Research Results For 'Per Annum'

DEATH-RATE

Death-rate is the proportion of deaths among the inhabitants of a town, country, etc. In Britain it is usually calculated at so many per thousand per annum.
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POPULATION

Population is the number of people inhabiting a country, region, area, or town. Population statistics are derived from many sources; for example, through the registration of births and deaths, and from censuses of the population.

The first national censuses were taken in 1800 and 1801 and provided population statistics for Italy, Spain, the UK, Ireland, and the USA; and the cities of London, Paris, Vienna, Berlin, and New York. Since that time a growing number of countries have taken regular censuses, often at ten-yearly intervals, including Austria (1821), France (1821), China (1851), Russia (1861), Japan (1871), and India (1901). Although censuses are approximately accurate for wealthy industrial countries, this may not be the case with other countries.

Between 1990 and 1995 world population increased by 1.7% a year (the number of elderly increased at 2.7% annually). In mid-1994 world population was 5.7 billion and increasing at the rate of 86 million per annum. According to a UN 'low variant' projection, the world population will be at least 7.9 billion by 2050, 9.8 billion by a mid-range projection, or 13 billion by high-range forecasts.

In September 1994, a UN international conference on population and development was attended by politicians from 150 countries. It emphasised the importance of improving the position of women for effective population control, as well as improved sex education and contraception. Serious population studies date from the later 18th century; for example, Thomas Malthus's 'Essay on the Principle of Population', first published in 1798.
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ABRAHAM COWLEY

Abraham Cowley was an English poet. He was born in 1618 at London and died in 1667. He was one of the metaphysical school of poets who followed John Donne in his use of far-fetched conceits. He published his first volume, Poetic Blossoms, at the age of fifteen. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1636, but was ejected as a royalist in 1643, and removed to St John's College, Oxford. He engaged actively in the royal cause, and when the queen was obliged to quit England, Abraham Cowley accompanied her. He was absent from his native country nearly ten years, and it was principally through him that the correspondence was maintained between the king and queen. On the Restoration he returned with the other royalists, and obtained the lease of a farm at Chertsey, held under the queen, by which his income was about 300 pounds sterling per annum. Abraham Cowley's poems have failed to maintain their ancient popularity, but he still holds a high position as a prose writer and as an essayist. He took a considerable interest in science, and was one of the founders of the Royal Society. His chief works are: Love's Riddle, a pastoral comedy; Davideis, a scriptural epic; Naufragium Joculare; The Mistress, a collection of love verses; Pindarique Odes; Liber Plantarum; etc.
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BARONET

Baronet is the first in rank among the gentry, and the only knighthood that is hereditary. They were instituted by James I in 1611 as a result of the rebellion in Ulster, it being required of a baronet on his creation, to pay into the exchequer as much as would maintain 'thirty soldiers three years at eight pence a day in the province of Ulster in Ireland.' It was also required that a baronet should be a gentleman born, and have a clear estate of 1000 pounds per annum.
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EDMUND BURKE

Edmund Burke was an Irish writer and statesman. He was born in 1729 at Dublin and died in 1797. After studying at Trinity College in Dublin, he moved to London and studied law at the Temple. He applied himself more to literature than to law, and in 1756 published his Essay on the Sublime and the Beautiful, which attracted considerable attention, and procured him the friendship of some of the most notable men of the time.

In 1761 he was appointed private secretary to W.G. Hamilton, secretary for Ireland. On his return he was rewarded with a pension of 300 pounds per annum, and obtained the appointment of private secretary to the Marquis of Buckingham, then First Lord of the Treasury, and in 1765 entered Parliament as member for Wendover. as a member of Parliament he advised badly on the question of taxing the American colonies. He was absent from Parliament from 1770, returning in 1774 as member for Bristol, advocating a policy of justice and conciliation towards the colonies. In 1782 he was appointed Paymaster-General of the Forces, shortly afterwards passing his bill for economic reform.

