Chapter III: THE SOUTHERN ZONE.--Characterized by absence of Cyprinidae and (14)

Blurred definition, then, as it exists in our natural view of things, is admitted into painting; a blurring that may arise from distance, from vapour or smoke, from brilliant light, from obscurity, or simply from the nearness in value of adjacent objects. Similarly, much detail that in primitive art is elaborated is absorbed by rendering the aspect instead of the facts known to make up that aspect. Thus hair and fur, the texture of stuffs, the blades of grass at a little distance, become patches of tone showing only their larger constructive markings. But the blurring of definitions and the elimination of detail that we find in modern pictorial art are not all of this ready-made character. We have so far only the scientific analysis of a field of view. If the painter were a scientific reporter he would have to pursue the systems of planes, with their shapes and values, to infinity. Impressionism is the art that surveys the field and determines which of the shapes and tones are of chief importance to the _interested_ eye, enforces these, and sacrifices the rest. Construction, the logic of the object rendered, determines partly this action of the eye, and also decoration, the effects of rhythm in line and harmony in fields of colour. These motives belong to all art, but the specially impressionist motive is the act of _attention_ as it affects the aspect of the field. We are familiar, in the ordinary use of the eye, with two features of its structure that limit clearness of vision. There is, first, the spot of clear vision on the retina, outside of which all falls away into blur; there is, secondly, the action of _focus_. As the former limits clear definition to one spot in the field extended vertically and laterally, so focus limits clear definition to one plane in the third dimension, viz. depth. If three objects, A, B and C, stand at different depths before the eye, we can at will fix A, whereupon B and C must fall out of focus, or B, whereupon A and C must be blurred, or C, sacrificing the clearness of A and B. All this apparatus makes it impossible to see everything at once with equal clearness, enables us, and forces us for the uses of real life, to frame and limit our picture, according to the immediate interest of the eye, whatever it may be. The painter instinctively uses these means to arrive at the emphasis and neglect that his choice requires. If he is engaged on a face he will now screw his attention to a part and now relax it, distributing the attention over the whole so as to restore the bigger relations of aspect. Sir Joshua Reynolds describes this process as seeing the whole "with the dilated eye"; the commoner precept of the studios is "to look with the eyes half closed"; a third way is to throw the whole voluntarily out of focus. In any case the result is that minor planes are swamped in bigger, that smaller patches of colour are swept up into broader, that markings are blurred. The final result of these tentative reviews records, in what is blurred and what is clear, the attention that has been distributed to different parts, and to parts measured against the whole. The Impressionist painter does not allot so much detail to a face in a full-length portrait as to a head alone, nor to twenty figures on a canvas as to one. Again, he indicates by his treatment of planes and definitions whether the main subject of his picture is in the foreground or the distance. He persuades the eye to slip over hosts of near objects so that, as in life, it may hit a distant target, or concentrate its attack on what is near, while the distance falls away into a dim curtain. All those devices by which attention is directed and distributed, and the importance in space of an object established, affect impressionistic composition.

It is an inevitable misunderstanding of painting which plays the game of art so closely up to the real aspects of nature that its aim is that of mere exact copying. Painting like Manet's, accused of being realistic in this sense, sufficiently disproves the accusation when examined. Never did painting show a _parti pris_ more pronounced, even more violent. The elisions and assertions by which Manet selects what he finds significant and beautiful in the complete natural image are startling to the stupid realist, and the Impressionist may best be described as the painter who out of the completed contents of vision constructs an image moulded upon his own interest in the thing seen and not on that of any imaginary schoolmaster. Accepting the most complex terms of nature with their special emotions, he uses the same freedom of sacrifice as the man who at the other end of the scale expresses his interest in things by a few scratches of outline. The perpetual enemy of both is the eclectic, who works for possible interests not his own.

Some of the points touched on above will be found amplified in
articles by the writer in _The Albemarle_ (September 1892), the
_Fortnightly Review_ (June 1894), and _The Artist_ (March-July 1896).
An admirable exposition of Impressionism in this sense is R. A. M.
Stevenson's _The Art of Velasquez_ (1895). Mr Stevenson was trained in
the school of Carolus Duran, where impressionist painting was reduced
to a system. Mr Sargent's painting is a brilliant example of the
system. (D. S. M.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] Mr H. P. Hain Friswell has pointed out that the word "impression"
occurs frequently in Chevreul's book on colour; but it is also
current among the critics. See Ruskin's chapter on Turner's
composition--"impression on the mind."

IMPRESSMENT, the name given in English to the exercise of the authority of the state to "press"[1] or compel the service of the subject for the defence of the realm. Every sovereign state must claim and at times exercise this power. The "drafting" of men for service in the American Civil War was a form of impressment. All the monarchical, or republican, governments of Europe have employed the press at one time or another. All forms of conscription, including the English ballot for the militia, are but regulations of this sovereign right. In England impressment may be looked upon as an erratic, and often oppressive, way of enforcing the common obligation to serve in "the host" or in the _posse comitatus_ (power of the county). In Scotland, where the feudal organization was very complete in the Lowlands, and the tribal organization no less complete in the Highlands, and where the state was weak, impressment was originally little known. After the union of the two parliaments in 1707, no distinction was made between the two divisions of Great Britain. In England the kings of the Plantagenet dynasty caused Welshmen to be pressed by the Lords Marchers, and Irish kerns to be pressed by the Lords Deputy, for their wars in France. Complaints were made by parliament of the oppressive use of this power as early as the reign of Edward III., but it continued to be exercised. Readers of Shakespeare will remember Sir John Falstaff's commission to press soldiers, and the manner, justified no doubt by many and familiar examples of the way in which the duty was performed. A small sum called imprest-money, or coat and conduct money, was given to the men when pressed to enable them to reach the appointed rendezvous. Soldiers were secured in this way by Queen Elizabeth, by King Charles I., and by the parliament itself in the Civil War. The famous New Model Army of Cromwell was largely raised by impressment. Parliament ordered the county committees to select recruits of "years meet for their employment and well clothed." After the Revolution of 1688 parliament occasionally made use of this resource. In 1779 a general press of all rogues and vagabonds in London to be drafted into the regiments was ordered. It is said that all who were not too lame to run away or too destitute to bribe the parish constable were swept into the net. As they were encouraged to desert by the undisguised connivance of the officers and men who were disgusted with their company, no further attempt to use the press for the army was made.

