A blanket bog is a very acidpeatbog, low in nutrients and extending widely over a flat terrain. They are found in cold wet climates. Research Blanket Bog
The Barbados Blackbelly is a breed of sheep, African in origin and developed on the island of Barbados. The Barbados Blackbelly has a variety of colour phases varying from basic black and tan colour through black, yellow, and variegated pinto patterns. The black colour covers the under parts completely in the basal pattern and extends up the neck with black extending down the inside of the legs, on the plank and back of the thighs. The inside hair of the ears is black with a small dash at the rear of the eye. The chin and poll are black. The black under parts and black lines medial to the eye contrasting with the normal tan to reddish coat in most other areas, gives an exotic contrasting appearance. Yellow ewes (pale to reddish yellow) have a white abdomen. The yellow colour phase may have been originally derived from a different breed of hair sheep.
There has also been noted a reddish, and also a white, hair sheep in northeastBrazil and light brown colours characteristic of hair sheep from Tobago. Further north there is a light to pale brown sheep in the Bahamas, the long island sheep in Cuba called the Pelibuey. All of these sheep are thought to be at least partially related to the Barbados Blackbelly. The mature rams have a neckpiece of long hair, up to six inches, which extends down the neck to the brisket. The cape reaches full development in the fall of the year. In some rams this is a full cape which extends over the sides and top of the neck and shoulders as a showy blanket. Rams and ewes on the island of Barbados are polled or with short scurs. Research Barbados Blackbelly
The Blanketeers were an assembly of some 500 Manchester operatives who in 1817 assembled at St Peter's Field, each carrying provisions and a blanket, proposing to walk to London to lay their grievances before the Prince Regent. The gathering caused some consternation, and the Habeas Corpus Act was suspended. The leaders were taken and imprisoned and the project frustrated. Research Blanketeers
The Celts were, according to some sources, ancient tribes of people which came to Britain from central Europe in the late Bronze age and again in the Iron Age. The name is also applied to the Ancient Britons, peoples living in Britain around the time of the bronze age until the invasion by the Romans. The Celts left no written accounts of their life, written accounts were made by the Romans, who in all probability were less than gracious.
Through archaeology we are able to understand a little of Celtic life, we know that they wove cloth, and yet corpses found are all dressed identically in a cloth made of brown felt, like a blanket, comprising a skirt and a cloak like top covering, in the case of women sometimes a crop top arrangement. These clothes found on dead Celts are often very tatty, full of holes, even though the deceased was obviously wealthy and of status, established from the artefacts found buried with the body.
We think that the Celts lived in round houses constructed of wattle and daub, and thatched with straw - these houses did not have a hole in the roof to emit the smoke from the interior fire, contrary to popular belief. If they had, the roof would fall outwards, and rain fall in and extinguish the fire. Rather, the smoke from the interior fire assisted in seasoning the wood and killing insects. They were farmers, growing wheat, barley and keeping sheep, pigs and goats. They were very eco-friendly, sustaining their environment for over a thousand years, and understanding herbalism which was used for medicine, and the production of coloured dyes.
At an early date the Celts divided into two great branches, speaking dialects widely differing from each other, but doubtless belonging to the same stock. One of these branches is the Gad-helic or Gaelic, represented by the Highlanders of Scotland, the Celtic Irish, and the Manx; the other is the Cymric, represented by the Welsh, the inhabitants of Cornwall, and those of Brittany. The Cornishdialect is now extinct.
The sun seems to have been the principal object of worship among the Celts, and groves of oak and the remarkable circles of stone commonly called 'Druidical Circles', their temples of worship. All the old Celts seem to have possessed a kind of literary order called Bards. The ancient Irish wrote in a rude alphabet called the Ogham; later they employed the Roman alphabet, or the Anglo-Saxon form of it. The chief literature existing consists of the hymns, martyrologies, annals, and laws of Ireland, written from the 9th to the 16th centuries. The Scottish Gaelic literature extant includes a collection of manuscripts in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, some of v/hich date from the 12th century; the Book of the Dean of Lismore, 16th century; a number of songs from the 17th century to the present day; and the so-called poems of Ossian. The Welsh literary remains date from the 9th century, and consist of glossaries, grammars, annals, genealogies, histories, poems, prose tales, etc. Research Celts
Hydropathy is a method of treating diseases by the use of pure water both internally and externally, which came extensively into practice in the 19th century. The system was originated by Vincent Priessnitz, a Silesian peasant, who in 1829 established at his native village of Grafenberg an institution for the hydropathic treatment of diseases, and invented a variety of forms in which the water cure might be applied, such as the wet-sheet pack, the dry blanket or sweatingpack, the sitz, douche, plunge, wave, etc, baths. The new system soon acquired popularity, and the original establishment expanded into an extensive suite of buildings. Other hydropathic institutions soon sprung up in other parts of Germany.
