Volume 1

The new complete dictionary of arts and sciences; or, an universal system of useful knowledge. The theological, philosophical, critical, and poetical branches / by the Rev. Erasmus Middleton ... the medicinal, chemical, and anatomical, by William Turnbull ... the gardening and botanical, by Thomas Ellis ... the mathematical, etc. by John Davison.

Date:
1778
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The new complete dictionary of arts and sciences; or, an universal system of useful knowledge. The theological, philosophical, critical, and poetical branches / by the Rev. Erasmus Middleton ... the medicinal, chemical, and anatomical, by William Turnbull ... the gardening and botanical, by Thomas Ellis ... the mathematical, etc. by John Davison. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    was paid to the landlord, for giving his tenants and bondmen leave to celebrate it. BOLCUS, Indian millet, in botany, a genus of plants, whofe flowers are male and hermaphro¬ dite on the fame plant: the corolla of the hermaphro¬ dite flower is a bivalvular glume, with three capillary ftamina and two ftyles, and contains an oval feed in¬ volved in tiie corolla ; the male flower is deflitute of a corolla, the cup being a glume, containing three hairy filaments topped with oblong antherae. HOLD, in fhip-building, all that part of a fliip’s infide which reaches from end to end, from the lower deck to the floor or bottom ; and contains the cargo, provifions, Sec. HOLDFAST, a large piece of iron, in the fhape of the letter S, fixed in a wall to ftrengtlien it : alfo a tool ■ufed by joiners, carvers. See. which goes through their benches, to hold fall fuch work as cannot be finiihed by its being held in the hand. HOLIBUT, the name of a very large flat fifh, re- fembling the flounder, but longer in proportion to its breadth. HOLLAND, in commerce, a fine and clofe kind of linen, fo called from its being firft manufactured in Holland. See Linen. HOLLOW, in architecture, a concave moulding about a quarter of a circle, called by fome a cafement, and by others an abacus. Hollow-Sqjj are, in the military art, a body of foot drawn up, with an empty fpace in the middle for colours, drums, and baggage. Ho llow-Tower, according to Hanis, is a round¬ ing made of the remainder of two brifures, to join the curtin to the orillon, where the fmall fliot are played, that they may not be fo much expofed to the view of the enemy. HOLLY, Ilex, in botany, a well known ever-green, formerly very much planted in gardens as an orna¬ ment; it grows naturally in woods and forefts in many parts of England, riling to 20 or 30 feet in height ; the Item by age becomes large, and is covered with a greyilh bark ; the leaves, which are armed with thorns, are placed alternately on every fide of the branches ; the Lowers are of a dirty white, and appear in May; thefe are fucceeded by roundilh berries, which turn red in autumn, and continue on the trees till after Chrift- mas. The tree is raifed by fowing the berries in the fpring, but they will not come up till the year following. There are feveral varieties ol variegated hollies, which are increafed by grafting or inculcating them on the common fort. The holly makes an excellent fence, and for that purpofe is preferable to moll other plants; but its being a flow grower at firft, deters feveral from ufingit; but when it does take to growing it makes amends by its height, ftrength, and thicknefs. From the bark of the common holly is made the bird-lime, and the wood is made into hones for fetting razors ; it Is the whiteft of all hard woods, and therefore ufed by Inlayers ; it is alfo ufed by mill-wrights, turners, Sec. HOLOCAUST, a burnt-offering, or facrifice, •wholly confumed by fire ; of this kind was the daily facrifice in the Jewifli church. This was done by way of acknowledgment, that the perfon offering, and all that belonged to him, were the effefts of the Divine bounty. HOLOGRAPH, in the civil law, an inftrument en¬ tirely in the hand-writing of the perfon who figns it. HOLOMETER, a mathematical inilrument for taking all forts of meafures, both on the earth and in the heavens ; it is the fame with the pantometer. HOLY-GHOST, one