physicians and naturalists in the prosecution of their researches by travel In 1835, the increasing infirmities of age compelled him to resign his academical functions. He died on the 22d Jan., 1840. BLUNDERBUSS is a kind of short musket with a very wide bore, sufficient to take in several shot or bullets at once. It has a limited range, but is very destructive at close quarters. As a military weapon, it is chiefly of service in defending passages, doorways, staircases, etc. Some of the English and German troopers in the 17th c. were armed with the B.; but the carbine has since nearly superseded this weapon. BLUNT, EDMUND, 1799-1866; b. Mass.; son of Edmund March; hydrographer and marine surveyor, engaged on his own account on the United States coast and in the West Indies, and appointed first assistant in the government coast survey. He introduced the use of the Fresnel light in American light-houses. BLUNT, EDMUND MARCH, 1770-1863; b. N. H.; author of the American Coast Pilot, a most useful work for navigators, which has passed through nearly 30 editions, and been translated into several other languages. He published many other nautical works, charts, etc. BLUNT, JAMES G., b. Maine, 1826; brig.gen. commanding the department of Kansas during the civil war. He was made a maj.gen, in 1862. BLUNT, JOHN JAMES, 1794-1855; an English clergyman, author of Vestiges of ancient Manners and Customs discoverable in Modern Italy and Sicily, Undesigned Coincidences in the Writings both of the Old and New Testaments an Argument of their Veracity, History of the Christian Church in the first three Centuries, and Sketches of the Reformation of the Church of England. BLUNT SCHLI, JOHANN KASPAR, b. Switzerland, 1808; a German jurist; graduated at Bonn in 1829. He was prof. in the university of Zurich, a member of the grand council of the local government, and strongly opposed the civil war of 1847-48. In 1848 he became prof. of German and international law at Munich, and in 1861 prof. of political science at Heidelberg. In 1864, with Baumgarten and others, he founded the Protestant union, and subsequently presided over several Protestant conventions, and over the general synod at Baden in 1867. He was in favor of a union between south and north Germany, and was elected to the customs parliament. B. is the author of many valuable works on politics, laws, and the sciences. BLUSHING, a sudden reddening of the face, neck, and breast, owing to some mental shock, most commonly of the character of humiliation or shame. The nature and cause of this effect have been recently elucidated by physiological researches. It is produced by an increased flow of blood into the capillary vessels over the parts where the blush extends. Besides reddening the complexion, it creates a sensible augmentation of heat in those parts. The feeling that accompanies the state is of a distressing kind The phenomenon of B. is part of a general influence exerted on the capillary circulation by mental causes operating through the brain. The experiments whereby the exist ence of this influence has been established, may be described as follows: The small blood-vessels, by which the blood is brought into proximity with the various tissues of the body, are kept in a state of balanced distension between two forces, the one the propul sive power of the heart's action, which fills and distends them; the other, an influence derived from the nervous centers, and acting upon the muscular fibers so as to contract the vessels. The first of the two forces-the agency of the heart-is quite well understood: it is simply like the case of distending the hose of a fire-engine by working the pump, and driving the water along. The counteracting force of the nerve-centers is proved by the following experiments: When the sympathetic nerve proceeding to the vessels of the head and face of an animal is cut, there follows congestion of the bloodvessels with augmented heat over the whole surface supplied by the nerve. The ear is seen to become redder; a thermometer inserted in the nostril shows an increase of temperature, the sign of a greater quantity of blood flowing into the capillaries. The inference from the experiment is that, from the withdrawal of a counterpoise, the force that distends the small blood-vessels-that is to say, the heart's action-has an unusual predominance. It is further proved that this nervous influence, acting upon the minute muscular fibers of the small vessels, proceeds from the nerve-centers iodged in the head, for, by cutting the connection between the brain and the ganglion in the neck, from which the above-mentioned nerve is derived, the same restraining influence is arrested, and the congestion takes place. By stimulating the divided nerve galvanically, the suffusion disappears, the vessels shrinking by the galvanic contraction of their muscular coats. The agency now described is of a piece with the action of the brain upon involuntary muscles generally, as the heart and the intestinal canal, and by it many organic functions-digestion, nutrition, absorption, etc.