A distinction between the liability of sailors and of other men dates from the 16th century. From an act of Philip and Mary (1556) it appears that the watermen of the Thames claimed exemption from the press as a privileged body. They were declared liable, and the liability was clearly meant to extend to service as a soldier on shore. In the fifth year of Queen Elizabeth (1563) an act was passed to define the liability of the sailors. It is known as "an Act touching politick considerations for the maintenance of the Navy." By its term all fishermen and mariners were protected from being compelled "to serve as any soldiers upon the Land or upon the Sea, otherwise than as a mariner, except it shall be to serve under any Captain of some ship or vessel, for landing to do some special exploit which mariners have been used to do." The operation of the act was limited to ten years, but it was renewed repeatedly, and was at last indefinitely prolonged in the sixteenth year of the reign of Charles I. (1631). By the Vagrancy Act of the close of Queen Elizabeth's reign (1597), disorderly serving-men and other disreputable characters, of whom a formidable list is given, were declared to be liable to be impressed for service in the fleet. The "Takers," as they were called in early times, the Press Gang of later days, were ordered to present their commission to two justices of the peace, who were bound to pick out "such sufficient number of able men, as in the said commission shall be contained, to serve Her Majesty as aforesaid." The justices of the peace in the coast districts, who were often themselves concerned in the shipping trade, were not always zealous in enforcing the press. The pressed sailors often deserted with the "imprest money" given them. Loud complaints were made by the naval officers of the bad quality of the men sent up to serve in the king's ships. On the other hand, the Press Gangs were accused of extorting money, and of making illegal arrests. In the reign of Queen Anne (1703) an act was passed "for the increase of Seamen and the better encouragement of navigation, and the protection of the Coal Trade." The act which gave parish authorities power to apprentice boys to the sea exempted the apprentices from the press for three years, and until the age of eighteen. It especially reaffirmed the part of the Vagrancy Act of Elizabeth's reign which left rogues and vagabonds subject to be pressed for the sea service. By the act for the "Increase of Mariners and Seamen to navigate Merchant Ships and other trading ships or vessels," passed in the reign of George II. (1740), all men over fifty-five were exempted from the press together with lads under eighteen, foreigners serving in British ships (always numerous in war time), and landsmen who had gone to sea during their first two years. The act for "the better supplying of the cities of London and Westminster with fish" gave exemption to all masters of fishing-boats, to four apprentices and one mariner to each boat, and all landsmen for two years, except in case of actual invasion. By the act for the encouragement of insurance passed in 1774, the fire insurance companies in London were entitled to secure exemption for thirty watermen each in their employment. Masters and mates of merchant vessels, and a proportion of men per ship in the colliers trading from the north to London, were also exempt.

Subject to such limitations as these, all seafaring men, and watermen on rivers, were liable to be pressed between the ages of eighteen and fifty-five, and might be pressed repeatedly for so long as their liability lasted. The rogue and vagabond element were at the mercy of the justices of the peace. The frightful epidemics of fever which desolated the navy till late in the 18th century were largely due to the infection brought by the prisoners drafted from the ill-kept jails of the time. As service in the fleet was most unpopular with the sailors, the press could often only be enforced by making a parade of strength and employing troops. The men had many friends who were always willing to conceal them, and they themselves became expert in avoiding capture. There was, however, one way of procuring them which gave them no chance of evasion. The merchant ships were stopped at sea and the sailors taken out. This was done to a great extent, more especially in the case of homeward-bound vessels. On one occasion, in 1802, an East Indiaman on her way home was deprived of so many of her crew by a man of war in the Bay of Biscay that she was unable to resist a small French privateer, and was carried off as a prize with a valuable cargo. The press and the jails failed to supply the number of men required. In 1795 it was found necessary to impose on the counties the obligation to provide "a quota" of men, at their own expense. The local authorities provided the recruits by offering high bounties, often to debtors confined in the prisons. These desperate men were a very bad element in the navy. In 1797 they combined with the United Irishmen, of whom large numbers had been drafted into the fleet as vagabonds, to give a very dangerous political character to the mutinies at the Nore and on the south of Ireland. After the conclusion of the great Napoleonic wars in 1815 the power of the press was not again exercised. In 1835 an act was passed during Sir James Graham's tenure of office as first lord of the admiralty, by which men who had once been pressed and had served for a period of five years were to be exempt from impressment in future. Sir James, however, emphatically reaffirmed the right of the crown to enforce the service of the subject, and therefore to impress the seamen. The introduction of engagements for a term of five years in 1853, and then of long service, has produced so large a body of voluntary recruits, and service in the navy is so popular, that the question has no longer any interest save an historical one. If compulsory service in the fleet should again become necessary it will not be in the form of the old system of impressment, which left the sailor subject to compulsory service from the age of eighteen to fifty-five, and flooded the navy with the scum of the jails and the workhouse.

