BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA 



760 



BLACKMORE 



the year following. Gold, silver, copper, lead, 

 iron and a number of valuable building stones 

 are obtained in the region. The great Home- 

 stake mine, one of the largest in the United 

 States, is located at Lead, in the Black Hills. 

 See SOUTH DAKOTA. 



BLACK HOLE OF CALCUTTA, a small 

 room, 14 feet 10 inches wide and 18 feet long, 

 in the old English fort of Calcutta, India. 

 On June 20, 1756, Sura j ah Dowlah and his 

 men, after forcefully robbing the city, cap- 

 tured the fort. On that intensely hot night 

 in June, 146 men were thrust as prisoners into 

 that one small room with but two tiny windows, 

 and by morning only twenty-three were alive 

 to tell of their terrible experience. See INDIA, 

 subhead History. 



BLACKING, for shoes, is commonly formed 

 of ivory black, bone black or lamp black, in 

 a liquid mixture of oil, vinegar, molasses or 

 sugar dissolved in water, and sulphuric acid. 

 The chemical combination of the acid, the 

 sugar element and the black gives the black- 

 ing its power to adhere to the leather. The 

 difference between liquid and paste blackings 

 is in the amount of vinegar contained. After 

 blacking is applied to leather a high polish 

 may be imparted by rubbing briskly with a 

 cloth or soft brush. 



BLACK LAKE, QUE., a town in Megantic 

 County, four and one-half miles south of 

 Thetford Mines and forty-six miles south of 

 Quebec, on the Quebec Central Railway. The 

 town is of importance chiefly for its valuable 

 mines, which yield asbestos, chrome and iron. 

 The mines of Black Lake and the vicinity 

 furnish about eighty per cent of the world's 

 supply of asbestos (which see). The town was 

 incorporated in 1908. Population in 1911, 

 2,645; in 1916, estimated, 4,000. 



BLACK 'LIST, a list of names of persons 

 thought deserving of censure or punishment, 

 or considered as untrustworthy as workmen, 

 or classed as delinquent debtors. Lists of the 

 latter are sometimes published by mercantile 

 agencies and others for the protection of em- 

 ployers or tradesmen; to a very general ex- 

 tent general blacklists were fofmerly used by 

 employers who wished to warn others against 

 the employment of persons whom they con- 

 sidered objectionable. As used in connection 

 with labor problems the term refers to lists 

 of persons considered undesirable by labor 

 unions or by employers as workmen. Activity 

 in the cause 'of unionism by a prospective em- 

 ployee is frequently objected to by an em- 



ployer, while the unions object to men for 

 exactly the opposite reasons, namely, that 

 such persons have refused to join the union 

 or obey its orders or have assisted as strike- 

 breakers. Blacklists are usually distributed 

 secretely, because the persons responsible for 

 such lists do not care to be known. 



The Dominion of Canada and more than 

 one-half of the states of the American Union 

 have passed laws against the use of blacklists, 

 but it has been found difficult to enforce these 

 because employers often discharge workmen 

 without stating any reason other than that 

 their services are no longer needed, and also 

 because it is easy to conceal the exchange of 

 information on which these blacklists are based. 

 Better understanding between employers and 

 laborers of late years has decreased the tempta- 

 tion to maintain such lists, even without the 

 pressure of law. See LABOR ORGANIZATIONS. 



Trading with the Enemy. The term black- 

 list also refers to enemies at war. In the War 

 of the Nations, for example, Great Britain and 

 others of the allies published lists of persons 

 and firms who were "by reason of enemy na- 

 tionality, sympathy or association, found to 

 be zealous to advance the cause of the enemy 

 and to make their trading or profits in trade a 

 means to this end." Trading with the enemy is 

 illegal under English common law, and the 

 effect of these lists was merely to add certain 

 persons nominally neutral to the class of those 

 with whom trade was prohibited. The publica- 

 tion of these lists, which included some firms in 

 the United States, was regarded by many as an 

 invasion of neutral rights, and called forth a 

 protest from the United States government. 



BLACK 'MAIL, a term legally applied to an 

 attempt to extort money from a person under 

 threat of exposure of an alleged past offense 

 or of some damaging secret. Whether suc- 

 cessful or not, blackmail is an offense punish- 

 able in the United States and Canada by 

 imprisonment or fine, or both. The laws of 

 Great Britain are exceptionally severe on black- 

 mailers, a sentence of twenty years' imprison- 

 ment having been pronounced on a person 

 proved guilty of even an attempt to blackmail 

 another. In olden times blackmail was a cer- 

 tain amount of money, corn, cattle or some 

 other thing of value, paid to men allied to 

 robbers for protection from pillage; from that 

 ancient usage the present meaning of the term 

 was derived. 



BLACKMORE, RICHARD DODDRIDGE (1825- 

 1900), an English novelist whose name would 





