BLONDEL (Francis), regius professor of mathematics and architecture at Paris, was employed in several negociations, arrived at the dignity of marshal de camp and counsellor of state, and was appointed to teach the dauphin mathematics, he was also made member of the academy of Sciences, and director of the Academy of Architecture. He died at Paris in 1686, aged sixtyeight. He wrote, 1. Notes on Savot's Architecture; 2. A Course of Mathematics; 3. Architecture Françoise, 2 vols. fol. 1772; 4. Cours d'Architecture Civile, 9 vols. 8vo. a work, the second part of which appeared in 1773, being left unfinished at his death; 5. A Treatise on Fortification, &c. BLONDUS (Fluvius), an historian born at Froli, in Italy, in 1388, was secretary to Eugenius IV. and other popes. He wrote, 1. Romæ Instauratæ Lib. iii., dedicated to Eugene IV. 2. Romæ Triumphantis Lib. X, dedicated to Pius II. 3. Italiæ Illustratæ Lib. viii. 4. De Origine et Gestis Venetorum; besides three decades of a general history of Rome, the MS. of which is still preserved in the library of Modena. BLOOD, v. & n. BLOOD'Y, n. & adj. BLOOD'INESS, BLOOD'ILY, BLOOD'LESS, BLOOD HOUND, BLOOD BOLTERed, BLOOD'HOT, BLOOD'LET, V. BLOOD LETTER, BLOOD GUILTINESS, BLOOD'SHED, BLOOD'SHOT, BLOOD'SUCKER, BLOOD THIRSTY, BLOOD'YFLUX, BLOOD'YMINDED, BLOOD VESSEL. See BLEED. The red liquor that circulates in the veins and arteries. Progeny; family; kindred; descent; high extraction; the corporeal part of man. Sometimes applied to the temper of the mind; to that which is the life; and to every agent and instrument by which the life may be affected. But flesh, with the life thereof, which is the blood thereof, shall you not eat. Genesis. The voice of thy brother's blood crieth unto me from the ground. Id. iv. 10. He washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes. Id. xlix. 11. When wicked men have slain a righteous person in his own house, upon his bed, shall I not therefore now require his blood at your hand? 2 Samuel iv. 11. Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. Matt. xvi. 17. Of kinges blood of Perse is she descended, I say not that she hadde most fairenesse, But of hire shape she might not be amended. Chaucer. Canterbury Tales. He red, and measured many a sad verse, That horrour gan the virgin's hart to perse, And her faire locks up stared stiffe on end, Hearing him those same bloody lines reherse, And, all the while he red, she did extend Her sword high over him, if aught he did offend, Shall prove a deadly bloodshed but a jest, Exampled by this heinous spectacle. Id. King John. By continual martial exercises, without blood, she made them perfect in that bloody art. Sidney. bloodsucker, a murderer, and a parricide. The nobility cried out upon him, that he was a Hayward. Before you let blood, deliberate upon it, and well consider all circumstances belonging to it. Burton. Anatomy of Melancholy. So when the never-settled Scythian Removes his dwelling in an empty wain: When now the sun hath half his journey ran, His horse he bloods, and pricks a trembling vein; So from the wound quenches his thirsty heat: Yet worse; this fiend makes his own flesh his meat Monster! the ravenous bear his kind will never eat. Fletcher. Purple Island The news put divers young bloods into such a fury as the ambassadors were not, without peril, to be outBacon. raged. When the faculties intellectual are in vigour, not drenched, or, as it were, blooded by the affections. Id. Apothegms. War brings ruin where it should amend; But beauty, with a bloodless conquest, finds A welcome sovereignty in rudest minds. Waller. Dryden. Id. This day the poet, bloodily inclined, Has made me die, full sore against my mind. Then all approach the slain with vast surprise, And scarce secure, reach out their spears afar, And blood their points, to prove their partnership in Id. Fables. war. And, though the villain 'scape awhile, he feels Slow vengeance, like a bloodhound, at his heels. Swift. This mischief, in aneurism, proceedeth from the ignorance of the blood-letter, who, not considering the errour committed in letting blood, binds up the arm carelessly. Wiseman. Cold, by retarding the motion of the blood, and suppressing perspiration, produces giddiness, sleepiness, pains in the bowels, looseness, bloody fluxes. Arbuthnot on Air. The chyle is not perfectly assimilated into blood by its circulation through the lungs, as is known by experiments in blood-letting. Id. On Aliments. And that the winds their bellowing throats would try, When reddening clouds reflect his bloodshot eye. Garth. He was blooded up to his elbows by a couple of Moors, whom he butchered with his own imperial hands. Addison. The skins of the forehead were extremely tough Did not the painted kings of India greet The heart contracts four thousand times in one hour; from which it follows that there pass through the heart every hour four thousand ounces, or three hundred and fifty pounds of blood. Now the whole mass of blood is said to be about twenty-five pounds; so that a quantity of blood, equal to the whole mass of blood, passes through the heart fourteen times in one hour; which is about once every four minutes. Paley. BLOOD; the fluid contained in the arteries and veins. While circulating in these vessels it appears homogeneous and uniform, but when