AUTHORITIES.--Grose's _Military Antiquities_, for the general subject
of impressment, vol. ii. p. 73 et seq. S. R. Gardiner gives many
details in his history of James I. and Charles I., and in _The Civil
War_. The acts relating to the navy are quoted in _A Collection of the
Statutes relating to the Admiralty_, &c., published in 1810. Some
curious information is in the papers relating to the Brest Blockade
edited by John Leyland for the Navy Record Society. Sir James Graham's
speech is in Hansard for 1835. (D. H.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] It is now accepted generally that "to press" is a corruption of
"prest," as "impress" is of "imprest," but the word was quite early
connected with "press," to squeeze, crush, hence to compel or force.
The "prest" was a sum of money advanced (O. Fr. _prester_, modern
_prêter_, to lend, Lat. _praestare_, to stand before, provide, become
surety for, &c.) to a person to enable him to perform some
undertaking, hence used of earnest money given to soldiers on
enlistment, or as the "coat and conduct" money alluded to in this
article. The methods of compulsion used to get men for military
service naturally connected the word with "to press" (Lat.
_pressare_, frequentative of _premere_) to force, and all reference
to the money advanced was lost (see _Skeat, Etym. Dict._, 1898, and
the quotation from H. Wedgwood, _Dict. of Eng. Etym._).

IMPROMPTU (from _in promptu_, on the spur of the moment), a short literary composition which has not been, or is not supposed to have been, prepared beforehand, but owes its merit to the ready skill which produces it without premeditation. The word seems to have been introduced from the French language in the middle of the 17th century. Without question, the poets have, from earliest ages, made impromptus, and the very art of poetry, in its lyric form, is of the nature of a modified improvisation. It is supposed that many of the epigrams of the Greeks, and still more probably those of the Roman satirists, particularly Martial, were delivered on the moment, and gained a great part, at least, of their success from the evidence which they gave of rapidity of invention. But it must have been difficult then, as it has been since, to be convinced of the value of that evidence. Who is to be sure that, like Mascarille in _Les Précieuses ridicules_, the impromptu-writer has not employed his leisure in sharpening his arrows? James Smith received the highest praise for his compliment to Miss Tree, the cantatrice:--

On this tree when a nightingale settles and sings,
The Tree will return him as good as he brings.

This was extremely neat, but who is to say that James Smith had not polished it as he dressed for dinner? One writer owed all his fame, and a seat among the Forty Immortals of the French Academy, to the reputation of his impromptus. This was the Marquis François Joseph de St Aulaire (1643-1742). The piece which threw open the doors of the Academy to him in 1706 was composed at Sceaux, where he was staying with the duchess of Maine, who was guessing secrets, and who called him Apollo. St Aulaire instantly responded:--

La divinité qui s'amuse
A me demander mon secret,
Si j'étais Apollon, ne serait pas ma muse,
Elle serait Thétis--et le jour finirait.

This is undoubtedly as neat as it is impertinent, and if the duchess had given him no ground for preparation, this is typical of the impromptu at its best. Voltaire was celebrated for the savage wit of his impromptus, and was himself the subject of a famous one by Young. Less well known but more certainly extemporaneous is the couplet by the last-mentioned poet, who being asked to put something amusing in an album, and being obliged to borrow from Lord Chesterfield a pencil for the purpose, wrote:--

Accept a miracle instead of wit,--
See two dull lines with Stanhope's pencil writ.

The word "impromptu" is sometimes used to designate a short dramatic sketch, the type of which is Molière's famous _Impromptu du Versailles_ (1663), a miniature comedy in prose.

IMPROVISATORE, a word used to describe a poet who recites verses which he composes on the spur of the moment, without previous preparation. The term is purely Italian, although in that language it would be more correctly spelt _improvvisatore_. It became recognized as an English word in the middle of the eighteenth century, and is so used by Smollett in his _Travels_ (1766); he defines an improvisatore as "an individual who has the surprising talent of reciting verses extempore, on any subject you propose." In speaking of a woman, the female form _improvisatrice_ is sometimes used in English.

