Essen

quosa class and order. Natural order of Siliquosæ. Cruciferæ, Jussieu. tial character: silique bursting elastically with the valves rolled back; stigma emarginate; calyx converging lengthwise. There are four species, of which D. enneaphylla, nine-leaved tooth-wort, is about a foot and a half in height; leaves biternate leaflets lanceolate, serrate, acuminate, and smooth; flowers from three peduncles forming a panicle or raceme, erect, fasciled; calyx pale-green or yellowish; petals reddish-yellow, or yellowish-red; there is a gland on each side, between the longer stamens and the calyx, and one surrounding the base of each shorter stamen; in each cell are four seeds. It is a native of Hungary, Austria, Idria, Friuli, Silesia, in the woods. It flowers in April and May.

DENTELLA, in botany, a genus of the Pentandria Monogynia class and order. Natural order of Contorta. Rubiaceæ, Jussieu. Essential character: corolla tubular five-cleft, with three toothed segments; calyx five-parted; stigmas two; capsule globular, inferior, two-celled, many seeded. There is but one species, viz. D. repens, a native of New Caledonia.

DENTIFRICE, a remedy for the teeth. Various - are the compositions sold for the purpose of keeping the teeth in good preservation; they are mostly composed of earthy substances, finely powdered, and mixed with alum. Acids, though very effectual for cleansing the teeth, are decidedly mischievous. Charcoal is at present in high reputation as a dentifrice; but the sepia or cuttle fish, sold by the chemists, and finely powdered, and which are picked up on the sands on the southern coast, are much valued for this purpose.

DENTITION, the breeding or cutting the teeth in children. See INFANCY, diseases of.

DEOBSTRUENTS, in pharmacy, such medicines as open obstructions.

DEODAND, in our customs, implies a thing devoted or consecrated to God, for the pacification of his wrath, in case of any misfortune, as a person's coming to a violent end, without the fault of any reasonable creature; as if a horse should Strike his keeper, and so kill him. In this case, the horse is to be deodand; that is, he is to be sold, and the price distributed to the poor, as an expiation of that dreadful event.

DEPARTURE, in navigation, is the easting or westing of a ship in respect of the meridian it departed or sailed from:

or it is the difference of longitude, either east or west, between the present meri. dian the ship is under, and that where the last reckoning or observation was made. This departure, any where but under the equator, must be accounted according to the number of miles in a degree proper to the parallel the ship is under.

DEPHLOGISTICATED, a term, applied, by Dr. Priestley, to what is now called oxygen gas, when he first discovered it. It was called by Scheele, who discovered it at the same time, vital air.

DEPOSITION. Proof in the high court of chancery is by the depositions of witnesses; and the copies of such, regularly taken and published, are read as evidence at the hearing. For the purpose of examining witnesses in or near London, there is an examiner's office appointed; but for such as live in the country, a commission to examine witnesses is usually granted to four commissioners, two nam ed on each side, or any three or two of them, to take the depositions there. And if the witnesses reside beyond sea, a com mission may be had to examine them there, upon their own oaths; and if foreigners, upon the oaths of two skilful interpreters. The commissioners are sworn to take the examinations truly, and without partiality, and not to divulge them till published in the court of chan cery, and their clerks are also sworn to secrecy. The witnesses are compellable by process of subpoena, as in the courts of common law, to appear and submit to ex-. amination. And when their depositions are taken, they are transmitted to the court with the same care that the answer of a defendant is sent.

DEPOT, in military affairs, any par ticular place in which military stores are deposited for the use of the army. In a more extensive sense, it means several magazines collected together for that purpose. It also signifies an appropriated fort, or place for the reception of recruits, or detached parties,belonging to different regiments. When a

DEPRESSION of the pole.

person sails or travels towards the equator, he is said to depress the pole,because as many degrees as he approaches nearer the equator, so many degrees will the pole be nearer the horizon. This phænomenon arises from the spherical figure of the earth. When a star is under the horizon, it is termed the depression of that star under the horizon. The altitude or depression of any star is an arch of the vertical, intercepted between the horizon

scension, an arch of the equinoctial, intercepted between the next equinoctial point and the horizon, passing through the centre of the object, at its setting, in an oblique sphere.