taken from these it very shortly separates into distinct parts. In the first instance, a vapor exhales from extravasated blood which has a peculiar smell; but this exhalation, when condensed into a liquid, differs very little from mere water. Soon a film appears on the surface of the blood, which is preparatory to the separation of the mass into a firm red substance called the cruor, and a yellowish liquid or serum. The first is resolvable again into two parts, viz. the red globules and the fibrin, or what has been called the coagulable lymph; this coagulable lymph appearing on the surface of the crassamentum, in greater or less quantity, both, as the blood may have been more or less tardy in separation, and as it may contain more or less of fibrin; the properties of this lymph differing very little from those of the fibrin, which is obtained from muscular fibre; and which, indeed, is regarded as the essence of muscular fibre. Fibrin, then, exists in the largest proportions under conditions of high health; and, in individuals of different species, the quantity of this ingredient has been said to bear a relation to the ferocity and strength of the animal. The red globules of the blood were first accurately examined by Mr. Hewson; it is a curious fact respecting these, that although they appear readily to dissolve in water, and thus impart their color to the solvent, they still retain, under this solution, their globular shape, and thus remain colorless globules. The diameter of these globules has been stated so low as from 1-4000th to 1-6000th part of an inch. According to some they become elliptical in order to accommodate themselves to the decreasing diameter of the vessels they have to pass through. Prevost and Dumas state that the elliptical form of the globules is common to birds, and to the cold blooded animals; while in the mammaliæ they are always spherical. These last physiologists remark, that the size of the globule varies from of an English inch in man, the dog, pig, &c. to 200 in the she-goat. There has been much controversy respecting the principle upon which the color of the blood depends. Berzelius and others have ascribed it to the oxide of iron entering into its composition; while Dr. Wills, and subsequently Mr. Brande and Vauquelin, have attributed it, and apparently with much more correctness, to an animal substance of a peculiar nature. Mr. B., when investigating the coloring matter of the blood distinctly from its crassamentum, did not find it to contain a greater proportion of iron than the other principles; the theory, then, says a modern chemist, which accounts for the red color of the fluid in question, by the presence of iron, may be considered as completely set aside; and the same chemist, Dr. Henry, gives, from Vauquelin, the following method of obtaining, in a separate form, this coloring matter. Let the coagulum of blood, well drained upon a hair-sieve, be digested in four times its weight of sulphuric acid, diluted with a double proportion of water, at the temperature of 160° of Fahrenheit for five or six hours. Filter the liquor while yet hot, and wash the residuum with a quantity of hot water, equal in weight to the acid which has been employed. Concentrate the liquor to half its bulk; then add pure ammonia till there remain only a slight excess of acid. After having agitated the liquor allow it to stand, and a purple sediment will be deposited. This sediment is to be washed with distilled water till the washings cease to precipitate the nitrate of baryte. It may then be drained on filtering paper, and dried at a very gentle heat. The serum or watery portion of the blood is differently stated, as to its composition, by different chemists; and it is probable that much variation actually takes place according to the different circumstances of the individual from whom it has been taken.. Its specific gravity is about 1:030. When exposed to heat it is converted into coagulated albumen, from which, by pressure, a small quantity of a saline liquor may be made to oose, which is distinctly called the serosity of the blood. This last consists, according to Berzelius, of water, of soda holding albumen in solution, of muriates of soda and potash, of acetate of soda, and an animal matter always accompanying the last ingredient, forming, together, the muco-extractive matter of Marcet. Dr. Bostock and Marcet could discover no albumen in the serosity of the blood, but only the mucoextractive or uncoagulable matter just mentioned. Serum, evaporated by a heat below that which coagulates it, yields à semi-transparent substance resembling amber, the insoluble part of which is albuminous; and it is important to observe that the mineral acids, in their action upon serum, produce insoluble compounds, which resemble fibrin treated in the same way. Hence it has been inferred, that albumen and fibrin are nearly one and the same principle. Upon the whole, we may, perhaps, receive the following analysis of Berzelius as presenting a pretty correct account of the contents of the serum generally; it differs very little from one given by Dr. Marcet. It is thought by Berzelius that the coloring matter rather contains the bases of these substances than the substances themselves; and the same products may be obtained, he says, by incineration