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 356 CHELTENHAM topher Wren in the reign of Charles II., who laid its foundation stone, Feb. 16, 1682. It was completed in 1690 at an expense of 150,- 000. It accommodates upward of 500 resident pensioners, besides whom there are about 70,- 000 out-pensioners. The annual expenditure for the maintenance of this establishment is about 1,000,000. The body of the duke of Wellington lay in state in Chelsea hospital for a few days previous to the funeral (November, 1852). The royal military asylum for the sup- port and education of children of soldiers (espe- cially orphans), with accommodations for 1,000 boys and girls, is in Chelsea. A children's hos- pital was opened in 1866. Prominent among the educational institutions are a normal school for males and one for females. Adjoining the military hospital are the botanical gardens of the apothecaries' company, occupying four acres on the bank of the river. The old parish church forms the termination to a long grove called Cheyne walk ; and the churchyard con- tains monuments to Sir Thomas More and Sir Hans Sloane. A beautiful suspension bridge completed in 1858, 915 ft. in length including abutments, connects Chelsea with Battersea. The steamboat traffic is accommodated by three piers. In 1871 was laid the first stone of the embankment on the N. side of the Thames. Cremorne gardens in Chelsea are a favorite popular resort. In 1867 Chelsea was constitu- ted a borough, comprising also Fulham, Ham- mersmith, and Kensington, entitled to two members of parliament. CHELTENHAM, a market town and parliamen- tary borough of Gloucestershire, England, on the river Cbelt, 86 m. N. W. of London ; pop. in 1871, 44,519. It is celebrated as a fashion- able watering place. It lies in an extensive valley open to the south and west, but shelter- ed on other sides by an amphitheatre formed by the Malvern, Cotswold, and Leckhampton hills. The scenery on every side is noted for its picturesque beauty. Excepting a large rail- way carriage and wagon manufactory, the town has no manufactures, and but little trade beyond supplying the wealthy invalids who make it their residence, and whose houses and villas adorn the suburbs and surrounding coun- try. The place possesses the usual attributes of a fashionable resort : assembly rooms, thea- tre, reading and billiard rooms, club house, literary and philosophic institute, horticultu- ral and choral societies, cricket ground, race course, &c. The parochial church of St. Mary's is an ancient Gothic structure, in the decorated style, cruciform in shape, with a tower rising from the intersection of the cross, and with a lofty octagonal spire containing a peal of eight bells. There are 19 other churches and chap- els, and numerous educational and benevolent institutions. Among the former is a free gram- mar school founded in 1578. Cheltenham pro- prietary college was erected in 1843, and is attended by over 600 students. The college building is an imposing specimen of the Tudor CHEMISTRY collegiate style, with a frontage of 240 ft. There are four springs: the Royal old well, Montpelier spa, Pittville spa, and Cam bray spa, with numerous baths. The water is a saline Cheltenham College. acidulous chalybeate, its main constituents being chloride of sodium, sulphate of soda, sulphate of magnesia, carbonic acid, and carbonate of iron, and is esteemed in bilious ailments. The first spring was discovered in 1716, but it was not till 1788, when George III. visited the town for his health, that it became a place of fashionable resort. Since then its growth has been very rapid. CHEMISTRY, the science which investigates the composition and certain properties of mate- rial substances. Nothing is certainly known of the derivation of the term, but it is most probably from X^uf/a (Chemia), the original name of Egypt, in which country it is supposed to have originated ; hence it was called the Egyptian art. Others derive it from x v P l rf r xni"rf, relating to juices; hence the word was formerly written chymistry. The oldest au- thor who mentions it is Julius Maternus Fir- micus, in the reign of Constantine, about A. D. 840. Suidas defines chemistry as the making of gold and silver ; Libavius, in 1595, as the art of making chemical preparations and of ex- tracting the pure essences in a separate form from mixtures; L6mery, in 1675, as the art which treats of separating the different sub- stances which occur in mixtures; Bergman, in the latter part of the 18th century, as the sciencewhich investigates the components of bodies in regard to their nature, their proper- ties, and the manner in which they are com- bined ; Macquer, about the same time, as the science which makes known to us the nature and properties of all bodies by composing and decomposing them. To the last two defini- tions, which express quite fully the ideas of chemists of the present day, may be added that of Berzelius: "Nature is composed of certain elementary bodies or elements. The knowl- edge of these bodies, of their mutual combina- tions, of the forces by which these combina- tions are brought about, and of the laws in ac- cordance with which these forces act, consti- tutes chemistry." Chemistry is often incor- rectly spoken of as a science of recent origin. This view may be readily disproved. It would be impossible to determine at what exact period