693 



DULCIMER. 



DUNES, DOWNS. 



During the reign of William IV. two dukedoms were created, Gower 

 Duke of Sutherland, and Vane Duke of Cleveland. 



The whole number of dukes in tlie English peerage is at present 

 twenty, exclusive of the blood royal. There are seven Scottish dukes 

 (Argyll, Atholl, Buccleuch, Hamilton, Lennox, Montrose, and Rox- 

 burghe), of whom one (Hamilton) is also an English duke. The only 

 Irish duke is the Duke of Leinster. 



All the dukes of England have been created by letters patent, in 

 which the course of succession has been plainly pointed out. Generally 

 the limitation is to the male heirs of the body. 



DULCIMER, a very ancient musical instrument, and not yet en- 

 tirely fallen into disuse. There seems to be little doubt of this being 

 the psaltery, or psalteiium, or nebel, of the Hebrews. In shape it was 

 sometimes a triangle, sometimes a trapezium, as appears from Lusci- 

 nius, Kircher, and Blanchinus, a fact overlooked by Sir John Hawkins, 

 who argues in opposition to Kircher, that the instrument took different 

 names according to its different forms. The dulcimer, as now used 

 by ftreet-musicians, to whom it is confined, is a trapezium in shape, 

 has many strings, two to each note, and is struck by a pair of sticks 

 with wooden or metallic knobs. The tone much resembles that of the 

 iunet, and in skilful hands the instrument is of rather an agree- 

 able kind. [CITOLE.] 



DBLCIN. [MANMTE.] 



DULCOSE. [MANNITE.] 



DUMASIN. A derivative chemical compound from acetone. 

 Nothing satisfactory is known respecting it. 



DUMBNESS. [DEAF AND DUMB.] 



DUNES, DOWNS, and also DENES, are hillocks of sand formed 

 along the sea-coast. 



The word thus variously given has been usually regarded to be 

 formed from the French dune, or from the Celtic dun, a mountain. A 

 monastic history, repeatedly cited with respect to it, is again cited 

 here ; because it preserves two forms of this word as applied to the 

 subjects of this article. This is the ' Compend. Chronolog. Exord. ct 

 Progress. Abbat. Clariss. B. Maria; de Dunin,' by Charles de Visch, in 

 which it is said, " Vallem reperit arenarum collibus, quos incolso 

 Dtiyntn vocant undique cinctarn." 



The late learned printer, Mr. Richard Taylor, F.S.A., the editor of 

 Tooke's ' Diversions of Purley,' in an etymological note appended to a 

 paper by his cousin, Mr. 11. Cowling Taylor, F.G.S., referred to below, 

 says, " The appellation Denes for the sandy alluvial tracts next the sea on 

 the Norfolk coast corresponds with Dunes, Dttynen,naed by the French 

 and Flemish for those on the opposite coast. Thus Duynkerke (Dun- 

 kirk) derives its name from the church originally founded on the 

 Deneg, on the first establishment of that town." 



The term Dnvmt is also given, in England, to a hilly tract, or a large 

 open plain on elevated land, whether maritime or inland, as the South 

 Downs of the chalk of Sussex, the North Downs of that of Kent, 

 Kpsom Downs in the county of Surrey, St. Austell Downs in that of 

 Cornwall, &c. 



The mode of the formation of sand-dunes is this : the waves of the 

 BC.I, in certain localities, drive upon the beach a certain quantity of fine 

 sand, which, becoming dry during low water, is carried up still higher by 

 the wind till, meeting with the obstruction of large stones, bushes, tufts 

 of gra4,&c.,it is accumulated into little heaps ; these, offering still greater 

 surface of resistance as the sand increases upon and against them, Boon 

 rise into mounds of considerable height, whose number, arrangement, 

 and dimensions depend naturally upon the size and distribution of the 

 obstacles to which they owe their existence. If these obstacles are 

 close-set, there will be little more than one range of sand hillocks, and, 

 if very close, these will in time unite so as to form a continuous ridge. 

 Should the arresting objects, on the contrary, be thinly scattered, and 

 at different distances from the brink on a shelving coast, there will be 

 several ridges of hillocks, the one behind the other. Examples of all 

 these forma will be noticed in the sequel. The dunes having attained 

 a certain height, the wind has no longer the power to increase their 

 clfV'tion, and they are then urged forward upon the land. The way 

 in which this is effected is easily conceived. On the windward side of 

 the hillocks the grains of sand are forced up to the top, whence they 

 are swept off as they arrive, 'and fall by their own weight on the 

 opposite slope. Thus the ma-w goes on invading the laud, while fresh 

 material is constantly brought by the sea. 



This progress inland depends, however, upon the habitual direction of 

 th'.- wind and the relative direction of the coa*>t-line. In Gascony the 

 sand advances eastward, and generally along the whole coast of France, 

 fi m I'ayonne to Calais, the dunes progress in a north-easterly direction, 

 the wind blowing most frequently from the south-west ; whereas from 

 Calais to Dunkirk, the coast trending in the direction of the wind, they 

 make no progress inland, but form a ridge or chain parallel with the 

 The rapidity with which the sands advance is, in some cases, most 

 alarming. Between the mouths of the Adour and the Garonne their 

 progress is about sixty feet yearly ; nor is it easy to arrest their march. 

 The town of Mimiwiu is in part buried under the sands, against whose 

 ' hment it has been struggling for the last five-and-twenty years. 

 In Brittany, also, a village near St. Pol de Leon has been entirely 

 covered with the sand, o as to leave no part visible but the steeple of 

 the church. 



