125 



BUCCINA. 



BUCKTHORN. 



1.0 



of the " Treaty of America," which provided for the entire suppression 

 of the buccaneer warfare, was concluded between Great Britain and 

 Spain ; but, as far as the buccaneers were concerned, this was a bit of 

 waste paper, for much the most daring of their achievements took 

 place after the date of the treaty. 



The war between Great Britain and France, which followed the 

 accession of William III., in 1688, did much more to relieve the 

 Spaniards from the scourge. The French, without waiting for a de- 

 elaratiun of war, attacked the English in the West Indies, where, for 

 some time, the chief belligerents were those ancient allies and comrades, 

 the flibustiers of one nation and the buccaneers of the other, who 

 were now called privateers, and duly commissioned. The bonds of 

 amity were broken ; they exercised upon each other some of the 

 cruelties they had exercised in common upon the Spaniards, and they 

 never again confederated in any buccaneer cause. At one time, had 

 they been properly headed, and had conquest, not plunder, been their 

 object, they might, by degrees, have obtained possession of a fan- 

 portion of the West Indies they might perhaps have established an 

 independent state among the islands of the Pacific. Henry Morgan, in 

 fact, at one time entertained this magnificent idea. 



The treaty of Ryswick, in 1697, and four years later the accession of 

 a French Bourbon prince to the throne of Spain, brought about the 

 final suppression of the buccaneers. Many of them turned planters or 

 negro drivers, or followed their calling as sailors on board of quiet 

 merchant vessels ; but others, who had clippers, or good sailing ships, 

 quitted the West Indies, and went cruising to different parts of the 

 world. For nearly two centuries their distinctive character or function 

 had been the constant waging of war against the Spaniards, and against 

 them alone, and now this was lost for ever. 



"After the suppression of the buccaneers," says Captain Burnet, 

 " and partly from their relics, arose a race of pirates of a more despe- 

 rate cast, so rendered by the increased danger of their occupation, who 

 for a number of years preyed upon the commerce of all nations, till 

 they were hunted down, and, it may be said, exterminated." 



(Hitt&ry of the Buccaneers of America, by James Bumey, F.R.S. ; 

 Lives of Banditti and Rubbers, by C. Mac Farlane; The Buccaneers of 

 Ameryca, by an old anonymous author ; Dampier's Voyar/es ; Lionel 

 Wafer's, Basil Ringrove's, and Barty Sharp's Narratives ; and, in French, 

 the works of Pere Charlevoix.) 



BUC'CINA, a military instrument of the shrill horn, or cornet, kind, 

 in use among the ancients, and by some supposed to have been formed 

 of the horn of the bull or goat. According to others it was the shell 

 of the buccinum, a fish. Vegetius (' De Re Militari ') says that it was 

 made of brass, and bent in a circle. Blanchinus (' De lustrum. Vet.') 

 also states that it was a metallic instrument ; but from the engraving 

 he gives of it, after ancient bas-reliefs, Ac., the buccina would appear to 

 have been perfectly straight. Sir John Hawkins coincides in opinion 

 with Blanchinus, and copies the form of the instrument from a plate 

 given in the work of the learned Italian ; Burnet (' Hist, of Music,) 

 gives an engraving of a curved buccina with a very wide mouth. The 

 < in its primitive state was probably a simple horn, and was sub- 

 sequently formed of a more durable material. Ovid (' Met.' i. 335) 

 gives an excellent description of the buccina. 



BUCENTAUR (IL BUCENTOTIO), the state-galley of the republic 

 of Venice, for the name of which many very unsatisfactory derivations 

 have been proposed. 



The most elaborate description of this gorgeous vessel with which 

 we are acquainted is that given in the ' C'hronica Veneta.' But we 

 doubt not that the reader will gladly be spared a minute account 

 of the carving and gilding with which it was adorned ; and a detail 

 of the marine deities, the sirens, the masques, the fruit, the flowers, 

 the shell-work, the medallions, the cornucopias, the allegorical groups, 

 the winged lions, the birds, the zodiacs, the canopies, the virtues, 

 and the liberal arts, which were profusely scattered over it on one of 

 its latest repairs by the skill and taste of ' Giovanni Adami, Doratore 

 Veneto.' 



It may be sufficient to state that it was 100 feet by 21 in extreme 

 length and breadth ; 168 rowers, four to each oar, were allotted to it 

 from the arsenal, and were disposed in a lower deck ; besides these it 

 was manned by a crew of 40 mariners. The upper deck was covered 

 with an awning (tiemo) of crimson velvet, beneath which were seated 

 the doge and his goodly company. The doge himself was enthroned 

 near the stem, surrounded with foreign ambassadors, and the senators 

 and great officers of state were disposed on seats running in four rows 

 along the length of the vessel. 



The date of the original Bucentaur is not very clearly ascertained ; 

 bnt. like the famous ship at Athens, although in perpetual flux, the 

 galley of the moment, according to Howell, was ever reputed " to be 

 the self-same vessel still, however often put upon the careen and 

 trimmed." " Yet I believe there is not a foot of that timber remaining 

 which it had upon the first dock, having been, as they tell me, so often 

 planked, ribbed, caulked, and pieced." Its use on the feast of Ascen- 

 sion is traced to a victory obtained in the year 1177 by the Doge 

 Sebastiano Ziani over the Emperor Frederic Barbarossa. The Venetians 

 had espoused the cause of Pope Alexander III., who had taken refuge in 

 the Lagune. The doge, with a fleet not mustering half the number 

 of vessels which Pisa, Genoa, and Ancona had placed under the com- 

 mand of the Emperor's son Otho, encountered them off the coast of 



Istria. After a battle which lasted more than six hours, Otho, with 48 

 out of his 65 galleys, was taken prisoner, two of his ships having been 

 destroyed. The pope received the conquerors on the Lido, and pre- 

 senting Ziani with a golden ring addressed him in these words : " Take 

 this ring, and with it take, on my authority, the sea as your subject. 

