Bitter.

general field-marshal. In the war of 1866, one of his sons fell; in that of 1870, two were killed. D. 1884.

BITTER BEER. See ALE.

BITTER CRESS. See CRESS.

BITTERFELD, a t. in Saxony, 17 m. n. of Leipsic, at the junction of the Lober and the Mulde; pop. '90, 9047. It has foundries, breweries, and various other manufactories. B. was founded in the 12th c. by the Flemings.

BITTER KING, Soulaurea_amara, a shrub or small tree of the natural order poly galacea (q.v.), a native of the Indian archipelago, which has received its name from its intense bitterness. The genus differs from the usual structure of the order in its regular flowers. The B. K. has large oval leaves and axillary racemes of flowers. It is used medicinally in fevers and other diseases.

BITTERN, Botaurus, according to some modern ornithologists, a genus of the heron (q.v.) family (ardeida); but regarded by others as a mere sub-genus of heron (ardea), and not a very well defined one. Bitterns are indeed chiefly distinguished from herons by the long, loose plumage of the neck, which they have the power of erecting at pleasure, along with the rest of their clothing feathers, so as greatly to increase their apparent size. The back of the neck, however, is merely downy, or almost bare, the long feathers being on the front and sides. Bitterns also differ from herons in the greater length of their toes, the middle toe being as long as the shank. They are almost all solitary birds, inhabiting reedy and marshy places, where they lie hid during the day, and will almost allow themselves to be trodden upon ere they take wing; they feed during the night, and then, also, often rise spirally to a great height into the air, and emit loud resounding cries. Their food consists chiefly of frogs, and partly, also, of fish, lizards, water-insects, etc., and even of small birds and quadrupeds. The claw of the middle toe is serrated on the inner edge, probably to aid in securing slippery prey. -The COMMON B. (B. stellaris, or ardea stellaris) is a bird very widely diffused over the old world, being found in almost all, at least of the temperate, parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa, which are sufficiently marshy for its manner of life. It is now rare in Britain, owing to drainage; but was formerly more common, and in the days of falconry, was carefully protected by law in England, on account of the sport which it afforded. Its flesh also was in high esteem, and is not rank and fishy, like that of the herons generally. In size, it is rather less than the common heron; the bill is about 4 in. long, the feathers on the crown of the head are greenish black, and the plumage in general of a dull yellow color, beautifully and irregularly marked and mottled with black. The B. makes a rude nest of sticks, reeds, etc., in its marshy haunts, and lays four or five greenish-brown eggs. It has a peculiar bellowing cry, which has obtained for it such English provincial names as mire-drum, bull of the bog, etc., and many of its appellations in other languages, perhaps even its name B. (bitour, botur, botaurus). Some naturalists used to assert that the booming cry of the B. was produced by the bird inserting its bill into a reed; that notion, however, has long since been exploded. When assailed, it fights desperately with bill and claws; and it is dangerous to approach it incautiously when wounded, as it strikes with its long sharp bill, if possible, at the eye. See illus., BIRDS.

-The LITTLE B. (B. minutus, or ardea minuta) is common in some parts of Europe, but rare in Britain. Its whole length is only about 13 in.-The AMERICAN B. (B. lenti ginosus, or A. lentiginosa), a species almost equal in size to the common B., and very similar to it in habits and voice, has occasionally been shot in Britain. It is common in many parts of North America, migrating northward and southward, according to the season. The crown of the head is reddish brown, and the colors and markings of the plumage differ considerably from those of the common B.-The LEAST B. (B. or A. exilis) is another North American species, of very small size, which is also migratory, and somewhat social in its habits. The AUSTRALIAN B. (B. or A. australis) is generally diffused throughout Australia, wherever marshes or sedgy rivers occur. In habits it closely resembles the B. of Europe. The head and upper parts generally are purplish brown, except the wings, which are buff, conspicuously freckled with brown; the throat, breast, and belly mottled brown and buff.

