264 
BRA 
B R A 
BRA 
one pistil with two stigmas ; the fruit is a 
roundish drupa with a globular seed. Of this 
genus there is but one species, viz. 
Brabejum stellati folium, the star-leafed 
African almond, a native of the Cape of Good 
Hope. In Europe it seldom grows above 
eight or nine feet high, but in its native soil is a 
tree of a middling growth. It rises with an 
upright stem, which is soft, and full of pitch 
within, and Covered with brown bark. The 
leaves come out all round the branches at 
each joint : they are indented at their edges, 
standing on very short footstalks. The 
flowers are produced towards the end of their 
shoots, of a pale colour inclining to white. 
They may he propagated, though with dif- 
ficulty, by layers made in April. In winter 
they should have a good greenhouse ; but in 
summer they should be placed abroad in a 
sheltered situation. 
BRACE, in architecture, a piece of timber 
framed in with bevil joints, the use ot which 
is to keep the building from, swerving either 
way. When the brace is framed into the 
kinglesses, or principal rafters, it is by some 
called a strut. 
Braces, in the sea-language, are ropes 
belonging to all the yards of a ship, except 
the mizen, two to each yard, reeved through 
blocks that are fastened to penants, seized 
to the yard-arms. Their use is either to 
square or transverse the yards. 
Brace, in writing, a term used to signify 
a crooked line, as j , made at the end of two 
or more articles in an account, the amount of 
-which is usually placed in the centre of the 
brace. It is used also in printing to enclose 
an entire passage, as a triplet in poetry. 
BRACED, in heraldry, a term for the in- 
termingling three cheoronels. 
BRACIILEUS. See Anatomy. 
BRACHIALIS. See Anatomy. 
BRACHIUM, arm. See Anatomy. 
BRACI!MAN.S,or bramim , asect of Indian 
philosophers, known to the antient Creeks by 
the name of gymnosophists. The antient 
Bradnnans lived upon herbs and pulse, 
and abstained from every thing that had 
life in it. They lived in solitude, without ma- 
trimony, and without property. The mo- 
dern Brachmans constitute one of the casts or 
tribes of the Banians. They are the priests of 
that people, and perform their office of pray- 
ing and reading the law, with several mimic- 
gestures, and a kind of quavering voice. They 
believe in rewards and punishments after this 
life ; and have .so great a veneration for cows, 
that they look on themselves as blessed if they 
can but die with the tail of one of them in then- 
hand. They have preserved some noble frag- 
ments of the' knowledge of the antient Brach- 
mans. 'They are skilful arithmeticians, and 
calculate, with great exactness, eclipses of 
the sun and moon. They are remarkable for 
their religious austerities. One of them lias 
been known to make a vow to wear about his 
neck a heavy collar of iron for a considerable 
time : another to chain himself by the foot 
to a tree, with a firm resolution to die in that 
place t and another to walk in wooden shoes 
stuck full of nails on the inside. Their di- 
vine worship consists chiefly of processions, 
made in honour of their deities. They have a 
college at Bauara, a city seated on the 
river Canges. . 
BB AC H YG R APR Y, the art of short- 
hand-writing. See Tachygraphy. 
BRACKETS, in a ship, the small knees, 
serving to support the galleries, and com- 
monly carved. Also, the timbers that sup- 
port the gratings in the head are called 
brackets. 
Brackets, in gunnery, are the cheeks of 
the carriage of a mortar : they are made of 
strong planks of wood, of almost a semicircu- 
lar figure, and bound round with thick iron 
plates ; they are fixed to the beds by four 
bolts, which are called bed-bolts ; they rise 
up on each side of the mortar, and serve to 
keep her at any elevation, by means of some 
strong iron bolts, called bracket-bolts, which 
go through these cheeks or brackets. 
BRACTEAR1A, in natural history, a ge- 
nus of tales, composed of small plates in form of 
spangles, each plate being either very thin, 
or fissile into very thin ones. See Minera- 
logy. 
BRADS, among artificers, a kind of nails 
used in building, which have no spreading 
heads, as other nails have. They are distin- 
guished, by ironmongers, by six names ; as 
joiner’s-brads, flooring-brads, batten-brads, 
bill-brads or quarter- heads, &c. Joiner’s- 
brads are for hard wainscot, batten-brads for 
soft wainscot ; bill-brads are used when a floor 
is laid in haste, or for shallow joists subject 
to warp. See Nail. 
BRADYPUS, or sloth, a genus of animals 
of the order of bruta. The generic character 
is: 1st, Brady pus tridactylus, or three-toed 
sloth. The general appearance of the sloth 
is extremely uncouth; the body is of a thick 
shape : the fore-legs short, the hinder ones 
far longer ; the feet on all the legs are very 
small, but are armed each with three most 
excessively strong and large claws, of a 
slightly curved form, and sharp-pointed. 