Improvisation is a gift which properly belongs to those languages in which a great variety of grammatical inflections, wedded to simplicity of rhythm and abundance of rhyme, enable a poet to slur over difficulties in such a way as to satisfy the ear of his audience. In ancient times the greater part of the popular poetry with which the leisure of listeners was beguiled was of this rhapsodical nature. But in modern Europe it was the troubadours, owing to the extreme flexibility of the languages of Provence, who distinguished themselves above all others as improvisatores. It is difficult to believe, however, that the elaborate compositions of these poets, which have come down to us, in which every exquisite artifice of versification is taken advantage of, can have been poured forth without premeditation. These poets, we must rather suppose, took a pride in the ostentation of a prodigious memory, most carefully trained, and poured forth in public what they had laboriously learned by heart in private. The Italians, however, in the 16th century, cultivated what seems to have been a genuine improvisation, in which the bards rhapsodized, not as they themselves pleased, but on subjects which were unexpected by them, and which were chosen on the spot by their patrons. Of these, the most extraordinary is said to have been Silvio Antoniano (1540-1603), who from the age of ten was able to pour out melodious verse on any subject which was suggested to him. He was brought to Rome, where successive popes so delighted in his talent that in 1598 he was made a cardinal. In the 17th century the celebrated Metastasio first attracted attention by his skill as an improvisatore. But he was excelled by Bernardino Perfetti (1681-1747), who was perhaps the most extraordinary genius of this class who has ever lived. He was seized, in his moments of composition, with a transport which transfigured his whole person, and under this excitement he poured forth verses in a miraculous flow. It was his custom to be attended by a guitarist, who played a recitative accompaniment. In this way Perfetti made a triumphal procession through the cities of Italy, ending up with the Capitol of Rome, where Pope Benedict XIII. crowned him with laurel, and created him a Roman citizen. One of the most remarkable improvisatores of modern times appeared in Sweden, in the person of Karl Mikael Bellman (1740-1795), who used to take up a position in the public gardens and parks of Stockholm, accompanying himself on a guitar, and treating metre and rhythm with a virtuosity and originality which place him among the leading poets of Swedish literature. In England, somewhat later, Theodore Hook (1788-1841) developed a surprising talent for this kind, but his verses were rarely of the serious or sentimental character of which we have hitherto spoken. Hook's animal spirits were unfortunately mingled with vulgarity, and his clever _jeux d'esprit_ had little but their smartness to recommend them. A similar talent, exercised in a somewhat more literary direction, made Joseph Méry (1798-1865) a delightful companion in the Parisian society of his day. It is rare indeed that the productions of the improvisatore, taken down in shorthand, and read in the cold light of criticism, are found to justify the impression which the author produced on his original audience. Imperfections of every kind become patent when we read these transcripts, and the reader cannot avoid perceiving weaknesses of style and grammar. The eye and voice of the improvisatore so hypnotize his auditors as to make them incapable of forming a sober judgment on matters of mere literature.

IN-ANTIS, the architectural term given to those temples the entrance part of which consisted of two columns placed between the antae or pilasters (see TEMPLE).

INAUDI, JACQUES (1867- ), Italian calculating prodigy, was born at Onorato, Piedmont, on the 15th of October 1867. When between seven and eight years old, at which time he was employed in herding sheep, he already exhibited an extraordinary aptitude for mental calculation. His powers attracted the notice of various showmen, and he commenced to give exhibitions. He was carefully examined by leading French scientists, including Charcot, from the physiological, psychological and mathematical point of view. The secret of his arithmetical powers appeared to reside in his extraordinary memory, improved by continuous practice. It appeared to depend upon hearing rather than sight, more remarkable results being achieved when figures were read out than when they were written.

INCANTATION, the use of words, spoken, sung or chanted, usually as a set formula, for the purpose of obtaining a result by their supposed magical power. The word is derived from the Latin _incantare_, to chant a magical formula; cf. the use of _carmen_, for such a formula of words. The Latin use is very early; thus it appears in a fragment of the XII. Tables quoted in Pliny (_N.H._ xxviii. 2, 4, 17), "Qui malum carmen incantasset." From the O. Fr. derivative of _incantare_, _enchanter_, comes "enchant," "enchantment," &c., properly of the exercise of magical powers, hence to charm, to fascinate, words which also by origin are of magical significance. The early magi of Assyria and Babylonia were adepts at this art, as is evident from the examples of Akkadian spells that have been discovered. Daniel (v. 11) is spoken of as "master of the enchanters" of Babylon. In Egypt and in India many formulas of religious magic were in use, witness especially the Vedic _mantras_, which are closely akin to the Maori _karakias_ and the North American _matamanik_. Among the holy men presented by the king of Korea to the mikado of Japan in A.D. 577 was a reciter of _mantras_, who would find himself at home with the _majinahi_ or incantation practised by the ancient Japanese for dissipating evil influences. One of the most common, widespread and persistent uses of incantation was in healing wounds, instances of which are found in the _Odyssey_ and the _Kalevala_, and in the traditional folk-lore of almost every European country. Similar songs were sung to win back a faithless lover (cf. the second _Idyll_ of Theocritus).

See further MAGIC.

INCE, WILLIAM, English 18th century furniture designer and cabinetmaker. He was one of the most successful imitators of Chippendale, although his work was in many respects lighter. He helped, indeed, to build the bridge between the massive and often florid style of Chippendale and the more boudoir-like forms of Hepplewhite. Although many of his designs were poor and extravagant, his best work was very good indeed. His chairs are sometimes mistaken for those of Chippendale, to which, however, they are much inferior. He greatly affected the Chinese and Gothic tastes of the second half of the 18th century. He was for many years in partnership in Broad Street, Golden Square, London, with Thomas Mayhew (q.v.), in collaboration with whom he published a folio volume of ninety-five plates, with letterpress in English and French under the title of _The Universal System of Household Furniture_ (undated, but probably about 1762).

INCE-IN-MAKERFIELD, an urban district in the Ince parliamentary division of Lancashire, England, adjoining the borough of Wigan. Pop. (1901) 21,262. The Leeds and Liverpool Canal intersects the township. There are large collieries, ironworks, forges, railway wagon works, and cotton mills. There is preserved here the Old Hall, a beautiful example of half-timbered architecture.

INCENDIARISM (Lat. _incendere_, to set on fire, burn), in law, the wilful or malicious burning of the house or property of another, and punishable as arson (q.v.). It may be noted that in North Carolina it is provided in case of fires that there is to be a preliminary investigation by local authorities: all towns and cities have to make an annual inspection of buildings and a quarterly inspection within fire limits and report to the state insurance commissioner; all expenses so incurred are met by a tax of 1/5% on the gross receipts of the insurance companies (L. 1903, ch. 719).

