Adulteration is a term not only applied in its proper sense to the fraudulent mixture of articles of commerce, food, drink, drugs, seeds, etc, with noxious or inferior ingredients, but also by magistrates and analysts to accidental impurity, and even in some cases to actual substitution.
The chief objects of adulteration are to increase the weight or volume of the article, to give a colour which either makes a good article more pleasing to the eye or else disguises an inferior one, to substitute a cheaper form of the article, or the same substance from which the strength has been extracted, or to give it a false strength.
Among the adulterations which were commonly practised around 1905 for the purpose of fraudulently increasing the weight or volume of an article are the following: Bread was adulterated with alum or sulphate of copper, which gives solidity to the gluten of damaged or inferior flour; with chalk or carbonate of soda to correct the acidity of such flour; and with boiled rice or potatoes, which enables the bread to carry more water, and thus to produce a larger number of loaves from a given quantity of flour. Wheatflour is adulterated with other inferior flours, as the flour from rice, bean, Indian-corn, potato, and with sulphate of lime, alum, etc. Milk was usually adulterated with water. The adulterations generally present in butter consisted of an undue proportion of salt and water, lard, tallow, and other fats; when of poor quality it was frequently coloured with a little annatto, and, at times, with the juice of carrots. Genuine butter should not contain less than 80 percent of butter-fat. Cheese was also coloured with annatto and other substances. Tea was adulterated chiefly in China with sand, iron-filings, chalk, gypsum, Chinaclay, exhausted tea leaves, and the leaves of the sycamore, horse-chestnut, and plum, whilst colour and weight were added by black-lead, indigo, Prussian-blue (one of the deleterious ingredients used by the Chinese in converting the lowest qualities of black into green teas), gum, turmeric, soapstone, catechu, and other substances.
Confections were adulterated with flour and sulphate of lime. Preserved vegetables were kept green and poisoned by salts of copper. The acridity of mustard is commonly reduced by flour, and the colour of the compound is improved by turmeric. Pepper was adulterated with linseed-meal, flour, mustard husks, etc. Colour was given to pickles by salts of copper, acetate of copper, etc. Ale was adulterated with common salt, Cocculus Indicus, grains of paradise, quassia, and other bitters, sulphate of iron, alum, etc. Porter and stout were mixed with sugar, treacle, salt, and an excess of water. Brandy was diluted with water, and burned sugar was added to improve the colour; sometimes bad whisky was flavoured and coloured so as to resemble brandy, and sold under its name.
Gin was mixed with excess of water, and flavouring matters of various kinds, with alum and tartar, were added. Rum was diluted with water, and the flavour and colour kept up by the addition of cayenne and burned sugar. For champagnegooseberry and other inferior wines were often substituted. Port was manufactured from red Cape and other inferior wines, the body, flavour, strength, and colour being produced by gum-dragon, the washings of brandy casks, and a preparation of German bilberries. Cheap brown sherry was mixed with Cape and other low-priced brandies, and was flavoured with the washings of brandy casks, sugar-candy, and bitter almonds. Pale sherries were produced by gypsum, by a process called plastering, which removes the natural acids as well as the colour of the wine. Other wines were adulterated with elderberry, logwood, Brazil-wood, cudbear, red beetroot, etc, for colour; with lime or carbonate of lime, carbonate of soda, carbonate of potash, and litharge, to correct acidity; with catechu, sloe-leaves, and oak-bark for astringency; with sulphate of lime and alum for removing colour; with cane-sugar for giving sweetness and body; with alcohol for fortifying; and with ether, especially acetic ether, for giving bouquet and flavour.
Medicines, such as jalap, opium, rhubarb, cinchonabark, scammony, aloes, sarsaparilla, squills, etc, were mixed with various foreign substances. Castor-oil has been adulterated with other oils; and inferior oils were often. mixed with cod-liver oil. Cantharides were often mixed with golden-beetle and also artificially-coloured glass.
The adulteration of seeds was largely practised also, the seed which forms the adulterant being of course of the most worthless kind that can be had. Thus turnip-seed was mixed with rape, wild mustard, or charlock, which are steamed and kiln-dried to destroy their vitality, so as to evade detection in the progress of growth; old and useless turnip-seed was also used fraudulently mixed with fresh seeds. Clover was also much mixed with plantain and mere weeds.