—are affected by those changes in the cerebral substance that accompany mental states. It is known that mental excitement has an immediate influence in all those functions; one set of passions, such as fear, tend to derange them, while joy and exhilaration operate favorably upon them. To apply these observations to the case in hand. Supposing a person in the average mental condition, and something to arise which gives a painful shock to the feelings a piece of ill news, a reproach from some one whose good opinion is much valued, an open shame, or the fear of it, a fit of remorse, an occasion of grief-the pain is accompanied with a sudden loss, or waste, or decrease of cerebral power; none of the functions that the brain aids in maintaining is so strongly stimulated as before; and in particular, that stream of nervous energy which balances the heart's action in regulating the distension of the small blood-vessels, is abated, the abatement being made apparent in the redness and heat over the face and neck. In a great stroke of mental depression, the influence is of a much more extensive kind, though still of the same nature essentially as regards the enfeeblement of the nervous energy, and may lower the action of the heart itself: in which case there will be a wide-spread pallor, perhaps without a blush. In all probability, it is when the loss of cerebral influence extends only to the relaxation of the muscular fibers of the small vessels, leaving the heart in its usual vigor, that the state of B. is most fully manifested. Hence it is more apt to arise out of the smaller modes of painful apprehension than from the more serious calamities that prostrate the system throughout. It is said that, in the Circassian slave-market, a young woman that blushes fetches a higher price. Some complexions do not show the increased flow of blood in this way, and all persons are not equally sensitive to the cerebral shock that causes it. BOA, in popular language, the name of all those large serpents which kill their prey by entwining themselves around it, and constricting it in their coils; but by zoologists of the present day, limited as the name of a genus to a very small portion of their number, all of which are natives of the warm parts of America-the similar large serpents of Asia and Africa forming the genus python (q.v.). The name B., however, was certainly not originally applied to American serpents, for it is used by Pliny, who accounts for its origin by a fable of serpents sucking the milk of cows, thus referring it, very improbably, to the Latin bos, an ox. The Linnæan genus B. comprehended all serpents having simple subcaudal plates, but without spur or rattle at the end of the tail, and was thus very artificial, as founded chiefly upon a single unimportant character, and consisted of a very miscellaneous assemblage of species, venomous and nonvenomous. The B. family, or boide, as now constituted (containing the pythons, etc., of the old world, as well as the true boas of the new), is almost exclusively confined to tropical climates, and all the species are of large size and great strength, some of them far exceeding in these respects all other serpents. The story related by the ancients of & serpent 120 ft. in length, which devoured several soldiers, and caused alarm to a Roman army in Africa, may perhaps be deemed unworthy of credit, although the skin is said to have been long preserved at Rome; but there is good reason to believe that serpents in more modern times have attained at least half this length, and have made even the larger mammalia, and sometimes man, their prey. The boida are not venomous; but their mouth, although destitute of poison-fangs, is so furnished with teeth as to make their bite very severe. Their teeth are numerous, long, and directed backwards, so as the more effectually to prevent the escape of the prey, which is first seized by the mouth, and then the serpent, with a rapidity of motion which the eye of the closest observer fails perfectly to follow, coils itself around it; the powerful muscles of the body are afterwards brought into action to compress it, so that usually in a few minutes its life is extinct, and its bones are broken. Deglutition then takes place-not, as has been alleged, after the prey has been licked and covered with saliva by the tongue, but accompanied with an extraordinary flow of saliva, which seems not only to serve for lubrication, but to have the property of hastening the decomposition of animal substances, and so to assist in making the prey more easy to be swallowed. It is always swallowed entire, and the process is sometimes rather a tedious one, and seems to require no small muscular effort; but the muscles of the serpent are capable of acting for this purpose, even at the neck, when that usually narrowest part of the body is distended to an enormous degree as the prey passes through it. The lower jaw is not simply articulated to the skull, but by the intervention of other bones, a structure without which the prodigious dilatation of the throat would be impossible. The lungs consist of two lobes, one much larger than the other, and at the extremity of the larger is an extremely capacious air-bag, which is supposed to serve for the necessary aëration of the blood whilst respiration is impeded in the process of deglutition. The tail in all the boïde has great prehensile power, and its grasp of a tree round which it may be coiled is aided by the opposing action of two claws, one on each side of the anus, which are really the representatives of the hinder limbs of the superior vertebrate animals, and which, on dissection, are found to be connected not only with strong muscles, but with bones entirely concealed within the serpent, one jointed to another, so as to make the character of a rudimentary limb very apparent. These serpents, being almost all inhabitants of watery places, often lie in wait for animals that come to drink; thus the largest of the American species, boa (eunectes) murina-sometimes