we 
} 
Do2 BRIAR. 
gascar in 1820; and all these require hothouse 
culture, and usually grow to the height of about 
30 feet. Five other species are known to botan- 
ists. 
BRIAR (Sweet),—botanically Rosa rubiginesa. 
A hardy, deciduous shrub, of the rose genus. The 
common sweet-briar is a native of Great Britain 
and of Switzerland, and is well known in every 
part of England and of the lowlands of Scotland. 
It is particularly abundant, in its wild state, on 
the chalky banks of England. It usually grows to 
the height of about five feet; its branches have a 
reddish hue, and are everywhere closely armed with 
strong prickles ; the leaves exhale, from reddish 
viscid glands on their under surface, a very rich 
and grateful odour; and the flowers have a pink 
or pale red colour, and appear in May and June. 
The odour from the leaves is at once the richest, 
the best known, and the most extensively diffused 
of our native perfumes; it lusciously scents the 
air to a comparatively great distance around the 
plants; and it has deservedly rendered the sweet- 
briar a favourite in the vicinity of promenades, 
and won for it a place in almost all shrubberies 
and gardens. Though the plant has a gaunt, 
straggling, and wild appearance to the eye, and 
suits ill to grow side by side with anything orna- 
mental, yet it grows well in corners, backgrounds, 
and other concealed spots, and secretly diffuses 
clouds of odours over all the walks in its neigh- 
bourhood. Four varieties of it, all bearing pink 
flowers, have been recognised by systematic bo- 
tany ;—the small-flowered, 2. 7. micrantha, grow- 
ing wild in British thickets, blooming from May 
till July, and usually attaining a height of about 
six feet; the umbellated, 2. r. winbellata, a native 
of Germany, flowering in May and June, and 
usually attaining a height of four feet ; the hedge 
variety, 2. 7. sepium, growing wild in British 
thickets, and usually attaining a height of about 
three feet ; and the scentless variety, 2. r. ino- 
dora, growing wild in British hedges, and usually 
attaining a height of about six feet. But nu- 
merous other varieties and subvarieties are known 
to gardeners, and have as defined a place as any 
other garden roses in horticultural catalogues, 
The chief of these are the double, the tree double, 
the dwarf semidouble, the white semidouble, the 
American single, the zabeth, the blush, the cle- 
mentine, the maiden, the scarlet, the mannings, 
the cluster, the mossy, the monstrous, the royal, 
and the petite hessoise. Some of these, parti- 
cularly the double ones, possess the odoriferous- 
ness of the common kind, and at the same time 
are decidedly ornamental. “The flowers of the 
double blush sweet briar,’ remarks Marshall, 
“are of a pale red or blush colour, and every 
whit as double as the cabbage Provence rose ; it 
cabbages in the same manner, and is very fra- 
grant. No one need be told the value of a rose 
which has every perfection and charm, to the 
highest degree, both in the leaves and flowers, to 
recommend it.” Among the newest or the most 
BRICK. 
admired subvarieties produced by hybridizing, | 
the best is the madeleine or double marginated 
hip. 
A considerable subdivision of the rose genus 
takes the sweet-briar as its type, and is desig- 
nated, from the botanical name of the sweet- 
briar, Rubiginose. Twenty species of this sub- 
division are now growing in Great Britain ; but 
only one of these, Rosa borrert, is a native, and 
this grows wild in our hedges, and has a similar 
height, habit, and flerification to the common 
sweet-briar.—The eglantine, Rosa eglanteria, has 
been very generally, though incorrectly, identified 
with the sweet-briar. It forms quite a distinct 
species, belongs to the pimpinella-leaved division 
of the rose-genus, produces yellowish-coloured 
flowers, and has usually a height of about four 
feet. A well-defined variety of it is called R. e. 
luteola; but this variety has sometimes been 
named hispida, and the normal plant has been 
sometimes named /2. lutea unicolor. Milton very 
improperly applies the name eglantine to the 
honeysuckle. 
BRICK. An artificial or manufactured kind 
of stone, most extensively used in building ope- 
rations. The brick offers some advantage over 
stone, arising chiefly from the expedition and 
ease with which the work may be conducted. 
Stone cannot always be procured, owing to local 
circumstances, but there are few positions in 
which brick-earth cannot be obtained within a 
few miles; and bricks are very portable, are 
square and ready formed, and if good, and used 
with good mortar, will produce a better and more 
durable wall than could be produced by. small 
blocks of hard stone. The stability of a stone 
wall, with straight joints, depends more on the 
weight and magnitude of the stones than on the 
adhesion of the mortar ; for as the harder stones 
are not absorbent, the mortar will not adhere to 
their surfaces and produce union; while, from 
bricks being of an opposite character, the brick 
and mortar, after a short time, become one, and 
their adhesion is so strong that it is difficult to 
separate them. 
Bricks have, accordingly, been used by all na-. 
tions from the earliest antiquity. The bricks of | 
Babylon, many of which bear inscriptions, are 
known at the present day, and many of the ad- 
mired relics of the ancients, still extant in ruins, 
exhibit the perfection to which the art of brick- 
making had arrived in these early days. Some 
of the structures of Egypt and Persia, the walls 
of Athens, the Pantheon and Temple of Peace, at 
Rome, and many other buildings, are constructed 
of brick. What is surprising, however, is that 
many of these bricks, which have stood the test 
of about 2,000 years, do not appear to have been 
burnt or submitted to the action of fire, to pro- 
duce their hardness and durability, which can 
alone be attributed to the extreme dryness and 
heat of the climate in which they were exposed ; 
for these bricks, on being soaked in water, crum- 
