BUL 
B U N 
B U P 
Roman chancery, and scaled with lead, being 
written on parchment, by which it is partly 
distinguished from a brief. It is a kind of 
apostolical rescript, or edict, and is chiefly in 
use in matters of justice or grace. If the 
former is the intention of the bull, the lead is 
hung by a hempen cord ; if the latter, by a 
silken thread. It is this pendant lead, or 
seal, which is, properly speaking, the bull ; 
and which is impressed, on one side, with the 
heads ot St. Peter and St. Paul, and on the 
other with the name of the pope, and the year 
of his pontificate. The bull is written in an 
old, round, Gothic letter, and is divided into 
five parts ; the narrative of the fact, the con- 
ception, the clause, the date, and the saluta- 
tion, in which the pope styles himself servus 
servorum, i.e. the servant of servants. These 
| instruments, besides the lead hanging to 
1 them, have a cross, with some text of scrip- 
I ture, or religious motto, about it. Bulls are 
! granted for the consecration of bishops, the 
: promotion to benefices, and the celebration 
of jubilees, &c. 
Bull in ctrna Domini, a particular bull 
| read every year, on the day of the Lord’s 
supper, or Maundy Thursday, in the pope’s 
presence, containing excommunications and 
I anathemas against heretics, and all who dis- 
turb or oppose tire jurisdiction of the holy 
j see. After the reading of the bull, the pope 
j throws a burning torch into the public place, 
to denote the thunder of this anathema. 
Bull, golden, an edict, or imperial consti- 
tution, made by the emperor Charles IV. re- 
| puted to be the magna charta, or the funda- 
| mental law, of the German empire. It is 
I called golden, because it has a golden seal, 
in the form of a pope’s bull, tied with yellow 
I and red cords of silk; upon one side is the 
| emperor represented sitting on his throne, 
si and on the other the capital of Rome. It is 
also called Caroline, on Charles IV’s. account. 
Till the publication of the golden bull, the 
j form and ceremony of the election of an em 
j peror were dubious and undetermined, and 
the number of the electors not fixed. This 
[ solemn edict regulated the functions, rights, 
; privileges, and pre-eminences of the electors. 
I The original, which is in Latin, on vellum, 
| is preserved at Frankfort: this ordonnance, 
| containing thirty articles, or chapters, was 
; approved of by all the princes of the empire, 
\ and remains still in force. 
BULLA, in conchology, the name of a 
genus of shells, the character of which is thus 
defined: animal a Umax; shell univalve, con- 
I voluted, and unarmed; mouth or aperture 
somewhat straightened, oblong, longitudinal, 
and at the base very entire ; pillar lip ob- 
lique, and smooth. There are many species. 
BULL/E, in Roman antiquity, ornaments 
at first given only to the sons of noblemen ; 
though afterwards they became of more com- 
moil use. This ornament was first given by 
• Tarquinius with the praetextato his son, who 
had, with his own hand, at fourteen years of 
i age, killed an enemy. 
BULLION, uncoined gold or silver in 
i the mass. 
Those metals are called so, either when 
! smelted from the native ore, and not perfectly 
| refined, or when they are perfectly refined 
; but melted down in bars or ingots, or in any 
unwrought body of any degree of fineness. 
When gold and silver are in their purity, 
they are so soft and flexible that they cannot 
well be brought into any fashion for use, 
without being first reduced and hardened 
with an alloy of some other baser metal. To 
prevent abuses, according to the laws of Eng- 
land, all sorts of wrought plate in general 
ought to be made to the legal standard; and 
the price of our standard gold and silver, the 
common rule whereby to set a value on their 
bullion, whether the same is in ingots, bars, 
dust, or in foreign specie ; whence it is easy 
to conceive that the value of bullion cannot 
be exactly known without being first assayed, 
that the exact quantity of pure metal therein 
contained may be determined, and conse- 
quently whether it is above or below the 
standard. 
BUMALDA, in botany, a genus of the 
digynia order, belonging to the pentandria 
class of plants. The corolla is iive-petalled, 
styles villose, capsule two-celled, two-beaked. 
There is one species, a native of Japan. 
BUM ELIA, a genus of the class and 
order pentandria monogynia. The essential 
character is, corolla rive-cleft, with five-leaved 
nectary, drupe one-seeded. There are seven 
species, all trees and shrubs, natives of the 
West Indies, called there bastard bully-tree. 
BUMICILLI, a religious- sect of Maho- 
metans in Egypt and Barbary, who pretend 
to fight with devils, and commonly appear in 
a fright and covered with wounds and bruises. 
BUNIAS, in botany, a genus of the order 
siliquosa, and tetradynamia class of plants, 
and ranking under the thirty-ninth natural 
order, siliquosa?. The siliqua is deciduous, 
four-sided, muricated, or shagreened with un- 
equal pointed angles. There are nine spe- 
cies, ail annual plants, but none of them pos- 
sessed of any remarkable property. 
