Page images
PDF
EPUB
[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small]
[ocr errors]

though it contains the supplementary matter, Daubenton's
Anatomy is cut out, and the plates are considered as worn
and bad. Of the Supplement 6 vols. appeared in Buffon's
life-time. The 7th was published in 1789, by Lacépède,
after Buffon's death, and, in it, Lacépède expressed his deep
regret for the loss.

In the department of the birds Buffon was assisted by M.
Gueneau de Montbeillard, Baillon, and the Abbé Bexon.
There are 5 vols. on minerals: a history of vegetables was
also contemplated.

The magnificence of the Planches Enluminées' is well
known to every collector.

The Histoire Naturelle' has been translated into Italian, Spanish, Dutch, German (twice with additions), and English.* Voltaire, D'Alembert, and Condorcet were among the most severe critics of Buffon's hypotheses; but the first did not add to his fame by an attack which exhibited more point than learning, and the last pronounced his eulogy. (L'Homme aux quarante écus, chap. 6; and also Dialogues d'Evhémère, &c., vol. xxxv. ed. of Lequien.) His system of organic molecules, and his theory of generation, faded before the luminous observations of Haller, Spallanzani, and other experimental philosophers.

[ocr errors]

BUFFOON, a jester; the name is said to be derived
from buffa,' a word of the corrupt latinity of the middle
ages, synonymous with alapa,' i. e. a slap on the cheek.
Buffe' and Buffet' in the old French, and Bofetada in
Spanish, were used in the same sense. Mountebanks and
clowns in the farces used frequently to swell their cheeks
with wind and then give each other a slap which produced
a noise, to the amusement of the spectators. Hence are
derived the word Buffones in Latin, the French Bouffons,
and the Italian Buffoni (Ducange). Buffare or sbuffare
in Italian means to puff the wind through the mouth. The
English word buffoon is now generally used in a contemp-
The Italians have two distinct words, Buffo
and Buffone. Buffo is a theatrical term: opera buffa, com-
media buffa, is a burlesque play, in contradistinction to opera
seria and commedia di carattere, or serious comedy. The
buffo is one of the principal characters in those plays corre-
sponding to the English clown; in an opera there are
often two, primo buffo and secondo buffo. Buffoné in Italian
means a funny ludicrous fellow, but not always in a con-
temptuous sense. Bouffon in French and buffoon in Eng-
lish have been occasionally used as synonymous with king's
fool, a well-known character at courts in former times.
BUFO. [FROG.]

tuous sense.

BUG, one of a numerous tribe of insects which constitute the order Hemiptera, belonging to the family Cimicida (Leach), and genus Cimex, under which head the structure of the common bug together with its generic characters is given: at present we will confine ourselves to a brief account of the habits of this insect.

What was the natural habitat of this insect, which differs from most of its tribe in having no wings, is difficult to say; the species of bug which come nearest to it in affinity are generally found under the bark of trees, a habitat which the flat form of our insect is well adapted for. Pigeons, swallows, &c., are said to be harassed by bugs as well as

man.

Various means have been proposed for destroying these insects, but we would recommend cleanliness as the best. BUG (river). [BOG.]

BUGEY, an Alpine district of France, inclosed on the S.E., S., and S.W. by the Rhône, which here forms a considerable bend; several maps, however, make it extend across the Rhône into Savoy. It is a mountainous country; the heights are crowned with wood, especially firs; the valleys afford pasturage to a great quantity of cattle, from whose milk the inh. make cheese, which furnishes them with an important article of trade. The other chief articles of trade are cattle, wood, nuts, and hemp. The little city of Belley was the capital of the district.

Bugey formerly was subject to the counts (afterwards dukes) of Savoy, by whom it was ceded to France by the treaty of Lyon, A.D. 1601. BUILDING ACT. [BRICK, p. 410.] BUILTH. [BRECON.] BUITENZORG. [JAVA.] BULAMA. [BISSAGOS.]

