Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 1.djvu/960

 KER

K E T.

other with a white powder, and lays its eggs in the fame manner. Its growth is the fame with the other, and at the fame feafons, and its eggs are white. The young infects produced from both thefe fpecies are Very like, and have a confiderable refemblance to wood- lice, or millepedes, as indeed have the young of all the gall- infect clafs. They differ however in colour: thofe which are produced from the red eggs are themfelves red ; they are flat in fhape, and fomewhat more pointed behind than at the head ; their back is convex, with a round arched pro- minence. This kind has feveral fhining gold coloured fpangles, and is ftriated on the back, and has feveral tranf- verfe lines acrofs the belly. It has fix legs, and two horns nearly as long as its body, and a tail fplit into two, or fork- ed, the divided parts being nearly as long as its horns, and its eyes are black and mining. The young ones produced from the white eggs, are of a dirty white ; their back is fomewhat flatter than that of the others, and the fpangles on them, viewed by the microfcope, appear of a filver colour, not of a gold. There are a much fmaller number of thefe white than of the red kermes, and the people of the country call them the mother of the kermes. There are alfo among the kermes feveral found containing, inftead of thefe eggs, the nymphs of two kinds of fmall flies, which regularly are produced from them, and have both a power of hopping or jumping. The one fpecies of fly is of] a fine jet black, and the other is of a dirty white. One df thefe i's a white winged fly, alike, in all refpects, to the gall-infect fly, and is, without all doubt, the male kermes though this very obfervation of a fly being produced from fome of the kermes, has been one great occafion of believ- ing the kermes to be a true gall. According as the winter has been more or lefs mild, the har- veft of kermes is the more or lefs plentiful ; and the people al ways prefage themfelves a fine feafon,when the fpring has been free from frofts and fogs. It is obferved, that the loweft and oldeft fhrubs are always the fulleft of this infect ; and the kermes produced on thofe trees which are in the neighbourhood of the lea, is always larger and finer than that from the inland places. The merchants who purchafe the kermes, always wet it with vinegar, and afterwards expofe it to the heat of the fun, or to an equal heat from the fire, to deftroy all the young in- fects hatched, or in a ftate near hatching, in it. It is no uncommon thing to have two harvefts of kermes m a year. Thofe of the latter feafon are fmaller, and lefs va- luable, than thofe of the firft, and are found not on the branches, but on the leaves of the fhrub ; which is juft analogous to the cuftom of the gall-infects of all other kinds j all which about this age leave the branches to feed on the leaves, where their yet tender trunks can find an eafier en- trance. See Tab. of Infects, N° 30.

From this analogy between the kermes, and other infects of the fame clafs, it fhould fcem worth while to try, whether fome of thofe may not poflefs the fame virtues in medicine, at leaft, if not in the arts. It is certain that the common oak produces a red gall-infect of the very fhape of the kermes, and of the colour of the paler ones. Reaumur, Hift. Infect, p. 45. Kermes mineral. The kermes mineral was a preparation of Glauber, which the king of France bought of Mr. de la Li- gerie, and made public in 1720. That receipt was in the following form. Take a pound of Hungarian antimony, broken into thin pieces, according to the direction of its fpicula ; four ounces of nitre, fixed by charcoal ; and a pint of rain water : boil them two hours ; then filtre the warm liquor, and when it cools, the kermes precipitates. The fame antimony undergoes the fame operations with the re- maining liquor, to which three ounces of fixed nitre, and a pint of water, is added. In a third boiling, two ounces of nitre, and a pint of water, are to be added to the former lixivium. The kermes thus obtained is about a dram, and is well edulcorated by waffling it with water, and burning fpirit of wine on it ; then it is dried for ufe. Mr.Geoffroy fhews, by many experiments, that the kermes is the reguline part of the antimony, joined to a fort of hepar fulphuris. He teaches us a much eafier way of preparing this medicine, thus. Mix intimately the fine powder of two parts of antimony, and one of any fixed alkaline fait ; melt thofe materials in a crucible ; then having powdered them while hot, boil them two hours in a large quantity of water; after this, pafs the hot liquor through paper, receiving it into a veflel, in which there is hot water, the kermes feparates when it cools. The groffer parts, which do not pafs through the paper, are to be boiled again, and filtrated as before; and the operation is to be repeated a third time, by which fix or feven drams of kermes may be got out of every ounce of antimony. He fays, he has feen effects like to thofe of mild kermes from antimony, reduced to fuch a fine powder, that none of the mining fpicula are to be feen ; and that the magiftery of antimony, made by pouring fpirit of nitre, or aqua regia, on the powder of antimony, and then edulcorating the mafs with water, has the fame effects as kermes. Mem, de PAcad. des Sciences 1734, 1735*

Half a grain, or a grain of this powder, given every three or four hours, produces no violent effects ; but by encreaf- ing the dofe, it may be made to vomit, purge, and fweat. Some commend this medicine as the mod univerfal refolvent and deobftruent; affuring us, that it almoft infallibly cures pleurifies, peripneumonies, afthmas, catarrhs, angina?, fmall- pox, and many other difeafes. Others are as pofitive, that it heats and thickens the blood, thereby increafing ob- ftructions, and is particularly hurtful in ail inflammatory difeafes.

