678 



DIGGING DILL-SEED. 



yet in very different ways. The mild juice of i ferent from diphthongs, which consist of two vowels. 



the pancreas attracts the milk-like liquid of the 

 chyme, and forms with it the chyle, which is absorbed 

 by the capillary vessels called lacteals. On the 

 other hand, , the bitter matter called bile, formed 

 by the liver from the blood, attracts the coar- 

 ser parts, which arc not fitted to be absorbed into the 

 fine animal organization, and excites the intestinal 

 canal to the motion which carries it off. For further 

 information on the subject of digestion, particularly 



,t!ed digestion, see the article Dyspepsia. 

 Digestion, witli chemists and apothecaries ; the 

 maceration of any substance which is to be softened 



also, but produce a sound which neither of the vow- 

 els have separately. 



DIJON (Divio), the ancient capital of the duchy 

 of Burgundy, at present the chief place of the depart- 

 ment Cote-d'Or (see Department), 648 French feet 

 above the level of the sea, at the confluence of the 

 Ouche and Suzon, 100 miles N. Lyons, 175 S. E. 

 Paris, lat. 47 19' 25" N., Ion. 5 2' 5" E., contains 

 22,000 inhabitants, and is the seat of a suffragan bi- 

 shop, several courts and branches of government. In 

 1725, the academy of sciences and belles lettres was 

 erected here, and confirmed by the king in 1740. (See 



or dissolved, commonly pulverized, in a solvent j Academy.) There is also a school for the fine arts, 

 liquid. It is enclosed in a tight vessel, and exposed two libraries, (one of which contains 36,000 volumes,) 

 to a gentle heat for a longer or shorter time. By collections in natural history, an observatory, a bo- 

 this process essences, elixirs, and tinctures are made, tanical garden, &c. There are many old and inter- 



DIGGING, among miners ; the operation of free- esting buildings here. There is now a canal building 

 ing ore from the stratum in which it lies, where every from this city to the Saone, near Saint-Jean-de-Lorne, 

 stroke of their tools turns to account ; in contradis- which will be of great advantage to the place, 

 tinction to the openings made in search of such ore, Many of the most celebrated Frenchmen have been 

 which are called hatches, or essay-hatches, and the born at Dijon, among whom are Bossuet, Crebillon, 

 operation itself, tracing of mines, or hatching. 



DIGIT, in arithmetic, signifies any one ol the ten 

 numerals, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 0. The word comes 

 from digitus, a finger; thus indicating the humble 

 means originally employed in computations. Digit is 

 also a measure equal to three-fourths of an inch. 



Digit, in astronomy, is the measure by which we 

 estimate the quantity of an eclipse. The diameter of 

 the sun or moon's disc is conceived to be divided into 

 twelve equal parts, called digits ; and according to 

 the number of those parts or digits which are obscur- 

 ed, so many digits are said to be eclipsed. When 

 the luminary is wholly covered, the digits eclipsed 

 are precisely twelve ; and when it is more than cov- 

 ered, as is frequently the case in lunar eclipses, then 

 more than twelve digits are said to be eclipsed. 



DIGITALINE is the active principle of the digi- 

 talis purpurea, or foxglove, and is a very powerful 

 poison, possessing all the properties of digitalis (q. v.) 

 in a very concentrated state. To prepare it, the leaves 

 are digested in ether, the solution filtered and eva- 

 porated, and the residue dissolved in water : this solu- 

 tion is heated with oxide of lead, filtered, and evapor- 

 ated, and the residuum digested in ether, which af- 

 fords digitaline, on evaporation. It is a brown-co- 

 loured substance, deliquescent, and extremely bitter. 

 It restores the colour of reddened litmus, and com- 

 bines with acids. See Digitalis. 



DIGITALIS ; a genus of plants, including, among 

 other species, the purple foxglove (D. purpurea), a 

 vegetable possessing important medicinal properties, 

 inhabiting the temperate and southern parts of Eu- 

 rope, and frequently cultivated for ornament in 

 America. The stem is simple, herbaceous, glabrous, 

 or slightly pubescent, and'attains the height of two or 

 three feet ; the leaves oval lanceolate, soft to the 

 touch, and dentate on the borders ; the flowers are 

 large, purple, spotted within, pendent, and disposed 

 in a long, simple, and terminal raceme. The plant, 

 when fresh, possesses a bitter, nauseous taste, and is 

 violently emetic and cathartic. When prepared and 

 administered medicinally, it has the remarkable pro- 

 perty of diminishing the strength and frequency of 

 the pulse, and is, at the same time, diuretic. 



DIGRAPH (from the Greek S/ f and ?,*$*,, to 

 write ; double-written) ; a union of two vowels of 

 which one only is pronounced ; as in head, breath. 

 This is the meaning which Mr Sheridan gives to the 

 word. Mr Webster, in his American Dictionary of 

 the English Language, follows this meaning. Thus 

 stege, deceive, mean, hear, esteem, deem, need, contain 

 digraphs. It is well known how much the English 

 idiom abounds in digraphs. They are essentially dif- 



Piron, Saumaise. A fortified camp, constructed by 

 Caesar, gave origin to Dijon. Marcus Aurelius 

 caused the place to be surrounded by walls. 



DIKE, or DYKE, (in German, deich) ; a ditch or 

 drain, and also a work of stone, timl>er, or fascines, 

 raised to oppose the passage of the waters of the sea, 

 a lake, river, or the like. In no country has the art 



of building dikes and taking care of them been car- 

 ried to so much perfection as in Holland and the 

 north-west of Germany, where the construction and 

 superintendence of them, the draining of land and 

 guarding against inundations, and the distribution of 

 taxes for the maintenance of the dikes, form an im- 

 portant branch of government. 



DILAPIDATION is where an incumbent of a 

 church living suffers the parsonage-house or out- 

 houses to fall down, or be in decay for want of ne- 

 cessary repairs ; or it is the pulling down or destroy- 

 ing any of the houses or buildings belonging to a 

 spiritual lis'ing, or destroying of the woods, trees, 

 &c., appertaining to the same; it is said to extend 

 to committing or suffering any wilful waste in or 

 upon the inheritance of the church. 



DILEMMA (from ?, twice, and Xi/i^t, an as- 

 sumption), in logic ; an argument consisting of two 

 or more propositions, so disposed that, grant which 

 you will, you will be pressed by the conclusion. 



DILETTANTE ; an Italian expression, signifying 

 a lover of the arts and sciences, who devotes his 

 leisure to them, as a means of amusement and grati- 

 fication. 



DILLENIUS, JOHN JAMES ; a botanist, born in 

 1687, at Darmstadt, and distinguished for his inves- 

 tigations into the propagation of plants, particularly 

 cryptogamous plants. In compliance with the invi- 

 tation of a rich botanist, William Sherard, in 172J, 

 he went to England, where he spent part of his time 

 in London, and part at his friend's country seat, in 

 Eltham. Here he published several works, and 

 particularly that splendid production which ap- 

 peared in 1732, Hortus Elthamcnsis, in which the 

 drawings, prepared by himself, are distinguished by 

 the greatest faithfulness. His last work, on the mosses 

 (Historia Muscorum), added much to his reputation. 

 Sherard founded a professorship of botany in the 

 university of Oxford, for his friend, who died there, 

 in 1747. 



DILL-SEED (anethum graveolens, Lin.) is of an 

 oval form, convex on one side, flat on the other, 

 having three striae on the outside, and surrounded 

 with a small membranous border. Its taste is slight- 

 ly acrid, and its odour stronger, but less pleasant, 

 tlmn fennel seed. 





