B I S
B I S
moft '..fiial appearance is in the ftate of ore, into which it is reduced liy its particles being penetrated by, and intimately mixed with, a fulphur, and with a large quantity of arfenic, and with an earthy matter, which yields a blue colour, equal to the zaffar, or fmalt produced from cobalt. In the fufion of this ore, die fulphur and arfenic evaporate over the fire; and the reguline matter being freed from its im- prifoned ftate, runs off from the earthy fubilance, which being left fixed behind, may, with the addition of flints, and a fixed alkali, be run into a fine blue, glafly matter, no-way differing from the fmalt of cobalt.
Native bifmuth is found in fmall compact mafles, of a pale lead colour on the outride, and when broken, of a fine, glittering, fdvery white, and compofed of a multitude of foliaccous flakes or plates, laid evenly over one another, and difpofed in feve- ral irregular directions in the mafs.
In the irate of ore, it is ufually of a bright filvery white, and of an obfcurely fohaceous ftrudture. Sometimes alfo it ap- pears granulated ; and in fome fpecimens, the granules are large, and the mafles coarfe ; in which cafe, every feparate granule appears of a cubic form.
It is fubjeei: to fewer variations in its ore than moft other mi- nerals; but it is fometimes turned yellow by an over-propor- tion of fulphur, and fometimes is very deeply tinged with the matter of the common marcafites, and, in this condition, is often miftaken for mere marcafite, to the no fmall lofs of the proprietor of the mine.
It is very common in Germany and England. The tin-mines in Cornwall afford great quantities of it ; hut it is not much known there
Bifmuth is eafdy feparated from its ore, and may be procured pure, only by melting it in a crucible over a gentle fire. When the ore is more impure, it is eafily feparated by means of the common black flux of the metallurgies; but, with this mix- ture, the fire muft be kept very moderate, other wife the bif- muth will be loft. The regulus of bifmuth, thus prepared, is like the ore of bifmuth in its pureft ftate, or the native bifmuth, being compofed of a feries of plates or flakes, arranged in va- rious directions, and looking very much like thofe of many of the fpars ; and each plate in thefe feries is compofed, as in the fpars, of regular cubic or parallelepiped concretions. It is na- turally very bright and Alining, and of a filvery white ; but it eafily tarnifhes, and acquires a pale yellow. Bifmuth attenuates the parts of all other metals, by mixture with them. It renders them much more eafily fufible, and much more fit for amalgamation with mercury; the mercury, by its means, taking up a much larger quantity of them, and carrying them much more eafily through leather. It is foluble, like lead, in vinegar ; and the fait produced from it refembles that of lead in its fweet tafte. When diffolvcd in ftronger acids, it yields the famous cofmetic magiftery, and is a very valuable mixture in the metal ufed for cafting types for print- ing, and in bell-metal. H'tll, Hift. of Foff. p. 624. Mr. Boyle mentions a medicine prepared from bifmuth by cal- cination, and the addition of fpirit of vinegar and cremor tar- tan, which has been extolled in the dropfy. He alfo mentions a preparation of it with common fublimate into a white pow- der, a few grains of which purge gently. Schroder. Pharma- cop. 1 3. c. 18. ap. Boyle, Works abridg. p. 50 r. Chemifts have talked of a Arrange liquor obtainable from the ore of bifmuth, which put into a phial clofely flopped, would rife and fall with the increafe and wane of the moon. Vid. Boyle, Works abridg. Vol. J. p. 69, 70. & p. 583. He does not fay he himfelf ever faw fuch a liquor ; but quotes Orthelius for that purpofe.
Some, on account of the white bright colour of bifmuth, call it the/?/wr marcafite. Phil. Tranf. N" 396. p. 193. Burggr. Lex. Med. T. 1. p. 1586. Sec Marcasite. Bifmuth is of great ufe as a flux-poader, to procure a thin fufion to metals ; and hence becomes of fervice in the making of fod- ders. It is alfo ufed by pewterers, inftead of regulus of anti- mony. Kirch, Mund. Subter. 1. 1 1. §. 3. p. 301. Stahl, loo cit. p. 346. See Flux.
Its medicinal virtue is much the fame with that of the drofs of lead, being feldom ufed except in external forms a , as con- taining an arfenical fait, very dangerous to he taken inwardly; vet M, du Clos made a purgative of it to he ufed in the drop- fy b . Add, that bifmuth being diflblved in fpirit of nitre, yields a fume, which being precipitated with water, produces a white powder, found a good diaphoretic in acute cafes c . — [ 3 gfuinc. Difp. p. 51. b Boyle, Phil. Work abridg. T. 1. c 5/rt/j/, loc cit. p. 34;.]
But its chief ufe among the antients, as well as moderns, is as a cofmetic. Vid. Pitzfc. Lex. Ant. T. r. p. 281. Sig Poli, by repeated dif filiations of bifmuth with an equal quantity of corrofive fublimate, procured a running mercury, and a fine powder, of the colour of pearl, which might be of life in counterfeiting the oriental pearls. Hift. Acad. Scienc. ann. 1713. p. 55. BlSMDTH graupen, in mineralogy, a name given by the Ger- mans to a fixed earth contained in the ores of bifmuth, which ierves to make fmalt, as well as the earth of cobalt. After the bifitvih is melted from the ore, they take the refiditum, or grauten, and mixing it with flints calcined and powdered, they
run it into fine blue glafs, which is no-way inferior to the common fmalt.