INCENSE,[1] the perfume (fumigation) arising from certain resins and gum-resins, barks, woods, dried flowers, fruits and seeds, when burnt, and also the substances so burnt. In its literal meaning the word "incense" is one with the word "perfume," the aroma given off with the smoke (_per fumum_[2]) of any odoriferous substance when burnt. But, in use, while the meaning of the word "perfume" has been extended so as to include everything sweet in smell, from smoking incense to the invisible fresh fragrance of fruits and exquisite scent of flowers, that of the word "incense," in all the languages of modern Europe in which it occurs, has, by an opposite process of limitation, been gradually restricted almost exclusively to frankincense (see FRANKINCENSE). Frankincense has always been obtainable in Europe in greater quantity than any other of the aromatics imported from the East; it has therefore gradually come to be the only incense used in the religious rites and domestic fumigations of many countries of the West, and at last to be properly regarded as the only "true" or "genuine" (i.e. "franc") incense (see Littré's _Fr. Dict._ and Skeat's _Etym. Dict. of Engl. Lang._).[3]

The following is probably an exhaustive list of the substances
available for incense or perfume mentioned in the Hebrew
Scriptures:--Algum or almug wood (almug in 1 Kings x. 11, 12; algum
in 2 Chron. ii. 8, and ix. 10, 11), generally identified with
sandalwood (_Santalum album_), a native of Malabar and Malaya; aloes,
or lign aloes (Heb. _ahalim_, _ahaloth_), produced by the _Aloexylon
Agallochum_ (Loureiro), a native of Cochin-China, and _Aquilaria
Agallocha_ (Roxburgh), a native of India beyond the Ganges; balm (Heb.
_tsori_), the oleo-resin of _Balsamodendron opobalsamum_ and _B.
gileadense_; bdellium (Heb. _bdolah_), the resin produced by
_Balsamodendron roxburghii_, _B. Mukul_ and _B. pubescens_, all
natives of Upper India (Lassen, however, identifies _bdolah_ with
musk); calamus (Heb. _kaneh_; sweet calamus, _keneh bosem_, Ex. xxx.
23; Ezek. xxvii. 19; sweet cane, _kaneh hattob_, Jer. vi. 20; Isa.
xliii. 24), identified by Royle with the _Andropogon Calamus
aromaticus_ or roosa grass of India; cassia (Heb. _kiddah_) the
_Cinnamomum Cassia_ of China; cinnamon (Heb. _kinnamon_), the
_Cinnamomum zeylanicum_ of the Somali country, but cultivated largely
in Ceylon, where also it runs wild, and in Java; costus (Heb.
_ketzioth_), the root of the _Aucklandia Costus_ (Falconer), native of
Kashmir; frankincense (Heb. _lebonah_), the gum-resin of _Bosiwellia
Frereana_ and _B. Bhau-Dajiana_ of the Somali country, and of _B.
Carterii_ of the Somali country and the opposite coast of Arabia (see
"The Genus Boswellia" by Sir George Birdwood, _Transactions of the
Linnean Society_, xxi. 1871); galbanum (Heb. _helbenah_), yielded by
_Opoidia galbanifera_ (Royle) of Khorassan, and _Galbanum officinale_
(Don) of Syria and other _Ferulas_; ladanum (Heb. _lot_, translated
"myrrh" in Gen. xxxvii. 25, xliii. 11), the resinous exudation of
_Cistus creticus_, _C. ladaniferus_ and other species of "rock rose"
or "rose of Sharon"; myrrh (Heb. _mor_), the gum-resin of the
_Balsamodendron Myrrha_ of the Somali country and opposite shore of
Arabia; onycha (Heb. _sheheleth_), the celebrated odoriferous shell of
the ancients, the operculum or "nail" of a species of _Strombus_ or
"wing shell," formerly well known in Europe under the name of _Blatta
byzantina_; it is still imported into Bombay to burn with frankincense
and other incense to bring out their odours more strongly; saffron
(Heb. _karkom_), the stigmata of _Crocus sativus_, a native originally
of Kashmir; spikenard (Heb. _nerd_), the root of the _Nardostachys
Jatamansi_ of Nepal and Bhutan; stacte (Heb. _nataf_), generally
referred to the _Styrax officinalis_ of the Levant, but Hanbury has
shown that no stacte or storax is now derived from _S. officinalis_,
and that all that is found in modern commerce is the product of the
_Liquidambar orientalis_ of Cyprus and Anatolia.