Acts against adulteration have been passed in various countries and at various times. In Britain there was a law against it as early as 1267. Research Adulteration
The Alani (Alans) were a warlike Tartar tribe which migrated from Asia westwards at he time of the decline of the Roman empire. During the 5th century they merged with the Vandals. Research Alani
Attila (Etzel) was King of the Huns. He was born in 406 and died in 453. The son of Mundzuk, and the successor, in conjunction with his brother Bleda, of his uncle Rhuas, he succeeded to the chieftainship in 434 when his people were masters of eastern Europe north of the Danube, and were terrorising western Europe as far as the Rhine and western Asia. They threatened the Eastern Empire, and twice compelled the weak Theodosius II to purchase an inglorious peace. Attila caused his brother Bleda to be murdered in 444, and in a short time extended his dominion over all the peoples of Germany and exacted tribute from the eastern and western emperors. The Vandals, the Ostrogoths, the Gepidse, and a part of the Franks united under his banners, and he speedily formed a pretext for leading them against the Empire of the East. He laid waste all the countries from the Black Sea to the Adriatic Sea, and in three encounters defeated the Emperor Theodoeius, but could not take Constantinople.
Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece all submitted to the invader, who destroyed seventy flourishing cities; and Theodosius was obliged to purchase a peace. Turning to the west, the 'scourge of God,' as the universal terror termed him, crossed with an immense army the Rhine, the Moselle, and the Seine, came to the Loire, and laid siege to Orleans. The inhabitants of this city repelled the first attack, and the united forces of the Romans under Aetius, and of the Visigoths under their king Theodoric, compelled Attila to raise the siege. He retreated to Champagne, and waited for the enemy in the plains of Chalons.
In apparent opposition to the prophecies of the soothsayers the ranks of the Romans and Goths were broken; but when the victory of Attila seemed assured the Gothic prince Thorismond, the son of Theodoric, poured down from the neighbouring height upon the Huns, who were defeated with great slaughter. Rather irritated more than discouraged, he sought in the following year a new opportunity to seize upon Italy, and demanded Honoria, the sister of Valentinian III, in marriage, with half the kingdom as a dowry. When this demand was refused he conquered and destroyed Aquileia, Padua, Vicenza, Verona, and Bergamo, laid waste the plains of Lombardy, and was marching on Rome when Pope Leo I went with the Roman ambassadors to his camp and succeeded in obtaining a peace. Attila went back to Hungary, and died on the night of his marriage with Hilda or Ildico in 453, either from the bursting of a blood-vessel or by her hand. The description that Jornandes has left us of him is in keeping with his Kalmuck-Tartar origin. He had a large head, a flat nose, broad shoulders, and a short and ill-formed body; but his eyes were brilliant, his walk stately, and his voice strong and well-toned. Research Attila
Baber was the founder of the Mogul dynasty which ruled northern India for 300 years. He was born in 1483 and died in 1530. He was a grandson of the great Tartar prince Timur or Tamerlane, and was sovereign of Kabul. He several times invaded Hindustan, and in 1525 finally overthrew and killed Sultan Ibrahim, the last Hindu emperor of the Patan or Afghan race. He made many improvements, social and political, in his empire, and left a valuable autobiography. Research Baber
The Buriats are a nomadic Tartar people allied to the Kalmucks, inhabiting the southern part of the government of Irkutsk and Transbaikalia. They live in huts called yurts, which in summer are covered with leather, in winter with felt. They traditionally supported themselves by their flocks, by hunting, and the mechanical arts, particularly the forging of iron. Research Buriats
Originally the name Cossack was applied to any armed adventurer, later the name was applied to tribes who inhabited the southern and eastern parts of Russia, paying no taxes, but performing instead the duty of soldiers.
Nearly all of the Cossacks belonged to the Graeco - Russian Church, to which they were strongly attached, and to the observances of which they were particularly attentive. They were divided into two principal classes, both on account of their descent and their condition - the Cossacks of Little Russia and those of the Don. Both classes, and especially those of the Don, had collateral branches, distributed as Cossacks of the Azoff, of the Danube, of the Black Sea, of the Caucasus, of the Ural, of Orenberg, of Siberia, of the Chinese frontiers, and of Astrakhan.
Writers were not agreed as to the origin of this people and of their name, but they are believed to be a mixed Caucasian and Tartar race. In personal appearance the Cossacks bore a close resemblance to the Russians, but were of a more slender make, and had features which were decidedly more handsome and expressive.
Originally their government formed a kind of democracy, at the head of which was a chief or hetman of their own choice; while under him was a long series of officers with jurisdictions of greater or less extent, partly civil and partly military, all so arranged as to be able on any emergency to furnish the largest military array on the shortest notice. The democratical part of the constitution gradually disappeared under Russian domination. The title of chief hetman was later vested in the heir-apparent to the throne, and all the subordinate hetmans and other officers were appointed by the crown.
