meteorological Essays, 1793.) CLOU'TED or CLO'TTED CREAM. The cream produced on the surface of milk by setting a pan of new milk on a hot hearth is so named. It is chiefly used as a kind of entremet, and, when mixed with new milk,, is eaten along with fruit pies, strawberries, raspberries, &c. : it is also eaten without milk, spread on bread. CLOVES. (Lat. clavus, a nail.) The smaller bulbs formed in the axillae of the scales of a mother bulb, as in gariic. Cloves. The unexpanded flower-buds of the Cary- ophyllus aromattcus, a low branching tree cultivated in the Dutcn settlements in India. The finest cloves are from Amboyna ; they are of a bright brown colour, ex- tremely fragrant, and hot and acrid upon the tongue ; they abound in essential oil, which may be pressed out of their pores by the nail, and which is generally obtained by distillation with water, to the amount of from 15 to Wper cent. It is sold in commerce under the name oioil of cloves, and chiefly used in medicine, and occasionally in perfumery. The fruit of the clove tree was employed in old pharmacy under the name of anthophylli. CLUBS See Societies. CLUB MOSS. {Lycopodium clavatum.) The seeds of this moss, which are very minute, and resemble an im- palpable yellow powder, are used in theatres to imitate lightning ; when thrown across a flame, they produce a sudden flare : they contain a peculiar oil. CLUMP. A mass of trees or shrubs, or both, generally roundish and compact in its outline, and always small as compared with extensive plantations. The word ap- pears to Have been first used in planting and gardening in the time of the celebrated landscape gardener Brown, about the middle of the 18th century. Brown distributed his clumps at irregular distances over the entire surface of any piece of ground that was intended to be made a park ; surrounding the park at the same time with a belt of plantation. The intention of Brown in planting these clumps was to nurse up a few trees in each clump, which should remain as groups or single objects after all the other trees of the clump were removed ; but as thin- ning and the removal of the boundary fence of these clumps very seldom took place, they have grown up in most cases deformities rather than beauties. The term clump as applied to a plantation has long since become one of reproach. Clump. The compressed clay of coal strata. CLYPEA'STER. (Lat. clypeus, a buckler, and astrum, astar.) A genus of sea-urchins {Echinidce) of a flattened, shield-like form, with a submarginal vent. This genus is termed Echinantlius by Klein. CLY'PEATE. (Lat. clypeus.) Shield-like : it is the same as scutate. CLY'SSUS. ■ An alchemical name for the water ob- tained by deflagrating nitre with charcoal : the ^essels were generally burst iq. the operation ; but when it suc- ceeded the few drops of water obtained were highly prized for medical use. COACE'RVATE. (Lat. con, together, and acervus, a heap.) Accumulated. A term applied by older physio- logists to certain secretions or excretions long retained. COADJU'TOR. In Ecclesiastical matters, the as- sistant of a bishop or other prelate (in same instances even of a canon or prebendary, but the latter usage was irregular). These assistants. In France and other coun- tries, were iostituted by the pope. A coadjutor was equal in rank to the dignitary whose functions he might on occasion supply ; hence the coadjutor of a bishop was himself consecrated a bishop in partibus infidelium. The celebrated Cardinal de Retz was known by the title of the Coadjutor of Paris during the most active period of his career, having the administration of the tem- poralities of that see, which belonged to his uncle the Archbishop de Retz. Coadjutors usually succeeded their principals in their dignities ; and hence arose an abuse which tended towards making ecclesiastical dignities hereditary, nephews and othef relatives of bishops being named their coadjutors. The institution of coad- jutors to bishoprics is preserved by the French concordat uf 1801. COA'DUNATE. (Lat. con, ad, and una, together.') Two or more parts joined together. COAL. (Germ, kohle.) This highly important sub-* stance is found in beds or strata in that group of the secondary rocks which includes the red sandstone and mountain limestone formations, and which is commonly called the carboniferous group, or coal measures. From the peculiarities of their deposition they are often spoken 241 COBALT. i of undei the names of coal basins, and coalfields. There I are two or t^ree points, and those of much theoretical importance, respecting the origin of coal, on which geo- logical authorities are nearly unanimous. The one is, : that our present coal is exclusively of vegetable origin, I formed apparently from the destruction of vast forests ; and the prodigious quantities of timber drifted by some of the great rivers of the world into the i)resent ocean render it not improbable that a similar formation may now be carrying on in the depths of certain parts of the sea. Secondly, from the nature of the preserved vege- tables it api)ears probable that the climate of these parts was not merely tropical, but ultratropical. It may also be inferred that the coal strata were deposited in the neighbourhood, and often probably upon the verge, of ex- tensive tracts of dry land ; for the trees that are found in coal strata are often like those of our submarine forests, as far as position goes. And, finally, the deposits of coal appear afterwards to- have been elevated, and often sin- gularly dislocated and contorted by forces acting from below, and probably of a volcanic nature. In some coal fields there are appearances which justify the term coal basin : they are of limited extent, fre- quently dip as it were to a common centre, and consist of various beds of sandstone, shale, and coal, irregularly stratified ; and sometimes mixed with conglomerates, showing a mechanical origin. That these deposits have taken place, and that the change of wood into coal has often been effected under great pressure, and often under pressure and heat, seems evident from the appearance of some of the vegetable masses, and also from the manner in which the carbu- retted hydrogen escapes in the form of blowers and eructations from the strata, as if pent up in their cavities under vast condensation, and even sometimes, perhaps, in a liquid form. Though there are often many beds and seams of coal in one field, it is seldom that many of them are worked. They are generally of uniform thickness through a great extent, but are sometimes subject to irregularities. When less than two feet tliick they are seldom worked to any great extent. The nature of the upper stratum, or stony matter of the roof, is very important ; if compact, it is secure from falling, and keeps out water ; if loose, the expense incurred in supporting it absorbs the profits of the coal. The deepest coal mines in England are those of North- umberland and Durham, which are worked, nearly 1000 feet below the surface. The thickest bed of coal is said to be at Wood Mill Hill colliery in Staffordshire, and to exceed 40 feet. From 6 to 9 feet is the average thickness of the most productive seams. The coal generally most esteemed is that of the northern districts, — Northum- berland, Durham, and Yorkshire. It abounds in bitumen, softens and swells in the fire, and throws out jets of flame ; it coheres, and therefore burns hollow and re- quires poking ; it furnishes cinders, and but little ash. Most of the coal from the west of England blazes and burns briskly, being much more easUy kindled than the other ; it requires no poking, because it has no tendency to cake ; it affords no cinders, and leaves a dusty white ash. Culm contains scarcely any bitumen ; it abounds in earthy matter, and somewhat resembles bad coke. Coal is the most valuable of all the mineral substances from which Britain derives her prosperity, and, indeed, may be regarded as the main support of the whole system of British production. It fuses the metals, produces the steam which sets the machinery in motion, and, in short, may be said to render all the resources of this country available for use. The annual consumption of coal, throughout the British Empire, is estimated at 28,575,000 tons. The coal trade gives occupation to nearly 200,000 persons. In 1838, the total quantity of coal shipped was 7,190,433 tons: of which, from the Tyne and Wear, 4,628,000; South Wales, 1,228,300; Whitehaven, 395,000. The export was 2,449,417 tons, chiefly to Ireland, France, the Netherlands, Germany, Denmark, British America, and the United States. The imports into London in 1839 amounted to 2,638,256 tons, brought by 7500 vessels. CO'BALT. (Germ, liohold, a devil.) A term applied to this metal bv the German miners, who considered it unfa- vourable to the presence of the more important metals. Cobalt is a brittle metal of a reddish grey colour ; its specific gravity is 7'8. It fuses at a temperature a little below that required for the fusion of iron. It is magnetic. When heated Ted hot, and freely exposed to air, cobalt absorbs oxygen. Its equivalent number is 30; and the salifiable, or protoxide of cobalt, consists of 30 cobalt + 8 oxygen = 38 oxide of cobalt. The oxide of cobalt is nearly black ; but when in the state of hydrate, or when largely diluted by fusion with glass or borax, it produces its characteristic blue colour ; and as this colour is per- manent at very high temperatures, it is an invaluable article in the manufacture of porcelain and pottery, all theblue colours of which are derived from oxide of cobalt. When fused with glass it communicates a blue tint without impairing its transparency. A very deep blue COBBLES. glass of tills kind when finely powdered acquires a pale and brilliant colour, and is called smalt. Impure oxide of cobalt is known in commerce under the name of xaffrc. Cobalt is said by Stromeyer to exist in all meteoric iron, although in very small quantity. In its ores it is always associated with arsenic, and zaffre is prepared by roasting these native arseniurets of co- Cb'BBLES. Lumps of coal from the size of an egg to that of a football. COBI'TIS. (Lat. cobio, a gudgeon.) A genus of soft-finned fishes, belonging to the Cyprinidce or carp family ; and characterized by a small head ; an elongated body ; the skin covered with small scales ; ventral fins placed far backwards, with one small dorsal fin above them ; mouth small and toothless ; gill-openings very small, and with three rays. Ofthis genus the loche(Co627?s harhatula) inhabits the clear running streams of Britain. The pond loche ( Cobitis fossilis) is a larger species. It is remarkably sensitive to atmospheric changes, and when confined in a glass-globe may be observed to sink to the bottom in a state of quiescence when the weather is cold and gloomy ; but in boisterous weather it comes to the surface and swims about with great rapidity. It also swallows air, which it discharges from the vent, partly converted into carbonic acid gas. CO'BLE. A small boat or canoe, used chiefly on the rivers and lakes of Wales, and the borders. CO'B-WALLS. Walls formed of mud mixed with straw ; not uncommon in some districts of England. The best cob- walls are in Somersetshire. COCCINE'LLA. (Dim.ofLat.coccinus, c;vw5(j«.) A genus of Trimerous Coleopterous insects, including many small species, usually ornaTnented with scarlet spots, and familiarly known as lady-birds, lady-cows, &c. In France these small beetles are dedicated to the Virgin, and called Betes de la Vidrge. They are, in fact, of great service to the agriculturist, and especially to the hop-grower ; for they destroy the Aphides, or plant-lice, in vast numbers, feeding on them both in the larva and perfect state. CO'CCOLITE. (Gr. xoxxk, a grain, and XiBti, stone.) A mineral of a concretional or granular texture. COCCOO'N. The silken case which the larvse of certain insects spin for the purpose of a covering during the period of their metamorphosis, and which some spiders prepare as a protection to their ova during the development of the young. The cod or coccoon of the silk-worm is a %vell-known example of the most valuable of these productions. COCCULUS INDICUS. The fruit of the Afcm- spermum cocculus, imported from the East Indies. It contains a poisonous principle, which has been termed picrotoxia. It is often used to poison fishes : a few handfuls of it ground into coarse powder, and thrown into a pond, bring the fish, in the course of a few hours, to the surface in an intoxicated or poisoned state ; but if quickly removed into fresh water, they recover. It is sometimes added to ale to increase its stupefying quality. CO'CCUM. {Gr. xoxxojv, a pomegranate stone.) A term invented by Gartner to denote a pericarp of dry elastic pieces or cocci, as in Diosnia, &c. CO'CCUS. (Lat. coccus, scarlet cloth.) A name given by Linnseus to a genus of Hemipterous insects, in- cluding the Mexican species, the cochineal insect {Coccus cacti, L.), which feeds on Cactece, and which affords the well-known fine red dye. CCVCHINEAL. The Coccus cacti. This valuable insect was first introduced into l-lurope about the year 1523. It is imported from INlexico and New Spain. It feeds on several species of cactus. It is small, rugose, and of a deep mulberry colour. They are scraped from the plants into bags, killed by boiling water, and dried in the sun. Those are preferred which are plump, of a peculiar silvery appearance, and which yield a brilliant crimson when rubbed to powder. Cochineal is some- times adulterated by the admixture of a manufactured article composed of coloured dough. This is detected by the action of boiling water, which dissolves and disin- tegrates the imitation, but has little effect upon the real insect. The principal component of cochineal is a pe- culiar colouring matter, which has been called carminiujn and cochinelia. It is obtained by digesting the powder of cochineal first in ether, which takes up fat, and then in alcohol, which dissolves the cochinelia. Acids change its colour from crimson to an orange red, and alkalies turn it violet. When mixed with recently precipitated aluminous earth, it forms a beautiful lake. Cochineal yields a brilliant scarlet dye, which is produced by fixing the colouring matter of the insect by a mordant of alumina and oxide of tin, and exalting the colour by the action of supertartrate of potash. CO'CHLKAN. (Lat. cochlear, a spoon.) A term used in describing the aestivation of a flower, to express one piece being larger than the others, and hollowed like a helmet or bowl, covering all the others, as in Aco- nitum, &c. COCHLE.\RE. A spoon ; the bowls of spoons being 242 CODETTA. formerly made of the shape of a cockle-shell, and often fluted. COCHLEA'TE. {ILat. cochlea, a shell, a cockle.) A term used in describing the general form of bodies, to de- note any that are twisted in a short spire, so as to resemble the convolutions of a snail-shell ; as the pod of Medicago eochleata. It also means a concave body like that of one of the valves of a cockle-shell, asin Epidendrum cochleatum. CO'CKET. In Commerce, a scroll of parchment, signed and delivered by the oflficers of the custom-house to merchants upon entering their goods, to certify that their merchandise is customed and may be discharged. CO'CKLE-OAST. That part of a hop-kiln or oast where the fire is made. CO'CK-LOFT, The highest loft, or garret, in any building. CO'CKNEY. A contemptuous appellation of a citizen of London. Various derivations have been assigned to this word, all of which are more distinguished for inge- nuity than probability. But whatever may be the origin of the term, its antiquity cannot be disputed, as it is mentioned in some verses generally attributed to Hugh Bagot, Earl of Norfolk, in the reign of Henry II.: _ Were I in my castle at Bungey, Upon the river of VVavemey, I would ne care for the king of Cockeney (i. e. of London). CO'CK-PIT. The after part of the orlop deck, or deck below the lower deck, and altogether below the water. Here, in line-of-battle ships, are the cabins of several of the ofl[icers. The cock-pit is appropriated to the use of the wounded in time of action. There is also a fore cock-pit in the fore part of the ship, and sometimes an after cock-pit. Cock-Pit is the name given to the place where game cocks fight their battles. The room in Westminster in which her Majesty's privy council hold their sittings is called the cock-pit, from its having been the site of what was formerly the cock-pit belonging to the palace at Whitehall. COCY'TUS. (Gr. xatxvrii, lamentation; irom xux.Co», I bewail.) In Mythology, the river of Lamentations, which was one of the streams that washed the shores of the mythological hell, and prevented the imprisoned souls from returning to the earth. Milton alludes to it thus {Par. Lost, book ii.) : — CO'DA. (It. coda, a tail.) In Music, the passage at the end of a movement which follows a lengthened per- fect cadence. In some cases it consists of merely one phrase, in others it is carried to a great extent. At the conclusion of a canon or fugue, it often serves to end the piece which might otherwise be carried on to infinity. CODE (from the Latin codex, a manuscript), sig- nifies, in the language of jurisprudence, any collection of laws digested and reduced into an orderly arrangement, whether by public authority or by the private labour of learned men. But, in the ordinary sense, the word Code is only used to signify a compilation of laws by au- thority. Five collections of Roman law are designated by the title of codes : — that of Sextus Papirius, which only exists in fragments discovered by various authors, but which contained the laws of the Roman kings ; the Gre- gorian, the compilation of an unknown author, about the reign of Constantine ; the Hermogenian, of which the author is also doubtful, and the date nearly the same ; the Theodosian, framed under the order of the emperor Theodosius the younger, and containing the constitutions of the emperors from the time of Constantine to his own (from which, until the greater works of Justinian became publicly known in modern Europe, the jurisconsults of the dark ages drew the greater part of their knowledge of Roman law) ; and, lastly, that of Justinian, a. d. 529. Of the codes of law now recognised in modern states the most remarkable are, in order of time — the code of Frederic the Great of Prussia; that of Catherine of Russia, confined to criminal jurisprudence ; that of Jo- seph II. of Austria ; and the Code Napoleon in France. This title, though sometimes given in general language to all the digests of law made under that emperor, is appro- priated by French lawyers to the greatest of his works, the Code Civil. The project for this code was drawn up, in 1801, by five commissioners, by them reported to the Court of Cassation, and thence carried to the Conseil d'Etat : in that body it was fully discussed, clause by clause. Besides the Code Civil, the written French law comprises five other codes; viz. the Code Penal; the two Codes of Procedure, civil and criminal ; the Code de Commerce ; and, finally, the Code Forestier, or collection of 1.1WS relative to the administration of the woods, pub- lished in 1827 under Charles X. CODE'INE,or CODEIA. (Gr. xi»iicc. the poppy head.) An alkaline substance, discovered in 1832 by Robiquet in opium. It was at first confounded with morphia. CODE'TTA. (Dimin. of coda.) In Music, a short CODEX. passage which connects one section with another, and not composing part of a regular section. CO'DEX. A manuscript : in its original sense (Latin) the inner bark of a tree, which was used for the purposes of writing. The word was thence transferred by the Romans to signify a piece of writing, on wliatever mate- i;ial ; e. g. with the stylus on tablets lined with wax, or on a roll of parchment or paper. In modern Latin, a manu- script volume. Codex rescriptus or palimpsesttis is a manuscript consisting of leaves, from which some earlier writing has been erased in order to afford room for the insertion of more recent. Many such codices exist ; and from the imperfect nature of the erasing process, the earlier writing has in some instances been restored. Con- siderable fragments of classical works, previously con- sidered as lost, have been thus recovered by the Abate Mai from among the contents of the Ambrosian Library at Milan. CO'DICIL. (Lat. codicillus, diminutive of codex, a manuscript?) In Law, an addition or supplement to a will, for the purpose of altering, explaining, or adding to its contents. Of codicils, as of wills, the latter prevails where it contains provisions contradictory to those of a former. By the recent Wills Act (1 Vict. c. 26.), every codicil must be executed in the same manner as is thereby made requisite in the case of a will ; viz. signed by the testator in the presence of two witnesses at one time. See Will. COEFFI'CIENT. In Algebra, a number or known quantity prefixed as a multiplier to a variable or an un- known quantity. Tlius, in the equation a xm + 6 6 .rn = o, a is the multiplier or cocfiicicnt of j-m, and 66 is the co- efficient oix^. When no number or coefficient is pre- fixed, unity or 1 is understood. See Equation. CCELACA'NTHIDvE. (Gr. xoiKoj, hollow, and ctxccyOos, a spine.) A family of Ganoid fishes in the system- of Agassiz ; so called on account of the species composing it being armed with hollow spines. The following inte- resting fossil genera, Holoptychius and Ccelacanthtcs pro- per, belong to this family. CCE'LELMI'NTHA. (Gr. xotXos, and sA^/vir, a worm.) The name of a class of Entozoa, including part of the cavitary intestinal worms of Cuvier, or those which are characterized by having an alimentary canal contained in a distinct abdominal cavity. CCELE'STINE. A mineralogical name of sulphate qfstrontia (from its blue tint). COS'LIAC. (Gr.xoiXioc, the belli/.) A painful species of diarrhoea has been by some medical writers called the cceliac passion. The cceliac artery is the first branch of the aorta in the abdomen. " CCENA'CULUM. (Lat.) In ancient Architecture, the eating or supper room of the Romans. In the early Eeriods of the Roman history, the upper story of their ouses, which rarely consisted of more than two, seems to have been called by this name. CCENA'TIO. (Lat.) In ancient Architecture, an apartment for taking refreshment in the lower part of the Roman houses. CCENO'BIO. (Gr. «<«v«j, common, and /S/af, life.) A name invented by the French botanists, to distinguish that class of fruits which consists of two or more carpels separate at the apex and united at the base, from the middle of which a single style arises. It occurs in La- miaceae, &c. C(E'NOBITE. (Gr. noivog, and ^los, life.) One who lives under a rule in a religious community, as distinguished from an anchoret or hermit, who lives in solitude. See Anchoret. CCE'NURE, Cccnurtis. (Gr. xoivog, and ev^oc, a tail.) The hydatid which infests the brain of sheep is so called, because the dilated cyst is the common termi- nation or basis of attachment of many heads and bodies. The disease called " staggers " is produced by this pa- rasite. CO'FFEE. The berries of the Cq/^aamWco. These, when roasted, powdered, and infused in boiling water, jield the well-known beverage called coffee. It is exhi- larating, and operates upon many persons as an aperient. See Caffein. CO'FFER. (Sax. coppe-) In Architecture, a sunk panel in vaults and domes, and also in the soffit or under side of the Corinthian cornice, usually decorated in the centre with a flower. CO'FFER-DAM. In Architecture, and Bridge-build- ing, a case of piling, water-tight, fixed in the bed of a river for the purpose of laying the bottom dry for a space large enough to build the pier on. Coffer-dams are formed in various ways, either by a single inclosure or a double one, with clayor chalk rammed in between the two to pre- vent the water from coming through the sides. They are also made either with piles only, driven close together, and sometimes notched or dovetailed into one another ; or, if the water is not very deep, by piles driven at a distance of five or six feet from each other, and grooved in the sides with boards let down between them in the grooves, lu order to build in coffer-dams a very good natural 243 COHESION. bottom of solid earth or clay is required; for though the sides be made water-tight, if the bed of the river be of a loose consistence, the water will ooze up through it in too great a quantity to permit the operations to be car- ried on. It is almost needless to remark that the sides must be very strong, and well braced in the inside to re- sist the pressure of the ambient water. (Hutton's Tracts vol.i.) CO'GNIZANCE, Conmance. In Law, an acknow- ledgment of a fine, of taking a distress, &c. It also sig- nifies the power which a court has to hear and determine a particular species of suit. COGNO'MEN. In Antiquities, the last of the three names by which all Romans, at least those of good family, were designated. It served to mark the house {see Familia) to which they belonged, as the other two names, viz. the pranomen and nomen, served respec- tively to denote the individual and the class {see Gens) to which his family belonged. COGNO'VIT. (Lat.) In Law, is a confession whereby a defendant admits that the plaintiff's cause of action against him is just (cognovit actionem), and suffers judgment to be entered against him without trial. COHE'SION. (Lat. coha^reo, / hold together.) In Natural Philosophy, is the force or attraction with which the particles of homogeneous bodies are kept attached to each other, or with which they resist separation. Co- hesion is thus distinguished from adhesion; the latter term denoting the attractive force existing between two different bodies brought into contact, as a drop of water on a plate of glass ; or between two bodies of the same matter, as two lumps of lead, when their smooth surfaces have been pressed together. The three different forms which matter assumes, — solid, liquid, and gaseous, — are determined by the degree of cohesive force existing among the elementary particles. In solids this force is great, and, in fact, is that which causes solidity ; in liquids it is less powerful, but still sufficiently manifest in the drops or globular form assumed by small quantities of water or mercury poured on a table. In the case of aeri- form fluids it may be regarded as negative, the particles having a tendency to repel each other. The cohesive force of the elementery particles of matter depends on the distances of the particles from each other ; but of the law according to which its intensity increases or diminishes nothing is known, excepting that the force decreases ra- pidly as the distance increases, and vanishes altogether when the distance becomes so great as to be appreciable to the senses. It is a problem of very great importance to determine the cohesive power of the materials employed in me- chanical structures. Numerous experiments have been made for this purpose ; and their results have not only a practical utility, but throw much light on the constitution of bodies. Wiien a bar of metal, a beam of wood, or a rope is stretched lengthwise, the tension which it bears, or the cohesive power evolved, is equal to the accumu- lated attraction of all the particles in any transverse section. The longitudinal distension which takes place before disrupture is at first proportional to this attracr tion, but afterwards increases in a more rapid progression. " A bar of soft iron will stretch uniformly by continuing to append to it equal weights till it be loaded with half as much as it can bear ; beyond that limit, however, its extension will become doubled by each addition of the eighth part of the disruptive force. Suppose the bar to be an inch square, and 1000 inches in length ; 36,000 lbs. avoirdupois will draw it out one inch, but 45,000 lbs. will stretch it 2 inches, 54,000 lbs. 4 inches, 63,000 lbs. 8 inches, and 72,000 lbs. 16 inches, where it would finally break." {Leslie''s Nat. Philosophy/.) The following is a tabular view of the absolute cohe- sion of the principal kinds of timber employed in build- ing and carpentry, showing the load which would rend a prism of an inch square, and the length of the prism which, if suspended, would be torn asunder by its own weight : — Teak - - 12,915 lbs. — 36,049 feet Oak - - 11,880 — 32,900 Sycamore - 9,630 — 35,800 Beech - 12,225 — 38,940 Ash - 14,130 — 42,080 Elm - - 9,720 — 39,050 Memel fir - 9,540 — 40,500 Christiana deal - 12,346 — 55,500 Larch - 12,240 — 42,160 The above numbers must be regarded as only ap- proximative, and representing the average cohesive force of the different kinds of wood specified ; for the force differs greatly in different specimens of the same sort, and even in different parts of the same timber. Thus in the tables given by Professor Barlow of experiments on the direct cohesion of different woods, we find the weight required to tear asunder a prism of an inch square vary- ing as under: — Fir, from ll,000to 13,448 lbs. ; ash, from R 2 COHOBATION. 15,784 to 17,850 lbs. ; oak, from 8,889 to 12008 lbs. ; teak, from 14,062 to 15,405 lbs. ; pear, from 8,834 to ll,.5371bs., tiC. {Barlow on the Strength of Materials, 1837.) The metals differ more widely from each other in their cohesive strength than the several species of wood or vegetable fibres. According to the experiments of Mr. George Rennie in 1817, the cohesive power of a rod an inch square of different metals, in pounds avoirdupois, with the corresponding length in feet, is as follows : — Cast steel - - 134,2.56 lbs. — 39,4.55 feet. Swedish malleable iron 72,064 — 19,740 English ditto - - 55,872 — 16,938 Cast iron - - - 19,096 — 6,110 Cast copper - - 19,072 — 5,003 Yellow brass - - 17,9.58 — 5,180 Cast tin - - - 4,736 — 1,496 Cast lead - - - 1,824 — 348 It is difficult to measure directly the cohesion of fluids (and it is very considerably affected by the temperature) ; but an approximation may be derived from the magni- tude of drops, and the thickness of liquid sheets, heaped upon a horizontal surface. In this view, says Professor Leslie, let us trace the formation of a drop of water as it slowly collects at the end of a capillary siphon. The mutual attraction of the particles always rounds the un- der part of the pendant fluid, which continues to lengthen till its accumulating weight begins to overcome the co- hesion of the particles. But this force being 75 grains for each horizontal square inch, while a cubical inch of water weighs 252* grains, must correspond to the pull of a cylinder of -18 mch high, which will influence also the breadth of the pendant liquid. Beyond this limit a sepa- ration will ensue, when the cylinder merges into a sphere a little wider, or about 2-lOths of an inch diameter. The cohesion among the particles of alcohol and of sulphuric acid being respectively the fifth part of 215 and 460 grains, the weight of a cubic inch of each of these fluids, a drop of them should measure "17 of an inch in diameter. The cohesive force of quicksilver at the ordi- nary temperature amounts to 312 grains on each hori- zontal inch, while a cubic inch of it weighs 3424 grains ; the drop must separate when its mean depth approaches to the 9- 100th part of an inch. {Elements of Nat. Phi- losopkv, p. 369.) "With respect to the ultimate agent by which the effects of cohesion are produced, it is remarked by Dr. T.Young, that if it is allowable to seek for any other agent than a fundamental property of matter, appearances extremely similar might be derivedfrom the pressure of a universal medium of great elasticity. But all suppositions founded on such analogies must be considered as merely conjec- tural ; and our knowledge of every thing which relates to the intimate constitution of matter, partly from the intricacy of the subject, and partly for want of sufficient experiments, is at present in a state of great uncertainty and imperfection . ( Young's Lectures on Nat. Philosophy, vol. i. p. 630.) See Strength of Materials. COHOBA'TION. The repeated distillation of the »arae liquid from the same materials. The term was in- vented bj' Paracelsus. CO'HORT. The tenth part of a Roman legion. {See Legion.) The Prcetorian cohort was a body of picked troops who attended the general, and was first instituted by Scipio Africanus. COI'NAGE. Under this term we shall give a brief outline of the proceedings in reference to the manufac- ture of coin, as carried on in the Royal Mint of London. When a parcel of gold is brought to the mint in ingots, they are deposited with the master's assav-master, who makes an assay of each ingot ; and when he is ready to deliver his reports upon them, the importers are required to attend at the mint, where the weigher and teller reads over the said reports to them. They are then recorded in the journals of the master, comptroller, and master's first clerk and melter ; and a mint bill is given to the importer, certifj^ing the weight, fineness, and value of the ingots, and signed by the deputy master, comptroller, and king's (or queen's) clerk, which bill is returned upon the deli- very of the bullion to the importers in the state of coin. The bullion is then delivered to the melter, who, guided by the assayer's report, adds either alloy or fine gold (when either are required), so as to reduce the mass to standard fineness (that is, 22 parts of pure gold and 2 of alloy), and melts and casts the metal into bars of conve- nient form for rolling ; each bar, when intended for coin- age in sovereigns, being an inch and a half by one inch square, and about two feet in length, and weighing about 26 pounds. A piece is then taken from each extremity of each b.ir and delivered to the king's assay-master, whose duty it is to ascertain that the said bars are of standard fineness before he allows them to be delivered to the mo- nejers, who next receive them for the purpose of coinage. These preliminary operations are nearly the same as regards silver bullion. When the moneyors, or responsible manufacturers of the coin, receive bars from the melter, they are rolled 244 COLCHICUM. I and drawn Into plates of proper thickness, which require I to be most nicely adjusted, so that a piece of proper size i punched out of any part of the plate may have the exact j weight of the intended coin ; the blanks are then cut out of these plates, which are thus reduced to the state of , scissel, and remelted (under due checks and precautions), to be again cast into bars. The blanks (amounting to about two thirds, and the scissel to one third of the weight of the original plate of metal) are next annealed, and passed through the marking machine, by which the edge of each piece is made smooth and a little raised ; they are then cleaned or blanched by being put for a few mi- nutes into a hot and very dilute sulphuric acid, after which they are thoroughly washed and dried, and are ready to be stamped or coined. This operation is per- formed in presses moved by mechanical power, and con- sists in placing the blanks 'between two steel dies, upon one of which is engraved the obverse and upon the other the reverse of the coin, so as to give an impression in relief; while the spreading of the piece in a lateral direc- tion is prevented by the rising of a collar at the moment the blow is struck, in which collar is engraved the milling, which is thus transferred to the edge of the piece at the same moment that the impressions of the dies are taken upon its two surfaces. The coining presses at the mint are attended by boys, who only have to fill a tube or spe- cies of hopper with the blanks ; the operation of laying the blank upon the dies, and again throwing it off when stamped, being effected by the machinery connected with the press, thus preventing the risk of crushing the fingers of the persons who used to be employed in this depart- ment before these layers on, as they are technically called, were adopted. In the coining room at the mint there are eight presses, each adapted for every species of coin ; each press strikes upon an average 60 pieces per minute, or 3600 per hour ; so that in the day's work of 10 hours each press produces 36,000 pieces ; and the eight presses (sup- posing, which is rarely the case, that they are all in use) stamp 288,000 pieces daily. The money when thus com- pleted is weighed up in what are called journey weights for delivery to the importers of the bullion ; the gold in 15 lbs. and the silver in 60 lbs. troy. But, before any coin is suffered to pass out of the mint, it is inspected as to its workmanship ; and ifany journeys are faulty or im- perfect in this respect, they may be cut and returned to the moneyers for recoinage. The weight and fineness of the money are also ultimately examined and insured by the process of pixing, which consists in taking promis- cuously from every journey weight of coin a pound in talc, which is delivered by the weigher and teller to the king's assay-master, who carefully weighs it, and declares aloud the minus or plus upon each pound (if it be not standard or exact), which is recorded by the king's as- sayer, by the comptroller, and by the king's clerk. This determines whether the moneyers have made the money within the remedy allowed upon the pound troy ; but, as the remedy upon the pound is divided among the number of pieces in it, the comptroller weighs several of the pieces individually, and if they are not within the allowed limits, can, in conjunction with the other check officers assembled on this duty, return the coin to the moneyers to be remelted and recoined at their ex- pense. From the same pound weight of gold or silver the comptroller also takes two pieces, one of which is handed to the king's assay-master to assay, in order to prove that the metal has undergone no deterioration in any of the processes of its manufacture ; the other piece is sealed up in a packet and consigned to the pix box, which is locked by the separate keys of the check officers, where it remains until the trial qf'the pix by jury before the king or certain of his council, which usually takes place once every three or four years in the Court of Exchequer at Westminster. The term journey weight is applied at the mint to the weight of certain parcels of com, which were probably considered formerly as a day's work. The journey of gold is 15 troy pounds, which is coined into 701 sovereigns, or 1402 half sovereigns. A journey of silver weighs 00 lbs. troy, and is coined into 792 crowns, or 1584 haJf crowns, or 3900 shillings, or 7920 sixpences. COINS. See Numismatics. Money. COKE. The charcoal obtained by heating coal with the imperfect access of air, or by its distillation. The former is usually called oven coke i the latter gas coke, being abundantly produced in gas-works. The weight of coke usually amounts to between 60 and 70 per cent, of the coal employed. Coke is a valuable fuel for many pur- poses in the arts. COL'CHICUM. (From Colchis in Armenia, where the plant is said to have abounded.) This term is gene- rally applied to the cormus or bulb of the Colchicum autumnale, or meadow saffron, a plant common in this country, and largely collected for medical use. It was much employed formerly as a diuretic in dropsy ; then fell into disuse; and more recently again largely pre- scribed for the cure of gout, it having been ascertained that the celebrated French remedy for gout called Eau COLCOTHAR. tnedicinale d'Husson was a tincture of colchicum. Its etficacy may probably be ascribed to the presence of a peculiar alkaloid, which has been termed colchicia. When the cormi are intended for medical use, they should be dug up in summer (July), and immediately cut into tldn transverse slices, placed separately upon paper, and dried by a very gentle heat. The best preparation is the wine of colchicum, made by infusing an ounce and a half of the bulb prepared and dried as above, and coarsely pow- dered, in 12 ounces of sherry, for six or seven days, shak- ing it daily : then filter it for use. The dose is from 20 drops to 1 drachm, taken at bed-time in a little water, COLCO'THAR. A red oxide of iron, being the residue of the distillation of green vitriol or sulphate of iron. COLD. In Natural Philosophy. See Heat. Cold. In Medicine. See Catarrh. CO'I.EOPHY'LLUM. (Gr. xoXios, a sheath, and (fvXKov, a leaf.) A term introduced into botany, to indi- cate a monocotyledonous structure, the young leaves being evolved from within a sheath, while those of Dico- tyledons are always naked. COLEO'PTERANS, Coleoptera. (Gr. xo\i»5, and trn^ov, sheath-winged.) The name of the order of insects comprehending those in which the first pair of wings have the consistence of horn, and serve as defensive coverings to the secon I pair, or true wings, which are of large size, and are folded transversely when not in use. By means of this mechanism the Coleoptera are en- abled to burrow in the soil, or bore the trunks of trees, without injury to their delicate organs of flight, which are the true or second pair of wings ; these being of | as Poictou, Devonshire colic, &c. It Fjegins "with rest ample size are peculiarly folded, being bent at nearly | lessness and uneasiness about the stomach, nausea, and right angles, so as to pack up in small compass beneath j obstinate costiveness. There Is |e;eneral spasm of the COLLEGE. tamorphosis In the former " being dilTerent from that of Orihoptera and Hemiptera, and nearer to that of the Co- leoptera, this seems its most natural station, considered as an Elytrophorous order." COLEO'PTILUM. (Gr. xoA.tof, a sheath, axiAirnXov, a feather.) A term sometimes applied to the young leaves of Monocotyledons, from the circumstance of their al- ways being developed within a sheath, while those of Dicotyledons are always naked. This is, however, a mis- take both in fact and theory. CO'LEORHI'ZA. (Gr. xoXtos, a sheath, and p/?«, a root.) A terra invented by Mirleel to denote the sheath within which the radicle of monocotyledonous plants is enclosed. CO'LIC. {Gy.xciXo)), the colon; one of the large intestines, to the seat of which the principal pain is gene- rally referred.) There are many varieties of this com- plaint, and it arises from various causes, and exhibits different symptoms. The general indications of cure are to evacuate the bowels by the least irritating means, and, when the lower intestines are loaded, by the use of glysters ; opiates and etherial remedies may be resorted to to allay spasms, and warm bath and fomentations are often necessary. There is a peculiar disease called the painters^ colic or dry bellyache, which appears to arise from the ab- sorption of lead into the system, and which therefore commonly attacks plumbers, painters, and makers of white paint and other colours and preparations in which lead is used ; the persons employed also in the lead mines and furnaces are subject to it. It is often named from certain places in which it is peculiarly prevalent ; tlie elytra or wing-covers when the beetle is at rest In some species the membranous wings are wanting, but the elytra are always present ; although in this case, as they are never required to be expanded for flight, they are generally soldered together by a straight suture- at t timely relieved b^' opiates, emollient glyi the middle line. In ordinary cases the inner straight ; and gentle aperients, especially castor bowels, often accompanied by great pain, which is some- what relieved by pressure; and this circumstance enables us to distinguish the complaint in question from inflam- mation of the bowels ; into which, however, it runs, if not sters, warm bath, oil when it will margins of the wing-covers are simply but accurately remain on the stomach, by which the spasm is allayed applied to each other. I and the bowels evacuated of their hardened and irritating The Coleopterans are of all the orders of insects the ' fceces. This is the acute state of the disease ; but it often most numerous, and the best known. Their singular! occurs in a cArow/c form, in which case pains and consti- forms, the brilliant and agreeable colours which many of ' pation of the bowels are followed by ocsacional delirium, them present, the large size of some of the species, the ; epilepsy, paralysis, especially of the hands, and wasting solid consistence of their teguments, which renders their away ofthemuscles. This disease terminates fatally if not preservation easy, and the regular series of afiinities trace- i timely relieved, and above all the patient should be cau- able through several of the groups, all combine to render I tiously removed from all contact with lead, and allowed them objects of particular interest and attention. fresh air and a nutritious but not stimulating diet. The head supports two antennae of various forms, but ' COLLA'PSE. (Lat. collabor, I shrink down.) A almost always consisting of eleven joints. They have wasting of the body ; or a sudden and extreme depression two compound eyes, but no ocelli. The mouth is com- i of its strength and energies. posed of six principal pieces ; of which four, called the j CO'LLAR. (Lat. colla?.) In Architecture, an hori- mandibulfe and maxillae, move transversely in pairs, while zontal piece of timber connecting two rafters, the remaining two are fixed, and close the mouth verti- | Collar. In Ornithology, the coloured ring round the cally. The uppermost of the two vertical pieces is called neck of birds. In Malacology, the thickened secreting the labrum ; the lowermost is termed the labium, and is margin of the mantle in the testaceous Gastropods, itself subdivided into the tncntum and lingua, and to- ! t^oLLAR, signifies a peculiar badge worn round the gcther with the maxilla;, or the lowest of the vertical "t-'^^k by knights of different orders. It consists of a gold pieces, supports a pair of articulated processes, called chain, enamelled, &c., to which is attached the badge of palpi ox feelers. \ the order of knighthood ; and it is worn at court chiefly The anterior segment of the thorax, or manitrunk, sup- I on state occasions, which are thence called collar days. ports the first pair of feet, and greatly surpasses in extent COLLARI'NO. (Fr. collarin.) In Architecture, that the two other segments which form the alitrunk. The Par* of the Tuscan and Roman Doric columns on the abdomen is sessile, and united to the trunk by a great ' ufper part of the shaft encircling them like a small collar, part of its breadth. It is externallv composed of six or ! The more proper name is an astragal. cairr.'n. -n-i-nrr,, ' ^ P" rt' T T P O T" /-Jo*- ^„.. J ,11. 