BULB, a bud, usually formed under ground, having very fleshy scales, and capable of separating from its parent plant. Occasionally it is produced upon the stem, as in some lilies. [BUD.]

BULBOUS PLANTS, or those which spring from a bulb, form so peculiar a class among the objects of the gardener's care, as to require a short notice.

Bulbous plants are usually found wild in light sandy soil, in sheltered places; they spring up in the wet season, grow rapidly, and flower beneath a steady sun, and by the time their seeds are ripe their leaves wither, and the bulbs fall into a state of rest, which lasts generally for half the year. When they first begin to grow, their young stems are nourished to a great degree by the inspissated sap contained in the fleshy scales of which all bulbs consist; by the time they have acquired vigour enough to attract a sufficiency of nutritive matter from the soil by aid of their roots, the bulbs are so much exhausted that their external scales never recover, but dry up and fall away, while their place is supplied by an addition of new scales to the centre, of the bulb. In order to secure flowers, and a state of vigorous health for the succeeding year, it is necessary that the new scales should, during the growing season, be filled as completely with nutritive secretion or inspissated sap, as those were that first existed; and it is this to which the cultivator has especially to direct his attention. Now the It has been said that the bed bug was not known in only way to secure this result is to present the leaves during England previous to the great fire of London in 1666, and the whole time of their growth to the influence of solar light, that it was first imported from America in the timber because it is only by such agency that nutritive matter can brought over to rebuild that city; of the accuracy of this be generated. If this is attended to, bulbous plants will statement however there is considerable doubt. It appears go on growing and flowering and multiplying themselves to have been well known in various parts of Europe long from year to year, provided care is taken, firstly that the soil before that time. Its shape, colour, and the offensive smell which actually surrounds the bulbs, which are extremely which it emits when touched, together with the circum-succulent, is not retentive of moisture; and secondly, that stance of its deriving its nutriment from blood sucked the roots when they are emitted should have access to an through a long pointed proboscis, which when not in abundant store of food. These circumstances are attended use lies parallel with the underside of the body, are all to with great care by the Dutch, who possess an exclusive circumstances too well known to need comment. The trade of some value in hyacinths, tulips, and similar plants, female bug deposits her eggs in the beginning of summer; in consequence of their low sandy fields being naturally they are of a tolerable size compared with that of the insect, capable of satisfying the conditions above mentioned. This of a whitish colour, and each fixed to a small hair-like stalk, will be evident from the following account given of the which, when the egg is first deposited, is apparently of a bulb-grounds near Haarlem by a competent observer :--glutinous nature, and readily adheres to anything which it touches. The places generally chosen to deposit the eggs in are the crevices of bedsteads and other furniture, or the walls of a room. In about three weeks it is said these eggs hatch, and the young bug comes forth-an active larva, very closely resembling the parent insect except in size. The larva then undergoes the usual transformation, and becomes a perfect insect in about three months.

Sonnini's Histoire Naturelle, generaue et particulière, accompagnée de notes, etc., published at Paris from 1798 to 1807, forms a complete course of Natural History, in 127 vols. 8vo., containing Buffon's works, and the labours of the most able naturalists of the time, who assisted the editor in their several departments.

The structure of the antennae and some other parts, however, differ from those of the perfect insect,

Wherever the bulbs do well, he found the soil to be of the lightest description of sand, such as can be blown away by the wind, with the water standing under it not nearer the surface than 15 inches, nor farther below it than 2 feet 6 inches. This, it seems, is the level of the water in the adjoining canals and ditches; and it is owing mainly to the points of the fibres going down to this water that the plants are so fresh and vigorous, while the dry sand above prevents their bulbs from being rotted. As a proof of the exceeding lightness of the soil, immediately after putting in a crop in the spring season, the surface is raked, and generally thrown into beds; cow-dung mixed with water is then thrown from barrels wheeled along the alleys over the whole surface with a scoop, so as to cover it all with a thin

