Page:Cyclopaedia, Chambers - Supplement, Volume 1.djvu/821

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GRA

G R A

3. 7 Fhip- grafting, which is alio called tongue-grafting ; this is proper for final! flocks of an inch, or an inch and half diameter, and from this down to the fmaJlcft fize ; this is found the mod: effectual way of any, and is what is now almofr univerfally pra<£tifed.

4. Grafting by approach or ablactation. This is performed when the ftock to be grafted on, and the tree from which the bud is taken, are fo near together that they may be joined. This is beft performed in the month of April, and is called by fomc inarching; and is chiefly ufed for jafmines, oranges, and the tenderer exotic trees. All thofe trees which arc of the fame tribe, that is, which agree in their flower and fruit, will take upon one another; thus all the nuts may be engrafted on one another ; as may alfo all the plums, and all that are allied to them; as the almond, peach, nectarine, and the like : but as chefe ge- nerally lofe a great deal of gum in the grafting, the opera- tion of inoculation is greatly more proper for them. All the trees which bear cones will fucceed very well on one another, even though fume fhed their leaves in winter, and others do not. Thus the cedar of Lebanon and the larch tree do very well on one another ; but thefe, becaufe they abound fo greatly in refin, mutt be grafted by approach, be- caufe the rain of the graft being loir from it before it is fet into the flock, makes it otherwife often mifcarry. Bad weather will often deitroy the hopes of the belt operator ; otherwife with thefe regulations the whole generally fuccccds very well ; and is not only of ufe for the propagating many exotic plants, but even will make very tender ones bear our climate, by placing them on the hardier flocks of the fame kind. Miller^ Gardners Diet. The antients were very fond of grafting, and if we are to underifand their writings as they now irand, we muff ac- knowledge that they had an art greatly fuperior to ours, as they could make the moil unlike trees fucceed upon one another. Thus they grafted the mulberry on the fig, the plum upon the chefnut, and fo en : but it mould feem that cither the authors who have affirmed thefe things wrote upon hearfay, without any knowledge of experiments, or elfe that they called other plants by thefe names ; fincc experi- ence abundantly fhews us, that no tree, however like ano- ther in leaf, or any other particular, will ever be made to fucceed upon another, unlefs they have both the fame fruc- tification. Id. Ibid.

GRAILE, gradale or graduate, a gradual, or book containing fome of the offices of the Roman church. — Gradale, fie diilum, a gradalilnts in tali libra contentis. Lyndewod. Provincial. Angl. I. 3.

It is fometimes taken for a mafs-book, or part of it, insti- tuted by Pope Celeftine, anno 430. See Stat. 37 Hen. 6. c 32.

GRAIN (Cycl) — Strufture */"grain. There are three parti- culars obfervable in every grain, whether it be wheat, barley, oat, or whatever elfe of that kind. Thefe are, 1. The outer coat or pellicle which contains all the reft. This in the fame fpecies of grain is found to be very dif- ferent in thicknefs in different years, and as it has grown in different foils. 2. The germ or bud. This is always hid within the feed or grain, and is the plant in miniature that is to arili- from it ; and 3. The meal, or that farinaceous matter which is inclofed in the fkin, and which furrounds the germ, and ferves to give it nouriihment when rlrfr. put into the earth, before it is capable of drawing it from the earth itfelf. Dr. Grew, in his anatomy of plants, has treated of this at large. See Vegetation, &c. The whole ftrucrure of the plant which produces thefe feeds is equally admirable. The chafty hufk is admirably adapted to fhield and defend the feed as long as that is necef- fary, and then to let it fall ; and the ftalk formed hollow and round is neceflarily at once light and ftrong, capable of fuf- taining the ear, without abforbing too much of the juices deftined to its nouriihment j and the beards of many kinds ate a defence againft the birds, that would otherwife de- ftroy the feed before its ripening. The covering of the feed is formed of two membranes, which meeting in a line on one part of the feed, form together that furrow we fee on it. This is the place at which the feed is to burit open on being moifterted. Had not nature provided this means of die germ's coming out, the toughnefs neceflary to the coat of the feed, as a defence from injuries, would have fufferixl the farinaceous matter and the germ to rot together, within it, before it would have given them way to come out, and for the germ to grow.

Nor is this the only ufe of this place of opening. The great ■ Creator of all things has provided thefe feeds, not only for a fupply of the fame fpecies of plant, but for our food, and for that of birds, fcrV. We have art enough to erecT: machines for the reducing the farina to powder, and the freeing it from its covering membrane, but the birds eat it as it is, and it would pafs through them whole, and without doing them any good, were it not that the juices of the ifomach i welling it up, it burfls open at this furrow, and all the nu- tritive matter pours itfelf out. Dts Lambs Trait. Phyf. p. 62. Sum. Vol. I.

