Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/136

 OAT

O B L

. the ufes of fo minute parts, but, probably, thefe ferve either to aflifttbe motions of that trunk in lengthening, or iliortcning, or elfe as piftons, in drawing up the juices for food. Though the trunk already defcribed appear very fmgular in this infeiSt, there is fomething in the mechanifm of the parts by which it receives its nourifhment ftill more wonderful, more out of the common method of nature than that : this is, that the creature has, properly fpeaking, a double trunk, for it has, befide this long one, another which is fborter, being about the lengthened diameter of tiiofe of the other infe&s ot this kind, and placed, as they are, at the extremity of the he-id. The creature can elevate, and protend, this lefler trunk at pleafure, but, in its natural ftate, it is lodged in a fmall channel, in the long and large trunk before defcribed, made to receive it. I he ufe of this feems very plain, though very fmgular ; as the crea- ture was to feed upon the juices of a hard and folid wood, it required an organ of peculiar ftrength to enter its fubftance ; this nature has provided it with in its long trunk, but, as the ufes that was deftined for required its being placed on the breaft, this was a p rt too far diftant from the head to be pro- per for the receiving the juices. This fcheme of nature for the nourifhment of the animal, feems therefore to have been this ; the larger trunk is to receive, and convey to its upper part, the juices of the tree, and the fmaller trunk is there to be in- ferted at pleafure into it, and to fuck up from thence the juice into the body, as, in common cafes, its office is to do it imme- diately from the plant itfclf. Re&umur's Hift. Inf. Vol. 6. p.

64,78-

The ants are fo extremely fond of the juices of the tree, when prepared for them by palling through the body of this animal, that when the puceron has a drop not yet evacuated, but bang- ing only in part out at the paflage, an ant will often fcize on it there.

The difHnguifhing characters of the pucerens of all kinds, is their having two pafTages for the excrements on the hinder part of the body, befide what refcmbles the anus in larger animals ; thefe pafTages, in moll: (pedes, are formed into a fort of horns, or fhort hollow tubes, racking out from the body of the crea- ture, and ferving as a very obvious diftinction of it from all other animals : in this, however, and in fome other fpecies, thefe paflages are not formed into horns, but are 'only two round tubercles a little more elevated than tlfbrcft cf the furface of the body, and placed where the horns in others fland. Re- aumur's Hift. Inf. Vol. 6. p. 78. Oak fnake^ in zoology. See Dryin*us. OAT, avena, in botany. See the article Avena.

Some phyficians have greatly recommended a diet drink made of oats, in various diftempers. The method of preparing the drink is as follows : take of recent oats entire, and well warned, one pound and an half; of the frefli root of fuccory, cut into flices,one handfull ; fpring water twelve pints ; boil all together in a clean earthen veiTel to the confumption of half,' and then ftrain the liquor through a linnen cloth, and add to it fix ounces of coarfe fugar, and half an ounce of fal prunella; ; let it boil again, and afterwards be taken oft the fire,and fet by, for a day and a night, in a cool place ; then pour oft" the clear liquor, and keep it in a cellar in vefiels clofe flopped. Two ordinary cup-fulls of this liquor given twice a day, three hours before, and as many after dinner, are faid to do wonders in the cure of all kinds of fevers, colic pains, pleurifies, itches, cutaneous tumors, and hypocondriacat diforders ; as alfo in cleanfing the Iddnies from fand, and opening the obftruiHcd vifcera. The ufe of it is ordered to be continued thirteen days, and, if the patient be cacochymic, a gentle purge is to be given before it is taken. It is accounted a great prefervative again ft illnefs, if taken thrice a year, in fpring, in autumn, and in the dog days ; and the inventor of it, Joannes de St. Catharina, is faid to have kept himfelf alive by it to the age of an hundred and twenty years, without any difeafe.

Dr. Lower having tried it, and found its good effe&s, by re- peated experience, made it public, and the celebrated Hoffman has written an exprefs treatife about it, in which he recom- mends it both in intermittent and continued fevers, but ad- vifes purified nitre to be ufed inftead of the fal prunella;, and obferves that the two boilings ordered by Dr. Lower are not neceflarjr, but that the fugar and nitre maybe added at firft. It muft be kept carefully in furnmer, otherwife it foon be- comes four, and unfit for ufe.

Tbofe who defire to have it coloured may boil in it an ounce of alkanet root, and two ounces of red launders, which will give' it a fine red colour, without at all aff citing its vir- tues.

It is, unqueftionably, a very valuable medicine, affording fm- gular relief wherever obftructions of the vefTe's are to be re- moved, or faks to be wafhed out of the habit; where trevif- cid juices are to be diluted, or a due degree of moifture, and humidity reftored. It is alfo excellent for allaying thirft in fevers, and for flopping haemorrhages. Black Oats. Thefe are commonly fown upon an etch crop, or on a lay, which they plough up in January, when the earth is moift, taking care to turn the turf well, and to lay it even and flat. Oats are to be fown earlier in the northern parts of Eng- land than in the fouthern.

