Chapter XVI: Part 16

BLUMENBACH, JOHANN FRIEDRICH (1752-1840), German physiologist and anthropologist, was born at Gotha on the 11th of May 1752. After studying medicine at Jena, he graduated doctor at Gottingen in 1775, and was appointed extraordinary professor of medicine in 1776 and ordinary professor in 1778. He died at Gottingen on the 22nd of January 1840. He was the author of _Institutiones Physiologicae_ (1787), and of a _Handbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie_ (1804), both of which were very popular and went through many editions, but he is best known for his work in connexion with anthropology, of which science he has been justly called the founder. He was the first to show the value of comparative anatomy in the study of man's history, and his craniometrical researches justified his division of the human race into several great varieties or families, of which he enumerated five--the Caucasian or white race, the Mongolian or yellow, the Malayan or brown race, the Negro or black race, and the American or red race. This classification has been very generally received, and most later schemes have been modifications of it. His most important anthropological work was his description of sixty human crania published originally in _fasciculi_ under the title _Collectionis suae craniorum diversarum gentium illustratae decades_ (Gottingen, 1790-1828).

BLUMENTHAL, LEONHARD, COUNT VON (1810-1900), Prussian field marshal, son of Captain Ludwig von Blumenthal (killed in 1813 at the battle of Dennewitz), was born at Schwedt-on-Oder on the 30th of July 1810. Educated at the military schools of Culm and Berlin, he entered the Guards as 2nd lieutenant in 1827. After serving in the Rhine provinces, he joined the topographical division of the general staff in 1846. As lieutenant of the 31st foot he took part in 1848 in the suppression of the Berlin riots, and in 1849 was promoted captain on the general staff. The same year he served on the staff of General von Bonin in the Schleswig-Holstein campaign, and so distinguished himself, particularly at Fredericia, that he was appointed chief of the staff of the Schleswig-Holstein army. In 1850 he was general staff officer of the mobile division under von Tietzen in Hesse-Cassel. He was sent on a mission to England in that year (4th class of Red Eagle), and on several subsequent occasions. Having attained the rank of lieutenant-colonel, he was appointed personal adjutant to Prince Frederick Charles in 1859. In 1860 he became colonel of the 31st, and later of the 71st, regiment. He was chief of the staff of the III. army corps when, on the outbreak of the Danish War of 1864, he was nominated chief of the general staff of the army against Denmark, and displayed so much ability, particularly at Duppel and the passage to Alsen island, that he was promoted major-general and given the order _pour le merite_. In the war of 1866 Blumenthal occupied the post of chief of the general staff to the crown prince of Prussia, commanding the 2nd army. It was upon this army that the brunt of the fighting fell, and at Koniggratz it decided the fortunes of the day. Blumenthal's own part in these battles and in the campaign generally was most conspicuous. On the field of Koniggratz the crown prince said to his chief of staff, "I know to whom I owe the conduct of my army," and Blumenthal soon received promotion to lieutenant-general and the oak-leaf of the order _pour le merite_. He was also made a knight of the Hohenzollern Order. From 1866 to 1870 he commanded the 14th division at Dusseldorf. In the Franco-German War of 1870-71 he was chief of staff of the 3rd army under the crown prince. Blumenthal's soldierly qualities and talent were never more conspicuous than in the critical days preceding the battle of Sedan, and his services in the war have been considered as scarcely less valuable and important than those of Moltke himself. In 1871 Blumenthal represented Germany at the British manoeuvres at Chobham, and was given the command of the IV. army corps at Magdeburg. In 1873 he became a general of infantry, and ten years later he was made a count. In 1888 he was made a general field marshal, after which he was in command of the 4th and 3rd army inspections. He retired in 1896, and died at Quellendorf near Kothen on the 21st of December 1900.

Blumenthal's diary of 1866 and 1870-1871 has been edited by his son,
Count Albrecht von Blumenthal (_Tagebuch des G.F.M. von Blumenthal_),
1902; an English translation (_Journals of Count von Blumenthal_) was
published in 1903.

BLUNDERBUSS (a corruption of the Dutch _donder_, thunder, and the Dutch _bus_; cf. Ger. _Buchse_, a box or tube, hence a thunder-box or gun), an obsolete muzzle-loading firearm with a bell-shaped muzzle. Its calibre was large so that it could contain many balls or slugs, and it was intended to be fired at a short range, so that some of the charge was sure to take effect. The word is also used by analogy to describe a blundering and random person or talker.

BLUNT, JOHN HENRY (1823-1884), English divine, was born at Chelsea in 1823, and before going to the university of Durham in 1850 was for some years engaged in business as a manufacturing chemist. He was ordained in 1852 and took his M.A. degree in 1855, publishing in the same year a work on _The Atonement_. He held in succession several preferments, among them the vicarage of Kennington near Oxford (1868), which he vacated in 1873 for the crown living of Beverston in Gloucestershire. He had already gained some reputation as an industrious theologian, and had published among other works an annotated edition of the Prayer Book (1867), a _History of the English Reformation_ (1868), and a _Book of Church Law_ (1872), as well as a useful _Dictionary of Doctrinal and Historical Theology_ (1870). The continuation of these labours was seen in a _Dictionary of Sects and Heresies_ (1874), an _Annotated Bible_ (3 vols., 1878-1879), and a _Cyclopaedia of Religion_ (1884), and received recognition in the shape of the D.D. degree bestowed on him in 1882. He died in London on the 11th of April 1884.