In the Boulunnais the advance of the dunes has been almost wholly 



arrested since the works there executed by Cassini. The inhabitants 

 plant a species of Cyperacesc (the Carex arenaria), termed by them oya, 

 which thrives well, and fixes the sands. This process is so much the 

 more advantageous, as every hillock which becomes fixed is an effectual 

 barrier against the invasion of fresh sand from the sea. In Gascony 

 the peasants force the wind, in some measure, to drive back what it 

 brought. Thus, when the wind blows in a direction contrary to that 

 which pushes the downs upon the land, they toss the sand high into the 

 air with shovels, and in this manner get rid of a portion of it : this portion, 

 however is very small, and the prevailing winds being from the south- 

 west the sands continue to advance in spite of all their efforts. 



Dunes sometimes intercept the flow of water to the sea, forming 

 stagnant pools between and behind them, which give rise to an aquatic 

 vegetation and the occasional formation of a kind of peat. 



Dunes also skirt the shores of Spain, Holland, England and Wales, 

 and other countries, their formation being, in fact, a process which 

 must take place to a greater or less extent on most low sandy coasts. 

 In England, the north coast of the county of Norfolk, "between 

 Hunstanton and Weybourne," says Sir C. Lyell (' Principles of 

 Geology,' 9th ed. chap. xix. p. 305-307), " low hills or dunes of blown 

 sand are formed along the shore, from 50 to 60 feet high. They are 

 composed of dry sand, bound in a compact mass by the long creeping 

 roots of the plant called Marram (Arundo arenaria}." He inserts a 

 view (probably derived from the ' Geology of East Norfolk,' by the 

 late Mr. Richard Cowling Taylor, F.G.S., which he cites) of the church 

 of the ancient village of Eccles, half buried in the dimes, the inland 

 slope of which is represented. At this spot they also occupy the site 

 of houses which were still extant in the year 1605. Between it and 

 Winterton, to the south-east, they have barred up and excluded the 

 tide for many hundred years from the mouths of several small 

 estuaries. Similar hills of blown sand, affording temporary protection 

 to the coast, extend from near Happisburgh, north of Eccles, to the 

 port of Yarmouth on the south. Mr. Taylor has also noticed the 

 ridges of sand, another form of these accumulations, passing into dunes, 

 provincially termed " meals " (probably from the same source with the 

 Anglo-Saxon mcel, a boundary) and " meal-hills," by which the harbours 

 of Cley, Blakeney, AVells, Burnham, and Brancaster, all on the north 

 coast of the county, are securely defended from the fury of the 

 northerly gales. (' Phil. Mag.,' 2nd series, vol. i. p. 427.) 



As already indicated, the dunes of our eastern shores depend 

 essentially for their formation, and also for their degree of permanence, 

 on the remarkable disposition of the plants called Marram, and of 

 the Anindo arenaria, or sea-reed, "in particular, to collect around 

 them, to hold in a net-work composed of their fibres, stems, and 

 branches, the loose and shifting sands ; to bind in one comparatively 

 compact mass, a substance which is apparently little adapted to the 

 important office it is designed to fulfil." Other grasses and plants, 

 however, uniting with the sea-reed to produce this effect, are on the 

 Norfolk coast confounded with it, in popular language, under the 

 appellation of Marram (probably from the Gaelic muran, sea-reed, or 

 perhaps from the Dutch marren, to bind), which is given to all of them 

 collectively, or indifferently to any ; a confusion which scientific writers 

 on this subject have not always avoided. Among these plants the Elymits 

 arenariun, or upright Sea-Lyme grass, the Carex arenaria, or Sea-Carex, 

 and the Fettuca rubra, or Creeping Fescue grass, are the most important 

 and effective. As in France, so in Holland, and on our own eastern coast, 

 the Arundo arenaria and Carex arenaria have been cultivated with some 

 care on account of their utility in consolidating the sands. Acts of 

 parliament have been passed for the preservation of Marram. In con- 

 tinuation of the view of the subject just quoted, Mr. R. C. Taylor (in 

 ' Phil. Mag.,' as already cited, p. 296-297), has described, substantially 

 as follows, the agency of the A. arenaria in this part of the process of 

 formation of sand-hills, as examined by himself, in Norfolk, Suffolk, 

 and Hampshire : A small portion of the sea-reed fixes itself upon a 

 bed of " shingle" or pebbles, with perhaps scarcely sand sufficient to 

 cover the first root. Rapidly it sends round its creeping stolones, and 

 these serve to arrest some portion of the sands that are constantly 

 moved by the winds. Occasionally the quantity is sufficient for a time 

 to overwhelm the young plant ; soon it rises with increased vigour to 

 the surface ; now appearing not as one, but as many plants. Mr. 

 Taylor once observed a single plant which had struck out stolones, ten 

 ami twelve yards in length, radiating from the original stem, their 

 extremities thus forming a circle upwards of twenty yards in diameter. 

 [Over and beneath which space the sand-compacting structure was thus 

 extended.] The joints of the shoots were from six to nine inches 

 asunder, and from each or most of these a root was directed downwards 

 into the Kind, and one or two young shoots upwards. Calculating by 

 the number of stolones, it thus appears that this plant, during a single 

 year, had multiplied itself five hundred-fold, independent of the 

 further power of production by seed. Again, the sand accumulates ; 

 layer after layer succeeds ; the arenaria spreads its shoots still further 

 and higher, and always sends forth its creepers in search of the 

 newly-collected sand [by the nutritive emanations of which, doubtless 

 the vital forces of the plant on the side towards that sand are 

 stimulated]. By its continued agency a small hillock is formed, which, 

 by the gradual extension of the same vegetative and accumulative 

 processes, becomes in time a ridge many feet in elevation a " meal ; " 

 or a saud-cliff, or "dune," on which the most boisterous wave is 



