E U C 
the receptacle, VMerit.) antherse four.cornered-fubulate, 
grooved, ereft, perforated at the tip on both Tides, (fub- 
villofe, fliorter than the corolla, L'Herit.) —Female. Ca¬ 
lyx : perianthium one-leafed, four-toothed, (more- feldotn 
five-toothed,) permanent: fegments erect, three times 
Ihorterthan thecorolla. Corolla": onepetalled, four cleft : 
fegments ovate, obtule, concave, ereCl. Piflillutn : germ 
ovate, fubvillofe, fuperior ; ftyles two, thickifh, the length 
of the corolla ; ftigmas emarginate-bifid, obtufe. Pericar- 
pium : berry globular, umbilicate with a dot. fmooth, 
flefliy. (A berried capfule, three-horned, three-celled, 
three-valved, L'Herit. —two-celled, Linn.) Seed: An¬ 
gle, globular, fmooth ; (roundifh, arilled, one or two 
abortive, L'Herit.) There are hermaphrodite and male 
hermaphrodite flowers ; hence it feems to belong to the 
clafs polygamia. L'Herit. — EJfential CharaElcr. Male. Ca¬ 
lyx, four or five-toothed ; corolla, four or five-parted ; 
{lamina twelve to fifteen. Female. Calyx and corolla 
as in the male ; germ fuperior; ftyles two ; berry two- 
celled. 
Euclea racemofa, or round-leaved euclea : the only 
fpecies known is a branching-tree. Leaves alternate, lub- 
petioled, obovate, quite entire, obtufe, fmooth, peren¬ 
nial. Monf. L’Heritier remarks that fpecimens of this 
and Celaftrus corniculatus, when in fruit, are as much 
alike as one egg is to another, and that from this circum- 
ftance, before he was acquainted with the flower, he took 
this for that. See Celastrus corniculatus. Native of 
the Cape of Good Hope. Introduced here in 1722, by 
Mr. Thomas Knowlton. It flowers in November and 
December. 
EU'CLID, a Grecian philofopher, founder of the Me- 
garic fed, flouriftied about the 95th olympiad, four hun¬ 
dred years before Chrift. He was a native of Megara, 
and early contracted an attachment to the ftudy of philo- 
fophy. He removed from Megara to Athens, for the 
fake of attending the inftruftions of Socrates. Of that 
philofopher he was long a conftant hearer, and fo defirous 
of profiting by his lelfons of wifdovn, that he incurred 
great perfonal rilk in order to receive them. For after 
the Athenians had palled a law prohibiting any of the 
Megareans from entering Athens on pain of death, he fre¬ 
quently came thither by night, from a diilance of more 
than twenty miles, difguifed in a female drefs, that he 
might attend his mailer. He afterwards fet up a fchool 
at Megara, in which his chief employment was, not to 
teach the fcience of ethics, but the art of deputation, and 
how to refine the fubtilties of logic. With fuch impe- 
tuofity and ardour were debates conducted by his difei- 
ples, that his fed obtained the name of Erijlic, or difpu- 
tatious, as well as Megaric, from the place in which its 
founder was born. It was alfo called the dialectic fed; 
not becaufe it gave rife to dialectics,'or logical debates, 
but becaufe the difeourfes and writings of this clafs of 
philofophers generally appeared in the form of queftion 
and anfwer. But though Euclid was ardent and conten¬ 
tious in his philofophical debates, yet that he knew how 
to command his temper appears from Plutarch’s anecdote 
of his reply to his brother, who in a quarrel with him 
faid, “ Let me perifli if I be not revenged on you:” 
“ And let me perifh (anfwered Euclid), it 1 do not fub- 
due your refentment by my forbearance, and make you 
love me more than ever.” And it redounds greatly to 
his honour, that after the cruel and unjuft fentence paifed 
upon Socrates, he received at Megara, and entertained in 
the kindeft manner, Plato, and feveral others of his inti¬ 
mate difciples, whom a regard to their own fafety had 
obliged to withdraw from Athens. 