BIT TERN, BITTER LIQUID, or SALT OIL, is an oily liquid obtained during the prepa ration of common salt (q.v.). When the mother-liquor of the evaporating pans ceases to deposit crystals of common salt, there is left behind in the boilers the material called bittern. It consists principally of a strong solution of common salt, along with the chlorides of magnesium and calcium, which are valuable sources of the element bromine (q.v.) The B. obtained from the salt-works at Epsom was at one time the source of the sulphate of magnesium (hence called Epsom salts).

BITTER PRINCIPLES are extracts from various plants by maceration in water or other liquid. Some bitter principles can be crystallized, while the bitter of hops and wild cherry cannot be so treated. Some of the vegetable bitters are soluble in water, and some in alcohol, and their properties are usually neuter, having neither bases nor acids. There is a wide use of bitters as a tonic, but the great portion of those sold are merely a disguise for strong drink, and of no other use to the drinker.

Bivalve.

594

BITTERS are prepared from an infusion of herbs containing bitter principles. The plant generally used for the purpose is archangelica officinalis, or the garden angelica. See ANGELICA. The roots or seeds, or both, are placed in water, and the whole is left to simmer for several days, when the infusion will be strong enough. The B. from angelica are not much used by physicians, having been superseded very much by infu sions of gentian, etc.; but they are still used as a household medicine in town and country by elderly people. The chemical composition of the root is:

The medicinal properties of B. are mainly those of a mild tonic and pungent aromatic stimulant, and hence they are serviceable as a stomachic in cases of weakness of the digestive organs. The taste is at first sweetish, rapidly becoming hot, aromatic, and bitter, and the odor is rather pleasant. The angelica root yields a larger amount of the bitter principle than angelica seeds. Camomile flowers, coriander-seeds, and other vegetable tonics and stimulants, are occasionally employed in the preparation of bitters. BITTER SPAR, a name given to dolomite (q. v.), from the magnesia contained in it, which the Germans call bitter salt.

BITTERSWEET, or WOODY NIGHTSHADE (solanum dulcamara), a plant found in hedges and thickets in Britain, and in most parts of Europe, also in Asia and in North America. The root is perennial; the annual stems climbing and shrubby, many feet in length; the leaves ovate-heart-shaped, the upper ones spear-shaped; the flowers purple, in drooping corymbs, much resembling those of its congener, the potato, but much smaller, followed by ovate red berries of tempting appearance, which, being poisonous, are not unfrequently the cause of serious accidents, particularly to children. The twigs, collected in autumn after the leaves are fallen, are used in medicine as a diaphoretic and diuretic, and as a remedy for leprosy and other cutaneous disorders. See SOLANUM. BITTER VETCH. See OROBUS.

BITTERWOOD, a name given to certain species of the genus xylopia, trees and shrubs remarkable for the bitterness of their wood, particularly the West Indian X. glabra. Furniture made of this wood is safe from the attacks of insects.-The genus xylopia belongs to the natural order anonacea (q.v.). The fruit of some of the species, particularly X. sericea, is highly aromatic and pungent like pepper. X. sericea is a large tree, a native of Brazil; its bark is used for making cordage, which is excellent.

B. is also the name of pierana excelsa (formerly quassia excelsa), a tree of the natural order simarubacea, a native of Jamaica, the wood of which is used in medicine for the same purposes as quassia (q.v.), and often under that name; indeed, it is probable that all the present quassia of the shops is really this wood. It is, botanically, very nearly allied to the true quassia, and possesses very similar properties, containing the crystallizable bitter principle called quassite or quassin. The wood, which is intensely bitter, is a very useful stomachic and tonic; an infusion of it is a well-known and useful fly-poison; and it appears to act as a powerful narcotic on many quadrupeds.

