Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 02.djvu/92

LEFT BLOOD, COUNCIL OF sucker, so called from the rich scarlet color of the head, breast and back of the male. BLOOD, COUNCIL OF, the name popu- larly applied to the Council of Troubles, established by the Duke of Alva, in the Netherlands, in 1567. In the first three months alone its victims numbered 1,800, and soon there was hardly a Protestant house in the Netherlands that had not furnished a victim. BLOOD FLOWER, the English name of the hxmanthus, a genus of plants be- longing to the order amaryllidacese (amaryllids). The allusion is to the brilliant red flowers. The species, which are mostly from the Cape of Good Hope, are ornamental plants. BLOOD-HOUND, a variety of hound or dog, so called from the ability which it possesses to trace a wounded animal by the smell of any drops of blood which may have fallen from it. It is the cards fayniliaris, variety B. sagax, of Linnasus, now called variety sanguinaria. It is the sleuth-hound of the Scotch. It has large, pendulous ears, a long curved tail, is of a reddish tan color, and stands about 28 inches high. The breed is not now often pure. There are other subvarieties, es- pecially the Cuban blood-hound, used in the Maroon wars in Jamaica during the 18th century, as well as in tracking criminals in the United States. The African blood-hound is used in hunting the gazelle. BLOODLESS SURGERY, the so-called bloodless surgery brought prominently before the public by the visit to this country of Dr. Adolf Lorenz of Vienna; in 1902, was used during the above trip in the treatment particularly of con- genital dislocation of the hip, a condition in children which often leads to serious deformity. But Lorenz advocates the method for many other conditions. In an address before the New York Acad- emy of medicine during his American tour the doctor mentioned the following conditions as amenable to his "model- ling redressment" as he calls his manip- ulations: hip deformities, knee contrac- tures, all deformities of the foot, and wry neck. The Lorenz method consists essentially of a tearing of muscles and ligaments, followed by replacement of the displaced bone. The usual or bloody method consists of a cutting of the tis- sues. As a matter of fact the bloodless surgery is often about as bloody as when the knife is used, the only difference be- ing that the blood in the former case flows out among the tissues instead of 70 BLOOD ROOT appearing on the surface through the knife wound. The Lorenz method is not without danger. It appears to be useful in certain cases, but the knife is pre- ferred by the average surgeon and orthopedist in most cases. BLOOD LETTING, a method of re- lieving the human system in states of general or local plethora by the abstrac- tion of blood. General plethora is best treated, according to this method, by withdrawing a considerable quantity o' blood from the arteries (arteriotomy) c veins (venesection). Local engorgement, or hyperasmia, of a part is usually treated by abstracting blood from the smallest sized vessels, or capillaries, present in the skin, by the methods of scarification or leeching. In these cases, the removal of blood from the superficial textures diverts the blood stream in part from underlying tissues, and thus reduces the tendency to inflammatory action in the deeper structures. In general blood letting the object is to reduce the strength of the blood stream throughout the whole system, and thus to diminish the acute- ness of feverish conditions. The most usually employed method of accomplish- ing this is by the opening of one of the superficial veins of the arm, and allow- ing a sufficient quantity of blood to es- cape from the blood vessel thus operated upon. The amount of blood actually ab- stracted in blood letting must depend on the age of the patient and the nature of the case. The operation would be scarcely necessary if less than a quarter of a pint is to be removed, and it is now rare to remove more than one pint at one operation, however severe the case in which it is employed. See Bleeding. BLOOD POISONING, a name loosely used of pyasmia and allied diseases. It is also used popularly in a wider sense for the results on the human system of poison germs from malaria, bad drains, etc.; or for the condition of the blood caused by such ailments as Bright's dis- ease of the kidneys, etc. BLOOD RAIN, rain nearly of the color of blood, and which many of the unscientific suppose to be actual blood. It arises either from minute plants, mostly of the order algx, or from infu- sorial animalculae. It is akin to red snow, which is similarly produced. The word also applies to a bright scarlet alga or fungus, called palmella prodigiosa, sometimes developed in very hot weather on cooked vegetables or decaying fungi. BLOOD ROOT (sanguinaria canaden- sis), a plant of Canada and the United