called anaconda, although anaconda seems to be originally, like B., the name of a serpent of the old world-is to be found where rivers or narrow lagoons are overshadowed by gloomy forests. Perhaps the want of sufficient supplies of water, more than the greater cold of the climate, may account for the short time that specimens of the boïdæ brought to Europe have generally lived in confinement. After a repast, these serpents spend a considerable time in a state of comparative torpidity-several weeks generally elapsing before they waken up to require a new sup ply and in this lethargic state they are easily killed. When they do waken up, the demands of appetite seem to be very urgent. Many of our readers must still remember the interest excited some years ago concerning a B. in the London zoological gardens. which, to the astonishment of its keepers, swallowed its rug; but this, after a trial of a week or two, it found indigestible, and the animal then gratified public curiosity by a reversal of the process of deglutition. The head in the borde is thick, yet somewhat elongated; the eyes are small; the body is thickest in the middle; the tail usually has a blunt termination. The scales are numerous and rather small. The colors are various, and in many of the species rather bright and elegantly disposed. The true boas have the plates underneath the tail single, whilst in the pythons they are double. The species to which the name boa constrictor is appropriated is far from being one of the largest, seldom attaining a length of more than 12 feet. It is common in Surinam and Brazil, where its skin is used for making boots and saddle-cloths. The name boa constrictor is, however, popularly extended to almost any of the species.-The number of species, whether in the genus or in the family, is far from being well ascertained. Boas are much infested by intestinal worms, which appear often to cause their death. The excrement of the B.—the urine and fæces being combined as in other reptiles, and voided by a single vent-is a solid white substance, and consists mainly of urate of ammonia, accompanied by phosphate of lime (bone-earth). It is employed as an easy source of uric acid. BOADICE A, a warrior-queen of the Iceni, a tribe inhabiting the eastern coast of Britain, in the time of the Romans. She flourished after the middle of the 1st century. Prasutagus, her husband, who died A.D. 60, or 61, had left his wealth jointly to the Roman emperor Nero, and to his two daughters, hoping that by this artifice his kingdom would be protected from oppression; but the Roman soldiery, taking advantage of the defenseless condition of the country, began to plunder unscrupulously. B. herself was scourged, her daughters were violated, and the noblest among the Iceni were treated as siaves. These outrages soon drove the Britons to revenge. B. gathered round her a large army; attacked and captured the Roman colony of Camalodunum; defeated Petilius Cerealis, legate of the ninth legion, who was marching to its relief; took Londinium and Verulamium; and destroyed, it is said, somewhere about 70,000 Romans, many of them by torture. Suetonius, the Roman governor of Britain, now advanced at the head of 10,000 men against B., who, we are informed, had under her command no less than 263,000. A dreadful battle ensued (62 A.D.), in which, according to Tacitus, 80,000 Britons perished, and only 400 Romans. These figures, of course, cannot be trusted; but the victory must have been decisive, as it finally established the authority of the Romans in Britain. B., overwhelmed with despair, committed suicide. BOAR, WILD, Sus scrofa, a species of suide, regarded as the original of the domestic swine, equal to the largest in size, and far superior in strength and ferocity. It is of grayish-black color, covered with short woolly hair, thickly interspersed with stiff coarse bristles, which assume the form of a mane along the spine. Its great tusks are formidable weapons, but when old the tusks curve over the snout, and are no longer serviceable for goring; but then the teeth of the upper jaw protrude and curve outward, serving the same purpose as the tusks had done. The animal is native in Europe and Asia, inhabiting the deep recesses of marshy forest grounds. Boars were common in England until the time of Henry II., and then not found until, in the reign of Charles I., an unsuccessful attempt was made to raise them in the New Forest. In the time of the conqueror any one killing a wild boar was liable to have his eyes put out. It was for many centuries a favorite beast of chase with the nobles in Europe, and was hunted chiefly on foot with the spear, its strength and ferocity rendering the sport alike exhilarating and dangerous. There is little of boar-hunting now except in India. The animal seeks its food at night, and feeds chiefly on roots and grain, though it will eat smaller animals, birds' eggs, etc. The bristles of the boar are much used for brushes. BOARD, the general name applied to persons in their collective capacity, who have the management of some public office or department, bank, railway, charity, or indeed, of any other trust. Thus, the commissioners of customs, when met for the transaction of business, are called the B. of Customs; the Lords of the treasury, the B. of Treasury; commissioners of excise, B. of Excise directors of railways, B. of Directors; poor law guardians, B. of Guardians, etc. See CUSTOMS, TREASURY, etc. BOARD-BOARDING. In nautical language, board is used with many significations. Besides its ordinary application to a plank of wood, B. is a space or portion of sea over which a ship passes in tacking; hence the phrases, "to make a good board," "to make short boards," "to make a stern board," ,"to leave the land on back-board," etc.