A cacolet was a contrivance somewhat resembling a double arm-chair, or in other cases like a bed, formerly fixed on the back of a mule or horse for carrying sick persons or travellers in mountainous countries. Research Cacolet
Catgut is a cord made from the intestines of sheep, and sometimes from those of the horse, ass, and mule, but not from those of cats. The manufacture is chiefly carried on in Italy and France by a tedious process. Catgut for stringed instruments, as violins and harps, is made principally in Milan and Naples, the latter having a high reputation for treble strings. Research Catgut
Cotton-spinning is a term employed to describe in the aggregate all the operations involved in transforming raw cotton into yarn. The word 'spinning' has also a more limited signification, being used to denote the concluding process of the series. The following affords a general notion of the nature and order of the successive operations carried on in the manufacture of cottonyarn:
(1) Mixing, the blending of different varieties of raw cotton, in order to secure economical production, uniform quality and colour, and an even thread in any desired degree.
(2) Cleaning, an operation partly effected in mixing, partly by scutching, the cotton being prepared in the form of a continuous lap or rolled sheet for the next process.
(3) Carding, an operation in which the material is treated in its individual fibres, which are taken from the lap, further cleansed, and laid in a position approximately parallel to each other, forming a thin film, which is afterwards condensed into a sliver - a round, untwisted strand of cotton.
(4) Drawing, the drawing out of several slivers to the dimensions of one, so as to render the new sliver more uniform in thickness, and to place the fibres more perfectly in parallel order.
(5) Stubbing, the further drawing or attenuation of the sliver, and slightly twisting it in order to preserve its cohesion and rounded form.
(6) Intermediate or second stubbing, a repetition of the former operation and further attenuation, not necessary in the production of coarse yarns.
(7) Having, a continuation of the preceding, its principal object being to still further attenuate the sliver, and give it a slight additional twist.
(8) Spinning, which completes the extension and twisting of the yarn. This is accomplished either with the throstle or the mule. By means of the former machine the yarn receives a hard twist, which renders it tough and strong. By means of the latter yarns of less strength are produced, such as warps of light fabrics and wefts of all kind.
Up to the middle of the 18th century the only method of spinning known was that by the hand-wheel, or the still more primitive distaff and spindle. In 1767 a poor weaver of the name of Hargreaves, residing at Stanhill, near Blackburn, in Lancashire, invented a machine for spinningcotton, which he named a spinning-jenny. It consisted at first of eight spindles, turned by a horizontal wheel, but was afterwards greatly extended and improved, so as to have the vertical substituted for the horizontal wheel, and give motion to from fifty to eighty spindles. In 1769 Arkwright, originally a barber's apprentice, took out a patent for spinning by rollers. From the circumstances of the mill erected by Arkwright at Cromford, in Derbyshire, being driven by water-power, his machine received the name of the water-frame, and the thread spun on it that of water-twist. The next important invention in cotton-spinning was that of the mule, introduced by Samuel Crompton, of Bolton, in 1775, and so called from its combining the principle of the spinning-jenny of Hargreaves with the roller-spinning of Arkwright.
Numerous improvements in cotton-spinning have been subsequently introduced up to the present day, but they are all, more or less, modifications of Arkwright's spinning-frame and Crompton's mule-jenny. Among the principal of these may be mentioned the throstle, an extension and simplification of the original spinning-frame, introduced about the year 1810. Research Cotton-Spinning
A throstle was a drawing-frame machine used in the manufacture of cotton, succeeding the spinning-jenny in around 1885. The throstle was used for attenuating slivers of fibre by passing them through consecutive pairs of rollers, each pair in the succession revolving at a higher speed than its predecessor. The specific difference between the action of the throstle and the mule was that the throstle had a continuous action, drawing, twisting and winding; while the mule had an alternative action, drawing and twisting and then winding. Research Throstle
The ass or donkey (Equus asinus) is a species of the horsegenus, supposed by Darwin to have sprung from the wild variety {Asinus toeniopus) found in Abyssinia; by some writers to be a descendant of the onager or wild ass, inhabiting the mountainous deserts of Tartary, etc; and by others to have descended from the kiang or djiggetai (Asinus hemionus) of southwestern Asia. Both in colour and size the ass is exceedingly variable, ranging from dark grey and reddish brown to white, and from the size of a Newfoundlanddog in North India to that of a good-sized horse. In the south-western countries of Asia and in Egypt, in some districts of Southern Europe, as in Spain, and in Kentucky and Peru, great attention has been paid to selection and interbreeding, with a result no less remarkable than in the case of the horse. Thus in Syria there appear to be four distinct breeds: a light and graceful animal used by ladies, an Arab breed reserved for the saddle, an ass of heavier build in use for ploughing and draft purposes, and the large Damascus breed. The efforts made to raise the deteriorated British breed during the 19th century were only partially successful.
The male ass is mature at two years of age, the female still earlier. The she-ass carries her young for eleven months. The teeth of the young ass follow the same order of appearance and renewal as those of the horse. The life of the ass does not usually exceed thirty years. It is in general much healthier than the horse, and is maintained in this condition by a smaller quantity and coarser quality of food; it is superior to the horse in its ability to carry heavy burdens over the most precipitous roads, and is in no respect its inferior in intelligence, despite the reputation for stupidity which it has borne from very ancient times. The ass has a keen sense of humour and mischief, and domestic ass delight in throwing riders into rivers and thorn bushes, and also tripping over the unwary.
The skin is used as parchment to cover drums, etc, and in the East is made into shagreen. The hybrid offspring of the horse and the female ass is the hinny, that of the ass and the mare is the mule; but the latter is by far the larger and more useful animal. Asses' milk, long celebrated for its sanative qualities, more closely resembles that of a woman than any other. It is very similar in taste, and throws up an equally fluid cream, which is not convertible into butter. Research Ass
A hybrid is the product of a femal animal or plant which has been impregnated by a male of a different but nearly allied species or genus. Uncertainty prevails respecting the productive crossing of species, but it seems to be established that while the crossing of different genera may result in offspring, that of different orders will not.
Hybrids are obtained amongst fishes from different Species of carp; amongst birds, from the goldfinch and canary, the swan and the goose, etc; amongst mammals, from the horse and the zebra, the horse and the ass, the produce of the last two being the mule proper; from the lion and tiger, the dog and wolf, the dog and fox, the goat and ibex.
Instances of hybrids between animals of different genera have been furnished by the union of the goat and the antelope, and of the stag and the cow. It used formerly to be considered that the propagative power of hybrids was either absolutely null, or that they propagated only with an individual of the pure breed; but the experiments of Charles Darwin and other 10th century researches showed that although infertility to some degree generally attends sexual intercourse between different species, yet in such intercourse every degree of difference from absolute sterility up to complete fertility is found. The results hitherto obtained may be summarized as follows: The crossing of species of different families is in almost every case infertile; allied species are capable of producing offspring, and this capability is in indefinite ratio to the degree of their likeness; hybrids are frequently fertile with their parents, but more rarely among themselves; there is no fixed relation between the degree of fertility manifested by the parent species when crossed and that which is manifested by their hybrid progeny.
In many cases two pure species can be crossed with unusual facility, while the resulting hybrids are remarkably sterile; and, on the other hand, there are species which can only be crossed with extreme difficulty, though the hybrids when produced are very fertile. Research Hybrid
Mulatta is an offensive term for the female offspring of a white man and a black woman. A male child is similarly termed a Mulatto. Both terms mean a mongrel or mule. Research Mulatta
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Cacolet
