CONTEMPT CONTINENTAL SYSTEM. 



431 



decomposition of water by iron, instead of sulphuric 

 acid ; and his activity and skill on this commission 

 occasioned his appointment of director of the aerosta- 

 tic school at Meudon. Conte suggested the idea of 

 establishing; a place of deposit for useful machines, 

 tools, &c., in consequence of which the conservatory 

 was instituted. He afterwards introduced the manu- 

 facture of an excellent kind of crayons into France, 

 and established a great manufactory, which still sup- 

 plies all France with them. He was appointed, in 

 1798, to accompany the French expedition to Egypt, 

 and his services were of the greatest value. He con- 

 structed a furnace on the Pharos, near Alexandria, in 

 the space of two days, for red-hot balls, with which 

 the British were repelled, and thus time was given 

 for fortifying tliat place. The machines and instru- 

 ments of the army having fallen into the hands of 

 the Arabs, Conte was obliged to furnish everything, 

 even the tools : he constructed wind-mills, machines 

 for the mint at Cairo, for an Oriental printing estab- 

 lishment, for the fabrication of gunpowder, &c., and 

 cannon founderies ; manufactured steel, paper, 

 swords for the soldiers, utensils for the hospitals, 

 instruments for the engineers, telescopes for the as- 

 tronomers, microscopes for the naturalists, drums, 

 trmnpets, in short, everything necessary for such a 

 military and scientific expedition in such a country as 

 Egypt. On his return to France, he was appointed 

 to superintend the execution of the great work on 

 Egypt, and invented a graving machine, which, by 

 performing certain parts of the labour, spared the ar- 

 tist much time and trouble. The death of his wife, 

 to whom he was tenderly attached, threw him into a 

 lingering disease, and he survived her but a short 

 time. Conte was a member of the legion of honour. 

 His simplicity, integrity, courage, disinterestedness 

 and warmth of affection rendered him no less amiable 

 and estimable in private life, than his science and in- 

 genuity made him valuable to the nation. 



CONTEMPT. Legislative bodies and judicial 

 tribunals are generally invested with power to pro- 

 tect themselves against interruption ; and such a 

 power is essential to enable them to conduct their 

 business. They are usually empowered to commit 

 persons to prison, or punish them otherwise, for dis- 

 turbances and contempts. A legislative body may 

 punish one of its own members tor disorderly beha- 

 viour, as well as a bystander. Judicial tribunals have 

 the same power. The French penal code, article 

 222, &c., provides, that, when any executive or ju- 

 dicial officer shall, during or on account of his official 

 duties, be insulted, the person guilty of the outrage 

 shall be punished by an imprisonment of not less than 

 two months nor more than two years ; unless the of- 

 fence is committed in open court, in which case the 

 imprisonment is not less than two nor more than five 

 years. Blackstone says, in the fourth volume of his 

 Commentaries, that process for contempt is " an in- 

 separable attendant on every superior tribunal ; and, 

 accordingly, we find it actually exercised as far back 

 as the annals of our law extend." This power has a 

 much broader construction in Britain than in America, 

 being confined, in the latter country, mostly at 

 least, to the cases of actual disturbance and flagrant 

 disrespect to the court, or an attempt to influence a 

 decision by popular appeals, or direct and high-hand- 

 ed or outrageous resistance to, or obstruction of, its 

 proceedings or processes; whereas, in Britain, it 

 extends to acts or omissions which do not directly dis- 

 turb the judicial proceedings ; such, for instance, as 

 not paying a bill of costs awarded by the court ; not 

 obeying the summons of a court of equity, and not 

 answering a bill ; refusing to be sworn as a witness, 

 which has also been held to be a contempt in the 

 United States. Serving a process on an attorney, 



while attending court has been held to be a contempt 

 of the court in Britain ; likewise shouting or giving 

 applause, in court, on a return of a verdict by a jury. 

 It was held, in New York, to be a contempt of the 

 court to bring a suit in the name of another, without 

 his consent. It is a contempt to endeavour, by writ- 

 ings or publications, to prejudice the public mind, or 

 that of a jury, or the court, in a cause pending in 

 court. This is not only an attack upon the public 

 administration of justice, but also upon the right of 

 the individual parties in the suit, since it would be in 

 vain to provide, by law, that no party shall be adjudg- 

 ed or condemned without a hearing, if practices are 

 permitted which tend to deprive him of a fair hear- 

 ing. The party may be charged with contempt, 

 either on the view of the court, that is, without tak- 

 ing the testimony of witnesses, for misdemeanours 

 committed in presence of the court, or on the testi- 

 mony of witnesses ; and he is always heard in his 

 own defence, provided he observes decorum in mak- 

 ing his defence. The process is necessarily summary, 

 since the cases are generally such as require immedi- 

 ate interposition, and courts do not usually resort to 

 it, except in palpable and flagrant cases. 



CONTENT AND NONCONTENT are the words 

 by which assent and dissent are expressed in the 

 house of lords. AY AND NO are used in the house 

 of commons. 



CONTESSA, the elder and the younger; two 

 German authors. The former, Christian James 

 Salice Contessa, was born at Hirschberg, in Silesia, 

 in 1767, and died in 1825 : the latter, Charles Wil- 

 liam Salice Contessa, was born, August 9, 1777, at 

 Hirschberg, studied at Halle, and died at Berlin, 

 June 2, 1825. He wrote tales and comedies. Von 

 Houwald, likewise a German poet, published his 

 works in 1826. Hoffmann has described Contessa's 

 character in a masterly manner, under the name of 

 Sylvester, in his Serapionsbrueder. The elder of the 

 two brothers is unimportant as an author. 



CONTI, ANTONIO SCHJNELLA, ablate; a Venetian 

 patrician whose mathematical researches attracted 

 the attention of Newton, was born at Padua, in 

 1677. He gave up the clerical profession, because 

 he disliked to hear confessions. He visited Paris, and, 

 in 1715, London, where he was elected a member 

 of the royal society, on the proposition of Newton. 

 Here he became involved in the controversy be- 

 tween Newton and Leibnitz, and, by attempting to 

 avoid displeasing either of them, dissatisfied both. By 

 chance, Conti came into possession of a manuscript 

 which contained Newton's system of chronology. 

 From his hands they passed into those of Freret, 

 who published it, with severe notes. Newton was 

 much displeased with Conti's share in the transac- 

 tion. Feeble health obliged Conti to return, in 

 1726, to the milder sky of his own country. He liv- 

 ed mostly in Venice, entirely devoted to his literary 

 occupations, which included poetry. Of the six vol- 

 umes of his works, which he intended to publish, 

 only the two first appeared (Venice, 1734, 4to). 

 The first contains a long poem (// Globo di Venere), 

 intended to illustrate the Platonic ideas of the beau- 

 tiful. After Conti's death (Padua, 1749), four of 

 his tragedies were published at Florence, in 1751 

 (Giunio Bruto, Cesare, Marco Bruto, and Druso), 

 which did not establish his poetical reputation be- 

 yond all question. In all his works, abstract thinking 

 prevails over poetic imagination. His language is 

 powerful, but is accused of being tinctured with 

 foreign idioms. There are several other Contis 

 famous in the learned world. 

 CONTI. See Bourbon. 



CONTINENTAL SYSTEM was a plan devised by 

 Napoleon to exclude Britain from all intercourse 



