B L A 



501 



B L A 



the ships to contemn castles on shore, which had been 

 thought ever very formidable, and were discovered by him 

 to make a noise only, and to fright those who could be rarely 

 hurt by them. He was the first who infused that propor- 

 tion of courage into the seamen, by making them see whal 

 mighty things they could do if they were resolved, and 

 taught them to fight in fire as well as upon water ; and 

 though he has been very well imitated and followed, he was 

 the first that gave the example of that kind of naval 

 courage, and bold and resolute achievements.' 



Clarendon's History, Heath's Chronicle of the Civil 

 Warn, and the Memoirs of Whitelock, Ludlow, and other 

 contemporary authorities, will furnish accounts of the nume- 

 rous battles which we have only mentioned. The earliest 

 memoir which we know to exist of Blake is in Lives, Eng- 

 lish and Foreign, London, 1 704. There is also one by Dr. 

 Johnson. The account here given is taken, with some 

 curtailment and a few slight corrections, from that pub- 

 lished in the Gallery of Portraits, vol. 5. 



BLANC, LE, a town in France in the department of 

 Indre, in 46 39' N. lat., 1 3' E. long. It is on the river 

 Creuse, and on a cross-road which branches off from the 

 high road from Paris to Limoges, towards Poitiers. The 

 river Creuse divides the town into two parts, called the 

 upper and lower town. This river is not navigable, but 

 serves, as the older topographers tell us, to float timber and 

 staves, which are thrown in and re-assembled at a place 

 lower down the stream. There is a castle in the upper town ; 

 and previous to the Revolution there were two religious 

 houses in the lower town. At the same period there were 

 three parish churches in the whole town. The population 

 of Le Blanc in 183-2 was 3617 for the town, or 4804 for the 

 whole commune. The Dictionnaire Universel de la France 

 (1804) assigns to it a manufactory of woollen yarn, and a 

 considerable pottery. 



Le Blanc is the capital of an arrondissement, which had 

 in 1832 a population of 56,6 1-1. The territory around the 

 town is sterile, and covered with wood ; it yields however 

 some wine of a fair quality. A good deal of iron is smelted 

 in this district. The neighbourhood is remarkable for the 

 immense number of pools, the fish from which form an 

 article of trade at Le Blanc. Game and poultry are also 

 abundant. 



BLANC, MOUNT, in the system of the Alps, is in the 

 dominions of the king of Sardinia, on the boundary-line 

 between Savoy and Piedmont; it extends from S.W. to 

 N.E. between 45 46' and 45 57' N. lat. In this direction 

 it may have a length of about thirteen miles ; its breadth 

 varies from five to six miles. 



This enormous mass of primitive rock rises far above 

 the line of perpetual congelation, and descends with great 

 steepness and to a great depth on the N.W. and S.E. ; the 

 valleys, which bound the mountain on these sides, being 

 only between 3000 and 4000 feet above the level of the sea. 

 The valley to the north-west consists properly of two val- 

 leys, those of Montjoie and of Chamouny, which are sepa- 

 rated by a lateral branch of the mountain for some distance, 

 but afterwards join one another. The valley of Chamouny 

 is the larger, and the place to which travellers commonly 

 resort to have a view of the Mount Blanc, or to ascend it : 

 the village of Chamouny, or the Prieure, which is nearly in 

 the centre of the valley, is 3403 feet above the level of the 

 sea. The valley to the south-east of the mountain mass, 

 called the Valley of Entreves, consists properly of two val- 

 leys, which lie in the same direction, and open one into 

 the other, which takes place nearly at equal distances from 

 the extremities of the mountain-mass. The lowest point of 

 this valley is Cormaggior, situated 3900 feet above the level 

 of the sea. 



The southern extremity of the mountain is both united 

 to and separated from the high mountain-range which ex- 

 tends in a southern direction to the very shores of the Medi- 

 terranean sea, by the Col de Seigne. This mountain-pass, 

 the highest part of which is -below the point of eternal snow, 

 rising only to 8083, unites the Valley of Bonneval in Savoy 

 with the Valley of Entreves in Piedmont, and presents one 

 of the grandest views of the Mount Blanc. 



The northern extremity of the mountain is connected 

 with the high range which, running to the east, separates 

 Wallis, or the Valais, from Piedmont ; and with another 

 which, extending in a north-western direction, divides Savoy 

 li-.iTii Wallis, and terminates at no great distance from the 

 Lake of Geneva, From the former range it is separated by 



the Col de Ferret, or Ferrex, a mountain-pass, 7764 feet 

 above the sea, which connects the valley of Ferret, or Ferrex, 

 with that of Entreves. From the range of mountains ex- 

 tending to the Lake of Geneva, the Mount Blanc is divided 

 by the Col de Balme, which unites the valley of Chamouny 

 with that of Trient in Wallis, and rises to 75~52 feet. 