The head is small : the face short, with a 
rounded or blunt snout, which is naked, and 
of a blackish colour; the eyes are small, 
black, and round ; the ears rather small, fiat, 
rounded, lying close to the head, and not un- 
like those of monkeys. The hair on the top 
of the head is so disposed as to project some- 
what over the forehead and sides of the 
face, giving a very peculiar and grotesque 
physiognomy to the animal. The general 
colour of the hair on all parts is a greyish 
brown ; and the hair is extremely coarse, 
moderately long, and very thickly covers 
the body, more especially about the back 
and thighs. A remarkable character as to 
colour in this species, is a wide patch or 
space on the upper part of the back, of a 
bright ferruginous or rather pale orange co- 
lour, spotted on each side with black, and 
marked down the middle with a very conspi- 
cuous black stripe; wide at its origin, and 
gradually tapering to its extremity : it 
reaches more than half-way down the back, 
and terminates in a sort of trifid mark. The 
tail is nearly imperceptible, being so ex- 
tremely short as to be concealed from view 
by the fur. 
Die count dc Buffon is not willing to al- 
low this creature any share in contributing 
to the general beauty in the scale of animated 
nature, but considers it as an ill-constructed 
mass of deformity, created only for misery. 
Notwithstanding this appearance of wretch- 
edness and deformity, tiie sloth is, perhaps, 
as well-fashioned for its proper modes and 
habits of life, and feels as much happiness in 
its solitary and obscure retreats, as the rest of 
the animal world of greater locomotive pow- 
ers and superior external elegance. 
The sloth feeds entirely on vegetables, 
and particularly on leaves and fruit. Its 
voice is said to be so inconceivably singular, 
and of such a mournful melancholy, at- 
tended, at the same time, with such a’pecu- 
liarityof aspect, as at once to excite a mix- 
ture of pity and disgust : and it is added, 
that the animal makes use of this natural yell 
as its best mode of defence ; since other crea- 
tures are frightened away by the uncommon 
sound. This, however, is tar from being its 
only refuge; for so great is the degree of 
niuscular strength which it possesses, that it 
is capable of seizing a dog with its claws, and 
holding it, in spite of all its efforts to escape, 
till it perishes with hunger; the sloth itself 
being so well calculated for supporting abs- 
tinence, that the celebrated Kircher assures 
us of its power in this respect having been 
exemplified by the very singular experiment 
of suffering one, which had fastened itself to 
a pole, to remain in that situation, without 
any sustenance, upwards of forty days. This 
extraordinary animal is an inhabitant of the 
hotter parts of .South America. It is nearly 
as large as a middle-sized dog. See Plate, 
Nat. Hist. fig. 62. 
2d. Bradypus didactylus, or two-toed 
sloth, is also a native of South America ; and 
it is asserted, on good authority, that it is like- 
wise found in some parts of India, as well as 
in the island of Ceylon. In its general ap- 
pearance, as well as in size, it bears a const 
derable resemblance to the former species : 
it is, 'however, somewhat more slender in its* 
shape, covered with smoother or less coarse 
and harsh hair, and is of a more uniform or 
less varied tinge, and, in particular, is strik- 
ingly distinguished, as a species, by bavin 
onl)' two claws on the fore-feet ; it is also a 
much more active animal, and, even when 
imported into Europe, has been known, ac- 
cording to the testimony of the count de 
Buffon, to ascend and descend from a tall 
tree several times in a day ; whereas the 
three-toed sloth with difficulty performs that 
operation in a whole day, and can scarcely 
crawl a few hundred yards in the space ol 
many hours. 
3d. Bradypus ursinus, or ursine sloth, is by 
far the largest species : it is a native ot' India,; 
and has been but lately introduced to the 
knowledge of European naturalists. It was 
brought from the neighbourhood of Patna in 
Bengal. 'This animal has, at first sight, 
much of the general aspect of a bear, that it 
lias actually been considered as such by some 
observers: but it is no otherwise related to 
the bear than by its size and habit, or mere 
exterior outline. 
It is about the size of a bear, and is covered 
all over, except on the face, or rather the 
snout, which is bare and whitish, with long, 
shaggy, black hair ; which on the neck and 
back is much longer than elsewhere. On the 
fore part of the body the hair points forwards ; 
on the hinder part backwards. The eyes are 
very small : the ears rather small, and partly 
hid in the long hair of the head, It is totally 
destitute of incisores or front-teeth : in each 
jaw there are two canine teeth of a moderate 
size. The nose or snout is of a somewhat 
elongated form; it also appears as if fur- 