crust, through which the finest seeds vegetate, and without which the entire surface would be blown away. The cowdung is taken fresh from the cow-house. (Gardener's Magazine, and Loudon's Encyclopædia of Horticulture.) That with many bulbous plants the gardeners of this country have little or no success is obviously owing to one of the following causes. They do not expose the plants when growing to a sufficient quantity of light, keeping them in badly lighted greenhouses or frames, or in the windows of dwelling-houses; or if they do expose them freely to light, they do not protect them with sufficient care from the effects of nightly frosts, by which the leaves become injured and unhealthy. Thus Guernsey lilies (Nerine sarniensis) seldom flower in our gardens the second year, although they may have blossomed finely the first year of their importation. The reason is, that the first flowers exhaust the bulbs, and the leaves appear so late in the season, that between the short and gloomy days of autumn and the ill-lighted greenhouses in which such plants are kept, they are unable to prepare a supply of food sufficient to replace that which the first year's flowers consumed; and consequently flowers in the second year are either not formed at all, or if formed, cannot be developed. Mr. Knight put these principles to the test by stimulating Guernsey lilies into vegetation sufficiently early for their leaves to enjoy the full influence of the summer's sun; and he found that bulbs so treated flourished as well the second as the first year. Another cause is our not attending enough to the nature of the soil in which bulbs are grown. It should be always remembered that their scales are not only succulent, but very absorbent; and that if the soil is retentive of moisture, they will not only become gorged with fluid, and consequently unhealthy, but the nutritive matter which they contain will be so much thinned as to be less fit for the food of the young leaves. This is doubtless the reason why the Dutch are so careful to select the lightest soil they can find, and, for the fluid necessary to support the growing plants, they trust to the watery stratum which is found some distance, from 9 inches to 2 feet, below the station of the bulbs themselves.

shows however the manner of increasing the number of cloves. The principal reason why bulbs such as hyacinths, for instance, produce only two or three cloves is, that the powers of development inherent in the axillary buds cannot be called into action because of the exhaustion produced by the formation of a fine flowering stem; if this be prevented, that sap which would otherwise be consumed by the flowers is directed into the axillary buds, which then become cloves or young bulbs in much larger numbers than otherwise. Consequently the destruction of the flowering stem when quite young is the most effectual mode of forcing the bulb to produce young ones. BULGARIA, a province of European Turkey, now in eluded in the Ejalet of Rum-Ili. [RUM-ILI.]

[ocr errors]

BULIMIA (Bovλuía), canine appetite, insatiable desire for food. The statement of the quantities of food consumed by some persons labouring under this disease is scarcely credible, yet it rests on testimony the veracity of which there is no reason to question. In the third volume of the Medical and Physical Journal' an account is given, by Dr. Cochrane of Liverpool, of a man, placed under his own personal inspection, who, in one day, consumed, of raw cow's udder, 4 pounds, raw beef 10 pounds, candles 2 pounds, in all 16 pounds, besides 5 bottles of porter. M. Percy, a surgeon-in-chief to the French army, made a report to the National Institute of the case of a soldier who was in the constant habit of devouring enormous quantities of broken victuals, basketsful of fruits, and even living animals; the details given of the quality as well as of the quantity of arti cles consumed by this man, without ever satisfying his ravenous appetite, are too disgusting to be related. Dr. Cop land gives an account of two cases of this disease, which occurred in his own practice in children, one seven years of age and the other nine. In both these, but in the younger especially, the quantity of food devoured was astonishing. Everything that could be laid hold of, even in its raw state, was seized upon most greedily. Besides other articles an uncooked rabbit, half a pound of candles, and some butter, were taken at one time. The mother stated that this little girl, who was apparently in good health otherwise, took more food, if she could possibly obtain it, than the rest of her family, consisting of six besides herself. In both this and the other case the digestion seemed to be good. A nauseous smell emanated from the bodies. These children, who were both very intelligent, complained of no other uneasiness than a constant gnawing or craving at the pit of the stomach, which was never altogether allayed, but which, shortly after a meal, impelled them irresistibly to devour everything that came in their way, however disgusting.'