DESCENSIONAL difference, that be tween the right and oblique descension of any heavenly body. See DESCEN

SION.

DESCENT, in general, is the tendency of a body from a higher to a lower place: thus all bodies, unless otherwise determined by a force superior to their gravity, descend towards the centre of the earth the planets too may be said to descend from their aphelion to the perihelion of their orbits, as the moon does from the apogee to the perigee. Heavy bodies,meeting with no resistance, descend with an uniformly accelerated motion, for the laws of which see MECHA

NICS.

DESCENT, or hereditary succession, is the title which a man on the death of his ancestor acquires his estate by right of representation, as his heir at law and an estate so descending to the heir is in law called the inheritance.

Descent is of three kinds; by common law, by custom, or by statute. By common law, as where one hath land of inheritance in fee-simple,and dieth without disposing thereof in his life-time, and the land goes to the eldest son and heir of course, being cast upon him by the law.

Descent of fee-simple by custom is sometimes to all the sons, or to all the brothers (where one brother dieth without issue,) as in gavel-kind; sometimes to the young est son, as in borough English; and sometimes to the eldest daughter, or the youngest, according to the customs of particular places. Descent by statute is of fee-tail, as directed by the statute of Westminster, 2. de donis.

DESCENT, in genealogy, the order of succession of descendents in a line or family; or their distance from a common progenitor. Thus we say, one descent, two descents, &c.

DESCENT, in heraldry, is used to express the coming down of any thing from above; as a lion en descent, is a lion with his head towards the base points, and his heels towards one of the corners of the chief, as if he were leaping down from some high place.

DESCENT, in fortification, are the holes, vaults, and hollow places, made by undermining the ground.

The descent into the moat or ditch is a deep passage made through the espla

nade and covert way, in form of a trench, whereof the upper part is covered with madriers and clays, to secure the besiegers from the enemy's fire. In wet ditches this trench is on a level with the surface of the water, but in dry ones it is sunk as deep as the bottom of the ditch.

DESCRIPTION, is such a strong and beautiful representation of a thing, as gives the reader a distinct view and satisfactory notion of it.

DESCRIPTION. In deeds and grants there must be a certain description of the lands granted, the places where they lie, and the persons to whom granted, &c. to make them good. But wills are more favoured than grants as to those descriptions; and a wrong description of the person will not make a devise void, if there be otherwise a sufficient certainty what person was intended by the testaWhere a first description of land, &c. is false, though the second be true, a deed will be void: contra, if the first be true, and the second false.

tor.

DESCRIPTION, applied to botany, the natural character of the whole plant, including all the external parts. In this respect the description of the species is distinguished from the specific difference, which regards the essential or striking characters only. A perfect or complete description is not confined to the principal parts of plants, as the root, stem, leaves, and fructification; but includes, likewise, whatever is conspicuous in their external appearance: as the foot-stalks of the leaves and flower; the stipula, or scales; the bractea, or floral 'eaves; the glands, or vessels of secretion; the weapons of offence and defence; the buds; the complication, or folding of the leaves within the buds; and the habit or general appearance of the whole plant. The order to be observed in the description is that of nature, proceeding from the root to the stem; next the branches; then the foot-stalks, leaves, flower-stalks, and flowers.

DESERTER, in a military sense, a soldier, who, by running away from his regiment or company, abandons the service. A deserter is, by the articles of war, punishable by death, and, after conviction, is hanged at the head of the regiment he formerly belonged to, with his crime writ on his breast, and suffered to hang till the army leave that camp, for a terror to others.