-all of which refer to the direction of a ship's movement at a particular time and place. Again, board or aboard relates to the interior of the ship, in such phrases as "to go aboard," "to heave overboard," etc. But the most important of these meanings is that which relates to the boarding of an enemy's ship, or making a forcible entry for the sake of capturing it. Whenever this bold operation is determined on, certain seamen are told off to act as boarders. It is very rarely that, between two men-of-war, this operation is ventured on; it would, in most cases, be too perilous to the assailants, who more frequently conquer by cannon and musketry. Boarding is, in most instances, attempted by privateers against mer chantmen, where the defenders are few in number. The assailant well considers all the circumstances for and against him-the relative sizes of the two vessels, the relative strength of the crews, the state of the wind and sea, and the chances of escape if foiled. Besides the pistols, cutlasses, and boarding-pikes of the seamen, there are provided pow. der-flasks for producing smoke and confusion on the enemy's deck, and shells called stink-pots, for producing an intolerable stench. The moment and the spot being selected, the fuses of the flasks and stink-pots are lighted; these combustibles are thrown upon the enemy's deck; and while the fire, smoke, and stench are doing their work by confusing the enemy, the boarders climb on board, and gain a mastery by their personal prowess-that is, if the calculations of relative strength have been duly made. Sometimes terrible hand-to-hand encounters take place on deck before victory decides for or against the assailants. General sir Howard Douglas, in his able work on Warfare with Steam, expresses an opinion that steam war-ships are likely sometimes to come to close quarters; and that, on that account, they should be provided with a larger quota of marines and of boarding-implements than have hitherto been supplied to sailing ships. The defenders, he adds, should construct loopholed barricades across the terminations of the quarterdeck and the forecastle, to prolong the defense within board. The French naval officers, it is known, look forward to a great increase in all such military resources on board war-steamers; and sir Howard endeavors to impress similar convictions on the English authorities. BOARDMAN, GEORGE DANA, 1801-31, b. Maine; educated at Waterville college, where he was chosen tutor. In 1823, he offered to become a missionary under the Baptist board of foreign missions, and having studied at Andover theological seminary, was ordained in 1825, and in the same year sailed for Calcutta. He established a mission at Maulmain in 1827, which soon became the most important station under the board. For three years he labored incessantly with unabating zeal and accomplished an immense amount of work, till his course was cut short by death. BOARDMAN, HENRY AUGUSTUS, D.D. See page 895. BOARDMAN, GEORGE DANA, D.D., son of George Dana, b. in Burmah, 1828; graduate of Brown university and Newton theological institution; ordained in South Carolina, but became pastor first in Rochester, N. Y., whence he went to the First Baptist church in Philadelphia, where he still remains (1880). He has traveled in the east and in Europe, and has delivered courses of lectures in Philadelphia which have drawn great week-day audiences. BOARD OF ADMIRALTY, a government department which has the management of all matters concerning the British navy. In the article ADMIRAL, the steps are noticed by which the duties of the lord high admiral, in former days, were transferred to a board of commissioners. The constitution and functions of this body will now be described. The B. of A. comprises five lords commissioners, who decide collectively on all important questions. Besides this collective or corporate action, each has special duties assigned to him. There are two civil or political lords, and three naval or sea lords. The first lord, who is always a cabinet minister, besides a general control, has the management of naval estimates, finance, political affairs, slave-trade prevention, appointments, and promotions. The first naval lord manages the composition and distribution of the fleet, naval discipline, appointment of inferior officers, commissioning ships, general instructions, sailing orders, and the naval reserve. The second naval lord attends to armaments, manning the navy, the coast-guard, the marines, marine artillery, and naval apprentices. The third naval lord has control over the purchase and disposal of stores, victualing-ships, navy medical affairs, transports, convicts, and pensioners. The junior civil lord attends to accounts, mail-packets, Greenwich hospital, naval chaplains, and schools. Naval architecture, the building and repairing of ships, steammachinery, and new inventions are superintended by the controller of the navy, who is not a member of the board, but is directly responsible to the first lord. Under the lords are the first secretary (parliamentary), the second secretary (permanent), and the naval secretary (professional), who manage the daily office work. The lords all resign when the prime minister resigns, and those who have seats in parliament are replaced by others. This change gives rise