from the mere albuminous portion of the erassamentum, with the exception of iron; a result which still leads this last chemist to infer that a ferruginous principle has to do with the impartation of color; an effect which, according to him, though not depending on the presence merely of an oxide of iron, may be produced by a compound of which that oxide is an essential part.' It has been well observed by Magendie, in his recently published Elements of Physiology, that the respective relations in the quantity of serum and cruor, coloring matter and fibrin, are variable according to an infinity of circumstances;' and this variability ought ever to be taken into account when experiments are instituted either upon the whole mass of blood or on its separate parts. The fluidity of the blood while circulating, and its coagulation when separated from its appropriate vessels, have constituted a subject of physiological speculation and enquiry. It was natural to suppose that the constant motion which circulation implies caused this homogeneous and fluid condition, but that this is not at any rate a full explanation of the fact is proved by isolating a portion of the vascular system from the general mass; by thus causing the blood in the vessel so isolated, to be at rest; which, notwithstanding this quietude, maintains for a length of time the character and appearance of circulating fluid; while, on the other hand, coagulation takes place in blood separated from its vessels, even though the mass be agitated during the process of extravasation. The phenomenon, then, is to be explained by, or rather referred to, vital action, and not to motion abstractedly; we say referred to, inasmuch as the announcement of a law must always be regarded as a different thing from the physical explanation of a fact. John Hunter overlooked this distinction, and thus fell into error when he assumed the vitality of the blood, and talked of the stimulus of necessity: all his positions and reasonings on this head, however ingenious and plausible, being reducible to the truism that the blood coagulates because it must coagulate. In a fluid of such importance as the blood, it will readily be inferred that many material changes are constantly going on, both of a physical and chemical kind, so as to modify constitutional temperaments, regulate the condition of health, and influence morbid affections; these changes, however, have not hitherto been ascertained with any thing like a precision sufficient to authorise inferences as to the connexion of such and such variations with such and such maladies. Indeed the seemingly innoxious nature of the blood, while the frame is under the influence of the most noxious poisons, is a striking fact in the animal economy. It has, for example, been ascertained that the flesh, and, á fortiori, the blood, of an animal that is laboring under hydrophobia, and which animal, by its saliva, is capable of inoculating another with the specific disease, may be eaten with impunity. Again, puncture the veins of an individual who is the subject of small-pox take blood from that subject and mix it with the blood of another, you will not by this process impart the sickness; an impartation which every one knows to be effected with facility by a very minute portion of the matter taken from the pustules that characterise the disorder. In conformity with the same principle, it is found that the blood of a patient, laboring under diabetes, does not yield the saccharine principle to the chemical experimenter, notwithstanding that the very essence of this distemper consists in the copious separation of sugar from the blood by the action of the kidneys. But, for further information on these interesting points, and for the modifications of which the facts are susceptible, we must refer the reader to the several articles of MEDICINE, PHYSIOLOGY, PATHOLOGY, and SECRETION. Under the words RESPIRATION and PERSPIRATION we shall likewise have to consider the color and temperature of the blood, in their connexion with exterior and interior circumstance. We shall conclude the present article by remarking that there have been very different estimates formed with respect to the average quantity of viood contained in the body. Some have calcuated it at 100 pounds, while others have rated it so low as thirty. From this last to forty, or a little more, the average may, perhaps, be correctly taken of the quantity of blood contained in the human system at the adult period. Man, it is said, has a considerably larger proportion of blood, relatively to his size and weight, than the inferior animals. BLOOD, IN DIET. As a species of food, it has been disputed whether blood really affords any nourishment or not. The best judges, however, are now generally agreed that it is nutritious; and though out of the body, like the white of an egg, it is very insoluble, yet, like that too in the body it is commonly of easy digestion. It is, however, highly alkalescent in hot climates; on which account alone the prohibition of it to the Israelites was very proper. Even in this country, when blood was used as food in great quantity, the scurvy was more frequent than at other times. In some countries we are told of barbarians who were accustomed to intoxicate themselves by drinking the warm blood of ani