BLUNT, JOHN JAMES (1794-1855), English divine, was born at Newcastle-under-Lyme in Staffordshire, and educated at St John's College, Cambridge, where he took his degree as fifteenth wrangler and obtained a fellowship (1816). He was appointed a Wort's travelling bachelor 1818, and spent some time in Italy and Sicily, afterwards publishing an account of his journey. He proceeded M.A. in 1819, B.D. 1826, and was Hulsean Lecturer in 1831-1832 while holding a curacy in Shropshire. In 1834 he became rector of Great Oakley in Essex, and in 1839 was appointed Lady Margaret professor of divinity at Cambridge. In 1854 he declined the see of Salisbury, and he died on the 18th of June 1855. His chief book was _Undesigned Coincidences in the Writings both of the Old and New Testaments_ (1833; fuller edition, 1847). Some of his writings, among them the _History of the Christian Church during the First Three Centuries_ and the lectures _On the Right Use of the Early Fathers_, were published posthumously.

A short memoir of him appeared in 1856 from the hand of William
Selwyn, his successor in the divinity professorship.

BLUNT, WILFRID SCAWEN (1840- ), English poet and publicist, was born on the 17th of August 1840 at Petworth House, Sussex, the son of Francis Scawen Blunt, who served in the Peninsular War and was wounded at Corunna. He was educated at Stonyhurst and Oscott, and entered the diplomatic service in 1858, serving successively at Athens, Madrid, Paris and Lisbon. In 1867 he was sent to South America, and on his return to England retired from the service on his marriage with Lady Anne Noel, daughter of the earl of Lovelace and a grand-daughter of the poet Byron. In 1872 he succeeded, by the death of his elder brother, to the estate of Crabbet Park, Sussex, where he established a famous stud for the breeding of Arab horses. Mr and Lady Anne Blunt travelled repeatedly in northern Africa, Asia Minor and Arabia, two of their expeditions being described in Lady Anne's _Bedouins of the Euphrates_ (2 vols., 1879) and _A Pilgrimage to Nejd_ (2 vols., 1881). Mr Blunt became known as an ardent sympathizer with Mahommedan aspirations, and in his _Future of Islam_ (1888) he directed attention to the forces which afterwards produced the movements of Pan-Islamism and Mahdism. He was a violent opponent of the English policy in the Sudan, and in _The Wind and the Whirlwind_ (in verse, 1883) prophesied its downfall. He supported the national party in Egypt, and took a prominent part in the defence of Arabi Pasha. _Ideas about India_ (1885) was the result of two visits to that country, the second in 1883-1884. In 1885 and 1886 he stood unsuccessfully for parliament as a Home Ruler; and in 1887 he was arrested in Ireland while presiding over a political meeting in connexion with the agitation on Lord Clanricarde's estate, and was imprisoned for two months in Kilmainham. His best-known volume of verse, _Love Sonnets of Proteus_ (1880), is a revelation of his real merits as an emotional poet. _The Poetry of Wilfrid Blunt_ (1888), selected and edited by W.E. Henley and Mr George Wyndham, includes these sonnets, together with "Worth Forest, a Pastoral," "Griselda" (described as a "society novel in rhymed verse"), translations from the Arabic, and poems which had appeared in other volumes.

BLUNTSCHLI, JOHANN KASPAR (1808-1881), Swiss jurist and politician, was born at Zurich on the 7th of March 1808, the son of a soap and candle manufacturer. From school he passed into the _Politische Institut_ (a seminary of law and political science) in his native town, and proceeding thence to the universities of Berlin and Bonn, took the degree of _doctor juris_ in the latter in 1829. Returning to Zurich in 1830, he threw himself with ardour into the political strife which was at the time unsettling all the cantons of the Confederation, and in this year published _Uber die Verfassung der Stadt Zurich_ (On the Constitution of the City of Zurich). This was followed by _Das Volk und der Souveran_ (1830), a work in which, while pleading for constitutional government, he showed his bitter repugnance of the growing Swiss radicalism. Elected in 1837 a member of the Grosser Rath (Great Council), he became the champion of the moderate conservative party. Fascinated by the metaphysical views of the philosopher Friedrich Rohmer (1814-1856), a man who attracted little other attention, he endeavoured in _Psychologische Studien uber Staat und Kirche_ (1844) to apply them to political science generally, and in particular as a panacea for the constitutional troubles of Switzerland. Bluntschli, shortly before his death, remarked, "I have gained renown as a jurist, but my greatest desert is to have comprehended Rohmer." This philosophical essay, however, coupled with his uncompromising attitude towards both radicalism and ultramontanism, brought him many enemies, and rendered his continuance in the council, of which he had been elected president, impossible. He resigned his seat, and on the overthrow of the Sonderbund in 1847, perceiving that all hope of power for his party was lost, took leave of Switzerland with the pamphlet _Stimme eines Schweizers uber die Bundesreform_ (1847), and settled at Munich, where he became professor of constitutional law in 1848.

At Munich he devoted himself with energy to the special work of his chair, and, resisting the temptation to identify himself with politics, published _Allgemeines Staatsrecht_ (1851-1852); _Lehre vom modernen Staat_ (1875-1876); and, in conjunction with Karl Ludwig Theodor Brater (1819-1869), _Deutsches Staats-worterbuch_ (II vols., 1857-1870: abridged by Edgar Loening in 3 vols., 1869-1875). Meanwhile he had assiduously worked at his code for the canton of Zurich, _Privatrechtliches Gesetzbuch fur den Kanton Zurich_ (4 vols., 1854-1856), a work which was much praised at the time, and which, particularly the section devoted to contracts, served as a model for codes both in Switzerland and other countries. In 1861 Bluntschli received a call to Heidelberg as professor of constitutional law (Staatsrecht), where he again entered the political arena, endeavouring in his _Geschichte des allgemeinen Staatsrechts und der Politik_ (1864) "to stimulate," as he said, "the political consciousness of the German people, to cleanse it of prejudices and to further it intellectually." In his new home, Baden, he devoted his energies and political influence, during the Austro-Prussian War of 1866, towards keeping the country neutral. From this time Bluntschli became active in the field of international law, and his fame as a jurist belongs rather to this province than to that of constitutional law. His _Das moderne Kriegsrecht_ (1866); _Das moderns Volkerrecht_ (1868), and _Das Beuterecht im Krieg_ (1878) are likely to remain invaluable text-books in this branch of the science of jurisprudence. He also wrote a pamphlet on the "Alabama" case.

