UR A 
tlie mouth to make it heard, and to form a 
distinct voice. See Grammar. 
The vowels are six in number, viz. A, E, 
I, O, U, Y, and are called vowels in con- 
tradistinction to certain other letters, which 
depending on a particular application of 
some part of the mouth, as the teeth, lips, 
or palate, can make no perfect sound with- 
out an opening of the mouth, that is, with- 
put the addition of a vowel, and are there- 
fore called consonants., 
UPRIGHT, in heraldry, is used in res- 
pect of shell fishes, as crevices, &c. when 
standing erect in a coat. 
UPUPA, the hoopoe, in natural history, a 
genus of birds of tite order Pica?. Generic 
character; bill long, slender, and bending; 
nostrils in the base of the bill ; tongue ob- 
tuse, entire, and triangular ; middle toe of 
the three toes before, connected in some 
degree to the outermost. There are eight 
species, of which the following deserve the 
chief notice. U. epops, common hoopoe ; 
this weighs three ounces, and is a foot 
long; is found in Europe, Asia, and Africa; 
but, even in the warmest countries of Eu- 
rope, is said to be migratory. In England 
it is by no means abundant. It is devoted 
to solitude, and rarely seen even in pairs. 
At Cairo, however, in Egypt, these birds 
appear in small flocks, and build on the ter- 
races of houses fronting the bustle ' and 
noises of the street. They seldom perch on 
trees, confining themselves almost entirely 
to the ground. When agitated by strong 
passion, whether of .surprise or anger, of 
fear or attachment, they erect their'’ crests 
and spread their tails with great fullne.ss and 
intensity. They feed upon insects, and give 
them to tlieir young ; and their nests are, 
for want of that cleanly management for 
which birds are generally distinguished, in- 
tolerably disgusting to the smell, in conse- 
quence of the putrid remains of this species 
of food. In confinement they will live on 
bread and cheese, or raw meat. See Aves 
Plate XIV. fig. - 1 . ’ 
U. promerops is about four feet long, 
but the body is little larger than that of a 
pigeon. Its plumage is of the most various, 
beautiful, and brilliant colour, and strongly 
reminds the observer of the bird of para- 
dise, to which, indeed, it is considered as 
allied. It is found in New Guinea, and em- 
ployed by the natives as one of the most 
striking personal embellishments. 
URAN, in mineralogy, a genus of ores 
containing three species. 1 . “Pitch-ore” 
of a velvet-black colour, inclining to iron- 
UR A 
black ; it occurs almost always massive and 
disseminated: specific gravity between 6 3 
and 7.5. It is completely infusible, with- 
out addition, before tlie blow pipe. AVith 
soda, or bora.x, it forms a grey, slaggy glo- 
bule ; with phosphoric salts a tran.sparent 
green bead. It dissolves imperfectly in 
sulphuric and muriatic acids ; but is nearly 
dissolved in nitrons and nitro-muriatic acids. 
It consists of 
Uran 86..5 
Oxide of iron 2.5 
Sulphurated lead e.o 
Silica 5,0 
100.0 
It occurs in veins, in primitive mountains, 
with lead and siver ores ; and is usually ac- 
companied with lead glance, copper pyrites, 
iion ochre, &e. It is found in Saxony and 
Noiway, and is distinguished from brown- 
blende by colour, specific gravity, fracture, 
and streak ; from wolfram by its streak and 
fracture. , 
The- chief colour of the second species, 
uran-niica, is grass-green : specific gravity 
3.1. It dissolves in nitrous acid without 
effervescence, and communicates to it a 
lemon-yellow colour. It consists of an 
oxide of uran, with a slight admixture of 
copper. It occurs in ironstone veins, in 
Cornwall, Germany, and France. It is not 
like mica, to wliich it has a great resem- 
blance, elastic. 
The third species is nran-ochre, which 
is of a straw-yellow colour: it occurs 
usually as a coating or efflorescence on pitch 
ore. From the ore we have 
URANIUiVr, in chemistry, a metal dis- 
covered by Klaproth in the year 1789. It 
was then announced as a metal more diffi- 
cult to be reduced than manganese, exter- 
nally of a grey colour, and rnternally of a 
clear hrown, of considerable lustre, and 
middling hardness, that it might be scratch- 
ed and filed, and that its oxide gives a 
deep orange colour to porcelain. It has 
been obtained from three different minerals. 
The first is in the state of sulphuret, of a 
blackish colour, and ofa shining fracture, and 
sometimes lamellated. In this s’tateit is some- 
times combined with iron and sulphureted 
lead. The uranium is in the metallic state. 
The second ore from which this metal is 
obtained, is the native oxide of uranium. 
It js always in the state of yellow powder 
on the surface of the sulphuret. The spel 
cific gravity is 3.24. AVhen it is of a pure 
yellow colour it is then a pure oxide. 