This farinaceous matter is compofed of an infinite number of white and tranfparent bodies, of a globular figure : thefe every way furround and inclofe the young plant, and by their figure being eafily put in motion, as foon as the heat and humidity of the earth a£t upon them, they, by degrees, force thcmfelves into the veflcls of the plant, and give it in- creafe from time to time till they are received into it ; and they then have fo far given it flrcngth, that it is in a condition to feed on the juices in the earth. The fame procefs of nature is obfervable in the cafe when grains of corn grow out of time, on being thrown too carclefsly together in a moifr place. When the corn is ground into powder, it is thefe farinaceous globules, that make what we call the flower. The germs arc always lefs white, and lefs tranfparent than they, but they are of great ufe : fince it is principally to them, that we owe the agreeable flavour of bread, and almofr. wholly to them, that the fermentation of dough is owing. Their little parts being, of all others, of the grain the moil eafily put in motion. And it is alfo to thefe, that the rotting of wheat, preferved in damp granaries, is to be attributed, their natural tendency being to motion and to corruption, if that motion be given without the neceflary accidents. That the obfervation of the fermentation of dough, and the lightnefs of bread, being owing to thefe germs, may not feem advanced at random ; it may be proper to confirm it, by the obfervations of the people employed in the making bread for the army. Thefe people always find, that fine flour, if well dried, and put up in dry barrels, will keep good a long time ; but that after it has been thus kept long, though it will make bifcuit, and ferve for many other necef- fary ufes, it will never make the fine light bread eaten at table ; and this they attribute to the life of the flower being fpent ; that is, to thefe germs being deftroyed, as to their vege- tative power, by having been a long time broken to pieces.

Grain of iron. Even iron has its grain as well as wood, and that not the fame in all iron, though all iron is very evi- dently the fame fpecies of body. The common call: iron has a.grain very different from that which has been hammered, or wrought, the granules which compofc the mafs, being in this Iaft itate forced as it were into combinations with one another, by the repeated blows of the hammer : the tern- 1 pering of iron into ifeel alfo alters its grain, partly by means of the falts and fulphurs, which are bv that operation intro- duced into it, and partly by the flopping the effect of the fiery particles received into it at a certain time. But befidc thefe differences, the common wrought iron has in its feveral pieces, or fometimes in the feveral parts of the fame piece, different grains. Firft a laminated one, fecondly a granulated one, and thirdly a fibrofe or ftringy one. Thefe, however, are not fo different, in reality, as they appear to be ; for the lamina,', as they become imaller, become granules ; and arrangements of thefe granules, in long lines, make the -fibres of the thready kind. The artificers, however, know by thefe marks of the grain, what iron is fittefr. for temper- ing into ifeel j and they find the laminated pieces to be the worftofall, and the granulated ones the beft. Mem. Acad, Scien. Par. 1722.

The world has talked much about the different grains of lead ores, but thefe are three, juit as in iron, and are ow- ing only to the fize aiid arrangement of the fame fhaped particles as in the iron. The broad grained lead ore being analogous to the laminated kind of iron, the ifeel grained being equally analogous to the granulated iron, and what is called the antimoniated lead ore, being in the fame manner analogous to the fibrous grained iron, and all in the fame maimer arifing out of one another.

Graik weight. The grain iveigbt m ufe among jewellers is one fourth of a carrat ; and the carrat is about th» one hundred and fiftieth part of an ounce troy-; according to Mr. Jeffreys, in his treatife on diamonds and pearls. Hence, the jewellers grain is to the troy grain, inverfely, as 600 is to 4S0, that is directly as 4. to 5.

GRA MINI FOLIA, in botany, a name given by Dillehhts to a genus of plants, called by Micheli and Linmeus zawti- cbellia. D'rflen. Gen. 169. See Zakkjckellia.

GRAMMELOUC, in natural hiftory, the name of an Kail* Indian Ihrub, very common in the woods and fbrefls. It grows to five or fix feet high. Its leaves are very long and narrow, and terminate in a point ; they are of a lively green. The fruit is carried in a bag of a triangular fhape, of the fize of a hazel-nut, but fomething longer : on opening this there appear three cells, in each of which is contained one fruit, refembling the feed of the palma chriffi, but covered with a tranfparent pellicle, and a black one under that. The in- fide of the fruit is white, and is of a fharp and pungent tafte. It is a very violent medicine, operating both by itool and vomit, and that often, fo as to endanger the life of the perfon, who has taken it. They allay its operation by eat- ing betle. Mem. Acad. Par. 1699. See Br. rr.E.

GRAMPUS, in ichthyology, an Englifh name given to one of the cetaceous fifhes, properly of the genus of the delfhinus % or dolphin, according to the new Artedian fyfiem, and di- ifinguifhed from the others of that genus bv the name of the dolphin, with the fnout bending upwards, and with broad 12 N ferrated