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of several villages are a memorial of their former existence 

 There is a curious natural phenomenon near Harley Hall 

 at the western end of the township, in what is called the 

 Burning Well, from which a vapour rises, which by the 

 application of fire will produce a considerable flame. The 

 lower part of the township, called the Red Moss, has never 

 been brought into cultivation, nor have any attempts been 

 made until lately to drain it. Experiments are now being 

 tried, by means of a machine propelled by steam, to effecl 

 such a drainage as will restore the whole tract of land, con- 

 sisting of upwards of a hundred acres, to the purposes of 

 agriculture. 



The town presents little that is interesting ; the houses 

 are irregularly built in one long street, and generally of a 

 mean appearance. The church, the only place of worship, 

 except a chapel belonging to the Wesleyan Methodists, is 

 an antient structure dedicated to St. Catherine, at the north 

 end of the village. The living is a perpetual curacy in the 

 gift of the vicar of Bolton, in the deanery of Manchester, 

 and in the archdeaconry and diocese of Chester. 



There is a free grammar-school, in which 100 scholars 

 are educated. The income is returned at UOl. 4.S., besides 

 which there are three exhibitions to Pembroke College, 

 Cambridge. This school was originally endowed in 1568, 

 by John Holm, who left property of the value of 81. per 

 annum to the school, and 51. per annum for the maintenance 

 of a scholar at the College of St. Mary, now Pembroke 

 Hall, Cambridge, which property yields at present 80l. per 

 annum. An estate which was bequeathed to the school by 

 Elizabeth Tildesley of Bedford lets now for 1 20A a year. 



A fair is held at Blackrod annually, on the first Thursday 

 after the 12th of July, for toys, small wares, &c. There is 

 no market ; the inhabitants attend either Bolton or Chorley. 

 A petty sessions is held once a fortnight at Horwich, where 

 cases of a trifling nature are heard, but the more important 

 business connected with the township comes before the 

 bench of magistrates at Bolton. (Baines's History of Lan- 

 cashire ; Communication from Lancashire.) 



BLACK SEA, THE, is said to have received its present 

 name from the Turks, who, being accustomed only to the 

 navigation of the Archipelago where the numerous islands 

 and their convenient ports offered many places of refuge in 

 case of danger, found the traversing of such an open ex- 

 panse of water, which is subject to heavy storms, very 

 perilous, and accordingly they expressed their fears by 

 the epithet ' black.' Partly on the same account, and 

 partly because the shores of this sea were occupied by very 

 uncivilized and barbarous nations, the antient Greeks first 

 called it djt voy (dxenas, inhospitable) ; but afterwards, when 

 the art of navigation had been so far improved that they 

 no longer feared the dangers to be encountered in navigating 

 it, and had succeeded in establishing numerous colonies on 

 its shores, they changed its name from dZivog to ivZivos 

 (euxenos, hospitable). This unsatisfactory explanation of 

 the name, like many others of the kind, must be attri- 

 buted to the fondness of the Greeks for turning every 

 foreign name into one that had a resemblance to some term 

 in their own language, and consequently thus became sig- 

 nificant. The Greeks sometimes called this sea simply 

 Pontus, or the sea. 



The Black Sea divides the southern provinces of Russia 

 from Anatolia or Asia Minor, and extends in length nearly 

 700 miles between 28 and 41 30' E. long., and 41 and 

 46 40' N. lat. Its breadth on the west between the mouth 

 of the Dnieper and the opposite shore near the Bosporus 

 is nearly 400 miles ; in the middle, where it is narrowed 

 by the projecting peninsula of the Crimea, the narrowest 

 part hardly exceeds 160 miles, but farther east it enlarges 

 again to 300 miles, which width however decreases towards 

 its eastern extremity. The space which it occupies is cal- 

 culated by German geographers at upwards of 180,000 

 square miles. It is therefore smaller than the North Sea 

 (260,000 square miles), but larger than the Baltic (160,000 

 square miles). 



The Black Sea is connected with the Sea of Azof by the 

 straits of Yenikale or of Kaffa, and with the Archipelago 

 and the Mediterranean by the Bosporus, the Sea of Mar- 

 mora, and the straits of the Dardanelles. By the first it 

 receives the drainage of a part of Southern Russia, and by 

 the second it sends off the surplus waters which are not 

 lost by evaporation. 



With the exception of the Whang-Hai (or Yellow Sea) 

 there is probably no purtiou of the ocean which receives the 



drainage of a greater extent of country than the Black Sea. 

 By far the greatest part of its basin belongs to Europe. 