The chief feature in the latter part of Burke's life was his resolute struggle against the ideas and doctrines of the French revolution. His attitude on this question separated him from his old friend Fox, and the Liberals who followed Fox. His famous Reflections on the Revolution in France, a pamphlet which appeared in 1790, had an unprecedented sale, and gave enormous impetus to the reaction which had commenced in England. From this time most of his writings are powerful pleadings on the same side. We may mention An Appeal from the New to the Old Whigs; Letter to a Noble Lord; Letters on a Regicide Peace; etc. In 1794 he withdrew from parliament. Three years after, on July the 8th, 1797, he died, his end being hastened by grief for the loss of his only son.
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EDWARD PELLEW

Edward Pellew (Viscount Exmouth) was a British naval officer. He was born in 1757 and died in 1833. He went to sae at the age of thirteen, served as midshipman in the frigate 'Blonde' during the American War of Independence, and distinguished himself at Lake Champlain. In 1782 he was made a post-captain for a brilliant action in the 'Pelican', and on the outbreak of the war in 1793 was appointed to the command of the frigate 'La Nymphe', serving until peace in 1802. In 1804, on the redemption of hostilities, he was sent to take the chief command on the East India station, in the 'Culloden', of seventy-four guns; and there he remained until 1809, when he had attained the rank of vice-admiral. His next appointment was the command of the fleet blockading the Scheldt. In 1814 he was made Baron Exmouth with a pension of 2000 pounds per annum. In 1816 he was sent with a fleet to punish the Dey of Algiers for outrages committed, and to force him to give up his Christian captives and abolish Christian slavery. Along with some Dutch vessels he bombarded the city for eight hours, and inflicted such damage that the Dey had to agree to the demands, three thousand Christian slaves were henceforth freed. Lord Exmouth was made a viscount and received honours from several of the European sovereigns and the Freedom of The City of London. He retired in 1821.
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WILLIAM CARLETON

William Carleton was an Irish novelist. He was born in 1794 at Prillisk and died in 1869. His education commenced at a hedge-school, and terminated with two years' training in an academy kept by a relation, a priest, at Glasslough. Thence he went to Dublin to try his fortune in the walks of literature. There, in 1830 to 1832, were published his Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry. Among his other publications are: Fardorougha, the Miser; The Misfortunes of Barney Branagan; Valentine M'Clutchy; The Black Prophet; The Tithe Proctor; Willey Reilly; and the Evil Eye; this last novel appearing in 1860. He enjoyed a government allowance of 200 pounds per annum several years before his death.
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WILLIAM HUNTER

William Hunter was a Scottish physician and anatomist. He was born in 1718 at Long Calderwood, Lanarkshire and died in 1783. He studied at Glasgow with a view to entering the church, but abandoned theology for medicine. In 1741 he went to London, where he became a member of the College of Surgeons; acquired a large practice in surgery and midwifery; was appointed accoucheur to the British Lying-in Hospital, and in 1764 physician-extraordinary to the queen; in 1767 a fellow of the Royal Society; in 1780 foreign associate of the Royal Medical Society at Paris, etc.

In 1770 he established a theatre of anatomy for his own lectures and a splendid museum for his anatomical preparations, objects of natural history, pictures of ancient coins and medals, etc. He was the author of some important works, in particular the Anatomy of the Human Gravid Uterus, published in 1774. On his death he bequeathed the whole of his splendid museum, valued at 150,000 pounds sterling, to the University of Glasgow, with the sum of 8000 pounds sterling in cash to be expended in a building for its reception, and a further sum of 500 pounds sterling per annum to bear the charges of its preservation.
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OPIUM

Opium is the dried, milky juice (latex) of unripe capsules of the white poppy also known as the opium poppy (Papaver somniferum), a plant probably indigenous in the south of Europe and western Asia, but now so widely cultivated that its original habitat is uncertain.

The medicinal properties of the juice have been recognized from a very early period. It was known to Theophrastus and appears in his time to have consisted of an extract of the whole plant, since Dioscorides about 77 AD draws a distinction between different types of opium, one of which he describes as an extract of the entire herb, and the more active form derived from the capsules alone. From the 1st to the 12th century the opium of Asia Minor appears to have been the only kind known in commerce. In the 13th century opium thebaicum is mentioned by Simon Januensis, physician to Pope Nicholas IV.

In the 16th century opium is mentioned by Pyres in 1516 as a production of the kingdom of Cous (Kuch Behar, south-west of Bhutan) in Bengal and of Malwa. Its introduction into India appears to have been connected with the spread of Islam. The opium monopoly was the property of the Great Mogul and was regularly sold. In the 17th century Kaempfer describes the various kinds of opium prepared in Persia, and states that the best sorts were flavoured with spices and called theriaka. These preparations were held in great esteem during the Middle Ages, and probably supplied to a large extent the place of the pure drug.

Opium is said to have been introduced into China, probably by the Arabs around 1280-1295, during the reign of Taitsu, and its use seems to have temporarily ceased in 1368. It appears to have been commonly used in that country as a medicine before the trade with India started. In a Chinese herbal compiled prior to the 17th century both the plant and its inspissated juice are described, together with the mode of collecting it, and in the General History of the Southern Provinces of Yunnan, revised and republished in 1736, opium is noticed as a common product up to this date, however, it was imported in comparatively small quantity by the Chinese solely as a remedy for dysentery, diarrhoea, and fevers, and was usually brought from India by junks as a return cargo.

