385 



BARBACOU. 



BARBETS. 



a handful of dried dates in the morning, and a supply of water every 

 third day ; upon an extraordinary emergency he can even travel for 

 six or seven days without this important element ; but the desert- 

 horse must have a feed of camel's milk once a day, and for this purpose 

 there must be a couple of female camels wherever he goes. Camel's 

 milk is his only sustenance ; and indeed it would be difficult to find 

 him any other in the parched and arid deserts which he inhabits ; he 

 does not like wheat, hay, straw, or any other kind of food, aiid if forced 

 to live upon these substances, soon loses all his valuable qualities. lu 

 his native country the desert-horse is principally employed for the 

 puqjose of hunting the ostrich and gazelle, at which sports he is 

 amazingly expert, nor is there any other being that can equal these 

 animals in speed. When brought to Marocco, as is sometimes the 

 case, these horses soon decline under the change of food and climate. 

 " Alkaid Omar ben Daudy," says Jackson in his ' Account of the Empire 

 of Marocco,' " when governor of Mogodor, had two Saharawan horses 

 in his stables ; but finding it inconvenient to feed them constantly 

 upon camel's milk, he resolved to try them on the usual food given to 

 Barbary horses. He accordingly had their food gradually changed, 

 and in a short time fed them altogether with barley, and occasionally 

 with wheat and straw ; they grew fat, and looked better than before, 

 but they lost their speed, and soon afterwards died, as if nature had 

 designed them to be appropriated solely to that district whose arid 

 and extensive plains render their use essentially necessary." 



BARBACOU. [KINGFISHERS.] 



BARBA'REA (from a former name, Herb St. Barbara), a genus of 

 plants belonging to the natural order Cructfene. It has a terete 

 2-edged pod, the valves convex, with a prominent longitudinal nerve ; 

 the stigma capitate, the seeds in a single row. Barbarea belongs to 

 the first sub-order of CV. '//", ^Uiyuone, which possess a linear or 

 linear-lanceolate pod opening by two valves. The species of Barbarea 

 are perennial herbs, with fibrous roots and erect stems. The flowers 

 are yellow, arranged in racemes ; the pedicles without bracts. 



B. rali/arii, Common Yellow Rocket, Common Winter Cress, Herb 

 St. Barbara, has the lower leaves lyrate, upper pair of lobes as broad 

 as the large roundish subcordate terminal lobe, the uppermost leaf 

 undivided, toothed ; young pods obliquely erect ; seeds scarcely longer 

 than broad. It is a native, in damp moist places, of Great Britain, 

 and throughout Europe ; also of North America. This plant has a 

 bitter nauseous taste, and is sometimes cultivated as a spring salad. 

 In Sweden the leaves are boiled and eaten. It is often cultivated in 

 gardens, especially a double variety, which forms a handsome border- 

 plant. 



B. pracox, Early Winter Cress, has the lower leaves lyrate, upper 

 pair of lobes as broad as the roundish subcordate terminal lobe, upper- 

 most leaf pinnatifid, with linear oblong entire lobes. It is a native of 

 France and Great Britain ; abundant in North America. It is called 

 in Germany Amerikanischer Kraut ; in French, Cresson d'Amdrique ; 

 in England, American Cress, Black American Cress, French Cress, and 

 Belle-Isle Cress. It is used as a salad, and is more bitter than the 

 common Water-Cress. It can be raised for eating all the year round. 

 In cultivating, it should be grown from seeds, a quarter of an ounce 

 of which will serve for sowing 10 feet of drill. 



B. arcuata and B. stricta are two species described by Babington, 

 and lately added to the British Flora. A few others are found in the 

 northern parts of Europe and America. With the exception of the 

 Double Yellow Rocket, none of the species are worth cultivating as 

 ornamental. This plant may be propagated by cuttings, suckers, or 

 dividing the plants at the root. 



(Don, Gardener's Dictionary ; Babington, Manual.) 



BARBEL (Barbui, Cuvier), a genus of Abdominal Malacopterygious 

 Fishes, belonging to the Carp Family (Cyprinidos), and distinguished 

 by the shortness of their^dorsal and anal fins, by a strong spine, which 

 replaces the second or third ray of the dorsal, by four beards or fleshy 

 tentacula, which grow from the lips, two at the nose, and the other 

 two at the corners of the mouth, and by having but three branchios- 

 tegous rays. Like the great majority of the abdominal soft-finned 

 fishes, the Barbels are a freshwater genus, and certainly among the 

 least carnivorous of the whole class. They feed almost entirely upon 

 aquatic plants and roots, to obtain which they bore into the banks of 

 the ponds and rivers in which they reside, using their snout for that 

 purpose like a hog. 