mals. The eating of blood was prohibited to Noah, Gen. ix. 3, 4, and to the Jews, Lev. xvii. 10-14. In the latter instance principally, it has been said, with a view to its use in sacrifices, or as a token of respect to the altar, at which the blood of every victim was presented before God. Indeed this is expressly stated to be the reason on one occasion. The prohibition was repeated by the apostles at the council of Jerusalem, Acts xv. and confirmed and defended, we are told, by all the fathers, except St. Augustin; the universal practice both of the eastern and western churches being to avoid the eating of it till his time. In many churches, even of the west, this was the case much longer. The question is, whether the apostolic precept to abstain from blood, was only a temporary deference to the weakness of the Jewish converts, or a perpetual precept founded on moral principles, and consequently still obligatory? The former opinion is that of the majority of modern critics, though the advocates for the latter urge, that blood was prohibited with the original grant of animal food to man; that the prohibition is joined with that of fornication, which is an immorality; and that nothing like an express repeal of the apostolic decision can be found. Two respectable controversialists upon another subject, the Rev. R. Hall of Bristol, and Rev. Jos. Kinghorn of Norwich, have lately taken the opposite sides of this question also. Mr. Hall says of the insinuation respecting abstaining from blood: I have not the smallest doubt that it is of perpetual force, however little it may be regarded in modern practice. The precept was invariably observed by the faithful from the time of Noah; it resulted from the solemn and unanimous decision of the apostles, and is of more ancient origin than any other Christian institute.' Reply to the Rev. Jos. Kinghorn, in vindication of the practice of Free Communion, pp. 50, 51. Mr. Kinghorn quotes the learned Spencer as expressing his opinion that the Gentile Christians VOL. IV. 241 are required to abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and from things strangled, and from blood, because they were the causes, the attendants, and the signs of idolatry.' He other Hebrew critics, as intended to forbid eatconsiders the Noahic precept, after Geddes and ing the flesh with the blood of the animal while alive,' or before the creature was properly slain. He then alleges the express permission of the law died of itself, i. e. with the blood in it, as a proof (Deut. xiv.21.) for Gentiles to eat of any thing that that there could be no immorality in the practice. It would certainly seem clear, according to this, that the Ethiopian eunuch, or any other Gentile Christian, might have innocently eaten of such food, if so disposed, before the decision of the apostolic council. victims was anciently the portion of the gods; BLOOD, USES OF, IN RELIGION. The blood of altar in oblation to them. The priests made anand accordingly was poured or sprinkled on the streaming of blood from the earth, fire, and the other use of blood, viz. for divination. The like, was held a prodigy or omen of evil. The Roman priests were not unacquainted with the blood from images, ready to serve a turn; wituse of blood in miracles; they had the fluxes of Minerva at Modena, before the battle at that place. ness that said to have streamed from the statue of have not gone beyond them. How many relaBut we know not whether in this their successors tions in ecclesiastical writers of Madonas, crucifixes, and wafers, bleeding! The liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius at Naples, repeated by far all the frauds of the Grecian or Roman annually for so many ages, seems to transcend, priesthood. But the chemists at last divulged the secret; and M. Neuman at Berlin, performed the miracle of the liquefaction of dried blood, with all the circumstances of the Neapolitan miracle. We shall not occupy our pages with the profuse fables of the Franciscans and Dominicans, respecting our Saviour's blood. But Matt. Paris assures us, that Henry II. summoned his nobles and prelates to celebrate the feast of St. Edward in St. Peter's church, chiefly pro veneratione sancti sanguinis Christi nuper adepti, in veneration of the holy blood of Christ lately acquired.' And various other British monasteries pretended to be possessed of this pro fitable relic. BLOOD, in farriery, denotes a distemper in the his head aside, or after him; the cure is by slitback of a horse, which makes him in going draw ting the length of two joints under the tail, and thus letting the beast bleed plentifully. or whole blood. 