Besides these aromatic substances named in the Bible, the following
must also be enumerated on account of their common use as incense in
the East; benzoin or gum benjamin, first mentioned among Western
writers by Ibn Batuta (1325-1349) under the name of _lubân d' Javi_
(i.e. olibanum of Java), corrupted in the parlance of Europe into
benjamin and benzoin; camphor, produced by _Cinnamomum Camphora_, the
"camphor laurel" of China and Japan, and by _Dryobalanops aromatica_,
a native of the Indian Archipelago, and widely used as incense
throughout the East, particularly in China; elemi, the resin of an
unknown tree of the Philippine Islands, the elemi of old writers being
the resin of _Boswellia Frereana_; gum-dragon or dragon's blood,
obtained from _Calamus Draco_, one of the ratan palms of the Indian
Archipelago, _Dracaena Draco_, a liliaceous plant of the Canary
Island, and _Pterocarpus Draco_, a leguminous tree of the island of
Socotra; rose-malloes, a corruption of the Javanese _rasamala_, or
liquid storax, the resinous exudation of _Liquidambar Altingia_, a
native of the Indian Archipelago (an American _Liquidambar_ also
produces a rose-malloes-like exudation); star anise, the starlike
fruit of the _Illicum anisatum_ of Yunan and south-western China,
burnt as incense in the temples of Japan; sweet flag, the root of
_Acorus Calamus_, the bach of the Hindus, much used for incense in
India. An aromatic earth, found on the coast of Cutch, is used as
incense in the temples of western India. The animal excreta, musk and
civet, also enter into the composition of modern European pastils and
_clous fumants_. Balsam of Tolu, produced by _Myroxylon toluiferum_, a
native of Venezuela and New Granada; balsam of Peru, derived from
_Myroxylon Pereirae_, a native of San Salvador in Central America;
Mexican and Brazilian elemi, produced by various species of _Icica_ or
"incense trees," and the liquid exudation of an American species of
_Liquidambar_, are all used as incense in America. Hanbury quotes a
faculty granted by Pope Pius V. (August 2, 1571) to the bishops of the
West Indies permitting the substitution of balsam of Peru for the
balsam of the East in the preparation of the chrism to be used by the
Catholic Church in America. The _Sangre del drago_ of the Mexicans is
a resin resembling dragon's blood obtained from a euphorbiaceous tree,
_Croton Draco_.

Probably nowhere can the actual historical progress from the primitive use of animal sacrifices to the later refinement of burning incense be more clearly traced than in the pages of the Old Testament, where no mention of the latter rite occurs before the period of the Mosaic legislation; but in the monuments of ancient Egypt the authentic traces of the use of incense that still exist carry us back to a much earlier date. From Meroe to Memphis the commonest subject carved or painted in the interiors of the temples is that of some contemporary Phrah or Pharaoh worshipping the presiding deity with oblations of gold and silver vessels, rich vestments, gems, the firstlings of the flock and herd, cakes, fruits, flowers, wine, anointing oil and incense. Generally he holds in one hand the censer, and with the other casts the pastils or osselets of incense into it: sometimes he offers incense in one hand and makes the libation of wine with the other. One of the best known of these representations is that carved on the memorial stone placed by Tethmosis (Thothmes) IV. (1533 B.C.) on the breast of the Sphinx at Gizeh.[4] The tablet represents Tethmosis before his guardian deity, the sun-god Rê, pouring a libation of wine on one side and offering incense on the other. The ancient Egyptians used various substances as incense. They worshipped Rê at sunrise with resin, at mid-day with myrrh and at sunset with an elaborate confection called _kuphi_, compounded of no fewer than sixteen ingredients, among which were honey, wine, raisins, resin, myrrh and sweet calamus. While it was being mixed, holy writings were read to those engaged in the operation. According to Plutarch, apart from its mystic virtues arising from the magical combination of 4 × 4, its sweet odour had a benign physiological effect on those who offered it.[5] The censer used was a hemispherical cup or bowl of bronze, supported by a long handle, fashioned at one end like an open hand, in which the bowl was, as it were, held, while the other end within which the pastils of incense were kept was shaped into the hawk's head crowned with a disk, as the symbol of Rê.[6] In embalming their dead the Egyptians filled the cavity of the belly with every sort of spicery except frankincense (Herod, ii. 86), for it was regarded as specially consecrated to the worship of the gods. In the burnt-offerings of male kine to Isis, the carcase of the steer, after evisceration, was filled with fine bread, honey, raisins, figs, frankincense, myrrh and other aromatics, and thus stuffed was roasted, being basted all the while by pouring over it large quantities of sweet oil, and then eaten with great festivity.

How important the consumption of frankincense in the worship of the gods became in Egypt is shown by two of its monuments, both of the greatest interest and value for the light they throw on the early history of the commerce of the Indian Ocean. One is an inscription in the rocky valley of Hammamat, through which the desert road from the Red Sea to the valley of Egypt opens on the green fields and palm groves of the river Nile near Coptos. It was cut on the rocks by an Egyptian nobleman named Hannu, who states that he was sent by Pharaoh Sankhkere, Menthotp IV., with a force gathered out of the Thebaid, from Coptos to the Red Sea, there to take command of a naval expedition to the Holy Land of Punt (Puoni), "to bring back odoriferous gums." Punt is identified with the Somali country, now known to be the native country of the trees that yield the bulk of the frankincense of commerce. The other bears the record of a second expedition to the same land of Punt, undertaken by command of Queen Hatshepsut, 1600 B.C. It is preserved in the vividly chiselled and richly coloured decorations portraying the history of the reign of this famous Pharaoh on the walls of the "Stage Temple" at Thebes. The temple is now in ruins, but the entire series of gorgeous pictures recording the expedition to "the balsam land of Punt," from its leaving to its returning to Thebes, still remains intact and undefaced.[7] These are the only authenticated instances of the export of incense trees from the Somali country until Colonel Playfair, then political agent at Aden, in 1862-1864, collected and sent to Bombay the specimens from which Sir George Birdwood prepared his descriptions of them for the Linnean Society in 1868. King Antigonus is said to have had a branch of the true frankincense tree sent to him.