1 1 T ,\ seven wings The tarsi vary as to the number of their joints, in some Coleoptera having but three, in others four, in others five ; rnodifications upon %vhich Latreille founds his primary division of the order. See Pentamera, Tetramera, Tri- MERA. The Coleoptera undergo a complete metamorphosis. The larva resembles a worm ; the head is encased in. a CO'LLECT (Lat. con, together, and lego, / read), signifies, as the derivation of the word implies, a prayer read together with other parts of the Church of England service, either usually or on a particular occasion. COLLECTA'NEA, is applied, in Literature, to a se- lection of passages made from various authors, usually for the purpose of instruction. COLLE'CTORS. In Botemy, dense hairs covering the firm horny substance ; the mouth is analogous in the num- styles of some species of Compositce, &c. : and acting as ber and functions of its parts to that of the perfect insects , it has also generally six feet, but some species have in- stead only simple tubercles. When perfect the larva generally burrows in the earth, and excavates an oval cell, within which it undergoes its change into an inactive pupa; this is generally of a whitish colour, with the wings and legs folded upon the breast. The habitation and manner of life of these insects varies much, both in their immature and perfect stages. The afiinities of the Coleoptera to the Orthoptera arc of a closer and more manifest nature than can be traced between the Coleoptera and any other order of the mandibulate insects. The genus Forjicula forms the intervening link. It was for- merly placed by Linnaeus at the end of the Coleoptera, and was subsequently referred by Latreille to the order Or- thoptera ; but now constitutes the type of an order apart and intermediate to these two. The absence in some ants of the wings, sting, and ocelli, has led Mr. Macleay to sus- pect that, these Hymenoptera make an approach to the Coleoptera. Mr. Kirby would place the Strepsiptera in juxtaposition with the Coleoptera, observing that the mc- 245 brushes to clear the pollen out of the cells of the anthers. CO'I/LEGE. (Lat. collegium.) According to the primary meaning of the word, any society or number of persons bound together by the same laws or customs (Collegce, colleagues). Among the Romans not only societies invested with a character resembling that of modern corporations, enjoying certain political rights in common (as the colleges of augurs, pontifices,&c.), were termed Collegia ; but bodies of men who appear to have had no bond of union except common employment (as the collegia opificum, or colleges of the different trades) were also thus designated. Hence has originated the erroneous notion that the guilds of modern Europe were derived from similar institutions among the ancients, by attributing to the last-mentioned collegia a corporate character, which it is not sufliciently proved that they possessed ; although some of these bodies, as we learn from the fragments of the lawyer Gains, did in effect hold common property, and had their affairs administered by by-laws of their own. In England many corporate bodies are termed Colleges ; e. g. the colleges of phy.. R 3 COLLEGE. sicians and surgeons, of heralds, &c. &c. A college, in the academical meaning of the word, signifies a society established for academic purposes under royal or private foundation, endowed with revenues, and subject to a private code of laws. Where such a society possesses within itself all the means of instruction and the rights and faculties which are incident to a university, the terms University and College are in eflfect convertible, and indiscriminately used. Thus, Trinity College, Dublin, affords a specimen of an institution called indiscriminately by either title. On the other hand, the universities of Oxford and Cambridge are composed of a number of colleges united together under the same discipline and government, and in which those powers peculiarly be- longing to a university are wielded by one class of authorities, the functions of the colleges superintended by another. The Scottish universities, not being in the strict sense of the words endowed societies {i. e. not pos- sessing a regular body of fellows and scholars receiving stipends), cannot be properly termed collegiate bodies. The early history of colleges is somewhat obscure; although there can be no doubt that they were originally founded, in the various universities of the middle ages, with similar objects and from the same charitable motives. The first students at these universities as- sembled together under no common bond of union, except that of academic sttidy and discipline, and lodged as suited their own convenience. Next, hostels or board- ing houses were established (in the first instance, it is said, by the religious orders for students of their own fraternities), in which the scholars lodged together under certain superintendence. Charitable individuals after- wards endowed these hostels, for the purpose of providing poor scholars with free lodgings. Finally, to these endow- ments were added (by gifts or bequests) stipends for all or a certain number of the scholars frequenting these inns or hostels ; and thus the foundation of a college was completed. The distinction of language arising from ancient usages is still preserved at Oxford, where societies endowed for the maintenance of fellows and scholars are termed Colleges, — societies unprovided with such endow- ments. Halls. But at Cambridge there is no distinction between Colleges and Halls. At the university of Paris fifteen colleges, or more, are said to have been founded in the 13th century ; and the whole number, in the course of time, amounted to eighteen greater and about eighty lesser. But these institutions assumed a different shape from that which they took in England. The greater col- leges became appropriated to particular faculties, or de- partments of a faculty. Thus, for example, the Sorbonne was the college of the theological faculty ; and, in process of time, the lectures and disputations of most of the fa- culties became confined to the walls of those colleges which were exclusively devoted to them. Hence the university became, in fact, a collection of academies for instruction in particular subjects, and its corporate cha- racter for purposes of education vanished altogether as early as the 15th century. (See Maiden on the Origin of Universities, and the authorities there cited.) The name and institution of colleges were derived by the English universities, together with most of their other peculiarities, from Paris ; but their history is very dif- ferent. The colleges now subsisting in both these uni- versities were constituted by royal or private munificence ; either as original foundations, or (more commonly) by the endowment of formerly subsisting halls or hostels with stipends for students. They were all formed on the same principle, consisting of ahead (variously termed master, principal, provost, &c.) ; of a body of higher graduates (generally termed fellows) ; and another, of in- ferior graduates (scholars), who, according to the terms of the several foundations, were or were not eligible as a matter of right to the fellowships. The colleges were thus founded simply for the purpose of assisting scholars in their progress through the university, not for that of conferring instruction. All those of Catholic foundation, it must be added, were intended to supply the church with ministers ; hence the still subsisting regulations prohibiting the marriages of fellows. In the course of time independent members, t. e. members not upon the foundation nor sharing in the endowments, were admitted to reside within the walls of the colleges ; and the task of superintending, and finally of instructing them, was gradually transferred from the university authorities to those appointed by and resident within the colleges. And, by the present constitution of our national universities, the only powers retained by the university as such are of a general character, as of conferring degrees and other honours, &c. &c. ; while the function of education for the purpose of qualifying for those degrees has entirely passed into the hands of the colleges of which that university is composed, evory member of the university being now, by usage which has acquired the force of law, also mem- ber of some college or hall. And, with respect to dis- cipline and government, the power is shared between the university, which through its vice-chancellor and proctors exercises a general superintendence; and the colleges, 24G ^ COLLISION. which bjfc their own officers maintain order within their own walls. A college, therefore, in the sense in which the term is applied at Oxford and Cambridge, has a double character, — 1. as an endowed society ; 2. as a house of education. In the first sense, the college is composed of the head, fellows, and scholars. It is under the government of the original laws framed by its founder, with such variations as in some cases time has intro- duced ;. but alteration is always jealously watched. Ac- cording to the tenure of these statutes, the head is either chosen by the fellows from among themselves, or in some instances appointed by the crown or other autho- rity. The fellows, again (who are mostly, but not uni- versally, graduates who have passed the lowest d(!gree,that of Bachelor of Arts), and the scholars, who are admitted when under-graduates, are either chosen from particular ! localities, schools, &c. &c., according to the will of the I founder, or elected according to merit after free com- petition between members of the college or of the uni- j versity at large. Every college is finally under the , superintendence of a visitor, generally some high eccle- siastical functionary. 2. As a place of education, the college receives within its walls not only fellows and scholars, but also (in the great majority of instances) independent members, limited in number only by the extent of the lodging which it can afibrd ; it being usual at Oxford (although not at Cambridge) that every stu- dent on entering the university should not only belong to a college or hall, but reside within its walls. The under- graduate members of the college are under the superin- tendence of the tutors. These are, in general, resident fellows, appointed by the head to perform this office. In some colleges each tutor has under his special control 3 certain number of under-graduates ; in others the tutors divide among them, not the students, but the different branches of instruction which are to be communicated. Such is a very general outline of the system of English colleges ; but each of these foundations is exclusively governed by its own laws and usages, and no compre- hensive description will apply without exception to all. Oxford has nineteen colleges and five halls ; Cambridge seventeen colleges or halls. In both universities the oldest are supposed to have existed from the middle of the 13th century ; the greater part were founded between that period and the Reformation, but a few are of Protest- ant foundation. CO'LLEGE OF JUSTICE. In Scottish Law, a term applied to the supieme civil courts, composed of the lords of council and session ; together with the advo- cates, clerks of session, clerks of the bills, writers to the signet, &c. See Session. CO'LLET. See Collum. COLLIMA'TION. (Lat. coUimo, 1 aim at.) The line of coUimation, in a telescope, is the line of sight, or the straight line which passes through the centre of the object glass apd the intersection of the wires placed in its focus. The error of collimation is the difference between the actual line of sight and the position which that line ought to have in reference to the instrument. COLLIMA'TOR. Captain Kater gave the name of floating collimator to an instrument invented by him for ascertaining the horizontal point. It consists of a small telescope, furnished with cross-wires in its focus, and fastened horizontally on a flat iron float, which is made to swim on mercury, and which of course, when left to itself, will always assume one and the same invariable inclination to the horizon. If the cross-wires of the collimator be illuminated by a lamp placed in the focus of its object glass, the rays from them will issue parallel, and consequently be in a fit state to be brought to a, focus by the object glass of any other telescope, in which they w-ill form an image as if they came from a celestial object in their direction, i.e. at an altitude equal to their inclin- ation. By transferring, then, the collimator still floating on a vessel of mercury from one side of a circular instru- ment to the other, we are furnished with two quasi- celestial objects, at precisely equal altitudes, or opposite sides of the centre ; and if these be observed m suc- cession with the telescope of a circle, bringing its cross to bisect the image of the cross of the collimator, the difference of the two readings on the limb will be twice the zenith distance of either ; whence the horizontal or zenith point is immediately determined. Another form of the collimator has the telescope placed vertically, whereby the zenith point is directly ascertained. {Phil. Trans. 1828; Pearson's Practical Astronomy, \o\.i\.) COLLI'QUATIVE. (Lat. colliqueo, / 7nelt.) Ex- cessive evacuations are so termed, which appear to melt down the strength and substance of the body. COLLI'SION. (Lat. collisio, from collido, I strike against.) In Mechanics, the action of one body impinging against or striking another with a certain degree of force. In order to explain the phenomena which take place when two bodies in motion impinge against each other, wo suppose the bodies either perfectly non-elastic, or per- fectly elastic, and that they move in a medium which offers no resistance. As none of these suppositions have place COLLU.^r. exactly in nature, the results deduced from them must in practice undergo certain modifications. In the case of non-elastic bodies, let us suppose, first, that the body A strikes against another body B, which is either at rest or is moving in ^ a o the same direction with A to- ®~' ' ward C, but with a less velocity. The body B presents an obstacle to the motion of A ; part of the force of A must therefore be expended in overcoming the obstacle, that is to say, in causing B to move with a velocity equal to its own. But when the quantity of motion necessary for this purpose has been communicated, B no longer opposes the motion of A; so that both bodies have the same velocity after the shock. Now, since a body cannot impart force to another without losing precisely an equal quantity itself, the sum of the forces, or moments, must remain the same after as before collision ; but it has just been shown that the velocities of both bodies are the same after the shock ; therefore (this momentum being measured bv the product of the mass into the velocity) the sum of the moments is distributed between the two bodies in the proportion of their masses, and the common velocity is found by divid- ing the sum of the moments before the impact by the sum of their masses. Let us next consider the shock of two bodies moving in opposite directions. If the forces by which they are animated are equal, they will destroy each other at the instant of collision ; if they are not equal, the greater will destroy the smaller, and the two bodies will then move in the direction of that whose moment was the greater, and the two moments will be equal to the diflFerence of the moments before the impact. In this case also the ve- locity after the impact is the same for both bodies, and equal to the difference of the moments divided by the sum of the masses, and the remaining force is distri- buted between the two bodies in proportion to their re- spective masses. In the case of elastic bodies, the results are modified by a new force being brought into action. Let an ivory ball A strike against another B advancing in the same direction but with a less velocity. The first effect of the collision is to produce a momentary union of the two balls, and to compress or flatten the impinging surfaces ; the next is the effort of the bodies to recover their figure, and when the elasticity is perfect (as it is here supposed to be) the compressed surfaces are restored with a force exactly equal to that by which they were displaced. This restoring force, produced by the elasticity, is called the recoil, and its effect is to double precisely the effect that would be produced if the bodies were non-elastic. When the balls A and B come into closest union, they take a common velocity, A losing exactly as much as B gains. But in recovering their figure, the loss of A's velocity and the gain of B's velocity are each doubled. In order, therefore, to obtain the actual velocities of the impact, we may estimate the velocities that would be gained or lost by each if non-elastic, and add or subtract this to or from the common velocity they would have upon the same hypothesis. If the masses of the tyi'o bodies are equal, their velocities are interchanged. If only one of the equal bodies be in motion, it will come to rest after the impact, and the other will move forward in the direction in which the first was moving, and with the same velocity ; if they move in opposite directions, each will return in the con- trary direction with the velocity the other had. Whether the bodies be equal or unequal, the difference of their velocities, or their relative velocity, will be the same in amount both before and after the impact. A result of this theory, which at first sight appears paradoxical, is, that when several elastic bodies increasing m magnitude are arranged in the same straight line, touching each other, and one smaller than the least of them strikes against the least, each will in turn be re- flected, and communicate to the succeeding one a greater quantity of motion than it has itself. This increase of momentum is greatest when the masses of the bodies in- crease in geometrical progression. In all cases of collision the state of the centre of gra- vity, whether at rest or in motion, remains the same after the impact as before. If it was at rest, it remains in that state ; and if it was in motion, it continues to move in the same direction and with the same velocity, notwith- standing the impact. This is the case both in respect of non-elastic and elastic bodies ; and it is a constant law in whatever manner the bodies act on each other, and whatever be their respective natures. (For a full and elementary explanation of this subject, see Maclazirin's Account of Newton's Principia.) CO'LLUM. (Lat. coUum, the neck.) That i art of the axis of a plant whence the stem and root diverge. In the beginning it is a space which there is no difficulty in distinguishing, so long as the embryo or young plant has not undergone any considerable change ; but in the pro- cess of time it is externally obliterated, so as to become a mere m.atter of theory. 247 COLONY. COLLUTORIUM. (Lat. colluo, I wash, and so, the mouth.) A lotion for rincing the mouth. COLLY'RIUM. (Gr. xatXviu,! check, snA Uvi,a de- fiuxion.) Lotions intended to check inordinate discharges. The term is now exclusively applied to eyewaters. CO'LOBUS. (Gr. xoXo^og, mutilated.) A genus of long-tailed Quadrumanes, or monkeys ; so called, be- cause the fore hands are deficient in, and, as it were, mutilated of, a thumb. In this respect the Colobi, which are exclusively limited to the African continent, re- semble the spider-monkeys (Ateles) of South America: but they have not a prehensile tail to compensate for the imperfection of the hands ; their long caudal appendage is, on the contrary, terminated by a tuft of hairs. The Colobi differ also from the Ateles in having five molar teeth instead of six on each side of each jaw, and in having cheek-pouches. CO'LOCYNTH. (Gr. «^X«v, the colon, and xniu, I move.) This term is applied in the Materia Medica to the pith of bitter apple, the fruit of the Cucumis colocynthis, which is violently purgative. It is imported dried, and generally peeled, from Turkey : it is rarely used alone ; but one of^the most valuable purgatives is the compound extract of colocyrith, which is a combination of this drug with aloes, scammony, cardamum seeds, and soap. COLOCY'NTIN. The bitter purging principle of the colocynth. CO'LON. (Gr.) This name is given to the greater part of the large intestines: the colon passes upwards towards the liver, forming the transverse arch which de- scends upon the left side, forming its sigmoid flexure j entering the pelvis, it passes into the rectum. Colon. In Grammar. See Punctuation. COLONNA'DE. (Lat. columna.) In Architecture, a series of columns placed at certain intervals, called intercolumniations, from each other, varying according to the rules of art and the order employed. COLONEL. The commander of a regiment or" bat- talion of troops : he is the highest in rank of field officers, and immediately subordinate to a general of division. The word is of uncertain origin. The lieutenant-colonel is immediately under the colonel, assisting in his duties, and being his substitute when required. COLONY. (Gr. a!ro/»ia, Lat. colonia.) Colonies are establishments formed in foreign countries by bodies of men who voluntarily emigrate from, or are forcibly sent abroad by, their mother country. Various motives have, at different periods, led to the formation of colonies. Sometimes, as in the case of most of the Greek colonies of antiquity, they were formed by citizens driven from their native country by the violence of political factions ; sometimes, as in the case of the Roman colonies, they were formed for the purpose of bridling subjugated pro- vinces : the latter, indeed, were a species of camps or military stations, forming, as it were, the advanced posts of that mighty army which had its head-quarters at Rome : and sometimes, again, as in the case of the Phoenician colonies, and of most of those established in modern times, they have been formed for commercial purposes, or in the view of enriching the mother country, by openiftg new markets from which she might, if she chose, exclude foreigners. The nature of the connection that has existed between colonies and their mother countries has been exceedingly various. Most of the Greek colonies being founded by private adventurers, who received no assistance from the government of the parent state, were really independent ; the duty which they owed to their metropolis being such only as is due to kinsmen and friends, and not that due by subjects to their rulers. The Roman colonies, on the other hand, being founded by the state for an important po- litical purpose, always maintained an intimate connection with, and dependence upon, Rome. They formed the great bulwarks of the empire ; nor was the conquest of any pro- vince ever supposed to be completed till colonies had been established in it, and roads had rendered it accessible to the legions. The colonies established for commercial pur- poses have generally been subjected to such regulations as were deemed most for the advantage of the parent state. Their growth has thus in many instances been retarded ; and they have been rendered less serviceable to their founders than they would have been had they been treated with greater liberality. The very narrow limits within which this article must be compressed make it necessary that we should limit our statements to a few remarks, having more particular reference to those questions of colonial policy most in- teresting to the English reader. The advantages supposed to result fVom that monopoly of the colony trade which all modern counti'ics possessed of colonies have endeavoured to enforce, seem to be al.- together imaginary. The ties of kindred, and the identity of language, customs, and manners, give the merchants of the mother country great advantages, and enable them, provided their goods be about as cheap as those of R 4 COLONY. others, to supply the colonial markets in preference to every one else. But all attempts to establish a monopoly in favour of the mother country, by prohibiting the im- portation of the produce of other nations into the colony, are necessarily either useless or prejudicial, not merely to its interests, but even to those of the mother country. If the latter can produce the articles required by the colony as cheap or cheaper than others, she will com- mand the supply of the colonial markets, without any interference whatever ; and if she cannot do this, unless by excluding the cheaper products of others, then it is plain the goods sent to the colony can only be produced bv diverting a portion of the capital and industry of tfie mother country into comparatively disadvantageous channels, or into businesses in which she is excelled by others : it is plain, too, that no artificial monopolies can be maintained, except in the case of small and easily guarded colonies. The British merchants have at present the supply of by far the greater part of the manufactured goods required by our North American possessions ; because the goods they send to them are generally cheaper than those sent there by other par- ties. But were competitors capable of underselling our merchants to appear in the field, they would have very little difficulty indeed in depriving them of these markets. Cheap goods are sure to make their way through every barrier ; and the frontier of our North American colonies is so very extensive, and the impos- sibility of guarding it so obvious, that the smallest saving in point of expence would occasion the clandestine intro- duction of prohibited goods in unlimited quantities. In such a case custom-house enactments are good for no- thing. All the tyrannical regulations and sanguinary punishments of Spain and Portugal were unable to pre- vent their transatlantic possessions being deluged with the prohibited commodities of Britain, France, and Germany. The ability to supply it with comparatively cheap goods is the only means by which it is possible to preserve any market. It is this that secures for us at this moment the same superiority in the markets of the United States that we possessed in them when they were our depend- encies ; and the moment we lose this advantage we shall not merely lose their market, but, with it, the markets of cdl our colonies. Nothing, therefore, can in reality be more futile than to found colonies, or to retain them in a state of unwillmg dependency, in the view of mono- polising their trade. If we can undersell others, we shall command their markets without any sort of interference ; and if we cannot do this, the attempt to force upon them comparatively dear goods is sure to be defeated; or if, unhappily, it should have a partial success, it would be injurious alike to the mother country and the colony. A colony might be advantageous, and might contribute to increase the wealth of the mother country, if it yielded a greater revenue than was required for its government and defence : but this is rarely the case. Most colonies require a heavy outlay on their first foundation ; and when they attain to any considerable importance, all at- tempts to make them contribute directly to increase the income of the mother country are very apt to excite dis- content, and probably even rebellion : an unfortunate attempt of this sort led, in fact, to the American war. To obviate all chance of any such disastrous event occur- ring in future, we have distinctly renounced all pretensions to make our colonies contribute any thing, unless it be towards defraying the expense of their loccd government and militia. All the troops and squadrons required for their protection and security are furnished gratuitously by England ; and, instead of deriving any revenue from our colonial possessions, they cost us anntially, in time of peace, a direct outlay of about 2,500,000/. \Official Ac- count, 18th of August, 1836.) In time of war, or when dissatisfaction prevails in any important colony, the direct outlay may be twice or three times as great. A colony may, however, be advantageous in a pecuniary point of view, even when it costs the mother country a considerable direct outlay, provided it afford great fa- cilities to individuals for making fortunes, with which to return to the mother country. A large sum is annually brought in this way into England from India ; but our colonial possessions are, in this respect, of little advantage. Few, comparatively, of those individuals who acquire pro- perty in the N. American colonies return to England ; and but few situations under the colonial government give the means of acquiring fortunes. If a colony enjoy a natural monopoly of any product or article in extensive demand, it is supposed that, by laying a heavy duty on its exportation, a considerable advantage may be made to accrue to the mother country : but this does not really appear to be the case. Ceylon possesses a monopoly of the trade in cinnamon ; but the cnonnously high duty (3s. per lb.) laid on the article when exported has restricted the demand for it to the narrowest limits, 'and reduced its culture, and the revenue derived fVom it, to a comparatively trifling amount. Most of our readers have no doubt heard of the immense profits made by the Dutch on spices, of which the possession of the Moluccas gave them the monopoly. But these high profits were wholly a consequence of the limitation of the quantity sold ; and to prevent a fall of price by an increase of the supply brought to market, the Dutch occasionally de- stroyed a portion of the produce ! There is no longer, however, so much even as the shadow of a doubt that they were heavy losers by this oppressive and short- sighted policy. The sales were confined to an amount hardly sufficient to employ the capitJil even of a single merchant ; and the total sum realized by the government is not supposed to have amounted to the tenth part of what it would have risen to had the trade been left free, under a moderate duty. When a nation derives the whole or any considerable portion of any important article from abroad, it is neces- sarily exposed, especially when the supply comes from one or a few foreign countries, to the risk of more or less inconvenience, from an interruption of the friendly in- tercourse subsisting with such countries. When such important articles are furnished by a colony, their supply is comparatively secure ; and, in such cases, colonial pos- sessions may be very valuable. At this moment any in- terruption of the trade with the United States would most probably, by interfering with the supply of raw cotton, be productive of the most calamitous results ; and there can be no doubt that if the whole, or any considerable part of the supply of cotton, were derived from a colony, it would be an important advantage. This, however, is not the case. It is not improlfeble but that, at some future period, India may yield abundant supplies of cotton ; but at present the cotton she sends to Europe is neither considerable in amount nor of good quality. It was long supposed that our colonies in the West Indies were peculiarly valuable from their furnishing us with a secure and abundant supply of sugar, an article now become a necessaiy of life, and yielding a very large revenue. We doubt, however, whether there were ever any good foundation for such an opinion ; but, whatever may have been the case formerly, there is none now. Sugar is not produced in one or a few countries only ; but is a staple product of almost all intertropical regions ; and it is now largely produced even in the northern parts of Europe. (See Sugar.) So far, indeed, is it from being true that we are indebted to our West Indian co- lonies for abundant supplies of sugar, that the fact is nearly the reverse. Foreign sugar is, and has long been, excluded from our markets by oppressive discriminating duties ; and were these repealed, and the duties on all sugars placed on the same level, it is exceedingly doubtful whether we should continue to derive any considerable portion of our supplies of sugar from our sugar colonies in the west. Great stress is frequently laid on the advantage of co- lonies established in unoccupied countries, in affording a field fbr the ready and beneficial emploj-ment of the surplus or unemployed population that occasionally abounds in old settled and densely peopled countries j neither can there be a doubt that this is of very material importance. But it is pretty obvious that, having founded a colony, it is unnecessary to retain it in a state of de- pendence if it wish to become free, to realize the advan- tage referred to. Labour, in such colonies, is always in great demand, and a regard for their own interests always disposes the colonists to give every fair facility to the im- migration of labourers. Notwithstanding the advantages occasionally held out by the British government to en- courage emigration to our North American colonies, the great current of emigration has always been directed to the United States ; and, even of the emigrants that sail from this country for Canada, scarcely a fourth part re- main in the province, but immediately leave it for the contiguous states of the Union. It is idle, therefore, to attempt to excuse the policy of attempting to retain co- lonies in a state of reluctant dependence on the mother country, on pretence of their affording a profitable outlet for poor or unemployed persons. The interest of the settlers %vill keep this outlet open, and will secure every real advantage that could, in this respect, be derived from the most complete colonial domination. We beg, however, that it may not be supposed, from any thing now stated, that we regard the foundation of colonies as inexpedient ; on the contrary, their establishment has been highly advantageous to this as it has been to most old settled countries in all ages. It is not to their foundation, provided they be placedin proper situationsand judiciously managed, but to the needless interference with their go- vernment, the trammels imposed on their industry, the prevention of their free intercourse with other people, and the attempt to govern them after they are able and detenninod to govern themselves, that we object. A nation that founds a colony in an unoccupietl country, or in a country occupied only by savages, extends by so doing the empire of civilization to, it may be, an in- definite degree. Such colony not only forms a desir- able outlet for the redundant "or unemployed population of the mother country, but it forms a new and rapidly increasing market for its products and those of other countries. No one can doubt that Europe has been signally benefited by the discovery and civilization of America ; but the advantages thence arising, how great soever, would have been incomparably greater, but for the various impolitic regulations imposed by the mother stites on their colonies. The British colonies, though fettered in various ways, enjoyed a much greater degree of freedom than those of any other country ; and, in con- sequence their progress, both before and since the sera of their independence, has been proportionally rapid. The colonies of Spain, on the other hand, though occupying the finest provinces, had their progress thwarted by the blind jealousy and short-sighted rapacity of the mother country, and were kept as much as possible in a state of pupilage. The government was entirely administered by natives of Old Spain ; the colonists were carefully excluded from every office of pow^ and emolument ; one colony was prohibited from trading with another ; and had foreigners presumed to settle amongst them, they would have been liable to capital punishment. In con- sequence their progress was very slow ; and when at length they succeeded in throwing off the galling yoke of the mother country, they became, from their inexperi- ence in self-government, a prey to all sorts of disorders. It is very questionable whether her South American colonies were of the least service to Spain ; and it is, at all events, certain that they have not conferred either on her or on. other countries a tenth part of the benefit they would have done had they been treated with greater liberality, and permitted freely to avail themselves of all the ad- vantages of their situation. The American war seems to have decided, in so far as experience can decide any thing, the question as to the policy of retaining colonies in a state of dependency that are determined to govern themselves. No colonies were ever reckoned half so valuable as those which now form the republic of the United States ; and it was generally supposed that their emancipation would be decisive of the fate of Britain, — that her sun would then set, and for ever ! But have we really lost any thing by that evei)t ? Has our trade, our wealth, or our power been in any degree iiiil)aired by the independence of the United Slates? Tlu' reverse is distinctly and completely the fact. The notion that we could have continued for any length of time to retain such rapidly growing countries in a state of de- pendence, or that we could have been advantageously united in a federal union with vast regions situated in another hemisphere, is too wild and extravagant to require examination. But notwithstanding its independence we liave continued, and will necessarily continue in all time to come, to reap all the advantage we can reasonably claim as founders of this mighty empire in the wilderness. English- men will necessarily always command a preference in the American markets. And while we are disencumbered of tlie impossible task and enormous expense attending the government and defence of all but boundless countries 3.000 miles distant, our intercourse with them grows with thfir growth ; and we are as much benefited and enriched 1)\ them as we should have been'liad they continued in the same state of dependency as Australia or the Cape of Good Hope. The previous remarks are not, of course, meant to ap- ply to such dependencies as Malta or Gibraltar. These arc not colonies, but naval stations, necessary for the ac- commodation of our ships of war and merchantmen, and serving also as secure depots for our produce. Every commercial and maritime nation that takes a just view of its real interests will always take care to possess itself of some such strong-holds. Neither are the previous remarks meant to apply to the conquest and occupation of foreign countries, in the view of increasing national opulence and power. Such policy may be either good or bad, according to the peculiar cir- cumstances affecting each particular case. Our remarks apply only to "colonies strictly so called ; that is, to the case of foreign territories, peopled principally or wholly by emigrants, or 'by the descendants of emigrants from the mother country, and not held as a mere military station. Sometimes, in order to carry on a trade with a colonjr, it is necessary to give its products peculiar advantages in the markets of the mother country ; and consequently at the expense and to the prejudice of the consumers in the latter. We rather incline to think that no small portion of our trade with the West Indies is forced in this way ; and that were the discriminating duties on foreign sugar abolished, we should derive a considerable part of our supplies from other quarters. But whatever may be the case with the West India trade, this, at all events, is the case with the Canada trade. It employs a large number of ships and seamen, and seems, to a superficial observer, highly valuable. In truth and reality, however, it is very niiifli the reverse. Two thirds and more of this trade is forced and factitious ; originating in the oppressive dis- criminating duty of 45s. a load imposed on timber from the north of Europe, over and above what is imposed on 249 COLONY. that brought from a British settlement in North America ! This obliges us to resort to Canada, whence we import an inferior article at a comparatively high ]»rice. The disadvantages of this impolitic system are numerous and glaring. To a manufacturing country, having a great mercantile and warlike navy, timber is indispensable; and yet, instead of supplying ourselves with it where it may be found best and cheapest, we load the superior and cheaper article with an exorbitant duty ; and thus do the most we can to make our houses and ships be built and our machinery constructed of what is inferior and dear ! But the mischief does not stop here. By refusing to import the timber of the north of Europe, we pro- portionally limit the power of the Russians, Prussians, Swedes, and Norwegians to buy our manufactured goods ; while, by forcing the importation of timber from Canada, we withdraw the attention of its inhabitants from the most profitable employment they can carry on, — that is, from the cultivation of the soil, — and make them waste their energies in comparatively disadvantageous pursuits I Such, either in a less or a greater degree, is the uniform result of all attempts to interfere with the natural order of things, and to force a trade, whether with a colony or a foreign country matters not, that would not otherwise be carried on. But the existing state of our relations with Canada affords other matter for serious, and not very pleasant reflection : that colony is not, and never has been, of ad- vantage to England. Were the duties on Canada timber reduced to the same level as those on Baltic timber, we question whether it would be found to possess a single article that could be advantageously exported to this country, or that we might not buy cheaper and better elsewhere- It no doubt affords an outlet for emigrants, and Is in so far useful ; but in all other respects its occu- pation has always been, and will most probably continue to be, productive of little except loss. And even as re- spects emigration, it is, as already explained, by no means clear that the field would be at all narrowed by Canada becoming independent, or connected with the United States. But useless as Canada has been to England in time past, the connection with it will, in all probability, become much more onerous in time to come. We shall not stop to inquire whether the Canadians have good grounds for the dissatisfaction that prevails so generally amongst them. It is enough to know that it exists ; and that nothing but the presence of a large British army is able to maintain our nominal ascendency in that province. W'hile this state of things continues, the prosperity of the colony must be at a stand ; emigration to it will cease or be greatly narrowed ; and the distresses in which the settlers will be involved will give additional strength to the party wishing to break off the connection with the mother countr}:. The people of Britain would do well to reflect dispassionately on the state of the Canadian question. There are not, perhaps, a dozen men of sense in the em- pire who are not ready to admit that in some ten or twenty years Canada will be independent, or be incorporated with the United States. But if so, what should be our policy in the mean time ? Are we resolved to maintain an army of 10,000 or 15,000 men in Canada ? — to expend, directly and indirectly, some three or four milliojis a year in pre- serving a mere nominal ascendency in a colony our con- nection with which is really a loss ? If such be our deter- mination, it may be doubted whether we have profited much by the dear-bought experience afforded by the Ame- rican war. National pride may prevent our relinquishing this costly and barren dominion ; Tjut good sense, and the most obvious views of expediency, woidd seem to suggest the policy of voluntarily anticipating what there is every reason to think must in the end necessarily happen, and of providing for the independence of Canada under a system of friendly and mutually beneficial relations. The explanation given by Dr. Smith in the Wealth of Nations (book iv. cap. 7. )of the causes of the rapid growth and prosperitv of colonies founded in advantageous situ- ations, though impugned by Sismondl (Etudes sur VEco- nomie Politique, ii. cap. " Colonies ") and others, seems to be consistent alike with principle and historical evi- dence. When a colony is founded in an uninhabited or but thinly peopled district, each colonist gets a large extent of the best land ; he has no rent, and but few if any taxes to pjiy ; and being able to procure supplies of manufactured articles from the mother country, or one equally advanced, he applies all his energies to agriculture, which under the circumstances is most productive. The demand for labour in such colonies is very great ; for the high rate of wages, combined with the cheapness of -the land, speedily changes the labourers into landlords, who in their turn become the employers of fresh labourers. In consequence population and wealth advance with un- usual rapidity ; and in some instances, as in that of the United States, they have continued for a lengthened period to go on doubling every twenty or five and twenty years ! COLONY. But in stating that the facility of obtaining supplies of fertile and unoccupied land is the principal cause of the rapid progress of new colonies, it is net meant to affinn that it is the only cause. An advantageous situation for the prosecution of commercial pursuits, and great superiority m navigation, may enable a colony to advance at its out- set, though without any considerable extent of territory, with even more rapidity than if it enjoyed an unli- mited command of fertile land. This seems to have been the principal cause of the speedy extension of the Greek colonies in antiquity. The most famous of these, as Syracuse and Agrigentum in Sicily, Tarentum and Locri in Italy, and Kphesus and Miletus in Asia Minor, were amongst the principal emporia of the ancient world. They were all sea-port towns ; were founded in the most advantageous situations for carrying on an ex- tensive commerce, and owed, in fact, their wealth and greatness mainly to trade and navigation. Owing, how- ever, to the limited extent of their territorial acquisitions, a consequence partly of the difficulty of subduing the in- digenous population, and partly of the neighbourhood of other colonies founded by rival states, their power rested on no very broad or solid foundation ; so that the fall of the capital city and the annihilation of the state v/ere all but synonymous. The colonies founded in modern times have been placed under very different circumstances. The countries in which they were planted were either so very thinly in- habited as to be almost deserts, or they were occupied by a feeble and inferior race unable to oppose any effectual obstacle to the diffusion of the colonists ; so that the latter easily spread themselves over a large extent of country, and have had in general more of an agricultural than of a commercial character. But while this has given them greater strength, it has not, after the difficulties attendant on their first establishment were got over, in any degree impeded their progress, but the contrary. The most flourishing of the colonies of antiquity will not bear to be compared in respect of rapidity of growth, magnitude and power, with the United States ; and the slower progress of the Spanish and Portuguese colonies is not owing to the colonists having distributed themselves over a wide extent of country, but to the oppressive interference of the mother country with their domestic arrangements, and the vexatious restrictions laid on their intercourse with foreigners. A very great degree of equality prevailed among the free settlers in Greek colonies ; and in consequfnce the lands accquired by the colonists were distributed amongst them in nearly equal portions. But in modern times it is very different. Owing to the vast extent and almost desert state of the countries in which they have been principally planted, the poorest individuals have generally succeeded in acquiring slips of land ; while the superior class of colonists, or those who had influence with the colonial government, or with that of the mother country, frequently succeeded in getting grants of vast tracts of land, not in the view of cultivating, but of holding them till in consequence of the increase of population in the vicinity they had acquired a considerable value. These large reserves, by interrupting the communications be- tween different parts of the colony, and increasing the difficulty and cost of conveyance, have frequently proved not a little inj urious to its interests . But there are various ways in which an abuse of this sort might be obviated ; and perhaps the best would be to apportion the land according to the available capital of the settlers, it being stipulated that no individual should receive above a certain number of acres, and that it should revert back to the public unless certain improvements were effected upon it within a speci- fied time after the grant was made. But not satisfied with attempting to put down an abuse of this sort, we are now told that all the difficulties in- cident to colonization have originated in the too great dispersion of the colonists ; and that to obviate them, and to ensure to all new colonies the acme of prosperity, we have merely to compel the colonists to keep close to- gether by exacting a high price for the surrounding waste or unoccupied land ; in other words, by making the colony as like an qld settled country as possible ! Perhaps such a crude project was hardly worth notice. If, on the one hand, the price set on the waste land were inconsiderable, it would not prevent the purchase of large tracts of land on speculation, and the entailing on the colony all the dis- advantages that have resulted from the making of in- judicious grants ; and if, on the other hand, the price demanded for the land were pretty high, it would go far to