Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 2.djvu/402

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two rivers which open themfelves into the harbour of Breft very near one another ; the one of thefe is famous for the quantity oifalmm in it, and the great advantage of the fifh- ery, the other never has any of thefe fVfh in it. It molt probably is owing to their finding plenty of food, and proper places for the depofiting their fpawn in the one of thefe rivers, and not in the other, that makes this regular choice. Des Landes Trait. Phyf.

Sk-LMOU pipe, in our old writers, an engine to catch falmon, or fuch like fifh, 2J H. 8. c. 7. Blonnt, Cowel.

Salmon trout, in zoology, the Englifh name of the fifh called trutta lacujlris, by Gemer and other authors. It is caught in lakes, in mountainous countries, and grows to a very con- fiderable fize, fometimes to thirty, forty, or fifty pounds weight. It refembles the trout in figure, but its belly is very flat, and has, as it were, a long furrow or cavity running the length of the belly. Its back and head arc of a very beautiful bluifh green colour ; and the whole fifh, efpecially its back and the upper parts of its fides, are marked with numerous black fpots. Its back fin is alfo fpotted with black, and its fcales are finall and filver coloured. Gefner dePifc. p. 1210.

SALMULUS, in zoology, the name of a finall fifh of the truttaceous kind, called in Englifh zfamlet. It feldom grows to more than feven inches in length. It is very like tile common trout, but differs in thefe particulars. 1. It is broader in proportion to its length. 2. It has fewer fpots, and thofe of a deader colour. 3. It is white in its general colour. 4. The tail is more forked. 5. The lines on the fides are finaller and paler. 6. The fides under the lines are yellowifh; and 7thly, It has feveral bluifh ftreaks near the fide lines. It is caught about Hereford, and in fome other places. Willughby'a Hift. Pifc. p. 189.

SALPA, in zoology, the name of a fifh caught in great plenty in the Mediterranean, and common in the markets of Italy and elfewhere. Its ufualfizeis about a foot in length, and it has a fomewhat flatted, yet confiderably thick body, and a ftrait back. Its fides are variegated with a number of fine o-old coloured lines running longitudinally ; the intermediate fpaces between thefe toward the back are of a bluifh green, toward the belly they are white ; there are ufually eleven of thefe lines on each fide. The mouth is extremely ("mail, and each jaw has only one row of teeth, which are thick and broad below, and terminate in a double point. It has only one back fin, the anterior rays of which are prickly, the hinder ones foft. It generally keeps about the fhores, and fwims in large fnoals. Though it be a very beautiful fifh it is no very delicate tafted one, nor much regarded, the poorer fort of people ufually buying it up. Rondelet de Pifc. 1. 5. c. 23. p. 154. Aldrovand de Pifc. 1. 2. c. 21. See Tab. of Flfhes, N° 55.

SALPUGA, in natural hiftory, a name given by fome of the Latin writers to the [olipuga, a fmall kind of fpider, that buries itfelf in the fands in hot countries, and bites men who come in its way in a very venomous manner. It is common in Africa, and in fome parts of Europe; Sardinia in particular, according to Solinus, abounds with it. See the article Solipuga.

SALSIRORA, in botany, a name ufed by fome authors for the ros [olis, or fundew. Ger. Emac. Ind. 2.

SALT {Cycl.)— Salts are defined to be folid foflile bodies, fri- able, pellucid, not inflammable, but fufible by fire, and con- gealing again in the cold ; foluble in water, fo as to difap- pear in it, naturally concreting into regularly figured cryf- tals, and imprefling a fenfation of acrimony on the tongue. Thefe are the characters and qualities common to all falts, and to no other bodies : and thefe they always manifeft when pure and freed from heterogeneous fubftances ; but in the ftate in which they are naturally found in the earth, though they have that in their tafte alone which may fuffi- ciently diftinguifh them, yet they do not exhibit all their genuine characters : fome of them being found folid and pure, either within the earth or on its furface, but com- monly without their proper form ; others' embodied in earths and ftones, as the particles of metals in their ores ; and others in a fluid ftate fufpended in waters. Of the foffils of tiiis clafs, nature therefore affords us three diftincr. orders, and under thofe they are diftinguifhable into five genera. 'The falts of the firft order are thofe found na- tive and pure, either in the earth or without its furface, and .exhibiting all other natural characters, though often with- out their proper form. Of the fecond, are thofe found not native, but in form of ores, never pure, but diftinguifhable by their tafte, and immerfed in and blended with the con- stituent matter of earths and ftones in extremely fmall par- ticles. And of the third are thofe naturally found fufpended in waters, and in a fluid form, but ready to affiune their proper figures on the evaporation of a part of that water. Of the firft of thefe orders are the common alimentary fait or muria, and the nettrum or nitre of the antients. Of the fe- cond are alum and nitrum, and of tne third are borax, and halcryptium, an alkaline fait hid in the chalybeate waters. HUH Hift. of Foff. p. 380. See the articles Natrum, Alum, Nitrum, Borax, and Halcryptium. The muria or alimentary fait is a body which appears to us under an almoft infinite variety of forms, but is always im-