Bluntschli was one of the founders, at Ghent in 1873, of the Institute of International Law, and was the representative of the German emperor at the conference on the international laws of war at Brussels. During the latter years of his life he took a lively interest in the _Protestantenverein_, a society formed to combat reactionary and ultramontane views of theology. He died suddenly at Karlsruhe on the 21st of October 1881. His library was acquired by Johns Hopkins University at Baltimore, U.S.A.

Among his works, other than those before mentioned, may be cited _Deutsches Privatrecht_ (1853-1854); _Deutsche Staatslehre fur Gebildete_ (1874); and _Deutsche Staatslehre und die heutige Staatenwelt_ (1880).

For notices of Bluntschli's life and works see his interesting
autobiography, _Denkwurdiges aus meinem Leben_ (1884); von
Holtzendorff, _Bluntschli und seine Verdienste um die
Staatswissenschaften_ (1882); Brockhaus, _Konversations-Lexicon_
(1901); and a biography by Meyer von Kronau, in _Allgemeine deutsche
Biographie_.

BLYTH, a market town and seaport of Northumberland, England, in the parliamentary borough of Morpeth, 9 m. E.S.E. of that town, at the mouth of the river Blyth, on a branch of the North Eastern railway. Pop. of urban district (1901) 5472. This is the port for a considerable coal-mining district, and its harbour, on the south side of the river, is provided with mechanical appliances for shipping coal. There are five dry docks, and upwards of 1-1/2 m. of quayage. Timber is largely imported. Some shipbuilding and the manufacture of rope, sails and ship-fittings are carried on, and the fisheries are valuable. Blyth is also in considerable favour as a watering-place; there are a pleasant park, a pier, protecting the harbour, about 1 m. in length, and a sandy beach affording sea-bathing. The river Blyth rises near the village of Kirkheaton, and has an easterly course of about 25 m. through a deep, well-wooded and picturesque valley.

B'NAI B'RITH (or SONS OF THE COVENANT), INDEPENDENT ORDER OF, a Jewish fraternal society. It was founded at New York in 1843 by a number of German Jews, headed by Henry Jones, and is the oldest as well as the largest of the Jewish fraternal organizations. Its membership in 1908 was 35,870, its 481 lodges and 10 grand lodges being distributed over the United States, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Rumania, Egypt and Palestine. Its objects are to promote a high morality among Jews, regardless of differences as to dogma and ceremonial customs, and especially to inculcate the supreme virtues of charity and brotherly love. Political and religious discussions were from the first excluded from the debates of the order. In 1851 the first grand lodge was established at New York; in 1856, the number of district lodges having increased, the supreme authority was vested in a central body consisting of one member from each lodge; and by the present constitution, adopted in 1868, this authority is vested in a president elected for five years, an executive committee and court of appeals (elected as before). The first lodge in Germany was instituted at Berlin in 1883. A large number of charitable and other public institutions have been established in the United States and elsewhere by the order, of which may be mentioned the large orphan asylum in Cleveland, the home for the aged and infirm at Yonkers, N.Y., the National Jewish hospital for consumptives at Denver, and the Maimonides library in New York City. The B'nai B'rith society has also co-operated largely with other Jewish philanthropic organizations in succouring distressed Israelites throughout the world.

See the _Jewish Encyclopaedia_ (1902), s.v.

BOA, a name formerly applied to all large serpents which, devoid of poison fangs, kill their prey by constriction; but now confined to that subfamily of the _Boidae_ which are devoid of teeth in the praemaxilla and are without supraorbital bones. The others are known as pythons (q.v.). The true boas comprise some forty species; most of them are American, but the genus _Eryx_ inhabits North Africa, Greece and south-western Asia; the genus _Enygrus_ ranges from New Guinea to the Fiji; _Casarea dussumieri_ is restricted to Round Island, near Mauritius; and two species of _Boa_ and one of _Corallus_ represent this subfamily in Madagascar, while all the other boas live in America, chiefly in tropical parts. All _Boidae_ possess vestiges of pelvis and hind limbs, appearing externally as claw-like spurs on each side of the vent, but they are so small that they are practically without function in climbing. The usually short tail is prehensile.

One of the commonest species of the genus _Boa_ is the _Boa constrictor_, which has a wide range from tropical Mexico to Brazil. The head is covered with small scales, only one of the preoculars being enlarged. The general colour is a delicate pale brown, with about a dozen and a half darker cross-bars, which are often connected by a still darker dorso-lateral streak, enclosing large oval spots. On each side is a series of large dark brown spots with light centres. On the tail the markings become bolder, brick red with black and yellow. The under parts are yellowish with black dots. This species rarely reaches a length of more than 10 ft. It climbs well, prefers open forest in the neighbourhood of water, is often found in plantations where it retires into a hole in the ground, and lives chiefly on birds and small mammals. Like most true boas, it is of a very gentle disposition and easily domesticates itself in the palm or reed thatched huts of the natives, where it hunts the rats during the night.

The term "boa" is applied by analogy to a long article of women's dress wound round the neck.