Each Cossack was liable to military service from the age of eighteen to thirty-eight, and had to furnish his own horse. They supplied the Russian empire with one of the most valuable elements in its national army, forming a first-rate irregular cavalry, and rendering excellent service as scouts and skirmishers. In 1570 they built their principal 'stanitza' and rendezvous, called Tcherkask, on the Don, not far above its mouth. As it was rendered unhealthy by the overflowing of the island on which it stood, New Tcherkask was founded in 1805 some miles from the old city, to which nearly all the inhabitants removed. This formed the capital of the country of the Don Cossacks, which constituted a government of Russia, and had an area of 61,900 square miles and a population of some 2.5 million in 1905. Research Cossack
Genghis Khan was a Mongolianchieftain and warrior. He was born in 1162 and died in 1227. His father was chief over thirty or forty clans, but paid tribute to the Tartar Khan. He succeeded his father when only fourteen years of age, and made himself master of the neighbouring tribes. A great number of tribes now combined their forces against him. But he found a powerful protector in the great Khan of the Karaite Mongols, Oung, or Ung, who gave him his daughter in marriage. After much intestine warfare with various Tartar tribes Genghis was proclaimed Khan of the United Mongol and Tartar tribes. He now professed to have a divine call to conquer the world, and the idea so animated the spirit of his soldiers that they were easily led on to new wars.
The country of the Uigurs, in the centre of Tartary, had long excited his ambition. This nation was easily subdued, and Genghis Khan was now master of the greatest part of Tartary. Soon after several Tartar tribes put themselves under his dominion, and in 1209 he passed the great wall of China. The conquest of China occupied the Mongols more than six years. The capital, then called Yenking, now Beijing, was taken by storm in 1215 and plundered. The murder of the ambassadors whom Genghis Khan had sent to the King of Kharism (now Khiva) occasioned the invasion of Turkestan in 1218 with an army of 700,000 men; and the two cities of Bokhara and Samarcand were stormed, pillaged, and burned. Seven years in succession was the conqueror busy in the work of destruction, pillage, and subjugation, and extended his ravages to the banks of the Dnieper.
In 1225, though more than sixty years old, he marched in person at the head of his whole army against the King of Tangut (South-western China), who had given shelter to two of his enemies, and had refused to give them up. A great battle was fought, in which the King of Tangut was totally defeated with the loss of 300,000 men. The victor remained some time in his newly-subdued provinces, from which he also sent two of his sons to complete the conquest of Northern China. At his death his immense dominions were divided among his four sons. Research Genghis Khan
Tamerlane or Tamburlaine or Timur was a Tartarchieftain and a King of Samarkland. He was born in 1336 of noble family near Samarkand and died in 1405. In 1358 he began his military career by invading Khorassan. He became a powerful chieftain and in 1369 was crowned king of Samarkand. After being crowned king he embarked upon a series of wars and invasions, reaching the Caspian Sea, subduing most of Persia and routing the Golden Horde. In 1398 he invaded India and sacked Delhi, carrying back to Samarkand enormous booty. He was victorious against the Turks and Egyptians, captured Damascus and Aleppo and defeated and captured Bayazid I in 1402. He died while preparing an invasion of China. Research Tamerlane
The Tartars (more correctly Tatars) are a Slavonic people akin to the Mongols. They live in central Asia and ethnically hold an intermediate position between Europeans and Mongols. The name Tartar was incorrectly applied by Europeans to the Mongol followers of Genghis Khan and the Mongol hordes. Research Tartars
Dentistry is the art or science of cleaning and extracting teeth, of repairing them when diseased, and replacing them when necessary by artificial ones. There are two very distinct departments in dentistry, the one being dental surgery, the other what is known as mechanical dentistry.
The first requires an extended medical knowledge on the part of the practitioner, as, for instance, a knowledge of diseases whose effects may reach the teeth, of the connection between the welfare of the teeth and the general system, etc, as well as ability to discern latent oral diseases, calculate the effects of operations, etc. The chief operations in this department are scaling, or removing the tartar which has accumulated on the base of the teeth; regulating, the restoring of overcrowded and displaced teeth to their proper position; stopping or stuffing, the filling up of the hollow of a decayed tooth and thus preventing the progress of decay; extracting, a process requiring considerable muscular power and delicacy of manipulation.
The second department, mechanical dentistry, is concerned with the construction of artificial substitutes for lost teeth, and requires much mechanical science, it being a very delicate work to give artificial teeth a perfectly natural appearance in shape and colour. The actual construction of the teeth, however, has passed largely into the hands of the manufacturers, and the dentist has only the selecting, fitting, and fixing to do.
Until the start of the 19th century no special curriculum or collegiate certificate was obtainable by practitioners of dentistry in Britain, who thus held an anomalous and altogether unrecognized position in the medical profession. This was partially remedied in 1858, when the dental certificate of the College of Surgeons of England was established for such as chose to pass the required examination. Finally, in 1878 an act was passed regulating the education and registration of dentists, by which a course of instruction in various branches of medicine and surgery with a corresponding examination was made necessary for all who wish to be registered as dental practitioners. In the United States the Baltimore College of Dental Surgery is the oldest, being chartered in 1839. The Ohio College of Dental Surgery followed in 1845, and various others have been established since. Research Dentistry
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Adulteration
