538 



HANAPER OFFICE 



HAND 



the winter the hamster hibernates, living upon its 

 store of food. Each individual makes a burrow for 

 itself, to which there is a vertical entrance and a 

 sloping passage for exit. The sleeping apartment 

 is always separate from the storehouse, of which 

 young hamsters only make one, older ones several. 



Hamster (Cricetus vulgaris). 



It lives upon roots, grain, and fruits, but does 

 not disdain to eat frogs, beetles, or worms. During 

 the summer it lays up a store of grain and pulse, 

 which it carries home during the night in its cheek- 

 pouches. Only the nutritive portions of its booty 

 are stored up, the husks and chaff being rejected ; 

 sometimes the amount of its hoard will reach nearly 

 a hundredweight. Hence it is a great pest to the 

 farmers of the countries in which it abounds, and 

 the object of their unceasing hostility. The skins 

 of hamsters are of some value. 



Hanaper Office, an office of the Court of 

 Chancery, from which certain writs were formerly 

 issued. The name is derived from the fact that 

 the papers and writs used to be kept in a hamper 

 ( in hanaperio ). The Comptrollers of the Hanaper 

 were abolished in 1842. 



Hanau, a town in the Prussian province of 

 Hesse-Nassau, is situated at the confluence of the 

 Kinzig and the Main, 13 miles E. by N. of Frank- 

 fort by rail. It is divided into the Old and the 

 New Town ; the latter was founded in 1597 by 

 Protestant refugees from Holland and Belgium, 

 who introduced the manufacture of woollen and 

 silk goods, which still nourishes. The town of Hanau 

 stands pre-eminent in Germany for its jewelry and 

 gold and silver wares. Besides these it carries on 

 manufactures of carpets, chocolate, leather, cards, 

 paper, hats, tobacco, and gunpowder, and has 

 breweries and an iron-foundry. Here the brothers 

 Grimm were born. In the neighbourhood is the 

 watering-place of Wilhelmsbad. Hanau dates as a 

 town from 1393. It had a very chequered history 

 during the Thirty Years' War. Near the town 

 was fought one of Napoleon's last battles in Ger- 

 many, October 30 and 31, 1813, when he defeated 

 the allied Austrians and Bavarians under Wrede. 

 Pop. (1875)22,269; (1890)25,029. 



Hancock, WINFIELD SCOTT, a distinguished 

 American general, was born at Montgomery Square, 

 near Philadelphia, 14th February 1824. His grand- 

 father was a Scotsman, his father an attorney of 

 good position. He graduated at West Point in 

 1844, served with merit through the war with 

 Mexico, and had reached the rank of captain when 

 the civil war broke out. Commissioned in 1861 

 brigadier-general of volunteers, he did good service 

 in organising the army of the Potomac, and was 

 prominent in the battles of South Mountain and 

 Antietam ; at Fredericksburg, as major-general of 

 volunteers, he led 5000 men to the desperate assault 

 on Marye's Heights through a deadly fire from 

 which less than 3000 came back. In June 1863 

 he was given the command of the 2d corps. At 

 Gettysburg, Hancock was in command until Meade's 

 arrival ; and on 3d July he was severely wounded, 

 but remained on the field until the enemy's last 



determined assault was repulsed by his corps. In 

 1864 he was conspicuous in the hard-fought catties 

 of the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, and Cold Harbor ; 

 at Spottsylvania he captured nearly an entire 

 division, and carried a salient of field-works on the 

 Confederate centre, afterwards known as the ' bloody 

 angle,' which, with the help of the 6th corps, he 

 held against Lee's desperate assaults. For this, 

 and his services afterwards under Grant, he was 

 created brigadier-general in the regular army, 12th 

 August 1864. His Avound now broke out again, 

 and thereafter, while the war continued, his energies 

 were directed mainly to the work of organisa- 

 tion. In 1866 he was promoted to major-general, 

 and assigned to the command of the department of 

 the Missouri, where he was for a time employed 

 against the Indians. He was then transferred to 

 the South, and in 1868 to the division of the 

 Atlantic. To this post, after three years' command 

 in Dakota, he was restored in 1872, and filled it 

 till his death. He was the Democratic candidate 

 for the presidency of the United States in 1880, but 

 was defeated by Garfield (q.v. ). He died on 

 Governor's Island, in New York harbour, 9th Febru- 

 ary 1886. Grant has written, ' Hancock stands the 

 most conspicuous figure of all the general officers 

 who did not exercise a separate command." 

 McClellan called him 'superb,' and the title stuck 

 to him. He was a brave, fearless soldier, prompt 

 in decision, and skilled to command ; but one who 

 would rather lead than send his troops forward, 

 and whose presence in the thickest of the fight won 

 him their confidence. See the Lives by Junkin and 

 Norton (1880), Goodrich (1886), Walker (1890), 

 and the .Reminiscences of him by his widow (1887). 

 Hand, THE. The genus Homo, or Man, was 

 ranked by Cuvier in his classification of mammals 

 as a distinct order, Bimana, in consequence of man 

 being the only animal possessing two hands. Ke- 

 cently the tendency has been to revert to the 

 classification of Linnaeus, and to place man with 

 all monkeys, lemurs, and bats in the order Pri 

 mates (see BIMANA, MAMMALIA). At first sight 

 it might be considered that the so-called Quadru- 

 mana or four-handed animals ( monkeys, &c. ) were 

 better equipped than those which possess only two 

 hands, but this is far from being the case. None of 

 the four hands are adapted to the variety of actions 

 which the human hand is capable of performing, 

 and they are all, to some degree, required for sup- 

 port and locomotion ; so that, while in the higher 



8 CARPAL 



BONES 



FORMING 



WRIST 



METACARPAL 

 BONES 



14 PHALANGES 

 FORMING FINGERS 



Fig. 1. Front view of the Bones of right hand : 

 a, radius ; 6, ulna. 



forms of the quadrumana the extremities present an 

 approximation in structure to those of man, in the 

 lower they gradually tend to resemble the ordinary 

 quadrupedal type. 'That,' says Cuvier, 'which 

 constitutes the hand, properly so called, is the 