The bifmuth ore is often mixed among the cobalt, and, in this cafe, the miners feparate them with all the care they can ; but often they are not able to do it perfectly, and the two mi- nerals bear the fire together ; in which cafe, there arifes fome difficulty in the working, for the bifmuth mixing itfelf with fome of the earth of the cobalt, in this cafe, fubfides to the bottom of the veffel in form of a rcdifh regulus ; but this is to be feparated by a fecond operation, and the regulus obtained pure and white ; and its own earth, together with that of die cobalt, are feparated from it, and wrought together into fmalt.
BISNOW, or Bischnou, a fet among the Indian banians, or caft of merchants. See Banian.
The banian feci: confifts of two leffcr ones ; that of b'lfnow, and that of famarath.
The followers of the former hold one God, whom they call ram-ram, and allow of no lieutenants or deputy-gods, as is done by thofe of the (&difa?nnrath ; but they allow their god a wife, and have idols, which they drefs up with gold chains, and collars of pearl and precious ftones, and pay them worfhip, by finging hvmns in their temples, and dancing before them to the found of flagelets and kettle-drums. In this feci, the wives do not burn themfelves after their huf- bands death, as is praclifed by thofe of the famarath feci ; but content themfelves with a perpetual widowhood. Trev. Diet, Univ. T. 1 . p. 1 05 1.
BISOMUM, in antiquity, a tomb for tw T o bodies, or the allies of two. See Tomb, Cycl.
The word is hybrid, compounded of the Latin bis, twice, and the Greek c-upa, body, or allies of a body. Some, with more purity, write difommn.
The antients frequently buried two, three, or four bodies in the fame fepulchre, difpofed afide of each other; for it was held an impiety to lay one a-top of another a . Hence the fe- pulchres of the primitive Chriftians had the words bifomi, tri- Jbmi, quadrifomi, &c. inferibed on them, to indicate the num- ber of bodies depofited in them b . — [ a Pitifc. Lex. Ant. T. r. p. 281. b Du Cange-, Gloff. Lat. T. 1 . p. 564. Salmaf Exerc. ad Solin. p. 1207.]
BISON, in natural hiftory, the name of a fpecies of wild bull, which differs from all other fpecies, by having a very fliaggy mane, running down his neck quite to his moulders, and a large hump upon his back. In Mr. Ray's time, there was a bull of this kind kept in St. James's Park; but there was no account of whence it was brought. This author fuppofes it to have been from Florida, where, according to Ambrofe Pare, there are bulls called buirones by the natives, which have horns of about a foot long, and a bunch in the middle of the back, like the camel. Thevet alfo mentions this creature ; and Gefner defcribes it under the name of the bos camelita.
BISSACRAMENTALES, a denomination given by fome Ro- mifh writers to protcftants, on account of their only holding two facraments, viz. baptifm and the fupper. Prated. Elench. Ha?ref. 1. 2. §. 24. p. 101. See Sacrament, Cycl.
BISSEL^EON, in the materia medics, a name that is found in many copies of the moft antient Greek and Roman writers, and ufed to exprefs the oil of pitch, or that fluid fubftance which fwims at the furface of melted pitch, and was taken up by means of wool or cotton by the antients, and ufed in many external difordcrs. The common name of this oil was piffel- laum; and this other name is only a corrupt way of fpelling it. The old authors, in many other words as well as this, have changed the initial P into B.
BISSEXTIAL1S, or Bisextialis olla, an antient meafure or veffel, containing twelve ounces, or two fextaries, Mar cell. Empir. c. 15. p. 108. DuCangc, Gloff. Lat. T. 1. p. 564. See Sextarius, Cycl.
BISTI, a fpecies of Perfian money, valued at fixteen or eighteen French deniers. Some reprefent the bijl'i as an antient filver coin : others, as Chardin, make it only a money of account, and call it'diner li/li. Savar, Diet.. Comm. T. i. p. 352.
BISTORT, hijhrta, in botany, the name of a genus of plants; the characters of which are thefe: the flower is of the apeta- lous kind, confuting of a number of ftamina, which arife from a cup, divided into feveral fegments at die edge : die piftil be- comes afterwards a feed, ufually of a triangular figure, and contained in a capfule, which was before the cup of the flower. See Tab. 1 . of Botany, CJafs 15. To this it is to be added, that the flowers are difpofed in fpikes ; and the roots are large and flefhy, oddly twifted or contorted, and furnifhed with a number of fmall fibres, like hairs. There are alfo fome fpecies of hijhrt, in which, be- fide the common flowers and feeds, there are certain tubercles, which have their roots, and rudiments of leaves. The fpecies of bijlort, enumerated by Mr. Tournefort, are thefe :
1. The common bijlsrt, with a lefs contorted root. 2. The biftort, with a more contorted root. 3 The great alpine bi- ftort. 4. The middle-fized alpine bijlort. And, 5. The little alpine bijlort. Tourn. Inft. p. 5 1 1 .
Bijlort, popularly QzWz&jnakc weed, is a very beautiful plant,
and may be met with in moift places in many parts of England,
2 and