of the perfons of the holy Trinity. See Trinity. Order of ^Holy-Ghost, the principal military order in France inftituted by Flenry III. in 1569. It coniifts of 100 knights, who are to make proof of their nobility for three delcents. The king is the grand maf- ter, or fovereign, and as fuch takes an oath on his co¬ ronation day, to maintain the dignity of the order. Holy-Thursday, the fame with alcenfion- day. See Ascension. Vol. L No. 38. Holy-Days, the fame with feftivals. See the ar- cle Festival. Holy-Rood-Day, a feftival, otherwife called the exaltation of the crofs. HOMAGE, in law, is the fubmiffion, loyalty, and fervice which a tenant promifed to his lord, when he was firfl; admitted to the land which he held of the lord in fee : alfo that owing to a king, or to any fuperior. Homage-Jury, a jury in a court baron, confifting of tenants that do homage to the lord of the fee. This jury makes enquiry into, and prefentments of, defaults and deaths of tenants, and of admittances and furren- ders into the lord’s court. HOMESOKEN. See Hamsoken. HOMICIDE, in common law, the killing a man. It is divided into voluntary and cafual. Cafual is either merely cafual, or mixed ; the former is when a perfon kills another by pure mifchance, being about his lawful occafions; it is accounted mixed, when there is negligence or fome unwarrantable circumftance attend¬ ing the aftion. Voluntary homicide, that which is deliberate; and is either with a precedent malice, or without: the former is a felonious killing, with malice prepenfe, any perfon in the realm, who is under his majefty’s proteftion. HOMILY, inecclefiaftical writers', afermon, or dif- courfe, upon fome point of religion, delivered in a plain manner, fo as to be eafily underftood by the common people. It is much to be wifhed that our incompa¬ rable homilies were more univerfally read, and better underftood. HOMODROMUS, Vectis, that kind of lever, in which the weight is in the middle, between the pow¬ er and the fulcrum, or the power in the middle between the weight and the fulcrum. See Lever. HOMOGENEOUS, or Homogeneal, denotes fuch fubjefts as confift of parts of the fame nature, in contradiction to heterogenous, where the parts are of different natures. HOMOGENEAL Light, that whofe rays are all of the fame colour, degree of refrangibility, and' reflex¬ ibility. See Colour. Homogene al Numbers, fuch as are of the fame kind. Homogeneal Surds, fuch as have one common radical fign, as a b, or V3 b3. See Surd. HOMOGENEUM Comparationis, in alge¬ bra, the known quantity in an equation, the fame with abfolute number. It is fo called to diftinguifh it from the other terms, which, though homogeneous, are not the quantities to which things are here referred. HOMOLOGOUS, in geometry, is applied to the correlpondent fides and angles of fimilar and equi¬ angular figures, which are faid to be homologous, or in proportion to one another. Homologous Things, in logick, thofe which agree in name, but are of different natures. HOMONYMOUS, an appellation given to words which have two different fignifications, being the fame with equivocal terms. HONE, a fine kind of whetftone, ufed for fetting razors, pen-knives, and the like. HONEY, Mel, is, in general, a thick, vifeous, and more or lefs fluid fubftance, of a whitifh or vellowifh colour, fweet to the talle, foluble in water, becoming vinous in fermentation, inflammable, liquable by a gentle heat, and of a fragrant fmell. There are three diftin&ions of honey, according to its purity, fluidity, and the manner in which it has been procured from the honey-combs. The firft and fineft kind is virgin-honey, or the firft produce of a (warm, obtained from the combs without prefling; thefe being only fet to drain, in order to its running out. The fe- cond kind is that known by the name of white honey, being thicker than the former, and often indeed almoft folid ; it is procured by prefling the combs, but without the afliftance of heat. The third and worft Rind is the common yellow honey, obtained from the combs firft heated over the fire, and then prefled. Honey is prepared in the neftaria, or honey-glands of plants, fituated in their flowers ; the only office of A - the