BOABDIL (a corruption of the name Abu Abdullah), the last Moorish king of Granada, called _el chico_, the little, and also _el zogoybi_, the unfortunate. A son of Muley Abu'l Hassan, king of Granada, he was proclaimed king in 1482 in place of his father, who was driven from the land. Boabdil soon after sought to gain prestige by invading Castile. He was taken prisoner at Lucena in 1483, and only obtained his freedom by consenting to hold Granada as a tributary kingdom under Ferdinand and Isabella, king and queen of Castile and Aragon. The next few years were consumed in struggles with his father and his uncle Abdullah ez Zagal. In 1491 Boabdil was summoned by Ferdinand and Isabella to surrender the city of Granada, and on his refusal it was besieged by the Castilians. Eventually, in January 1492, Granada was surrendered, and the king spent some time on the lands which he was allowed to hold in Andalusia. Subsequently he crossed to Africa, and is said to have been killed in battle fighting for his kinsman, the ruler of Fez. The spot from which Boabdil looked for the last time on Granada is still shown, and is known as "the last sigh of the Moor" (_el ultimo suspire del Moro_).

See J.A. Conde, _Dominacion de los Arabes en Espana_ (Paris, 1840),
translated into English by Mrs J. Foster (London, 1854-1855);
Washington Irving, _The Alhambra_ (New York, ed. 1880).

BOADICEA, strictly BOUDICCA, a British queen in the time of the emperor Nero. Her husband Prasutagus ruled the Iceni (in what is now Norfolk) as an autonomous prince under Roman suzerainty. On his death (A.D. 61) without male heir, his dominions were annexed, and the annexation was carried out brutally. He had by his will divided his private wealth between his two daughters and Nero, trusting thereby to win imperial favour for his family. Instead, his wife was scourged (doubtless for resisting the annexation), his daughters outraged, his chief tribesmen plundered. The proud, fierce queen and her people rose, and not alone. With them rose half Britain, enraged, for other causes, at Roman rule. Roman taxation and conscription lay heavy on the province; in addition, the Roman government had just revoked financial concessions made a few years earlier, and L. Annaeus Seneca, who combined the parts of a moralist and a money-lender, had abruptly recalled large loans made from his private wealth to British chiefs. A favourable chance for revolt was provided by the absence of the governor-general, Suetonius Paulinus, and most of his troops in North Wales and Anglesey. All south-east Britain joined the movement. Paulinus rushed back without waiting for his troops, but he could do nothing alone. The Britons burnt the Roman municipalities of Verulam and Colchester, the mart of London, and several military posts, massacred "over 70,000" Romans and Britons friendly to Rome, and almost annihilated the Ninth Legion marching from Lincoln to the rescue. At last Paulinus, who seems to have rejoined his army, met the Britons in the field. The site of the battle is unknown. One writer has put it at Chester; others at London, where King's Cross had once a narrow escape of being christened Boadicea's Cross, and actually for many years bore the name of Battle Bridge, in supposed reference to this battle. Probably, however, it was on Watling Street, between London and Chester. In a desperate soldiers' battle Rome regained the province. Boadicea took poison; thousands of Britons fell in the fight or were hunted down in the ensuing guerrilla. Finally, Rome adopted a kindlier policy, and Britain became quiet. But the scantiness of Romano-British remains in Norfolk may be due to the severity with which the Iceni were crushed.

See Tacitus, _Annals_, xiv.; _Agric_. xv.; Dio lxii. The name Boudicca
seems to mean in Celtic much the same as Victoria. (F. J. H.)

BOAR (O. Eng. _bar_; the word is found only in W. Ger. languages, cf. Dutch _beer_, Ger. _Eber_), the name given to the un-castrated male of the domestic pig (q.v.), and to some wild species of the family _Suidae_ (see SWINE). The European wild boar (_Sus scrofa_) is distributed over Europe, northern Africa, and central and northern Asia. It has long been extinct in the British Isles, where it once abounded, but traces have been found of its survival in Chartley Forest, Staffordshire, in an entry of 1683 in an account-book of the steward of the manor, and it possibly remained till much later in the more remote parts of Scotland and Ireland (J.E. Harting, _Extinct British Animals_, 1880). The wild boar is still found in Europe, in marshy woodland districts where there is plenty of cover, and it is fairly plentiful in Spain, Austria, Russia and Germany, particularly in the Black Forest.

From the earliest times, owing to its great strength, speed, and ferocity when at bay, the boar has been one of the favourite beasts of the chase. Under the old forest laws of England it was one of the "beasts of the forest," and, as such, under the Norman kings the unprivileged killing of it was punishable by death or the loss of a member. It was hunted in England and in Europe on foot and on horseback with dogs, while the weapon of attack was always the spear. In Europe the wild boar is still hunted with dogs, but the spear, except when used in emergencies and for giving the _coup de grace_, has been given up for the gun. It is also shot in great forest drives in Austria, Germany and Russia. The Indian wild boar (_Sus cristatus_) is slightly taller than _Sus scrofa_, standing some 30 to 40 in. at the shoulder. It is found throughout India, Ceylon and Burma. Here the horse and spear are still used, and the sport is one of the most popular in India. (See PIG-STICKING.)

The boar is one of the four heraldic beasts of venery, and was the cognizance of Richard III., king of England. As an article of food the boar's head was long considered a special delicacy, and its serving was attended with much ceremonial. At Queen's College, Oxford, the dish is still brought on Christmas day in procession to the high-table, accompanied by the singing of a carol.

