CRETE CRIBBAGE. 



521 



generally. It is commonly a piece of the arms, as 

 that of Castile is a castle. Crests, therefore, form an 

 important subject in heraldry. 



CRETE. See Candia. 



CRETICUS. See Rythmus. 



CRETINISM approaches very closely to rickets 

 in its general symptoms. It differs principally in its 

 tendency to that peculiar enlargement of the thyroid 

 gland, which, in France, is denominated goitre, and 

 in the mental imbecility which accompanies it from 

 the first. The enlargement of the gland does not al- 

 ways, however, accompany the other symptoms, 

 though it does generally. 



Cretinism was first distinctly noticed and described 

 by Plater, about the middle of the seventeenth cen- 

 tury, as occurring among the peasants in Carinthia 

 and the Valais. It was afterwards found, in a still 

 severer degree, in other valleys of Switzerland, and 

 the Alps generally. It has since been detected in 

 various other regions, where the country exhibits 

 similar features, as among a miserable race called 

 Cagots, inhabiting the hollows of the Pyrenees, 

 whose district and history have been described by Mr 

 Raymond ; and in Chinese Tartary, where it is re- 

 presented as existing by Sir George Staunton. 



On the first discovery of cretinism, it was ascribed 

 by some to the use of snow water, and by others to 

 the use of water impregnated with calcareous earth, 

 both which opinions, are without foundation. The 

 first is sufficiently disproved by the feet that persons 

 born in places contiguous to the glaciers, and who 

 drink no other water than what flows from the melt- 

 ing of ice and snow, are not subject to this dis- 

 order ; and, on the contrary, that the disorder is ob- 

 served in places where snow is unknown. The second 

 is contradicted by the fact, that the common water of 

 Switzerland, instead of being impregnated with cal- 

 carious matter, excels that of most other countries in 

 Europe in purity and flavour. The water usually 

 drunk at La Batia and Martigny is from the river 

 Dranse, which flows from the glacier of St Bernard, 

 and falls into the Rhone. It is remarkably free from 

 earthy matter, and well tasted. At Berne, the 

 water is extremely pure ; yet, as Haller remarks, 

 swellings of the throat are not uncommon in both 

 sexes, though cretinism is rare. As comfortable and 

 congenial warmth forms one of the best auxiliaries in 

 attempting the cure of both cretinism and rickets, 

 there can be no doubt that the chill of snow-water 

 must considerably add to the general debility of the 

 system when labouring under either of these diseases, 

 though there seems no reason for supposing that it 

 would give rise to either. It is not difficult to ex- 

 plain why water impregnated with calcarious earth 

 should have been regarded as the cause ; for in cre- 

 tinism, as in rickets, the calcarious earth, designed 

 by nature for the formation of the bones, is often 

 separated, and floats loose in various fluids of the 

 body, for want of a sufficiency of phosphoric acid to 

 convert it into a phosphate of lime, and give it soli- 

 dity. And as it is, in consequence, pretty freely dis- 

 charged in the urine, this seems to have given rise to 

 the opinion that such calcarious earth was introduced 

 into the system with the common water of the lakes 

 or rivers, and thus produced the morbid symptoms. 



M. de Saussure has assigned the real cause of the 

 disease. The valleys of the Alps, he tells us, are 

 surrounded by very high mountains, sheltered from 

 currents of fresh air, and exposed to the direct, and, 

 what is worse, the reflected rays of the sun. They 

 are marshy, and hence the atmosphere is humid, 

 close, and oppressive ; and when to these causes we 

 add the meagre, innutritious food of the poor of these 

 districts, their indolence, and uncleanUness, with a 

 predisposition to the disease, from a hereditary taint 



of many generations, we can sufficiently account for 

 the prevalence of cretinism in such places, and for 

 the humiliating character which it assumes. 



The general symptoms of cretinism are the same 

 as those of rickets ; but the disease shows itself ear- 

 lier, often at birth, and not unfrequently before this 

 period, apparently commencing with the procreation of 

 the foetus, and affording the most evident proofs of an- 

 cestral contamination. The child, if not deformed and 

 diseased at birth, soon becomes so ; the body is stinted 

 in its growth, and the organs in their development. 



CREUSA ; the name of several celebrated females 

 of antiquity. 1 . Daughter of Erechtheus, who, before 

 she was married to Xuthus, gave birth to Ion, the fruit 

 of an amour with Apollo. To her second husband 

 she bore Achaeus. 2. The daughter of Priam and 

 Hecuba, wife to ^Eneas, and mother of Ascanius. 

 In the tumult of the conflagration of Troy, when 

 -flSneas fled with the images of his gods, with his 

 father and son, he lost her, and, after he had sought 

 her a long time in vain, her spirit appeared to him, 

 saying that the mother of the gods had taken her to 

 herself, because she was not willing that she should 

 leave Phrygia. 



CREUTZ, GUSTAVUS PHILIP, count of; a Swedish 

 poet and statesman, was born hi Finland in 1726. He 

 was a member of the learned and elegant circle, 

 which surrounded the queen of Sweden, Louisa Ul- 

 rica, sister of Frederic the Great ; and his Atis og 

 Camilla, an erotic poem in five cantos, published at 

 Stockholm (1761), grew out of the meetings of this 

 society. This poem and his Letter to Daphne are 

 considered as masterpieces in Swedish poetry. He 

 was appointed minister to Madrid, and, at a later 

 period, to Paris, where he remained twenty years, 

 and became particularly acquainted with Marmontel 

 and Gretry. April 3, 1783, he signed, with Dr 

 Franklin, a treaty of amity between the United 

 States and Sweden. He was afterwards placed at 

 the head of the department of foreign affairs hi Stock- 

 holm, but he could not endure the climate of his 

 country, and died in 1785. His works and those of 

 his friend Gyllenborg are published together, under 

 the title f^itterheis Arbeten of Creutz og Gyllenborg, 

 Stockholm, 1796. At a chapter of the Seraphim 

 order, April 28, 1786, king Gustavus 'himself read 

 the eulogy of Creutz. 



CREVENNA, PIETRO ANTONIO (commonly called 

 Bolongaro Crevenna), a bibliographer, born hi the 

 middle of the 18th century, at Milan, received from 

 his father-in-law, Bolongaro (whose name he took) a 

 large fortune, and lived mostly in Holland. Love 

 for the sciences, in particular for literary history, in- 

 duced him to devote his hours of leisure, from an ex- 

 tensive commercial business, to literary pursuits, and 

 to collect a choice library. The learned catalogues 

 of his books, prepared by himself and others, have 

 given to the works which belonged to him great value 

 in the eyes of amateurs, and the catalogues them- 

 selves have bibliographical authority. His Catalogue 

 Caisonne de la Collection des Livres de M. Crevenna 

 (Amsterdam, 1776, 6 vols. 4to) contains an exact 

 description of the Incunabula, with collations of rare 

 books, and letters of many learned men of the 17th 

 and 18th centuries, printed there for the first tune. 

 To understand the importance of the Crevenian li- 

 brary, it is necessary to compare with this catalogue 

 another, the Catalogue des Livres de la Bibl. de M. 

 Crevenna (Amsterdam, 1789, 6 vols.). In 1790, he 

 sold the greatest part of his library by public auc- 

 lon. What he retained may be known by the Cata- 

 logue de la Bibl. de feu M. Crevenna (Amsterdam, 

 1793). Towards the end of his life, he left Holland, 

 and died in Rome, Oct. 8, 1792. 

 CRIBBAGE ; a game at cards wherein no cards 