BITU'MEN, a mineral substance, remarkable for its inflammability and its strong peculiar odor; generally, however, supposed to be of vegetable origin. The name, which was in use among the ancient Romans, is variously employed, sometimes to include a number of the substances called mineral resins (see RESINS), particularly the liquid mineral substances called naphtha (q.v.) and petroleum (q.v.) or mineral oil, and the solid ones called mineral pitch, asphalt (q.v.), mineral caoutchouc, etc.; sometimes in a more restricted sense it is applied by mineralogists only to some of these, and by some mineralogists to the solid, by others to the liquid ones. All these substances are, however, closely allied to each other. Naphtha and petroleum consist essentially of carbon and hydrogen alone, 84 to 88 per cent. being carbon; the others contain also a little oxygen, which is particularly the case in asphalt, the degree of their solidity appearing to depend upon the proportion of oxygen which they contain, which amounts in some specimens of asphalt to 10 per cent. Asphalt also contains a little nitrogen. Bituminous substances are generally found in connection with carboniferous rocks, in districts where there is, or evidently has been, volcanic agency. See the articles already referred to. Indeed, most kinds of coal contain B., and a substance essentially the same is produced from all kinds of coal by distillation; and whether before existing actually formed in the coal, or produced at the time by the action of heat, B. may often be seen bubbling from pieces of coal after they have begun to burn on an ordinary fire. Some of the shales of the coal-measures are very bituminous, as is also a kind of marl-slate abundant in some parts of the continent of Europe. See SHALE and MARL.-One of the most interesting

of the bituminous minerals is that called mineral caoutchouc or elastic B., and for which the new name of elaterite has been devised, as if to support the dignity of its exaltation to the rank of a distinct mineral species. It is a very rare mineral, only three localities being known for it in the world -the Odin lead-mine in Derbyshire; a coal-mine at Montrelais, near Angers, in France; and a coal-mine near Southborough, in Massachusetts. It is elastic and flexible like caoutchouc, and may be used, like it, for effacing pencilmarks. It is easily cut with a knife. Its color is blackish, reddish, or yellowish-brown; and its specific gravity is sometimes a little less and sometimes a little more than that of water. It has a strong bituminous odor, and burns with a sooty flame.

BITU'MINOUS COAL is a term applied to the varieties of coal which contain a large percentage of volatile matter. They yield, on their destructive distillation, a considerable quantity of gas, remarkably pure, and with good illuminating qualities, and are con sequently largely used for that purpose. See COAL.

BITU MINOUS LIMESTONES are limestones impregnated and sometimes deeply col ored with bituminous matter, obtained from decaying vegetables, or, more probably, from the decomposed remains of those animals the hard parts of which form so large an amount of the rock.

BITU'MINOUS SHALES are indurated beds of clay occurring in the coal-measures, and containing such an amount of carbon and volatile matter that they are able to keep up combustion when mixed with but a little coal. They are indeed impure coal, with a large percentage of ash or earthy matter, which after burning retains the original form. See COAL.

BITZIUS, ALBERT, better known under the nom de plume of Jeremias Gotthelf, a Swiss author, was b. at Morat, in the canton of Freiburg, 4th Oct., 1797. He was educated for the church; and after holding several cures, was appointed, in 1832, pastor of Lützelflüh, in Emmenthal, canton of Bern, which office he retained till his death. His first work was entitled The Mirror of Peasants (Burgsdorf, 1836). It is the touching history of a poor villager, Jeremias Gotthelf, which pseudonym B. ever after retained. In 1838 appeared his Sorrows and Joys of a Schoolmaster; in 1839, Dursli, the Brandy Drinker, and How Five Maidens Miserably Perish in Brandy; in 1842-46, Scenes and Traditions of the Swiss, in 6 vols., in which B. narrates, with great art, the old national legends, among which the most remarkable is the Reconciliation. The best and most popular of his stories, however, are Grandmother Katy (Berlin, 1848); Uli, the Farmservant (Berlin, 2d edition, 1850); and Stories and Pictures of Popular Life in Switzerland (Berlin, 1851.) Subsequently, he wrote several pamplets against the German democrats, without, however, violating those popular sympathies and liberal convictions which pervade his writings, and which at an earlier period led him to vehemently oppose the family government of the Bernese aristocracy. His last work was The Clergyman's Wife, which appeared in 1854. Its author died on the 22d Oct. of the same year. B.'s writings are greatly relished in Switzerland. They are characterized by simplicity, inventiveness, a wonderful fidelity in the delineation of manners and habits, great vigor of description, and raciness of humor, while their tone is strictly moral and Christian.

