Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/227

 P H A

P H A

The patient fees a ihoufand phantoms, fome times all jovial and merry ones, and fome times imaginary fcenes of blood and cruelty. Some are fond of feeing little ftreams of wa- ter trickling down into a bafon ; others are never eafy un- lefs they have green leaves before them: this indeed is almoft an univerfal fymptom. Some are delighted with various colours, and fome are fond of violent motion, fuch as dan- cing, leaping, and the like ; and fome are in love with flow and graceful movements, as walking majeftically, bowing, and dancing flow dances- Some are military mad, and call out for the noife of drums and trumpets, and the clafhing of fwords ; but all of them, as well the briflc and noify as the lethargic and dull, are pleafed with mufic. They will get up and dance to any inftrument; and the mo- ment it ceafes playing they will fall down to the ground as if apoplectic, and not ftir again till the mufic is renewed. Many people have laughed at the whole hiftory of the bite of the tarantula, from this one accident of its poifon being - cured by mufic; but all who have been upon the fpot atteft it ; and there feems no reafon to call in queftion the various authorities on which we have it related. Valett. dephalang. Apulo. Phalangium deSlicum, in natural hiftory, a name given by all the old Greek writers to a poifonous kind of field fpider, the fame with the folipuga of the Latins, or flifuga, as fome write it. It is a final! infect that buries itfelf in the fand, and if it bites a man does very great mifchief ; the part fwell- ing, and the perfon becoming fick as if bitten by a viper : fome fay the bite is actually mortal ; but this feems to be go- ing too far. Solinus tells us that this creature is peculiar to Sardinia, but we find Pliny mentioning it in Ethiopia ; and Lucan tells us that it was one of the poifonous reptiles that were in his time the peft of Africa. FhalangiuMj fplderwort, in botany, the name of a genus of plants, the characters of which are thefe : The flower is liliaceous, and confifts of four petals ; from the center of which there arifes a pifiil, which finally becomes a roundifli fruit divided into three cells, and filled with angular feeds ; to this it is to be added that the root is fibrous. The fpecies of phalanglum, enumerated by Mr. Tournefort, are thefe : i. The large flowered not branched phalanglum. 2. The fmall flowered not branched phalanglum. 3. The branched phalanglum with fmall flowers. 4. The iris-leaved alpine marfh phalanglum. 5. The iris-leaved Englilh marfh phalanglum. 6. The leaft iris-leaved Scotifti marfh phalan- glum. Tourn. Inft. p. 368. PHALANGOSIS, in forgery, the name of a tumor and re- laxation of the eye-lids, which is often fo great as to deform the eye, and very much impede vifion. Sometimes the re- laxed eye-lid fubfide3 or finks down, occafioned either by a palfy of the mufcles which fuftain and elevate the eye-lid, or elfe from a relaxation of the cutis above, from various caufes. Sometimes alfo an cedematous or aqueous tumor is formed on the eye-lids, fo as almoft entirely to exclude vifion j but this laft cafe fhould be well diftinguifhed from the other, and may be remedied without much difficulty, by the ufe of in^ ternal and topical medicines; fuch as purges and diuretics given inwardly, and a comprefs dipped in warm fpirit of wine and lime water.

But in the paralitic or relaxed cafe, the ufe of cordial and nervous medicines muff, be propofed internally, and outward ly balfam of Peru and hungary water are to be employed. If all thefe fail, the remaining method is to extirpate a fuf- ficient quantity of the relaxed cutis ; and then, after healing up the wound, the remainder will be fufficiently fhortened. Heljlers Surgery, p. 367. PHALANX (Cycl.) — Phalanx, in natural hiftory, a term ufed by Dr. Woodward, and fome other writers of foffils, to exprefs an arrangement of the columns of that fort of foffile coralloide body found frequently in Wales, and called lithojl ration.

In the great variety of fpecimens which are found of this, fome have the whole phalanx of columns cracked through, and others only a few of the external ones ; but thefe cracks never remain empty, but are found filled up with a white fpar, as the fmaller cracks of ftone ufually are. This is not wonderful, as there i? much fpar in the compofition of this foffil ; and it is eafily wafhed out of the general mafs to fill up thefe cracks, and is then always found pure, and there- fore of its natural colour white.

The Uthojlrotlon or general congeries of thefe phalanges of columns, is commonly found immerfed in a grey ftone, and found on the tops of the rocky cliffs about Millford in "Wales. It is ufually erect, tho' fomewhat inclining in fome fpeci- mens, but never lies horizontal. It feems to have been all white at firft, but to have been fince gradually tinctured with the matter of the itone in which it lies. The fingle columns which form each phalanx, are ufually round or cylindric, tho' fome times flatted and bent j fome of them are alfo na- turally of an angular figure; thefe, however, are not regu- lar in the number of their angles, fome confiff ing of three fides, fome of five, and fome of feven ; fume are hexangular alfo, but thefe are fcarce. They are from five or fix to fixteen inches in length; and the largeft. are near half an inch over, Suppi- Vol. II.

the leaft about a quarter of an inch ; the greater number are very equal to one another in fize ; but the fides of the co- lumns being unequal, the fame column meafures of a dif- ferent thicknefs when meafured different ways : the phalanges or congeries of thefe are fometimes df a foot or more in diameter.