BOARD (O. Eng. _bord_), a plank or long narrow piece of timber. The word comes into various compounds to describe boards used for special purposes, or objects like boards (drawing-board, ironing-board, sounding-board, chess-board, cardboard, back-board, notice-board, scoring-board). The phrase "to keep one's name on the boards," at Cambridge University, signifies to remain a member of a college; at Oxford it is "on the books." In bookbinding, pasteboard covers are called boards. Board was early used of a table, hence such phrases as "bed and board," "board and lodging"; or of a gaming-table, as in the phrase "to sweep the board," meaning to pocket all the stakes, hence, figuratively, to carry all before one. The same meaning leads to "Board of Trade," "Local Government Board," &c.

From the meaning of border or side, and especially ship's side, comes "sea-board," meaning sea-coast, and the phrases "aboard" (Fr. _abord_), "over-board," "by the board"; similarly "weather-board," the side of a ship which is to windward; "larboard and starboard" (the former of uncertain origin, Mid. Eng. _laddeboard_ or _latheboard_; the latter meaning "steering side," O. Eng. _steorbord_, the rudder of early ships working over the steering side), signifying (to one standing at the stern and looking forward) the left and right sides of the ship respectively.

BOARDING-HOUSE, a private house in which the proprietor provides board and lodging for paying guests. The position of a guest in a boarding-house differs in English law, to some extent, on the one hand from that of a lodger in the ordinary sense of the term, and on the other from that of a guest in an inn. Unlike the lodger, he frequently has not the exclusive occupation of particular rooms. Unlike the guest in an inn, his landlord has no lien upon his property for rent or any other debt due in respect of his board (_Thompson v. Lacy_, 1820, 3 B. and Ald. 283). The landlord is under an obligation to take reasonable care for the safety of property brought by a guest into his house, and is liable for damages in case of breach of this obligation (_Scarborough v. Cosgrove_, 1905, 2 K.B. 803). Again, unlike the innkeeper, a boarding-house keeper does not hold himself out as ready to receive all travellers for whom he has accommodation, for which they are ready to pay, and of course he is entitled to get rid of any guest on giving reasonable notice (see _Lamond v. Richard_, 1897, I Q.B. 541, 548). What is reasonable notice depends on the terms of the contract; and, subject thereto, the course of payment of rent is a material circumstance (see LANDLORD AND TENANT). Apparently the same implied warranty of fitness for habitation at the commencement of the tenancy which exists in the case of furnished lodgings (see LODGER AND LODGINGS) exists also in the case of boarding-houses; and the guest in a boarding-house, like a lodger, is entitled to all the usual and necessary conveniences of a dwelling-house.

The law of the United States is similar to English law.

Under the French Code Civil, claims for subsistence furnished to a debtor and his family during the last year of his life by boarding-house keepers (_maitres de pension_) are privileged over the generality of moveables, the privilege being exerciseable after legal expenses, funeral expenses, the expenses of the last illness, and the wages of servants for the year elapsed and what is due for the current year (art. 2101 (5)). Keepers of taverns (_aubergistes_) and hotels (_hoteliers_) are responsible for the goods of their guests--the committal of which to their custody is regarded as a deposit of necessity (_depot necessaire_). They are liable for the loss of such goods by theft, whether by servants or strangers, but not where the loss is due to _force majeure_ (arts. 1952-1954). Their liability for money and bearer securities not actually deposited is limited to 1000 francs (law of 18th of April 1889). These provisions are reproduced in substance in the Civil Codes of Quebec (arts. 1814, 1815, 1994, 2006) and of St Lucia (art. 1889). In Quebec, boarding-house keepers have a lien on the goods of their guests for the value or price of any food or accommodation furnished to them, and have also a right to sell their baggage and other property, if the amount remains unpaid for three months, under conditions similar to those imposed on innkeepers in England (art. 1816 A; and see INNS AND INNKEEPERS); also in the Civil Code of St Lucia (arts. 1578, 1714, 1715) (A. W. R.)

BOARDING-OUT SYSTEM, in the English poor law, the boarding-out of orphan or deserted children with suitable foster-parents. The practice was first authorized in 1868, though for many years previously it had been carried out by some boards of guardians on their own initiative. Boarding-out is governed by two orders of the Local Government Board, issued in 1889. The first permits guardians to board-out children within their own union, except in the metropolis. The second governs the boarding-out of children in localities outside the union. The sum payable to the foster-parents is not to exceed 4s. per week for each child. The system has been much discussed by authorities on the administration of the poor law. It has been objected that few working-men with an average-sized family can afford to devote such an amount for the maintenance of each child, and that, therefore, boarded-out children are better off than the children of the independent (Fawcett, _Pauperism_). Working-class guardians, also, do not favour the system, being suspicious as to the disinterestedness of the foster-parents. On the other hand, it is argued that from the economic and educational point of view much better results are obtained by boarding-out children; they are given a natural life, and when they grow up they are without effort merged in the general population (Mackay, _Hist. Eng. Poor Law_). See also POOR LAW.

The "boarding-out" of lunatics is, in Scotland, a regular part of the lunacy administration. It has also been successfully adopted in Belgium. (See INSANITY.)

BOARDMAN, GEORGE DANA (1801-1831), American Baptist missionary, was born at Livermore, Me., and educated at Waterville College and Andover Theological Seminary. In 1825 he went to India as a missionary, and in 1827 to Burma, where his promising work among the Karens was cut short by his early death. His widow married another well-known Burmese missionary, Adoniram Judson.

His son, GEORGE DANA BOARDMAN, the younger (1828-1903), made the voyage from Burma to America alone when six years of age. He graduated in 1852 at Brown University, and from the Newton Theological Institution in 1855. He held Baptist pastorates at Rochester (1856-1864), and at Philadelphia, and was president of the American Baptist Missionary Union, 1880-1884. At Philadelphia he is said to have taken his congregation through every verse of the New Testament in 643 Wednesday evening lectures, which occupied nearly eighteen years, and afterwards to have begun on the Old Testament in similar fashion. Among his published works are _Studies in the Model Prayer_ (1879), and _Epiphanies of the Risen Lord_ (1879).