oppose an insuperable obstacle to the progress of the colony. Rich men do not leave their native country to expose themselves to the inconveniences and hardships attending the establishment of new settlements in the wilderness. This, if it be done at all, must be done in time to come as in time past, by individuals in straitened circumstances, and anxious to improve their fortunes. But to exact a high or considerable price for land from such persons would, by sweeping away the whole or a considerable portion of their capital, deprive them of the 250 COLOSSAL. means of clearing and cultivating the land, and propor- tionally retard their progress and that of the colony. The plan of letting lands by fine is admitted by every one who knows any thing of agriculture to be one of the worst that can be devised ; and this colonization project is bottomed on the same principle, and will no doubt be as pernicious. It is said that in consequence of the exaction of a price for the land, and the concentration of the colonists, their employments, being more combined and divided, will be prosecuted with a great deal more success than at present. All this, however, proceeds on the false and exploded as- sumption that the colonists are not, like other individuals, the best judges of what is for their own advantage. Dr. Smith says truly that it is the highest impertinence for kings and ministers to attempt to direct private people hoio they should employ their capitals. But it is, if pos- sible, a still greater impertinence to attempt to direct them where thev shall employ them. A regard to their own interest will draw people sufficiently together ; and to enact regulations in the view of concentrating them still more, is in every respect as contradictory and absurd as it would be to set about increasing the public wealth by regulating the sort of employments to be carried on, and the countries with which, and the commodities in which, to deal. We have already sufficiently explained the principal cause of the rapid progress made by some of the Greek colonies : it should, however, be borne in mind that these colonies had great numbers of slaves, who carried on most part of the more common employments. Hence, in Sy- racuse or Tarentum, every rich individual might have as many obsequious servants as he pleased, and all sorts of luxurious accommodations were to be had in the greatest profusion. But in those modern colonies where slavery is abolished, the different ranks and orders of men are more nearly assimilated, less by the depression of the rich than by the elevation of the poor. What is wanted in re- finement and attention is far more than compensated by the wellbeing and comfort of the lower classes. It is a part of this new project, on the supposed ex- cellence of which much stress is laid, that the sums got by the sale of lands in the colony are to be expended in defraying the expense attending the conveyance thither of labourers. This is a species of bait held out to tempt capitalists to buy land, by making them believe that though land be artificially dear, labour will be artificially cheap, and that on the whole they will be very well off! This, however, is merely attempting to repair an injury done the capitalists, by inflicting a still more serious in- jury on the labourers. In a colony where a large portion of the capital is swallowed up in the purchase of land, the demand for labour must be comparatively limited ; and this limited market is to be glutted by throwing upon it crowds of paupers transported gratis from England ! We say crowds of paupers ; for few labourers aware of the facts of the case, who can afford to pay for a passage to the United States, will voluntarily go to a colony where land is to be artificially raised to a high price, and labour ar- tificially reduced. The whole scheme seems, in fact, to be little else than a tissue of delusions and contradictions, and it says little for the discernment of the public that it should have attracted any notice. It is true that the Americans sell their unoccupied lands ; but they sell the richest and finest lands in the valley of the Mississippi at less than a dollar an acre, whereas we exact 5s. an acre for the worst land at the antipodes, or in that terra incognita called Southern Australia ! If these regulations be intended to divert the current of voluntary emigration from our own colonies to the United States, they do honour to the sagacity of those by whom they were contrived, and there is not a word to be said against them ; but in all other respects they seem to be as im- politic and absurd as can well be imagined. (For further information on this important subject, see St. Croix, de VEtat et du Sort des Anciennes Colonies ; the art. " Co- lony" in the EncyclopcEdia Britannica ; and M'Cttlloch's Commercial Dictionary, and Edition of the Wealth of Nations.) CO'LOPHON. In Bibliography, the postcript con- tained in the last sheet of an early printed work (before the introduction of title-pages), containing the printer's name, date, &c., is so termed ; from a fanciful allusion to a Greek satirical proverb, in which the people of Colo- phon, in Asia Minor, are reproached with being always the hindmost. COI.O'PHONITE. A variety of garnet of a resinous fracture. COLO'PHONY. (Gr. KoAwpw;*, the city whence it was first brought.) The dark-coloured resin which re- mains after the distillation of oil of turpentine. COLO'SSAL. (From Colossus, a very large statue at Rhodes.) In the Fine Arts, a term applied to any work of art remarkable for its extraordinary dimensions. It is, however, more applied to works in sculpture than in the other arts. It seems probable that colossal statues had their origin from the attempt to astonish by size at a period wlien the science of proportion and that of imi- COLOSSEUM. tation were in their infancy. Colossal statues of the di- vinities were common both in Asia and Egypt. By the description of the palace or temple attributed to Semi- ramis it abounded with colossal statues, among which was one of Jupiter forty feet in height. In Babylon we learn from Daniel that the palaces were filled with statues of an enormous size, and in the present day the ruins of India present us with statues of extraordinary dimensions. The Egyptians surpassed the Asiatics in these gigantic monuments, considering the beautiful finish they gave to such a hard material as granite. Sesostris, according to history, appears to have been the first who raised these colossal masses, the statues of himself and his wife, which he placed before the temple of Vulcan, having been thirty cubits in height. This example was imitated by his successors, as the ruins of Thebes sufficiently testify. The taste for colossal statues prevailed also among the Greeks. The statue of Apollo at Rhodes, executed by Chares, a disciple of Lysippus, has indeed given this species of art the name it bears ; and the great Phidias contributed several works of this order. The colossus at Tarentum by Lysippe was no less than forty cubits in height ; and the difficulty of removing it, rather than the moderation of the conqueror, prevented Fabius carrying it off with the Hercules from the same city. But the proposition made to Alexander of cutting Mount Athos into a statue, in one ef whose hands a city was to be placed capable of holding ten thousand inhabitants, whilst in the other he was to hold a vessel pouring out the tor- rents from the mountain, exceeds all others in history. Before the time of the Romans colossal statues were frequently executed in Italy. The first monument of this nature set up in Rome was one placed in the capitol by Sp. Carvilius after his victory over the Samnites. This was succeeded in after times by many others, of which those now on Monte Cavallo, said to be of Castor and Pollux, are well known to most persons. In mo- dern times the largest that has been erected is that of S. Carlo Boromeo at Arona near Milan. This gigantic statue is upwards of sixty feet in height. COLOSSE'UM. See Amphitheatre. COLO'STRUM. The first milk after delivery. A mixture of turpentine with the yolk of egg. CO'LOUR. (Lat. color.) In Painting, that quality of a body which affects our sensation in regard to its hue. Local colours are those which are natural to a particular object in a picture, and by which it is distinguished from other objects. Neutral colours are those in which the hue is broken by partaking of the reflected colours of the objects which surround them. Positive colours are those unbroken by such accidents as affect neutral colours. CO'LUBER. A Linnaean genus of serpents, inclu- ding all those in which the subcaudal scale-plates or scutae are arranged in pairs. This extensive group is now sub- divided into numerous subgenera. CO'LUM. A term, now obsolete, denoting that part of the ovarium from which the ovula arise ; commonly called the Placenta. COLU'MBA. (Lat. columba, a jo?^eoM.) A genusof birds which form the transition from the Passerine "to the Gallinaceous orders. They fly w€ll ; live in a state of monogamy ; build their nests in trees or in the crevices and fissures of rocks ; and lay but few eggs at a time, ge- nerally two; their tail is composed of twelve quill-feathers: 80 far the Columbae resemble the Passerine birds. But their beak is vaulted ; the nostrils perforated in a broad membranous space, and covered with a cartilaginous scale, which even forms a bulge at the base of the bill ; the sternum is deeply and doubly notched; a dilated crop is developed from both sides of the oesophagus ; the stomach is a true gizzard ; and the lower larynx has only a single pair of muscles : all these important modifications of structure indicate the close affinity of the Dove tribe to the Gallinaceous birds. And it may be further re- marked, that although the pigeons lay but few eggs at each brood, they breed frequently, and at short intervals. The male assists his mate in the business of incubation and rearing of the young, which are at first supported by a milky secretion prepared from the glandular coat of the crop, and regurgitated, together with the macerated grain. The Linnaean genus is subdivided into numerous but unimportant subgenera, characterized by the greater or less length of the bill, and the proportions of the feet and tail. COLU'MBA NOACHI. (Noah's Dove.) A small constellation in the southern hemisphere, near the hin- der feet of Canis Major, formed by llalley. COLUMBA'RIUM. (Lat.) In Architecture, a pigeon- house or dovecote. From the similarity the arched and square-headed recesses in the walls of cemeteries, which were made to receive the cinerary Urns, were also called Columbaria. COLU'iMBIA. A bitter crystalline principle, obtained from colomba root. COLU'MBIUM. A metal discovered by Mr. llatchett in 1801, in a mineral from Massachusets in North America. It has since been found in a Swedish mineral 251 COMBINATION. called tantalite, but its ores are extremely rare. It is acidifiable, and hence the peroxide has been termed columbic acid. COLUMELLIA'CEJE. (Colum.ellia, one of the genera.) An obscure natural order of shrubby or ar- borescent Exogens, inhabiting Mexico and Peru ; dis- tinguished from JasminacecE, to which order they have been referred, by having an adherent ovary, a perigynous disk, undivided stigma, and inferior capsule with poly- sperraous ceils. Of its true affinity little is known. CO'LUMN. (Lat. columna.) In Architecture, a member of an order whose section through the axis is usually a frustum of an elongated parabola. It is circular on every height of its plan, and consists of a base, shaft or body, and a capital. It differs from a pilaster, which is square on the plan. The use of the column is to support the entablature. See Order. CO'LURES. In Astronomy, two imaginary great circles of the celestial sphere mtersecting in the poles of the world ;. one passing througli the equinoctial points of Aries and Libra, and the other through the solstitial points of Cancer and Capricorn. For this reason the first is called the equinoctial, and the second the solstitial colure. The name Colure, derived from Gr. xoXev^es (Cauda truncus, imperfect), is supposed to have been given to those circles because a portion of them is always concealed from view under the horizon. But this is the case with every other meridional circle as well as the colures. CO'LZA, OIL OF. The oil expressed from the seed of the Brassica oleracea, a species of cabbage. Colza oil is much used in France and Belgium for burning in lamps and other purposes. CO'MA. (Gr. xofji-vi, hair.) The assemblage of branches forming the head of a forest tree. Also used to denote bracts that are empty and terminate an inflo- rescence, as in Salvia horminum. Coma. (Gr. «4/^a, a swoon.) Lethargy, or unna- tural drowsiness ; whence the term comatose. CO'MA BERENl'CES. (Literally Berenice's hair.) A constellation of the northern hemisphere, between the tail of the Lion and Bootes. See Constellation. COMB, or COOMB. A measure of corn, commonly four Winchester bushels. Comb, or Combe, in the western counties of England, signifies a small valley. The same ancient word of Celtic derivation is used in Wales (cwm), and in the Alps be- tween France and Piedmont (combe), in the same sense. COMBINA'TION. (Lat. con, and binus, double.) In Algebra, signifies the disposition or arrangement of any number of objects or symbols in all possible ways. The two principal problems that occur in the theory of combination are the following : — 1 st. Any number of things with the number in each combin- ation being given ; to find the number of combin- ations. 2d, To find the number of alterations which any number of quantities can undergo when combined in every possible variety of ways. In the solution of the first problem we have to consider that in combining things by pairs, twa things, a, b, admit of one combin- ation only, viz. ab j three things, a, b, c, admit of three, viz. ab, ac, be ; four admit of six, viz. ab, ac, ad, be, bd, cd; five admit often, viz. ab, ac, ad, ae, be, bd, be, cd, ce, de. Generally, if n denote the number of things, the formula which expresses the number of all their combin- n{n—l) , .„ ^ , .5-4 ations by pairs is — : — - — . Thus, if n = 5, then : 1-2 1 -2 G-5 =10; if w = 6, then = 15 is the number of combin- ations. 1 ■ 2 When the things are combined by threes, the number of combinations that can be made out of a given number n, is _" .,,^— y "~— . If combined by fours, the number \ ^ 2 3 „ »— 1 n— 2 n—3 of combinations is ™ X -^ X -^ x -j- , and so on. The number of combinations of all sorts that can be made of « things (that is, by first taking the things one at a time, then taking them by twos, then by threes, and so on) is 2n-l. Thus, all the possible combinations or selections that can be made of three things are 23-1=7, \\z. abc,ab, ac,bc, a, b,c. , , . ^ The second problem requires us to take into account not only the different combinations of the things them- selves, but also the order of their arrangement. Ad- mitting this element of variation. Two things may be varied by pairs m four ways : thus, aa, ab, ba, bb. _ • j • Three quantities, taken by pairs, may be varied nine ways ; thus, aa, ab, ac, ba, ca, bb, be, cb, cc. Generally the number of variations by pairs which can be made of w things is equal ton2 ^ when taken by threes, the number of variations is n^ ; when by fours, the number of changes is «*, and so on. Hence the whole number of changes in n things, taken by twos, by threes, by fours, COMBINATION. and so on to ra, is the sum of the geometrical series n + _«n— 1 7j2 + 7^3 + „4 4- »n— ^ X «. Thus, if »=5, the 55-1 number of possible changes »s— — x 5=3905; and if » =24 (the number of letters in the alphabet), the theorem gives 1391724288887252999425128493402200, a number con- sisting of 34 digits. See Permutation. COMBINA'TION. In Law, may take place for the performance of any unlawful act, and is punish- able before such act is executed. But the word has been commonly used in a particular sense ; viz. that of a combination among workmen to demand wages at a particular rate ; which was an unlawful act prior to the 6 G. 4. c. 129. repealing former statutes. Workmen are now at perfect liberty to form such combinations ; but penalties are enacted by the statute against such as use threats or violence towards those who refuse to join in them. And the offence of administering unlawful oaths (whether preparatory to a combination among work- men, or for any other purpose) remains unaffected by the statute. Combinations to raise wages, or " strikes," have formed for the last fifty j;ears the most embarrassing difficulties with which British manufacturers, and the labouring classes themselves, have had to contend ; and it can scarcely be said that the repeal of the combination laws in 1824 has produced much effect either to encourage or diminish them. On this subject we shall make an ex- tract from a note, or rather a dissertation on " wages of labour," in Mr. M'CulIoch's 'Edationoi Smith's Wealth of Nations, in which the tendency of combinations to fetter commercial operations is set forth with a brevity and perspicuity no where surpassed. " The repeal of the act against voluntary combin- ations in 1824 was a just and a wise measure. If any number of persons choose to combine to refuse to work, except for a certain amount of wages, or for certain hours per day, or week, to forbid them would seem to be a most oppressive interference with one of the distinguishing privileges of free labourers. It was found too that practically the laws against such com- binations were good for nothing, and that, instead of putting them down, they gave them a secret character, and made them be easily perverted to other and more objectionable objects. But when workmen have power to refuse to employ themselves on terms of which they disapprove, they have got all, in this respect, to which they are entitled. None of them have any riglit to dictate to their fellows ; or to say that because they object to certain stipulations in the terms offered by such and such employers, no one else shall be allowed to accept them. A pretension of this sort strikes at the very foundations of society ; and if tolerated might enable juntos of designing individuals to inflict irreparable in- jury, not only on the employers of labour, but on the manufactures of the country, and consequently on the lasting interests of the labouring class. Wc need not, liowever, be surprised to learn that this is what numbers of workmen in various places have attempted to do ; and that combinations have been formed, not for the legitimate purpose of refusing to work except on certain conditions, but for preventing other workpeople who may disapprove of, or not choose to insist on, these conditions, acceptingthe terms offered by their employers. The measures taken to enforce this most unjustifiable pretension have in some instances been of a very ob- noxious description, and have evinced the existence of a very dangerous spirit. Nothing should be omitted that may serve to root out and suppress combinations for such illegal ends. They are completely subversive of that security essential to the prosecution of all industrious undertakings ; and are, at bottom, as hostile to the in- terests of those that enter into them as they are to the interests of every one else." (For further details on this subject, see A. Smith, Book i. chap. 8. ; the Parlia- mentary Debates of the Year 1824 ; Torrenson Wages and Combinations, London, 1834 ; FAinb.Revietv,\o\.2,^.b^.) CO'MBRETA'CE^. (Combretum, one of the genera.) A natural order of shrubby or arborescent Exogens, all living within the tropics, and placed indifferently in the vicinity of Santalacece and Elceagnacece, or of Onagraccce and MyrtacetB. They all possess an astringency, and some are employed in dyeing. Some are polypctalous, some apetalous. They are especially distinguished by their convolute embryo. COMBU'STION. This term is generally applied to the phenomena exhibited by burning bodies, and which depend upon the rapid union of the combustible with the oxygen of the air. The evolution of heat and light which attends this process announces intense chemical action ; and we consequently find that combustion is always at- tended by the production of new compounds. See Heat. CO'MEDY. (From the Greek words x^fjt,y>, a vil- lage, and m*!, a song; because the original rude dia- 252 COMET. logues, intermixed with singing and dancing, out of which the early Greek comedy arose, were sung by rustic actors at village festivals.) A species of drama, of which the characteristics in modern usage are, that its incidents and language approach nearly to those of ordinary life ; that the termination of its intrigue is happy ; and that it is distinguished by greater length and greater complexity of plot from the lighter theatrical piece entitled a farce. The original Attic comedy was a burlesque tragedy in form, in substance a satire on individuals, and founded on political or other matters of public interest. The modern comedy is derived from the new comedy of the Greeks, of which Menander and Philemon were the principal authors, and which has been preserved to us througli the Latin imitations of Plautus and Terence. See Drama. CO'MET. (Gr. xo,u.r,ryis, from xo/xfi, hair.) The name given to a numerous class of celestial bodies belonging to the solar system. The luminous point which shines with greater or less brilliancy at the centre of a comet is called its nucleus. The nucleus is generally surrounded by a nebulosity, or luminous aurora. The train of light, of greater or less extent, with which most comets are ac- companied, is called the tail. Formerly this name was only applied to the luminous train when it fell behind the comet in its diurnal motion ; if it preceded the comet, it was called the beard; but this distinction has disappeared in modern works on Astronomy. The ancients gave the name of comet to every ne- bulous star or meteor which was observed to pass suc- cessively through different constellations. Modern astro- nomers apply the name, notwithstanding the etymology, to stars which have neither nebulosity nor tail. Ac- cording to them, the distinctive characters of a comet are, 1st, that it possesses a proper motion ; 2d, that it traverses space in a curve so elongated that in the distant parts of its orbit it ceases to be visible. The proper motion distinguishes comets from those new stars which occasionally appear, and become extinguished without changing their place in the sky. The elongated form of the orbit establishes a distinction equally marked between the comets and the planets. Orbits of Comets. — Some of the ancient philosophers regarded comets as simple meteors, engendered in the atmosphere. In order, however, to be convinced that they occupy a far more remote situation, it is only neces- sary to compare simultaneous observations at very distant places on the earth. Tycho Brahe was the first who showed that their true place is in the planetary regions : since the time of Tycho, it has been discovered that they revolve about the sun according to regular laws, similar fee those which govern the planetary motions ; and that their orbits are very elongated ellipses, having the sun in one of their foci. Comets are only visible during the short time they are near the perihelia of their orbits. But an elongated ellipse, and a parabola having the same summit and focus, only begin to diverge sensibly at a considerable distance from the common summit. In order, therefore, to represent the different positions of a comet during the short time it is visible, we may in general without any inconvenience substitute a parabola for an ellipse. If it happens that the orbit cannot be represented by a para- bola, we conclude that the ellipse is not very elongated. Now, by means of three positions of a comet seen from the earth, all the elements of its parabolic orbit may be determined. These elements are, 1st, the line ot the nodes ; 2d, the inclination of the orbit to the plane of the ecliptic ; 3d, the perihelion distance, or least distance of the comet from the sun, expressed in parts of the earth's semidiameter ; 4th, the instant of the passage through the perihelion ; 5th, the longitude of the perihelion. When these elements are known, the path of the comet is completely determined ; and it is only necessary, in addition, to indicate the direction of the motion, that is to say, whether it is in the order Of the signs, or the contrary. The proper motion of all the planets is performed from west to east in the order of the signs ; comets, on the other hand, appear to traverse the heavens in all direc- tions indifferently. Of 129 comets whose orbits have been determined, there are 68 whose motion is direct, and 61 whose motion is retrograde, and their orbits intersect the ecliptic at all possible angles. Out of the whole number there are only three whose returns to the sun in suc- cessive revolutions have been verified by observation. These are, 1st, Halley's comet, of which the period is about seventy-five and a half years ; 2d, Enckc's, whose period is about three and one third years ; and 3d, Biela's, which performs its revolution in six years and about eight months. Halley's Comet. — Newton was the first who submitted the motion of -a comet to calculation, and pointed out a method of determining its orbit from three of its ob- served positions. Halley applied Newton's method to a great number of comets, of which the positions had been observed ; and on comparing the resulting elements, per- COMET. ccived that the comet which appeared In 1682 moved nearly in the same orbit as one which had been observed ill u;07, and another which had* been observed by Apian ill 1531. As the interval between these successive appa- ritions was nearly the same, namely, about seventy-six years, the identity of the three comets appeared to Halley to be established, and he accordingly predicted its return in 1759. Clairaut, a celebrated French mathema- tician, computed the time at which it would arrive at its perihelion ; and his results were confirmed by observ- ation, the comet actually passing its perihelion within about a month of the time predicted. The computation of the comet's return to its perihelion is a work of great difficulty and labour ; for in consequence of the attractions of the larger planets, th^ath of the comet is considerably changed at each revolution, and all these changes or perturbations, as tliey are called, must be computed from the theory of gravitation. The reappearance of this comet in 1835 was expected with great interest. Its perturbations in the previous revolution were calculated by Damoisean and Pontecou- lant in France, and. by Ilosenberger in Germany, and the time of its perihelion passage fixed for the month of No- vember in that year. Damoisean's calculation gave the 4th, Pontecoulant's the 7th, and Rosenberger's the M of the month. The comet, true to its appointed laws, ' became visible about the end of August, in the part of the heavens predicted ; and it appears from the compa- rison of the numerous observations that were made of it» to have actually passed its perihelion on the 16th of November. The position of its orbit was such that it could scarcely be seen in Europe after the passage, on account of its proximity to the horizon ; but it was then caught by the astronomers of the southern hemisphere, and contmued to be observed by Sir John Herschel at the Cape of Good Hope till the end of March, 1836, when its increasing distance from the earth rendered it invisible. For some weelis it continued visible to the naked eye, but its splendour was not very remarkable. Encke's Comet. — Two otJier comets have more recently been identified as having been seen in preceding revolu- tions about the sun. One of these is called Encke's comet, from Professor Encke of Berlin, who first com- puted its elliptic elements. Its orbit is very elongated, the eccentricity being nearly = -845, and inclined to the ecliptic in an angle of about 13° 22^. The period of its revolution is 1207 days, or about 3 and l-3d years. Though this comet was not recognized as periodic till 1819, it had frequently been observed in previous revolu- tions—in 1789, 1795, 1801, and 1805. From the ellipse cal- culated by Encke, its return was predicted in 1822. On this occasion it was invisible in Europe, but was observed at Paramatta in New South Wales. In the subsequent returns of 1825, 1828, and 1832, it was observed in the principal observatories both in the northern and sou- thern hemispheres. In comparing the interv^ils between the successive returns to its perihelion, it is found that the period of this comet is continually diminishing. This is exactly the effect that would be produced if it moved through a resisting medium ; for the resistance, by diminishing the actual velocity, diminishes the centri- fugal force, in consequence of which the solar attraction preponderates, and the comet is drawn nearer to the sun, and completes its revolution in a shorter time. Accord- ingly, as there appears no other way of accounting for the observed acceleration, it seems now to be the general opinion of astronomers that an ethereal medium pervades the regions of space, of sufficient density to affect the motions of comets, though so rare as to offer no sensible resistance to the denser masses of the planets, whose periods of revolution have continued exactly the same since the epoch of the first astronomical observations. If this medium really exists, the comet must ultimately fall into the sun, unless it is dissipated altogether ; an event which seems not improbable, from the observed fact of its having been less conspicuous at each reappearance. J5/(?to's Comet. — The third periodic comet at present known was discovered by Biela, an Austrian officer then residing at Prague, in February, 1826 ; and by M.Gambart of Marseilles in April of the same year. It has been identified with comets observed in 1772, 1789, 1795, 1846, &c. It performs its revolution in 2461 days, in an ellipse inclined to the ecliptic, in an angle of 13° 33' 15", having an eccentricity of 0*74701, its greater semi-axis being 3*56705. Its last apparition took place, in accordance with calculation, in 1839 ; and its next return will be in 1846. It is a small comet, having no tail, and presenting no ap- pearance of a solid nucleus, but only a slight increasing density towards the centre ; and small stars were seen through it. Its orbit, by a singular coincidence, nearly intersects that of the earth ; and liad the earth, at the time of the comet's passage in 1832, been a month in advance of its actual place, it would have passed through or very near the comet. Effects of the Action of the Planets on the Orbits of Comets — Comets in passing near the larger planets are drawn aside frbm their paths, and have their orbits some- 253 times entirely changed. In June, 1770, a comet was dis- covered by Messier ; and as soon as three observations had been obtained, the elements of its parabolic orbit were determined. The comet continued visible for a long time, and it was found that the parabolic elements could not be made by any combination to represent the obser- vations. It followed, therefore, that the orbit could not be a parabola. Lexell undertook the computation of an elliptic orbit, and found, in fact, that the comet was de- scribing an ellipse, of which the greater axis was only equal to three times the dicuneter of the terrestrial orbit, and would consequently complete its revolution in about five years and a half. He accordingly predicted its return at the end of that period ; nevertheless, the comet did not appear at the expected time, and, though very con- spicuous in 1770, has never been seen since. On exa- mining the catalogues, no trace was found of a comet describing the same orbit having been seen before. The question, therefore, occurred, in what manner was this mysterious appearance and disappearance to be explained? The solution was found in the disturbing influence of Jupiter. On submitting to calculation the action of this planet on the comet, it was found, in the first place, that in the year 1767, before the comet had approached Ju- piter, the elliptic orbit which it described corresponded to a revolution, not of five, but of fifty years ; and in the second place, it was found that in 1779, when getting beyond the sphere of attraction of the same planet, the orbit in which it then moved could only be described in twenty years. Previously to 1767 it moved in so wide an orbit that it could not be seen from the earth : the attrac- tion of Jupiter threw it into the orbit in which it was ob- served by Messier. On a second approach to Jupiter, it was again deflected from its path, and thrown into an orbit in which it was invisible as at first. Physical Isature qf Comets — Notwithstanding the at- tention which has been given to the observation of comets whenever they make their appearance, nothing whatever is known of their physical constitution ; nor has any ra- tional or even plausible explanation been offered of the voluminous appendage denominated the tail. The fol- lowing remarks of Sir John Herschel on this subject are extremely interesting. " The 'smaller comets, such as are visible only in te- lescopes, or with difficulty by the naked eye, and which are by far the most numerous, offer very frequently no appearance of a tail, and appear only as round or some- what oval vaporous masses, more dense towards the centre ; where, however, they appear to have no distinct nucleus, or any thing which seems entitled to be consi- dered as a solid body. Stars of the smallest magnitudes remain distinctly visible, though covered by what appears to be the densest portion of their substance ; although the same stars would be completely obliterated by a moderate fog, extending only a few yards from the surface of the earth Whenever powerful telescopes have been turned on these bodies, they have not failed to dispel the illusion which attributes solidity to that more condensed part of the head which appears ta the naked eye as a nucleus ; though it is true that in some a very minute stellar point has been seen, indicating the existence of a solid body. " It is in all probability to the feeble coercion of the elastic power of their gaseous parts by the gravitation of so small a central mass, that we must attribute this ex- traordinary development of the atmosphere of comets. If the earth, retaining its present size, were reduced by any internal change (as by hollowing out its central parts) to one thousandth part of its actual mass, its coercive power over the atmosphere would be reduced in the same proportion, and in consequence the latter would expand to a thousand times its actual bulk ; and indeed much more, owing to the still further diminution of gra- vity by the recess of the upper parts from the centre. " That the luminous part of a comet is something in the nature of a smoke, fog, or cloud, suspended m a transparent atmosphere, is evident from a fact which has been often noticed ; viz. that the portion of the tail, where it comes up to and surrounds the head, is yet separated from it by an interval less luminous, as if sustained and kept off from contact by a transparent stratum, as we often see one layer of clouds laid over another, with a considerable space between. These, and most of the other facts observed in the history of comets, appear to indicate that the structure of a comet, as seen in section in the direction of its length, must be that of a hollow envelope, of a parabolic form, enclosing near its vertex the nucleus and head, some- thing as is represented in the an- nexed figure. This would account for the apparent division of the tail into two lateral branches,, tho envelope being oblique to the line of sight at its borders, and therefore a greater depth of illuminated matter being there exposed to the eye. In all probability, however, they admit great varie- ties of structure, and among them may very possibly be COMETARIUM. bodies of widely different physical constitution." (As- tronomy ; Cabinet Cyclopcudia, p. 304.) From the same authority we extract the following statement respecting the actual dimensions of some of the most conspicuous comet - : — " The tail of the great comet of 16S0, immediately after its perihelion passage, was found by Newton to have been no less than 20,000,000 of leagues in length, and to have occupied only two days in its emission from the comet's body ! — a decisive proof this of its being darted forth by some active force, the origin of which, to judge from the direction of the tail, must be sought in the sun itself. Its greatest length amounted to 41,000,000 leagues, a length much exceeding ■*the whole interval between the sun and the earth. The tail of the comet of 1769 extended 16,000,000 leagues, and that of the great comet of 1811, 36,000,000. The portion of the head of this last comprised within the transparent atmospheric envelope which separated it from the tail was 180,000 leagues in diameter. It is hardly conceiv- able that matter once projected to such enormous dis- tances should ever be collected again by the feeble attraction of such a body as a comet — a consideration which accounts for the rapid progressive diminution of the tails of such as have been frequently observed." (Ibid. p. 311.) It is extremely probable that the comets are merely collections of gaseous matter, of which a part may be dissipated in space at every revolution ; but further ob- servations are wanted to make this hypothesis certain. In 1682 Halley's comet appeared as round and clear as Jupiter ; in 1759 it was not visible to the naked eye ; in 1836 it was again sufficiently visible, but it was then in a much more favourable position than in 1759. In former times comets were regarded as preternatural appearances, betokening the displeasure of the superior powers, and accordingly viewed with the terror and ap- prehension naturally excited by hai-bingers of indefinite and unavoidable calamity. Since they have been dis- covered to be component parts of the solar system, tht.r appearance excites no other interest than that which as- tronomers feel to determine their orbits, and to deduce from their physical aspects such conclusions as they are calculated to afford relative to the constitution of the universe. COMETA'RIUM. An astronomical toy, intended to represent the motion of a comet about the sun. Any in- strument capable of describing an elongated ellipse may be called a cometarium. See Elliptic Compasses. COMI'TIA. In Ancient History, the assemblies of the Roman people, which were of three kinds, distin- guished by the epithets Curiata, Centuriata, and Tributa. 1 . The Comitia Curiata were the assemblies of the pa- trician houses or populus ; and in these, before the ple- beians attained political importance, was vested the su- preme power of the state. The name Curiata was given because the people voted in curies, each curia giving a single vote representing the sentiments of the majority of the members composing it ; which was the manner in which the tribes and centuries also gave their suffrages in their respective comitia. After the institution of the Comitia Centuriata, the functions of the curiata were nearly confined to the election of certain priests, and passing a law to confirm the dignities imposed by the people. 2. The Comitia Centuriata were the assemblies of the whole Roman people, including patricians, clients, and plebeians, in which they voted by centuries . By the con- stitution of the centuries, these comitia were chiefly in the hands of the plebeians, and so served originally as a counterpoise to the powers of the comitia curiata, for which purpose they were first instituted by the lawgiver king Servius TuUius. These comitia quickly obtained the chief importance, and public matters of the greatest moment were transacted in them ; as the elections of consuls, praetors, and censors, and the passing laws and trials for high treason. 3. The Comitia Tributa were the assemblies of the plebeian tribes. They were first instituted after the ex- pulsion of the kings ; and in them were transacted mat- ters pertaining to the plebeians alone, as the election of their tribunes and jediles. CO'MMA. (Gr.) In Music, the smallest of all the subdivisions, being about the ninth part of a tone. Comma. In Grammar. See Punctuation. COMMA'NDER. In the Navy, otherwise called master, an officer next in rank above lieutenant, corre- sponding with major in the army, COMMANDER-IN-CHIEF. The officer in whom is vested the supreme command of all the land forces of the British Empire. This officer is appointed by the ministry of the day, whose confidence he is supposed to enjoy, and he is assisted in the discharge of his duties by several subordinate officers, such as the adjutant-general, the quartermaster- general, &c. (see these terms), who are each at the head of a particular department. COMMA'NDERY, or PRECEPTORY. According to the usages of some orders of Knights, a district attached COMMERCE. to a manor or chief messuage under the control of a member of the order, who receives the income of that district arising from the estates of the order, taking out of it his own pension, and accounting for the rest. COMMELINA'CE^. (Commelina, one of the ge- nera.) A natural order of herbaceous Endogens, chiefly inhabiting the East and West Indies. Brown remarks that the order greatly differs from Juncaccce both in habit and structure, and agrees better with Restiacece, having but little affinity with Palms ; and Agardh adds, that it agrees with Orchidacecs in the structure of the stamens and seeds, but in what respect he does not state. The species are very often mere weeds, but occasionally are beautiful flowering nlants. A common example is the Tradescantm virginica. COMME'NDAM. (Lat.) A term of the Canon Law. A person to whom custody of a void ecclesiastical benefice is committed by the superior, without the profits apper- tadning to it, was said to hold the benefice in commen- dam, i. e. entrusted to his care; but by various devices the restriction on the receipt of profits was evaded, and the holding benefices in commendam became a mode of enjojdng pluralities. By the English law, no one can hold in commendam without license from the crown. An ordinary case is where clergymen promoted to bishoprics with insufficient revenues are allowed in this manner to retain the profits of livings . COMME'NSURABLE. Quantities, in Geometry, are said to be commensurable when they have some common measure or divisor which divides each of them without leaving a remainder. Thus a yard and a furlong are commensurable magnitudes, because a foot is a measure or aliquot part of each of them, being contained in the yard three times, and in the furlong 660 times. Fractional numbers and surds are also said to be commensurable when they have a common measure of the same kind as themselves . Thus § and f are commensurable, being each divisible by ^ \ and so are 2\/2 and 3v^2, being each measured by \/2. CO'MMENTARY. (Derived from the Latin verb oomminiscor, / call to mind.) In Literature, a word used in different significations : — 1 . In the same sense with memoirs, as a short narrative of particular events and occurrences, composed by an actor or spectator of those events with the professed object of calling back the cir- cumstances to his own mind ; e. g. the Commentaries of Caesar. 2. Critical observations on the text or contents of a book. These are either in the form of detached notes, containing remarks on particular passages ; or they are embodied in what is termed a running commen- tary, or series of remarks written and printed in a con- nected form. CO'MMERCE (from commutatio mercium), is the exchange of one sort of produce or service for some other sort of produce or service. Exchanges of this description have their rise in the na- ture of man and the circumstances under which he is placed, and their origin is coeval with the formation of society. The varying powers and dispositions of different individu- als dispose them to engage in preference in particular occu- pations ; and in the end every one finds it for his advantage to confine himself wholly or principally to some one em- ployment, and to barter or exchange such portions of his produce as exceed his own demand, for such portions of the peculiar produce of others as he is desirous to obtain and they are disposed to part with. The division and combination of employments is carried to some extent in the rudest societies, and it is carried to a very great extent in those that are most improved ; but to whatever extent it may be carried, commerce must be equally advanced. The division of employments could not exist without com- merce, nor commerce without the division of employ- ments: they mutually act and react upon each other. Every new subdivision of employments occasions a greater extension of comnierce; and the latter cannot be ex- tended without ccatributing to the better division and combination of the former. In rude societies, the principal business of commerce, or the exchange of ®ne sort of commodities for some other sort, is carried on by those who produce them. Individuals having more of any article than is required for their own use endeavour to find out others in want of it, and who at the same time possess something that they would like to have. But the difficulties and inconveniences insepa- rable from a commercial intercourse carried on in this way are so obvious as hardly to require being pointed out. Were there no merchants or dealers, a farmer, for ex- ample, who had a quantity of wheat or wool to dispose of, would be obliged to seek out those who wanted these com- modities, and to sell them in such portions as might suit them ; and having done this, he would next be forced to send to, perhaps, twenty different and distant places, before he succeeded in supplying himself with the various articles he might wish to buy. His attention would thus be perpetually diverted from the business of his farm ; and while the difficulty of exchanging his own produce for that of others would prevent him from acquiring a COMMERCE. taste for improved accommodations, it would tempt him j to endeavour to supply most things that were essential by his own labour and that of his family ; so that the division ! of employments would be confined within tlie narrow- est limits. The wish to obviate such inconveniences has given rise to a distinct mercantile class. ^ Without employing themselves in any sort of production, mer- chants or dealers render the greatest assistance to the producers : they collect and distribute all sorts of com- modities ; they buy of the farmers and manufacturers the things they have to sell ; and bringing together every variety of useful and desirable articles in shops and ware- houses, individuals are able, without difficulty or loss of time, to supply themselves with whatever they want. Continuity is in consequence given to all the operations of industry ; for, as every one knows beforehand where he may dispose to the best advantage of all that he has to sell, and obtain all that he wishes to buy, an uninterrupted mo- tion is given to the plough and the loom. Satisfied that they will have no difficulty about finding merchants for their produce, agriculturists rmd manufacturers think only how they may improve and perfect tlieir respective bu- sinesses. Their attention, no longer dissipated upon a variety of objects, is fixed upon one only. It becomes the object of every individual to find out machines and processes for facilitating the separate task in which he is engaged ; and while the progress of invention is thus im- measurably accelerated, those who carry on particular businesses acquire that peculiar dexterity and sleight of hand so astonishing to those who live in places where the division of labour is but imperfectly established. Facility of exchange is, in truth, the vivifying principle, the very soul of industry ; and no interruption is ever given to it without producing the most ruinous consequences. The merchants, or dealers, collect their goods in dif- ferent places in the least expensive manner ; and by carry- ing them in large quantities at a time they can afford to sup- ply their customers at a cheaper rate than tiie latter could supply themselves. Not only, therefore, do they, by ena- bling every employment to be carried on without interrup- tion, and the divisions of labour to be perfected, add prodi- giously to the powers of industry, and, by consequence, to the wealth of tlie community, but they also promote the convenience of every one, and reduce the cost of mer- chandising to thelowest limit. According as commerce is extended, each particular business becomes better un- derstood, better cultivated, and carried on in the best and cheapest method : where it is far advanced, the whole society is firmly linked together ; ' 57,127 64,93 59,54 ) 63,09 I 10-.,15< 113,30 1 101,121 Norway 53,582 63,92£ 58,580 34,52J 55,05 s 61,98 < 79,275 79,46 ^ ,^M'5 Denmark - - 111,880 118,81.1 92,294 93,39( 99,95 94.59. > 107,97t 91,3(« i 103,448 Prussia . 