S A U 
S A V . 
ject of education, and projected a plan of reform in that 
conducted at Geneva. The design of this was to make 
young people, at a very early period, acquainted with the 
natural sciences and mathematics. It was not, however, 
carried into effect. In 1786, he published his second vo¬ 
lume of travels, containing a description of the Alps round 
Mont-Blanc, the whole having been examined with the eye 
of a mineralogist and geologist. He founded the “ Society 
of Arts,” to the operation of which Geneva is said to have 
been much indebted for the state of prosperity to which it 
arrived. Over that society he presided as long as he lived. 
In 1788 Saussure, with his eldest son, encamped for 17 days 
on the Col du Geant, which he employed in accurate and 
interesting observations, both meteorological and geological. 
In these branches of knowledge he was confessedly one of 
the greatest proficients in Europe, and his numerous writings 
on these and other scientific subjects, gave him admission 
into the principal learned societies in different countries. 
He was visited by all the eminent and illustrious travel¬ 
lers who passed through Geneva, whom he instructed by 
his conversation, and gratified with the view of a cabinet 
rich in the natural products that he had collected during his 
travels. When Geneva was united to the French republic, 
he was made deputy to the National Assembly. But this 
revolution, in its destructive course, swept away the greatest 
part of his fortune, and its political storms ruined the peace 
of his mind. In 1794, his health began to decline, and a 
severe paralytic seizure almost wholly deprived him of the 
use of his limbs; he was still active in his mind, and pre¬ 
pared the last two volumes of his travels for the press, which 
appeared in 1796. They contain a mass of new facts and 
observations of great importance to science. During his 
illness, he published “ Observations on the Fusibility of 
Stones, by means of the Blow-pipe.” He was, in general, 
a Neptunian, that is, ascribed the revolutions of the globe 
to water, and supposed it to be possible that mountains 
should have been thrown up by elastic fluids disengaged 
from the cavities of the earth. He died on the 22d of 
March, 1799, in the 59th year of his age, lamented by his 
family, to whom he was dear; by his country, to which he 
•had done honour; and by Europe at large, the knowledge 
of which he had greatly extended. 
SAUSTRA BEADY, a name given by the people of the 
East Indies, to a kind of fossile, to which they attribute great 
virtues in medicine. 
Before it is given internally, it undergoes a hundred cal¬ 
cinations, and several preparations with the juices of herbs. 
When the operation is over, they say it will cure a thousand 
diseases. It has its name from thence, the word saustra 
signifying with them a thousand. 
SAUTENAY, a village in the east of France, in Bur¬ 
gundy. Its wine is in great repute. 
SAUTGUR, a town of the south of India, district of the 
Baramahal. The situation of this place is extremely pic¬ 
turesque, being surrounded with rocks covered with brush¬ 
wood. The nabob of the Carnatic has a handsome garden 
and country house here. In the former are some exotics. 
Lat. 12. 58. N. long. 78. 54. E. 
SAUTHY, a small river of Wales, in Carmarthenshire, 
which falls into the Muthy, near Llangadock. 