As bulbs are very much cultivated in this country in glasses of water for the ornament of sitting-rooms, the manner in which they can be most successfully treated under such circumstances deserves a brief notice. It has been already stated that if bulbs are placed in contact with water they are liable to rot; it is consequently desirable that the water into which they are to root should be at least an inch below their base. To enable them to bear their leaves and flowers with vigour they should be abundantly furnished with roots, and this should have been secured for some short time before the stems and leaves are allowed to grow. But as the leaves are easily excited by light and warmth it will frequently happen, when bulbs are placed in water-glasses in sitting-rooms, that their leaves are formed before the roots, and that the flowering is consequently weak and imperfect. To prevent this, it is desirable always to commence the forcing of bulbs by placing them in a damp closet or cellar where there is just warmth enough to excite them into growth; in such a situation the roots will strike out freely, but the leaves will remain at rest. After the roots are sufficiently formed, the glasses may be gradually removed into the light, and the leaves and flowering stem will then be developed with great vigour. After this there is nothing to guard against except too much heat and too great an absence of light; the former will cause the There can be no question that most cases of this disease leaves to grow too rapidly, and to become what is techni- might be greatly mitigated, if not wholly removed, by the cally called drawn, unless a much larger quantity of direct firm and constant restriction of the food to that quantity solar light is permitted to act upon them than we can have only which the wants of the system really require. "Unless the opportunity of procuring in the months when bulbs are the individual have strength of mind to submit to the neces forced. They should therefore be kept in a south windowsary privation, or unless, in the case of children, a steady in a cool room, and never removed to the interior of the apartment until their flowers are ready to unfold.

We have only to add a word or two upon the propagation of bulbs. They generally multiply by forming cloves in the axils of their scales; such cloves or young bulbs are in reality buds, and one such must exist in a rudimentary state at the base of every scale [BUDS]. But it is only in a few species that more than two or three develop; in the common garlic a larger number than usual is constantly produced. When the number naturally developed is small, the multiplication of a new variety would be very slow if left to the unassisted efforts of the parent plant; a little simple application of the principles of vegetable physiology

The real nature of the morbid condition of the stomach and of the system in this disease is very imperfectly known, In several cases the health in other respects has appeared good, but in most cases there has been evident disease in various organs, and death has usually taken place at an early age. On the examination of the body after death the stomach has commonly been found enormously distended and sometimes misplaced; the duodenum and the rest of the intestines are usually in the same state of distension; the coats of all these organs are commonly thickened, and the valvula conniventes (the folds of the inner or mus cous membrane of the intestines) as large as in carnivorous animals. Various organic changes have at the same time been found in the mesentery and its glands, as well as in the liver, the pancreas and the spleen.

and undeviating restraint be imposed, every attempt to remedy the evil will be vain. If a rigid regulation of the diet be enforced, the cure will be materially assisted by a course of nauseating purgatives, as oil of turpentine rendered more active by castor oil. Several cases of great intensity have been completely cured by a steady treatment conducted on these principles.

When inordinate appetite is merely the result of some other unusual or morbid condition of the system, that is, when it is what is called symptomatic; when, as is often the case, it is the consequence of great fatigue, or of inani tion, from long-continued acute disease, or of some malady attended with an extraordinary degree of secretion and ex

[blocks in formation]
[merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

cretion, and therefore with the removal from the system of a
proportionate quantity of its nutrient matter, the disease
can be cured only by the restoration of the system to its
ordinary and sound state.

