CAU 
their food consists of various fruits, and of 
nuts, which they will hide and abstain from 
touching for many months ; they breed with 
the rapidity of rabbits, no season checking 
their prolific tendencies ; their flesh is very 
agreeable to the taste, and even when they 
are old, acquires little or no toughness. 
They are caught by the Indians in Guinea, 
and other warm parts of South America, 
where alone they are to be met with in 
great numbers, sometimes being hunted 
down by their dogs, and frequently being 
taken in traps to which they are allured by 
tlie accurate invitation of their peculiar 
sounds. They are nearly of the size of a 
hare ; when pursued they retreat to bur- 
rows or holes of trees, which, indeed, con- 
stitute their irregular and frequently chang- 
ed abodes, and in which they are almost 
uniformly found alone ; or the female with 
its young ones. Tliey hold their food in the 
same manner as the squirrel; they make 
their excursions for food during the day, 
and may be easily domesticated, though not 
so completely as to exclude altogether tlieir 
natural wildness. See Mammalia, Plate 
Vir. fig. 4. 
CAURING, or Caulking of a ship, is 
driving oakum, or the like, into all the 
seams of the plank of a ship, to prevent 
leaking and keep out the water. 
Cauking irons, are iron chissels for that 
purpose. Some of these irons are broad, 
some round, and others grooved. After the 
seams are stopped with oakum it is done 
over with- a mixture of tallow, pitch, and 
tar, as low as the, ship draws water. 
CAUL, in anatomy, a memt)ranaceous 
part of the abdomen, covering the greatest 
part of the intestines. 
CAULIFLOWERS, in gardening, a 
much esteemed species of brassica, or cab- 
bage. 
CAUSE, causa, that from whence any 
thing proceeds, or by virtue of which any 
thing is done : it stands opposed to elfect. 
We get tlie ideas of cause and effect, says 
Mr. Locke, from our observation of the vi- 
cissitude of things, while we perceive some 
qualities or substances begin to exist, and 
that they receive their existence from the 
due application and operation of other 
beings. That which produces, is the cause, 
and that which is produced, the effect : 
thus, fluidity in wax is the effect of a certain 
degree of heat, which we observe to be con- 
stantly produced by the application of such 
boat. 
Cause, j5rsf, that which acts ofifself,and 
CAU 
of its own proper power or virtue : God is 
the only first cause in this sense. 
Causes, second, are those which derive 
the power and faculty of action from a first 
cause : these are improperly called causes, 
as they do not, strictly speaking, act at all, 
but are acted on ; of this kind are all those 
that we term natural causes. 
Causes, final, are the motives inducing 
an agent to act ; or the design and purpose 
for which the thing was done. 
Lord Bacon says that the final cause is so 
far from being serviceable, that it corrupts 
the sciences, unless it be restrained to hu- 
man actions : however, continues he, final 
causes are not felse, nor unworthy of in- 
quiry in metaphysics : but their excursions 
into the limits of physical causes hath made 
a great devastation in that province ; other- 
wise, when contained within their own 
bounds, they are not repugnant to physical 
causes. 
CAUSEWAY, or Causey, a massive 
construction of stones, stakes, and fasci- 
nes ; or an elevation of earth, well beaten ; 
serving either as a road in wet marshy 
places, or as a mole to retain the waters of 
a pond, or prevent a river from overflowing 
the lower grounds. 
CAUSTIC, 7 a substance is said to 
CAUSTICITY, 3 be caustic when it 
produces the same effect on the tongue as 
that of actual fire, that is, an immediate 
sensation of burning, followed with a slight 
disorganization of the surface actually in 
contact. Thus alkalies are called caustic 
when deprived of carbonic acid, because 
when concentrated, they then bum and 
blister the tongue almost instantly. Caustic 
substances are tilso generally corrosive, or 
such as act upon organized matter, and de- 
compose it with rapidity. The term caustic 
prefixed to the alkalies and earths to distin- 
guish the pure or decarbonated state is 
now almost alw'ays omitted, as unnecessary 
by the use of the term carbonate, thus to 
the terms caustic potash, and mild potash 
are substituted those of potash, and carbo- 
nate of potash respectively. We also say 
lirae, and the carbonate of lime. There is 
still some confusion with regard to the term 
soda among others ; soda meaning in che- 
mical language pure or caustic soda, but in 
commerce, and in common use the mild or 
carbonate of soda. 
Caustic lunar, the old name for nitrate 
(tf silver, melted and cast into cylindrical 
pieces about the size of small black-lead 
pencils, for the use of surgeons : and tha 
« 
