81 
TRICHECUS. 
irifler, that 'spendeth his forenoons on his glass and barber, 
his afternoons with paint or lust, tributing most precious 
moments to the sceptre of a fan! Whitlock. 
TRICALA, or Trikala, anciently called Tricea, a con¬ 
siderable town of European Turkey, in Romania, the capital 
of a sandgiacat or district comprising a considerable part of 
Thessaly; 30 miles west of Larissa, and 33 east-by-south of 
Joannina. 
TRICALA, a small town of European Turkey, in the 
Morea, about 18 miles distant from Corinth. There is like¬ 
wise in this quarter a mountain of the same name, command¬ 
ing a very extensive view. 
TRICARICO, a small town of Italy, in the south part of 
the kingdom of Naples, in the province of Basilicata, on the 
river Basiento. It is the see of a bishop; 19 miles east of 
Potenza, and 75 east of Salerno. 
TRICE, s. [from thrice, that is, while one can count 
three: “ All sodenly, as who saith treis." Gower, Conf. 
Am. b. i.] A short time; an instant; a stroke.—If they get 
never so great spoil at any time, the same they waste in a 
trice, as naturally delighting in spoil, though it do them¬ 
selves no good. Spenser. 
TRICERA [from rpe<? and xepa?, a horn. Three-horned; 
so named from its capsule], in Botany, a genus of the class 
monoecia, order tetrandria, natural order of tricoccoe, eu¬ 
phorbia (Juss.) — Generic Character. Umbel simple, 
with the male florets peduncled; and a female in the middle, 
sessile. Involucre none.—Males. Calyx: perianth one- 
leafed, four-parted to the base; segments lanceolate, acute, 
erect, permanent, coloured. Corolla none. Stamina: fila¬ 
ments four, erect, longer than the calyx, ovate. Anthers 
sitting on the top of the filaments, lanceolate, acute, chan¬ 
nelled in the middle, after flowering recurved.—Female. 
Calyx perianth five-leaved; leflets ovate, acute,] erect, 
coloured. Corolla none. Pistil: germ subtrigonal. Styles 
three, short, roundish, conical, after flowering bipartile. 
Stigmas longer than the styles, recurved, patulous, chan¬ 
nelled, permanent. Pericarp: capsule oblong, trigonal, 
three-horned, three-celled, three-valved. Seeds in pairs, 
oblong, obtuse.— Essential Character , Male.— Calyx 
four-leaved. Corolla none. Filaments ovate.—Female. 
Calyx: [five-leaved. Corolla none. Styles conical. Cap¬ 
sule three-horned, three-celled. 
Tricera laevigata.—This is a branching shrub, two or 
three feet high. Branches almost simple, long, spreading, 
four-cornered, leafy, even. Leaves on short round petioles, 
opposite, ovate-lanceolate, quite entire, veined above, marked 
with lines at the edge, veinless beneath, stiffish, very smooth. 
Flowers in simple, axillary, opposite umbels; the common 
peduncle four-cornered, three-times shorter than the leaves. 
•—-Native of Jamaica in mountain coppices in the western 
parts of the island; flowering in the spring months. 
TRICERO,asmall walled town in the north-west of Italy, 
in Piedmont. Population 900; 10 miles west-north-west of 
■Casale. 
TRICESIMO, a small town of Austrian Italy, in the Ve¬ 
netian delegation of Udina. It is situated to the north of 
Udinar. 
TRICHECHUS, a genus of the order of bruta, and class 
of mammalia, in the Linnrean system : the characters of 
which are, that it has no fore-teeth in the full-grown animal, 
either above or below ; that it has solitary tusks in the upper 
jaw; that the grinders on both sides are formed of a rugged 
bony substance; that the lips are geminated or doubled; 
and the hinder feet, at the extremity of the body, united into 
a fin. 
This genus is altogether marine, comprehending few 
species. Gmelin, in his edition of the Linnsean System, 
enumerates the three following species and varieties:— 
1. Trichechus rosmarus, the rosmarus of Johnston, the 
morse of Buffon, the sea-horse of Ray and Ellis, and the 
Arctic walrus of Pennant and Cook’s last voyage. It is 
characterised by its distant, exserled tusks. It inhabits the 
Vox.. XXIV. No. 1628. 