179.145 177,92,' 192,816 258,55( 144,17c J 136,42. 5 188,27: 160,72 i 131.536 Germany 4,394,104 4,463,60a 3,642,952 6,068,99- 4,.355,54J $ 4,547,1 6( ) 4,602,%f 4,46.3,72' > ^^?^2iS Holland . - BelKium } 2,142,736 2,022,458 2,062,536 2,789,39!' f 2,181,89. I 886,421 5 2,470,26 750,05C 2,648, lO'. 818,487 2,509,62 839,27( >. 3,040,029 , «04,917 France 498,938 475,884 602,688 674,791 848,33. 5 1,116,88; 1,453,636 '1,591,38 1,613,204 Portugal, Proper 945,016 1,106,69.'- 975,991 540.792 967,09 1,600,1 M 1,554,326 1,085,9.34 1,079,815 56,405 Azores 27,940 23,629 41,638 77,92C 54,43t 63,27; 49,71-7 63,574 Madeira - 39,802 38,444 38,960 28,038 33,411 38,455 40,082 62,166 46,044 Spain and the Balearic Islands - 301,153 607,068 597.848 442,926 442,837 325,907 405,065 4.37 ,07f 286,636 Canary Islands 3S,152 42,620 33,282 21,0.53 30,507 30,686 24,308 40,37C 4I,9CH Gibraltar Italy and the Italian Islands 1,038,925 292,760 367,285 461,470 385,460 460,719 602,580 756,411 906,1551 1 2,176,149 3,251,379 2,490,376 2,361,772 2,316,260 3,282,777 2,426,171 2,921,466 2,406.066! Malta 239,458 189,1.35 134,519 96.994 135,4^8 242,696 136,925 14.3,015 103,«,80 Ionian Islands 41,078 66,963 60,883 55,725 38,915 94,498 107,804 109,123 124,465 Turkey and Continen- tal Greece (exclusive oftheMorea) 185,842 1,139.616 888,654 915,319 1,019,604 1,207,941 1,331,669 1,775,034 1,163,426 Morea & Greek Islds. 335 9.694 10,446 10,149 25,914 37,179 28,834 12,003 15,431 Egypt (Ports on the Mediterranean) Tripoli, Barbary, and Morocco 35.302 110,227 122,832 113,109 145,647 158,877 269,225 216,930 220,080 13.745 1,138 426 751 2,350 14,823 29,040 29,.322 54,007 Western Coast of Africa 191,452 252,123 234,768 290,061 .'529,210 326,483 292,540 467,186 312,9.18 Cape of Good Hope - C;.pe Verd IslanclT - 218,049 330,036 257,245 292,405 316,197 " 304,382 326,921 482,315 488,814 5,856 1,710 215 146 .-■.30 575 413 751 St. Helena 31,362 38,915 39,431 21,236 30,041 31,015 31,187 11,041 9,645 Isle of Bourbon 35,188 10,042 • 7,091 - 3,795 Mauritius 185,972 161,029 ' 148,476 " 163,191 83,424 149,319 196,559 260,855 349,488 Arabia - 250 6,049 16,358 7871 East India Company's Territories & Ceylon China - - 4,256,582 3,895,530 3,377.412 3,614,779 3,495,301 2,578,569 842,852 3,192,692 1,074,70« 4,285,829 1,326,.388 3,612,975' 67st375' Sumatra and Java - 189,200 162,102 " 285,296 150,606 " 471,7"l2 410,273 353,S9'Z 234, 85i 31.3,791 PhiUippine Islands - New South VVales,Van 300 71,220 39,613 102,284 185,298 76,018 129,743 61,778 33,808 Diemen's Land, and Swan River 443,839 314,677 .398,471 466,238 558,372 716,014 696,345 835,637 921,568 New Zealand, and South Sea Islands - 2,487 1,396 4,752 1,576 936 ■ 2,687 Ports of Siam J3ritish North Ame- rican Colonies 10,467 19,742 1,691,044 1,857,133 2,089,327 2,075,725 2,092,550 1,671,069 2,158,158 2,732,291 2,141,035 British West Indies - .1,289,704 2,838,448 a.-OS 1,949 2,439,808 2,597,589 2,680,024 3,187,540 3,786,453 3,456,745 Hayti - - 248,3 -iS 321,793 376,103 543,104 381,528 357,297 365,798 251,663 171,050 Cuba & other Foreign West Indies 569,728 618,029 663,531 633,700 577,228 913,005 787,043 987,122 891,713 United States of Ame- rica 5,810,315 6,132,346 9,053,583 5,468,272 7,579,699 6,844,989 10,568,455 12,4-25,60.\ 254,822 4,695,2251 Mexico 307,029 978,441 728,858 199,821 421,487 459.610 402,820 620,200 Guatemala 6,191 3,700 30,366 ■ 15,244 764 78 Colombia 261,113 ' 216,751 248,250 " 283,568 121,826 199,906 1.32,242 185,172 170,451 1,824,082 Brazil 3,518,297 2,452,103 1,238,371 2,144,903 2,575,680 2,460,679 2,630,767 3,030,532 States of the Rio de la Plata 312,389 6.32,172 3.39,870 660,152 615,362 831,564 658,525 697,334 696,104 Chili 709,371 640,626 651,617 708,193 816,817 896,221 606,176 861.903 625,545 Peru Isles of Guernsey, Jer- 374,615 368,469 409,003 275,610 387,524 299/235 441 ,.324 606,302 476,374 sey, Aldemey, and Totals 329,428 344,036 324,634 317,496 335,934 360,665 351,612 318,609 3.30,017 36,812,756 38,271, .597. 37,164,3721 36,450,594 ■39^667,3471 41,649,191 1 47,372,270 53,368,572 42.070,744 2.59 COMMERCE. Years ending 5th January, 1837 and 1838. Ashes, pearl and pot UarUla and alkali Bark for tanning or dyeing — Cofl-ee.vi..:- ^^^ Foreign plantation Cocoa - - - lbs. Husks and shells - — Cotton wool from foreign coun- tries, viz. : _ The United Sutes of Ame- rica - - lbs. Brazil Turkey and Egj-pt - — Other foreign countries — Cotton wool from British posses- sions, Tiz. : — East Indies and Mau- ritius - - lbs. British West Indies, the growth of - - — British West Indies, im- ported from - — Other British possessions — Quantities imported. 152,955 70,214 18.877,912 9,906,710 6,270,215 2,788,224 425,648 289.615,692 27,501,272 6,426,721 6,734,413 75,957,887 1,312,806 Total quantities 406,959,057 407,286,783 Indigo ... lbs. Lac dye • - — Logwood . - - tons Madder - - cwts. Madder roots - — Flax and tow, or cedilla of flax and hemp - — Currants - - — Lemons and oranges . chests Raisins - . cwts. Hats of straw - - No. Platting of straw - lbs. Hemp, undressed - cwts. Hides, untanned, viz. : — Buffalo, bull, ox, cow, or horse hides - - — Hides, tanned, viz. : — Buffalo, bull, ox, cow, or horse hides - • lbs. Leather gloves - pairs Molasses -, - - cwts. Oil — Olive ' - - galls. Palm - - cwts. Train, spermaceti, and blubber - tuns Saltpetre and cubic nitre cwts. Flax and linseed - bushels Silk, raw - - lbs. Waste and knubbs - — Cassia lignea - . — . Pepper ... — Pimento - - — Sugar, viz. : — West India - cwts. East India and Mauritius — Foreign - - — Tallow . . - _ Tea ... lbs. Timber, viz. : — Battens and batten ends, gt.hun. Deal and deal ends — Masts, 6 and under 8 inches in diameter - - No. Masts, 8 and under 12 inches in diameter - — M'asts, 12 and upwards loads Oak planks • — Staves - - gt. hund. Fir, 8 inches square and upwards - loads Oak, ditto . Unenumerated, ditto — Wainscot logs, ditto — Tobacco, viz. : — Unmanufactured • lbs. Manufactured or cigars Snuff - - _ Wool, sheep and lambs' — Wine, viz. T_ i^ape - - imp. galls. Irench . . _ Portugal . . _ Spanish , . - _ Madeira . . . _ Other sorto . . — Totals of Wine 147,329 102,135 786,730 15,184,413 9,950,005 11,278,096 Quantities exported. Quantity retained for Consumption. 1836. 19,137 1,680 108,493 3,622,895 6,950,370 332,68 16,800 320,651,716 20,940,145 7,881,540 4,616,829 51,577,197 1,199,162 7,710,544 663,675 12,SS1 108,906 85,251 1,529,116 196,561 265,864 182,286- 14,042 42.890 586,032 70,410 1,490,999 528,306 2,682,016 277,017 19,489 279,902 .3,.339,2I5 4,453,081 1,608,289 837,413 7,724,932 3,269,V- 3,600,517 720,997 327.647 1.186..^64 49,307,701 17,247 69,318 8,414 6,545,873 1,011.674 14,699 84,841 109,235 1,000,865 217,921 349,880 169,690 26,228 30,862 773,621 338,652 87,678 1,265,920 682,283 1,721,914 223,33- 21,803 349,993 3,.^2 1,089 4,146,481 943,281 984,674 5,291,993 2,113,300 3,305,238 912,967 265.073 1.314,649 36,973,981 9,474 3,628 4,273 1.968 85,721 579,960 31,656 48,484 5,593 27,144,107 632,186 4,153 48,379,708 618,10, 725,140 2,693,365 2,802,585 289.400 904,885 8.0.33.480 31,739,763 1837. 18,810 3,441 329,017 1,320,255 6,411,703 933,276 130,176 97,202 17,532,731 7,412,725 2,254 1,1.'50,168 364,144 128,098 91,404 Drawbcks& repayments. 781,113 17,138,158 9,205.634 1,416,613 481,170 39,722,031 363,684,232 3,691 .95 200.975 4,385 364 16,789 6,73! 1.45/ 36.496 16,172 11, 38.105 31,305 31,405 l,6or 150,56 34,379 1,.365 38,444 1,371 113,600 87,645 633,083 4,151,569 2,337,982 Ra ; 278,098 Refi: I 248,644 18.709 4,269,863 80 1,022 345 268 12.319,405 432.661 3.496 613,707 10,876 99,112 381,026 645,822 152,368 385,320 3,587,561 133,959 3,316 822 2 6,970 17,841 1,5,16 11,526 12,-"" 7,546 16,574 19,903 18,894 1,641 209,472 16,732 36,959 6.879 345,97 1 21,268 760,141 4,768,860 1,376,645 '' 448,382 ' 227,807 52,376 4,716,248 160 19 6 1,638 2 80 3 17,341,587 302,869 3,472 2,831,352 6,766 106,935 199,518 492,345 148,107 381,122 1,3.34.793 2,840,.? 620,248 1 2,36 105,445 84,101 1,511,428 175,774 249,661 156,194 3,437 29,681 667,r - 63,010 1,469,363 657,082 1,844,622 234,357 18,722 231,134 3,179 4,239,254 1,524.968 89.396 2,794.491 400,914 [•3,488,399 1,314,085 49,142,236 9,247 3.291 3,200 2.871 90,811 612,865 26,062 39,314 3,988 22,150,786 158,182 508 60,366,416 541,511 352,063 2.878,369 2,.388,413 1.33.673 615.193 6.809,212 2,226,194 423,335 12,023 78,8.30 100,503 993,654 174,842 311,490 152,162 6,624 23,962 651,613 63,895 1,218,470 692,019 1,496,666 211 -•" 20.878 240.222 3.381,643 3,520,105 876.456 105,485 2,625,075 335,406 1,289,614 30,625,206 14,451 66,651 3,444 4,077 2,199 84,464 4,146 25,855 \ 11,165 430,006 36,356 1,717 2,473 10,712 2,114 6,441 194,821 52.226 117,095 1,009 24,558 2,482 45,769 794 27,507 295,645 46,614 14,678 1.292 6,045 19,906 18.072 712 2,242 99.13 6-359 4,184,165 207,789 4,674,635 162.596 647,581 L. 193 Gross rev. 8,996 6,391,531' 1.793,963.1 COMMERCE. IV. Account specifying the different Articles, and tlie Real or Declared Value of each, of the Produce and Manu- facture of the United Kingdom, exported to Foreign Parts during each of the Three Years ending with 1837- Species of Exports. 1835. 1836, L. 1837. Species of Exports. 1835. 1836. 1837. GRBAT BRITAIN. L. L. CHEAT BBITAiN. L. L. L. Alum 1,359 3,898 2,761 Mules 1,762 5,366 5,104 Apparel, Slops, and Negro Clothing Musical Instruments 60,810 76,120 71,618 494,861 604,863 633,301 Oil, Train, of Greenland Fishery Arms and Ammunition 407,490 411,286 289,112 39,074 5,836 5,700 Bacon and Hams 27,'j73 42,319 35,840 Painters' Colours 169,861 210,811 151.507 IJeef and Pork, salted 104,782 136,898 119,117 Plate, Plate Ware, Jewel- Beer and Ale 225,641 264,560 2t>.S,235 lery, and Watches 231,900 338,869 257,726 Books, printed 148,098 178,034 147,430 Potatoes - 5,954 4,915 7.* 130 Brass and Copper Manufac- Salt 142,412 171,163 190,444 1,093,949 1,072,002 1,166,08-^ Saltpetre. British refined - Seeds of all sons 20,284 14,411 ^2'^^ J?read and Biscuit 6,405 8;i84 9,991 8,549 8.920 7,466 Butter and C^heese 178,657 205,858 179,073 Silk Manufactures 973,479 916,757 603.653 Cabinet and Upholstery Soap and Candles 248,803 27(j,222 230,835 Wares - - 51,003 75,511 67,357 Spirits 16,866 24,297 10,485 Coals and Cuhn 242,746 329,760 428,690 Stationary of all sorts 257,877 2y7,945 197,489 Cordage Com, Grain, Meal,and Flour 79,541 84,475 73,231 Sugar, refined 851,745 697,920 602,377 25,109 31.297 34,781 Tin, unwrought 32,290 61,847 74,657 Cotton Manufactures 16,393,170 18,482.586 13,632,146 and I'ewttr Wares and 5,706.563 6,120,326 6,955,936 Tin Plates 381,068 587,528 371.518 Cows and Oxen 1,445 3,072 6,107 Tobacco (manufactured) Karthenware of all sorts - 539,990 837,493 563,082 and Snuff- 13,594' 13,654 13,124 Fish of all sorts 217,652 185,433 185,120 Tongues 2,422 3.599 3,744 (i lass of all sorts 636,928 551,599 475.995 Umbrellas and Parasols - 45,462 ^'^•1¥a 39,464 ll.jberdashery and Millinery 516,775 681,980 414,687 Whalebone 12,960 10,550 6,347 Hardwares and Cutlery - 1,831,766 2,270,630 1,460,404 Wool. Sheep's of other sorts 387,834 ^l'>?J^ 185,350 Hats, Beaver and Felt 135,048 147.907 104,600 45,080 39,967 10.076 of all other sorts 27,437 41,753 46,290 Woollen and Worsted Yarn 309,091 358.690 3.-.7,MO Hops 16,616 11,788 10,547 Woollen Manufactures - 6,836,735 7,636,117 4,654,397 Horses Iron and 'Steel, wrought and unwrought 99,465 98,302 75,215 All other Articles 1,034,142 1,293,932 1,113,069 1,640,939 2,340,207 2,003,708 Total real or declared! I-ard 11,881 26,585 14,782 Value of the Prod. Lead and Shot Leather, wrought and un- 195,096 224,931 155,210 and Manufac. of the j- V. K. exported from ''"• 46,926,370 53,015,431 41,911,898 wrought 278,978 316.322 250,308 Great Britain to Fo- Saddlery and Har- reign Parts - J ness 73,348 93,388 87,037 Ihelanu, Total Exports Linen Manufactures Machinery and Mill-work 2,838,050 216,635 307,316 3,249.053 315,608 300,852 2,109.897 416.726 493,298 from - - L. 445,900 353,141 363,010 Total from the United Mathematical and Optical Kingdom - L. 47,372,270 53,368,572 42,274,938 Instruments 25,004 25,030 27,259 1 See the Commercial Diet.; see also the Treatise on Com- merce by the same author, from which part of the above article has been abstracted. CO'MMISSARY (Lat. committo, I entrust), is used in various ways as nearly synonymous with deputy. In military affairs, the parties who provide clothing, &c. for the artny are styled commissaries ; and the whole body of officers belonging to this department, the commissaiiat. COMMl'SSION. In the Army. ,St?e Army. Commission. In the Navy, the title of the appointment or warrant of officers of the rank of lieutenant, and above to hold their office. The commission is signed by the lords commissioners of the Admiralty. Commission, in Law, an appointment, usually by war- rant or letters patent to one or more as commissioners, to perform certain duties specified in the instrument. In this mode many of the highest judicial or ministerial functionaries of the realm are appointed ; thus, the judges of tlie superior courts hold several commissions, as of oyer and terminer, gaol delivery, &c. And high offices of state, when not regularly filled, are often entrusted to commmissioners for the time being, and said to be put in commission ; thus the custody of the great seal is put in coumiission in the absence of a lord chancellor and lord keeper. The Treasury and Admiralty have of late times been usually entrusted to commissioners, no lord high treasurer or lord high admiral having been appointed. The Court of High Commission consisted of persons ap- pointed under letters patent to examine into matters of ■ecclesiastical jurisdiction, under stat. 1 Eliz, c. 1. (abo- lished 16 Car. 1.) Magistrates or justices of the peace ire appointed by means of a commission, occasionally re- lewod, commonly termed the commission of the peace. CO'MMISSU'R^. A term applied in Anatomy to certain parts of the brain which cross from one of its ^ides to the other. See Brain. In Botany, it signifies ;he place of junction of two opposite carpels. COMMl'TMENT. In Law, the sending to prison of me charged with any crime. It appears to have been the uicient usage that whoever could lawfully arrest a person "or felony or treason could also send or bring him to the :ommon gaol ; but since the Habeas Corpus Act it is the aniform practice that offenders are committed by the ftrarrant in writing of a justice of the peace. The privy Ipuncil and secretary of state can also commit in cases of M^on. A commitment in writing must declare the Kthority of him who makes it, and also the nature of the HPence with which the party is charged. COMMI'TTEE, in the language of Parliament, is jithcr a committee of certain members, or a committee )f the whole house. {See Parliament.) Select committees ire bodies appointed by open nomination or by a peculiar node of election for the transaction of business, either iccording to the standing orders, or by accustomed usage. 261 All private bills are referred in the first instance to select committees. Joint committees in former times consisted of bodies deputed by the two houses, and met for the purpose of adjusting differences, sometimes after free conferences had failed. They were free from the forms ob- served in conferences. As in the latter, the Lords deputed only half the number of members sent by the Commons. They have been long disused. CCyMMODORE. A naval officer having the tempo- rary rank of rear-admiral ; the senior captain of several ships is called the commodore by courtesy. CO'MMON. (Lat. communis.) In Law^^ is the right which one person has of taking a part of the produce of land, while the whole property in the laud is vested in another. Common of pasture is either, 1 . Common ap- pendant, which is the right of the tenant of a manor to pasture his beasts on the lord's waste ; 2. Comman ap- purtenant, annexed to land by grant or prescription ; 3. Common in gross, a right severed from the land. When a common is under pasture all those who have a right of pasturage may turn out on it a certain number of animals, according to the extent of the enclosed grounds which they cultivate. When the common consists wholly or partly of arable land, this arable land is formed into ridges, generally with a narrow riband or balk of turf be- tween each ridge, or between each two or three ridges. The right of cultivating these ridges is distributed among the holders of the enclosed lands of the parish, according to the extent of their possessions ; and in order that there may be no partiality, and that every one may have as much interest in preserving his neighbour's ridge as his own, the ridges which any individual has the riglit of cultivating do not lie together, but are distributed among the ridges of his neighbours. CO'MMONABLE LANDS. A common in which the greater part of the land is arable. CO'MMON-FIELD LANDS. When the whole of a common belonging to a parish is not in a ring fence, but lies in different places, these places are called com- mon fields. CO'WMON MEASURE. In Arithmetic, is a number which divides two or more other numbers without leaving a remainder. CO'MMON PLEAS, or COMMON BENCH. COURT OF. In Law, was originally that branch or side of the aula regia in which civil causes between subjects were tried. It was separated and rendered sta- tionary, while that portion of the court from which the King's Bench is derived followed the person of the king by a provision of Magna Charta. This court has con- current jurisdiction with the other two superior common law courts {see Courts, Superior) in personal actions and ejectments. But it retains exclusive jurisdiction over all other mixed, and all real actions or pleas of S 3 COMMON PRAYER BOOK. land. These, however, have now nearly fallen into dis- sue. (See Pleadim;.) The Court of Common Pleas has one chief and four puisne judges. COMMON PRAYER BOOK. The name given to the collection of all the offices of regular and occasional worship according to the forms of the church of England. The basis of this book is to be found in the King's Primer, set forth in 1546 by Henry VIII., which was intended to convey instruction to the people in the most important parts of the church service ; but contained little more than the Creed, Lord's Prayer, Command- ments, and Litany. This Primer underwent two re- visions and republications under Edward VI., whose second Liturgy approaches very near in its contents to that which exists at present. It was at that review that the Sentences, Exhortation, Confession, and Absolution were prefixed to the Daily Service ; the Decalogue was introduced into the Communion Service ; and certain remnants of the Romish customs were finally abolished, as the sign of the cross in confirmation and matrimony, the anointing of the sick, and the prayers for the dead. On the accession of Elizabeth, another review of the Liturgy was instituted ; but the alterations effected were little more than in the selection of the lessons. At the review in the reign of James 1., after the conference with the Presbyterians at Hampton Court, no change of im- portance was introduced, except the addition of the explanation of the Sacraments in the Catechism. Again, when on the restoration of Charles II. a conference had been held with the Dissenters at the Savoy, the sub- ject of the Common Prayer Book was reconsidered in convocation. The services for the 30th of January and 20th of May were then added, as also the Form to be used at Sea. A few trifling alterations were made also in the other services ; but these were the last that have been effected. On the accession of William III. another revi- sion took place, and a considerable number of alterations were proposed and supported by many of the bishops and clergy ; but they were rejected by convocation, and have never since been revived by authority. The fol- lowing is a chronological list of the revisions of the Prayer Book in which any alterations have taken place. It is taken from the Bev. T. V. Short's History of the Church of England : — 154G. The King's Primer. 1548. The Communion Service. 1549. First Liturgy of Edward VI. 1550. First Ordination Service. 1552. Second Liturgy of Edward VI. 1552. Second Ordination Service. 15G0. Liturgy of Elizabeth. IG04. Alterations introduced by James I. 1G33. Alterations introduced by Charles I. 1661 . Last Revision ; authorized Liturgy, COMMONS, HOUSE OF. See Parliament. CO'MMON TIME. In Music, that in which every measure or bar contains one semibreve, two minims, four crotchets, eight quavers, and so on. CO'MMONWEALTH. See Republic. COMMONWEALTH OF ENGLAND. In History, the form of government established in England on the death of Charles I. in 1649, and which existed during the protectorate of Oliver Cromwell and his son Richard, until the abdication of the latter in 1659. The substi- tution ot a democratical for a monarchical form of go- vernment was provided for and enjoined by two succes- sive charters. The first charter of the commonwealth was drawn up in December, 1653, by the council of officers, who, on the voluntary resignation of the parlia- ment in the early part of the same year, had declared Cromwell " Protector ; " it was styled the " Instrument of Government." The second charter, called the " Pe- tition and Advice," was framed in May, 1G57, by the par- liament which the protector had assembled in the pre- vious year. Under the first charter, as has been well observed, the English government may be classed among republics with a chief magistrate at its head ; under the second, it became substantially a monarchy, and Oliver Cromwell from 1657 to the period of his death was de facto King of England. {Hallam's Constit. History, 421.) On the demise of Cromwell, the succession of his son Richard was at first cordially recognized ; but soon after- wards discontents and cabals having sprung up in the country, his inability or disinclination to govern induced liim to abandon the protectorship after a reign of eight months ; and on the 29th of May, ]6iJ9, the restoration of the monarchy under the old regime was effected by the triumphal entry into London of Charles II. It would be out of place to give here a detailed view of the state of England during the commonwealth. SuflSce it to observe, all authors have concurred in opinion, that, whatever were the defects of the home government, arising partly from the ambition of the protector, and partly from the stubbornness and opposition of his councils, the energy and decision which Cromwell maintained in every department of the state not only laid the found- 2C2 COMPANY. ation of England's maritime greatness, but raised her to a pitch of prosperity that has rarely, if ever, been equalled. COM]VIU'NION, is used in various ways in the ge- neral sense of participation : — 1 . A person is said to be in communion with a church, who declares his acqui- escence in its doctrines and participates in its worship ; and hence the term communion is used sometimes for a church. 2. Communion is confined emphatically to par- ticipation in the Eucharist. {See Eucharist.) 3. The Communion of Saints, an article of the Apostles' Creed, is variously explained. COMMUTA'TION. In Astronomy, the angle of commutation of a planet is the angle formed at the earth by a straight line drawn from the earth to the sun and the orthographical projection on the plane of the ecliptic of the straight line which joins the earth with the planet. It is measured by the difference between the sun's longi- tude and the geocentric longitude of the planet. CO'MMUTATION OF TITHES. See Tithes. COMO'SE. Ending in a tuft or kind of brush. COMPA'NION. The hut or covering over a ladder (or staircase) in a ship. COMPANY (Fr. compagnie), in Its most general sense, means any two or more individuals associated for any common object, whether of business or pleasure. In its more limited sense, however, and that in which it is usually understood in this country, the term com- pany means an association of individuals for the prose- cution of some industrious undertaking. Such associations may be of very various descriptions, inasmuch as the terms of the association or partnership may be varied in an infinity of ways. Generally, however, they may be said to be either private or public companies ; that is, according to the law of England, companies with not more than six partners and with more than six ; and pub- lic companies may farther be divided into joint stock and regulated companies, and these again into incorporated and unincorporated companies. I. The principle on which associations for industrious purposes are established is too obvious to require much illustration. All great results are brought about by co- operation, and could not be effected otherwise. Isolated man is coipparatively feeble and helpless ; the capacity of associating for a common purpose is, in fact, the main source of his power, and the principal distinction be- tween him and the lower animals — Quo alio fortes sumus qua?n quod mutuis juvamur qfficiisf One man has capital without skill, and another skill without capi- tal : if such persons act independently, they will be able to effect little or nothing ; but if they combine their efforts, and the capital of the one be applied and directed by the skill of the other, the effect of their exertions will be incomparably greater. But this is not all. Many of the greatest and most important works undertaken in modern times could not have been attempted by one in- dividual, how opulent or skilful soever. Some of them require a vast outlay ; while the returns being frequently remote and contingent, no single individual, and, indeed, no small number of individuals, would be willing to put their fortunes to hazard by engaging in them. But such undertakings are readily and advantageously carried on by large associations ; lor, in that case, individuals being called upon only to subscribe comparatively small sums to the common stock, they can afford to lose them with- out, in most instances, suffering any material inconve- nience ; while the aggregate amount of the subscriptions may, notwithstanding, amount to a very large sum, and be adequate to the greatest undertakings. In fact, some of the most -"gigantic works ever entered upon either in this or any other country have been accomplished by the joint contributions of the subscribers of 100/. shares. It is true that wealthy individuals usually subscribe for a number of such shares ; but this does not affect the prin- ciple of the system, which is to distribute the risk ac- cording to the ability of the individuals associated. II. \n private companies the business is usually con- ducted by one or more of the partners on the principles laid down in the deed of partnership. The rights and obligations of the partners as respects each other are, of course, mainly determined by this deed : as respects the public, the law regards the act of one partner as the act of the company ; and each partner is bound, without any regard to the sum he has subscribed to the company's stock, to the whole extent of his fortune, for the debts and engagements of the firm. Certain formalities are necessary at the withdrawal of a partner ; such as adver- tizing in the Gazette, and the sending of special inform- ation of the fact to all individuals in the habit of dealing with the company. See Partnership. III. Public companies may, as alreiuly stated, be either joint stock or regulated; and these again may be either incorporated or unincorporated. 1 . By a joint stock company is meant a company the stock of which is subscribed by a certain number of per- sons in shares of a certain amount. Thus, supposing that a joint stock association is to be formed for carrying on the business of banking or insurance, for excavating COMPANY. a dock or a canal, or for constructing a railway, and that its capital is to amount to 1 ,000,000/. to be subscribed in shares of 100/. each ; any individual (unless exceptions be made in the conditions under which the company is to be formed) who can command 100/. may become a part- ner of this association, and will be registered in the com- pany's books as the holder of a share of 100/. of the company's stock. It is customary, too, in the vast ma- jority of instances, to allow individuals to transfer their stock or shares to others, who succeed to all the rights and obligations of their predecessors. The price which shares or portions of stock fetch in the market depends, of course, on the real or supposed state of the company's affairs : if it be known or supposed to be in a flourishing and prosperous condition, and paying a high interest or dividend on its stock, the latter may sell for 10, 20, 50, or 100 per cent. or upwards of advance ; whereas if it be known or sup- posed to be in an unprosperous condition, its shares may not bring a third or a tenth part of what they originally cost. The aff;iirs of companies of this description are usually conducted by salaried officers, who are appointed by and act under the orders of a board of directors chosen by the company at large, according to the conditions in their deed of associ'ation. The partners in such companies are all individually liable, without regard to the magni- tude of their stock or shares, for the entire debts and obligations of the company. At common law no action can be raised by or against such companies without making all the shareholders parties to the action. But the obvious and insuperable * mconveniences that would result from the enforcement of this rule have made it be enacted, by the 1st Victoria, cap. 73^., that the crown may at pleasure grant to joint stock associations letters patent, authorizing them to sue and be sued in the names of particular officers of their own ; without, however, unless government judge proper, in- corporating the company, or affecting the liability of the diflferent partners for its debts. 2. When joint stock companies are incorporated by royal charter, or by letters patent, the liability of the partners is limited to the amount of their stock, and they cease to be responsible beyond that amount. This is the case with some great joint stock associations ; as the banks of England, Scotland, and Ireland ; the East India Company, the Royal Exchange Assurance, and a few more. But government has hitherto been, and that for the best reasons, very chary of granting charters of incorporation. It is d.ifficult, in fact, to imagine a case in which they ought to be granted. Individuals are always ready to embark, without stipulating for any re- striction of their liability, in any scheme, however ha- zardous, that holds out any promise of even a moderate return. And this unlimited responsibility of the part- ners is, in all ordinary cases, the only security worth a pinch of snuff on which the public can ever rely for pro- tection against the fraud or misconduct of the managers of joint stock companies. The grand distinction between unincorporated and incorporated joint stock companies is, that in the case of the former, the law looks only to the individuals forming the association ; while, in the latter, it looks only to the corporate body, and pays no attention to the individuals of which it is made up. On judgment against an in- corporation, execution can only pass on the corporate property ; and supposing it to become insolvent, the partners can only, as already stated, be called upon to make good the amount of the stock of the incorporation standing in their names. But it is quite otherwise with an unincorporated joint stock company : should it become insolvent, the partners, to use the words of Lord Eldon, are severally liable for the whole debts and engagements of the company, even " to their last shilling and their last acre." We have already sufficiently explained (see art. Banks) the advantages that would result from the periodical publication of the names of the partners in joint stock companies. The public are clearly entitled to know who the parties are that embark in such concerns. Nothing on which it would be prudent to place much reliance can be learned from prospectuses and professions. Without knowing who the partners really are, the pub- lic have no means of forming any fair estimate of the character of any association, or of the credit to which it may be justly entitled. But we doubt whether it -svould be prudent to carry interference with joint stock com- panies farther than this. It is excessively difficult, and in most cases quite impossible, to enforce such regula- tions in regard to such companies as would serve to dis- close the real state of their affairs, provided they had an interest in concealing it ; and it is needless to say, that the leading of the public to depend on regulations that cannot be carried into effect, is one of the most likely means that can be resorted to for the encouragement of imposture and fraud. 3. Reflated companies consist of a jiumber of uncon- nected mdividuals or associations engaged in the same 2G3 COMPASS. business or department of trade, under condition of their conforming to regulations laid down for their common guidance. Such companies have been mostly formed for the prosecution of the trade with distant and peculiarly situat«d countries. Their principle is not to exclude in- dividual competition, but merely to make the different parties engaged in the trade observe the same general rules. Companies of this description were at one time common ; but they have now mostly fallen into desue- tude, though it be easy to imagine circumstances in which they might be advantageously revived. 4. Civic companies, of which there are many in the the city of London and other large towns, are in reanity gtcilds or fraternities. Originally they consisted of the parties carrying on a peculiar trade or profession ; and in most instances they gradually acquired the privilege of prescribing the conditions and limitations under which individuals not belonging to the fraternity might obtain leave to engage in its peculiar trade within the precincts of the city or borough to which it belonged. In more modern times, however, the injurious influence of such restrictions on the free exercise of industry becam*. ob- vious ; and in consequence the powers formerly exer- cised by civic companies or guilds over individuals not > free of their society, who attempted to carry on the same trade, have been either wholly repealed or greatly mo- dified. At present, therefore, the companies in question exist principally as charitable institutions, or as incor- porated associations, having, in many instances, the ma- nagement of large amounts of property appropriated for the use of their poorer brethren, or for some similar pur- pose. Co'mpany. In the Army, a body of men, forming one of the chief divisions of a battalion of infantry. In the guards and artillery, a company consists of 120 men, but in all other infantry regiments of 100. A company in the infantry corresponds to troop in cavalry regiments ; and is under the inspection of a captain, a lieutenant, and an ensign, besides the non-commissioned officers ; with the exceptions of the artillery, engineers, marines, and the rifle brigade, in which second lieutenants are substi- tuted for ensigns. COMPA'RISON, or SIMILE. In Rhetoric, appears to differ from Metaphor (which see) only in form ; the resemblance being stated in the first case, implied in the second. This is the sense in which the term Comparison is used and defined by Aristotle, in Jiis jirt qf Rhetoric. Frequently the same idea furnishes at the same time both comparison and metaphor ; as in the following line, "They melted from the field as snow." The word "melted" is -used by transferring the property of the snow to a multitude of individuals : so far, therefore, the phrase is a metaphor ; but the additional words, "as snow," transform it into a direct comparison. Perhaps, how- ever, it might be more correctly said, in this instance, that the predicate " melted" is transferred by the figure termed Hypallage from the snow to the mvltitude, both words being used as subjects in the same sentence. The comparison, being as it were a metaphor resolved and rendered more flowing and less concise, is more appro- priate to poetry than to prose composition. In fact, the only figures of this description which are generally ad- missible in prose writing are illustrations ; i. e. arguments drawn from analogy in the form of comparisons. {See Il- lustration.) It will generally be found that in every language the earliest writers, especially the poets, are the most addicted to the use of comparisons and meta- phors of a highly figurative and hold character, as is especially observable with respect to the sacred poets, and to Homer ; ^vhile as language advances in cultivation the metaphor comes more and more into ordinary use, and forms, as it were, the basis of composition, while at the same time it gradually loses the energetic and poetical cast which at first distinguished it. COMPARISON, DEGREES OF. Those varieties in the inflexions of adjectives which denote the degree in which a quality is possessed by a substance, either gene- rally or in reference to one or more other substances. In English there are only two decrees of comparison, commonly named the comparative and the superlative. The first compares two conceptions only, as " John is taller than Charles." The second either compares one conception with a definite number of others, as " John is the tallest of all the four ;" or expresses general superiority, as " the fairest of women." COMPA'RTMENTS. (Ital. compartimenti.) In Architecture, the subdivisional parts of larger divisions for ornament, to which alone this term is properly ap- plicable. CO'MPASS. a name given to instruments contrived to indicate the magnetic meridian, or the position of objects with respect to that meridian. According to the purposes to which the instrument is chiefly applied, it becomes the mariner's compass, the aximuth compass, the variation compass, each particular application re- quiring some peculiarity of construction ; but whatever modifications it may receive, the essential parts are the S 4 COMPASS. same in all cases. These are a magnetized bar of steel, called tiie needle, having fitted to it at its centre a cap, which is supported on an upright pivot, made sharp at the point in order to diminish the friction as much as possible and allow the needle to turn with the slightest force. The ?ruinner's compass has a circular card at- tached to its needle, which turns with it ; and on the cir- cun ference of which are marked the degrees, and also the 32 points or rhumbs, likewise divided into half and quarter points. The pivot rises from the centre of the bottom of a circular box, called the compass box, which contains the needle and its card, and which is covered with a glass top to prevent the needle from being dis- turbed by the agitation of the air. The compass box is suspended within a large box, by means of two concentric brass circles or gimbals ; the outer one being fixed by horizontal pivots, both to the inner circle which carries the compass box, and also to the outer box, the two sets of axes being at right angles to each other. By means of this arrangement the inner circle, with the compass box, needle, and card, always retain a horizontal position notwithstanding the rolling of the ship. The notation of the mariner's compass is as follows : — The circumference being divided into the four quadrants by two diameters at right angles, the extremities of these diameters are the four cardinal points (cardo, a hinge), marked N., S., E., W. (north, south, east, west). Bisect- ing each of the quadrants, the several points of bisection ar«? denoted by placing the two letters at the extremities of the quadrant in juxtaposition. Thus, N.E. (north-east) denotes the point which is half way between north and east ; and so with N.W., S.E., S.W. (north-west, south- east, south-west). Let the octants next be bisected ; the points of divi- sion are denoted by prefixing to each of the above combina- tions first the one, and then the other of the two cardinal points of which it is formed. Thus N.E. gives N.N.E. and E.N.E. (north north-east, and east north-east) ; and so in respect of the others. Sixteen points have thus Deen named. Let the distances be again bisected ; then each of the points so found is expressed by that one of the preceding points already named to which it is nearest, followed by the name of the cardinal point towards which its departure from the nearest points leads it, the two being separated by the letter 6(by) . Thus, the point half way between N. and N.N.E. is N. by E. (north by east); that which is halfway between N.N.E. and N.E. is N.E. by N. (north-east by north), &c. The whole of the thirty-two points are thus distinguished, as in the figure. The principal requisites of a compass are intensity of directive force, and susceptibility. The first of these is obtained by constructing the needle of the material and form best suited to receive and retain the magnetic virtue. A number of experiments on this subject were made by Coulomb, and more recently by Captain Kater, an account of which is given in the Phil. Trans, for 1821. Captain Kater found that the kind of steel capable of receiving the greatest magnetic force is shear steel ; and that the best form is that of a lozenge or rhomboid {Jig.), cut out in the middle, so as to diminish the extent of surface in pro- portion to the mass, it being found that the directive force of the needle, when magnetized to saturation, depends not on the extent of surface, but on the mass. Beyond a certain limit (about five inches) no additional power is gained by increasing the length of the needle ; and needles exceeding a very moderate length are apt to have several consecutive poles, the effect of which is to produce a great diminution of directive force. On this account short needles, made very hard, are to be preferred. Like many other of the most valuable arts of life, the origin of the compass is entirely unknown. By some writers it is ascribed to Flavio Gioja, who lived in the 13th century ; yet Guyotde Provence, who lived a century earlier, speaks of the loadstone; to which he gives the name o{ tnarineiti, or mariner's stone, as useful to navi- gation. Others pretend that it was invented in France ; but there seems to be no other reason for this suppo- sition than the fact that from time immemorial the north point of the compass card has been distinguished and ornamented with a Jtcnr dc lis. For a reason of a ditlerent kind, but perhaps of the same degree of weight, COMPOSITJE. Dr. Wallis and others have supposed the invention to belong to England, the name co?npass, which is given to the instrument by most European countries, being used in England to signify a circle. The term bussola in Italian, and buussole in French, has also been supposed to be derived from our terra box, by which the compass is frequently designated. Gilbert, in his celebrated work De Magnete, affirms that Marco Polo brought the in- vention to Europe from China, about the year 12G0. It appears very probable that the Chinese were acquainted with the directive property of the loadstone at an early period. Their method is to place it on a small piece of cork and set it to float on water. The art of communi- cating the magnetic virtue to steel, and suspending the needle on a pivot, is undoubtedly an European invention. The aximuth compass, being intended to show the bearing of objects in respect of the magnetic meridian, has its circle divided merely into degrees, instead of the rhumbs used in navigation, and is provided with sights to allow the angles to be taken more accurately. The variation compass is designed to exhibit the diurnal changes in the deviation of the magnetic from the true meridian ; and the needle is generally made of much greater length than in the mariner's compass, in order to render minute variations more sensible. See Magnetism. COMPITA'LIA. CLHt-compitam, a street.) A Roman feast celebrated in honour of the Lares and Penates. Under Tarquinius Superbus, it is said that human victims were sacrificed at this solemnity. The gods in- voked at it were termed Compitales, as presiding over ^ the streets. CO'MPLEMENT. (Lat. compleo, Z^Km;?.) What is wanted to complete or fill up some quantity or thing. Thus, the complement of an angle is what is wanted to make the angle a quadrant or 90°. Complement of a number is what is necessary to be added in order to make the number 1, or 10, or 100, or, in general, 1 with zeros. In Geometry, the complements of a parallelogram are the two spaces which, with the parallelograms about the dia- gonal, make up the whole parallelogram. COMPLU'VIUM. (Lat.) In Ancient Architecture, an area in the centre of the Roman houses, so constructed that it might receive the waters from the roofs. It is also the gutter or eave of a roof. CO'MPOSITE NUMBERS, in Arithmetic, are numbers which can be divided by some other number greater than unity. They are consequently opposed to prime numbers, which admit of no divisor. In Music, composite numbers are such as are composed by the mul- tiplication of the prime integers, 2, 3, 5. CO'MPOSITE ORDER. In Architecture, one of the five orders of architecture, and, as its name imports, com- posed of two others, the Corinthian and the Ionic. Its capital is a vase with two tiers of acanthus leaves, like the Corinthian ; but in- stead of stalks, the shoots appear small and adhere to the vase, bending round towards the middle of the race of the capital ; the vase is terminated by a fillet, over which is an astragal crowned by an ovolo. The vo- lutes roll themselves over the ovolo to meet the tops of the upper row of leaves, whereon they seem to rest. The corners of the abacus are supported by an acanthus leaf bent up- wards. The abacus resembles that of the Corinthian capital {see Capital). In detail theComposite is richer than the Corinthian, but less light and deli- cate. Its architrave has usually only two fascia-, and the cornice varies from the Corinthian in having double modil- lions. The column is ten diameters high . The principal examples of this order are the Temple of Bacchus at Rome, the arch of Sep- timius Severus, those of the Goldsmiths and of Titus, and that in the baths of Diocletian. The example here given is from the arch of Titus, which is considered a fine specimen of the order. Sec Order. COMPO'SITS. In Botany, the largest of all known natural groups of plants ; and so called because the old botanists who invented the name regarded the flower- heads as compound flowers. They answer to the Sijn- COMPOSITION. gcncsta polygamja of Linnaeus, and are positively charac- terized by having capitatojAowers, syngenesious anthers, and an inferior ovary with a single erect ovule. In the most recent account of this order, by M. De Candolle, nearly 8000 species are enumerated in about 900 genera, and the subject is not nearly exhausted ; they exist all over the world where vegetation can develope, and are sometimes trees, although more generally herbaceous plants or shrubs. Among medical species, the chamomile, wormwood, southernwood, elecampane, and opium lettuce are conspicuous ; of esculents, the order contains the arti- choke, the Jerusalem artichoke, the lettuce, succory, and endive ; and among ornamental plants, the aster, dahlia, coreopsis, sunflower, &c. But by far the greater part of this large assembly consists of species which are either weeds or of no known use. The reader who wishes to become acquainted with this order must consult Dc Can- dalle's Prodromus Regni Vegetabilis, vols, v., vi., and vii. COMPOSITION. In Law, an agreement made between the owner of lands and the parson, with the consent of the ordinary and the patron, that such lands shall be discharged from the payment of tithes, by reason of some land or other real recompence given to the par- son In satisfaction thereof. Such an agreement, since the 13 Ellz. c. 10., is not good for a longer term than three lives or twenty-one years. Composition signifies also the agreement between a bankrupt after his last examination and nine tenths of his creditors for the satisfaction of their claims, and has the effect of superseding the fiat of bankruptcy. Composition. In the Fine Arts, that combination of the several parts, whereby a subject is agreeably pre- sented to the mind, each part being subordinate to the whole. See Invention. Composition. In Music, the art of disposing and arranging musical sounds into airs, songs, &c., either in one or more parts, for voices or instruments or both. Zarlino defines it to be the art of joining and combining concords and discords together, Avhich are the matter of music. COMPOSI'TION OF FORCES or MOTION. In Mechanics, signifies combining or uniting several forces or motions, and determining the result of the whole. If a body is solicited by two forces which act in the same direction, the resulting force, or resultant, is equal to the sum of both ; that is to say, the effect produced is the same as would be produced by a single force acting in the same direction, and equal to their sum. If the two forces act jiu opposite directions, the resultant is equal to their difference, and the body will move in the direction of the greater. If the lines of direction of the two forces make an angle with each other, the resultant will be a mean force in an intermediate direction. Thus, if the two forces be represented in Intensity and di- rection by the two sides of a parallelogram, then the- resultant is represented in intensity and direction by the diagonal of the parallelogram which passes through the angle formed by those two sides. COMPO'SITOR. (Fr. compositeur.) In Printing, the workman who arranges the types in lines and pages, and pre])ares them for being printed off. COMPOSTE'LLA, ST. JAMES OF, or ST. JAMES OF THE SWORD. An ancient order of knighthood in Spain, the chief of the four military orders (Oom- postella, Calatrava, Alcantara, Manresa) ; probably founded either by Alphonso IX. of Castile (1158, 1214), or Ferdinand II. of Leon (1157, 1188). It originally began from the voluntary association of certain gentle- men to defend the great road leading to the celebrated shrine of St. James at Compostella. Pope Alexander III. gave the order its rules of government. The order possessed at one period eighty-four commanderies, with two cities and numerous burghs and villages. The knights take the vows of poverty, obedience, and conjugal chastity; to which they add a fourth, "to defend and maintain the immaculate conception of the Holy Mother of Jesxis Christ." CO'MPOUND INTEREST, is interest charged not only on the principal, but also on the interest for- borne. Thus, if money is invested so that the interest is not paid as it becomes due, but successively added to the capital, the capital is said to accumulate at compound interest. Let r = the amount of 1/. for 1 year; that is to say, = 1/. with its interest added to it ; then the amount of 1/. at the end of 2 years will be r"^ ; at the end of 3 years, r^ ; at the end of 4 years, r* ; and so on. The law of this country does not allow compound interest to be charged on money lent. COMPRE'SSIBI'LITY. The quality of bodies in virtue of which they can be reduced to small dimensions. All bodies, in consequence of the porosity of matter, are compressible mense force. CO'MPTONITE. A mineral found in ejected masses on Vesuvius ; named after Lord Compton, who first brought it to England in 1818. COMPURGA'TION. An ancient mpde of trial both eqi compressible, though liquids resist compression with im- CONCHOID. in civil and criminal cases. In the latter, by the law of the Saxons (which William the Conqueror confirmed in this respect, at least as to its main features), the accused party was allowed to clear himself by the oath of as many of his neighbours to his innocence as amounted in collective worth, according to the legal arithmetic of the Anglo-Saxons, to one pound (^see Wehegild), if he could in the first instance (being a villein) obtain the testimony of his lord that he had not been previously convicted. If otherwise, he was bound to undergo ordeal, or wage his law with a greater number of compurgators. Compurgation in criminal cases was abolished in gene- ral by Henry II. 