SEA 
SEA 
887 
SDAIN, i. Disdain.—So she departed full of grief and 
daine. Spenser. 
SDE'INFUL, adj. Disdainful. 
They now, puft up with sdeinful insolence, 
Despise the brood of blessed sapience. Spenser. 
SDILLES, or Sdili, two small islands in the Grecian ar¬ 
chipelago, situated between Naxia and Andro, and well 
known in Grecian history by the names of Great and Little 
Delos. The larger island is about 17 miles in circuit, and 
though not inhabited, produces vines, olives, and even 
corn, all cultivated by the Greeks of the adjacent island of 
Myconi. There are here considerable remains of antiquity, 
in particular the tombs. But the other island, though only 
eight miles in circuit, and of a rocky surface, was the more 
celebrated of the two in ancient history. Being the supposed 
birth-place of Apollo and Diana, it contained a magnificent 
temple, dedicated to the former, and erected at the joint ex¬ 
pense of the Grecian states. There still remains the pedestal, 
the inscriptions, and even some of the fragments of a colos¬ 
sal statue of Apollo. The practice of a periodical legation 
from Athens to this island, was regularly observed for many 
ages. This and the resort of other strangers contributed to 
enrich it, but Delos declined with the prosperity of Greece. 
The existing remains consist of columns, altars, porticoes, 
inscriptions, of the ruins of a gymnasium, of a small marble 
theatre, and of a Naumachia, or large basin for naval ex¬ 
hibitions. Both islands are uninhabited, in consequence of 
the dauger from pirates. 
SDUR, a village of Hedsjas, in Arabia; 20 miles south- 
south-east of Suez. 
SE, or Tse, a city of China, of the second rank, in the 
province of Honan. Lat. 36. 25. N. long. 114. 14. E. 
SEA, s. [pae, Saxon.] The Briny water that surrounds 
the land. 
Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood 
Clean from my hand ? No, this my hand will rather 
Thy multitudinous sea incarnardine, 
Making the green one red. Shakspeare. 
The pilot - 
Moors by his side under the lee, while night 
Invests the sea. Milton. 
A collection of water; a lake.—By the sea of Galilee. 
St. Matt .—Proverbially for any large quantity.—That sea 
of blood which hath in Ireland been barbarously shed, is 
enough to drown in eternal infamy and misery the malicious 
author and instigator of its effusion. Ikon Basilike .—Any 
thing rough and tempestuous. 
To sorrow abandon’d, but worse felt within, 
And in a troubled sea of passion tost. Milton. 
The bottom of the sea is covered with a variety of mat¬ 
ters, such as could not be imagined by any but those who 
have examined into it, especially in deep water, where the 
surface is only disturbed by tides and storms, the lower part 
and consequently its bed at the bottom, remaining for ages 
perhaps undisturbed. The soundings, when the plummet 
first touches ground on approaching the shores, give some 
ideas of this. The bottom of the plummet is hollowed, and 
in that hollow there is placed a lump of tallow; this being 
the bottom of the lead, is what first touches the ground, and 
the soft nature of this fat receives into it some part of those 
substances which it meets with at the bottom; this matter, 
thus brought up, is sometimes pure sand, sometimes a sort 
of sand made of the fragment of shells, beat to a sort of 
powder ; sometimes it is made of a like powder of the seve¬ 
ral sorts of corals; and sometimes it is composed of frag¬ 
ments of rocks; but beside these appearances, which are 
natural enough, and are what might very well be expected, 
it brings up substanees which are of the most beautiful 
colours. 
Things of as fine a scarlet, Vermillion, purple, &c., as 
the finest paint could make them, or as yellow as a solu¬ 
tion of gamboge, are common; and sometimes, though not 
so frequently, the matter brought up is blue, green, or of a 
pure snowy whiteness. These coloured matters sometimes 
seem to have made up the whole bottom or mass of the sur¬ 
face, but more usually they have been formed upon other 
things, as upon the mud, or upon larger pieces of shells, 
corals, and the like, in the manner of tartareous crusts, and 
those in some degree resembling the crustaceous coats of 
some of the sea plants. The colours of these substances are 
not merely superficial and transient, but many of them are 
so real and permanent, that they may be received into white 
wax melted, and poured upon them, or kept in fusion about 
them ; and when thus examined, they seem as if a proper 
care might make them of great value, as paints of the finer 
kinds, where little is to be used. 
The same coloured matters that thus coat the substances, 
found at the bottom of the sea in these places, are also some¬ 
times found extended over the surface of marine substances 
of the harder kind, which are found in deep water. They 
are always, in this case, in a sort of liquid form, being lodged 
within, or embodied among a sort of jelly or glue of a trans¬ 
parent substance, which in these cases perfectly coats over 
the whole. In this state it gives the naturalist, who is pre¬ 
sent at the fishing up his treasures, a transient prospect of 
a very elegant kind, but this vanishes while he admires it. 
A piece of coral, or other hard substance, thus coated over, 
appears as it rises to the surface of the water, of a delicate 
green, blue, or purple ; but when taken above water it is 
found that this fine colour is only in the coat of glue or 
jelly which covers the substance; as soon as this is wiped 
off, the colour is carried away with it, and the coral shews 
its own native tinge; and it is to no purpose to attempt 
the preserving of it, by suffering this glue to dry upon the 
coral, for the colour flies away by degrees, as the moisture 
evaporates, and the coral, &c., whatever it be, is only so 
much the less beautiful, than it naturally would have been, 
as it is covered with a dry yellowish dirty looking homy 
matter. These are beauties in the sub-marine productions, 
therefore, which can only be seen by those who venture out, 
in order to take them up. 
The small quantities of these elegant colours, which we 
thus find spread over the surfaces of marine bodies, as we 
approach deep water, may give a rational idea of what we 
should find, we are able to examine the bottom of the sea 
in its deep and unfathomable recesses. It is easy to con¬ 
ceive, that in these places we should find great quantities of 
the most beautiful substances. Marsisli, Hist. Plu/s. dr- 
la Mer. 
Half Seas over. Half drunk. A vulgarism. — -The 
whole magistracy was pretty well disguised before I gave ’em 
the slip: our friend the alderman was half seas over before 
the bonfire was out. Spectator. 
SEA, or Cea, a river in the north of Spain, which rises 
in the mountains that separate Leon from the Asturias, flows 
south, and afterwards west, through the province of Leon, 
and joins the Esla. 
SEA-ADDER, s. A species of Syngnatiius. 
SEA-BA'NK. The sea-shore.—I was, the other day, talk¬ 
ing on the sea-hank with certain Venetians. Shakspeare. 
—A fence to keep the sea within bounds. 
SE'A-BAR, s. The sea-swallow. 
SEA-BAT, s. A fish. See Cii/ETODon Vespertilio. 
SEA-BA'THED, adj. Bathed or dipped in the sea. 
Sea-bath'd Hesperus, who brings 
Night on. Sandys. 
SEA-BEAR, s. The Phoca Leonina : which see. 
SEA-BE'AST, s. A word used by Milton for a large 
animal of the sea. 
That sea-beast 
Leviathan, which God of all his works 
Created hugest that swim the ocean stream. Milton. 
SE'A-BEAT, or Sea-be'aten, adj. Dashed by the waves 
of the sea. 
The 