In 1757 the monopoly of opium cultivation passed into the hands of the East India Company through the victory of Clive at Plassey. Up to 1773 the trade with China had been in the hands of the Portuguese, but the quantity annually exported to that country rarely exceeded 200 chests. In that year the East India Company took the trade under their own charge, and in 1776 the annual export reached 1000 chests, and 4054 chests in 1790. Although the importation was forbidden by the Chinese emperor Keaking in 1796, and opium-smoking punished with severe penalties, which were ultimately increased to transportation and death, the trade continued and had increased during 1820-1830 to 16,877 chests per annum. In 1839 a proclamation was issued threatening hostile measures if the English opium ships serving as depots were not sent away. The demand for removal not being complied with, 20,291 chests of opium (of 149.3 Ib each), valued at 2,000,000 pounds sterling, were destroyed by the Chinese commissioner Lin; but still the British sought to smuggle cargoes on shore, and some outrages committed on both sides led to an open war, which was ended by the treaty of Nanking in 1842. From that time until the end of the 19th century, in spite of the remonstrances of the Chinese Government, the exportation of opium from India to China continued, having increased from 52,925 piculs (of 133.3 Ib) in 1850 to 96,839 piculs in 1880. It appears to be certain, however, that, while the court of Peking was endeavouring to suppress the foreign trade in opium from 1796 to 1840, it did not or could not put a stop to the home cultivation of the drug, since a Chinese censor in 1830 represented to the throne that the poppy was grown over one-half of the province of Chekeang, and in 1836 another, Cho Tsun, stated that the annual produce of opium in Yunnan could not be less than several thousand piculs.

In 1885 it was estimated that south-western China, including Szechuen, produced not less than 224,000 piculs, while the entire import from India did not exceed 100,000 piculs. Opium was then produced in nine out of the eighteen provinces of China. The comparative cheapness of the Chinese opium, the lighter duties levied upon it, and the increasing care taken in its cultivation were enabling it to compete successfully with the Indian drug even in eastern China, where, however, it was hitherto chiefly used to mix with and cheapen the foreign article.

The amount of opium imported into Great Britain in 1861, 1871, and 1881 was 284,005, 591,466, and 793,146 lbs respectively, and the exports for the same years 290,120, 307,399, and 401,883 lb.

Formerly opium was widely produced in Turkey, England, India, China and Asia Minor. Now opium is produced chiefly in England, Afghanistan, Asia Minor, India, and China.

The method of cultivationa nd manufacture varies between countries, but generally the opium poppy is cultivated from seeds sown between November and March, and successive crops are ready from May to July. The flowers are white or purplish, there being different varieties of opium poppies; and a few days after the petals have fallen, when the capsules are about 25 mm. in diameter, they are cut round the middle with a knife, and left overnight for the juice to flow out and harden. After further drying on poppy leaves, the dark, plastic masses are made into lumps for sale.

Opium is bitter, and has a characteristic smell. Its properties depend upon the nineteen or twenty alkaloids it contains. The chief of these are: Morphine (9 per cent); narcotine (5 per cent); papaverine (0.8 per cent) ; thebaine (0.4 per cent); codeine or methylmorphine (0.3 per cent); narceine (0,2 per cent.). Morphine, the most important alkaloid, is separated from the others by extracting the opium with hot water, and boiling the extract with milk of lime. Alcoholic tincture of opium is known as laudanum. It contains about 0.75 per cent, of morphine.

Opium is used medicinally, mainly to relieve pain and to produce sleep, and for this purpose is best given hypodermically as morphine. It is also employed to relieve vomiting and to stop diarrhoea, to lessen distressing coughing, to stop bleeding in the stomach and intestines; while it is valuable in heart disease, diabetes, in cystitis and other inflammatory conditions, for haemoptysis, and, as Dover's powder, to cause perspiration in, for instance, common cold.

A conference of the Powers at the Hague in January 1912, drew up a convention of twenty-five articles by which they agreed to control the supply of and gradually suppress the manufacture of opium.
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REGIUM DONUM

Regium donum was a sun of 1200 pounds per annum granted by William III to the Presbyterian clergy of Ireland as a reward for the active measures they took against James II. After various vicissitudes it was abolished in 1871, after the Irish Church was disestablished, but compensation was granted to the clergy who had a claim upon the annuity.
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