1. Half blood is applied to BLOOD (Thomas), commonly called colonel R actually seized him one night in his coach in St. James's-street, and bound him on horseback behind one of his associates, resolving to hang him at Tyburn, with a paper pinned to his breast: but when they reached the fields, the duke threw himself and the assassin, to whom he was fastened, to the ground; and while they were struggling, he was rescued by his servants. The authors of this attempt were not, however, then discovered. After living a considerable time among the malcontents in Ireland, and afterwards in Holland, he returned to England, with recommendations to the republican party; went to Scotland, where he contributed much to the breaking out of the insurrection; and was present in the action of Pentland Hills on the 27th of November, 1666. He returned to England, where he rescued his friend Captain Mason from a party of soldiers, who were conducting him to his trial. In 1671 Blood formed a design of carrying off the crown and regalia from the tower; and was very near succeeding. He had bound and wounded Edwards, the keeper of the jewel office, and had actually left the tower with his prey; but was overtaken and seized, with some of his associates. When questioned, he frankly avowed the enterprize; but refused to discover his accomplices. The fear of death, he said, should never engage him either to deny a guilt, or betray a friend.' These extraordinary circumstances made him the general subject of conversation; and King Charles II. was moved with an idle curiosity to see and speak with a person so noted for his courage and his crimes. Blood wanted not address to improve this opportunity of obtaining a pardon. He told the king that he had been engaged, with others, in a design to kill him with a carabine above Battersea, where his majesty often went to bathe; but that when he had taken his stand among the reeds for that purpose, he found his heart checked with an awe of majesty; and he not only relented himself, but diverted his associates from their purpose. That he had long ago brought himself to an entire indifference about life, which he now considered lost; but that his associates had bound themselves by the strictest oaths to revenge the death of any of their confederacy; and that no precaution nor power could secure any one from the effects of their resolutions. Whether these considerations excited fear or admiration in the king, Blood secured his object--a pardon; and Charles is said to have carried his kindness still farther, and to have granted him an estate of £500 a year in Ireland. He even encouraged his attendance about his person, and while old Edwards, who had bravely ventured his life, and had been wounded in defending the crown and regalia, was forgotten and neglected, this man, who deserved to be hanged, became a kind of favorite. Blood enjoyed his pension about ten years, when being charged with fixing a scandalous imputation on the duke of Buckingham, he was again thrown into prison; yet, though the damages were laid at £10,000, this adventurer found bail. He died, however, soon after, on the 24th of August, 1680. Linnæus (see CANIS), le chien courant of Buffon, the slow hound of the Scots. The hound or dog, with long, smooth, and pendulous ears. It was a dog of great use, and in high esteem with our ancestors and was employed to recover anv game that had escaped wounded from the hunter or been killed and stolen out of the forest. it was remarkable for the acuteness of its smell, tracing the lost beast by the blood it had spilt; whence the name is derived. This species could, with the utmost certainty, discover the thief by following his footsteps, let the distance of his flight be ever so great, and through the most secre and thickest coverts: nor would it cease its pursuit till it had taken the felon. They were likewise used by Wallace and Bruce during the civil wars. The poetical historians of the two heroes frequently relate very curious passages on this subject; of the service these dogs were to their masters, and the escapes they had from those of the enemy. The blood-hound was in great request on the confines of England and Scotland; where the borderers were continually preying on the herds and flocks of their neighbours. The true kind was large, strong, muscular, broad-breasted, of a stern countenance, of a deep tan-color, and generally marked with a black spot above each eye. BLOOD-LETTING, the operation of bleeding, or letting blood. Under this term is comprehended every artificial discharge of blood made with a view to cure or prevent a disease. Blood-letting is divided into general and topical. As examples of the former, venæsection and arteriotomy may be mentioned; and of the latter, the application of leeches, cupping-glasses, and scarification. BLOOD-RED HEAT, the last degree of heat given by smiths to iron in the forge. BLOOD-RUNNING ITCH, in farriery, a disease in a horse, proceeding from an inflammation of the blood by over heating, hard riding, or other severe labor; which, getting between the skin and flesh, makes the beast rub and bite himself; and, if not cured, sometimes turns to a highly infectious mange. BLOOD, SALAMANDER's, the redness remaining in the receiver, after distilling the spirit of nitre. BLOOD, SATYRION, a ruddy liquor produced from the roots of satyrium, baked with bread, and liquefied, as it were, into blood, by a long digestion. BLOOD-SHOT. See OPHTHALMIA. BLOOD-SNAKE, the English name of the hæmorrhus. BLOOD-SPAVIN. See FARRIERY. BLOOD, SPITTING of, or hæmoptoe. See MEDICINE. See ANATOMY See MEDICINE. BLOOD-STONE. See HELIOTROPE. BLOO'MY. Germ. blume; Dutch, bloem; Goth. bloma; Ang., Sax. blosm, blosmian Skinner thinks from blaen, to swell; to break out, as the flower which precedes the fruit. Wachter, from blazen, to blow; to breathe out BLOOD-HOUND, in zoology, the canis sagax of odors. Somner gives blotsmian, to germinate; BLOOD, FIELD of. See ACELDAMA. |