's assizes, the ordeal being enforced in lieu of it. But it was retained as a special franchise in some boroughs, to which those assizes did not extend ; and the last instances of it on record are to be found in the rolls of the hundred court of Winchilsea, in the reign of Henry VI. (See Sir F.Palgrave on the British Commonwealth.) A singular usage of the same descrip- tion long remained in the ecclesiastical courts, by which convicted clerks, allowed their clergy and delivered up to the ordinary, were admitted to purge themselves by the oaths of compurgators, which was abolished by 18 Eliz. c. 7. Wager of law, in civil cases, lay in some per- sonal actions only, and in incidental traverses in real actions (see Blackstone, lib. ill. c. 23.) ; and in these cases, although many technical difficulties prevent de- fendants from availing themselves of it, it is not yet abo- lished. COMS, COOMS, COOMES, or CHIVES. The points of the radicles of malted grain, which after kiln.- drying drop off during the process of turning. They are sold by maltsters under the name of malt dust, and are considered excellent manure. CONCE'PTACLES, (Lat. conceptaculum, a re- ceiver.) The cases containing the reproductive organs of such plants as ferns, in which they are produced from the back of the leaves, growing in the form of spots at the anastomoses, margins, or extremities of the veins, and then collectively called Sori. The conceptacles are also termed Capsules, Thecae, and Sporangia. CONCEPTA'CULUM. (Lat. a receiver.) A term in Botany, denoting a one-valved fruit opening longitudi- nally on one side, and distinct from the seeds. It is a foUiculus without any attachment between the placenta and the ventral suture, as in Asclepias. CONCE'PTION. (Lat. concipere, to conceive.) In Mental Philosophy, that faculty or act of the mind by which we combine a number of individuals together by means of some mark or character common to them all. We may observe, for instance, that equilateral isosceles and scalene triangles all agree in one respect, that of having three sides ; and from this perceived similitude we form the conception triangle. CONCERTA'NTE. (It. concentare.^ocowifrjw.) In Music, a term expressive of those parts of a musical com- position that sing or play throughout the piece, as distin- guished from those that play only occasionally in par- CONCE'RTO. (It.) In Music, a piece composed for a particular instrument, which bears the greatest part in it, or in which the performance is partly alone and partly accompanied by other parts. CONCE'TTL (It. ; rendered by English writers on rhetoric conceits.) Ingenious thoughts or turns of expres- sion, points, jeux d'esprit, &c. in serious composition. In the IGth century, the taste for this species of brilliancy, of- ten false and always dangerous, spread rapidly in the poet- ical composition of European nations, especially in Spain and Italy ; where the name of ooncetti was applied rather in a good than a bad sense, the critical taste being much perverted. Tasso is not free from concetti. After his time they became offensively prominent in Italian poetry for a century afterwards : Marino and Filicaia offer strong examples. In France, the mode of concetti was equally prevalent in the I7th century, and was peculiarly in vogue with the fair critics of the Hotel Rambouillet, so well known by Moliere's " Precieuses Ridicules." In England, Donne and Cowley are instances of a style full of concetti. CO'NCHIFERS. (Lat. concha, a shell, and fero, i carry.) A name applied by Lamarck, Schwcigger, and Latreille to all moUusks which are protected by a bivalve shell. CO'NCHOID. {Gr.xoyxr, a shell, and il^ns, form.) The name given to a curve invented by Nichomedes for the solution of the two famous geometrical problems of antiquity, — the duplication of the cube, and the tri- section of an angle. It is constructed as follows : — Let P be a given point through which any straight line is drawn to cut or meet another straight line C D given in position ; if a segment AB (orAB') of a given length be taken on either side of C D, the point B (or B') will trace the conchoid. The curve has different forms, according to the different relative CONCHOLOGY. positions of the point B with respect to the pole P and the given straight line C D. The conchoid is a curve of the fourth order, the equation between the rectangular co-ordinates (the origin being placed at A in the straight line perpendicular to C D) being x2 y2 — („2 _ yi) (^ + y2), in which A B = «, and A P (perpendicular to C D) CONCHO'LOGY. (Gr. »oy;t;»j,flS^fW,andA«>-a.-, arf/5- course.) The science of shells : that department of Ma- lacology which treats of the nature, formation, physio- logical relations, and classification of the hard parts or skeletons of the molluscous animals. As Osteology, inasmuch as it relates to the nature, deve- lopment, and physiological subserviencies of the skeletons of the vertebrate animals, is a science in the strict accept- ation of the term, so also is Conchology under the like applications ; but as no naturalist has yet conceived, a classification of vertebrate skeletons independently of the softer organs of the body which they support and protect, and as, notwithstanding that the complex internal ske- letons of the Vertebrates are closely related to their general structure and habits, the classification of these parts would not in all cases tally with the natural ar- rangement of the animals to which they belonged, there- fore still less scientific must be a classification of shells merely, apart from a consideration of the moUnscous animals by which they are secreted. For shells, instead of consisting, like bones, of living organized substance permeated by blood-vessels, absorbents, and nerves, are mere inorganic laminated, concretionary, or crystalline deposits of calcareous earth, more or less combined with albuminous matter : they are also formed in the skin, and are appendages to the dermal system, which in all classes of animals is the principal seat of variety. In many cases, therefore, there exists very little correspondence between the structure or even the presence of a shell and the general character of the organization of a mollusk; and the absence^ of uniformity between the condition of the shell in closely allied species is ex- emplified in the highest as well as the lowest classes of the molluscous sub- kingdom. The argonaut, the poulp (Octopus), the calamary, the cuttle-fish, and the spirula, all possess the same peculiar and highly developed organization ; and in a classification founded on general structure, and expressive of the true aflSnities of its objects, they must rank in the same order of their class. But the shells of these mollusks present respect- ively the following conditions : — the first, a simple, ex- ternal, light, elastic, subtransparent, but calcareous dis- coidal univalve ; the second, two internal, friable, sub- transparent styles, composed of hardened albumen ; the third, an elongated, feather-shaped, horny plate ; the fourth, an internal, compressed, oval, laminated, friable, calcareous mass ; the fifth, an elongated, cylindrical, conical shell, twisted spirally in the same plane, divided into chambers by calcareous partitions, perforated by a siphon, and partly internal, partly external, m its situ- ation. Now, in a system of Conchology, understood as the classification of shells in the abstract, these produc- tions would necessarily be dispersed into five widely dif- ferent groups ; and in like manner, the small, thin, and fiat plate, which is buried in the substance of the mantle of the slug, would be far removed from the large external spiral shell of the snail. But no conchologist groups together his shells strictly and exclusively, according to their resemblances ; all the testaceous productions of the Cephalopods, now that the real affinities of these mollusks are known, are arranged in the same group, notwithstanding their striking discre- pancies of texture and form, and in their relative size and position to the bodies of their fabricators : so likewise with the shells or their rudiments of the air-breathing Gas- tropods, or of the Pteropodous MoUusca. In short, every purely conchological system must undergo modifications corresponding with the progress which is made in the knowledge of the true natural affinities of the molluscous animals ; and the progress of Conchology is therefore es- sentially connected with that of Malacology, under which term an outline of the most approved classification of the Mollusca and their shells will be found. Under the present head will be briefly treated those points which relate to Conchology as a science ; viz. the development, structure, configuration, and physiological subserviencies of shells. The formation of a shell commences with the exudation of layers of albumen from the outer surface of the mantle or skin of the embryo mollusk, which is generally fol- lowed by the admixture of rhombic or prismatic crys- talline particles of the carbonate of lime : and this first- \ formed shell of the embryo constitutes the nucleus of the shell of the mature mollusk. The nucleus is de- veloped in most cases before the embryo quits the egg- coverings, but it is never " coeval with the first formation of the animal ; " it is preceded by several distinct stages in the development of the embryo. The subsequent growth of the shell depends upon the deposition of fresh layers to the inner surface of the circumference of those , 2G6 1 previously formed ; beyond which the new-formed layers extend in proportions which determine the figure of the future shell. Sometimes the calcifying margin of the mantle extends outwards at an obtuse or right angle to the last-formed margin of the shell ; and after having deposited a cal- careous plate in this position, is retracted and absorbed, to be again similarly produced and extended after or- dinary growth has proceeded to a certain extent. It is to this periodical growth of the mantle and plethoric condition of the calcifying vessels that the ridges on the exterior of the shell in the Venus plicata among Bivalves, and in the Scalarta pretiosa among Univalves, are due. Should the mantle, instead of being uniformly extended, send outwards a number of detached ten taculiform calcify- ing processes,these will form a row of spines corresponding in length and thickness to the soft parts on which they are moulded ; and as the calcifying processes continue to deposit shelly material during the progress of their ab- sorption, the spines, which were at first hollow, thus become solidified, and are soldered to the margin of the shell. This development of calcifying processes or fila- ments of the mantle and spines may likewise alternate with periods of the ordinary formation of the shell ; and thus the exterior of the shell may become bristled with rows of spines, as in some s'pecics of Spondylus, and in the Murex crassispina. The most simple form of shell is the cone, which may be much depressed, as in the genus Vmhrella ; or ex- tremely elevated and contracted, as in the Dentalium; or of more ordinary proportions, as in the limpets {Patellce). The apex of the cone is oblique and excentric ; directed, in the limpets, the argonaut, and the nautilus, towards the head, but in most other mollusks towards the op- posite extremity of the body. A shell may consist of one piece, as in the Inopercular Univalves; or of two pieces, as in the Opercular Univalves and most Bivalves ; or of three pieces, as in Terebratula ; or of four or more pieces, as in some of the Pholades and the Multivalves proper, or Chitons. With respect to the operculum, this part is sometimes calcareous, but it consists frequently of albu- minous membrane only, or is horny ; thus presenting the condition which the univalve shell itself presents in certain genera, as Aplysia, Loligo, &c. The conical univalve shell is generally spirally con- voluted ; sometimes, as in the Nautilus {fig. 3.), in the same plane, more usually in an oblique direction, as in^^. 1 and 2. As a general rule, the spiral univalve, if viewed in the position in which its in- habitant would carry it if it were moving for- wards from the observer, is twisted from the apex downwards, from left to right, the spire being di- rected obliquely towards the right {a, fig. 1., in- dicates the spiral turns of Pleurotoma). In certain genera, as Clausilia,Ph^- sa, the shell is twisted in the opposite direction : such shells are called "perverse," or sinistral. Some species of Bulinus, Partula, and Pupa are sinistral ; and a few marine shells, as Fusu^ sinistroisus, also exhibit the reverse of the ordinary disposition of the spire. The part around which the spiral cone is wound is termed the " columella." This is sometimes simple, sometimes plicated, as in the Valuta musica (fig. 2.) ; it is also sometimes solid, sometimes hollow: when the latter, its aperture is termed the umbilicus. (/, fig. 1.) The opening forming the base of the spiral univalve is bounded by an inner lip d, and an outer lip e : the inner lip offers a smooth convex surface, over which the foot or locomotive disk of the mollusk glides to reach the ground. In many Univalves, the aperture of the shell is entire ; in others, it is broken by a notch, or perforated by one or more holes ; or a portion of it is produced into a canal. or siphon (c, fig.l ) ; or it may present a pallial notch (6. fig.l .) opposite to the siphon). These modifications are impor- tant, on account of the constancy of their relation to cer- tain conditions of the respiratory organs : thus the concho- logist, in grouping together all the spiral univalve shells of which a part of the margin was either notched or produced into a grooved siphon, would really indicate a very na- tural tribe of Mollusca, every species of which he might be assured was aquatic and marine, and breathed bj^ means of two gills having a pectinated structure, to which the water is conducted by a fleshy tube. Were a like cor- relation between the shell and its inhabitant to hold good in other families of Mollusca, the classification of shells CONCIIOLOGY. would then be a subject of much importance, and worthy the attention of the scientific naturalist : unfortunately, the reverse of this is frequently the case. The part called the operculum, which is present in certain univalre mollusks, is a plate consisting of layers of sometimes calcified, sometimes uncalcified, albumen, attached to a disk at the back part of the foot, and forming, when this is retracted, a more or less perfect defence to the outlet of the shell. Some opercula increase by the addition of matter to their entire circumference ; and these are either con- centric, as in Bithynia and Paludina, or excentric, as in Ampullaria and most of the Pectinibranchiate mol- lusks : other opercula grow by the addition of matter to part of their circumference ; and these are either spiral or imbricated : in the latter, the layers of growth succeed each other in a linear series. No operculum presents an annular form. As the operculum sometimes varies in structure in species of the same genus, as, e.g., of Ver- metvLSi — since, moreover, this part is inconstant even as to its presence in species of the same genus, as in the Volutes, Cones, Mitres, and Olives ; and as some genera in a na- tural family, as Harpa and Dolium, among the Buccinoids, are without an operculum, while the other genera of the same family possess that appendage, it obviously affords characters of very secondary importance in a scientific classification of the Univalve MoUusca. Much confusion indeed might have been introduced into the science of Malacology if the opinions of those conchologists who have proposed to classify shells from the modifications of the operculum had been much respected by naturalists. True bivalve shells are peculiar to the Acephalous MoUusca ; and their presence is constant, although they are in a few instances too small to cover the whole of the body, and in the ship-borers (Teredo) exist only as small instruments, limited to the function of excavating the burrows inhabited by these mollusks. But all the species in which the bivalve shell is inadequate to the protection of the whole of the body derive extrinsic defence by burrowing in sand, or stone, or wood ; and they also com- monly line their burrows with a layer of smooth and compact calcareous matter, forming a tube. This cal- careous tube, in some cases, is of considerable size and thickness, as in the Teredo gigantea or Septaria of La- marck. In the Clavagclla one valve, and in theAspergtUum both valves, are soldered to this tube, which, in the latter, presents a peculiar modification of its exposed extremity, which resembles the end of the spout of a watering-pot. No two shells can present a greater contrast than do those of the Placuna and Aspergillum ; yet the organiz- ation of their respective constructors is essentially the same. In a classification of shells, the calcareous tubes of the Hentalium, Serpula, Aspergillum, Vermetus, &c., would be associated in the same general group ; but it needs only to observe how these products of animals, be- longing not only to different classes, but to distinct pri- mary divisions of the animal kingdom, are arranged in the cabinets of collectors, to be convinced that Concho- logy, as a classificatory science, apart from Malacology, no longer exists. With regard to the structure and physiological relations of bivalve shells, it may be observed, first, that in all Ace- phalous MoUusca which breathe by distinctly developed lamellated gills {Lamellibranchiata), one valve corre- sponds to the left, the other to the right side of the animal ; but in the Brachiopodous Bivalves, one valve is applied to the V entral, and the other to the dorsal aspect of the animal. In all the Lamellibranchiate Bivalves which are free, the two valves are symmetrical, and the shell is termed equivalve ; in all those which adhere by one of their valves to foreign bodies, this valve is deeper and larger than the unattached valve : such shells are termed in- eqw'valve. Of those Acephalans which are attached to foreign bodies by means of a byssus, some, as Tridacna, Saxicava, and Bysso-arca, are equivalve, and both valves are notched, to form the hole for the passage of the byssus ; while others, as the Peclines, AviculcB, and Peda, are in- equivalve, the byssus passing through a groove in the right valve. Linnaeus, who first introduced precision into the de- scription of shells, defined several points requisite to be noticed in the outer and inner surface of a bivalve shell, but the prurient epithets, which his comparison of the bivalve selected for illustration induced him to attach to those parts, have been abandoned and changed. If the shell of the common cockle {Cardium edule) be examined, each valve wiU be seen to be produced into a conical prominence, bent towards, and nearly meeting at, that part by which the valves are joined together. These prominences are termed the umbones. Tlie apex, or beak of the umbo, corresponds to the apex of the univalve shell, and is the point at which the development of the bivalve commences. When the apex is directed in the transverse plane of the shell, and so placed that a bisection of the shell in that plane through the apices shall divide the valve into two equal parts, the shell is termed equilateial : of this form the 2C7 common scallop (^Pecten) is an example. When, upon a similar division, a slight difference is observed in the two valves, the shell is termed sub-equilateral^ but where the difference is well marked, it is an inequilateral bi- valve. When the apex is bent, as is commonly the case, out of the transverse plane, it is always directed more or less towards the anterior part of the shell ; if such a Bi- valve shtll as a Cytherea or Isocardia be held before the observer, with the umbones directed forwards and the hinge above, — in theposition, in fact, in which the living animal would place itself if it were creeping forwaYds from the observer, — the right valve will of course corre- spond with the right hand of the observer, and the left with the left. {Fi^. a 4. is the left valve of a Cytherea; a is the upper or dorsal margin, b the lower Or ventral margin, c the anterior, d the posterior margin, e the apex of the um- bo, / the lunule.) Now, if a Bivalve in which the apices have a spiral twist, as an Isocardia or Diceras, be placed in the above posi- tion, and compared with the univalve shell of a Concho- lepas or Purpura, it will be seen that the left valve cor- responds with the ordinary or dextral spiral Univalve, and the right valve to the perverse or sin- istral Univalve. In- stances, however, have been met with where the charac- ters of the valves of the Bivalve were reversed, like the occasional excep- tions in the " per- verse " sinistral Univalves before mentioned. When the circumference or margin of one valve fits exactly at every part to that of its fellow, it is said to be " regular," or entire ; but if it be notched at any part, so as not to come into contact with the corresponding part of the opposite valve, it is " irregular," or emarginate. With respect to the outer surface of a Bivalve, the parts called umbones and apices have already been defined, and the upper or dorsal and anterior margins of the valve de- termined ; if we continue our examination of the exterior surface of the Bivalve, we shall find, in most cases, ante- rior to the apices, a depression of variable extent and depth. This is the " lunule " (/, fig. 5.) : it mav be cor- diforra, or crescentic, lanceolate, oval, oblong, deep, su- perficial, &c. Behind the apices is another depression, longer and narrower than the lunule, and which is called the "fissure" (g, fig. 5.), audits margins lips. Behind the fissure there is sometimes a small depression, called the " suture " earl ;" the outer stratum is secreted by the thick glan- dular margin of the mantle, and consists of conical fibres, resting obliquely by their apices, or narrower ends, upon the nacreous laminae. The thickness of the two strata of the shell always preserves an inverse ratio, the outer one being thinnest at the wnbo, and thickest at the mar- gin ; the inner one the reverse. One hundred parts of oyster shell give — Of carbonate of lime Phosphate of lime Insoluble anim^J matter ■ 98-3 . 1-2 ■ 0-5 100-0 Most univalve shells are composed of three strata, which consist of layers of rhombic or prismatic crystals, dif- ferently arranged in tlie adjoining strata. The chief dif- 2G8 CONCORDAT. ference of structure depends on the relative quantity of the animal to the earthy constituents of the shell. Hunter discovered that the molluscous mhabitants of shells had the power of absorbing a part of the shell previ- ously formed ; a fact which has been confirmed by subse- quent observers, and which gives rise, in several species, to singular modifications in tlie form and structure of the shell in the progress of growth. Another change of forih is due to the physical decomposition or destruction of a part of a shell : this occurs to the apex of certain Univalves, after they have been evacuated by their original occu- pant, in the widening and lengthening the shell to accom- modate it to an increase of bulk. Such shells are said to be " decollated," as in Ceritkium decollatum. Helix decol- lata. Sec. An analogous partial decomposition always obtains in many Utiiones and Anodontee, of which the "umbones" are then said to be "decorticated," the ex- ternal coloured layer or bark of the shell being worn away. There is no general law or uniformity in the mode in which the inhabitants of either univalve or bivalve shells dispose of that part of their calcareous abode which they evacuate in the progress of their growth. In the decol- lated shells, the vacated spire is partitioned off by the formation of a thin nacreous plate ; and its walls being thin and fragile, it is then broken away, as above de- scribed. In VermeUis gigas, the vacated portions of the tube are successively partitioned off, and a series of con- cave plates or septa developed ; but the part of the shell thus divided into chambers, or "camerated," is retained. The Spondylus varius, among Bivalves, offers an analo- gous structure. In the pearly nautilus, the vacated portion of the shell is converted into a series of chambers by the development of calcareous septa in greater number and regularity than in any Gastropodous Univalves ; and the partitions are perforated by a membranous tube or siphon, and the deserted chambers are converted, by the superaddition of this part, into a hydraulic machine, per- fectly adapted to the habits and exigencies of the animal. The like structure, with various modifications, obtains in the extensive, but mostly extinct, race of " Siphoniferous " Cephalopods. In the argonaut.the vacated spire of the shell is not partitioned off, but is retained in full communication with the inhabited part, and made subservient to the repro- ductive economy of the species. In the Magilus antiquus, the posterior part of the shell, as it is deserted, is progres- sively filled up with a dense, solid, subtransparent crystal- line deposit of carbonate of lime. A deposit of similar calca- reous material, in a less degree, fills up the deserted spire of the shell in some species of Cassis, Mitra, Triton, &c.; and in the long "turreted" shells of the Terebrce, Ce- rithicB, &c. the deposition of this dense material in the vacated apex is the preventative, instead of the cause, of decollation. CO'NCLAVE, (Lat. con, together, and Gr. xUiu, I shut up.) The assembly of cardinals for the election of a pope. It begins the day following the funeral of the deceased pontiff. The cardinals are locked up in separate apartments, and meet once a day in the chapel of the Vatican (or other pontifical palace), where their votes, given on a slip of paper, are examined. Tliis continues until two thirds of the votes are found to be in favour of a particular candidate. The ambassadors of France, Austria, and Spain have each the right to put in a veto against the election of one cardinal, who may be unac- ceptable to their respective courts. CONCLU'SION. In Logic, that proposition which is inferred from certain former propositions, termed the premisses of the argument. CO'NCORD. (Lat. concordia.) In Music, the re- latiod of two sounds agreeable to the ear either in suc- cession or consonance. CONCO'RDANCE. (Lat.) A biblicaj index, in which all the leading words used in scripture are arranged alphabetically, and a reference ma(ie to the various places in which they occur, for the purpose of enabling the student to collate with facility one passage with an- other in the view of determining its meaning. The im- portance of this class of works was early appreciated, and a vast deal of labour has been expended in compiling them. Concordances have been made of the Greek Sep- tuagint, the Greek Testament, the Latin Vulgate, and the English Old and New Testaments ; a full list of which will be found in Watt's Bibliotheca Britannica, and in Orme^'s Biblio. Biblica. The first Concordance was com- piled by Cardinal Hugues de St. Cher, who died in 12G2. The best English Concordance is that of Cruden, which appeared in 1737, and still maintains its ground as an au- thority. CONCO'RDAT. An agreement or convention upon ecclesiastical matters made between the Pope and some temporal sovereign, as that between Pius VII. and Bona- parte in 1802, by which the Roman Catholic religion was re-established in France ; on which occasion the Pope re- cognized the new division of France into GO sees, instead of the much greater number which had existed before the revolution, the payment of the clergy from the national revenues, and the appointment of the bishops by the CONCRETE. civil authority. Origiually tlie term was applied to agreements regulating mutual rigiits between bishops, abbots, priors, &c. * The liberties of the French church were first established by the pragmatic sanctions of Saint Louis (1268), and Charles VII. (1439). In 151G a concor- dat between Francis I. and Pope Leo X. divided the pri- vileges of the church between them, and the king assumed the nomination of bishops. The states of Orleans re- stored their election to the chapters in 15G0. The prag- matic sanctions were still considered as forming the base of ecclesiastical law in France down to the revolution. CO'NCKETE. (Lat. concrescere, to coalesce in one mass.) In Architecture and Engineering, a mass com- posed of stone chippings or ballast cemented together through the medium of lime and sand, usually employed in making foundations where the soil is of itself too light or boggy, or otherwise insufficient for the reception of the walls. The employment of concrete in this country owes perhaps its introduction to Mr. George Semple, the engineer who erected the Essex bridge at Dublin, and who in 1776 published a Treatise on Building in Water; but there is no doubt it was well known at least to the Italian architects, if not to those of higher antiquity. The ric7nputa of Palladio, and the instructions in Alberti's 3rd Book, chap, viii., clearly point to what is now called concrete. The essential quality of concrete seems to be that the materials used should be of small dimensions, so that the cementing medium may act in every direction round them, and that the latter should on no account be more in quantity than is necessary for that purpose. Ar- chitects and engineers have much varied the proportions of lime and sand used. If the lime, which should be fresh and ground to powder, be good stone lime, such as that from Dorking, used in the neighbourhood of London, it will bear three or four times its measure by bulk of sand. These, and the ballast or gallots, as the stone chippings are called, should be thoroughly turned over and mixed together. If the foundations be wet, the mixture will want very little if any water ; indeed sometimes the bal- last only is wetted, and then covered over with the lime and sand. It is then filled into the barrows, and run on to be dropped from a stage into the foundations. This latter operation should be performed at as great a height as possible above the level of the trench, in order that the whole of the different particles of the composition may be compressed together so as to occupy the least possible space. The stones employed should not exceed the size of a common hen's egg. The mass very quickly sets and becomes extremely hard. On the top of it.which is kept as level as possible, a tier of what is called York- shire stone landings is laid, and very often throughout the lengths a chain of timber is buried in the footings, whose durability, is requisite only while the work is set- tling ; over the landings and timber thus laid, the latter, it is to be observed, occupying but a very small portion of the thickness of the footings, and quite buried in them, the walls arc carried up. CONCRETE TERM, in Logic, is so called when the notion derived from the view taken of any object is ex- pressed with a reference to, or as in conjunction with, the object that furnished the notion ; as " foolish," or" fool." When the notion is expressed without any such reference, it is called an abstract term ; as " folly." (See Whately's Logic, p. 124.) CONCU'SSION. (Lat. concutio, / sArtArg.) A term generally applied to injuries sustained by the brain, inde- pendent of fracture of the skull, as from blows and falls. More or less insensibility, sickness, impeded respiration, and irregular pulse are the first symptoms ; but these subside, and the sufferer often becomes more easy and col- lected; yet, although the symptoms apparently abate, dangerous inflammation may be going on, and a fatal ter- mination ensue. In all accidents of this kind, where, as is commonly said, persons are stunned, the most cautious treatment should be adopted, and no time lost in, ob- taining skilful professional aid. CONDENSA'TION. The rendering a body more dense, compact, or of greater specific gravity, by bringing its particles into closer union. The term is commonly applied to the conversion of vapour into fluid by distil- lation or otherwise. See Gas. CONDE'NSER. An instrument for reducing an elastic fluid of a given mass into a smaller volume. The pneumatic condenser is a syringe by which a large quan- tity of air may be forced into a given space. It is con- structed on the same principle as the air-pump ; only the valves are disposed in the contrary order, that is, to open inward instead of outward. CONDI' TION. In Law, has been defined in the most general sense, " A restraint annexed to a thing, so that by the non -performance the party shall receive loss, and by the performance advantage." It is most com- monly used to signify a term whereon a grant is made : e.g. grant of an estate to A., on condition that the grantee shall pay such a sum on such a day, or else his estate shall cease. Conditions of this description may be implied by law : as, where tenant for life enfeoffs a stranger in fee 26D CONE. simple, he forfeits his estate for the breach, as it is said, of the implied condition not to grant a greater estate than his own. Conditions are precedent, when an estate is gained on the performance of them ; subsequent, when the condition is to be performed after the acquisition of the estate whicli is lost by its non-performance. But the distinctions between these two classes are numerous and minute. In general, where a condition is of such a nature that compensation can be made for its non-performance, equity will relieve tiie party breaking it from the conse- quences of the breach on making such compensation. CONDITIONAL PROPOSITION, in Logic, is one which asserts the dependence of one categorical propo- sition on another : e. g. " If the wind changes, it will rain." The proposition from which the other results is termed the Antecedent; the resulting proposition the Consequent. A conditional syllogism is one in which the reasoning depends on a conditional proposition. It is of two sorts, constructive and destructive ; as, 1. If A=B, then C=:D ; but A = B, therefore C = D. 2. If A=B, then C=D ; but C is not equal to D, therefore A is not equal to B. The connection between the antecedent and consequent of a conditional proposition is termed the Consequence. CONDOTTIE'KI. (\t. leaders.) In Italian History, a class of mercenary adventurers in the I4th and 15th centuries, who commanded military bands, amounting to armies, on their own account, and sold their services for temporary engagements to sovereign princes and states. One of the earliest and most famous among those leaders was the Englishman Sir John Hawkwood, who com- manded in various Italian wars about the time of our Edward III. The bands under command of the Con- dottieri were well armed and equipped. Their leaders had in many instances considerable military skill ; but, as they took no interest in national contests, except to receive pecuniary advantages, the wars between them became a sort of bloodless contests, in which the only object of each party was to take as many prisoners as possible for the sake of the ransom. This singular system of warfare was only put an end to by the more serious military ope- rations of the French, who invaded Italy under Charles VIII. Although many Condottieri acquired much honour as well as emolument, one only attained to high rank and independent power ; this was I* rancesco Sforza, originally a peasant, who in 1451 made himself duke of Milan, and transmitted that sovereignty to his descendants. CONDU'CTOR. In Electricity. See Electricity. CO'NDUIT. (Fr.) In Architecture, a passage of very narrow dimensions, usually subterranean, for the purpose of secret communication between apartments, many of which exist in ancient buildings. Also a pipe for the supply of water to any place. CO'NDYLE. {Gr. xoiidvXo{, a knuckle.) The rounded head of a bone. CONDY'LOPEDS, Condylopoda. (Gr. xoiluXos, and frovi, afoot.) A name applied by Latreille to that subdivision of Encephalous articulate animals which have jointed feet : the Acephalous Cirripeds are excluded from this group, which consequently includes the Myriapods, Insects, Arachnidans, and Crustaceans. CONE. In Geometry, a solid body, having a circle for its base, and terminating in a point, which is called its vertex. The cone may be described as follows : — Sup- pose a fixed point A without the plane , of the circle B C D, and through the point A let a straight line A B indefinitely .produced on both sides be drawn, and 'carried round the circumference of the circle BCD; the two surfaces A B C D and Kb cd generated by this motion are the surfaces of two opposite or ver- tical cones. The circle B C D is called the base of the cone, and the straight line A O drawn from its vertex to the centre of the base is called its axis. If the axis Is perpendicular to the plane of the base, the cone is said to be right ; if the axis is inclined to the plane of the base, the cone is oblique. Some of the prin- cipal properties of the cone are the following : — The area or surface of a right cone, exclusive of its base, is equal to a triangle of which the base is equal to the periphery of the base of the cone, and altitude equal to the slant side of the cone ; or equal to the sector of a circle whose radius is the side of the cone, and its arc eejual to the cir- cumference of the base of that solid. It is much more difficult to determine the surface of an oblique cone, which cannot be reduced to the measure of the sector of a circle. The solid contents of a cone, whether right or oblique, aie equal to one third of a cylinder having the same base and altitude. The centre of gravity of a right cone is distant from the vertex | of the axis. Sometimes the name cone is given to other solids than those whose surfaces are produced by the motion of a straight line about the cir- cumference of a circle. It is applied generally to all bodies which can be formed in the same manner, as- suming any curve whatever for the circumference of the base. The beautiful relation which connects the cone, CONE OF RAYS. the sphere, and the cylinder, namely, that they are to each other in the proportion of 1 , 2, and 3, was discovered by Archimedes. CONE OF RAYS. In Optics, includes all the rays which fall from a luminous point, or from a single point of a luminous object, upon a given surface ; for example, the object glass of a telescope. CONFE'DERACY. (Lat. con, together, fcedus, a league.) In Politics, an alliance of independent states for a common object : sometimes also, but less properly, of individuals. CONFEDERATION, THE GERMANIC, was formed at the congress of Vienna : the instrument by which it is constituted bears date June 8.1815. This union was framed to supply the want of the ancient imperial go- vernment, dissolved in 1806. The constituent members are thirty-four monarchical states and four free cities, which enter the confederation as equal and independent. The diet of plenipotentiaries, which forms the repre- sentative body of the league, is permanent, and sits at Frankfort-on-the-Maine. When this diet meets as a general assembly (plenum) six states, viz. Austria, Prus- sia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Wurtemberg, have four votes each ; five other states three each ; four two ; the rest one ; making seventy in all. But in the making of fundamental laws, admission of new members into the confederacy, and on religious questions, unanimity is re- quired. In the ordinary assembly of the diet, the votes are so apportioned as to make only seventeen in all : this is the assembly in which propositions are discussed, which are decided without discussion in the plenum. This ordinary diet manages the general affairs of the confederation. Austria presides in both diets. The prin- cipal objects of the confederation are, the examination of disputes between its members ; mutual protection ; re- ciprocal assistance towards securing internal tranquillity ; the establishment of constitutions of estates in all the states ; the establishment of certain central courts of appeal ; legal equality of Christian sects ; an international community of civil rights in some points ; and finally, the regulation of the condition of mediatized princes and states. See Mediatization. CO'NFERENCE. In English Parliamentary usage, a meeting of certain delegated members of the two houses to discuss the provisions of a bill respecting' which there is a disagreement between them ; usually on the subject of amendments introduced by one and rejected by the other. The principal rules relating to conferences are, 1. That a conference must be demanded by that house which is in possession of the bill. 2. It is the privilege of the House of Lords to name the time and place at which the conference shall be holden. 3. The house which asks the conference must in its message clearly express the subject matter respecting which it is to be holden. 4. It is usual for the house desiring the con- ference to appoint a committee to draw up reasons to be offered in support of the measure which the house has adopted. These reasons are communicated by its ma- nagers (». e. delegates) to those of the other house ; and it is irregular for any member to go beyond these reasons, or to speak anything except by way of introduction to their delivery. 