Homer tells us that the Egyptians of his time were emphatically a nation of druggists (_Od._ iv. 229, 230). This characteristic, in which, as in many others, they so remarkably resemble the Hindus, the Egyptians have maintained to the present day; and, although they have changed their religion, the use of incense among them continues to be as familiar and formal as ever. The _kohl_ or black powder with which the modern, like the ancient, Egyptian ladies paint their languishing eyelids, is nothing but the smeeth of charred frankincense, or other odoriferous resin brought with frankincense, and phials of water, from the well of Zem-zem, by the pilgrims returning from Mecca. They also melt frankincense as a depilatory, and smear their hands with a paste into the composition of which frankincense enters, for the purpose of communicating to them an attractive perfume. Herodotus (iv. 75) describes a similar artifice as practised by the women of Scythia (compare also Judith x. 3, 4). In cold weather the Egyptians warm their rooms by placing in them a brazier, "chafing-dish," or "standing-dish," filled with charcoal, whereon incense is burnt; and in hot weather they refresh them by occasionally swinging a hand censer by a chain through them--frankincense, benzoin and aloe wood being chiefly used for the purpose.[8]

In the authorized version of the Bible, the word "incense" translates two wholly distinct Hebrew words. In various passages in the latter portion of Isaiah (xl.-lxvi.), in Jeremiah and in Chronicles, it represents the Hebrew _lebonah_, more usually rendered "frankincense"; elsewhere the original word is _ketoreth_ (Ex. xxx. 8, 9; Lev. x. 1; Num. vii. 14, &c.), a derivative of the verb _kitter_ (Pi.) or _hiktir_ (Hiph.), which verb is used, not only in Ex. xxx. 7, but also in Lev. i. 9, iii. 11, ix. 13, and many other passages, to denote the process by which the "savour of satisfaction" in any burnt-offering, whether of flesh or of incense, is produced. Sometimes in the authorized version (as in 1 Kings iii. 3; 1 Sam. ii. 28) it is made to mean explicitly the burning of incense with only doubtful propriety. The expression "incense (_ketoreth_) of rains" in Ps. lxvi. 15 and the allusion in Ps. cxli. 2 ought both to be understood, most probably, of ordinary burnt-offerings.[9] The "incense" (_ketoreth_), or "incense of sweet scents" (_ketoreth sammim_), called, in Ex. xxx. 35, "a confection after the art of the apothecary," or rather "a perfume after the art of the perfumer," which was to be regarded as most holy, and the imitation of which was prohibited under the severest penalties, was compounded of four "sweet scents" (_sammim_),[10] namely stacte (_nataph_), onycha (_sheheleth_), galbanum (_helbenah_) and "pure" or "fine" frankincense (_lebonah zaccah_), pounded together in equal proportions, with (perhaps) an admixture of salt (_memullah_).[11] It was then to be "put before the testimony" in the "tent of meeting." It was burnt on the altar of incense by the priest every morning when the lamps were trimmed in the Holy Place, and every evening when they were lighted or "set up" (Ex. xxx. 7, 8). A handful of it was also burnt once a year in the Holy of Holies by the high priest on a pan of burning coals taken from the altar of burnt-offering (Lev. xvi. 12, 13). Pure frankincense (_lebonah_) formed part of the meat-offering (Lev. ii. 16, vi. 15), and was also presented along with the shew bread (Lev. xxiv. 7) every Sabbath day (probably on two golden saucers; see Jos. _Ant._ iii. 10, 7). The religious significance of the use of incense, or at least of its use in the Holy of Holies, is distinctly set forth in Lev. xvi. 12, 13.

The Jews were also in the habit of using odoriferous substances in connexion with the funeral obsequies of distinguished persons (see 2 Chron. xvi. 14, xxi. 19; Jer. xxxiv. 5). In Amos vi. 10 "he that burneth him" probably means "he that burns perfumes in his honour." References to the domestic use of incense occur in Cant. iii. 6; Prov. xxvii. 9; cf. vii. 17.

The "marbles" of Nineveh furnish frequent examples of the offering of incense to the sun-god and his consort (2 Kings xxiii. 5). The kings of Assyria united in themselves the royal and priestly offices, and on the monuments they erected they are generally represented as offering incense and pouring out wine to the Tree of Life. They probably carried the incense in the sacred bag so frequently seen in their hands and in those also of the common priests. According to Herodotus (i. 183), frankincense to the amount of 1000 talents' weight was offered every year, during the feast of Bel, on the great altar of his temple in Babylon.

The monuments of Persepolis and the coins of the Sassanians show that the religious use of incense was as common in ancient Persia as in Babylonia and Assyria. Five times a day the priests of the Persians (Zoroastrians) burnt incense on their sacred fire altars. In the Avesta (_Vendidad_, Fargard xix. 24, 40), the incense they used is named _vohu gaono_. It has been identified with benzoin, but was probably frankincense. Herodotus (iii. 97) states that the Arabs brought every year to Darius as tribute 1000 talents of frankincense. The Parsees still preserve in western India the pure tradition of the ritual of incense as followed by their race from probably the most ancient times.

