or rapidly. It is particularly used of the setting afloat a vessel from the stocks on which she has been built. The word is an adaptation of O. Fr. lancher, lancier, to hurl, throw, Lat. lanceare, from lancea, a lance or spear. (2) The name of a particular type of boat, usually applied to one of the largest size of ships’ boats, or to a large boat moved by electricity, steam or other power. The word is an adaptation of the Span. lancha, pinnace, which is usually connected with lanchara, the Portuguese name, common in 16th and 17th century histories, for a fast-moving small vessel. This word is of Malay origin and is derived from lanchār, quick, speedy.
LAUNDRY, a place or establishment where soiled linen, &c.,
is washed. The word is a contraction of an earlier form lavendry,
from Lat. lavanda, things to be washed, lavare, to wash.
“Launder,” a similar contraction of lavender, was one (of either
sex) who washes linen; from its use as a verb came the form
“launderer,” employed as both masculine and feminine in
America, and the feminine form “laundress,” which is also
applied to a female caretaker of chambers in the Inns of Court,
London.
Laundry-work has become an important industry, organized on a scale which requires elaborate mechanical plant very different from the simple appliances that once sufficed for domestic needs. For the actual cleansing of the articles, instead of being rubbed by the hand or trodden by the foot of the washerwoman, or stirred and beaten with a “dolly” in the wash-tub, they are very commonly treated in rotary washing machines driven by power. These machines consist of an outer casing containing an inner horizontal cylindrical cage, in which the clothes are placed. By the rotation of this cage, which is reversed by automatic gearing every few turns, they are rubbed and tumbled on each other in the soap and water which is contained in the outer casing and enters the inner cylinder through perforations. The outer casing is provided with inlet valves for hot and cold water, and with discharge valves; and often also arrangements are made for the admission of steam under pressure, so that the contents can be boiled. Thus the operations of washing, boiling, rinsing and blueing (this last being the addition of a blue colouring matter to mask the yellow tint and thus give the linen the appearance of whiteness) can be performed without removing the articles from the machine. For drying, the old methods of wringing by hand, or by machines in which the clothes were squeezed between rollers of wood or india-rubber, have been largely superseded by “hydro-extractors” or “centrifugals.” In these the wet garments are placed in a perforated cage or basket, supported on vertical bearings, which is rotated at a high speed (1000 to 1500 times a minute) and in a short time as much as 85% of the moisture may thus be removed. The drying is often completed in an apartment through which dry air is forced by fans. In the process of finishing linen the old-fashioned laundress made use of the mangle, about the only piece of mechanism at her disposal. In the box-mangle the articles were pressed on a flat surface by rollers which were weighted with a box full of stones, moved to and fro by a rack and pinion. In a later and less cumbrous form of the machine they were passed between wooden rollers or “bowls” held close together by weighted levers. An important advance was marked by the introduction of machines which not only smooth and press the linen like the mangle, but also give it the glazed finish obtained by hot ironing. Machines of this kind are essentially the same as the calenders used in paper and textile manufacture. They are made in a great variety of forms, to enable them to deal with articles of different shapes, but they may be described generally as consisting either of a polished metal roller, heated by steam or gas, which works against a blanketted or felted surface in the form of another roller or a flat table, or, as in the Decoudun type, of a felted metal roller rotating against a heated concave bed of polished metal. In cases where hand-ironing is resorted to, time is economized by the employment of irons which are continuously heated by gas or electricity.
LA UNION, a seaport and the capital of the department of La
Union, Salvador, 144 m. E.S.E. of San Salvador. Pop. (1905)
about 4000. La Union is situated at the foot of a lofty volcano,
variously known as Conchagua, Pinos and Meanguera, and on a
broad indentation in the western shore of Fonseca Bay. Its
harbour, the best in the republic, is secure in all weathers and
affords good anchorage to large ships. La Union is the port of
shipment for the exports of San Miguel and other centres of
production in eastern Salvador.
LA UNION, a town of eastern Spain in the province of Murcia,
5 m. by rail E. of Cartagena and close to the Mediterranean Sea.
Pop. (1900) 30,275, of whom little more than half inhabit the
town itself. The rest are scattered among the numerous metal
works and mines of iron, manganese, calamine, sulphur and lead,
which are included within the municipal boundaries. La Union
is quite a modern town, having sprung up in the second half
of the 19th century. It has good modern municipal buildings,
schools, hospital, town hall and large factories.
LAURAHÜTTE, a village of Germany, in the Prussian province
of Silesia, 5 m. S.E. of Beuthen, on the railway Tarnowitz-Emanuelsegen.
It has an Evangelical and a Roman Catholic
church, but is especially noteworthy for its huge iron works,
which employ about 6000 hands. Pop. (1900) 13,571.
LAUREATE (Lat. laureatus, from laurea, the laurel tree). The laurel, in ancient Greece, was sacred to Apollo, and as
such was used to form a crown or wreath of honour for
poets and heroes; and this usage has been widespread. The
word “laureate” or “laureated” thus came in English to
signify eminent, or associated with glory, literary or military.
“Laureate letters” in old times meant the despatches announcing
a victory; and the epithet was given, even officially (e.g. to
John Skelton) by universities, to distinguished poets. The name
of “bacca-laureate” for the university degree of bachelor shows
a confusion with a supposed etymology from Lat. bacca lauri (the
laurel berry), which though incorrect (see Bachelor) involves
the same idea. From the more general use of the term “poet
laureate” arose its restriction in England to the office of the
poet attached to the royal household, first held by Ben Jonson,
for whom the position was, in its essentials, created by Charles I.
in 1617. (Jonson’s appointment does not seem to have been
formally made as poet-laureate, but his position was equivalent
to that). The office was really a development of the practice
of earlier times, when minstrels and versifiers were part of the
retinue of the King; it is recorded that Richard Cœur de Lion
had a versificator regis (Gulielmus Peregrinus), and Henry III.
had a versificator (Master Henry); in the 15th century John
Kay, also a “versifier,” described himself as Edward IV.’s
“humble poet laureate.” Moreover, the crown had shown its
patronage in various ways; Chaucer had been given a pension
and a perquisite of wine by Edward III., and Spenser a pension
by Queen Elizabeth. W. Hamilton classes Chaucer, Gower,
Kay, Andrew Bernard, Skelton, Robert Whittington, Richard
Edwards, Spenser and Samuel Daniel, as “volunteer Laureates.”
Sir William Davenant succeeded Jonson in 1638, and the title of
poet laureate was conferred by letters patent on Dryden in 1670,
two years after Davenant’s death, coupled with a pension of
£300 and a butt of Canary wine. The post then became a
regular institution, though the emoluments varied, Dryden’s
successors being T. Shadwell (who originated annual birthday
and New Year odes), Nahum Tate, Nicholas Rowe, Laurence
Eusden, Colley Cibber, William Whitehead, Thomas Warton,
H. J. Pye, Southey, Wordsworth, Tennyson and, four years
after Tennyson’s death, Alfred Austin. The office took on a new
lustre from the personal distinction of Southey, Wordsworth
and Tennyson; it had fallen into contempt before Southey,
and on Tennyson’s death there was a considerable feeling that
no possible successor was acceptable (William Morris and
Swinburne being hardly court poets). Eventually, however, the
undesirability of breaking with tradition for temporary reasons,
and thus severing the one official link between literature and the
state, prevailed over the protests against following Tennyson by
any one of inferior genius. It may be noted that abolition was
similarly advocated when Warton and Wordsworth died.
The poet laureate, being a court official, was considered