EU'CLl D, a celebrated mathematician, native of Alex¬ 
andria in Egypt, where he flouriftied, and taught the ma¬ 
thematics with great applaufe under the reign of Ptolemy 
Lagus, about three hundred years before Chrift. He was 
tiie firft who fet up a mathematical fchool in that city, 
where, till the conqueft of Alexandria by the Saracens, 
; *3110ft of the eminent mathematicians were either born, or 
**** Vol, VII. No. 407. 
E U C 45 
ftudied ; and it is to him and his fcholars that the world 
has been indebted for Eratofthenes, Archimedes, Apol¬ 
lonius, Ptolemy, Theon, &c. There is no doubt but 
that, before his time, many of the fundamental principles 
of the pure mathematics had be-en difeovered, and deli¬ 
vered down by Thales, Pythagoras, Hippocrates of Chios, 
Eudoxus, Leon, and others who are enumerated by Pro- 
clus. But Euclid was the firft who reduced them into 
regular order, and added many others of his own difeover- 
ing; on which account arithmetic and geometry may be 
faid to owe their fcientific form to his labours. He like- 
wife applied himfelf to the ftudy of mixed mathematics, 
particularly to aftronomy and optics. He was the author, 
according to Pappus and Proclus, of 1. Elements. 2. 
Data. 3. An Introduction to Harmony. 4 Phenomena. 
5. Optics. 6. Catoptrics. 7. A treatife of the Divi- 
fion of Superficies. 8. Porifms. 9. Loci ad Superficiem. 
10. Fallacies; and four books of Conics, The moft va¬ 
luable of all thefe, is his Elements of Geometry, confift- 
ing, as commonly publifhed, of fifteen books; of which 
the two laft are by fome fufpeCted not to have been Eu¬ 
clid’s, but a comment of Hypficles of Alexandria, who 
lived two hundred years after this time Others alfo are 
of opinion that fome additions have been made to Euclid’s 
treatife bv Theon, and other ancient mathematicians. 
Be this as it may, the name of Euclid has been rendered 
immortal by that precious legacy bequeathed by him to 
pofterity, the excellences of which are too univerfally 
known to require any illuftration or eulogium from us. 
Valerius Maximus and others among the ancients, and 
alfo fome modern writers, have confounded the mathe¬ 
matician with the fubject of the preceding article. Eu¬ 
clid died, but at what age is uncertain, in the 123d olym¬ 
piad, and the year 2S3 before Chrift. He is reprefented 
to have been a perfon of agreeable and pleafing manners, 
and admitted to habits of friendfhip and familiarity with 
king Ptolemy. It is faid, that when that prince alked 
him if he could not diredl him to fome fliorter and eafier 
way of acquiring a knowledge of geometrical fcience than 
that which he had laid down in his Elements ; he anfwer¬ 
ed, “ there was no royal road to geometry, Of his Elements 
there have been numberlefs editions in all languages; 
and of all his works now extant, a fine folio edition was 
publifhed at Oxford, in 1703, in Greek and Latin, by 
David Gregory, the Savilian profelfor of aftronomy in 
that univerfity. 
EU , 'COMIS, f. [s vzopo;, Gr. having beautiful hair, j 
In botany a genus of the clafs hexandria, order monogynia, 
natural order ofcoronariae, (aiphodeli, JuJf.) The gene¬ 
ric characters' are—Corolla: inferior,. fix-parted, perma¬ 
nent, fpreading. Stamina: filaments Tubulate, dilated 
at the bafe, and united there into a concave nettary faften- 
ed to the bottom of the corolla. Piftillum : germ fupe¬ 
rior, ftigma Ample. Pericarpium : capfule three-celled. 
Seeds : many. EJfential CharaEier. —Corolla : inferior, 
fix-parted, permanent, fpreading.; filaments united at the 
bafe into a nettary growing to the corolla.. 
Species. 1. Eucomis liana, or dwarf Eucomis: fcape 
club-fliaped, leaves broad-lanceolate, acute. The leaf¬ 
ing is that of Maflonia ; leaves ovate, acuminate, marked 
with lines underneath, the veins confluent at the tip. 
Native of the Cape of Good Hope; flowers in May. 
2. Eucomis regia, tongue leaved eucomis or fritillaria : 
fcape cylindric, leaves tongue-lhaped obtufe clofe to the 
ground. Root tuberous, from which arife in' the autumn 
fix or eight obtufe leaves, near five inches long, and two 
broad towards the top, growing narrower at their bafe, 
crenated on their borders, lying flat on the ground, a’tjd 
continuing all the winter. In the fpring ari.fes the flower, 
ftalk in the center of the leaves, about fix inches high, 
naked, at the bottom; but the. upper part is furrourided 
by bell-lhaped flowers, of a.greenilh colour, appearing in 
April. The leaves decay in June. Native of the Cape 
of Good Hope. Cultivated in the Eltliam garden, to 
which was lent by Mr. BUthwaite of Dirham in Glou- 
O cclterftme. 