The whole mountain mass enclosed between the valleys 

 and these three mountain-passes probably rises to upwards 

 of 1 0,000 feet, and as in this parallel the snow-line does 

 not extend beyond 9000 or 9300 feet, it probably is about 

 1000 feet above it. It is consequently all covered with 

 snow, except in a few places where the steepness of the 

 rock does not allow the snow to lie. The upper surface is 

 extremely irregular, and a considerable number of rocks 

 rise from it, which, from their resemblance to pyramids or 

 steeples, are called aiguilles, or needles. 



Towards its southern extremity this extensive mass of 

 rocks rises to its greatest elevation in that mountain pin- 

 nacle properly called Mont Blanc, whose summit attains 

 the height of about 14,748 feet above the sea, in 45 41' 

 52" N. lat. and 6 44' 22" E. long. When seen from the 

 north or south, it presents the form of a pyramid, descend- 

 ing nearly perpendicularly to the south. When seen from 

 the N.E. or the valley of Chamouny, it resembles the back, 

 of a dromedary, and is called by the inhabitants of that 

 valley Basse de Dromedaire. 



Near it rises the Aiguille de Goute to the height of 

 12,204 feet. Farther to the N.E. the Aiguille du Midi at- 

 tains 12,854 feet, and its neighbour, the' Aiguille de Geant, 

 1 3,902 feet. Still farther to the N.W. stands the Aiguille 

 d'Argentier, 13,400 feet high, and to the west of it the 

 Aiguille de Dru, 12,460 feet. The most northern and 

 lowest is the Aiguille de Tour, whose summit is only 11,036 

 feet above the level of the sea. There are still more of these 

 peaks, but they have not been noticed by travellers. 



Mount Blanc exhibits all the grandeur of the Alps on a 

 large scale. High tapering pyramids covered with eternal 

 snow ; extensive fields of ice, split to a great depth by wide 

 cracks ; glaciers of green colour descending from its sides 

 between bare dark-coloured perpendicular rocks, and skirted 

 by forests of fir ; and grottoes formed in the masses of eter- 

 nal ice, in addition to all the other varieties of mountain 

 scenery, attract great numbers of curious and scientific tra- 

 vellers. [See CHAMOUNY.] 



The first mention made of Mount Blanc does not go back 

 a century. If we are not mistaken, this mountain was first 

 noticed by our countryman, Richard Pococke, who, in his 

 travels to the East, being struck by its extraordinary height 

 and appearance, described it in his account of the glaciers 

 of Switzerland. Nearly fifty years elapsed after Pococke's 

 description before it was ascended, for the first time, by Dr. 

 Paccard and James Balma, with great difficulty and danger, 

 in August, 1786. A year afterwards Saussure succeeded 

 in reaching the summit, where he remained for five hours, 

 and made a great number of observations. The pulse of 

 the whole company, which was composed of twelve persons, 

 beat with extreme quickness, and all of them felt great 

 thirst and exhaustion, without any desire to take food. The 

 colour of the sky was dark blue ; the stars were visible in 

 the shade; the barometer sunk to 16 inch. 1 line, while at 

 Geneva it stood at 27 inch. 1 line ; the thermometer indi- 

 cated in the shade + 26i, and in the sun + 29, whilst 

 at Geneva it was + 87 of Fahrenheit. Water consequently 

 froze even when exposed to the sun. Since Saussure's 

 ascent Mount Blanc has been ascended at least twenty 

 times, but no very important observations have been made 

 since that date. 



BLANCHARD (aeronaut). [See BALLOON.] 

 BLANCO, CAPE, on the west coast of Africa (20 46' 

 26" N. lat., and 1 7 4' 10" W. long.), is the western extremity 

 of a rocky ridge, which extends eastward into the Sahara 

 to an unknown distance, and is called Jebel el Bied, or the 

 White Mountains, probably from their colour. The cape 

 itself terminates in a rocky but low point, which bends to 

 the southward, and forms with the shore a spacious harbour, 

 called the Great Bay. A few miles farther south is another 

 harbour, the bay of Arguin, which is by many considered as 

 the extreme point to which antient navigation extended. 



Cape Blanco is remarkable in more than one respect. 

 The coast to the north of it, as far as Cape Geer, the western 

 extremity of the Atlas Mountains, is rocky, but of very mo- 

 derate elevation (near Cape Blanco from sixty to eighty feet), 

 except at a few places, as at Cape Laguedo, Cape Bojadnj-, 