Northern seas, and Ghiefly within the arctic cirele. It grows 
to a large size, having been found 18 feet long, and 12 feet 
in girth round the body. Its form is inelegant; having a 
small head, short neck, thick body, and short legs; the lips 
thick, and the upper one cleft into two large rounded lobes, 
the surface having numerous semi-transparent bristles of a 
yellowish tinge, and about the size of a straw in diameter, 
and three inches long, pointed at their extremities; the eyes 
small; round orifices instead of ears; the skin thick and 
wrinkled, and scattered over with short brownish hairs; with 
five toes on each foot, connected by webs; the hind-feet 
broader than the fore-feet, and the tail very short. In the 
upper jaw are two long tusks, sometimes two feet but gene¬ 
rally about one foot in length, without cutting teeth, and with 
four roundish grinders.—These animals are found about the 
northern parts of America, in the gulf of St. Lawrence, 
between 47° and 48° lat., in Davis’s Straits, and within Hud¬ 
son’s Bay in lat. 62°; in great numbers about Spitzbergen, 
also on the coast of Greenland and of Nova Zembla, and on 
the headlands extending towards the north pole. They are 
gregarious, produce their young, one at a time, early in the 
spring, and feed on sca-plants, shell-fish, &c. 
Unprovoked the walrus is harmless, otherwise furious and 
vindictive. The female, when surprised on the ice, flings its 
young into the sea, plunges after it, and having carried it to 
a safe distance, returns with great rage to revenge the injury. 
They sometimes fasten their teeth in the boats, to sink them, 
or crawl under them, to overset them, indicating, by gnash¬ 
ing their teeth and roaring frightfully, great tokens of rage. 
Their attachment to one another is very strong; for a 
wounded walrus plunges to the bottom, and rises again sud¬ 
denly with a number of attendants to attack the boat whence 
they received insult. They are said to lie on the ice in 
herds of many hundreds, loudly roaring, and giving notice 
of ice in the night or in a fog, when it could not be seen: 
some of the herd are always on the watch, who, on the ap¬ 
proach of danger, awake the rest. They are soon frightened 
by a flash in the musket-pan, and plunge into the deep; but 
the female will defend the young to the last, on the ice or in 
the water; nor will the young one quit the dam, though she 
be dead. In the gulf of St. Lawrence, this animal is called 
a sea-cow, and it is said to resemble a cow much more than 
a horse, which name may probably be a corruption of the 
Russian name morse. The teeth of the walrus are used for 
ivory: the animals are killed chiefly for the sake of the oil; 
and it is said that a very strong and elastic leather may be 
prepared from the skin. 
2. Trichechus dudong, the dugon of Buffon, and the 
Indian walrus of Pennant, with approximate, exserted tusks. 
•—This animal inhabits the seas about the Cape of Good 
Hope and the Philippine Islands. 
3. Trichechus manatus, the manati or sea-cow of Ray, 
and lamantin of Buffon; without tusks, slightly hairy; 
with a horizontal tail in place of hind-feet.—Found in 
the larger rivers as well as seas of Guiana, and growing to the 
length of 16 or 18 feet; the skin being dark-brown, with 
scattered hairs upon it; the feet with five toes; the body 
nearly of the same thickness to the tail, when it suddenly 
narrows; the tail flat, of the shape of a spatula, thicker in 
the middle, and thinner towards the edges. 
The trichechus Clusii, or Clusius’s manati, is supposed to 
be a variety: it grows to an enormous size in the South 
American rivers. As an article of food, it is said to be supe¬ 
rior to any other animal of this genus, particularly the young. 
It is taken by means of harpoons. The Indians take great 
numbers, by making dams across the mouths of the shallow 
lakes formed by the floods. Dr. Shaw mentions a manati, 
called by the inhabitants of the country, on account of its 
gentle nature, “ Matum,” which, at the time of the arrival of 
the Spaniards, was kept by a prince of Hispaniola in a lake 
adjoining to his residence: it hated the Spaniards, but would 
offer itself to its Indian favourites, and carry over the lake ten 
at a time, singing and playing on its back. The trichechus 
Y hydropethicus, 