5. If the reasons alleged on both sides fail in producing agreement between the houses, what is termed a free conference is demanded ; usually after two conferences have been holden without effect. In a free conference the managers are not tied down to follow a particular line of instructions (although they may have received such instructions from their house), but may discuss the provisions of the measure in a more liberal manner. Conference has also been the frequent denomination of meetings of divines for ecclesiastical purposes. The con- ferences of Hampton Court (1604) and the Savoy (1660), between clergy of the church of England and Puritans and Presbyterians, are well known in English history. The annual meetings of Wesleyan preachers are styled conferences. CONFE'SSION, AURI'CULAR (Lat. auricula, car), is accounted by the church of Rome part of the sacrament of penance. It must be made to a priest, who is under solemn obligation not to reveal it ; and must be of every mortal sin. The Roman Catholics cite several passages of scripture, particularly Matt. iii. 6., Acts xix. 18., and James v. 16., as indirectly establishing this usage ; which, however, as an authorized practice of the church, does not appear to be older than about a.d. 1215. Confession is also prescribed by the Gre^k church. Among Protestants, the Lutherans for some time retained it ; but confession to God alone is recognized in our church as preparatory to absolution. (See especially Bingham, Orig. Eccl. book xvfii. c. 4.) CONFESSION OF FAITH. A formulary setting forth the opinions held by a religious community. The most important documents of this nature published prior to the Reformation are the Apostles', the Nicene, and the Athanasian creeds . ( See these arts . ) Since that period theRomanists refer, 1 .To the decrees and catechism of the 270 CONFLICT OF LAWS. council of Trent, as containing a complete exposition, ac- companied by an elaborate defence, of their opinions ; 2. To the Creed of Pius IV., published in 1564, which begins with a statement of the Nicene creed, and proceeds to declare briefly and explicitly the additional tenets of the Romish church ; 3. The exposition of the Catholic faith by Bossuet, as having been sanctioned by the Pope, is considered of secondary authority. The most authentic symbol of the Greek church is that which was draVn up in 1642 by Mogila, the metropolitan of Kiow. It was approved with great solemnity by the patriarchs and principal clergy of that communion. The reformed churches have in almost all cases drawn up summaries of their peculiar tenets, and require their ministers to express their assent to them. The church of England requires subscription upon ordination to the Thirty-nine Articles, and the three articles of the 36th Canon which relate to the supremacy of the King, &c. The Book of Common Prayer and the Homilies are also authorized statements of the doctrine of this community. The symbolic books of the Lutheran church are nu- merous : the principal are, the Confession of Augsburgh, drawn up by Melanchthon in 1530 ; the articles of Smalcald by Luther (1.538) ; the Great and Little Cate- chisms of Luther (1529); and the Form of Concord (1579). The original symbol of the Scotch church is called the General Confession of the true Christian Faith, which was adopted by the King and nation, together with the Solemn League and Covenant, in 1581. A second was drawn up in 1660 by some of the principal ministers, in consequence of an order in parliament for that purpose. The Confession of the Westminster Assembly (in 1643) was declared in 1690 by an act of parliament to be the national standard of faith in Scotland. In this country the imposition of formularies for sub- scription which are conceived in other than the words of scripture has frequently been made a ground of dissent and separation from the English church. The Pres- byterians also and Independents have suffered many secessions upon this ground, which is maintained as a clear deduction from the Protestant principle of the right of private interpretation. It may be answered, that a church, like ths Romish, which forbids private inter- pretation, might reasonably enough express its belief in the words of scripture, the meaning of which in its mouth would be suflJciently intelligible ; but that a Protestant church, on the contrary, must paraphrase the language of the Bible to make itself understood, and that its alter- native must be between a confession of this nature and none at all ; and the impracticability of the latter course has been shown by the experience of several minor sects in this country and elsewhere. CO'NFESSOR. (In Greek, «>«Xtfy^Ti5f.) In Eccle- siastical History, the title given to those who have under- gone persecution for Christianity short of death. They were peculiarly honoured in the primitive church, to- gether with the memory of those who had actually suf- fered (martyrs). Cyprian, Epist. 37. (See Gieseler's Eccl. Hist. 1st Period, 2nd Division, ch. 3.) CONFl'GURATION. In Astronomy, denotes thepo- sition which the planets occupy relatively to each other. CONFIRMA'TION. The laying on of hands by the bishop, for the conferring of the grace of the Holy Spirit; a rite by which a person arrived at years of discretion takes upon himself the performance of the baptismal vow made for him by his sponsors. This ceremony is derived from the practice of the Apostles, of whom we read (Acts, viii. 16. xix. 16.) that after certain disciples at Samaria and Ephesus had been baptized, they laid their hands upon them, and the Holy Ghost came upon them. The descent of the Holy Ghost upon the Apostles themselves on the day of Pentecost is considered also as an example of confirmation succeeding baptism. In the early ages this ceremony seems to have been accompanied very generalljr with the unction of the forehead. This ce- remony IS retained by the Roman Catholics, who consider confirmation a sacrament. CO'NFLICT OF LAWS. The opposition between the municipal laws of different countries, in the case of an individual who may have acquired rights or become sub- ject to duties within the limits of more than one state. In the language of Mr. Burge ( Colonial and Foreign Law, 1. 5.), " the right or claim which is in contestation before a judicial tribunal may present a conflict between the laws of the country in which he was born, or had a domi- cile, or had taken up a temporary residence, or in which his property, the subject of the claim, was situated, or in which the act, instrument, or testament on which the claim is founded was executed, or in which the contest- ation takes place. In this conflict of laws it becomes an important branch of jurisprudence to ascertain which should be selected, and the principles on which the se- lection is to be made." The following are among the principal works on this subject : — Rodenburg on the Con- flict of Statutes, an Essay appended to his treatise De Jtcre Conjuguin ; Hortius, De Collisione Legum ; Boul- lenois, De la Personnaltte et dc la It6alite des Loit ; the CONFLUENT. American judge Story's treatise on tlie ConftictofLaws ; and the above cited work of Mr. Burge, Commentaries on Colonial and Foreign Laivs generally, in their Conflict with each other and with the Law of England, 4 vols.Svo. I-ond. 1837. CO'NFLUENT. (Lat. conOnens, flawing together.) Running together. Applied to eruptive diseases in which tlie pimples or pustules are not detached, but so numerous as to form confluent patches, or even to cover the whole surface of the body ; hence the term confluent small-pox. CONFO'RMITY, OCCASIONAL. The participa- tion of one in any of the observances (more particularly sacraments) of a church from whicli he dissents. Much controversy existed among the English Dissenters, espe- cially in the reign of Queen Anne, with respect to the lawfulness of occasional conformity. CONGE'. (Fr.) In Architecture the same sort of moulding as the echinus or quarter-round ; also a term used for the cavetto ; the former being called the swelling conge, the, latter the hollow conge. CONGE' D'ELIRE. (Fr. leave to choose.) The king's writ or license to the dean and chapter to choose a bishop in the time of vacancy of the see ; a mere formal pro- ceeding. CO'NGENERS. Species belonging to the same genus. CONGE'STION. When there is an unnatural accu- mulation of blood in the capillary vessels of any part of the sanguiferous system, the organ in which it takes place, and the functions of wliich are disturbed, is said to suffer under congestion : it induces a morbid condition of the vessels of the part affected, which when once established is difficult of removal. Congestion of the brain, liver, or lungs is a frequent effect of fevers, though generally con- sequent upon a previous morbid condition of the organs. CONGLO'MERATE. (Lat. conglomero, I keep together.) In Anatomy, glands which are made up of many small glands, the ducts of which unite into one, as the salivary glands, are so called. In Botany, the term is applied to flowers closely compacted upon one footstalk. Conglomerate. In Geology, a rock composed of pebbles cemented together by another mineral substance, either calcareous, silicious, or argillaceous. CONGREGA'TION. (Lat. congrego, from con, to- gether, and grex, a flock.) At Oxford and Cambridge the assembly of masters and doctors is so called, in v;hich the ordinary business of giving degrees, &c. is transacted. Congregation. In Ecclesiastical language, properly an assembly of the people for the purpose of dirine worship. Companies of religious persons, forming sub- divisions of monastic orders, are styled in the church of Rome congregations. For an account of the congregations of cardinals at Rome, a species of committees for the transaction of business of the see of Rome, see Enc. Metropol. art. " Congregation." The " Congregation of the Lord " was an appellation assumed by the first Scotch Presbyterian Dissenters, in contradistinction to the Church of England, which they styled the " Congregation of Satan." They first came into notice in 1557, under the Duke of Argyle, and were at a later period led by John Knox. CO'NGREGA'TIONALI'STS. A sect of Protestant Dissenters, who arose in this country as early as the reign of Queen Elizabeth, when Robert Brown main- tained that every society of Christians meeting in one place for religious worship under its own laws and minis- ters formed a legitimate and independent congregation. The Congregationalists have been called from their founder Brownists, and in later times Independents. They form a powerful body in England, and are very nu- merous in America. Each congregation appoints its own ministers by vote, and can remove them at pleasure, and reduce them to the rank of laymen. They believe in the Trinity, predestination, total depravity, particular re- demption, effectual grace and final perseverance ; and rnaintain that every congregation of^ visible saints fur- nished with a pastor is under no other ecclesiastical ju- risdiction whatever. (See Neale's Hist. Puritans.) The number of Independent congregations in England and Wales was stated in 1836 to be about 1840. {M'Culloch's Statistical Accoimt of the Br. Empire.) CO'NGRESS. (Lat. congredior, / g-o ^o^e^^er.) In Politics, a meeting of the sovereigns of states, or their representatives, for the purpose of arranging international matters. The first general European congress was after the conclusion of the thirty years' war in Germany, at Miinster and Osnabriick, 1648, which was followed by the peace of Westphalia. Remarkable general congresses have been — 1 . of the Pyrenees, 1659 ; 2. of Aix-la-Cha- pelle. 1668; 3. Nimeguen, 1676; 4. Ryswick, 1697; 5. Utrecht, 1713 ; 6. Aix-la-Chapelle, 1748 ; 7. Teschen, 1779 ; 8. Paris, 1782 ; 9. Versailles, 1785 ; 10. the Hague, 1790; ll.Rastadt, 1797; 12. Erfurt, 1808; 13. Vienna,' 1814, concluded at Paris, 1815 ; 14. Aix-la-Chapelle, 1818; 15. Troppau, 1820 ; 16, Laybach, 1821 ; 17. Verona, 1822. Congress is also the title of the national legislature of the United States of America. It consists of a house of re- 271 CONIC SECTIONS. presentatives, and of a senate. The former is composed of members chosen every second year. The qualification of electors is the same with that required in their respective states for electors to the lower house in the state legis- lature. The number of representatives is apportioned according to the population of each state, and is altered every ten years, when the census is taken by authority. In making this estimate, the slave population is reckoned only at three fifths of its amount. There cannot be more than one representative for 30,000 free persons. The senate is composed of two members from each state : the senators are chosen for six years by the legislature of the state. The house of representatives chooses its own speaker : the vice-president of the United States is, ex officio, president of the senate. Bills for revenue pur- poses must originate in the house of representatives ; but are liable to the propoeal of amendments by the senate. The senate has the sole power of trying impeachments ; but can only convict by a majority of two thirds of the members present, and its sentence extends only to re- moval from office and incapacitation far holding it. The regular meeting of congress is on the first Monday in December annually. Every bill which passes the two houses is sent to the president for approval or disap- proval ; in the latter case, he returns it, with his reasons, to the house in which it originated : if, on reconsidera- tioti, it is passed again by a majority of two thirds in each house, it becomes law. The powers of congress are strictly limited, and separated from those of the various state legislatures, by the constitution. CO'NIC SE'CTIONS. In Geometry, lines formed by the intersections of a plane with the surface of a cone, which assume different forms, and acquire different pro- perties, according to the different positions of the plane m respect o"f the axis of the cone. There are five species : — 1 . If the cond be cut by a plane passing through its vertex, the common intersection o« the conical super- ficies and the plane will be two straight lines meeting in the vertex. 2. If the intersecting plane be parallel to the base, or, in the case of the oblique or scalene cone, if it be so situ- ated as to cut off from the vertex a cone similar to the original cone, the section will be a circle. 3. If the intersecting plane be parallel to a plane which touches the cone, the section will be a parabola. 4. If the intersecting plane pass through both sides of the cone, and is neither parallel to the base nor to the plane of a subcontrary section, the section will be an ellipse. 5. If the intersecting plane have such a position that, when produced, it meets the opposite cone, the section is a hv'perbola. These five are the only lines which can be formed by the common intersection of a plane and the surface of a cone, and they all equally arise from that intersection ; but as the straight line and the circle form the peculiar subject of elementary geometry, their properties are usu- ally treated apart ; and the three last, namely, the para- bola, the ellipse, and the hyperbola, considered as the curves especially designated by the term Conic Sections. Some of the principal and distinctive properties of the curves are easily deduced from this mode of generation. Let V A C B be the cone, and C D E the section made by a plane parallel to the plane which touches the cone in the line VA ; then, by the definition, C E D is a parabola. Now let P Q be the intersection of the plane which touches the cone in V A with the plane of the base A C B ; then P Q being a tangent to the circle A C B D, is perpendicular to A B, the diameter of that circle, and consequently C D, which is parallel to P Q, is also perpendicular to A B j therefore C F is equal to F D. In F E take any point G, through which let there pass a plane H L K, parallel to the base A C ^, intersecting the plane C E D in the straight line L G M ; then L M will be parallel to C D, and perpendicular to H K, and L G equal to G M. We have therefore, from the property of the circle, C F2 = A F • F B, and L G^ = H Gf • G K ; therefore since by reason of the parallels V A and E F the line A F is equal H G, C Y^ : L G^ ::FB:GK. ButFB:GK::EF:EG; therefore C F2 : L G2 : : E F : E G ; consequentlv, since C F and E F are constant quantities, the ratio of L G^ to E .G (or of L M2 to E G) is constant ; whence we infer that in the parabola the square of any ordinate L G is equal to the rectangle of the corresponding absciss E G into a constant quantity. From this all the other properties of the curve may be deduced. It is in fact the common equation of the parabola. See Parabola. CONIC SECTIONS. For the ellipse and hyperbola, let E M F L he the aection ; through V draw a plane parallel to E M F L, and let P Q be its intersection with the plane of the base. Through C, the centre of the base, draw C S perpendicu- lar to P Q, meeting the base in A and B. Let E F be the inter- section of the plane ELM with the plane A V B, which passes through the axis of the cone ; and in E F take any point G, through which let a plane H M K L be drawn parallel to the nlane of the base, the line L M being its intersection with the plane ELM. Lastly, through the points E and F let E N and F O be drawn, meeting the opposite sides of the cone in N and O. Because of the similar triangles, we have EG:GK::EF:FO, and F G : G H : : F E : E N, therefore EG-GF:GKGH::EF2:FO-EN. Now E F2 and the rectangle F O • E N are constant quantities, independent of the position of the point G ; and G K • G H = G L2 (L M being parallel to P Q, and therefore perpendicular to H K) ; consequently the rec- tangle E G • G F is to the square of G L in a constant ratio. This property furnishes an equation to the ellipse and hjrperbola, from which all the properties of those curves may be deduced. See Ellipse and Hyperbola. The mutual relations of all the curves to each other may be rendered sensible by supposing the plane V P Q to revolve about an axis passing through V parallel to P Q, and the intersecting plane E M L to accompany it in its revolution, always maintaining its parallelism, Suppose the revolution to commence when the plane V P Q is parallel to the base ; in this position the inter- section of the cone with E M L is a circle. When V P Q changes its position, and becomes inclined to the plane of the base, the section E M F L (flg. 2.) becomes an el- lipse. As the plane V P Q continues to revolve, the ellipse becomes more and more elongated, till at length P Q touches the plane of the base 0?^. 1.), when the curve, instead of returning into itself, exhibits two infinite branches, and passes into the parabola. The re- volution continuing, the line P Q falls within the base of the cone (fig. 3.) ; the section E M L still presents in- finite branches, but its axis E G now meets the opposite cone in F, the vertex of another section entirely similar and equal to E M L ; whence the hyperbola has two pairs of branches, which, from the opposite cones, are called opposite hyperbolas. Suppose that in this position (while P Q falls within the base) the distance between the two planes V P Q and E M L is diminished ; as the distance diminishes the curvature of the hyperbolic branches will also diminish ; and when the distance va- nishes the curvature vanishes, and the two branches pass into a system of two straight lines intersecting each other in the apex of the cone. The sections of the cone were first studied by the geo- metricians of the school of Plato. They admitted, how- ever, only the right cone into their geometry ; and they supposed the section to be formed by a plane perpen- dicular to its side. Consequently the three sections were formed from three different cones, the angles at the vertex being right, acute, or obtuse. The parabola was pro- duced from a right-angled cone, the ellipse from an acute- angled cone, and the hyperbola from an obtuse cone. ApoUonius of Perga, according to Eutocius, was the first who showed that the three sections may be obtained from every cone, whether right or oblique, and whatever the the angle of its apex, the species of the curve depending on the different inclinations of the plane of the section to the cone itself. It has, however, been established that Archimedes, who flourished about forty years prior to ApoUonius, was acquainted with the fact that the three sections may be derived from the same cone. Pappus, in his Mathematical Collections, ascribes to ApoUonius the names by which the three sections are designated : the term P^. The given fraction therefore becomes 4l<, or4-».i*- Again, dividing the fraction -i-i by the greatest measure of its numerator, namely 7, it will be changed into ^6, or |^6^ Wherefore the original frac- tion is now transformed into 4 J. 2 It is, however, CONTINUITY, LAW OF. more convenient to divide by such numbers as will render the numerators all units. Thus, let the fraction be ^^. Divide both terms by 287, and there results ] 131. Di- viding again the terms of the last fraction by its numerator 131, there arises i 25 . Dividing again by 25, the fraction -^^ is converted into J- 6 . Lastly, -f^ = ^1. Collect- ing all the fragments, we now get ^^-^ = ^ .j. i It is easy to see how the continued fraction is recon- structed into its equivalent simple fraction, by following the reverse process. By decomposing a fraction in this manner a series of derivative fractions is obtained, which constantly approach to the true expression, and exhibit the successive ap- proximate values in the lowest terms. Taking the last example, %%^ • if we stop with the first term of the expansion, we find for the approximate value 1, which is considerably too small ; if we take in two terms, we find -1- , ,=-2-, which is a little too large. Admitting three terms, we get 4-. 1 = -J-tt. which is again too little, but nearer the true value than the last. In this manner we approach nearer and nearer at every successive step ; and it may be remarked, that the errors are alternately in excess and defect. (See Leslie's Philosophy of Arith- metic ; Euclid's Analysis Infinitorum ; and the Addi- tions to the French translation of Euler's Algebra.) CONTINU'ITY, LAW OF. A principle of consi- derable use in investigating the laws of motion, and of change in general, and which may be thus enunciated : — Nothing passes from one state to another without passing through all the intermediate states. Leibnitz claims the merit of having first made known this law ; but in so far as motion at least is concerned, it is distinctly laid down by Galileo, and ascribed by him to Plato. But though a perception of its truth seems to have been felt long before, Leibnitz was certainly the first who applied the principle to test the consistency of theories, or sup- posed laws of nature. The argument on which he at- tempted to establish it d, priori is, that if any change were to happen without the intervention of time, the thing changed must be in two different conditions at one and the same instant, which is obviously impossible. A re- markable application of the law of continuity was made by John Bernoulli in an Essay on the Laws and Com- munication of Motion, which gained the prize of the Academy of Sciences of Paris in 1724, to prove that perfectly hard bodies cannot exist ; because, in the col- lision of such bodies, a finite change of motion must take place in an instant, an event which, by the law now ex- plained, is impossible. This conclusion was objected to by D'Alembert and Maclaurin, who on account of it were disposed to reject the law of continuity altogether ; but the difficulty is got over by supposing (which on various \ grounds is extremely probable) that there is no real con- tact, and that bodies begin to act on each other when their surfaces, or what seem to be their surfaces, are yet at a distance. CONTO'RNIA'TL In Numismatics, medals supposed to have been struck about the period of Constantino the Great and his immediate successors ; they are of bronze, with a flat impression, and marked with peculiar furrows. (Ital. contorni, whence their name.) They bear the . figures of famous emperors or celebrated men. Their I object is uncertain ; but they have been supposed to be [ tickets of admission to the public games of the circus in Rome and Constantinople. CONTOUR. (It. contorno.) In the Fine Arts, the external lines which bound and terminate a figure. The beauty of contour consists in those lines being flowing, lightly drawn, and sinuous. They must be carefully and scientifically drawn, which cannot be effected without a thorough knowledge of anatomy. CO'NTRABA'ND. (Ital. contra, against ; bando, cm edict or proclamation.) In Commercial language, goods exported from or imported into a country against its laws. Contraband of war, such articles as a belligerent has, by the law of nations, the right of preventing a neutral from furnishing to his enemy. Articles contraband of war are, in general, arms and munitions of war, and those out of which munitions of war are made ; all these are liable to be seized : but very arbitrary interpretations have been affixed to the term by powerful states, when able to en- force them by arms. Thus provisions are held contraband of war when it is the object to reduce the enemy to _ famine. But with respect to these and other articles not CONTRACT. in their nature contraband, it seems to be the practice that the belligerent should purchase them from the neu- tral for a reasonable equivalent, instead of confiscating. CONTRABA'SSO. (It.) The largest of the violin species of string and bowed instruments, whereof it forms the lowest bass, usually called the double bass. CO'NTRACT. In Civil Law, the term usually ap- plied to such agreements, whether express or implied, as create, or are intended to create, a legal right, and corresponding liability ; such right not attaching to the possession of the subject matter of the contract, except in equity, and that indirectly, but subsisting both in equity and law against the contracting party. The conditions essential to the legal validity of a con- tract relate either to the competency of the parties, the sufficiency of the consideration or mducement, the na- ture of the thing contracted for, the fairness of the trans- action, or, lastly, to the form of the agreement. And, first, as to the competency of the parties. The party to be sued must have been at the time of the con- tract of sound mind, and, unless it was for the supply of necessaries, of full age ; and if a woman, she must havo been unmarried, subject as to the latter condition to some exceptions established either by local custom or by the doctrines of equity. . Secondly, as to the sufficiency of the consideration on the part of the person suing, — it must have been either future marriage since performed, or money, or something capable of being estimated in money ; or some act, whether of performance or abstinence, whereby some undoubted advantage, though not capable of being exactly valued, accrues to the party sued. Thirdly, the act contracted for must be neither con- trary to written law, nor to public policy ; and it must be beneficial to the party seeking either performance or com- pensation, or to some one on whose behalf he gave the consideration. Fourthly, there must have been neither fraud (either by concealment or misstatement) nor compulsion on the part of the plaintiff in obtaining the agreement ; and fraudulent acts subsequent to the agreement having re- ference to it are also sufficient to deprive the guilty party of all right under it. Some circumstances are in equity considered either as conclusive evidence of fraud, or as substantive acts of coercion, which are not strictly of such a nature, and are not so deemed at law. Lastly, as to the form of the agreement. Where it re- lates to an interest in land of three years' duration or more, or to goods of the value of 10/. or upwards, unless there be earnest or delivery, or where it is an agreement as surety, or where it is upon marriage as a consideration, it must be in writing ; though the want of a written in- strument may be supplied in equity by partial performance, that is, by acts evidently done in pursuance of the alleged contract. Contracts are sometimes implied either in the whole from the acts of the parties, as from the ordering of goods a contract to pay for them ; or in part, and as incidental to the principal agreement, as, in the case of a lease, a contract by the tenant to use fairly and take due care of the thing leased. And at law some obligations not arising in any manner from contract are, as regards the mode of enforcing them, placed on the same footing as those which do arise from contract ; the remedy, and not the right, being assimilated by statute. Such are the general requisites to the validity of agree- ments ; but at law the extent of the right and liability arising under them varies according to their form ; agree- ments being there divided into those under seal, which are called agreements by specialty, and those not un- der seal, which are called simple contract or parol agreements, including not only such as are merely ver- bal, but such as are written and unsealed. The first sort alone are binding upon the land, and that only when the heir is named ; and they possess this farther advan- tage over agreements by simple contract, that being exr ecuted as the deed of the contracting party , a sufficient con- sideration will always be implied in their favour, unless an insufficient one be actually stated on the face of them. Again, agreements both by specialty and simple con- tract are either to pay a sum certain actually stated in the agreement, or a sum uncertain to depend upon the value of the thing received ; or they are agreements to perform certain acts. In the first case, the remedy is by action of debt either on bond pr covenant, or upon simple contract, as the case may be. In either of thelatter cases the remedy is by action for breach of covenant where the agreement is under seal, or by action of assumpsit where it is by simple contract ; the relief given in each of the two last-mentioned sorts of action being compen- sation in damages for the iiyury accrued from non-per- formance of the agreement. See Action. The remedy in equity, where there is any, is in all cases alike. — specific performance of the act agreed to be done ; and such relief will be given to the same extent and against the same parties, whether the contracting party himself or his real or personal representatives. T 3 CONTRADICTORY PROPOSITIONS. without any distinction between agreements under seal and tiiose wliicii are not so. But though courts of equity have jurisdiction in all cases of agreements, at least in all such as do not con- stitute an actual debt at law, yet the exercise of that jurisdiction is, subject to certain rules, a matter of dis- cretion ; for the reason that the denial of the equitable relief will not leave the party without some remedy, namely, that of damages at law : and on tliis account specific performance can only be obtained in equity in those cases where pecuniary damages would not aflbrd to the disappointed party an adequate compensation- Thus such relief will not be granted in any of those cases where the inducement to the bargain or agreement was merely the expectation of profit, as it is in agreements for the sale or purchase of personal chattels ; apd other circumstances also are a bar to equitable relief, which are no defence to an action at law, as, for instance, the want of mutual liability, apparent laches, and indifference in following up the agreement ; or particular consequences of collateral hardships arising to one party from actual performance ; or the impropriety in equity of the agree- • ment, as where performance would be a breach of trust. And on the other hand, though the equitable jurisdiction is founded upon a supposed legal right, there are cases in which the right having been lost at law, as by default in literal compliance with the terms of the agreement, will yet be enforced in equity. Contract, Original or Social. In Politics, that which is supposed to exist ab initio, according to some theories of government, between the sovereign power and the subject. So prevalent was this doctrine at the period of the revolution of 1688, that the Convention Par- liament pronounced James II. to have broken the "original contract between the king and the people." The original contract, with the reciprocity of rights and duties which it engenders, is clearly a supposition having no historical foundation in the annals of any people ; but it is, never- theless, the only hypothesis in which men can consistently proceed in framing a theory of government which shall ijatisfy at once the moral and economical wants of society. CONTRADl'CTORY PROPOSITIONS. In Logic, are those which having the same terms differ in quantity and in quality. Contrary Propositions are two univer- sals with the same terms, the one negative and the other affirmative. See Proposition. CONTRA'LTO. (It.) In Music, the part imme- diately below the treble ; called also the counter tenor. CO'NTRAST. (Fr. contraste.) In the Fine Arts, an opposition of lines or colours to each other, so contrived that the one gives greater effect to the other. By means of contrast energy and expression are given to a subject, even when employed on inanimate forms. All art is indeed a system of contrast : lights should contrast with shadows, figures with figures, members with members, and groups with groups. It is this which gives life, soul, and motion to a composition. CO'NTRATENO'RE. In Music, the same as Con- tralto, which see. CO'NTRAVALLA'TION. (Lat. vallum, trench.) In Fortification, a trench guarded by a parapet, formed by the besiegers between their camp and the place be- sieged, to secure themselves and check the sallies of the garrison. The line of contravallation is thus, as the name implies, a sort of counter fortification. CONTRO'L, BOARD OF, or BOARD OF COM- MISSIONERS FOR THE AFFAIRS OF INDIA, is constituted under the authority of Mr. Pitt's celebrated Act, passed in 1783. It consists of such members of the privy council as his Majesty is pleased to appoint, of whom the two principal secretaries of state and chancellor of the exchequer always form three. The president is usually a cabinet minister. The controlling functions of the board consist in revising all despatches prepared by the court of directors and addressed to the governments in India. It also has the power of requiring the court to prepare de- spatches on a given subject, and revising and altering them. The board is divided into six departments, — accounts, revenue, judicial, military, secret political, and foreign and public. The names of the first four indicate their duties : the third has three subdivisions, — the secret departments, respecting confidential communications ad- dressed (as the act prescribes) by the local governments to the secret committee of the court of directors, and vice versa ; the political, comprising general correspondence respecting native chiefs and states ; the foreign, respecting foreign Europeans and Americans resorting to India. The public department takes charge of commercial, eccle- siastical, and other miscellaneous affairs. The salary of the president of the board is 3500/., that of a paid com- missioner 1200/., of the secretary 1.500/. CONTRO'LLER. (Fr. controleur.) An officer ap- pointed to control or oversee the accounts of other offi- cers, and to certify whether the matters confided to his care have been conirolled or examined. In England, there are several public functionaries of this title, as the controller of the mint, customs, stationery, &c. 278 CONVERSION. CO'NTUMACY. (Fr. contnmsice, stubborn') la Scotch Ecclesiastical Law, a wilful disobedience to any lawful summons or judicial crder. It is punished by im- prisonment. CO'NUS. (Gr. x.mog, a cone.) A term in Botany, denoting that form of inflorescence called a strobilus or cone, which is a spike, the carpels of which are scale-like, spread open, and bear naked seeds. Sometimes the scales are thin, with little cohesion ; but they often are woody, and cohere into a single tuberculated mass. CoNUS. The name of a Linnaean genus of Vermes Testacea, characterized by the conical form of the shell, the base of which is formed by the spire, which is ac- cordingly flat, or very slightly projecting ; the aperture is narrow and rectilinear, or nearly so,' without any en- largement or plication. The genus is retained without subdivision, and forms part of the Bucdnoid family of the Pectinibranchiate order of Gastropods in the system of Cuvier. CO'NVENT. (Lat. conventus, from cojivenio, / come together.) A religious house, inhabited by a society of monks or nuns. See Monachism. CONVE'NTICLE. (Lat., diminutive of conventus.) An assembly for the purpose of divine worship ; first used in a contemptuous sense foi the meetings of the followers of Wicliffe (stat. 2H. 4. c. 1.5.), and^ince applied to the places of meeting of petty sects and of Dissenters in general in the Conventicle Act, 16 Car. 2., repealed by 52 G. 3. c. 155. OriginaHy the word had no such pecu- liar application, but was used by the fathers and ancient writers for a church . CONVE'NTION. In Political language, this name has been applied to assemblies of national represent- atives meeting on extraordinary occasions without being convoked by the legal authority. Two parliaments have been so called in English history. The first, that which met in April, 1G60, and restored Charles II. to the throne — the Lords assembling by their own authority ; and the Commons, by virtue of writs issued in the name of the keepers of the liberties of England, by the authority of parliament. The second, that which met in 1688, each house by its own authority, and on the summons of the Prince of Orange ; which declared King James II. to have abdicated the crown, and transferred it to William and Mary. In French History, the name Convention is ap- plied to that assembly which met after the legislative assembly had pronounced the suspension of the royal functions, in September, 1792, and proclaimed the re- public at its first sitting. This body dissolved itself on the establishment of the Directory, in October, 179G. The Scottish assembly which met on the flight of James II. was entitled the Convention of Estates. In the United States, meetings of the people of separate states, by specially chosen representatives, to review and amend the state constitutions,, have been termed Conventions. Conve'ntion, Military. A treaty between military commanders concerning terfns for a temporary cessation of hostilities ; generally between a victor and a defeated general, for the evacuation of a district or position by the latter. Such, at least, were the two most celebrated conventions of modern times : that of Closter- Seven (1757), between the Dukes of Cumberland and Riche- lieu; that of Cintra (1808), between Junot and the English generals. CONVE'RGENT-NERVED. A term used in de- scribing the venation of leaves, to denote cases where the ribs form a curve and meet at the point, as in Plantago lanceolata. CONVE'RGING SERIES. In Analysis, are series of which every succeeding term is smaller than the preceding, and which, consequently, tend to a certain limit. It is only converging series which admit of smn- mation. CO'NVERSE. In Geometry, a proposition is said to be the converse of another when tlie conclusion of the first being used as the supposition iai the second, the conclusion of the second agrees with the supposition of the first. Thus, the fifth proposition of the first book of Euclid affirms tliat if the two sides of a triangle be equal, the angles at the base are equal ; and the sixth affirms that if the angles at the base be equal, the two sides are equal. The sixth is therefore the converse of the fifth. CONVE'RSION. In Logic, a proposition is said to be converted when the terms are so transposed that tlie subject is made the predicate, and vice vers^. All lo- gical conversion is illative ; i. e. the truth of the converse follows from that of the original. Conversion is either " simple " or " per accidens." Universal negatives (de- noted by the sign E) and particular affirmatives (I) can be converted simply, retaining both quantity and quality : thus, " No virtuous man is a rebel ; " " No rebel is a vir- tuous man." Conversion per accidens changes either quantity or quality. Universal affirmatives (A) are con- verted by changing the quantity ; as. "All oaks are trees ;" " Some trees are oaks." Particular negatives (O) by changing the quality, considering tlie negative as attached to the predicate instead of the copula : the proposition Is 1 CONVERT. ( lias changed into I,—" Some poets are not learned ; " '■ Some not learned (unlearned) men are poets." See ruOPOSITION. CO'NVERT. (Lat.) .A person who changes his re- ligion. Individuals, of what faith soever, who abandon their own creed and embrace Christianity are called con- verts, in contradistinction to apostates, applied generally to Christians who adopt another religion. History, both sacred and profane, has transmitted to us many instances of sudden conversion, in which the hand of a miraculous providence may clearly be traced. Among the most re- markable may be mentioned the conversion of 3000 Jews on tlie day of the Feast of Tabernacles, and that of Paul the apostle, the emperor Constantine, and Clovis, king of France. CONVEY'ANCE. (Yrora convey.) In Law, a deed uliich passes land from one to anothei^. {See Real Pro- ri;uTY, Law of.) -A conveyancer is a lawyer, whose business consists in advising and preparing such deeds. It is not necessary to be called to the bar to practise as a conveyancer ; but most conveyancers take that step soon after beginning their business, and frequently combine it with that of equity draftsmen. CONVI'CTION. At Common Law, is the finding of one guilty of an offence by the verdict of a jury ; and may take place where one is outlawed, or appears and confesses, or is found guilty on the inquest. (See Jury, Verdict.) By various statutes summary proceedings, without the intervention of a jury, are authorized for tlie trial and conviction of minor offenders. Such are tiiose before commissioners of excise, &c. for breaches of the revenue laws, and before justices of the peace for various disorderly offences. The party charged must be summoned to attend ; and a conviction by a magistrate must be in writing, and should state the whole of the evidence for and against the defendant. CONVOCA'TION. (Lat. convoco, I call together.) In English Ecclesiastical Law, the council of the church, derived, first, from the custom of the bishops assem- bling their diocesan clergy for the sake of considering spiritual matters ; and, secondly, of the archbishops lidlding convocations of the clergy of a whole province. (Convocations were first assembled in England under tlie king's authority by Edward I., who summoned them liy their provinces, for the sake of obtaining subsidies from the clerical body. They met in each province in two houses — one of the suffragan bishops ; the other of deans, archdeacons, and representatives of the inferior clergy. Tlie taxation of their own body was withdrawn from convocation in 1664 ; and, on the other hand, the privilege of voting for knights of the shire was then conceded to ecclesiastics. As the power of enacting canons had been already virtually abolished by statutes of Henry VIII., l^lizabeth, and Charles II., there now remained no bu- siness for convocation to transact ; and it was only in tlie reigns of William III. and Anne, when attempts were made by the high church party to impart fresh activity to it as an ecclesiastical tribunal, that its meetings were attended with any historical importance. Since that pLM-iod it has become customary to prorogue convocation t very year immediately upon its assembling. The riglits 1 history of the convocation are treated of at length in ral writings of the learned Bishop Gibson, especially Synodus Anglicana, Lond. 1702. CoNvocA'TioN, House of, in the University of Ox- ford, is the assembly which enacts, amends, &c. laws and statutes ; elects burgesses, many professors, and other officers, &c. It is composed of all members of the university who have at any time been Regents (see Regents), and who, if independent members, have re- tained their names on the books of their respective col- leges. The power of convocation at Oxford to make statutes is limited : in the first place, the royal statutes cannot be explained or amended without royal license ; and, in the next place, with respect to all other laws and statutes, no proposition can be entertained in convocation unless it has been first submitted to the hebdomadal meet- ing of heads of houses, by whom it must be in the first in- stance sanctioned or rejected. CONVO'LVULA'CEtE. (Convolvulus, one of the fenera.) A natural order of herbaceous or shrubby ixogens, twining and producing a milky juice when wounded. They are very abundant in the tropics, and possess purgative qualities in their roots, depending upon a peculiar resin, of which scammoiw and jalap, yielded by the Convolvultis Scammonia and Ipomcea purga, may be taken as examples. Many of these plants are objects of striking beauty ; some, which unfold their pure, white, magnificent flowers at night only, are called in tropical countries Belle de Nuit ; others expand only beneath a warm and brilliant sunshine. The Lignum Rhodium of the old pharmacologists is produced by an upright bushy species, called Br ewer ia scoparia. CO'NVOY. (Fr. conveyer, to condtict.) In Naviga- tion, tlie term applied to designate a ship or ships of war, appoint(!d by government, or by the commander in chief on a particular station, to escort or protect the merchant 279 COPPER. ships proceeding to certain ports. Convoys are mostly appointed during war ; but they are sometimes also ap- pomted during peace, for the security of ships navigating seas infested with pirates. For an account of the various regulations and conditions relative to convoys, see M'Culloch's Com. Diet. Convoy, in the Military service, signifies a detachment of troops appointed to guard supplies of provisions, am- munition, or money, in their progress to a distant part of any country, or to an army in the field, against an attack which might be made upon them either by the peasantry or by parties of the eneiny. CONVU'LSION. (Lat. convello, / pull together.) A writhing and agitation of the limbs, and involuntary action of the muscles in general. The fits vary much in extent and violence, sometimes attacking the whole body, and at others confined to particular parts ; in the former case the mind is affected, but it often remains in the latter undisturbed : they also vary in duration, lasting from a few min.utes to some hours. They are sometimes preceded with dizziness, double or disturbed vision, and coldness, and are followed by great languor ; but at others they come and go without much disturbance. Teething, worms, and overloaded bowels are common causes of convulsive attacks in children ;'and these are relieved by freely and timely lancing the gums, and by the administration of proper purges. In puerperal con- vulsions bleeding and opiates are the usual remedies ; and in cases where convulsive attacks arise from violent affections of the mind, the exciting causes must be stu- diously avoided. W^arm baths, bleeding, and nervine stimulants are the usual medical aids ; and where there is difficulty of swallowing, a glyster, composed of half a pint of gruel with a drachm of tincture of opium and two drachms of tincture of assafcetida, has, in adults, proved eminently useful. Cold affusions often do harm. The after-treatment consists in the judicious use of tonics and nervous stimulants, and in avoiding all obvious exciting causes. COO'LER. An apparatus used by brewers and dis- tillers for cooling worts. The coolers generally consist of very shallow vessels exposing great surface, and placed in the high and airy parts of the brewery : the cooling is sometimes assisted by fans, which agitate the air over their surfaces. Worts are also occasionally cooled by causing them to traverse metal pipes, which are sur- rounded by a counter-current of cold water. Cb-O'RDINATES. (Lat. con, together, and ordino, I arrange.) In Analytical Geometry, the system of lines to which points under consideration are referred, and by means of which their position is determined. The position of a point on a plane is absolutely determined if we know its distances, measured in a given direction, from two straight lines given by position in the same plane. In like manner, the position of a point in space is determined by its distances from three straight lines given by position, provided any one of them be not in the same plane with the other two. The use of co- ordinates was introduced into geometry by Descartes, for the purpose of facilitating the investigation of the pro- perties of curve lines. For the sake of convenience, they are generally chosen at right angles to each other, and are then called rectangular co-ordinates. In plane geo- metry, one of them is the absciss, and the other the ordinate. The geometry of three dimensions requires one absciss and two ordinates ; the first horizontal, and the second vertical. The point from which they all pro- ceed is the origin of the co-ordinates. COPAI'BA or COPIVI BALSAM. An exudation from the Copaifera officinalis, a South American tree ; it is a liquid resin, and yields by distillation a considerable quantity of a pungent volatile oil. A small teaspoonful taken twice a day in a glass of water proves diuretic, and is of use in the cure of gleet and the latter stages oi gonor- rhoea. A larger dose is aperient, and has been of service in the treatment oi hainorrhoids . CO' PAL. (An American name applied to clear gums ?) This substance is often improperly called gum copal. It is a peculiar resin, very ditiicultly soluble in alcohol ; hard, brittle, and inodorous : its specific gravity varies from 1-04 to 1'13. It is the produce of the Rhus copallinum and of the Elccocarpus copaliferus of the East Indies : a third kind of copal is also brought from the Coast of Guinea. It is used in varnishes. COPA'RCENARY. (Lat. con, and particeps.) In Law, an estate is said to be held in coparcenary, and the tenants termed coparceners, where it descends from an ancestor to two or more persons. Sisters are coparceners at common law ; tenants in gavelkin by custom . No right of survivorship exists between coparceners. They may agree, or any one may force the rest to make partition. ' CO'PING. (Sax. cop, ^^e /iearf.) In Architecture, the upper covering or top course of a wall, usually of stone, and wider than the wall itself, in order to let the rain water fall clear from the wall. CO'PPER. {Cuprum, a corruption of Cypriuni, from the island of Cyprus, whence it way formerly broughtO T 4 COPPERAS. This metal was known at a very remote period ; and in the early ages of the world, before iron was in use, copper was the chief ingredient in domestic utensils and instru- ments of war. It is an abundant metal, and is found native, and in many ores ; of these the most important are the varieties oi pyrites, which are sulphurets of copper and iron. The richest mines are those of Cornwall. It occurs in veins, traversing the primary rocks of that county ; it is chiefly transported to Swansea to be smelt- ed, in consequence of the deficiency of coal in Cornwall. The ores are repeatedly roasted and fused to drive off the sulphur, and the oxide of copper is ultimately reduced by the joint agency of heat and carbon. Copper is dis- tinguished by its colour. Its specific gravity is 8-6. It is ductile and malleable, and requires a temperature equal to about 2000° of Fahrenheit's scale for its fusion ; that is, nearly a white heat. Exposed to air and moist- ure, copper gradually becomes covered by a green rust ; heated red hot it absorbs oxygen, and is superficially con- verted into a black oxide, which is the basis of the prin- cipal salts of copper : It consists of 32 copper and 8 oxygen. It forms blue or green salts with the acids ; of these the sulphate qf copper, or blue vitriol, is a good example. The salts of copper are poisonous ; and in consequence of the use of copper vessels for culinary purposes, food is some- times contaminated by them. It is detected when in very minute quantities by the bright blue colour produced by the addition of liquid ammonia, and by a brown precipi- tate with ferrocyanate of potash. A clean plate of iron dipped into a solution containing copper becomes covered with the latter metal in a metallic state. COPPERAS. Green vitriol, or sulphate of iron. CO'PPERPLATE. In Engraving, a plate of copper highly polished on which an engraving is made. CO'PPICE. Woods which are cut down at stated periods to be manufactured into poles, rods, stakes, fag- gots for fuel, bark for the tanner, or charcoal. When wood of this kind has no standard trees, it is called simply a coppice, or copse wood ; but when it has standard trees interspersed through it, it is called a wood. When cop- pices are cut down for hoops, rods, and small stakes for manufacturing into crates, hoops, wicker hurdles, &c., the period at which they are cut varies from six to ten years, according to the soil. When they are cut down for poles for hops and similar purposes, the periodical cuttings are commonly between twelve and fourteen years apart f and when they are cut down chiefly for the sake of the bark, they are seldom cut oftener than from fourteen to twenty-one years. A country abounding in coppice wood generally abounds also in singing birds, which are comparatively rare in countries where all the woods are of the pine and fir tribe. COPRO'PHAGANS, Coprophaea. (Gr. xor^o;, dung, and (fotyu, I eat.) A section of Lamellicorn beetles which live in and upon the dung of animals. CO'PULA. (Lat. a bond or tie.) In Logic, that part of the proposition whicli affirms or denies the predicate of the subject. The only true logical copula is the pre- sent tense of the verb to be, with or without the negative sign, " is " or " is not." CO'PY. (Fr. copie.) In the Fine Arts, a transcript from an original work of art. When an artist copies his own work, it is called a duplicate or double. Copy. In Printing, is the subject matter to be printed, whether it be an original work in manuscript or a re- print : in the first case it is termed manuscript copy, or written copy ; in the second printed copy. CO'PYHOLD. In Law, is a species of customary estate, said to be held by copy of court roll ; i. e. where the tenant's title is evidenced by a copy of the rolls of a manor made by the steward ot a lord's court. Cus- tomary estates are those which exist in real property subject to the custom of manors ; and their peculiar cha- racteristic is, that all alienations of them must be trans- acted, in part at least, in the lord's court, the ordinary mode of alienations being by surrender to the lord and admittance of the new tenant. The peculiar tenure called copyhold is derived from the tenure in villain socage, as it was termed, held formerly under a manor. This was in its origin a mere permissive tenure* by serfs attached to the soil ; and copyhold estates are still expressed in legal phraseology to be held " at the will of the lord by the custom of the manor." With respect to the incidents of dower, and other characteristics, they are frequently go- verned by the custom of the manor ; but where this is not the case, they are under the same rules which govern the transmission and alienation of freehold property. By the Reform Act, copyholders for life, or a greater estate to the amount of 10/. per annum, are admitted to the ex- ercise of the electoral franchise in counties. The best treatises on the law of copyholds are those of fVatkins and Scriven. CO'PYRIGHT. In Law, the right of property in a literary composition vested in the author. By .'54 G. 3. c. 1.56. 