DESHACHE, in heraldry, is where a beast has its limbs separated from its body, so that they still remain on the escut

cheon, with only a small separation from their natural places.

DESIDERATUM, is used to signify the desirable perfections in any art or science; thus, it is a desideratum with the blacksmith, to render iron fusible by a gentle heat, and yet preserve it hard enough for ordinary uses.

DESIGN, in a general sense, the plan, order, representation, or construction, of a building, book, painting, &c.

DESIGN, in the manufactories, expressses the figures with which the workman enriches his stuff, or silk, and which he copies after some painter, or eminent draughtsman, as in diaper, damask, and other flowered silk and tapestry, and the like.

In undertaking of such kinds of figur ed stuffs, it is necessary, before the first stroke of the shuttle, that the whole design be represented on the threads of the warp we do not mean in colours, but with an infinite number of little packthreads, which being disposed so as to raise the threads of the warp, let the workman see, from time to time, what kind of silk is to be put in the eye of the shuttle, for woof. This method of preparing the work is called reading the design, and reading the figure, which is performed in the following manner: a paper is provided considerably broader than the stuff, and of a length proportionate to what is intended to be repre sented thereon. This they divide lengthwise, by as many black lines as there are intended threads in the warp; and cross these lines by others drawn breadthwise, which, with the former, make little equal squares: on the paper thus squared, the draughtsman designs his figures, and heightens them with colours, as he sees fit. When the design is finished, a workman reads it, while another lays it on the simblot.

To read the design, is to tell the person who manages the loom the number of squares or threads comprised in the space he is reading, intimating, at the same time, whether it is ground or figure. To put what is read on the simblot, is to fasten little strings to the several packthreads, which are to raise the threads named; and thus they continue to do till the whole design is read.

Every piece being composed of several repetitions of the same design, when the whole design is drawn, the drawer, to rebegin the design afresh, has nothing to do but to raise the little strings, with slipknots, to the top of the simblot, which he had let down to the bottom : this he

is to repeat as often as is necessary, till the whole be manufactured.

The ribbon weavers have likewise a design, but far more simple than that now described. It is drawn on paper with lines and squares, representing the threads of the warp and woof. But instead of lines, whereof the figures of the former consist, these are constituted of points only, or dots, placed in certain of the little squares formed by the intersection of the lines. These points mark the threads of the warp that are to be raised, and the spaces left blank denote the threads that are to keep their situation: the rest is managed as in the former.

DESIGN is also used in painting, for the first idea of a large work, drawn roughly, and in little, with an intention to be executed and finished in large. See PAINT

ING.

DESIGNING, the art of delineating or drawing the appearance of natural objects by lines on a plane.

DESPOUILLE, in heraldry, the whole case, skin, or slough of a beast, with the head, feet, tail, and all appurtenances, so that being filled and stuffed it looks like the entire creature.

DETACHMENT, in military affairs, a certain number of soldiers drawn out from several regiments or companies equally, to be employed as the general thinks proper, whether on an attack, at a siege, or in parties to scour the country.

A detachment of two or three thousand men is a command for a brigadier; eight hundred for a colonel; four or five hundred for a lieutenant-colonel. A captain never marches on a detachment with less than fifty men, a lieutenant, an ensign, and two serjeants. A lieutenant is allowed thirty and a serjeant; and a serjeant ten or twelve men. Detachments are sometimes made of entire squadrons and battalions.

DETACHMENT, in naval affairs, is a certain number of ships of a fleet or squa dron, chosen by an admiral or commodore from the others, to execute some particular service.

DETENTS, in clock-work, are those stops, which, by being lifted up or let down, lock or unlock the clock in striking. See HOROLOGY.

DETENT wheel, or Hoop wheel, in a clock, that wheel which has a hoop almost round it, wherein there is a vacancy at which the clock locks.

DETERGENT. See PHARMACY.

DETERMINATE problem, in geome