ut eo facilius adgnoscantur. Solam testam nec animal inhabitans vidi, quod diversum esse à Limace affirmat Adansonius.' (Delicia, &c., p. 67.) Now Adanson has no suck genus as Bulimus, but he has such a genus as Bulinus, BULI'MULUS, Leach's name for a genus of terrestrial At plate 1, fig. G 2, in his Natural History of Senegal, will molluses, which he thus defines:-Shell univalve, free, coni-be found 'Le Bulin, Bulinus,' but the letters 'n' and 'u' are cally acuminated; spire elevated, regular; the last whorl so confusedly engraven, that, at first sight, the word looks very large; mouth entire, long; pillar smooth, simple; ex- like Bulimus. In the text (p. 5), the word is printed ternal lip thin; internal lip inflected towards the middle, Bulinus very plainly; but neither Scopoli nor any of his with a hollow beneath. To this generic character the Rev. successors appear to have noticed it. Till the time of Lansdown Guilding observes that there should be the fol- Lamarck, who confined the genus (still calling it Bulimus, lowing addition: Tentacula 4, the two upper ones long after Scopoli and Bruguières) to the land-shells with a rewith terminal eyes: no operculum.' The last named author flected lip, which now range under it, many land and freshobserves that it differs from Bulimus in the delicacy of its water shells which have not a reflected lip, such as Achatinæ, outer lip. It is indeed a Bulimus of Lamarck. [BULIMUS.] Physa, Limnææ, and Succineæ, were also congregated Leach observes that Bulimulus trifasciatus (Bulimus under the name of Bulimus. The Bulinus of Adanson was Guadalupensis, Brug.), a very common existing West In- a fresh-water shell, apparently a Physa or Limnæa.' dian species, occurs imbedded in the same limestone which The shell is never orbicular, as in the Helices, but of the incloses the fossil human skeleton from the Grande Terre of shape noticed at the commencement of the article; the last Guadaloupe, now in the British Museum. Several skele. whorl is always larger than the penultimate, and, indeed, as tons of men,' says Lyell (in the 3rd vol. of his 'Principles a general rule, may be stated to be larger than all the of Geology, p. 190, last edit.) more or less mutilated, have others put together. The mouth or opening is an oval been found in the West Indies, on the north-west coast of oblong, and the border is disunited. The adult reflected the main land of Guadaloupe, in a kind of rock which is lip or border on the right side is generally very thick, but known to be forming daily, and which consists of minute this reflection is sometimes absent. The animal is very like fragments of shells and corals, incrusted with a calcareous that of Helix; De Blainville says entirely so (tout-à-fait cement resembling travertin, by which also the different semblable). The head is furnished with four tentacula or grains are bound together. The lens shows that some of horns, the two largest of which are terminated by the sothe fragments of coral composing this stone still retain the called eyes. There is no true operculum. The geographical same red colour which is seen in the reefs of living coral distribution of the genus is very general, and there is which surround the island. The shells belong to the neigh- scarcely a part of the world where the form does not occur. bouring sea, intermixed with some terrestrial kinds, which The great development of it takes place in the warmer now live on the island, and among them is Bulimus Guada- climates, where some of the species are very large. lupensis.' There is another human skeleton from the same rock in the Museum at Paris. Mr. König has published an interesting paper on the skeleton in the British Museum in the Philosophical Transactions.'

[Bulimulus trifasciatus.]

[ocr errors]

The reproduction is by means of eggs, which are white and have a firm shell like those of birds: some of these eggs are of considerable size. The Bulini are androgynous, true hermaphrodites (Paracephalophora monoica of De Blainville), both the sexual organs being distinct, but existing in the same individual, and requiring the union of two for the continuation of the species. Three eggs were laid by one of the species, Bulinus ovalis, from Rio in a hot-house in the garden of the Horticultural Society at Chiswick. It was brought over in October, 1828, by Mr. William M'Culloch, then gardener to the Right Hon. Robert Gordon, and presented by him to the Society. At first it appeared rather sickly, but after it had been kept in the hot-house for some time, it recovered and began to move about. Mr. Booth, who was on the spot, says, It cannot now be correctly ascertained when it produced the first egg, but it was very shortly after its arrival; I should think about the beginning of November. This egg was sent, by the desire of Mr. Sabine, to the Zoological Society. About the same time this year (1829), it produced a second egg, and, three weeks afterwards, a third; the latter was unfortunately broken by the animal itself, but the former is still in preservation. It fed upon lettuces and the tender leaves of cabbages; the former seemed to be its favourite food. Sometimes it would devour two large lettuces, and then remain for days afterwards without touching food or moving from its place, except when cold water was sprinkled upon it. During the day it was usually in a dormant state in the shade; but towards the evening, when the house was moist and warm, it would spread itself out, and move from one part to another. It seemed to like moisture, and I have no doubt that it might have been preserved for years, if it had not been accidentally killed. On Saturday last it was at the end of the house where the fire comes in, and ventured too far upon the hot bricks after they had been watered. In the morning it was found fixed to them and quite dead.'* Bulinus ovalis, though it a good deal resembles Bulinus hæmastoma, which is here figured, is considerably larger.