In 1842 a hydropathic society was formed in London, and before long numerous establishments were erected all over the United Kingdom. Before Priessnitz's death in 1851 he had the satisfaction of seeing his system adopted extensively throughout Europe, as well as in the United States of America, where it was introduced in 1843. In many cases there can be no doubt of patients having received great and lasting benefit by a sojourn at a hydropathic institution, and the free use of water in its various forms of appliance; but it may well be doubted whether these advantageous results are not as much to be attributed to the ablutions, exercise, and diet to which in such circumstances the patients readily conform themselves as to the wet bandages, douches, and other forms of hydropathic treatment. Research Hydropathy
Silvester's method is a method of artificial respiration in which the patient lies on his back with a folded coat or blanket under the upper part of the thorax. The patient's arms, flexed at the elbow, are abducted and taken above his head so that the pectoral muscles elevate the ribs and expand the chest. As the arms are brought down, with pressure against the sides of the chest, forced expiration is produced. This method really requires an assistant to hold the tongue forward, in order to preserve the airway: a safety pin can be put through the dorsum of the tongue and attached to a string held by the assistant. Research Silvester's Method
Gold is a bright yellow coloured, rare, precious metal element with the formulae Au and a relative hardness of 3 occurring in nature in widely distributed small amounts. The main source of gold is in gold-quartz veins where gold was deposited from mineral bearing solutions. When the veins weather, the gold is separated from the quartz and mechanically settles on the stream floor as a placer deposit. The fineness of gold is measured in carats. 24 carat gold is pure, 22 carat gold is 22 parts gold to two parts other metals and so on. Gold is seldom used for any purpose in a state of perfect purity on account of its softness, but is combined with some other metal to render it harder. Standard gold, or the alloy formerly used for the gold coinage of Britain, consists of twenty-two parts of gold and two of copper (being thus 22 carats fine). Articles of jewelry are made of every degree of fineness up to 22 carats, i.e. 22 parts of gold to 2 of alloy.
Gold is one of the most ductile and malleable of all the metals It is one of the heaviest of the metals, and not being liable to be injured by exposure to the air, is well suited for making coins and jewelry. Its ductility and malleability are very remarkable. It may be beaten into leaves so exceedingly thin that one grain in weight will cover 56 square inches. It is also extremely ductile; a single grain may be drawn into a wire 500 feet long, and an ounce of gold covering a silver wire is capable of being extended upwards of 1300 miles. It may also be melted and remelted with scarcely any diminution of its quantity. It is soluble in nitro-muriatic acid or aqua regia, and in a solution of chlorine. Its specific gravity is 19.3, or it is about nineteen times heavier than water.
The alloy of gold and silver is found already formed in nature. It is of a paler yellow than pure gold, while the copperalloy has a colour bordering upon reddish yellow. Palladium, rhodium, and tellurium are also met with as alloys of gold.
Gold has been found in larger or smaller quantities in nearly all parts of the world. It is commonly found in reefs or veins among quartz, and in alluvial deposits. Among the latter may be ranked the deposits in river beds, from which the gold is obtained by dredging. Dredging is even employed where the water has to be brought by artificial means. When gold is in rock, quarrying, crushing, washing, and treatment with mercury are employed. The rock is crushed by machinery, and the crushed material is treated with mercury, which dissolves the gold, forming a liquid amalgam, after which the mercury is volatilized, and the gold left behind. Two other processes are also in use, viz. the chlorination and the cyanide. In the former the gold is transformed into soluble gold chloride, and the metal is obtained from this solution by means of sulphuretted hydrogen. The cyanide process is especially useful for ores containing tellurium, or for ores in a fine state of division, and con^sists in dissolving the metal in potassiumcyanide solutions, from which it can be obtained by various means. The gold obtained by these methods always contains silver, from which it is separated by the process known as 'parting'.