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mediately diftinguifhed by applying it to the tongue, and al- ways afiumes the fame figures after a regular cryftiulization. Sea water, and that of fait fprings, fuilain it in a liquid form ; and belide this ftate, it is found in vaft maffes in the earth, either of a fine pellucid ftrufture, called fal gem t or elfe varioufly debafed and coloured, or in form of a ftri- ated body, refembling the fibrarix, or fibrofe talcs, as they are called. This is the true fal ammoniac of the antients. See Sal ammoniac. But in which ever of thefe forms this fait is found, it affords the fame cryftals on evaporation : thefe, according to the degree of heat ufed in the evapora- tion, are either pyramidal, cubic, or parallellopipcd. All thefe falts are foluble in water, but they require different quantities of it to di Solve them, and this makes one of their criterions. This [alt requires three times and one fe- venth its own quantity of water, to make a perfefl folution. The fea water, in different parts of the world, is very dif- ferently fated with it, fome parts containing twice as much as others. Hill's Hift. of Foff. p. 380.

Alimentary fait, according to the various ways of preparing it, may be diftinguifhed into feveral kinds. 1. Bay fait, prepared by evaporation by the heat of the fun. 2. Marine [alt boiled, which is extracted from fea water by coition. 3. Brine fait, or fountain fait, prepared by boiling from na- tural brine, whether of ponds and fountains, or of lakes and rivers. 4. White fait, prepared from fea water, or any other kind of fait water, firft heightened into a ftrong brine by the heat of the fun, and operation of the air. 5. White fait, prepared from a ftrong brine, or lixivium, drawn from earths, ftones, or fands, flrongly impregnated with common fait. 6. Refined rod fait, which is boiled from a folution of foffile fait in fait water, or in frefh. And 7. fait upon fait, which is made from bay fait difiblved in fea water, or other water, and boiled to a white/a/r. Brownrig, on Salt, p. 50. Bay Salt. This fait is of two kinds : the firft drawn from fea water, as is praflifed in France, Spain, and Portugal, and many other hot countries ; the other from the water of fait fprings, or lakes, as in the Cape Verd iflands, in the ifland of Tortuga, Turks ifland, and many other parts of America.

The firft kind is, in times of peace, imported into Great- Britain in very large quantities, and our colonies and fifhe- ries in America commonly fupply themfelves with the latter.

There are feveral methods pra&ifed, in the different parts of the world, of making this ufeful fait ; of which fome are more fimple and eafy, others more complex. It is fome- times prepared by a toral exhalation of the water in which it was diffblved ; but the moft fimple and eafy method of making it, is, when the water of ponds and lakes, impreg- nated with fait, is totally exhaled by the force of the fun and air, and the fait is left concreted into a hard cruft at the bottom of the lake. We have many inftances of fait thus prepared, in the different parts of the world. In the Po- dolian deferts, near the Boryfthenes, is a fait lake, whofe. water, by the heat of the fun, is exhaled, and all its fait left in form of ice, in fo hard cakes, that it is to be cut away in large pieces with tools ; and in Ruflia, on the bor- ders of Crim Tartary, there are vaft defert plains, which in fummer produce neither tree nor plant, but are covered with fait. In the Weft-Indies we are told of a falina of this kind, called garci mendossa, forty leagues long, and fix- teen broad. And in the kingdom of Algiers there are many faiines, which in winter are fo many fait water lakes, and dry plains in fummer, covered with a cruft of fait, which is du» out, and fold in very large quantities; and there are more of them in feveral parts of the world. Large quantities of fait of this kind, however, are prepared by the art and labour of man. The Englifh in the Cape Verd iflands have long been ufed to prepare great quantities of it. The iflands, which principally afford this fait, are chiefly Mayo, Bonavifta, and Sail. The fubjeefs of Great- Britain have long enjoyed a liberty of preparing fait in the two firft of thefe, free of all taxes, except a late one im- pofed on the captains for every afs which they hire of the inhabitants, to carry the fait to their boats. Brownrig of Salt, p. 1 to 1 g.

The time of making this fall is in the dry feafon, which m thofe iflands is ufually from November to July : thofe fhips, therefore, which are to load with fait, are to be there in the months of December or January. On the weft fide of Mayo, or May ifland, they find themfelves, as foon as on (hoar, upon a bank of dry loofc fand, fifty or fixty yards broad ; and when they have palled this, they enter upon the falina, or fait marfh. This is a plain of half a mile broad,, and a mile long, the greater part of which is hol- lowed out into pits, which, at a proper feafon of the year, are filled to the depth of eight inches with ftrong brine, or pickle. See Salt-?im?[/}, infra. _ j

Some authors, who have given accounts of thefe wow, fay, that this brine is only fea water, let in through holes in the bank at fpring tides. But this is an error, the brine of thefe pits being much more ftrongly impregnated with , fait,