Barbus rulgarie, the Common Barbel, sometimes measures 3 feet in 

 length, and weighs from 15 to 18 pounds. The section of its body 

 forms an elongated ellipse ; it* scales are small, its head smooth, its 

 eyes large and contiguous to the nostrils, and the lateral line straight 

 and nearly parallel to the back. Its pectoral fins are of a pale brown 

 colour, its ventral and anal tipped with yellow ; the tail is slightly 

 bifurcated, and of a deep purple, and the general colour of the scales 

 is pale gold, edged with black on the back and sides, and silvery-white 

 on the belly. The dorsal fin is armed with a strong serrated spine, 

 with which it sometimes inflicts dangerous wounds on the hands of 

 the fishermen, and does considerable damage to their nets. The barbel 

 H 1'iiind only in deep and still ponds, and in sluggish rivers which have 

 little or no current. In the hot summer months the barbels abandon 

 for a time the deep pools and ponds which had protected them from 

 the severe winter frosts, and make excursions into the shallower parts 

 utream in search of food. Their habits are nocturnal, and they 



RAT. HIST. DIV. VOL. I. 



are fond of the society of their own species, being generally found 

 together in large companies. Their flesh is extremely coarse and 

 unsavoury, and their roe in particular is said to produce vomiting, 



Common Barbel (llarbits rulgaris). 



purging, and slight swellings in those who incautiously eat it. The 

 barbel is a very common fish in the Thames, where it is taken rather 

 on account of the sport for the angler than the goodness of the fish. 



The Binny, or Barbel of the Nile, is so like the Common Barbel of 

 our European rivers, that it might readily be mistaken at first sight 

 for that fish ; but a little observation will show that it is proportionally 

 shorter and thicker, its back more arched, and it is particularly distin- 

 guished by having the first three rays of the dorsal fin so closely united 

 as to have the appearance of almost forming but one single spine. 

 The Binny is very common in the Nile ; it grows to a large size, some- 

 times weighing, according to Bruce's statement, upwards of 70 pounds, 

 and is described as being a firm, delicate, and well-flavoured fish. The 

 traveller just mentioned gives an interesting account of the methods 

 which the Egyptians employ for the capture of the Binny, and for 

 preserving it alive till they require to dress it, or have an opportunity 

 of disposing of it. Having kneaded together a quantity of oil, clay, 

 flour, and honey, with some chopped straw or other similar material 

 to unite the different parts of the composition, the whole is formed 

 into a mass, in size and appearance resembling a Cheshire cheese, 

 round the sides of which, in different parts, are stuck small pieces 

 of dates saturated in honey. Seven or eight stout hooks, each 

 having a separate line of strong whip-cord, and baited with a date 

 steeped in honey, are concealed in the centre of the cake. The fisher- 

 man then, bestriding his inflated goatskin, paddles himself and his 

 burden out into the middle and deepest part of the stream, where, 

 having sunk the whole mass, he carries the cords attached to the hooks 

 on shore, and fastens each of them separately to the branch of a palm 

 stuck firmly into the ground, and having a small bell suspended from 

 the top of it. He then goes off about his work, which, upon such 

 occasions, is always contiguous to the river, and within hearing of the 

 bells. In a short time the action of the water begins to dissolve the 

 mass of paste at the bottom of the river, and the small pieces of dates 

 getting detached from it float down the river, and are greedily caught 

 and devoured by the Binnies. These naturally ascend the stream in 

 the direction from which they perceive their favourite food to proceed, 

 and having arrived at the mass of composition, begin, as is their 

 custom, to root and bore into it, till they at length arrive at the dates 

 inside, which they ravenously swallow, and are of course caught by 

 the hook concealed within. In its struggles to escape the fish neces- 

 sarily pulls the line and the palm branch to which it is made fast on 

 shore, when the ringing of the bell gives notice to the fisherman. 



" The fisherman," says Bruce, " runs immediately to the bell, and 

 finding thereby the particular line, hauls his prisoner in, but does not 

 kill him : the hook being large, it generally catches him by the upper 

 jaw, which is considerably longer than the under. He then pulls him 

 out of the water, and puts a strong iron ring through his jaw, ties a 

 few yards of cord to it, and returning the fish to the river, fastens him 

 to the shore : so he does with the rest, for very rarely is there a single 

 hook empty. Those who want fish at Girg<5, a large town opposite, 

 or at Achmim itself, come thither as to a fish-market, and every man 

 takes the quantity he want, buying them alive. Fish when dead do 

 not keep in Egypt, which makes that precaution necessary. We 

 bought two, which fully dined our whole boat's crew ; the fisherman 

 had 10 or 12 of them fastened to the shore, all of which he pulled out 

 and showed us." 



BARBERRY. [BEBBERIS.] 



BARBERRY-BLIGHT. [^BciDIUM.] 



BARBETS, the English name for a family of birds of the order 

 Scansorei, or Climbers ; Les Barbus of the French, and the genus ucco 

 of Brisson and Linnoms. They are distinguished by their large conical 

 beak, which appears swollen, as it were, or puffed out at the sides of 

 its base, and is bearded (whence their name) with five tufts of stiff 

 bristles directed forwards. One of these tufts is behind each nostril, 

 one on either side of the lower mandible, and the fifth is under the 

 symphyais. 



Their short wings and heavy proportions do not admit of swift 

 flight ; and their prey consists of insects and young birds, which they 

 surprise, and also of fruits. Their nests are generally built in the 



2 c 