The _Ramayana_ and _Mahabharata_ afford evidence of the employment of incense by the Hindus, in the worship of the gods and the burning of the dead, from the remotest antiquity. Its use was obviously continued by the Buddhists during the prevalence of their religion in India, for it is still used by them in Nepal, Tibet, Ceylon, Burma, China and Japan. These countries all received Buddhism from India, and a large proportion of the porcelain and earthenware articles imported from China and Japan into Europe consists of innumerable forms of censers. The Jains all over India burn sticks of incense before their Jina. The commonest incense in ancient India was probably frankincense. The Indian frankincense tree, _Boswellia thurifera_, Colebrooke (which certainly includes _B. glabra_, Roxburgh), is a doubtful native of India. It is found chiefly where the Buddhist religion prevailed in ancient times, in Bihar and along the foot of the Himalayas and in western India, where it particularly flourishes in the neighbourhood of the Buddhist caves at Ajanta. It is quite possible therefore that, in the course of their widely extended commerce during the one thousand years of their ascendancy, the Buddhists imported the true frankincense trees from Africa and Arabia into India, and that the accepted Indian species are merely varieties of them. Now, however, the incense in commonest use in India is benzoin. But the consumption of all manner of odoriferous resins, gum resins, roots, woods, dried leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds in India, in social as well as religious observances, is enormous. The grateful perfumed powder _abir_ or _randa_ is composed either of rice, flour, mango bark or deodar wood, camphor and aniseed, or of sandalwood or wood aloes, and zerumbet, zedoary, rose flowers, camphor and civet. The incense sticks and pastils known all over India under the names of _ud-buti_ ("benzoin-light") or _aggar-ki-buti_ ("wood aloes light") are composed of benzoin, wood aloes, sandalwood, rock lichen, patchouli, rose-malloes, _talispat_ (the leaf of _Flacourtia Cataphracta_ of Roxburgh), mastic and sugar-candy or gum. The _abir_ and _aggir butis_ made at the Mahommedan city of Bijapur in the Mahratta country are celebrated all over western India. The Indian Mussulmans indeed were rapidly degenerating into a mere sect of Hindus before the Wahabi revival, and the more recent political propaganda in support of the false caliphate of the sultans of Turkey; and we therefore find the religious use of incense among them more general than among the Mahommedans of any other country. They use it at the ceremonies of circumcision, _bismillah_ (teaching the child "the name of God"), virginity and marriage. At marriage they burn benzoin with _nim_ seeds (_Melia Azadirachta_, Roxburgh) to keep off evil spirits, and prepare the bride-cakes by putting a quantity of benzoin between layers of wheaten dough, closed all round, and frying them in clarified butter. For days the bride is fed on little else. In their funeral ceremonies, the moment the spirit has fled incense is burnt before the corpse until it is carried out to be buried. The begging fakirs also go about with a lighted stick of incense in one hand, and holding out with the other an incense-holder (literally, "incense chariot"), into which the coins of the pious are thrown. Large "incense trees" resembling our Christmas trees, formed of incense-sticks and pastils and osselets, and alight all over, are borne by the Shiah Mussulmans in the solennial procession of the Mohurrum, in commemoration of the martyrdom of the sons of Ali. The worship of the _tulsi_ plant, or holy basil (_Ocymum sanctum_, Don), by the Hindus is popularly explained by its consecration to Vishnu and Krishna. It grows on the four-horned altar before the house, or in a pot placed in one of the front windows, and is worshipped every morning by all the female members of every Hindu household. It is possible that its adoration has survived from the times when the Hindus buried their dead in their houses, beneath the family hearth. When they came into a hot climate the fire of the sacrifices and domestic cookery was removed out of the house; but the dead were probably still for a while buried in or near it, and the _tulsi_ was planted over their graves, at once for the salubrious fragrance it diffuses and to represent the burning of incense on the altar of the family Lar. The rich land round about the holy city of Pandharpur, sacred to Vithoba the national Mahratta form of (Krishna)-Vishnu, is wholly restricted to the cultivation of the tulsi plant.

As to the [Greek: thyea] mentioned in Homer (_Il._ ix. 499, and elsewhere) and in Hesiod (_Works and Days_, 338), there is some uncertainty whether they were incense offerings at all, and if so, whether they were ever offered alone, and not always in conjunction with animal sacrifices. That the domestic use, however, of the fragrant wood [Greek: thyon] (the _Arbor vitae_ or _Cailitris quadrivalvis_ of botanists, the source of the resin sandarach) was known in the Homeric age, is shown by the case of Calypso (_Od._ v. 60), and the very similarity of the word [Greek: thyon] to [Greek: thyos] may be taken as almost conclusively proving that by that time the same wood was also employed for religious purposes. It is not probable that the sweet-smelling gums and resins of the countries of the Indian Ocean began to be introduced into Greece before the 8th or 7th century B.C., and doubtless [Greek: libanos] or [Greek: libanôtos] first became an article of extensive commerce only after the Mediterranean trade with the East had been opened up by the Egyptian king Psammetichus (c. 664-610 B.C.). The new Oriental word is frequently employed by Herodotus; and there are abundant references to the use of the thing among the writers of the golden age of Attic literature (see, for example, Aristophanes, _Plut._ 1114; _Frogs_, 871, 888; _Clouds_, 426; _Wasps_, 96, 861). Frankincense, however, though the most common, never became the only kind of incense offered to the gods among the Greeks. Thus the Orphic hymns are careful to specify, in connexion with the several deities celebrated, a great variety of substances appropriate to the service of each; in the case of many of these the selection seems to have been determined not at all by their fragrance but by some occult considerations which it is now difficult to divine.

Among the Romans the use of religious fumigations long preceded the introduction of foreign substances for the purpose (see, for example, Ovid, _Fast._ i. 337 seq., "Et non exiguo laurus adusta sono"). Latterly the use of frankincense ("mascula thura," Virg. _Ecl._ viii. 65) became very prevalent, not only in religious ceremonials, but also on various state occasions, such as in triumphs (Ovid, _Trist_, iv. 2, 4), and also in connexion with certain occurrences of domestic life. In private it was daily offered by the devout to the _Lar familiaris_ (Plaut. _Aulul._ prol. 23); and in public sacrifices it was not only sprinkled on the head of the victim by the pontifex before its slaughter, and afterwards mingled with its blood, but was also thrown upon the flames over which it was roasted.