BUY 



JBUB 



have any language intelligible to one an- 

 other. Some have pretended, that they 

 have a kind of jargon, by which they can 

 make a mutual communication of their 

 sentiments. There is at least a similitude 

 of speech in brutes ; for they know each 

 other by their voices, and have their signs, 

 whereby they express anger, joy, and 

 other passions. Thus a dog assaults in 

 one strain, fawns in another, howls in 

 another, and cries when beaten in an- 

 other. 



Dr. Hartley has investigated the intel- 

 lectual faculties of brutes, and applied 

 his theory of vibrations and association in 

 accounting for the inferiority of brutes to 

 mankind, with regard to intellectual ca- 

 pacities. He ascribes the difference sub- 

 sisting between them to the following cir- 

 cumstances, which he has taken occasion 

 to illustrate on the principles of this the- 

 ory. The first of these is the small pro- 

 portionate size of their brains, whence 

 brutes have a far less variety of ideas and 

 intellectual affections than men. The 

 second cause of this difference is the im- 

 perfection of the matter of their brains, 

 whereby it is less fitted for retaining a 

 large number of miniatures, and combin- 

 ing them by association, than man's. The 

 third cause is their want of words, and 

 suck like symbols. Fourthly, the instinc- 

 tive powers which they bring into the 

 world with them, or which rise up from 

 internal causes, as they advance towards 

 adult age, is another cause of this differ- 

 ence ; and, fifthly, it is partly owing; to 

 the difference between the external im- 

 pressions made on the brute creation, and 

 on mankind. This ingenious writer sup- 

 poses, with Des Cartes, that all the mo- 

 tions of brutes are conducted by mere 

 mechanism ; yet he does not suppose them 

 to be destitute of perception ; but that 

 they have this in a manner analogous to 

 that which takes place in us ; and that 

 it is subjected to the same mechanical 

 laws as the motions. He adds, that it 

 ought always to be remembered, in speak- 

 ing on this subject, that brutes have more 

 reason than they can show, from their 

 want of words, from our inattention, and 

 from our ignorance of the import of those 

 symbols, which they do use in giving in- 

 timations to one another, and to us. 



BRYONIA, in botany, a genus of the 

 Monoecia Syngenesia class and order. 

 Natural order of Cucurbitse. Essential 

 character ; calyx five-toothed ; corolla 

 five-parted: male, filaments three: fe- 

 male, style quadrifid. Berry subglobu- 

 lar, many-seeded. There are nineteen 



species, of which B. alba, black berried 

 white bryony, seems to differ from the 

 red in little else besides the colour of the 

 berries. Native of Sweden, Denmark, 

 Cariola, and probably other parts of Eu- 

 rope, in hedges. B. dioica, red berried 

 white bryony, is easily distinguished by 

 its prodigious root, its stems climbing by 

 tendrils, leaves resembling those of the 

 vine in shape, not smooth as they are, but 

 harsh and rugged, and of a paler colour, 

 and by its bunches of small berries, which 

 are red when ripe, and produced on a dif- 

 ferent plant from the male flowers. B, 

 palmata, palmatecl bryony, has heart- 

 shaped leaves, the side divisions shortest} 

 the upper surface is marked with dots, 

 very close, but scarcely visible ; there are 

 callous tubercles of the veins and pedun- 

 cles. The berries are round and large. 

 It is a native of the Island of Ceylon. 



BRYUM, in botany, a genus of moss, 

 distinguished by a capsule covered with 

 a lid, and over that a smooth veil. But 

 these characters it has in common with 

 Minium and Hypnum, two other genera 

 much resembling this. The peculiar 

 mark of the bryum is, that the thread or 

 little stem supporting the fructification 

 grows from a tubercle at the ends of the 

 stem and branches. 



BUBALUS, the buffalo, in zoology. 

 See Bos. 



BUBBLE, in philosophy, small drops or 

 vesicles of any fluid filled with air, and 

 either formed on its surface, by an addi- 

 tion of more of the fluid, as in raining, 

 &.c. or in its substance, by an intestine 

 motion of its component particles. 



Bubbles are dilatable or compressible, 

 i. e. they take up more or less room, as 

 the included air is more or less heated, or 

 more or less pressed from without, and 

 are round, because the included aura acts 

 equally from within, all round ; their 

 coat is formed of minute particles of the 

 fluid, retained either by the velocity of 

 the air, or by the brisk attraction between 

 those minute parts and the air. 



The little bubbles rising up from fluids, 

 or hanging on their surface, form the 

 white scum at top, and these same bub- 

 bles form the steam or vapour flying from 

 liquors in boiling. 



BUBBLE, in commerce, a cant term, 

 given to a kind of projects for raising ot : 

 money on imaginary grounds, much prac- 

 tised in France and England, in the years 

 1719, 1720, and 1721. 



The pretence of those schemes was, 

 the raising a capital for retrieving, setting 

 on foot, or carrying on some promising 