SAVU, an island in the Eastern seas, about 20 miles in 
length. The sea coast is in general low ; but in the middle 
of the island there are hills of a considerable height. This 
island is represented both by Captain Cook and M. La- 
billarde, as presenting a most enchanting prospect from the 
sea; being intersected, especially towards the south-west, by 
very beautiful hills, whose gentle declivity seems to offer to 
the natives a soil of easy and favourable cultivation. Groups 
of cocoa-nut trees scattered on the shore, afford shelter to 
some cottages, which form an additional embellishment to 
those beautiful plantations. “The principal trees,” says 
Cook, “ of this island are the fan-palm, the cocoa-nut, ta¬ 
marind, limes, oranges, and mangoes; and other vegetable 
productions are maize. Guinea-corn, rice, millet, calevances, 
Vol. XXII, No. 1534, 
705 
and water melons. We saw also one sugar-cane, and a few 
kinds of European garden stuff, particularly celery, mar¬ 
joram, fennel, and garlic. For the supply of luxury, it 
has betel, areca, tobacco, cotton, indigo, and a small 
quantity of cinnamon, which seems to be planted here only 
for curiosity. There are, however, several kinds of fruit, 
besides those which have been already mentioned. The 
tame animals are buffaloes, sheep, goats, hogs, fowls, pigeons, 
horses, asses, dogs, and cats; and of all these there is great 
plenty. The sheep are of the kind which in England are 
called Bengal sheep, and differ from ours in many parti¬ 
culars. The fowls are chiefly of game breed, and large, 
but the eggs are remarkably small. Of the fish which the 
sea produces here, we know but litttle: turtles are sometimes 
found upon the coast, and are by these people, as well as 
all others, considered as a dainty. The people are rather 
under than above the middling size; the women especially 
are remarkably short, and squat built ; their complexion is a 
dark brown, and their hair universally black and lank. The 
men are in general well made, vigorous, and active, and 
have a greater variety in the make and disposition of their 
features than usual; the countenances.of the women are, on 
the contrary, all alike. The men fasten their hair up to the 
top of their heads with a comb ; the women tie it behind in 
a club, which is very far from becoming. Both sexes era¬ 
dicate the hair from under the arm, and the men do the same 
with their beards, for which purpose the better sort always 
carry a pair of silver pincers, hanging by a string round 
their necks, some, however suffer a very little hair to re¬ 
main upon their upper lips; but this is al ways kept short. 
The dress of both sexes consists of cotton cloth, which being 
dyed blue in the yarn, and not uniformly of the same shade, 
is in clouds or waves of that colour, and even to our eye 
has not an inelegant appearance. This cloth they manu¬ 
facture themselves; and two pieces, each about two yards 
long, and a yard and a half wide, make a dress. Almost 
all the men have their names traced upon their arms in inde¬ 
lible characters, of a black colour; and the women have a 
square ornament of flourished lines, impressed in the same 
manner, just under the bend of the elbow. The houses of 
Savu are all built upon the same plan, and differ only in size, 
being large in proportion to the rank and riches of the 
proprietor. Some are 400 feet long, and some are not more 
than 20 ; they are all raised upon posts or piles, about four 
feet high. When the natives of this island were first formed 
into a civil society, is not certainly known, but at present 
it is divided into five principalities or nigrees: Laai, Seba, 
Regecua, Timo, and Massara, each of which is governed 
by its respective rajah or king: The religion of these people, 
according to Mr. Lange’s information, is an absurd kind of 
Paganism, every man choosing his own god, and determining 
for himself how he should be worshipped, so that there are 
almost as many gods and modes of worship as there are 
people. In their morals, however, they are said to be irre¬ 
proachable." Lat. 10. 35. S. long. 122. 30. E. 
SAUVAGES (Francis Boissier de), a distinguished 
physician, and the inventor of modern nosology, was the 
sixth son of a military officer of rank, and was born at 
Alais, in Lower Languedoc, on the 12th of May, 1706. 
The means of education which his native town then 
afforded were very limited, and the only tutors whose 
assistance he had were men of indifferent attainments. 
Nevertheless his own talents enabled him to overcome these 
obstacles, and his progress in literature and philosophy was 
great and rapid. Having determined to adopt the profes¬ 
sion of medicine, he went to Montpellier in 1722, where he 
attended the courses delivered by Chicoyneau, Astruc, and 
other celebrated professors, and received the degree of 
doctor in 1726. The thesis which he defended on this 
occasion attracted a good deal of notice, partly perhaps 
from the singularity of the subject; which was, “ Si 
l’amour peut etre gueri par les remddes tires des pi antes ?” 
He still continued to pursue his studies; and in 1730 went 
to Paris with a view to farther improvement in his profession. 
8 R He 