 Every year, on the return of this happy day, you and your successors 

 shall make known to all posterity that the right of conquest has sub- 

 jugated the Adriatic to Venice as a spouse to her husband." The 

 Venetians themselves have sometimes claimed an earlier authority for 

 this lordship of the Adriatic ; and Foscarini (' Delia Letteratura Vene- 

 ziana,' lib. ii.) finds some trace of it in Dandolo's ' Chronicle ' towards 

 the close of the 10th century. 



The Bucentaur having been conducted, on the eve of the feast of 

 Ascension, from the arsenal to the piazza, received its splendid 

 passengers. Accompanied by innumerable feluccas and gondolas, it 

 passed on to the mouth of the Lido amid the thunder of artillery. 

 On coming in front of the ohapel of the arsenal, the rowers in maritime 

 fashion, saluted an image of the Virgin, and in the meantime the 

 patriarch of Santa Helena, on which island is a convent, awaiting the 

 pomp, was entertained by the monks with a repast of chestnuts and 

 water (una reramente religiosa, porera colazlone). As soon as the doge 

 appeared in sight, the patriarch embarked with his clerical suite in a 

 small gilded barge (peatone) in order to meet the procession, and 

 during his passage he blessed the remainder of the water, which was 

 afterwards thrown into the sea. On issuing from the port of Lido, 

 near the mouth of the harbour, the doge dropped a ring into the bosom 

 of the Adriatic, betrothing her by these words, " We wed thee with 

 this ring in token of our true and perpetual sovereignty." He then 

 returned to the church of San Nicolo di Lido, and having heard a 

 solemn pontifical mass, re-embarked in the Bucentaur and enter- 

 tained his cortege with a magnificent banquet in the palace. 



When the French took Venice, the original Bucentaur was burnt. It 

 was replaced by a model made from drawings and from the recollections 

 of the workmen ; this was deposited in the arsenal, but has ceased to 

 be an object of any interest. 



BUCHU, or BOOCHO. Medical Properties of. These are names 

 given by the Hottentots to the leaves of several species of evergreen 

 shrubs, natives of South Africa, referred by botanists to a species of one 

 of the genera formed out of the old genus Diosma. The several 

 species yielding buchu belong to the genus Barosma, or Baryosma, a 

 more appropriate name than Diosma, many having to Europeans any- 

 thing but a divine fragrance. Three species chiefly are collected. 

 B. crenata (Ecklon), B. crenvlata, Willd., B. serrata, Willd. The 

 differences of these are slight, being only of shape and size ; they have 

 all one general character, more or less oblong, nearly an inch long by a 

 quarter broad, more or less serrated or crenated at the edges, of a pale 

 or yellowish-green, thickly studded with deeply imbedded transparent 

 glands, filled with volatile oil, and which gives to the dried coriaceous 

 leaves a puckered appearance. On bruising the leaves, the peculiar 

 odour is very perceptible. This is likened to rosemary by those who 

 relish itto rue, cumin, or cat's urine by those who do not like it. The 

 taste is warm, pungent, mint-like. 



The chemical analyses by Cadet de Gassicourt, and in the same year 

 by Brandis, closely correspond. No alkaloid was found, but volatile 

 oil 0-665, gum 21'170, extractive 5'170, chlorophylle 1100, resin 

 2'151, lignin 69'744, from Barosma crenata. The bitter extractive 

 has been deemed by Brandis peculiar, and called Diosmin. The vola- 

 tile oil is yellowish brown, and lighter than water. To it the peculiar 

 odour of buchu is due, as well as much of the medical virtue of the 

 plant. 



The Hottentots use a powder obtained by bruising the leaves of 

 several species, and mixed with lard, to besmear their bodies ; they 

 distil a kind of brandy (Buchu brandy) from the leaves, along with the 

 dregs of wine. An infusion is also used by them. 



The bitter extractive and volatile oil possess tonic, stimulant, and 

 some astringent properties ; the organs of secretion feel these, as well 

 as the nervous powers. The digestive organs are strengthened, but the 

 urinary organs feel the influence most. A feeble condition of these 

 with excessive secretion, is much benefited. The skin, in some 

 chronic affections of a gouty or rheumatic origin, is improved. But 

 no disease is so certainly influenced by buchu as the rheumatism 

 which attacks Europeans on their return to a cold climate, after a 

 residence in hot climates, particularly Africa. The spasms of the 

 chest or heart connected with rheumatic irritation of these organs are 

 much relieved by buchu. Asiatic cholera is stated to have yielded to 

 it ; but in the bad cases, like everything else, it failed. The best form 

 is infusion with cohl water, or tincture. The wine is not so good 

 while hot water employed to make an infusion dissipates the volatile 

 oil on which its activity should depend. 



BUCKTHORN (Rhamnus catharlicus, or Spina cen-ina), Medical 

 uies of. The berries contain a peculiar extractive, a colouring prin- 

 ciple, acetic acid, gum, and sugar, which is of the nature of grape 

 sugar. The properties are purgative, and the action is attended with 

 much sickness, griping, and thirst. All the forms of exhibition are 

 objectionable, but particularly the berries, either fresh or dried : yet 

 this acrid and almost poisonous article is retained in practice, and is a 

 lommon domestic medicine, especially for young children, the most 

 unsuitable of all for its employment. 