BULI'NUS or BULI'MUS, the name of a very extensive
genus of terrestrial pulmoniferous molluscs. Lamarck
arranges it under his Colimacés, a family of phytophagous or
plant-eating trachelipods, respiring air by means of lungs,
and protected by a spiral shell which is more or less elon-
gated, oval, oblong, or turriculated, with an entire aperture
longer than it is wide, and with a very unequal border,
which is reflected in the adult. The columella is smooth,
without any notch or truncation at the base, but with an
inflexion in the middle at its point of junction with that
part of the peristome which it contributes to form. De
Blainville places it under the Limacinea, his third family of
Pulmobranchiata, whose organs of respiration are retiform,
and line the cavity situated obliquely from left to right upon
the origin of the back of the animal, communicating with
the ambient air by means of a small rounded orifice in the
right side of the border of the mantle. Some of the species
were placed by Linnæus under his genera Bulla and Helix.
Scopoli and Bruguières began the reform, and Lamarck
carried it still further. But before we proceed, it may be
necessary to say a word as to the origin of the term used to
designate the genus. We constantly hear,' says Broderip,
in the 4th volume of the Zoological Journal, among con-
chologists the question, what is the meaning of Bulimus?'
The author of the article entitled Lamarck's Genera of
Shells, in the 15th volume of the Journal of Science, thus
derives the word 'Boúλpos, insatiable hunger-what title
this genus has to so strange a name we know not.' It may
not then be unacceptable to give a plain statement of the
origin of the word. Swainson observes (Zool. Illust., vol. i,
Bulimus Melastomus) that the genus Bulimus was long
ago formed by Scopoli, out of the heterogeneous mixture of
shells thrown together in the Linnæan genus Helix. Let
us now turn to Scopoli's account of the source whence he
derived the name. 'Proprium,' says Scopoli, itaque ex
his constituo et duce celeberrimo Adansonio Bulimos voco,

The shell varies much in colour.

The species are multitudinous. Mr. Cuming lately brought home numbers of new ones from South America, and we are indebted to that gentleman, who has just departed on another voyage which has for its object the collection of subjects of natural history, for the following account of the habits of Bulinus rosaceus. In the dry season he always found the animals adhering to the under side of stones, generally among bushes, and close at the edge of the sea-shore, within reach of the spray at times. On the hills, about 1000 feet above the sea, they were observed ad⚫ Zoological Journal, vol. v. p. 102,

hering between the lower leaves of an aloe-like plant, on the honey of whose flowers the giant humming-bird (Trochilus Gigas) feeds. The natives burn down clumps of these plants for the sake of the rings at the bottom of the footstalks of the leaves, which they use for buoys for their fishing nets and for baking the coarse earthenware which they make on the hills, because this part of the plant, when ignited, throws out a great heat. Between these leaves the Bulini lie, in the dry season, in a torpid state. In the spring (the months of September and October), they burrow in the shady places at the roots of this plant, and among the bushes on the sea-shore. At this period (the spring), they lay their eggs in the earth, about two inches below the surface. Mr. Cuming never saw them crawling

about. In the dry season they were evidently hybernating, for their parchment-like secretion, which operates in place of an operculum to seal up the animal, was strongly formed, and they stuck to the stones so tenaciously that Mr. Cuming broke many of them in endeavouring to pull them off. Chili and the neighbouring coasts of South America generally were the localities where the species was taken. Captain Phillip Parker King, R.N., who described the species in the Zoological Journal, has the following notice of the power of the animal to exist in a dormant state :- Soon after the return of the expedition (his Majesty's ships Adventure and Beagle,-Survey, 1826-30), my friend Mr. Broderip, to whose inspection Lieutenant Graves had submitted his collection, observing symptoms of life in some of