The columns are often burft, as if they had been affected by external injuries ; and it is evident, that they were not formed before feveral other of the extraneous foflils ; for there are found fometimes {hells of fea-fifhes and entrochi immerfed and bedded in the bodies of the columns. It appears plain- ly from hence, that when thefe bodies were wafhed out of the fea, and tofTed about in the waters which then covered the tops of thefe cliffs, which cannot reafonably be fuppofed to have been any other than thofe of the univerfal deluge ; this elegant foffil, together with the flony bed in which it is con- tained, were fo foft that thefe other bodies found entrance into their very fubftance, and they were formed, as it werej upon them. This foffil takes an elegant polifh, and makes in that ftate a very beautiful appearance, being of the hard- nefs of the common white marble, and carrying the elegant ftructure vifible in the fmalleft lineaments. Ifcedward's Coll. of Foff. p. 1 1. PHALARIS, in the Ltnnsean fyftem of botany^ the name of a peculiar kind f of grafs called pbalaroides by Scheuhzer and others ; and 'with this author making a difhinc-t genus of plants, the characters of which are : That the cup is a glume, containing only one flower ; this glume is large, bivalve, ob- tufe, and comprefled, each of the valves being of a boat- 1 like fhape, flatted, obtufe above, with ftrait edges meeting one another in parallel lines. The flower is alfo bivalve, and is fmaller than the cup ; the exterior valve of it being ob- long, pointed, and folded, the interior much fmaller. The ftamina are three capillary filaments, fhorter than the cup ; * the antheras are oblong; the germen of the piftil is round- ifli j the ftyli are two in number, and are capillary ones ; the ftigmata are hairy ; the flower ferves for a ciofe covering to the feed, not at all gaping from it ; the feed is fingle,- fmooth, and roundifh, but pointed at both ends. Llnnai Gen. Plant, p. 14. PHALEN./E, in natural hiftory, the name by which authors diftinguifh thofe butterflies which fly by night, and which the French thence call papilions noflurnes, and we vulgarly ?noths.

All the creatures of this clafs are quiet by day, remaining fixed to the ftalks or leaves of plants, except only fome of the males, which are now and then found fluttering about in the woods in fearch of the females ; but as foon as night ap- proaches they all fly about. This difpofition is very remark- ably implanted in their nature ; for when kept fhut up in boxes they always remain quiet without changing place all day, but as foon as the fun is about letting, they always be- gin to flutter about and fly as much as their prifon will per- mit them. The fpecies of thefe are more numerous even than thofe of the day butterflies. The day kinds all have trunks fitted for the fucking the juices of flowers for their nourifhment, but many of the phalenee wholly want them : thefe, however, have always the beards which ferve to de- fend the trunk from injuries in the day-flies, and fometimes in the place of the trunk within thefe, there is found a fmall white protuberance or two. It is certain, therefore, that many of the phalena have no organs of eating, nor lake in any food during their whole lives in that winged ftate. Reau- mur's Hift. of Inf. Vol. f. P. 1. p. 363. The grand diftinttion of the ph'akna is into thofe which have trunks, and thofe which have not; or at leaft which have not any fenfible to the eye of a common obferver; accord- ing to thefe, and to other efiential diftinctions, thefe, in 'the manner of the papil'm or day-flies, are arranged into feven clafles. See Papiliq. Clafs 1. This contains the phalfiue which have prifmatic an- tennae, or fuch as are of an equal thicknefs in almoft all their length, and have their anterior part rounded, but their hin- der part formed of two planes meeting in an angle ; fo that a tranfverfe fection of one of thefe antennae reprefents a cur- vilinear triangle. All the phalena of this clafs have trunks, and the greater part of them have their wings fo difpofed, that they form a flat furface when the creature is at reft, and leave the upper part of the body naked ; and this ufually terminates in a point. The inferior wings are fmall in corn- par ifon of the fuperior, and their inferior edge is fhorter, and ufually very much fo, than the fuperior ; and the end of this reaches to the end of the body, or beyond that, whereas the other ufually leaves two or three rings of it uncovered. Thofe moths which have large and heavy bodies, and have fhort under-wings, and narrow, tho' long upper ones, always make a great noife in flying, and cannot fupport themfclves in the air without agitating their wings very fwiftly. This is alfo the cafe with fome of the day-butterflies. Many of the very large and beautiful phafentc are of this firft clafs, particularly that which is produced of the beau- tiful fpurge caterpillar. Clafs 2. This comprehends the fhalena which have conic horns or antenme, which regularly decreafe in diameter from 2 G g their