Oats are fown with a broad caft at twice as they do barley, harrowing it well in j but tin's muft always be harrowed the fame way that the furrows lie of a lay, or but very little crofs, for fear of railing the turf, but upon an etch, as foon as the land is ploughed on an edge, they fow and harrow it in once ; then fow it a fecoml time, the full quantity, and harrow it five or fix times over, obferving to harrow once or twice acrofs, which breaks the clods, and covers the feed better than har- rowing all one way. They commonly fow them upon a broad ridge, which they give the land but one ploughing for. The ufua! time of (owing black oats is in the beginning of Fe- bruary, or a very few weeks later, fometimes not till the be- ginning of March : they are a hardy grain, and will bear any- thing of wet or cold. Four bufhcls of feed is the qu ntity for an acre ; but they grow bed on a moift land, though they will not mifs any where. The farmer knows that his oats are ripe when tbeftaik turns yellow, the grain feels hard and the hufk begins to open, and fhew the feed. After they are cut- they fhould lie for the dew and the rain to plump them, and make them thrafh well ; and, if weedy, to kill the weeds: hut, if there happen much rain, they muft be got 111 again as foon as dry, otherwife the oats will foon fall out of the hufks, and great part of the crop be loft. Red Oats. The red oat is a kind of corn very common in Sraf- fordfbirc, and fome of the northern counties ; it is a fort of naked oaf, and is very proper for making oatmeal, becaijfe the kernel thrafhes out of the hull, without carrying it t6 the mill, ordryingof it. This^f is cultivated in the fame manner as barley. White Oats. This kind of oat is commonly fown upon an etch, after wheat,rye, or barley : they only give the land one plough- ing, and fow them, and harrow them, as they do the black eatiy except the land is lubject to weeds ; in that cafe it is (rood to plough up the wheat, or rye {rubble, in November, which will make it rot the better, and be a kind of winter fallowing. Only if you have a very dry burning ground, which black oats will not delight in, in that cafe, they often low them upon a lay. March and April are the ufual time of fowing white oats, and the drier the weather is when they are fown, the bet- ter ; they grow beft upon a dry, gravelly, orfandyland, and they are the beft cf all to be fowed upon a land very fubjecT; to weeds, becaufe, being fowed late, they allow a very late plough- ing, and growing very quick after this, they over-top the weeds fooner than any other plant. The reaping of white oats is the fame with that of the black, and they generally yield about the fame quantity, that is, twenty bufhels, or thereabouts, from an acre. Mortimer's Hulbandry, p. 134. Wild Oat, in hufbandry, a kind of oat, or oat grafs, which comes up of itfelf, without fowing, and is much hated, and dreaded by the farmers. This, in many counties of England, is the greateft of all hinderances of the good crops of barley, and often of other grain. It is a rough and hairy oat, and ufu- ally black. In the wetter years, and after much froft, this is found to be moft troublefome.

The beft remedy the farmer has againfl this, is to fow the land moft apt to produce it with beans, and when they are come up to about three inches high, to turn in fheep upon the around, about twenty fheep to an acre ; thefe will eat up all the fhoots of the wild eat, and not touch the beans fo long as there is any of the oat fhoots left. Mcretotis Northampt. p. 480. OAT-fnnil. See the article Snail.

OBELISCUS marmoreus, in natural hiftory, the name of a very ■ remarkable fpecies of fliell-fifh, unknown to us in its recent ftate. but met with very frequently foftile in the Swedifhftcne ufed for pavements, and in fome other kinds, and more accu- rately named by late authors yolythalamium, and orthoceratites, and by Klein tubulus marinus oncameratus. Klein, de tubul. p. 7. See Tubulus concameratus. OBELISK {Cyd.) — One of" the ufes of olelijks among the an- tients, was to find the meridian attitudes of the fun, at differ- ent times of the year. Hence they ferved inftead of very large gnomons. One of the '.bclifks now (landing at Rome, that of St. John's Lateran, is, in height, ir8 Englifti feet, without the pedeftal ; and the other obdijk, buried under the campb Marzo, wants but little of the fame height. Pliny gives us a defer i- ption of this gnomon, lib. 36. §.15. From him it appears that there was laid down, from the foot of the obeUJk northward, a level pavement of lfone, equal in breadth to the breadth of the obelijh itfelf, and equal in length to its fhadow at noon, upon the fhortcft day ; that is to fay, that its length was to the height of the obelijk, almoft as 22 to 10, and that, under this pavement, there were properly let in parallel rulers of brafs, whofe di- ftances from the point, directly under the apex of the obelijk, were refpec'iively equal to the lengths of the fhadow thereof at noon, on the fevcral days of the year, as the fame lengths de- creafed from the fhorteft day to the longeft, and again increafed from the longeft day to the fhorteft. Vid, Phil. Tranf. N° 482. Led. 5. where we alfo find fome remarks by Mr. Folkes on Hardouiirs amendment of a paflage in Pliny's natural hi- ftory, lib. 2. §. 74. Edit. Parif. 1723. fob about the length of the fhadows of gnomons in different latitudes. OBEY, in the manege. A horfe is faid to obey the band and heels, to obey the aids, or helps, when he knows and anfwers them according to demand.

OBLADA,