In alluvial (or placer) deposits it is extracted by washing, in the form of dust, grains, laminae, or nuggets. After the gravel has been turned over and the nuggets have been taken out, the remainder is washed to recover the finer particles of gold. In washing in the pan - 'panning out' - a quantity of the 'dirt', free from stones, is put into a shallow dish with a slight depression in the middle. It is then mixed with water, and the dish held with one side lower than the other, while by a gentle motion the sand and other lighter bodies are washed over the edge of the pan, and the heavy matters containing the gold remain at the bottom. The 'dolly' or 'tossing tub' is a circular tub for washing rather fine stuff that has been sifted. The 'cradle' consists of a short box or trough two meters long, mounted on a kind of rockers, and slightly inclined to allow the mud to run off. A box, with a bottom of iron plate perforated with holes, is placed over the higher end of the trough. The 'pay dirt' (i.e. gravel or sand containing a sufficient amount of gold to be profitably worked) is thrown into this box, and water is run or poured upon it. The finer portion is thus carried through the holes, and directed by an inclined plate into the trough. The cradle is rocked from side to side, the light matters are carried away by the water, and the particles of gold and other heavy matters lodge behind the 'rimes', or transverse bars of wood, with which the bottom of the trough is fitted, and are afterwards collected.
Where practicable, the method known as 'sluicing' is often adopted for treating alluvial deposits. The 'sluices' consist of troughs called 'flumes', in sections about 3.5 meters long, inclined on trestles. The bottom of the sluice-box is crossed by 'riffle' bars of wood or iron. The smallest of the sluices consists of two such sections. Into the upper one the gravel is thrown, and the lower end is closed by an iron grid to keep back the pebbles and large stones, while the sand, etc, pass through to the lower trough. In this it deposits ite gold and heavy matters behind the riffle bars. In the longer sluices (say 75 meters long) the lower end of the upper section is not blocked, but near it the bottom consists of an iron grating - the 'grizzly'. The large stones are washed forward over the grating, but the sand and fine particles carried by the water fall through it on to the second section of the sluice. In some cases the fine sand, after passing through the first section of the sluice, falls on inclined tables covered witli blankets, rough cloth, or hides witli. the hairy side up, over which it flows in a thin stream. These 'blanket-strakes' serve to arrest and recover the fine gold. In other cases amalgamated copper plates are employed for the same purpose.
Where water is plentiful, 'hydraulic mining' is the cheapest mode of working. Under this system, 'deep leads' (which are alluvial deposits covered over with more recent matter in ancient river beds) and other alluvial deposits are worked by washing down the gravel by means of a powerful jet of water.
In quartz mining - and the case is similar with the hard, solid 'banket' formation of South Africa that contains tlie gold - the ore to be crushed is first passed through a 'stone-breaker' or 'ore crusher', and is further crushed by the 'stamps' or other grinding mill. The ordinary stamp-battery consists, in its lower part, of a cast-iron 'mortar-box', fitted on one or both sides with a fine screen. At the bottom of this box is a row of iron blocks called 'dies', upon which the stamps, or heavy cylindrical cast-iron blocks, are made to rise and fall by means of cams, being thus kept pounding away at the ore in the mortar-box. A stream of water is admitted, and carries the crushed material through the screens. Mercury is fed into the mortar-boxes in small quantities, and much of the gold is retained there on amalgamated copper plates. Slightly inclined amalgamated plates arranged in steps are placed in front of the battery, and over these the crushed orepulp passes slowly, the gold being retained by the amalgamated surfaces. The remaining product, or 'tailings', which may still contain some gold, is then treated either by 'concentration' and the concentrates chlorinated, or the whole is treated by the cyanide process.
For the concentrating process 'vanners' are generally employed. These consist of a slightly sloping table, formed of an endless travelling belt of rubber, which is stretched over rollers and so mounted as to be capable of violent agitation (the vibrations numbering 200 a minute) while moving slowly in an upward direction. The pulp is led on at the higher end, and the flow of water carries the light matters down the slope, the separation being greatly assisted by the shaking movement. The heavy matters only are carried forward by the belt over the higher end, and pass into a box below, being then known as 'concentrates'.
At one time large supplies of gold were obtained from Peru, Bolivia, and other parts of the New World. A rich source of the supply has long been the UralMountains, whence gold is still obtained. An immense increase in the world's production was caused by the discovery of gold in California in 1848, and Australia in 1851, while the South African gold-fields caused a similar increase. It is only since 1886 that the Transvaal became a great gold-producing area, the chief locality being the Witwatersrand.
In Western Australia many mines were opened at the end of the 19th century, and the Yukon district of Canada (Klondike) was also recognized as a gold-field in the 19th century. There are also gold-mines in India that have been worked with great success. Gold has been found in various parts of the United Kingdom, as in Sutherlandshire, Wicklow, and many places in Wales.
Blanket stitch is a type of stitching used for edging heavy fabrics which cannot be turned back and hemmed. Blanket stitch is an attractive stitch also used for decorative work. Research Blanket Stitch
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
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