HARDNESS 



2688 



HARDY 



the sea to stop." Hardecanute's mother was 

 Emma of Normandy. At the time of his 

 father's death in 1035 he was ruling as under- 

 king in Denmark, and his half-brother Harold 

 at once laid claim to the throne. His claims 

 were supported by his mother and Godwin, 

 Earl of the West Saxons, who succeeded in 

 holding Wessex, while Northumberland and 

 Mercia were held by Harold. Hardecanute, 

 however, made no effort to secure his part of 

 the kingdom, and it passed also to Harold. 

 The latter died in 1040. The Witan, or coun- 

 cil members, then chose Hardecanute king, and 

 he reached England with sixty ships and be- 

 gan at once to extort a large sum for their 

 maintenance. His reign was not marked by 

 war or other important events, the govern- 

 ment being left in the hands of his mother 

 and Earl Godwin, while he gave himself up 

 to coarse pleasures. After his death he was 

 succeeded by his half-brother, later known as 

 Edward the Confessor, who built Westminster 

 Abbey. 



HARDNESS. In a solid substance, such as 

 copper, glass or steel, hardness is determined 

 by its ability to scratch or to resist being 

 scratched by other substances. One body is 

 harder than another when it will scratch or 

 indent it; for instance, glass will' scratch cop- 

 per, so it is the harder of the two. When 

 many solid substances, such as iron and steel, 

 are heated to a very high temperature and 

 suddenly cooled they become much harder, 

 but some substances, such as copper, if treated 

 in this manner, become soft and pliable, so 

 they are slowly cooled to harden (see TEM- 

 PERING; ANNEALING). Gold and silver are too 

 soft to use as coins when pure, but are made 

 hard by mixing with copper (see ALLOY). The 

 hardness of any given substance is generally 

 measured from a table of a few well-known 

 minerals ranging from the soft talc, which is 

 easily scratched by the finger nail, to the dia- 

 mond, the hardest known substance. This 

 standard "scale of hardness," beginning with 

 the soft minerals, is as follows: 



1. Talc 



2. Gypsum 



3. Calcite 



4. Fluorspar 



5. Apatite 



6. Feldspar 



7. Quartz 



8. Topaz 



9. Sapphire 

 10. Diamond 



Numbers 1 and 2 can be scratched by the 

 finger nail; numbers 3 to 6, inclusive, can be 

 scratched by a knife, and number 6 will scratch 

 ordinary window glass. Number 10 can be 

 ground or polished only by diamond powder. 



HARDY, ARTHUR STURGIS (1837-1899), a 

 Canadian barrister and statesman, for many 

 years one of Sir Oliver Mowat's chief lieuten- 

 ants in Ontario, and for the last three years 

 of his life premier of the province. Hardy was 

 bora at Mount Pleasant (or Mohawk), Brant 

 County, Ont., attended the grammar school 

 there, and after further studies was admitted 

 to legal practice as an attorney in 1861, though 

 he was not regularly called to the bar until 

 1865. His youthful enthusiasm, his attention 

 to detail, a pleasing presence, which conciliated 

 juries, and, above all, his capacity for hard 

 work, all combined to win him rapid advance- 

 ment. He was created Queen's Counsel in 

 1876. 



Hardy's success as a barrister naturally 

 turned his thoughts towards a political career, 

 but he was wisely restrained from entering 

 politics until 1873, when he felt that his pro- 

 fessional standing was assured. He was elected 

 as a Liberal member of the Ontario legisla- 

 ture, in which he sat until his death. In 1877 

 Sir Oliver Mowat appointed him provincial 

 secretary, and in 1889 commissioner of crown 

 lands. In 1896 Hardy succeeded Mowat as 

 premier. He was an active legislator, and 

 secured the adoption of many needed laws on 

 sanitation, liquor licenses, legal procedure, 

 railways and other matters of general inter- 

 est. Though his administration was brief, it 

 was important in Ontario's history. G.H.L. 



HARDY, THOMAS (1840- ), an English 

 novelist whose stem types of character will 

 probably live in literature in spite of the fact 

 that they are too tragic and cruel to appeal 

 to many readers. He was born in Dorsetshire, 

 studied at King's 

 College, London, 

 and early began 

 training to be- 

 come an archi- 

 tect. When he 

 was twenty-seven 

 he left that pro- 

 fession to begin 

 writing, and his 

 Far from the 

 Madding Crowd 

 first gained him 

 popular favor. In 

 1878 he produced 

 The Return of the Native, which some regard 

 as his masterpiece. The Woodlanders, written 

 in 1887 was followed four years later by Tess 

 of the D'Urbervilles, through which Hardy 



THOMAS HARDY 