BOASE, HENRY SAMUEL (1799-1883), English geologist, the eldest son of Henry Boase (1763-1827), banker, of Madron, Cornwall, was born in London on the 2nd of September 1799. Educated partly at Tiverton grammar-school, and partly at Dublin, where he studied chemistry, he afterwards proceeded to Edinburgh and took the degree of M.D. in 1821. He then settled for some years as a medical practitioner at Penzance; there geology engaged his particular attention, and he became secretary of the Royal Geological Society of Cornwall. The results of his observations were embodied in his _Treatise on Primary Geology_ (1834), a work of considerable merit in regard to the older crystalline and igneous rocks and the subject of mineral veins. In 1837 he removed to London, where he remained for about a year, being elected F.R.S. In 1838 he became partner in a firm of bleachers at Dundee. He retired in 1871, and died on the 5th of May 1883.

BOAT (O. Eng. _bat_; the true etymological connexion with Dutch and Ger. _boot_, Fr. _bateau_, Ital. _battello_ presents great difficulties; Celtic forms are from O. Eng.), a comparatively small open craft for conveyance on water, usually propelled by some form of oar or sail.

The origin of the word "boat" is probably to be looked for in the A.S. _bat_ = a stem, a stick, a piece of wood. If this be so, the term in its inception referred to the material of which the primitive vessel was constructed, and in this respect may well be contrasted with the word "ship," of which the primary idea was the _process_ by which the material was fashioned and adapted for the use of man.

We may assume that primitive man, in his earliest efforts to achieve the feat of conveying himself and his belongings by water, succeeded in doing so--(1) by fastening together a quantity of material of sufficient buoyancy to float and carry him above the level of the water; (2) by scooping out a fallen tree so as to obtain buoyancy enough for the same purpose. In these two processes is to be found the genesis of both boat and ship, of which, though often used as convertible terms, the former is generally restricted to the smaller type of vessel such as is dealt with in this article. For the larger type the reader is referred to SHIP.

Great must have been the triumph of the man who first discovered that the rushes or the trunks he had managed to tie together would, propelled by a stick or a branch (cf. _ramus_ and _remus_) used as pole or paddle, convey him safely across the river or lake, which had hitherto been his barrier. But use multiplies wants, discovers deficiencies, suggests improvements. Man soon found out that he wanted to go faster than the raft would move, that the water washed over and up through it, and this need of speed, and of dry carrying power, which we find operative throughout the history of the boat down to the present day, drove him to devise other modes of flotation as well as to try to improve his first invention.

The invention of the hollowed trunk, of the "dug-out" (monoxylon), however it came about, whenever and wherever it came into comparison with the raft, must have superseded the latter for some purposes, though not by any means for all. It was superior to the raft in speed, and was, to a certain extent, water-tight. On the other hand it was inferior in carrying power and stability. But the two types once conceived had come to stay, and to them severally, or to attempts to combine the useful properties of both, may be traced all the varieties of vessel to which the name of boat may be applied.

The development of the raft is admirably illustrated in the description, given us by Homer in the Odyssey, of the construction by the hero Ulysses of a vessel of the kind. Floating timber is cut down and carefully shaped and planed with axe and adze, and the timbers are then exactly fitted face to face and compacted with trenails and dowels, just as the flat floor of a lump or lighter might be fashioned and fitted nowadays. A platform is raised upon the floor and a bulwark of osiers contrived to keep out the wash of the waves (cf. _infra_, Malay boats). It seems as if the poet, who was intimately acquainted with the sea ways of his time, intended to convey the idea of progress in construction, as illustrated by the technical skill of his hero, and the use of the various tools with which he supplies him.

On the other hand the dug-out had its limitations. The largest tree that could be thrown and scooped out afforded but a narrow space for carrying goods, and presented problems as to stability which must have been very difficult to solve. The shaping of bow and stern, the bulging out of the sides, the flattening of the bottom, the invention of a keel piece, the attempt to raise the sides by building up with planks, all led on towards the idea of constructing a boat properly so called, or perhaps to the invention of the canoe, which in some ways may be regarded as the intermediate stage between dug-out and boat.

Meanwhile the raft had undergone improvements such as those which Homer indicates. It had arrived at a floor composed of timbers squared and shaped. It had risen to a platform, the prototype of a deck. It was but a step to build up the sides and turn up the ends, and at this point we reach the genesis of ark and punt, of sanpan and junk, or, in other words, of all the many varieties of flat-bottomed craft.

When once we have reached the point at which the improvements in the construction of the raft and dug-out bring them, as it were, within sight of each other, we can enter upon the history of the development of boats properly so called, which, in accordance with the uses and the circumstances that dictated their build, may be said to be descended from the raft or the dug-out, or from the attempt to combine the respective advantages of the two original types.

Uses and circumstances are infinite in variety and have produced an infinite variety of boats. But we may safely say that in all cases the need to be satisfied, the nature of the material available, and the character of the difficulties to be overcome have governed the reason and tested the reasonableness of the architecture of the craft in use.

It is not proposed in this article to enter at any length into the details of the construction of boats, but it is desirable, for the sake of clearness, to indicate certain broad distinctions in the method of building, which, though they run back into the far past, in some form or other survive and are in use at the present day.

The tying of trunks together to form a raft is still not unknown in the lumber trade of the Danube or of North America, nor was it in early days confined to the raft. It extended to many boats properly so called, even to many of those built by the Vikings of old. It may still be seen in the Madras surf boats, and in those constructed out of driftwood by the inhabitants of Easter Island in the south Pacific. Virgil, who was an archaeologist, represents Charon's boat on the Styx as of this construction, and notes the defect, which still survives, in the craft of the kind when loaded--

"Gemuit sub pondere cymba
Sutilis, et multam accepit rimosa paludem!"
_Aen._ vi. 303.