BUNIUM, pig-nut, or earth-nut, in 
botany, a genus of the digynia order, and 
pentandria class of plants, and in the natural 
method ranking under the 45th order, um- 
bellate. The corolla is uniform, the umbel 
thick, and the fruit ovate. There is but one 
known species, viz. 
Bunium bulbocastanum, with a globulai* 
root. It grows naturally in moist pastures 
in Britain, and lias a tuberous solid root, 
which lies deep in the ground. The leaves 
are finely cut, and lie near the ground. The 
stalk rises a foot and a half high, is round, 
channelled, and solid. The flowers are white, 
and shaped like those of other umbelliferous 
plants ; the seeds are small, oblong, and 
when ripe are channelled. The roots of this 
sort are frequently dug up, and by some peo- 
ple eaten raw. They have much resemblance 
in taste to a chesnut, whence the specific 
name. 
BUNT of a sail, the middle part of it, 
formed designedly into a bag or cavity, that 
the sail may gather more wind. It is used 
mostly in top-sails, because courses are ge- 
nerally cut square, or with but small allow- 
ance lor bunt or compass. The bunt holds 
much leeward wind, that is, it hangs much 
to leeward. , 
Seamen all agree that a bellying or bunting 
sail carries a vessel faster to ‘the windward 
than a straight or fast sail. 
Bunt-lines are small lines made fast to 
the bottom of the sails, in the middle part of 
the bolt-rope, to a cringle, and so are reeved 
through a small block, seized to the yard. 
Their use is to trice up the bunt of the sail, 
for the better furling it up. , 
2/9 
BE OY, at sea, a short piece of wood, or a 
close-hooped barrel, fastened so as to float 
directly over the anchor, that the men who 
go in the boat to weigh the anchor, may 
know where it lies. 
Buoy is also a piece of wood or cork, 
sometimes an empty cask, well closed, swim- 
ming on the surface of the water, and fast- 
ened by a chain or cord to a large stone, 
piece of broken cannon, or the like, serving 
to mark the dang-, rous places near a coast, 
as rocks, shoals, wrecks of vessels, anchors, 
&c. 
Stream the buoy, is to let the anchor fall 
while the ship has way. 
Io buoy up the cable is to fasten some 
pieces' of wood, barrels, &c. to the cable, 
near the anchor, that the cable may not 
touch the ground in case it be foul or rocky, 
lest it should be fretted and cut off. 
BUPHAGA, in ornithology, a genus of 
the order of pica?, of which only a single spe- 
cies, Africana (see Plate, Nat. Ilist. fig. 
68.) has been discovered. Its character is, 
tne bill straight and somewhat quadrangular ;. 
mandibles gibbous, entire, and more gibbous 
on the outside ; legs formed for walking. 
It is found in Africa, and is called in English 
the beef-eater from this peculiarity; that it 
sometimes alights upon the backs of cattle, 
and picks holes in them in order to get at the 
larva? of the cestri, or gad-flies, deposited by 
those creatures in the flesh directly below 
the skin 
BUPHTHALMUM, ox-eye, a genus of 
the polygamia superflua order, and syngene- 
sia class of plants, and in the natural method 
ranking under the 49th order, composite. 
1 he receptacle is paleaceous ; the pappus an 
indifferent rim; the seeds, especially those 
of the radius, emarginated on the sides ; the 
stigmata of the hermaphrodite florets undi- 
vided. Mhere are twelve species, all of 
which may be propagated by seeds ; and 
those which do not, by parting their root?^f%r 
cutting off their branches. Some of the spe- 
cies are tender, and require to be raised on a 
hotbed. The following are the most re- 
markable : 
L Buphlhalmum arborescens, rises with 
several woody stems to the height of eight or 
ten feet. Tie flowers are produced at the- 
ends of the branches; they are of a pale 
yellow colour, and have scaly empalements. 
2. Buphlhalmum helianthoides, a native of 
North America. It has a perennial root and' 
an annual stalk, which rises six or eight feet 
high. The flowers come out at the ex- 
tremities of the branches, and are of a bright 
yellow colour, resembling a small sunflower. 
BEPLEURUM, hare’s ear, or thorough- 
wax, a genus of the digynia order, and pen- 
tandria class of plants, and in the natural 
method ranking under the 45th order, um- 
bellate. The involucra of the partial umbels 
are large in proportion, and pentaphy lions; 
the petals involuted or rolled inwards ; the 
fruit roundish, compressed and striated. There 
are 14 species, the principal of which is, 
Bupleurum fruticosum, or shrubby Ethio- 
pian hartwort. It rises with a shrubby stem,, 
dividing into numerous branches, forming a 
bushy head five or six feet high, adorned with, 
oblong, oval, entire leaves of a sea-greens 
colour, placed alternate, with yellow flowers 
in umbels at the ends of the branches, which 
appear in July and August, and are some- 