to many evils. There is likely to be a change of views and of system: the new board is not bound to act on the plans of its predecessors; and many of the costly novelties in the navy within the last ten years are directly traceable to this cause. The system is defended on the plea that these changes infuse new blood into the admiralty, and give fair-play to increased knowledge and new plans. Some statesmen advocate a modified plan: proposing to render a few naval officers of rank permanent lords of the admiralty, and only changing the others on a change of ministry. A connecting-link between the old and new boards is the controller of the navy, who is a permanent officer. The secretaries and the lords determine which letters ought to be submitted to the board collectively; and that portion of the correspondence is treated as in Boar's Head, most boards and committees. All delicate or doubtful matters are specially reserved for the first lord; but in the board meetings he has only one vote, like the rest, though, from his general parliamentary responsibility, he has practically at once an absolute veto and an absolute power of giving action to his views. The admiralty offices are at Whitehall and Spring Gardens, close adjoining. BOARD OF ORDNANCE, a government department formerly having the management of all affairs relating to the artillery and engineering corps, and to the matériel of the British army, Under this precise designation, the board no longer exists; a change having been made which requires brief explanation. The board existed from the time of Henry VIII. until 1855, when it was abolished, its functions being vested in the secretary of state for war as regarded matériel, and in the commander-in-chief as concerned the military command of the artillery and engineers. The B. of O., until 1854, comprised the master-general of the ordnance, the surveyor-general, the clerk of the ordnance, and the principal storekeeper, all of whom were usually members of parliament. There was no chairman at the meetings, and the board often consisted of only one officer. The master-general had a veto, and was in that respect more powerful than the chief member of the board of admiralty; although, not having necessarily a seat in the cabinet, he had less political power. The board days were thrice a week; and each of the four members had control over certain departments-the patronage of which was generally vested in him. Scarcely any improvements were made from 1828 till 1854, and the general arrangements were very defective. Of the four members, the master-general, besides his veto, had a general authority; the surveyor-general had control over the artillery, engineers, sappers and miners, ordnance medical corps, contracts, laboratory, gunpow der, barracks, and navy gunners; the clerk of the ordnance managed the estimates, money-arrangements, civil establishment, pensions, superannuations, and ordnance property; while the principal storekeeper had charge of stores, store-rooms, naval equipments, and naval war-stores. In matters relating to coast-defenses, it was often difficult to decide between the admiralty and the ordnance, each board claiming authority. When the Crimean disasters took place in 1854, the defects of the B. of O. became fully apparent: it could not work harmoniously with the other government departments. The board was dissolved, and the office of master-general abolished. By the war office act of 1870, the post of surveyor-general of the ordnance was revived as one of the principal officers of the secretary of state for war. He is responsible for the matériel and supplies of the army. BOARD OF TRADE. See TRADE, BOARD OF. BOAR-FISH, Capros, a genus of fishes of the dory (q.v.) family, or zeida, differing from the genus zeus, or dory, in the still more protractile mouth-the resemblance of which to the snout of a hog is supposed to have given origin to the name-in the want of spines at the base of the dorsal and anal fins, and of long filaments to the dorsal spines. The body has the usual oval, much compressed form of the family. The common B. (C. aper) is a well-known inhabitant of the Mediterranean, rarely caught on the coasts of England. The eyes are very large, and placed far forward; the body is of a carmine color, lighter below, and with seven transverse orange bands on the back. The flesh is little esteemed. BOAR'S HEAD. The B. H. is the subject of a variety of legends, poetic allusions, and carols connected with the festivities of Christmas in England. At this wintry season, the wild boar was hunted, and his head served up as the most important dish on the baronial table. According to Scott's graphic lines: Then was brought in the lusty brawn By blue-coated serving-man; Then the grim boar's head frowned on high, Crested with bays and rosemary. Well can the green-garbed ranger tell How, when, and where the monster fell; What dogs before his death he tore, And all the baiting of the boar. Referring to the article CHRISTMAS for a notice of some of the observances on this occasion, we need here only say that in the "boar's-head carols" are found some of the most interesting specimens of the old English convivial verses. The following, from a carol printed by Wynkin de Worde (1521), may be given; Caput Apri defero The boar's head in hand bring I, Qui estis in convivio. The boar's head. I understand, The boar's head "erased," according to heraldic phraseology, is a well-known cogniz ance of a number of old families, particularly the Gordons; it also formed the sign of s |