*

[graphic][merged small][graphic][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][graphic][subsumed][subsumed][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small]

ently hybernating operates in place s strongly formel ciously that Mr. aring to pull them f South America pecies was taken cribed the species ing notice of the t state:-'So esty's ships Ad my friend M Graves had sub life in some of

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

the shells of this species, took means for reviving the inhabitants from their dormant state, and succeeded. After they had protruded their bodies, they were placed upon some green leaves (cabbage), which they fastened upon and ate greedily. These animals had been in this state for seventeen or eighteen months; and five months subsequently another was found alive in my collection, so that the last has been nearly two years dormant. These shells were sent to Mr. Loddiges's nursery, where they lived for eight months in the palm-house, when they unfortunately died within a few days of each other. Soon after the shells were first deposited at Mr. Loddiges's, one got away and escaped detection for several months, until it was at last discovered in a state of hybernation : it was removed to the place where the others were kept, when it died also. The upper surface of the animal, when in health, is variegated with ruddy spots and streaks on an ash-coloured ground.' The only process used for revivifying these animals was placing them on a plate near a moderate fire, and sprinkling them with tepid water. Upon their restoration, they ate a considerable part of the parchment-like seal or operculum. They lived some time with Mr. Broderip before they were sent to Messrs. Loddiges. These animals had been packed up in a box and enveloped in cotton from the time of their capture to the period mentioned, when they were unpacked by Mr. Broderip. Lyell notices this circumstance when treating on the geographical distribution of testacea, in the third volume of his Principles of Geology.*

[blocks in formation]

a, nat. size; b, magnified. Inhabits Northern Europe, and is common in the
Shell smooth, shining, of a horn colour, inclining

neighbourhood of Paris.
to fulvous; transparent.

FOSSIL BULINI.

BULL. [Ox.]

[ocr errors]