Next to the raft, and to be counted in direct descent from it, comes the whole class of flat-bottomed boats including punts and lighters. As soon as the method of constructing a solid floor, with trenails and dowels, had been discovered, the method of converting it into a water-tight box was pursued, sides were attached plank fashion, with strong knees to stiffen them, and cross pieces to _yoke_ or _key_ (cf. [Greek: zugon, klaeis]) them together. These thwarts once fixed naturally suggested seats for those that plied the paddle or the oar. The ends of the vessel were shaped into bow or stern, either turned up, or with the side planking convergent in stem or stern post, or joined together fore and aft by bulkheads fitted in, while interstices were made water-tight by caulking, and by smearing with bitumen or some resinous material.

The evolution of the boat as distinct from the punt, or flat-bottomed type, and following the configuration of the dug-out in its length and rounded bottom, must have taxed the inventive art and skill of constructors much more severely than that of the raft. It is possible that the coracle or the canoe may have suggested the construction of a framework of sufficient stiffness to carry a water-tight wooden skin, such as would successfully resist the pressure of wind and water. And in this regard two methods were open to the builder, both of which have survived to the present day: (1) the construction first of the shell of the boat, into which the stiffening ribs and cross ties were subsequently fitted; (2) the construction first of a framework of requisite size and shape, on to which the outer skin of the boat was subsequently attached.

Further, besides the primitive mode of tying the parts together, two main types of build must be noticed, in accordance with which a boat is said to be either carvel-built or clinker-built. (1) A boat is carvel-built when the planks are laid edge to edge so that they present a smooth surface without. (2) A boat is clinker-built when each plank is laid on so as to overlap the one below it, thus presenting a series of ledges running longitudinally.

The former method is said to be of Mediterranean, or perhaps of Eastern origin. The latter was probably invented by the old Scandinavian builders, and from them handed down through the fishing boats of the northern nations to our own time.

Ancient boats.

The accounts of vessels used by the Egyptians and Phoenicians generally refer to larger craft which naturally fall under the head of SHIP (q.v.). The Nile boats, however, described by Herodotus (ii. 60), built of acacia wood, were no doubt of various sizes, some of them quite small, but all following the same type of construction, built up brick fashion, the blocks being fastened internally to long poles secured by cross pieces, and the interstices caulked with papyrus. The ends rose high above the water, and to prevent hogging were often attached by a truss running longitudinally over crutches from stem to stern.

The Assyrian and Babylonian vessels described by Herodotus (i. 194), built up of twigs and boughs, and covered with skins smeared with bitumen, were really more like huge coracles and hardly deserve the name of boats.

The use of boats by the Greeks and Romans is attested by the frequent reference to them in Greek and Latin literature, though, as regards such small craft, the details given are hardly enough to form the basis of an accurate classification.

We hear of small boats attendant on a fleet ([Greek: kelaetion], Thuc. i. 53), and of similar craft employed in piracy (Thuc. iv. 9), and in one case of a sculling boat, or pair oar ([Greek: akation amphaerikon], Thuc. iv. 67), which was carted up and down between the town of Megara and the sea, being used for the purpose of marauding at night. We are also familiar with the passage in the Acts (xxvii.) where in the storm they had hard work "to come by the boat"; which same boat the sailors afterwards "let down into the sea, under colour as though they would have cast anchors out of the foreship," and would have escaped to land in her themselves, leaving the passengers to drown, if the centurion and soldiers acting upon St Paul's advice had not cut off the ropes of the boat and let her fall off.

There can be little doubt that boat races were in vogue among the Greeks (see Prof. Gardner, _Journal of Hellenic Studies_, ii. 91 ff.), and probably formed part of the Panathenaic and Isthmian festivals. It is, however, difficult to prove that small boats took part in these races, though it is not unlikely that they may have done so. The testimony of the coins, such as it is, points to galleys, and the descriptive term ([Greek: neon amilla]) leads to the same conclusion.

It is hardly possible now to define the differences which separated [Greek: akatos], [Greek: akation], from [Greek: kelaes], [Greek: kelaetion], or from [Greek: lembos] or [Greek: karabos]. They seem all to have been rowing boats, probably carvel-built, some with keels (_acatii modo carinata_, Plin. ix. 19), and to have varied in size, some being simply sculling boats, and others running up to as many as thirty oars.

Similarly in Latin authors we have frequent mention of boats accompanying ships of war. Of this there is a well-known instance in the account of Caesar's invasion of Britain (_B.G._ iv. 26), when the boats of the fleet, and the pinnaces, were filled with soldiers and sent to assist the Legionaries who were being fiercely attacked as they waded on to the shore. There is also an instance in the civil war, which is a prototype of a modern attack of torpedo boats upon men of war, when Antonius manned the pinnaces of his large ships to the number of sixty, and with them attacked and defeated an imprudent squadron of Quadriremes (_B.C._ iii. 24). The class of boats so frequently mentioned as _actuariae_ seems to have contained craft of all sizes, and to have been used for all purposes, whether as pleasure boats or as despatch vessels, or for piracy. In fact the term was employed vaguely just as we speak of craft in general.

The _lembus_, which is often referred to in Livy and Polybius, seems to have been of Illyrian origin, with fine lines and sharp bows. The class contained boats of various sizes and with a variable number of oars (biremis, Livy xxiv. 40, sexdecim, Livy xxxiv. 35); and it is interesting to note the origin in this case, as the invention of the light Liburnian galleys, which won the battle of Actium, and altered the whole system of naval construction, came from the same seaboard.