BI'VALVE SHELLS or BIVALVES are those testaceous coverings of mollusks which consist of two concave plates or valves, united by a hinge. So long as molluscous animals provided with shells were considered by naturalists almost exclusively with respect to these, the order of B. S., originally established by Aristotle, retained its place (see CONCHOLOGY); and indeed the external character upon which it is founded is closely connected with some of the important structural characters according to which mollusks are now classified. See MOLLUSCA. A vast majority of recent B. S. belong to Cuvier's testaceous order of acephalous mollusca, the lamellibranchiata (q.v.) mollusca of Owen, although with them are classed some which were placed among multivalves (q.v.) by conchologists on account of accessory valves which they possess, and some which have a calcareous tube superadded to the true valves, or even taking their place as the chief covering of the animal. There are also mollusks of the class brachiopoda (q.v.), palliobranchiata, which possess B. S., as the terebratule, or lamp-shells (q. v.), etc. The structure of the shell, however, when closely examined, is found to be different in these two classes (see SHELL), although its general appearance is much the same. A very large proportion of the B. S. of the older fossiliferous rocks belong to the class brachiopoda.

In the brachiopoda, one valve is ventral, and the other dorsal; in the lamellibranchiata, the one is applied to the right side, and the other to the left side of the animal. The valves of ordinary B. S. consist of layers, of which the outermost is always the smallest; and each inner one extends a little beyond it, so that the shell becomes thicker and stronger as it increases in length and breadth. The valves are connected at the hinge by an elastic ligament; and in general this consists of two parts, more or less distinct one on the outside, to which the name ligament is sometimes restricted, and which is stretched by the closing of the valves; another, sometimes called the spring, more internal, which is compressed by the closing of the valves, and tends to open them when the compressing force of the adductor muscle or muscles is removed, the effect of which is to be seen in the gaping of the shell when the animal is dead. The hinge is often

furnished with teeth which lock into each other; sometimes it is quite destitute of them; sometimes the hinge-line is curved, sometimes straight. Conchological classification has been much founded upon characters taken from this part. The valves of some B. S. are equal and symmetrical, in others they are different from one another, particularly in those mollusks which, like the oyster, attach themselves permanently by one valve to some fixed substance, as a rock. Sometimes the valves of B. S. close completely at the pleasure of the animal, those of others always gape somewhere.

The point at the hinge, from which the formation of each valve has proceeded, is called the umbo. On the side of the umbo opposite to the ligament there is usually a small depression called the lunule. The marks, familiar to every one, upon the inside of a bivalve shell, are the impressions of the mantle of the (lamellibranchiate) mollusk, and of the adductor muscle or muscles.

BIVOUAC (from the German beiwacht, or bewachen, to watch over) is the encampment of soldiers in the open air, without tents, where every one remains dressed, and with his weapons by him.

BIXA. See ARNOTTO.

BIZER'TA, or BENZER'TA (ancient Hippo Diarrhytus, or Zaritus), a seaport t. of Tunis, at the bottom of a deep gulf or bay of the Mediterranean, and at the mouth of a lagoon, united to the gulf by a narrow channel. It is the most northerly town in Africa, being about 38 m. n. w. of Tunis, in lat. 37° 17′ n., and long. 9° 51' east. It is surrounded by walls, and defended by two castles; which, however, as they are commanded by the neighboring heights, are quite useless against a land attack. Its port, formerly one of the best in the Mediterranean was suffered to fill up, until only small vessels could be admitted, though very little labor was required to give a uniform depth of 5 or 6 fathoms to the channel leading to the inner harbor or lagoon, which has a depth varying from 10 to 50 fathoms. At last in 1894 a new harbor was opened. The adjacent country is remarkably fertile, but its cultivation is neglected. Pop. variously estimated at from 7000 to 8000. Agathocles, between the years 310 and 207 B. C., fortified and provided B. with a new harbor; and under the Romans, it was a free city.