BULL, GEORGE, was born in the city of Wells, on the 25th of March, 1634: he received the first part of his education at the grammar-school of Wells, from which he was removed to the free school of Tiverton, in Devonshire, then superintended by Mr. Samuel Butler, who is reported to have had an excellent method of teaching. At fourteen he was admitted a commoner of Exeter College, Oxford; but, in the following year, on refusal to swear to the engagement, 'That he would be true and faithful to the Commonwealth of England, as it was then established without a King, or House of Lords,' he retired, with his tutor, Mr. Ackland, and several others, to North Cadbury, in Somersetshire, where he prosecuted his studies until his nineteenth year. By persuasion of his friends he now went to reside with Mr. William Thomas, a Presbyterian divine, from whom he derived little or no assistance in the study of divinity. This residence however brought him into intimate acquaintance with Mr. Thomas's son, who directed his reading, and supplied him with the writings of Hooker, Hammond, Taylor, &c. Mr. Bull was irregularly ordained, at the age of 21, by Dr. Skinner, ejected bishop of Oxford, at a time when it was criminal for a Bishop to confer holy orders. His professional duties commenced in the parish of St. George, near Bristol. In 1658 he obtained the living of Suddington St. Mary near Bristol, where he became privy to an unsuccessful scheme of a general insurrection in favour of the exiled family, his house being one of the points of meeting. After the Restoration he was presented by Lord Chancellor Clarendon to the vicarage of Suddington St. Peter. These preferments he retained until 1685, having distinguished himself by his zeal, judgment, and charity, on all occasions. In 1669 he published, in Latin, his Harmonia Apostolica.' In the words of his biographer, Nelson, There having been, during the unhappy times of the great rebellion, a vast multitude of books written upon the subject of Justification, by the hot men of the several parties, some of whom in treating of it leaned too much to Popery or Judaism, others to Antinomianism and Liberalisin, some again to Pelagianism and Socinianism, and others, lastly, to Manichæism and Fatalism, all very dangerous errors; and abundance of learned sophistry having been used in perplexing the plain and natural sense of the divinely inspired writers; and several hypotheses moreover invented purely to serve a turn, which did but the more still obscure what they pretended to clear up, and set at a wider distance those whom they laboured to reconcile by their strained and metaphysical subtleties; they not only disagreeing about what was meant by justification, but even by faith and by works, and indeed about every term that is made use of either by St. Paul or by St. James when they speak to this point and so feigning one apostle to write concerning a first, and the other concerning a second justification, or else one concerning a justification before men only, and the other concerning the same before God; one concerning a true, the other concerning a false faith, with a multitude of other groundless inventions, utterly foreign to the minds of both the said apostles; and many foolish contests having been started about words, that could have no other end but to raise a dust, there could nothing come forth more seasonably, if well done, than a treatise of this nature. The object of this book, which consists of two parts, or dissertations, was to explain and defend, first, the doctrine of St. James, and, in the second, to demonstrate the agreement with him of St. Paul; it being more particularly his aim, in the first dissertation, to show, That good works, which proceed from faith, and are conjoined with faith, are a necessary condition required from us by God, to the end that by the New Evangelical Covenant, obtained by and sealed in the blood of Christ, the mediator of it, we may be justified according to his free and unmerited grace. In the second, having in the first place established this one point for his foundationThat St. Paul is to be interpreted by St. James, and not St. James by St. Paul, in consent with many of the antients, (and particularly of St. Augustine himself,) who are of the opinion that the General Epistle of St. James, the first of St. John, and the second of St. Peter, with that of St. Jude, were written against those who, by misinterpreting St. Paul's Epistles, had imbibed a fond notion, as if faith without works were sufficient to save them; he sheweth whence this obscurity and ambiguity in the terms of St. Paul might grounded came to mistake or pervert the same.' probably arise, which was the occasion that persons not well

Deshayes, in his tables (see Lyell's Principles of
Geology, vol. iii. Appendix I. pp. 18 and 19; N. B. these
tables are not printed in the last edition), enumerates three
fossil species of Bulini in the tertiary formation, one of
which is known to him from the sub-Apennine beds, and
another from Paris, but he does not give the locality of the
third, nor does he identify any of the fossils with recent
species. De la Beche, in his geological manual, under the
head of Fossil Shells, contained in the supracretaceous
rocks of Bordeaux and Dax, enumerated by M. de Basterot,
has the following notice: Bulimus? terebellatus, Lam.,
analogous to the existing species, Grignon, Placentine, Dax.'
Lamarck (Animaux sans Vertèbres, vol. vii. p. 534) de-
scribes the shell of Bulimus terebellatus, a Grignon fossil,
as two centimeters in length, and observes on the singu-
larity of its mouth or opening, but he makes no allusion to
its resemblance to any existing species. In the Annales
du Muséum,' he places it among the Bulimi with doubt,
observing that it may, from its conformation, be probably
marine, but keeping that generic name for it, because it
approaches nearer to the Bulimi than to any other known
genus. In the seventh volume of his Animaux sans Ver-
tèbres, published eighteen years afterwards, he still arranges
it among the Bulimi, and not under the head of doubtful
species. The fifteen species described by Lamarck in this
volume are all stated to be fossil, and only the five last are
separated as Espèces douteuses. Of the not doubtful
species, Bulimus sextonus, found fossil at Villiers and
Grignon, bears a great resemblance, according to the author,
to Bulinus lubricus; but he observes that the opening or
mouth of the fossil shell is much shorter than that of the
recent, and that the summit of its spire is less obtuse. It
may be doubted whether even the ten first fossil species
enumerated by Lamarck are all true Bulini. De Blainville
quotes Defrance for thirty-seven fossil species. [HELIX.]

[blocks in formation]

VOL. VI.-C

Bull

« EelmineJätka »