8. 4. the term of copyright in an author and his assignee extends to twenty-eight years absolutely, and for the life of the author if he survive that period. Neglect 280 CORIANDER. to enter a work at Stationers' Hall does not affect copy- right. Every assignment of copyright must be in writing. The author or assignee of a pirated work has his remedy by action ; or chancery will grant an injunction to re- strain the sale of pirated copies, and produce an account of such copies printed and sold. The act above mentioned required that eleven copies of every work should be de- livered at the expense of authors and publishers, on de- mand in writing, for the use of a few favoured public and private libraries in the United Kingdom ; but by the 6 & 7 Will. 4. cap. 110. the number was reduced to five. In France, copyrights continue for 20 years after the death of the author. In most of the German states, they are perpetual ; and to prevent spurious copies being in- troduced from other states, a late resolution of the Diet has declared that a copyright secured in one state is good in all. Both in England and on the Continent, various other compositions, such as engravings, etchings, prints, maps, charts, and sculpture of all kinds, receive from sta- tute a protection analogous to that of literature. CO'RACLE. A boat made of wicker-work covered with leather, used chiefly by the ancient Egyptians. CO'RACOID. (Gr.»resembling CORINTHIAN ORDER. that of the bug.) It is a native of Europe, cultivated on account of its seeds, which are occasionally used in me- dicine ; they have a peculiar perfumed flavour, with some bitterness, and form one of the ingredients of curry pow- der. CORI'NTHIAN ORDER. In Architecture, one of the five orders of architecture. The capital (see Ar- chitecture) is a vase elegantly covered with an abacus, and surrounded by two tiers of leaves, one above the other ; from among which stalks spring out, terminating at their summits in small volutes at the external angles and centres of the abacus. The capitals of the Tuscan, Doric, and Ionic orders appear added to the tops of the shafts ; t)ut the Corinthian capi- tal seems to grow out of the column, varying in height from a diameter and one sixth of the lower part of the shaft to one diameter only ; such last being the height of the capitals of the temple at Tivoli. The entablature of this order is variously deco- rated. The architrave is usually profiled, with three fasciae of unequal height, though in some specimens there are only two. The frieze is often sculptured with foliage, and the cornice decorated both with modillions and dentils ; the former having a sort of baluster front with a leaf under them; and the latter, which are cut into the body of the band, being occasionally omitted, as are sometimes even the modillions. The principal remain- ing ancient examples of the order at Rome are in the Temple of Mars Ultor, Portico of Severus, the Forum of Nerva, Temple of Vesta, Basilica of Antoninus, the Pantheon, &c. &c. CORK. (Corrupted from Lat. cortex ; Germ, kork.) The bark of the Quercus suber, a species of oak growing in the southern provinces of Spain, France, and Italy. When rasped cork is digested m water and alcohol, it leaves from 70 to 80 per cent, of insoluble matter, which has been called suberine, and which, by the continued action of nitric acid, is converted into suberic acid. CO'R'MUS. (Gr.«og,aof, a stem.) In Botany, a short roundish rhizoma. CORN. The seeds of certain grasses which have been immemorially used as food, for man or animals, are called corn ; and those which are used exclusively or principally by man are called bread corns. The term corn is also sometimes applied to the seeds of other plants which may be ground into meal and used as food, such as the seeds of the buckwheat, the quinoa, and of cer- tain leguminous plants, which, however, are more pro- perly denominated pulse. The principal bread corns of temperate climates are wheat, rye, oats, and barley ; those of warm climates are maize, rice, and millet ; and those of cold climates oats and barley. It may be worthy of remark, that all bread corns are annual plants, and from that circumstance far better adapted for universal cultivation than if they had been perennials, or even biennials. An annual plant may in- deed be said to belong to no country in particular, be- cause it completes its existence during the summer months ; and in every part of the world there is a sum- mer. Hence, we find the same corns ripening their seeds within the frigid and the torrid zone ; and though the quality of barley and wheat grown in Lapland be far inferior to that grown in the south of Spain, or on the plains of India, yet it is still such as may be made into wholesome bread and invigorating fermented liquor. Had the bread corns been perennials, they must necessarily have lived through the winter in every country in which they were grown, as well as through the summer ; and such of them as might have been adapted to the winters of cold climates, when taken to warm climates would have been so far weakened Ijy being kept in a growing state throughout the year as in a few years to have ceased to exist ; while the peren- nials of warm climates, such as the south of Spain and Italy, could not have lived through a single winter in Russia or Lapland. For the same reason, that is, because they are annuals, and require little more than to be sown and reaped, the bread corns are in an especial manner the domestic plants of man in an early stage of civilization. A people like the wanderhig Arabs, who live in tents, and 281 CORN. change their encampments annually or oftener, may con- veniently reap their crop, raise their tents, and carry their seed corn about with them, till they find a suitable spot where they can pitch their tents and take their next crop. This, however, could not be done by a people who, in addition to corn and pulse, depended for the food of themselves and cattle on the production of roots, such as the turnip and the potatoe ; and these accordingly are plants characteristic of a settled people, in a higher degree of civilization and a greatly advanced state of agriculture. The capacity of any country for growing corn may be said to be according to the flatness of its surface, provided it be neither too hot nor too cold, too wet nor too dry. The perennial grasses and trees also grow better in plains than any where else ; but they will thrive on the steep declivities of hills, which, if subjected to tillage in order to grow corn, would have the surface soil washed away by rains and thawing snows. Value of the Produce of Corn. — In agricultural'coun- tries, not in a very high state of civilization, the culture of corn is the principal employment of the great bulk of the community ; and in all considerable countries, how far soever they may be advanced in arts and refinement, its culture is always by far the most extensive as well as the most important branch of national industry. No great country, perhaps, ever existed, the population of which was so extensively engaged in manufactures and commerce as that of Great Britain. Still, however, we employ about a third part of our inhabitants in agricul- ture ; and of these, fully three fourths are directly or indirectly engaged in the raising of corn. Unfortunately, there are no accounts, on which it would be safe wholly to rely, of the ordinary produce of corn either in this or any other great country. But, without pretending to peculiar accuracy, we are inclined to think that the pre- sent (1842) average growth of all sorts of corn in the United Kingdom may be safely estimated at about G4,000,000 quarters, of which about 55,000,000 may be consumed by man, and the lower animals. (Seepo^^.) Now supposing this estimate to be nearly accurate, and taking the average price of the different descriptions of corn at 355. a quarter, the total value of the corn annually produced will amount to the sum of 112,000,000/. sterling, or to nearly or quite four times the total annual value of the cotton manufacture ! This is sufficient to evince the paramount importance of agriculture as a source of wealth as well as a means of subsistence. Corn Laws — This superior importance of corn as an article of culture, and the dependence so generally placed upon it as an article of food, are the causes why the trade in it has been so very generally subjected to regulation. It is long even before the most enlightened portion of an instructed community become satisfied of the advantage of permitting the supply of corn or any indispensable article to be adjusted, like that of other less important things, by the unfettered competition of private indi- viduals. It seems, at first sight, reasonable to suppose that the most likely way to secure plenty at home is to impose restrictions on exportation. But in truth and re- ality, this is very far from being the case. How fertile soever, no country that imposes restrictions on exportation need hope to escape perpetually-recurring scarcities ; for wherever free exportation is prevented, the excess of supply that occurs in plentiful years being thrown wholly upon the home market depresses prices to such an extent as to be ruinous to the farmer : and thus, by injuring agriculture and lessening the quantity of land in corn, never fails to occasion a scarcity on the occurrence of a deficient harvest. In Great Britain, however, the po- licy has long been to give every facility to exportation, and even to lay restrictions on importation. This has arisen from our legislature being principally composed of individuals dependent on and connected with the land ; and whose interest consequently has led them to en- deavour to secure as high a price' as possible for its pro- duce. But it is needless to add that this policy is, if possible, even more objectionable than the other. Instead of being publicly advantageous, high prices are, in every instance, distinctly and completely the reverse. The less the sacrifice of money or of labour for which corn or any other article can be procured so much the better. But to make sure that the price of corn, or of any thing else, will be fixed at the lowest limit at which the required supply can be obtained, all that is necessary is to abolish all restrictions, whether on exportation or importation. Freedom is the parent of abundance, cheapness, and equal- ity of price ; restriction, of scarcity, dearness, and uncer- tainty. Any interference with the trade in corn, or with any other great department of trade, that has not the removal of natural or artificial restraints for its object, is not only inconsistent with the best established principles, but is sure to be pernicious. In this, as in all other things connected with national industry, the short and only safe rule is to leave individuals to pursue their own interest in their own way. Our limits forbid our attempting to make any enumer- ation of the various statutes that have been passed at dif- *T 5 CORN. ferent periods for regulating the trade in corn. Down to the RevoUition, the policy was to restrict exportation ; but from that period the contrary policy has been pursued, and the legislature has pretty uniformly endeavoured to facilitate exportation, and to prohibit or fetter im- portation. It was not, however, till about 1770 that the restrictions on importation began to have much practical influence. But about that time, population having begun rapidly to advance, in consequence of the extraordinary impulse given to manufacturing in- dustry by the inventions and discoveries of Watt, Ark- wright, Wedgwood, and others, the price of corn in Eng- land began to rise above its price on the Continent ; and from being an exporting we became an occasionally, or rather a pretty constantly, importing country. Had there been no restrictions on importation, our prices, it is plain, could not have exceeded those of the adjoiningContinental states by a greater sum than might have been required to defray the cost of importing into this country. The re- strictions, however, overturned this natural principle ; and in deficient years added materially to the difference between our prices and those of the Continent. This dif- ference attained to its greatest height during the late war, owing to the formidable difficulties it threw in the way of importation. During the last six years of that contest, prices in England (after allowing for the depre- ciation of the currency) were fully double their amount in the principal continental markets. At the close of the war, in 1814 and 1815, the renewed intercourse with the Continent led to a great importation of corn, which occasioned such a sudden and heavy fall of prices as was productive of much severe distress amongst the farmers. Parliament endeavoured to obviate this by increasing the restrictions on importation, a device which had, in part, the anticijjated effect. But since 1820, the influence of improved communications and of amelior- ations in agriculture has been so very great, that, not- withstanding the vast increase of population, prices have been progressively falling, and were, in 1835, lower than in any previous year since 1787. Praetically, therefore, the influence of the restrictions has been materially diminished, and a much greater effect is now usually ascribed to them in ordinary years than they really exert. No doubt, however, they tend materially to aggravate the scarcity and suffering originating in a deficient harvest, and are, therefore, highly objectionable. The existing duty on foreign corn, or that imposed in the course of the present year (1842), by the act 5 Vict, 2 sess. cap. 14, is not invariable, but fluctuates according to the variations of price in the home market. It amounts to 20*. on wlieat, when the price is at and under 51s. a quarter ; and decreases, though not regularly, as the price rises, till the latter reaches 73s., when the duty is 1*. only. We subjoin the scale of duties on wheat : — Average ?i ice per Quarter. Duty per Quarter. Average Price per Quarter Zl^. Average Duty per Quarter. Under 51». Ws. 58 — 59*. Us. 66 — 67*. 6s. 51 _ 62 19 59-60 13 67 — 68 6 52-53 18 60—61 12 68-69 6 6.5 _ .94 18 61 - 62 11 69-70 6 64-65 18 62—63 10 70 — 71 4 55 — 56 17 63—64 9 71 — 72 3 56-57 16 61-65 8 72_73 2 57-58 15 65 — 66 7 73 and upwards 1 Correspond ling duties are laid on barley, o ats, and oth Jr species «- ofgrain. This fluctuating scale of duty, though it be a material improvement on the previous scale, or that laid down by the act 9 Geo. 4. c.ip. 60, has like it, though in a less de- gree, the defect of adding to the risk and uncertainty in- cident to the corn trade ; for, suppose a merchant orders a quantity of foreign corn when prices are at a certain level, if they fall before it arrives, he not only loses in consequence of the decrease of price, but is further charged with a corresponding increase of duty ; whereas on the other hand, had the price advanced, he would have gained not merely by its increase, but by the fall in the rate of duty ! The effect of this system is, therefore, precisely the reverse of what it should be were it founded on sound principles, inasmuch as it aggrav.ites the loss arising from a bad, and increases the profit of a successful, speculation ! But in recommending the policy of a free trade in corn, we do not mean to contend that it would be either just or expedient always to admit of importation free of duty. In certain circumstances this may be the proper course, but not in all. No duty should ever be laid upon foreign corn on pretence of protecting British agriculture, as that is, in fact, taxing the other classes in order to secure a doubtful benefit for the agriculturists. But if agriculture be more heavily burdened than any other great depart- ment of industry carried on at home, a constant duty should be laid on corn from abroad, to balance the ex- cess of duty falling on the agriculturists. This is not to favour the latter, but to do them justice. It has been denied that the British agriculturists are in this predica- ment ; but were this the place for entering into such inves- tigations, it would not be difficult to show that they are in fact more heavily taxed than the manufacturers or traders; and that, consequently, they are entitled to claim that a fixed and invariable duty be laid on all foreign corn when imported, corresponding to the excess of taxation by which they are affected. We believe, however, that a fixed duty of Us. a quarter on wheat, and on other grain in proportion, would be more than adequate to meet all the claims of the agriculturists arising out of the peculiar pressure of the taxes to which they are subjected ; and it is abundantly certain, that with such a duty, but little foreign corn would now be imported in ordinary years ; and, consequently, that the agriculturists would sustain no real injury from the adoption of such a sys- tem. Those who may wish for further information as to the interesting topics now merely glanced at, and others we have not been able to notice, are referred to the article " Corn Laws," in the new edition of the Ency- clopedia Britannica, the art. " Corn Laws " in the Com- inercial Dictionary, and the note on the same subject in M'CuUoch's edit, of the Wealth of Nations, 1 vol. 8vo. We subjoin an estimate of the quantity of corn used as food for man ; and of the total quantity of corn pro- duced and consumed in the United Kingdom, deduced from the data given in M'CtUloch's Statistics oftlie British Empire, and the census of 1841. I. Consumed by man : — Wheat Oats, rye, and maslin - - - Barley for malting, &c. Beans and pease cis meal . . - Total consumed by man II. Consumed by the lower animals : — Corn (principally oats), used in the feeding of horses and other animals, in distillation, &c. - - - Quarters. - 15,000,000 - 15,000,000 . 6,000.000 600,t;00 36,600,000 18,000,000 Total consumed by man and the lower animals, &c. - - - - 54,600,000 To which add seed, 16th part - 9,100,000 Total growth of corn in the United Kingdom 63,700,000 Account of the Average Prices of British Wheat per Quarter, in England and Wales, since 1771, as ascer- tained by the lleceiver of Corn Returns. Years. Wheat. Years. Wheat. Years. Wheat. I t. *. d. X,. s. d. L. s. d. 1771 2 7 2 1795 3 14 2 1819 3 13 1772 2 10 8 1796 3 17 1 1820 3 ■ 7 11 1773 2 11 1797 2 13 1 1821 2 16 2 1774 2 12 8 2 10 3 18'hy, the punctuation, the language, and in making such alterations as may appear to liim necessary. The following explanation of the marks which are in general use by i)rinters for this purpose, with the annexed specimen, will enable a gentleman who has to super- intend a work through the press to correct the proof sheets in a wav that will be clearly understood by the printer, and will tend to promote correctness by prevent- ing those mistakes that occasionally occur, owing to his not clearly comprehending the marks on the proof. 1. Where a word is to be changed from small letters to capitals draw three lines under it, and write caps, in the margin. ' 2. Where there is a wrong letter draw the pen through that letter, and make the right one opposite in the margin. 3. A letter turned upside down. 4. The substitution of a comma for another point, or for a letter put in by mistake. 5. The insertion of a hyphen. G. To draw the letters of a word close together that stand apart. 7. To take away a superfluous letter or word the pen is struck through it and a round top d made opposite, being the contraction of delealur, toexpunge. 8. Where a word has to be changed to Italic draw a line under it, and write Ital. in the margin ; and where a word has to be changed from Italic to Roman, write liom. opposite. 9. When words are to be transposed three ways of marking them are shown ; but they are not usually num- bered except more than three words have their order changed. 10. The transposition of letters in a word. 11. To change one word for another. 12. The substitution of a period or a colon for any other point. It is customary to encircle these two points with a line. 13. The substitution of a capital for a small letter. 14. The insertion of a word, or a letter. 15. When a paragraph commences where it is not intended, connect the matter by a line, and write in the margin opposite run on. 16. Where a space or a quadrat stands up and appears, draw a line under it and make a strong perpendicular line in the margin. 17. When a letter of a different size to that used, or of a different face, appears in a word, draw a line either through it or under it, and write opposite to./., for wrong fount. 18. The marks for a paragraph, when its commence- ment has been omitted. 19. When one or more words have been struck out, and it is subsequently decided that they shall remain, make dots under them, and write the word slet in the margin. 20. The mark for a space where it has been omitted between two words. 21. To change a word from small letters to small capitals make two lines under the word, and write sm. caps, opposite. To change a word from small capitals to small letters make one line under the word, and write in the margin lo. ca. for lower case. 22. Tlie mark for the apostrophe ; and also the marks for turned commas, which designate extracts. 23. The manner of marking an omission, or an inser- tion, when it is too long to be written in the side margin. When this occurs it may be written either at the top or the bottom of the page. 24. Marks when lines or words do not appear straight. The subjoined specimen when corrected would be as follows : — ANTIQUITY, like every other quality that attracts the notice of mankind, has undoubtedly votaries that reverence it, not from reason, but from prejudice. Some seem to admire indiscriminately whatever has been long preserved, without considering that time has sometimes co-operated with chance : all perhaps are more willing to honour past than present excellence ; and the mind contemplates genius through the shades of age, as the eye surveys the sun through artificial opacity. The great contention of criticism is to find the faults of the moderns, and the beauties of the ancients. While an author is yet . living, we estimate his powers by his worst performances; aind when he is dead, we rate them by his be.'-t. To works, however, of which the excellence is not absolute and definite, but gradual and comparative ; to works, not raised upon principles demonstrative and scieutifick, but appealing wholly to observation and ex- perience, no other test can be applied than length of duration and continuance of esteem. 28G Antiquity, like every other quality that attrrcts the notice of ;^ankind, has undoubtedly ^ ^ votaries that reverence it, not Jlh from reason/ but from preju- )/ 9 dice. _some seem to admire injliscriminately whatever has been long preserved, without considering that time has some^ times co-operated with chance: all perhaps are more v^illing to honour^resen t\than/past^ ex- cellence ; and the the mind contemplates gen^s through the shades of age, as the eye vi e ws the sun through artificial opacit^^^he great contention ^ Qf0i of criticism is to find the faults of the moderns,^the beauties a^J/ of the ancients.) ^^ C While an auyor is yet living 15 '/Uy'ri an we estimate"his powers by hi^ worst performances ; and when he is deadA (To works*, however, 6l}^Mk oi which /the excellence is not ^1T gradual j but absolute and defi- ^ niteJand(comparative ; to works, ;/ Raised n^upon principles de- ^ ^nstrative) aftd^ ci o ntifick, but ^^4kt a^ealing /wholly to observa- 20 ' tion and (experience, no|other ^ tesj^an bejapplied than length -^i- <^/ of dya^tionjand continuance of 22 f CORRESPONDENCE. CORRESPO'NDENCE. (Lat. con, with, and re- spondeo, / answer.) In the Fine Arts, the fitting or proportioning the parts of a design to each other, so that they may be correlative, and that tlie same feeling may pervade the whole composition. CO'RRIDOIl. (Ital. corridoro.) In Architecture, a gallery or open communication to the different apart- ments of a house. CORRO'SIVE SUBLIMATE. The bichloride of mercury, composed of 200 mercury + 72 chlorine. It is an acrid poison of great virulence : the stomach-pump and emetics are the surest preventives of, its deleterious effects when accidentally swallowed ; white of egg has also been found serviceable in allaying its poisonous in- fluence upon the stomach. Its specific gravity is 62. It requires 20 parts of cold water, but only 2 of boiling water, for its solution. See Mercury. CO'RRUGATE. (Lat. ruga, wrinkle.) In Zoology, the surface of an animal is so called when it rises and falls in parallel angles more or less acute. CO'RSAIR. (Ital. corsaro.) A term used in the south of Europe and some other parts for a pirate or his ship. The corsairs of Barbary were commissioned by their princes to attack the merchant ships of hostile countries. CO'RTES. (.9d'e- States.) The old assembly of the estates in Leon, Castile, Arragon, and Portugal. These estates were framed, as elsewhere, of nobility, dignified clergy, and representatives of the towns. In Arragon they were presided over by a high officer, termed Justiza, with powers in some respects sufficient to control the mo- narch . The origin of popular representation in the cortes of the several kingdoms out of which that of Spain was finally formed is assigned to a date as early as the 12th cen- tury ; but the deputies sent by the towns were irregularly summoned, frequently did not attend, and the numbers which appeared for each town frequently bore no propor- tion to the relative size of the different places. In the 1 Jth century the power of the cortes seems to have been at its height, after which it gradually decayed, and under the fjovernment of Ferdinand and Isabella was reduced almost to a nullity. ( See Prescotfs Ferdinand and Isabella, vol. i. ; llallam's Middle Ages.) After the time of Philip II., the cortes of Spain were only occasionally convoked on the accession of kings, and their sittings were a mere form. In 1811, during the French invasion, they were con- voked at Cadiz, and conducted the affairs of that king- dom during the war of independence. In 1814, Ferdi- nand VII. dissolved them, and declared all their decrees null. In 1820, the cortes met again, and adopted a new constitution; in 1821, the people of Portugal fol- lowed the same example : both constitutions were over- thrown in 1823 ; the first by the French invasion, the latter by a counter revolution. The later events of Spanish and Portuguese history have again called these national assemblies into existence. CORTI'CIFERS, Corticiferi. (Lat. cortex, bark, fero, / carry.) Those Polypg whose uniting fleshy substance is spread, like the bark of a tree, over a central calcareous or corneous axis. CO'RTILE. (Ital.) In Architecture, an open quad- rangular or curved area in a dwelling-house, surrounded by the buildings of the house itself. CO'RTINA. (Lat. cortina, a kind of table.) A term used in describing Fungi, to denote that portion of the vt'lum which adheres to the margin of the pileus in frag- inonts. CORU'NDUM. A crystallized or massive mineral of extreme hardness, and composed of nearly pure alumina ; it is usually almost opaque, and of a reddish colour. It is allied to the sapphire. CORVE'E. (French.) In Feudal Law, the obligation of the inhabitants of a district to do certain services, as the repair of roads, &c. for the sovereign or the feudal lord. Some species of corvee were performed gratis ; others for a fixed pay, but generally below the value of tlie labour performed. CO'RVUS. (La.t. tfieraven.) A Linna^an genus of birds, now the type of a family ( Corvidce), belonging to the Coni- rostral division of the Passeres of Cuvier ; and including, with the Crows proper, the Rollers (Coracias) and Birds of Paradise {Paradisea). Co'rvus. In Astronomy, one of Ptolemy's constel- lations, in the southern hemisphere. CORYBA'NTES (Gr.) in Grecian Mythology, were the priests of Cybele ; so called either from Corybas, the son of that goddess, or from the frantic gestures with which their devotions were accompanied ; the term Co- lybantes signifying literally "shaking the head violently." They used to beat brazen cymbals in their sacred rites ; Si geminant Corybantes sera. Hor. Oi. I. 16. 8. I and their whole religious proceedings were character- ized by such extravagant fanaticism as to have enriched the Greek language with several terms expressive of mad^ __. ness or frenzy. & CORYCE'UM. {Gr. xievxcc.) In Ancient Archi- COSMORAMA. lecture, an apartment in a gymnasium whose exact des- tination is Hot known. CORYDA'LEA. An alcaline principle, from the Co- rydalis tuherosa and Fumaiia cava. CO'RYMBI'FER^. (Lat. corymbus, afiat-lieaded kind of inflorescence, and fero, 1 bear.) One of the divisions of the great group of Compositce admitted by Jussieu. It comprehends those plants which, like the Chrysanthemum and the Aster, have the capitula fur- nished with a ray ; and those others which, like Arte- misia, although destitute of a ray, are similar to such plants in the majority of their characters. CORY'MBUS. (Lat.) In Ancient Sculpture, the cluster of ivy leaves, berries, garlands, &c. with which vases were encircled. Cory'mbus. In Botany, a form of inflorescence con- sisting of a central axis, developing lateral pedicels, the lower ones of which are so long that their flowers are elevated to the same level as that of the uppermost. CORYPHCE'NA. (Gr. xo^v?, a helmet, and ^«;»a, I show.) A genus of spiny-finned fishes, so called from the head being crested like a helmet. It belongs to the Mackerel faniily (Scomberoids) ; and includes the true dolphin, or changeable coryphene {Coryphcena hippu- ris). The genus is now raised to the rank of a family, including, with Coryphcena proper, the subgenera Cen- trolopus and Leptopodes. CO'RYPHCE'US. (Gr.xo^wfn, summit.) The leader of the chorus in ancient dramas ; by whom the dialogue between the chorus and the other actors of the drama was carried on, and who led in the choric song. CORY'ZA. (Gr.»fl|y?fl6.) A copious running from the nose. CO'SECANT and COSINE. The secant and sine of the complement of an angle or arc ; the prefix co being merely the abbreviation of complement, first intro- duced by Gunter. COSME'TIC. (Gr. xotriJ-io), I adorn.) Remedies to remove freckles and pimples from the face and to im- prove the complexion. CO'SMICAL. (Gr. xoorted, in lbs. Peickases exported . . - Lbs. weight annually impbrted, in mil- lions and tenths Lbs. weight consumed do. Lbs. weight in ports, 31st of Dec. do. - Lbs. weight in Great Britain, do. Average price per lb. of uplands in Liverpool .... Do. do. Femams Do. do. Surats '990 2,918 1,192 409 3,7 n 2,442 360 5,452 4.756 460 5,896 7,S23 364 4,438 10,2'^.? 310 6,605 11,742 317 5,464 9,915 266 6,346 13,854 392 4,036 1,689 207 656 4,519 2,408 C5I8 531 6,515 2,502 891 1,096 627 10,668 3,602 508 940 284 14,073 2,339 446 1,069 .421 14,971 2,483 1,639 461 17,564 2,460 781 ^6^f 15,644 2,373 518 2,H2 723 19,692 1,444 640 2,227 260 6,488 337,400 263 5,122 256 29,300 9.3-9 'it 16id. 8,979 466,900 258 6.945 249 28,400 14.V9 120-3 110-6 127-0 IIW. 15p. 8.^. 11,531 699,600 278 9,634 270 72,800 222-4 166-8 107-0 115-5 ll-6d. 15-ld. 8-9d. 16,002 932,100 298 14,320 300 3.V00 2612 2476 914 •1188 6-9d. Td! 18,348 954,100 333 18,348 331 102,800 361-7 318-1 73-3 89-6 74d. 20,333 1,057,300 346 20,333 347 123,400 40S-2 366-7 82-1 115-6 Id. 23,204 1,206,600 3^6 23,204 350 103,300 501-0 416-7 1101 160 9 7d. 9-375d. 5d. 21,430 1,114,400 343 20,764 348 117,300 388-6 381-7 98-5 125-8 5|d. 24,063 1,161,300 354 24,063 365 119,700 583-4 458-9 162-9 207-0 6d. 9Jd. 4|d. N. B. —Messrs. Holt and €o. estimate the average weight of the packages imported in 1840 at 333 lbs. per bag Upland ; 415 lbs. Orleans and Alabama; 330 lbs. Sea-Island ; 171 lbs. Brazil ; 215 lbs. Egyptian; 342 lbs East Indian ; and 166 lbs. West Indian. We subjoin, from Burns' s Glance, — a tabular statement, annually published at Manchester, and admitted to be drawn up with great care, — an account of the cotton spun in Great Britain and Ireland in 1838, and how that spun in England was dispos^ of, with several other interesting particulars. Statement of Cotton spunin England, Scotland, and Ireland, in 1838 ; showing the Quantity of Yarn produced, and how that spun in England was disposed of. GrtiU Britain. American cotton Brazil ditto ... Egyptian ditto Esut India ditto ... West India ditto Total number of bags consumed Allowed for loss in splnning> If oz. per lb. Total quantity spun in England and Scotland Deduct quantity spun in Scotland Total quantity spun in England in 1838 Number of Bags consumed. 938,168 147,392 40.273 94.468 16,519 1,236,820 Average Weight of Bags in lbs. Exported in yam during the year How disposed (if. thread Ditto in manufactured goods ...... Estimated quantity of y^m sent to Scotland and Ireland . . . ExjMrted in mixed manufactures, not stated in the above-named articles, consumed in cotton banding, healds, candle and lamp wick, waddings, flocks, calender bowls, paper, umbrellas, hats, and loss in manufacturing goods - . . . Balance left for home consumption and stock, 1st January, 1839 - • - Ditto ditto Ditto ditto Ditto ditto ditto ditto ditto 1837 Gross weight of cotton spun in Ireland in 183S Allowed for loss in spinning, J | oz. per lb. Total quantity of yam spun in Ireland in 1838 Total Weight in lbs. 349,936,664 26,204,032 11,437,632 34,291,884 5,220,004 426,090,116 46,603,606 113,753,197 2,362,983 120,784,629 6,875,952 16,753,000 84,133,283 63,667,902 43,486,686 49,932,800 4,412,860 482,656 Weekly Consumption of Bags, describing each sort. 18,041-36 2,834-24 774-25 1,816-36 317-35 23,786 379,486,510 34,823,466 344,663,044 In 1832 the quantity spun was 222,596,907 lbs., giving a weekly supply of 4,280,709 lbs. Mr. Burns estimates the quantity spun per spindle, per week, at 8+ oz., making the total number of spindles employed in England and Wales, in 1832, 7,949,208. Those employed in Scotland, during the same year, are estimated, in the same way, at 381,020. Mr. Burns further calculates the number of looms employed in England and Wales, in 1832, at 203,730. The consumption of flour in the manufacture is much greater than any one not pretty well acquainted with it would readily suppose. The average quantity required for each loom is estimated at 4 Jbs. per week ; making the total annual consumption in England and Wales, in 1832, 42,301,584 lbs., or 215,824 barrels of 196 lbs. each ! The places whence the supply of raw cotton is derived, and the quantity furnished by each, are seen in the fol- lowing table : — COTTON MANUFACTURE. .Account of the Quantities of Cotton Wool imported into the United Kingdom during the Seven Years ending with 1838 ; specifying the Quantities brought from different Countries, the Total Quantities exported, and the Quan- titles left for Consumption (Compiled from Farl. Papers.) Countries. | 1832. j 1833. | 1834. j 1835. 1836. 1 1837. 1 1838. iJotton wool from foreign countries, viz. _ United States of America Brazil - ... Turkey and Egypt - - - - Other foreign countries ... Cotton wool from British possessions, viz. — East Indies and Mauritius British West Indies, the growth of - Ditto, ditto, imported from Other British possessions Total quantities imported Quantities exported Left for consumption - - - 219,756,753 20,109,560 9,113,890 598,048 35,1-78,625 1,708,764 331,664 35,221 Ibt. lb,. lbs. 237,506,758 269,203,075 284,455,812 28,463,8211 19,291,396 24,986,409 987,262 855,167 5,738,966 1,696,108 2,260,852 5,207,389 32,755,164 32,920,865 41,474,909 1,653,166 1,672,211 1,495,517 431,696 624.314 319,753 162,862 47,545 24,208 tbt. Ibt. 1 Ibt. 289,615,692 320,651,716 431,437,888 27,501,272 20,940,145 24,464,505 5,426,721 7,881,540 5,412,478 6,734,413 4,616,829 4,759,688 75,957,887 51,577,197 40,230,064 1,31-2,806 1,199,162 928,425 401,531 396,540 600,931 8,735 23,654| 16,606 286,832,525 18,027,940 303,656,837 17,363,882 286,292,955 326,875,425 363,702,963 24,461,963 32.779,734 406,959.057 31,739,763 375,219,294 407,^86,783 39,722,031 367,564,752 507,850,577 30,644,469 477,206,108 268,804,585 302,414,462 330,923,229 Account of the Exports of Cotton Goods and Yarn from the United Kingdom in 1837; specifying the Quantity and declared Value of those shipped for each Country. White or Plain Cottons. Printed or Dyed Cottons. Hosiery and small Wares. Twist and Yam. Total Countries to which exported. Declared Value. Yards. Declared Yards. Declared Declared Pounds. Declared Value. Value. Value. Value. i. L L. r L. Russia 980,779 40,203 145,760 7,590 9,106 24,108,593 l,6'r2,956 1,669,855 Sweden 62,939 1,717 48,552 1,850 708 734,336 55.060 59,335 Norway . - 164,634 4,08 347,809 9,964 1,68! 197,70C 10,474 26,201 Denmark ... 45,992 1,032 71,569 1,359 57,470 2,870 5,357 Prussia . 4,924 502 502 Germany 14,203,855 " 294,378 28,967,374 713,771 162,263 34,272,607 2,177,823 3.348,235 Holland 16,382,581 341,448 11,588,241 322,400 50,205 15,993,072 1,386,388 2,100,441 Belgium - - - 865,339 32,271 1,998,160 72,528 102,233 67,397 8,752 215,784 France . 1,169,753 23,68; 1,269,924 35,529 93,768 94,707 31,364 184,344 Portugal, Proper 15,966,118 268,18t 15,748,216 369,712 21,084 323,262 23,612 682,597 Azores 541,605 11,78£ 731,946 18,740 838 17,840 786 32,155 Madeira . 519,315 8,25^ 649,954 12,767 1,068 1,358 78 22,168 Spain and the Balearic Islands - 151,380 4,047 205,986 5,694 221 687 45 10,007 Canaries 471,917 10,762 435,599 12,234 924 1,071 63 23,984 Gibraltar 13,956,830 310,777 12,681,183 375.367 17,271 225,939 14,729 718,144 Italy and the Italian Islands 24,976,414 526,881 17,631,057 481,915 40,910 8,775,028 477,882 1,527,588 Malta 1,108,032 21,638 562,773 17,."64 2,208 176,260 9,729 50,939 Ionian Islands - 1,497,260 26,314 841,686 19,955 790 297,980 14,303 61,362 Morea and Greek Islands 9,054 256 67,794 2,664 33 1,800 100 3,053 Turkey 23,727,096 482,438 9,423,139 288,230 2,297 3,527,538 180,225 953,190 Syria and Palestine 5,140 330 . . . . 330 5,559,900 107,125 693,240 23,207 349 660,700 41,372 172,053 Tripoli, Tunis, Algiers, and Mo- rocco - . - 2,928,580 41,552 253,009 4,892 407 . . 46,851 Western Coast of Africa 607,843 15,783 4,365,569 119,540 .'^fll 2,982 395 136,109 Cape of Good Hope St.1lelena - "^ - - - 2,293,943 54,567 3,136,936 80,483 9,389 9,314 899 18,816 519 5,326 141 19 . 679 1 Mauritius 3,053,808 78,395 2,237,689 73,556 7,749 10,400 468 160,168 East India Company's territories and Ceylon 46,366,175 1,040,018 17,847,458 488,231 30,444 8,478,021 602,293 2,160,986 Sumatra, Java, and other Islands of the Indian Sea 5,952,848 144,962 2,620,300 97,620 5,931 127,620 7,858 256,371 Philippine Islands 473,370 10,075 613,421 17,695 1,115 28,885 China 8,519,245 193,075 2,445,178 79,300 1,012 1,873,965 " 103 908 377,295 New South Wales, Van Dieman's Land, and other -Australian Set- tlements . - . 1,275,348 36,561 1,335,325 44,889 15,809 13,625 781 98,040 6,319,864 161,392 7,950.884 222,001 39,068 260,732 14,307 436.768 British West Indies 19,695,492 417,580 17,998.452 465,449 43,812 65,549 4,487 931.328 Hayti - - - Cuba and other Foreign West 1,246,463 28,421 1,612,897 53,270 2,751 84,442 Indian Colonies 6,798,703 148,024 11,966,502 293,865 11,608 6,250 309 453,806 United States of America 5,471,788 187,585 12,010,067 407,237 117,572 219,712 13,359 725,753 States of Central and South Ame- Mexico 2,713,901 55,651 4,227,065 143,805 13,339 2,654,867 144,489 357,284 Columbia 1,436,553 32,630 2,675,164 58,136 4,085 188,283 12,488 107,339 Brazil 25,387,191 436,192 23,380,427 551,258 26,987 560 48 1,014,485 States of the Rio de la Plata - 10,923,196 207,714 9,260,258 237,557 18,818 5,734 364 464,473 ChiU 7,825,718 150,492 9,356,806 240,267 18,217 . . 408,970 Peru 3,655,774 88,013 5,641,351 165,804 14,300 . . 268,117 Isles of Guernsey, Jersey, Alder- ney,Man,&c. Totals 833,704 38,975 159,360 4,334 21,323 7,255 376 65,008 286,164,256 6,085,789 245,209,407 6,642,200| 912,192 103,455,138] 6,955,942 20,596.123 Manchester, or rather Lancashire, is the grand seat of the English cotton manufacture ; and next to it Cheshire, Nottinghamshire, the West Riding of Yorkshire, and Cumberland are its principal seats. Glasgow and the surrounding district is the seat of the manufacture in Scotland. In Ireland it is principally confined to Belfast ; but there it is of very limited dimensions, and is said to be rather on the decline. With the exception of those employed in hand-loom weaving, the condition of the labourers employed in the cotton trade is eminently satisfactory. It has not only made a vast addition to the field of employment, but it has increased the comforts of those engaged in it. The stories once so current as to the cruelties practised upon and the hardships endured by the children and young persons employed in cotton factories were, though 291 not wholly without foundation, grossly exaggerated ; — they never, indeed, existed in the first-class mills ; and since the system began of excluding children under 9 years of age, limiting the hours of emploj-ment, and appointing inspectors, abuses have been wholly put an end to. The value of the cotton manufacture of Great Britain is greater than that of all Europe besides. And provided tranquillity be maintained at home, and we continue to be exemptetl from that political agitation that is the bane of industry and the curse of every country in which it prevails, we have nothing to fear from foreign competition. Our natural and acquired advantages for the prosecution of manufactures and trade are vastly su- perior to those of every other country ; and though fo- reigners do excel us in a few departments, and may come to excel us in others, so that the character and species of U 2 COTTUS. the manufacturemay in consequence be partially changed, there is not so much as the shadow of a foundation for supposing that its amount will be at all affected. On the contrary, it is all but certain it will continue to augment with the augmenting wealth and population of the innu- merable nations with which we have commercial rela- tions. It is impossible to frame any accurate estimate of the total value of the cotton goods and yarn annually pro- duced in Great Britain. In the Commercial Dictionary they are estimated at about 34,000,000/., and we are m- clined to thiols, that this is not far from the mark. Mr. Baines, in his elaborate work on the History of the Cot- ton Manufacture, gives the following estimate of the number of people employed, and the value of the ma- nufacture. Estimated Yearly Value of the British Cotton Manufacture. Wages of £ 237.000 * operatives engaged in spinning and power-loom weaving - - 6,044,000 250.000 1 hand-loom weavers, at 7s. per week each ... - 4,375,000 45,000 calico printers, at 10s. per week each - 1,170,000 1.59,3001 lace workers (including 100,000 em- ployed in embroidery, and 30,000 in mending, pearling, drawing, and finishing) .... 