BIZET, GEORGES (ALEXANDRE CÉSAR LEOPOLD), was born in Paris, in 1828, and died there in 1875. He studied composition at the Conservatoire, Paris, under Halévy, whose daughter he married, and won the grand prix de Rome in 1857. On his return from Italy he composed several operas which met with little success His fame was made by his opera Carmen, first represented in Paris in 1875, which, owing to its strong treatment, melodies, and rich orchestration, is ranked among the best French operas. Bizet was an accomplished pianist, and was noted for his remarkable reading of orchestral scores on the pianoforte at sight. His death was universally lamented, for great hopes were entertained of his future. His operas include: Le Docteur Miracle, Paris, April 9, 1857; Les pêcheurs de perles, ib., Sept. 30, 1863; La jolie fille de Perth, ib., Dec. 26, 1867; Numa, ib., 1871; Djamileh, May 22, 1872. He also wrote incidental music to Daudet's L'Arlésienne; two overtures entitled Patrie and La Chasse d'Ossian; two movements of a symphony; pianoforte music, and songs.

BJORNEBORG, or BIORNBORG, a t. or city in Finland, on the gulf of Bothnia, 72 m. n. of Abo; pop. 8718; has export trade in tar, pitch, lumber, etc. It was wholly burned in 1801.

BJÖRNSON, BJÖRNSTJERNE, b. 1832 in Norway; poet and novelist, first known by articles in a newspaper, Folkblad, in which he published sketches and stories. Later ho issued Fædrelandet, Thrond, Arne, and Synnove Solbakken. His stories in English are Arne, Ovind, The Fisher Maiden, The Fishing Girl, The Happy Boy, The Newly Married Couple, Love and Life in Norway, and others. He also wrote a trilogy, Sigurd Slembe (1862); a tragedy, Maria Stuart (1867); a drama on Norwegian social life, A Gauntlet (1894); a German play, Über Unsere Kraft (1895), etc.

BJÖRNSTJERNA, MAGNUS FRIEDRICH FERDINAND, Count, a Swedish statesman and author, was born 10th Oct., 1779, at Dresden, where his father then resided as ecretary to the Swedish fegation. He received his education in Germany, and entered Sweden for the first time in 1793 to join the army. In 1813 he was appointed lieut. in the Swedish army that went to aid the allies in Germany; took part in the conflicts at Grossbeeren and Dennewitz; was present at Leipsic, and concluded the formularies of capitulation with the French at Lübeck and Maestricht. Subsequently, he fought in Holstein, and in Norway, where he concluded the treaty that united that country with Sweden. In 1826 he received the title of count; and in 1828 was appointed ambassador to the court of Great Britian, which office he held till 1846, when he returned to Stockholin, where he died 6th Oct., 1847. As a politician B.'s opinions were liberal. In addition to some political writings, he published a work on the theogony, philosophy, and cosmogony of the Hindus in 1843.

BLACAS, PIERRE LOUIS JEAN CASIMIR, Duc de, 1771-1839; a member of the cabinet of Louis XVIII., and one of the confidential advisers of the bourbons. As ambassador in Rome he negotiated the concordat of 1817, and was afterwards minister at Naples. At the overthrow of Charles X. he went into exile, offering to the unfortunate king his for tune, which, however, was not accepted.

BLACK may be considered as the negation of color, resulting from the absorption of the rays of light by certain substances. Painters produce it by an unequal combina tion of the three primary colors. In mediæval art, B. was symbolical of evil, error, and woe: thus we find Christ, when the old illuminators wished to represent him as wres tling against the spirit of evil, arrayed in black drapery; and Byzantine painters, to express the sorrow of the Virgin Mary, gave her a black complexion. 'All faces shall gather blackness," is the expression of Joel, when he wishes to convey the idea of the trouble of the people when the calamities which, with prophetic eye, he sees brooding over Jerusalem, should come to pass. B. clothing among some oriental nations was regarded as a badge of servitude, slavery, or low birth; among the Moors, it has several significations-obscurity, grief, despair, constancy. B. in blazonry, under the name of sable, denotes constancy, wisdom, and prudence. For B. as a funereal color, see FUNERAL RITES; MOURNING.

BLACK PIGMENTS, used in painting, are derived principally from animal and vegetable substances. They are very numerous, and of different hues and degrees of trans parency; but the most important are vegetable blue-black-obtained from beech-wood burned in close vessels-ivory-black, cork-black, and lamp-black, the principal constituent of all being charcoal or carbon. A fine-toned B. pigment is obtained by burning German or French Prussian blue. Combined with white, B. P., which are slow driers, yield grays of several tints.

