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BAKING POWDER the Nile Basin. He published The Rifle and the Hound in Ceylon, The Albert Nyanza as I Saw It, Ismaila and Cast up by the Sea. He died at Newton Abbott England, December 30, 1893. Baking Powder, a combination chemically prepared of tartaric acid and bicarbonate of soda, mixed with flour for the making of bread, biscuits, cakes, etc. The powder, when water is added, causes the bread to rise, as in the olden method of making bread by the fermenting of yeast. Some bakers substitute the bicarbonate of ammonia for that of soda, which is unobjectionable; though the ase of alum in lieu of tartaric acid is objectionab. ^ if one desires to have wholesome bread. Baku (bȧ-kōō' ) a province of Russia, in Transcaucasia, situated on the western shores of the Caspian Sea, southeast of Tim's and north of the rivers Kur and Aras, the latter separating Russia in Asia from Persia. Area, 15,061 square miles; population of province (1910), 1,013,900, and of the city (in 1909), the seat of administration for the Transcaucasian region, 177,777. The province in 1806 passed from Persian to Russian control, though the population largely remains Tartar and Armenian rather than Russian. There is a good harbor at the port of Baku, of importance to Russia as a naval station on the Caspian Sea and utilized as shipbuilding yards, as well as a port for the shipment of petroleum, the chief product of this region, and the yield of which is estimated at about nine million tons annually. Just north of the port is the great oil-well emporium and refineries, known as the Black Town, where, besides the crt|de oil works, are a number of chemical works, mills and tobacco factories. Much of the trade of Persia passes into Russia and western Europe through the port of Baku. Here spouting wells of petroleum may be seen all about, many destructive fires frequently occurring from the easily igniting gases as well as from the large areas of oil-saturated land. Ba'laam, a Midianite, the son of Peor, who was hired by Balak, King of Moab, to curse the children of Israel while the latter were encamped in the land of Moab on their way to the Promised Land. Although Balaam made three attempts to pronounce the curse desired by Balak, he was each time constrained by the Lord to bless instead of curse. Balaam was afterward killed by the Israelites in a war with the Midianites. See Numbers, also. Balaklava (bȧ'lȧ-klā'vȧ), a small Russian fishing village in the Crimea, near Sebastopol. In the Crimean War the British made it their headquarters and began building a railroad to Sebastopol. It was attacked by && Russians, October 25, 1854; but they were repulsed. During this attack the famous charge of the light brigade was made. Upon a probably mistaken order, Lord Cardigan led his light brigade of 600 men against a large force of Russians. With great bravery they cut their way to the Russian guns, but finding that they could do nothing there, turned and cut their way back again. Only 150 men survived the brilliant but fruitless charge. Tennyson's ode in commemoration of it is well known. The English left the town in June, 1856. Balanced Ration, the daily food of farm animals containing the proportion of tissue-producing and heat-producing food-elements calculated to give the best results under different conditions of development and requirements of work. The first sort of foods are the nitrogenous (protein) foods, of which egg-albumen and wheat gluten are familiar types drawn from human foods. The second includes the carbonaceous foods, as starches and sugars (carbohydrates) and fat, or, more strictly speaking, materials soluble in ethei (ether extract;. Protein can also furnish heat, but, being so much more expensive, the feeder's problem is to add as much carbonaceous food as will supply the necessarv heat and also, if the animal if intended for food, as can be converted into fat. The proportion of protein to heat-producing elements is called the nutritive ratio. When the proportion of heat-producing elements is large, the ratio is said to be wide; when small, it is narrow. Thus timothy hay and oat-straw, with proportions of 1:16.7 and 1:34, are examples of wide ratios. Soy beans, 1:1.9, have a narrow ratio. Corn, 1:10, has a medium ratio. For growing cattle a balanced ration is about 1:4.5; for fattening cattle, i. :6; for heavily worked horses, 1:6; for light-worked horses, 1:7, It is no more important to know the amount of these materials in a ration than to know the percentage of their digestibility. The results of the many analyses and experiments in feeding have been embodied in the Wolff-Lehmann feeding standards, which form the basis of all calculations of the feeding value of different food compounds used by stockmen. See Henry's Feeds and Feeding. Balboa (bäl-bā'ō) Vasco Nunez de, a Spanish conqueror, was born in 1475 He crossed the ocean and began farming in St. Domingo, but fell into debt and to escape his creditors smuggled himself on board a ship and joined an expedition to Darien in 1510. An insurrection which took place there gave him the chief place in the new colony. Rumors reached im here of a great western ocean, and in 1513 he set out in search of it. On Sep-