1,000,000 33,000 makers of cotton hosiery - - 505,000 Bleachers, dyers, calenderers, fustian- cutters, machine-makers ; makers of steam-engines,cards, rollers, spindles, shuttles, looms, and reeds ; smiths, joiners, builders of all classes, mill- wrights, carriers, carters, warehouse- men, &c. &c. ; say - - - 4,000,000 Haw material (spun in 1833) 283,675,200 Ibs.^if at 7rf. per lb. - - - - 8,244,693 Profits of capital, sums paid for materials of machinery, coals, flour for dressing, and other outgoings II - - - - 6,000,090 COUNCIL. \ £ 31,338,693 In the Commercial Dictionary the capital employed in the manufacture is estimated at 34,000,000/. ; which Mr. Baines thinks is very moderate. CO'TTUS. (Gr. xortr,, a head.) A genus of spiny- finned fishes ; so called on account of the large size of the head. It includes two British species, viz. the Father- lasher (Coitus bubalis), and the Sea Scorpion (Cottus Scorpio) ; both of which are dreaded by fishermen on account of the painful and dangerous wounds which they inflict by means of the spines with which the gill-covers are armed. COTYLE'DON. (Gr. xenXt,, a hollow.) In Bo- tany, the seminal leaf of a plant. This organ forms a part of the embryo, and is what nourishes the plumula and radicle at their first period of development, before they are able to subsist upon the organizable matter absorbed by the latter from the earth. Exogenous plants have generally two cotyledons. Endogenous as generally one only ; but there are exceptions in both cases. The latter class of plants seldom elevate their cotyledon above ground, and never convert it into a green leaf-like body, but usually leave it behind them within the integu- ments of the seed ; the former frequently raise their coty- ledons above the soil in the form of small green leaves, as In the garden radish ; but there are very numerous exceptions to this, as in the pea, the oak, the chesnut, &c. COTYLE'DONS. (Applied by Aristotle to designate the sucking-cups of the arms of the Dibranchiate Cepha- * Mr. Stanwav, from the Returns of the mill-owners, ascertained that 67,SI9 mill operatives in Ens^land received 141,635/. 5«. 7^d. as wages for a month of four weeks : at the same r.ite, 237,fKX) mill operatives, the number in the United Kingdom, would earn 6,434,453/. per year- But, as wages in Scotland are 10 per cent, and in Ireland 15 or W per cent- lower than in Ent;land, and as two weeks' wages in the vear ought to be deducted for holidays, the amount of wages paid will be about 6,04 1,000/. f In mj estimate of the number of weavers I have not reckonetl the winders, draw -boys, ^.c. who assist them, and who must amount to a great many thousands ; but, in the supposed average of their wages, I include those earned bv the assistants of the weavers as well as by the weavers themselves. The sum of 7*. per week for the grost wages of all the hand-loom weavers is, 1 am convinced, a fair estimate. The calculation is for 50 weeks in the year. i The wages paid to the women and children employed in em- broidery, mending. Sec. the lace, must be extremely low. Mr. Felkin estimates the whole value of the Uce manufactured in England at 1 ,8 >0,r>50/. ; de5jtt««o5;o^/, and by the Romans cursores ; and the duties of tlie ancient couriers seem to have been wholly analo- gous to those of the moderns, and were performed chiefly on horseback ; though the original derivation of the name would lead to an opposite supposition. In the middle ages couriers were known by the appellation trottarii, or trotters; and hence perhaps originated the English term running footmen, of whom history makes mention in the 17th and 18th centuries. COURSE. (Lat. cursus.) In Architecture, a con- tinued level range of stones or bricks of the same height throughout the face or faces of a building. See Bond. COURSE OF CROPS. The rotation or succession in which crops follow one another, in a prescribed course of cropping. The rule is to follow a crop grown for its seeds or roots by one grown for its leaves or stems. COU'RSERS, Cursores. (Lat. curro, /rww.) An order of birds, including those which are disabled from flight by the restricted development of the wings, but which pos- sess superior powers of running from the compensating size and strength of the legs : the ostrich, rhea, casowary, emeu, and apterj-x are examples of this order. COU'RSE^. The lower square sails, as the foresail and mainsail. COU'RTESY. (Fr. courtoisie, Ital. cortesia.) It was at the courts of princes and great feudatories that the minstrels and troubadours of the middle ages especially delighted to exercise their art ; and it was there, also, that the peculiarities of chivalrous life and manners were chiefly exhibited. Hence courtesy was a general term, expressive of all the elegance and refinement which the society of those times had attained ; in fact, it was syno- nymous with all the gentler parts of chivalry itself : and it is in this sense that it is used both by the early trou- vdres and romancers, and also by poets of a later age, when sdfecting the use of chivalrous language, as in the first lines of the great poem of Ariosto : — Le donne, i cavalier, 1' arme, gli amori, Le corteiie, V aadaci imprese io csmto. The transition from this wider meaning to that in which It is now employed is obvious enough. It may be suffi- cient to refer to the very ingenious theories of Signor Ros- setti respecting the secret meaning attached to this (among other) words of frequent occurrence in the poems of the Italian canzonieri of the thirteenth and fourteenth cen- turies. (Inferno di Dante, 1827, vol. ii. p. 430, &c.) 294 COURTS, SUPERIOR. COURT PLASTER. Black silk varnished over with a solution of isinglass, which is often perfumed with benzoin. COURTS OF JUSTICE, are divided by the rules of English law into courts of record and not of record. The former have power to make up their acts and ju- dicial proceedmgs in the form technically called a record, as evidence of their judgment. All courts having power to fine or imprison are said to be impliedly courts of record ; but this seems questionable. The courts termed Superior are divided into those of Law, Equity, Ecclesiastical, Maritime, Prize or Inter- national, and Courts of Appeal and Error. They are, — Three Superior Courts of Common Law {see Courts, Superior), being — 1. The Court of King's Bench. Set- King's Bench. 2. The Court of Common Pleas. See Common Pleas. 3. The Court of Exchequer. See Exchequer. Four Superior Courts of Equity {see Chancery), being - The High Court of Chancery. The Rolls Court. The Vice-Chancellor's Court. 7. The Equity side of the Court of Exchequer. 8. The Ecclesiastical Courts. See Ecclesiastical Courts. 9. The Court of Admiralty. See Admiralty. 10. The Prize Court. See Admiralty. 11. The Courts of Bankruptcy. See Bankruptcy. The Courts of Error and Appeal are — 12. The Exchequer Ch^nber, from the Superior Common Law Courts. See Exchequer Cham- ber. 13. The Privy Council, and Judicial Committee of the Privy Council, which are Courts of Appeal from the Ecclesiastical Courts, Admiralty, and also from the decisions of various Colonial Judicatures. 14. The High Court of Parliament. See Parlia- ment. Inferior Courts are numerous, both of record and not of record; being for the most part local jurisdictions of very various extent and authority. To these belong the Courts of Conscience and Requests, Courts Baron, Hundred Courts, Borough Courts, and County Courts, in which the sheriff presides. COURTS, SUPERIOR. The three superior common law courts of England are the Court of King's Bench, of Common Pleas, and of the Exchequer. For the origin and history of each court, and its peculiar jurisdiction, see those separate heads. For several centuries, by means of various admitted fictions, these three courts have exercised a concurrent jurisdiction in all personal actions {see Actions); and the practice of all three is, in material points, the same. They sit, during term, at Westminster. The different branches of jurisdiction of the three superior courts are, 1 . That of the full court in banc, during term only, when four judges sit together in each ; 2. Of the Practice or Bail Court (created by the 1 W.4. c. 70. s. 1., which as yet has been brought into operation in the King's Bench only, in which a single judge disposes of some less important matters of business) ; 3. Of a single judge at chambers, where also points of minor importance in the conduct of a cause are decided and directions given ; 4. Of the master or prothonotaries, officers to whom various matters of fact, as computations, &c., are referred ; 5. Of the judge at Nisi Prius and on the circuit, for the trial of issues in fact ; 6. Of the. sheriff in each county, who may be considered as an officer of the superior courts for the purpose of trying issues directed to him under 3 & 4 W. 4. - c. 42. The course of proceeding in the superior courts is either formal or summary. Formal proceeding, in per- sonal actions, is the regular course of a trial, whether the issue, or question tried, be one of fact or law. The party complaining, or plaintiff, having brought the de- fendant into court in person, or constructively, by pre- liminary process, entitles his declaration, or tlie form of statement of his grievance (see Pleading), as of one of the three courts, the same in which the writ for com- mencement of the action is said to be returnable. Tlie defendant then pleads ; and all the subsequent pleadings, or preparatory statements in writing, are entitled of the same court : in which also the record, or parchment roll containing the authentic entry of the whole pro- ceeding, is made up. The question eventually raised between the parties will turn out to be either of"^ law, or of fact. The former, being raised on what is termed a demurrer {see Pleading), is argued at Westminster before the full court, and the judgment in law is con- clusive of the issue. If the question be of fact, it must be tried by a jury. If the pleadings are dated at London or in Middlesex, as in local actions they miist be if the question arise in those districts, and as in transitory actions they COURT BARON. may be in all cases (see Pleading), the jury will be summoned accordingly, and the case tried before a judge of the court in which the action is brought, at nisi prim (see that head), either during term or in the sittings after term. If, on the other hand, the date, or venue, as it is termed, be in any other county, the parties proceed to trial at the assizes (the plaintiff bringing down the record from Westminster, by which means it is in his option to proceed to trial or not). In this case a jury is summoned in like manner before the judges of assize, by virtue of their commission of oyer and terminer. In some special cases, trial at bar is granted on application ; in which case the cause is tried by a jury before the full court, at such time as the court may fix for convenience. If a party imagines himself to have grounds for being dissatisfied with the result of a trial, as, that the judge has summed up the evidence improperly to the jury, or that material testimony has been illegally rejected, he may move the court at Westminster for a new trial, or to set aside the verdict, according to the circumstances of the case ; and such motion is made before the full court in term. On the issue of the trial judgment is awarded, declaring that the plaintiff either has, or has not, entitled himself to the remedy prayed ; and costs are ^iven with the judgment ; after which the successful party may sue out execution, unless there be an appeal by writ of error, which only lies on matter of law arising on the face of the proceed- ings. Summary proceedings are of very miscellaneous cha- racter ; and are by affidavit, motion, rule nisi {i. e. unless cause is shown against the rule on a certain day ; when, if no cause, or insufficient cause, is shown, the rule is made absolute ; and if made absolute, followed by demand of performance, and this performance enforced by means of attadiment for contempt of court). By these means the courts have extensive authority to give directions and enforce conditions during the progress of a suit. Among summary proceedings may also be enumerated the leave given, on motion, to amend various formal defects in pleadings. COURT BARON. A Court Baron, so called either from the lord or baron who presided over it, or from the freemen, in ancient times also called barons, who were its suitors and judges, was a court, having its origin apparently in notions of a patriarchal jurisdiction, properly and in I the tirst instance incident to every manor, in which it • was held by the lord of the manor or his steward, who, assisted by the freeholders of the manor, there decided r on the purely civil controversies which arose between I them. A court baron also belonged to every hundred i and county (see those titles) ; and in many cases also to I particular franchises or lordships, which might include I several manors. Courts baron, from the inferiority of their judges, and from the defects of their jurisdiction, which a party might defeat by removal of the cause to a liigher tribunal, have long fallen into disuse ; except in manors of ancient demesne, where the jurisdiction was, and in some respect still is, in the first instance exclusive, the lord of such manors having once been the king ; and except in manors containing land of copyhold or cus- tomary tenure. See Copyhold. COURT-MARTIAL. A court for trying and pu- nishing the military offences of officers and soldiers. Courts-martial, in our law, are bound by the same rules and principles of evidence as courts of law. Their jurisdiction is conferred by the Mutiny Act (1 W. & M.), which is annually renewed. The crimes cognizable by them are designated by the Mutiny Act and Articles of War. The persons liable to martial law are officers, soldiers, and persons serving with the army in the field ; and receiving pay as a soldier subjects the receiver to it ; but officers on half-pay are not liable. The judgments of courts-martial are open to the disapprobation of the king or his commanders-in- chief ; and are likewise liable to reversal by the Court of King's Bench. The acts of a court-martial, like those of other courts instituted by statute with particular powers, may become the subject of application to the courts at Westminster for a prohibition. Naval courts- martial have their jurisdiction defined by the thirty-six articles of war, embodied in 22 G. 2. c. 23. and 19 G. 3. c. 17., and are composed of admirals, captains, and com- manders. (See M' Arthur on Courts Martial ; Kennedy on C. M.; James, Collection of Proceedings of C. M. 1820 ; Tytler on Military Law.) COU'SSINET. (Fr. a cushion.) In Architecture, the crowning stone of a pier, or that which lies on the capital of the impost and under the sweep. Its bed is level below and inclined above, receiving the first rise or spring of the arch or vault. This word is also used for the ornament in the Ionic capital, between the abacus and echinus or quarter round, which serves to form the volute, and is thus called because its appearance is that of a cushion or pillow seemingly collapsed bv the weight over it, and bound with a strap or girdle dialled the bal- theus. COVE. An inlet on a rocky coast. It is a term nearly 295 COVENANTERS. synonymous with harbour; the word cove being generally, though not always, used when the indentation on the coast is too shallow or narrow to admit first-class vessels. CO'VENANT. In History, the famous bond of as- sociation adopted by the Scottish Presbj'terians in 1638. It was framed on the model of a similar declaration, which had been twice solemnly subscribed in the early period of the Reformation : but in more violent language, and with more specific obligation to support the kirk, together with a prohibition and abjuration of the Anglican liturgy and articles. The founders of the Solemn League and Covenant were Alexander Henderson, leader of the clergy, and Archibald Johnston of Wariston, an advocate. (See Laing's History of Scotland, vol. iii.) A new re- ligious covenant between the two kingdoms was framed in 1643, and taken by the English House of Commons and assembly of divines at Westminster. Charles II. subscribed the Scottish covenant on his coronaticm in 1651 ; but on his restoration it was declared null by act of parliament, and burned by the common hangman. It formed, however, the watch-word and bond of union of the discontented party, or Covenanters, as they were called, in the rebellions of his reign. Covenant. In a theological sense, a promise made by God to man upon certain conditions : the two grand distinctions of which are emphatically designated the Old and New Covenant or Testament ; in each of which cer- tain temporal or spiritual benefits are promised to man upon the performance of duties therein pointed out. Covenant. In Law, is an engagement under seal to do or to omit a direct act. Covenants are of many dif- ferent species, as, in fact and in law, implied and express, &c. ; and, according to their subject matter, or express stipulation, they are binding respectively on the heirs, executors, and assigns, or executors and assigns only, of the covenantor. Covenant is also a form of action, which lies where a party claims damages for breach of a covenant or con- tract under seal. COVENA'NTERS. The great body of the Scottish people, at the era of the Reformation, adopted the pres- byterian faith and polity as established by Calvin at Geneva, and as introduced into Scotland by Knox, and recommended and enforced by his eloquence. As pres- b)rterianism was thus closely associated in their minds with their deliverance from what they regarded as the degrading authority of popery, the people of Scotland have ever been distinguished for their cordial and un- flinching adherence to this new faith. But though it was the object of public veneration, it never succeeded in gaining permanently either the affection or countenance of the court. On the contrary, the successive monarchs by whom Scotland was governed from the Reformation in 1560 till the final establishment of presbytery as the national church in 1690, regarded it with disfavour, and did all in their power, either by open persecution, or by private intrigue, to undermine and destroy it. They re- garded it, being a republican hierarchy, as incompatible with royal authority ; and James V 1 . declared that "presby- tery and monarchy could no more agree than God and the devil." But though, owing to royal favour, episcopacy, or " black prelacy," as it was contemptuously called by the presbyterians, occasionally predominated, it was as often superseded by presbytery. The latter, after having been for some time displaced by prelacy, gained the su- periority in 1592; from which time till 1606 it was es- tablished as the national religion. At this latter period, however, episcopacy obtained the mastery, which it en- joyed for upwards of thirty years. But though this polity, being favoured by the influence of the court, so long maintained the ascendency, it continued as obnoxious as ever to the great body of the Scottish people. Indeed, so obnoxious was it known to be, that, though episcopacy legally prevailed, it was thought prudent for some time nominally and formally to rule the church by means of the ecclesiastical judicatories peculiar to presbytery. But the people were not so easily deceived ; nor could any consideration induce them either to forego the eccle- siastical polity which was so d«ar to tUem, or look on its rival with the least degree of toleration or favour. Mat- ters at length came to a crisis on this subject. Charles I. having introduced that arbitrary judicatory in matters religious and ecclesiastical, the High Commission Court, and having attempted to introduce the Book of Canons and the Liturgy or Service Book, the public voice was aroused, and public indignation was generally and un- equivocally expressed, particularly in Edinburgh, where a very serious tumult took place (July, 1637) on a Sun- day, on occasion of an attempt being made (according to royal proclamation) to read the liturgy in the church of St. Giles. Supplications against the liturgy issued from almost every quarter, of the country, from all classes of the people, and from the great majority of municipal corporations, and were carried by the principal men of the kingdom to be presented to the privy council. These supplications were not attended with the success which it was hoped they would have experienced. But th©. U 4 COVENANTERS. supplicants or the public were not to be driven from their purpose. The supplicants, who had flocked to Edinburgh m great numbers, could not long remain there. But the most effectual means were adopted to keep up an or- ganized opposition to the royal procedure in this matter. Four tables, as they were called, were formed. One table consisted of nobility, another of gentry, a third of clergymen, a fourth of burgesses ; thus representing all ranks and classes of the people. There was also a ge- neral table, composed of representatives from the four subordinate tables, which received suggestions from these, and decided on what steps it was necessary to adopt. One of the first acts they passed was the production of the Covenant ; and hence all those who either then or afterwards subscribed it or gave in their adherence to it, were denominated Covenanters. (Baillie's Letters, i. passim ; Laing's Hist, qf Scotland, iii. ; Cook's Hist, of the Church, iii. ; Acts of General Assembly.) The origin of the Covenant in Scotland may be traced to tiie Reformation, during the progress of which it was renewed several times ; and it evidently had a reference to the covenants so frequently adopted by the children of Israel, and by which they bound themselves to adhere to that religion which the Almighty had established among them. The Covenant to which we at present more imme- diately refer, is in many respects a renewal of the Covenant which was subscribed in the year 1580, 1581, and 1590, but so modified and enlarged as to embrace the circum- stances under which the church was placed at the in- teresting crisis under review. It inveighed not merely against popery, as the former Covenant had done, but " against the danger of the true reformed religion (that is, the presbyterian faith and polity as established in 1592), of the king's honour, and of the public peace of the king- dom, by the manifold innovations and evils" so generally prevalent. The subscribers also profess, and " before God, his angels, and the world, solemnly declare, that, with their whole heart, they agree and resolve all the days of their life constantly to adhere unto and to defend the foresaid true religion." " We promise and swear," to use their own words, " by the great name of the Lord our God, to continue in the profession and obedience of the foresaid religion ; and that we shall defend the same, and resist all these contrary errors and corruptions, ac- cording to our vocation, and to the uttermost of that power that God hath put in our hands, all the days of our life." ( Vide the National Covenant appended to the Westminster Confession of Faith, p. 483. edit. 1815.) These expressions, however unequivocal or strong, are not more energetic than others in the same document. They showed that the persons by whom they were ut- tered were in earnest, and that nothing could satisfy them but the abolition of the High Commission Court, and the revocation of the canons and liturgy ; in other words, the total and unconditional abrogation of prelacy. They in- sisted on the questions that existed between them and the king being immediately submitted to a free General Assembly of the Kirk, and to parliament. Meanwhile the tables invited all the supplicants to re- pair from the country to attend a solemn meeting, which was to be held in Edinburgh in honour of the Covenant The supplicants having obeyed the summons, the Cove- nant (1st March, 1638) was solemnly subscribed and sworn, amid prayers and with uplifted hands, by the no- bility, gentry, clergy, and burgesses ; by thousands of all classes, of both sexes, and of every age. Nor was this all. Commissioners were immediately despatched with copies of it throughout Scotland ; and in a few weeks every district of the country, with some partial excep- tions, submitted to the Covenant.* The nation was now divided into two parties, — the Covenanters, a name originally imposed by their adver- saries, and the Non- Covenanters ; the latter being a small, feeble, and scattered body. {Baillie's Letters; Living- stone's MS. Life.) Charles, seeing the formidable position assumed by the Covenanters, and the influence which they possessed, was at length willing to recal the liturgy and tiie canons, and to make considerable concessions for the sake of peace. But it was too late : no compromise could now be accepted ; nothing would satisfy the Covenanters but the extirpation of prelacy : nothing that fell short of this would be at all listened to. Nay, so far did they carry their condemnation of the bishops, that they had not oiJy • So pertinaciously was subscription of thp Covenant insisted on, that no student could erler college, or take a degree there, and no person could be admitted to the Lord's Supper, without having first »ubs«-ribed this obiiga'ion. Not only were such persons as jirofessors and teachers, but every human being of whatever rank, bound to sub- scribe under the risk of " all ecclesiastical censure." Those "sus- pected of papistry " were summoned before the church courts, with a Yiew of inducina them to sign the Covenant ; and if thev refused, they •were ordereespoken of, was ]>rosecuted with ^Imoft equal zeal. (Acte of Aitembly, aptid awtos 1639-48.) preferred an accusation against them as the authors of the innovations, but had, meanwhile, applied for an in- terdict, prohibiting them from having a seat in the privy council. The prelates, indeed, finding that they were the object of public odiinn, and that their influence was nearly gone, voluntarily withdrew from the council. The king, after much temporizing and intrigue, found himself obliged, however reluctantly, to agree to the meeting of the General Assembly on the terms which the Cove- nanters had proposed, — ^namely, that lay-elders should, as in the best days of presbvtery, be recognized as consti- tuent members of the inferior ecclesiastical courts, and eligible as members of assembly ; that not only should the bishops, the former official moderators (presidents) of presbyteries, not be replaced, but that these dignitaries might be legally prosecuted by the Assembly, and their usurpations restrained, if not their order entirely sup- pressed. (76.) The Assembly accordingly met at Glasgow in Novem- ber, and continued its sittings (for thirty days) as its inalienable right, even though the royal commissioner, the Marquis of Hamilton, had meanwhile declared the meetings dissolved. It embraced in the list of its members the most eminent of the nobility and gentry as lay-elders. It not only annulled the canons, liturgy, the High Com- mission Court, and other innovations, but it abolished episcopacy itself, and declared it as having been from the first both illegal and unscriptural. Of the prelates, fourteen in number, of whom the Scottish hierarchy had consisted, eight were excommunicated, four deposed, and the remaining two merely suspended from their ec- clesiastical functions. Nor did the Assembly stop here ; for, while it abolished prelacy, it re-established presbytery as it had existed previously to the late innovations, with all the privileges, liberties, powers, and jurisdictions which it had formerly enjoyed. (Acis ofAsseynhly, 1638.) The proceedings of this Assembly, particularly its con- temptuous and summary mode of dealing with the favourite hierarchy of the king, could not be agreeable to Charles. These proceedings were, on the contrary, so obnoxious to him that, on the Supplication voted at the conclusion of its meetings being presented to him, he expressed himself as deeply offended, and declined to return any answer to it. " When the Covenanters," says he, " have broken my head, they will put on my cowl." This injudicious conduct on the part of the king'brought matters to a crisis. Both parties prepared for war ; a step, however, which the Covenanters, who always pro- fessed the greatest loyalty, adopted with reluctance. So devoted, however, were the people to what they regarded as a righteous cause, that the expense on the side of the Covenanters, who included in the list of their adherents almost every individual in Scotland, was defrayed by a general voluntary assessment. In raising both men and money the clergy took an active part ; and contributions for carrying on the war were levied by them from their respective flocks to an extent scarcely credible. " We sent from Stranraer," says John Livingstone, then minister of that parish, " our fourth fencible man, viz. 15 men. The town was but little and poor ; all the yearly rent was estimated at 2000merks Scots * * *. I propounded to my flock the condition of the army, and desired they would prepare their contribution to be given after sermon ; at which time we got 45/. sterling," or nearly the half of the whole income of the place. {MS. Life, p. 34.) Nor was the spirit which pervaded the army less interesting or enthusiastic than that which characterized the whole body of the Covenanters. " Every company," says an eye- witness, " had fleeing at the captain's tent door a brave new colour, stamped with the Scottish arms, and the raotto,For Christ' sCroum and Covenant, in golden letters." {Baillie, i. 174.) Every regiment was attended by a chaplain. " I carried myself," says Dr. Baillie, who attended the army in the capacity of a chaplain, " as the custom was, a sword and a couple of Dutch pistols at my saddle." " Our soldiers grew in experience of arms, in courage, and favour daily. Every one encouraged another : the sight of the nobles and their beloved pastors daily raised their hearts. The good sermons and prayers, morning and evening, under the roof of heaven, to which their drums did call them for bells, the remon- strances very frequent of the goodness of their cause, of their conduct hitherto by a divine hand, made them as resolute for battle as could be wished." " Had you lent your ear, in the morning, or especially at even, and heard m the tents the sound of some singing psalms, some praying, and some reading scripture, ye would have been refreshed." (lb.) Such was the spirit under the influence of which the Covenanters waged and carried on the war with their sovereign. Of the hostilities that ensued it is unnecessary here to give a farther account than to say, that the Cove- nanters, though they gained the only battle that was fought, lost no time in making proposals of peace. These pro- posals were accepted by the king ; and a treaty was con- cluded (June, 1639) four months after the commencement of the war. Of this treaty the most important clause was, COVENANTERS. that, as the king would not ratify the enactments of the Assembly of Glasgow, and as the Covenanters would not annul them, a free General Assembly should be held in the ensuing month of August, and a parliament imme- diately afterwards ; to the decision of which courts every dispute between the contending parties was to be referred. This Assembly met accordingly ; and its proceedings, as might have been expected, were exactly of the same cha- racter as those of the former : and yet, such was the progress of public opinion, that the Earl of Traquair, the royal commissioner, not only did not refuse to ratify them, but consented to subscribe that obnoxious bond, the Covenant, which was ordained, under the penalty of ecclesiastical censure, to be subscribed by all ranks. The members of the privy council, besides, gave to the Co- venant the sanction of their authority, and attached their signatures to it. (lb.) The proceedings of this Assembly were, if possible, more obnoxious to Charles than those of its predecessor ; and afraid lest the parliament, which had already met, should exhibit a similar spirit, he lost no time in proroguing it. But nothing could now arrest the march of public sen- timent ; and in the parliament, which met in June ir>40, in direct opposition to the wishes of the king, who had determined to prorogue it, every enactment of the Ge- neral Assembly respecting the Covenant and the presby- terian faith obtained the sanction of that supreme court, and became the law of the land. Thus the Covenanters, after an arduous struggle of three years, saw their object fully gained ; namely, their favourite ecclesiastical polity established, and the validity and authority of theCovenant recognised by the legislature. Their history from this date (which will be found more at lengtli under the article Presbyterians) becomes that of the presbyterian church in Scotland, and is interwoven with the annals of their country. Charles, offended with the triumph of the Covenanters, again declared war against them ; but after a short campaign, unfavourable to the royalists, peace was restored (1G41) The king having, meanwhile, alienated the affections of his English subjects, and a civil war having, in consequence, broken oat, the Covenanters, on the repeated and urgent appli- cation of the parliament of England, made common cause with them, and took up arms for the third time against royal authority. But along with a civil league the Scots succeeded (1643) in carrying a religious covenant, known in history under the name of the Solemn Leagtie and Covenant ; an obligation which was long revered in both divisions of the island, and the main object of which was to accomplish uniformity of religious doctrine and church government in both kingdoms. Nor was this object long in being, so far, attained : a presbytery, as it existed in Scotland, having obtained the sanction of the famous Assembly of Divines met at Westminster (1643-9), and having been afterwards ratified by the English parliament, was recognised as the national church of botii portions of the empire. Presbytery, however, was introduced into England rather as an experiment than a permanent insti- tution. Besides, it was not systematically adopted except in London and Lancashire ; and it rapidly declined, having been, to a considerable extent,superseded by Independency. But at the Restoration episcopacy triumphed over both these forms, and has since prevailed as the established church in England. {Solemn League and Covenant ap- pended to the Westminster Confession of Faith, edit. 1815; Acts of General Assembly ; Wodrow, Baillie, Laing.) Though the presbyterians had, meanwhile, differed somewhat in opinion as to some public matter, and though they were not all equally zealous in favour of the Covenant, yet the importance of this obligation was never lost sight of. On the martvrdom of Charles L the Scots refused to recognise the rigfit of his son, Charles II., to the throne, till he consented to subscribe the Covenant, and to gua- rantee and uphold the presbyterian church. Cromwell, though he allowed them the free exercise of their religion, never was the object of their affections and confidence, inasmuch as he was a sectary, and a friend to toleration, which latter they had uniformly condemned. But the Protector, while he tolerated the presbyterian faith, deprived it of some of its most valuable attributes. He not merely interdicted the meetings of the General As- sembly*, but prohibited the tender of the Covenant or any similar obligation, and divested some of the ecclesiastical penalties, such as excommunication, of their terrors by depriving them of their civil effects. But a worse fate yet awaited the Covenant. At the Restoration, not only was episcopacy restored and presbytery superseded as the * The General Assembly had met annually from the year 1638 to 1649 inclusive. It sometimes met without having the sanction of the kin);, or without his majesty being represented in it, as is usual, by a commissioner. Not merely the Covenanters, but Presbyterians in general, laid it down as a principle, tliat the church courts are, in matters ecclesiastical and religious, independent of civil authority, and irresponsible to it. Accordingly, in 1 6.38, the Assembly continued its sittings even after it had been dissolved by the royal commissioner. Cromwell in 165.3 caused the General Assembly, then sitUng, to be summarily dismissed, and interdicted its meeting in future. In this instance, the Assembly had implicitly to obey. This judicatory did not again meet till after the Revolution. (Baillk't Letters, ii. 369-70.) 297 COW POX. national church ; but by a sweeping act, called the Act Rescissory., passed in 1661, all the parliaments that had been held since 1640 were declared null and void ; thus rendering invalid those acts, in confirmation both of the Covenant and of presbytery, to which the late king had assented, and which Charles II. himself had sworn to maintain. From this period the Covenant may date its decline. It continued, indeed, to be regarded as sacred by perhaps the most valuable, if not the most numerous, portion of the clergy and people, — of those who would submit to no compromise, and who, in consequence, were the objects, during the reigns of Charles and his brother James, of the most ruthless persecution. Nay, so far did some of these parties carry their opinions, that they did not regard any person entitled to homage as king unless he had " covenanted," or affixed his signature to the Covenant. The party by which such a principle was professed are known in history under the name of Came- ronians ; a body which, though now much reduced both in numbers and importance, and who have moderated oi changed their sentiments on this subject as well as on others, still exist in Scotland as a distinct religious sect. {See Camekonians.) At the Revolution, when presbytery was revived in Scotland and established as it now ob- tains, no mention was made of the Covenant either in the General Assembly or inferior courts. It seems to have been allowed to fall into desuetude, no steps having been taken with regard to it. It now exists only as a matter of history; though, as Just said, the Cameronians may be regarded as the successors and descendants of the Covenanters of the 17th century. (lb.) CO' VERTS. In Ornithology. " The lesser coverts " {tectrices ■primtE) are small feathers which lie in several rows on the bones of the wings. The " greater coverts" {tectrices secundcs) are the feathers that lie immediately over the quill-feathers and the secondaries. " The un- der coverts " are the feathers that line the inside of the wings. CO'VERTURE. In Law, the legal condition of a married woman. See Marriage, Law of. CO'VERT WAY, or COVERED WAY. In Fortifi- cation, a road or space of ground on the outer edge of the ditch, level with the adjacent country, and ranging all round the works. It is usually about 30 feet broad, and is protected by the glacis. Sometimes it is called the corridor. CO'VEY. An old bird with her young ones ; but generally used to designate a number of partridges or other game. It also in some countries signifies a cover for game. CO'VIN. In Law, a compact between two or more, to deceive or prejudice others in certain cases ; as, il tenant for life or in tail conspire with another party, to the intent that such party may recover lands held by the tenant to the prejudice of him in reversion. COW'HAGE, COWITCH. This term is generally applied to the hairs or spiculae which cover the seed pods of the Mucvna pruriens, a climbing perennial plant, which is a native of the East and West Indies. An elec- tuary formed by dipping the pods into treacle, syrup, or despumated honey, and then scraping them, has long been used as a vermifuge ; but it is often a very troublesome remedy, from the excessive itching which it produces when it touches the unprotected skin, and there are other more effectual means of expelling worms. COW'-KEEPER. A person whose business it is to keep a stock of cows for supplying the public with milk and cream. The principal cow-keepers of the metropolis have their establishments in the suburbs, where they are connected with pasture fields, in which the animals are turned out a portion of every day throughout the year, excepting when the ground is covered with snow, or when it rains very hard. The cows are fed in the house with grains, mangold wurzel, hay, tares, and other kinds of nourishing food ; and as the animals get air and exercise, their milk may be considered wholesome. There are many cow-keepers, however, in the metropolis, who keep only a few cows in confined back houses, and even in dark cellars ; and, while they feed them with rich food, give them no exercise at all : hence the milk of such cows cannot be considered as wholesome. COW POX. This disease was proposed in the year 1798 as a substitute for, and preventive of, the small pox by Dr. Jenner ; and subsequent experience, as well as the extent to which the inoculation of it, or vaccination, as it is called, is carried throughout the civilized world, furnish well-grounded hopes of the ultimate extinction of one of the severest visitations of the human race. Small bluish vesicles, surrounded by inflammation, ele- vated at the edge and depressed in the centre, and con- taining a limpid fluid, occasionally appear upon the teats of the cow, the animal being at the same time somewhat indisposed : a similar disease is transferable under cer- tain circumstances to the hands of the milkers ; and per- sons who had so received it were found to be in many instances unsusceptible of small pox, both natural and Inoculated. There is a disease of the horse's heel called *U 5 COWRIES. grease, which appears to have produced similar effects upon the hands of farriers, and is perhaps the origin of the cow's disease : but it is from the latter animal that the matter is most certainly effect! re, and from which it is transferred to the human race, where it produces simi- lar pustules ; and the fluid of these may again be trans- ferred with the same effects from one human subject to another. Whether by continuous circulation through human subjects the virv^, as it is called, gradually loses its preventive etBcacy, is an important question, and one upon which there are differences of opinion ; but it would probably be more safe if more frequently derived from Its original source upon the cow's teat. It seems useless here to discuss the various objections which have been raised, and the suspicions which have been thrown out against the permanent efficacy of this preventive, since the most extended and unbiassed experience of the most skilful observers seems amply to have proved that when the pustule has gone through its regular stages, the person is afterwards, during the whole period of life, unsus- ceptible of natural and of inoculated small pox, the ex- ceptions to this statement being so few as either to be referable to imperfect vaccination, or to idiosyncracy ; and though it is not pretended that cases of small pox after vaccination are as rare as of small pox after small pox, yet it is well known that the latter do occur, and, in short, that there is no rule without exceptions. In doubtful cases vaccination shotUd always be repeated ; and as no inconvenience results from a repetition of its ino- culation, and the disease is not infectious by effluvia, it may be performed at certain intervals, or may even be tested as to its efficacy by variolous inoculation ; although to the latter there are certainly serious objections, if we look to its ultimate extermination. In inoculating patients for the cow pox the matter should be taken from a healthy child, at about the 6th or the 8th day, at which time the pastule is well formed ; and it should be immediately transferred upon the point of the lancet from the pustule to the arm, and inserted by a small oblique puncture under the cuticle, one place in each arm being quite sufficient. If this direct mode cannot be followed, the virus intended for inoculation may be transferred between two pieces of plate glass, one of "which is slightly indented for its re- ception ; when slid over each other they are air-tight, and the edges may be secured by a strip of moist gold- beaters' skin or very thin bladder. If it is necessary to moisten the virus, this should be done with as small a portion as possible of tepid water, not exceeding the temperature of 100°. Lancet points wliich have been armed, as it is called, cannot be long depended upon, and are apt to be rusted and to irritate the arm. About the third day after inoculation the puncture generally becomes red and elevated, but the periods of its incipient progress are very uncertain ; it then continues to enlarge and be- come vesicular ; and is in full perfection about the eighth or ninth day, at which period also the surrounding circle of inflammation or areola is at its height. About the eleventh or twelfth day this declines, and the centre of the pustule becomes brown, and gradually dries up into a dark-brown circular scab, depressed in the centre". During the progress and scabbing off of the pustule great care should be taken to avoid all external injury ; all irregu- larities in its progress should also be carefully watched ; and if much inflammation comes on spontaneously two on or three days after inoculation, and especially if suppuration ensues, the probability is that the operation has failed ; and in all cases where there is the least doubt the inocu- lation should be repeated, although, if one of the pustules has gone through the above described progress, the failui-e or irregularity of the other is of no consequence. The cow-pock is seldom attended by any symptoms requiring medical aid ; but generally there is a slight drowsiness and febrile symptoms, with some restlessness, and occasionally sickness, about the second and third days ; but these symptoms are immaterial to the preventive efficacy of the virus, which can only be judged of by the appearance and progress of the pustules, to which there- fore it is necessary to pay close attention. COW'KIES. (Germ.kouri.) Small shells brought from the Maldives, which pass current as coin in smaller pay- ments in Ilindostan, and throughout extensive districts in Africa : 100 are equivalent to a penny. COY'POU. A Rodent quadruped ; the myopotamvLS of geologists. See Nutria. CIIAB. See Canceu. CKA'BRO. (Lat. crabro, a hornet.) A genus of Hy- mcnopterous insects, belonging to the section Aculeata or sting-bearers, and to the subsection Fossores or burrow- crs. The hornet {Crabro vulgaris) is the type of tliis genus, which is now raised to the rank of a family {Crab- ronid)f Wales, as duke of Cornwall ; and when there is no prince of Wales, of the crown. CRU'CIBLE. (Lat. crucio, / torment; because, in the language of old chemistry, the metals were tortured by fire to yield up their various virtues.) A vessel, gene- rally made of very refractory earthenware, in constant use in the chemical laboratory for performing fusions of metals and other substances. CRUCI'FER^. (Lat. crux, a cross; the flowers being in the form of a Maltese cross.) A naturcd order of Exogens, inhabiting most temperate countries. They are allied to Capparidacece, but differ in their tetradyna- mous stamens ; and also to Papaveracece and Fuma- riace