This preparation was famous in France, and known by the name of poudre des Cbartreux, becaufe a Carthufian monk, who got it from Mr. de la Ligerie, firft brought it into vogue. See Hift. de 1'Acad. des Sciences 1720. and the Me- moirs for the fame year, where it is faid, that Glauber was looked upon as the firft inventor of this remedy. Its effects, like th;tt of many other antimonial preparations, is very various, which is frequently owing, as Mr. Geoffroy obferves, to the different manner and care in making it. He adds, that the more the kermes contains of a regulus ea- fily revivified, the more it proves emetic. He alfo fhews how to make a cinnabar with the kermes and mercury, and to difengage the vitriolic acid from the kennes. See Mem. de l'Acad. des Sciences 1734.

KERN, in the Engl'dh fait works, a word ufed to fignify the cryftallizing, or {hooting of fait in the brine, when fuffici- ently evaporated in the boiling pan.

This word is alfo ufed by the feamen for the firft formino- of the bay fait, made by the fun's heat in the ifles of May* &c. See Salt.

Kernt?ohi?, in natural hiftory, a name given by the com- mon people of many parts of England to a peculiar fort of ftone, which is found on the fides of hills in fandy coun- tries, where the hills are rocky. Pyran fands afford a «reat many ftones of this kind ; and the manner of their forma- tion is thus. The rocks in the fides of the hills are con- tinually covered over with the loofe fand, which the winds tofs up, and the fparry matter continually ouzing out of the pores of thefe ftones, with the wet, cements the grains of fand together. When one cruft is thus formed, another is foon added, and fo on, till the whole mafs is of a con- fiderable thicknefs ; and the fpar ftill ferving as the general cement, the whole is held together, though but in a loofe way, yet fo as to refemble a fort of ftone. The little grains of fand are ftill vifible in all parts of this ftone, and are what induced the people to call it kern Jlone, as they call thefe kerns, or kernels. This account of the origin of the ftone is eafily proved, by puting a fmall piece of it into aqua fortis, for this difTolves the fpar, or cement, and the fand is left loofe.

KERUGHA, in botany, a name ufed by fome authors for the ricinus, or palma Chrifti. Ger?n. Emac. Ind. 2.

KESTREL, the Englifh name of a hawk, called alfo the Jiannel and the windhover, and by authors the tinnnnculus and cenchris. It builds with us in hollow oaks, and feeds on partridges and other birds. Kay's Ornithol. p. 50. SeeTiNNUNcuLUS.

KETMIA, in botany, the name of a genus of plants ; the characters of which are thefe. The flower confifts of one leaf, and is broad and open at the mouth, and very like the mallow flower. From the cup there rifes a piftil, which is fixed in the manner of a nail to the lower part of the flower, and afterwards ripens into a fruit, which is divided into feveral cells, and opens at the fummit, fhewing a num- ber of feeds.

The fpecies of ketm'ta enumerated by Tournefort are thefe. 1. The fmooth fhrubby ketmia, called by authors ketm'ta fy- rorum. 2. The violet purple flowered fmooth leaved ketmia.

3. The variegated red and white flowered fmooth ketmia.

4. The yellow flowered Syrian ketmia. 5. The poplar leaved African ketmia. 6. The poplar leaved African ketmia with green ftalks, and leaves hoary underneath. 7. The purple flow- ered bladder ketmia with leaves divided into three fegments, called by many authors the trefoil alcea, or bladder aleea. 8. The poplar leaved Indian ketmia with a compreiled orbicular fruit. 9. The lime leaved Indian ketmia. 10. The cotton leaved Indian ketmia with an acid tafte like that of forrel. ir. The mallow leaved tree ketmia of America with the tafte of forrel. 12. The Chincfe ketmia with a roundifh leaf and fingle flower. 13. The Chinefc ketmia with a roundifh leaf and double flower. 14. The purple marfh ketmia. 15. The painted leaved ketmia with rough hairy ftalks and a rtellated fruit. 16. The Indian ketmia with a fpear point- ed leaf and hard fruit. 17. The large vine leaved Indian ketmia. 18. The vine leaved Indian ketmia with a horned fruit. 19. The fmall flowered vine leaved ^Egyptian ket- mia. 20. The vine leaved Indian ketmia with a pendu- lous yellow flower. 21. The Egyptian ketmia with per- fumed feeds, called by authors hell tutfehus, and abel mo/eh. 22. The American hairy ketmia with yellow flowers and perfumed feeds. 23. The fig-leaved Brafilian ketmia with a long fulcated fruit. 24. The prickly Indian ketmia with fingered leaves. 25. The prickly American ketmia with a

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