BLACK MOUNTAINS 



761 



BLACKSTONE 



now be forgotten were it not for his Lorna 

 Doone, a vigorous and beautifully-written story 

 of Exmoor and the neighboring district, the 

 home of the Doone family. He was born at 

 Longworth, in Berkshire, educated at Oxford 

 and began the practice of law in 1852. Failing 

 health forced him to abandon his chosen pro- 

 fession, and settling on a fruit farm up the 

 Thames from London he devoted his time to 

 writing. Among the several novels from his 

 pen are Cradock Nowell, The Maid of Sker, 

 Alice Lorraine and Kit and Kitty, none of 

 which has the charm or literary merit of Lorna 

 Doone. 



BLACK MOUNTAINS, a range of mountains 

 extending across North Carolina into the north- 

 ern parts of Georgia and North Carolina. 

 Their direction is nearly east and west, and 

 they contain the highest peaks in the Appa- 

 lachian system, among which are Mount 

 Mitchell, 6,710 feet, and Clingman's Peak and 

 Guyot's Peak, the latter two exceeding 6,500 

 feet in altitude. Their sides are covered with 

 evergreen forests, from which they take their 

 name. Many, of the valleys are highly fertile. 

 See APPALACHIAN MOUNTAINS. 



BLACK PRINCE, THE. See EDWARD, THE 

 BLACK PRINCE. 



BLACK SEA, called by the ancients PONTUS 

 EUXINUS, is a sea situated between Europe and 

 Asia, bounded by Russia, Bulgaria, Rumania 

 and Turkish dominions in Europe and Asia. It 

 is connected with the Mediterranean by the 



BLACK SEA 



Very Important commercially, though subject 

 to violent storms and dangerous breakers. 



historic Bosporus, the Sea of Marmora and the 

 Dardanelles, and by the Strait of Kertch with 

 the Sea of Azov, which is, in fact, only a bay 

 of the Black Sea. It has a length of 750 miles, 

 a greatest width of 380 miles, a maximum depth 

 of 7,000 feet and covers an area of 180,000 

 square miles, more than the combined area 



.of Illinois, Iowa and Wisconsin. The water is 

 not so clear as that of the Mediterranean, and 

 it is less salt, on account of the many large 

 rivers flowing into it, among which are the 

 Danube, Dniester, Dnieper and Don. 



During January and February the shores 

 from Odessa to the Crimea are ice-bound. The 

 Black Sea contains few islands and those of 

 small extent. The most important ports are 

 Odessa, Kherson, Sebastopol, Batum, Trebi- 

 zond, Sinope and Varna. The sea is of great 

 commercial importance to Russia, as it fur- 

 nishes an outlet for the agricultural region of 

 the south, but its exit to the Mediterranean 

 Sea and the ocean has long been closed by 

 the Great Powers of Europe to the battle fleet 

 of Russia. At the outbreak of the War of the 

 Nations this great sea assumed first importance, 

 and on it many battles occurred between Rus- 

 sian and Turkish vessels. The attempted forc- 

 ing of the Dardanelles by the allies to allow 

 free access to the Mediterranean for Russian 

 warships failed utterly, though it was one of 

 the most gigantic undertakings in the history 

 of military and naval operations. 



Related Subjects. Connected more or less in- 

 timately with the Black Sea are the -following 

 topics : 



Azov Marmora 



Bosporus War of the Nations 



Dardanelles 



BLACK SNAKE, or BLUE' RACER, the 



most agile and swift of all snakes. It is com- 

 mon in North America, and often reaches a 

 length of five or six feet. It is comparatively 

 harmless, as it has no poison fangs, but it 

 possesses the power of destroying its prey by 

 the contraction of its folds in other words, by 

 squeezing it to death. It is a deadly enemy of 

 the rattlesnake, in destroying which it shows 

 great skill. It is said to follow its prey by 

 scent, and, being quicker in its movements, is 

 able to seize the rattlesnake by the back of the 

 neck and quickly crush it to death. The black 

 snake is usually bluish above and slate color 

 beneath, though in South America it is more 

 often an olive-green. Birds' eggs and small 

 animals, like mice, frogs and birds, comprise 

 its principal food. 



BLACKSTONE, SIR WILLIAM (1723-1780), a 

 distinguished English judge and writer on law, 

 whose most famous work, Commentaries on the 

 Laws of England, has had a wider influence 

 than any other treatise on law in the English 

 language. He was educated at Oxford Uni- 

 versity and was admitted to the bar in 1746. 

 He first attracted attention by a course of 