BLACK, ADAM, and CHARLES; publishers, Edinburgh. In 1826 they became pub. of the Edinburgh Review; in 1829 the copyrights of the "Encyclopedia Britannica" passed into their hands, and the 7th ed. was begun in monthly parts in March, 1830, and finished in Jan., 1842; the 9th ed., begun in 1875, was completed in 1888; in 1851 they, with Richardson Bros., became owners of the Waverley novels, at a cost of $131,000, and soon afterward sole proprietors; in 1861 the "collected writings of Thomas De Quincey" came into their hands. Charles, who was a nephew of Adam, died previous to 1830. Adam, besides managing this immense business, was lord provost of Edinburgh, 1843-48; succeeded Macaulay as M.P. in 1856; held his seat until 1865, retiring from business the same year; while lord provost, declined the honor of knighthood; died 1874, the Nestor of publishers.

BLACK, JEREMIAH S., 1810-83; b. Penn.; began in the law, 1830; president of his judicial district in 1842; elected judge of the supreme court of the state in 1851; and was chosen chief-justice. In 1857, president Buchanan made him attorney-general of the United States, and in 1860 secretary of state. He retired from the office when Lincoln's cabinet was appointed, and was actively engaged in his profession and in politics.

BLACK, JOSEPH, an eminent chemist, was b. in 1728, at Bordeaux, where his father was engaged in the wine-trade. Both his parents were of Scotch descent, but natives of Belfast, to which their son was sent for his education in 1740. In 1746, he entered the university of Glasgow, and studied chemistry under Dr. Cullen. In 1751, he went to Edinburgh to complete his medical course, and in 1754 took his degree. His thesis on the nature of the causticity of lime and the alkalies, which he showed to be owing to the absence of the carbonic acid (called by him fixed air) present in limestone and in what are now called the carbonates of the alkalies, contained his first contribution to chemical science, and excited considerable attention. In 1756, on the removal of Cullen to Edinburgh, B. succeeded him as professor of anatomy (which branch he afterwards exchanged for medicine) and lecturer on chemistry in Glasgow. Between 1759 and 1763, he evolved that theory of "latent heat" on which his scientific fame chiefly rests, and which formed the immediate preliminary to the next great stride in discovery by his pupil and assistant James Watt. In 1766, Cullen was appointed to the chair of theoretical medicine in Edinburgh, and B. succeeded him in the chair of chemistry. Thenceforth he devoted himself chiefly to the elaboration of his lectures, in which ho aimed at the utmost degree of perspicuity, and with perfect success. His class became one of the most popular in the university; it occasioned, however, some disappointment that one so capable of enlarging its territory made no further contributions to chemistry. Though of an extremely delicate constitution, he prolonged his life, by care and temperance, to the age of 71. He died on the 26th Nov., 1799.

BLACK, WILLIAM, b. Glasgow, 1841; studied art at a government school, but adopted journalism, and removed to London in 1864. During the Prusso-Austrian war of 1866 he was special war correspondent of the Morning Star. His novel, Love or Marriage, was pub. 1867. He was assist. editor of the Daily News for 4 or 5 years. Two novels, In Silk Attire and Kilmeny, were followed by A Daughter of Heth, 1871, the latter establishing his reputation with the novel-reading public. The Strange Adventures of a Phaeton was pub. 1872. A Princess of Thule (1873) proved very popular, being translated into several languages. B. visited America in 1876. Other works from him are: Three Feathers, Madcap Violet, Green Pastures and Piccadilly, Macleod of Dare, White Wings, Sunrise: a Story of These Times, Shandon Bells, Yolande, Judith Shakespeare, White Heather, Stand Fast, Craig Royston; Highland Cousins (1894); Briseis (1896), etc. He shows narrative power of a high order, but with an execution not always equal.

BLACK ACTS are the acts of the Scottish parliament of the first five Jameses, those of queen Mary's reign, and of James VI., down to 1586 or 1587. They were called the B. A. because they were all printed in the black or Saxon characters. Several of these acts