Besides these, the piratical _myoparones_ (see Cic. _In Verrem_), and the poetical _phaselus_, deserve mention, but here again we are met with the difficulty of distinguishing boats from ships. There is also an interesting notice in Tacitus (_Hist_. iii. 47) of boats hastily constructed by the natives of the northern coast of Asia Minor, which he describes as of broad beam with narrow sides (probably meaning that the sides "tumbled home"), joined together without any fastenings of brass or iron. In a sea-way the sides were raised with planks added till they were cased in as with a roof, whence their name _camarae_, and so they rolled about in the waves, having prow and stern alike and convertible rowlocks, so that it was a matter of indifference and equally safe, or perhaps unsafe, whichever way they rowed.

Similar vessels were constructed by Germanicus in his north German campaign (_Ann_. ii. 6) and by the Suiones (_Ger_. 44). These also had stem and stern alike, and remind us of the old Norse construction, being rowed either way, having the oars loose in the rowlock, and not, as was usual in the south, attached by a thong to the thowl pin.

Lastly, as a class of boat directly descended from the raft, we may notice the flat-bottomed boats or punts or lighters which plied on the Tiber as ferry-boats, or carrying goods, which were called _codicariae_ from _caudex_, the old word for a plank.

It is difficult to trace any order of development in the construction of boats during the Byzantine period, or the middle ages. Sea-going vessels according to their size carried one or more boats, some of them small boats with two or four oars, others boats of a larger size fitted with masts and sail as well as with oars. We find _lembus_ and _phaselus_ as generic names in the earlier period, but the indications as to size and character are vague and variable. The same may be said of the _batelli, coquets, chaloupes, chalans, gattes_, &c., of which, in almost endless number and variety, the nautical erudition of M. Jal has collected the names in his monumental works, _Archeologie navale_ and the _Glossaire nautique_.

It is clear, however, that in many instances the names, originally applied to boats properly so called, gradually attached themselves to larger vessels, as in the case of _chaloupe_ and others, a fact which leads to the conclusion that the type of build followed originally in smaller vessels was often developed on a larger scale, according as it was found useful and convenient, while the name remained the same. Many of these types still survive and may be found in the Eastern seas, or in the Mediterranean or in the northern waters, each of which has its own peculiarities of build and rig.

Existing types.

It would be impossible within our limits to do justice to the number and variety of existing types in sea-going boats, and for more detailed information concerning them the reader would do well to consult _Mast and Sail in Europe and Asia_, by H. Warington Smyth, an excellent and exhaustive work, from which much of the information which follows regarding them has been derived.

In the Eastern seas the Chinese _sanpan_ is ubiquitous. Originally a small raft of three timbers with fore end upturned, it grew into a boat in very early times, and has given its name to a very large class of vessels. With flat bottom, and considerable width in proportion to its length, the normal sanpan runs out into two tails astern, the timbers rounding up, and the end being built in like a bulkhead, with room for the rudder to work between it and the transom which connects the two projecting upper timbers of the stern. Some of them are as much as 30 ft. in length and 8 to 10 ft. in beam. They are good carriers and speedy under sail.

The Chinese in all probability were the earliest of all peoples to solve the chief problems of boat building, and after their own fashion to work out the art of navigation, which for them has now been set and unchanged for thousands of years. They appear to have used the lee-board and centre-board in junks and sanpans, and to have extended their trade to India and even beyond, centuries before anything like maritime enterprise is heard of in the north of Europe.

As regards the practice of long boat racing on rivers or tidal waters the Chinese are easily antecedent in time to the rest of the world. On great festivals in certain places the Dragon boat race forms part of the ceremony. The Dragon boats are just over 73 ft. long, with 4 ft. beam, and depth 21 in. The rowing or paddling space is about 63 ft. and the number of thwarts 27, thus giving exactly the same number of rowers as that of the Zygites in the Greek trireme. The two extremities of the boat are much cambered and rise to about 2 ft. above the water. At about 15 ft. from each end the single plank gives place to three, so as to offer a concave surface to the water. The paddle blade is spade-like in form and about 6-1/2 in. broad.

Both in Siam and Burma there is a very large river population, and boat racing is on festival days a common amusement. The typical craft, however, is the Duck-boat, which in the shape of hull is in direct contrast to the dug-out form, and primarily intended for sailing. It is interesting to note that the Siamese method of slinging and using quarter rudders is the oldest used by men in sailing craft, being in fact the earliest development from the simple paddle rudder, which has in all ages been the first method of steering boats. The king of Siam's state barge, we are told, is steered by long paddles, precisely in the same way as is figured in the case of the Egyptian boats of the 3rd dynasty (6000 B.C.). On the other hand the slung quarter rudders are the same in fashion as those used by Roman and Greek merchantmen, by Norsemen and Anglo-Saxons, and by medieval seamen down to about the 14th century.

The Malays have generally the credit of being expert boat-builders, but the local conditions are not such as to favour the construction of a good type of boat. "Small displacement, hollow lines, V-shaped sections, shallow draught and lack of beam" result in want of stability and weatherliness. But it is among them that the ancient process of dug-out building still survives and flourishes, preserving all the primitive and ingenious methods of hollowing the tree trunk, of forcing its sides outwards, and in many cases building them up with added planks, so that from the dug-out a regular boat is formed, with increased though limited carrying power, increased though still hardly sufficient stability.

To ensure this last very necessary quality many devices and contrivances are resorted to.

In some cases (just as Ulysses is described as doing by Homer, _Od_. v. 256) the boatman fastens bundles of reeds or of bamboos all along the sides of his boat. These being very buoyant not only act as a defence against the wash of the waves, but are sufficient to keep the boat afloat in any sea.