 This portion may be indicated by lines drawn from Con- 

 stantinople to the sources of the Inn, thence to those of the 

 Dnieper, and then to those of the Medwidiczs, a branch of 

 the Don rising near Saratow. From Saratow the boundary 

 runs near the banks of the Volga, and approaching the 

 shores of the Caspian Sea at the sources of the Manish, 

 terminates at the eastern extremity of the Black Sea. The 

 countries included by these lines, all of which modern geo- 

 graphers consider as belonging to Europe, occupy an area 

 exceeding 860,000 square miles, and consequently nearly 

 one-fifth of the whole surface of this division of the globe. 

 This extensive surface is drained by numerous large rivers, 

 among which are the Danube and the Dnieper, the largest 

 rivers of Europe, if we except the Volga. That part of 

 the basin of the Black Sea which is considered as lying 

 in Asia, probably contains somewhat less than 100,000 

 square miles, and runs from the eastern extremity of the 

 sea along the river Rion or Fas (the Phasis of the antients) 

 up to its source. Hence it follows nearly a straight line, 

 drawn south-west to the most southern branch of the Kizil 

 Ermak (the antient Halys). From this place the boundary 

 line runs in a north-western direction between the sources 

 of the Bujuk Minder (Meeander of the antients) and of the 

 Sakaria (Sangarius), and following at a small distance the 

 shores of the Sea of Marmora, terminates on the Bosporus, 

 or straits of Constantinople. / 



As the basin of the sea comprehends 960,000 square 

 miles, and its surface contains only 180,000 square miles, 

 it follows that each square mile of its surface receives the 

 drainage of five and one-third of a square mile. This will 

 account for the small degree of saltness of its waters. Their 

 specific gravity, compared with that of fresh water, is 1142 

 to 1000. The water of the Atlantic is 1288 ; but it contains 

 more salt than the water of the Baltic, the specific gravity 

 of which is only about 1039 or 1042. 



The shores of the Euxine present a very varied aspect. 

 From the Bosporus eastward the coast is rather low as far as 

 3ape Baba, though the hills are never far from the coast. 

 From Cape Baba to Cape Karempi (Carambis), and hence 

 ;o Sinup (Sinope), and even to the mouth of the Kizil 

 Ermak, the high lands advance close to the shore : then 

 'ollows a low shore, which extends as far as Cape Yasoun 

 (the Jasonium of the Greek geographers), the formation of 

 vhich is ascribed to the alluvions of the three rivers, the 

 iCizil Ermak, the Casalmak, and the Tharmeh, which empty 

 hemselves into the sea within these limits. To the east of 

 Dape Yasoun, up to the mouth of the Rion, and hence to 

 Anapa, to which place the western extremity of Mount 

 Caucasus extends, the coast is alternately low and high, 

 the offsets of the mountains which enclose the sea at no 

 *reat distance advancing frequently to the very shores. 

 The shores of the island of Taman, which on the east 

 advances to the straits of Yenikald, are very low and 

 marshy. But though the peninsula of Kertch, which forms 

 he op|>:isite shore of the straits, rises into considerable eleva- 

 :ions, the coast continues low and sandy as far as the town of 

 iaffa. West of Kaffa however the mountain-range of the 

 Yaila rises to a considerable height, and skirts the shore to 

 Sevastopol, so that in some places it rises to some hundred 

 eet, especially to the east of Sevastopol. The remainder 

 of the shore, as far as the mouth of the Danube, is low and 

 sandy, and continues so to Mangalia (about 44 N. lat.) 

 north of Cape Shabla, where the western offsets of the 

 Balkan Mountains approach the sea. Here the shore be- 

 :omes rocky, but does not rise so high as between the port 

 )f Varna and Cape Emineh. South of this cape the rocky 

 shore continues to the straits of Constantinople, but rises to 

 a moderate height only in a few places. 



The navigation of the Black Sea is neither difficult nor 

 dangerous : it is almost entirely free from islands and rocks. 

 !n its whole extent there is only one small island, called 

 Han Adassi, uninhabited, and lying under 45 15' N. lat. at 

 a considerable distance from the western shore. Rocks never 

 occur except near Cape Kerpen, about sixty miles east of 

 the Bosporus ; nor are shoals frequent. They are only found 

 near the straits of Constantinople ; also near Sinup, and 

 at the mouth of the Dnieper, of which the first, called the 

 sands of Domusdere, extend three miles, gradually deep- 

 ening. In all the other parts the Black Sea is rather deep, 

 ,he bottom of it not having been found by lines of 120 and 

 140 fathoms, except towards the coast, where at a distance 



NO. 266. 



[THE PENNY CYCLOPEDIA.] 



VOL. IV.-3 R 



