In 1854 he was appointed resident at Lucknow, in which capacity two years later he carried out the annexation of Oudh and became the first chief commissioner of that province. Appointed in 1857, with the rank of lieutenant-general, to command an expedition against Persia, he defeated the enemy with great slaughter at Khushab, and conducted the campaign with such rapid decision that peace was shortly afterwards concluded, his services being rewarded by the grand cross of the Bath.
From Persia he was summoned in June to India, with the brief explanation—“We want all our best men here.” It was said of him at this time that “a fox is a fool and a lion a coward by the side of Sir J. Outram.” Immediately on his arrival in Calcutta he was appointed to command the two divisions of the Bengal army occupying the country from Calcutta to Cawnpore; and to the military control was also joined the commissionership of Oudh. Already the mutiny had assumed such proportions as to compel Havelock to fall back on Cawnpore, which he only held with difficulty, although a speedy advance was necessary to save the garrison at Lucknow. On arriving at Cawnpore with reinforcements, Outram, “in admiration of the brilliant deeds of General Havelock,” conceded to him the glory of relieving Lucknow, and, waiving his rank, tendered his services to him as a volunteer. During the advance he commanded a troop of volunteer cavalry, and performed exploits of great brilliancy at Mangalwar, and in the attack at the Alambagh; and in the final conflict he led the way, charging through a very tempest of fire. The volunteer cavalry unanimously voted him the Victoria Cross, but he refused the choice on the ground that he was ineligible as the general under whom they served. Resuming supreme command, he then held the town till the arrival of Sir Colin Campbell, after which he conducted the evacuation of the residency so as completely to deceive the enemy. In the second capture of Lucknow, on the commander-in-chief’s return, Outram was entrusted with the attack on the side of the Gumti and afterwards, having recrossed the river, he advanced “through the Chattar Manzil to take the residency,” thus, in the words of Sir Colin Campbell, “putting the finishing stroke on the enemy.” After the capture of Lucknow he was gazetted lieutenant-general. In February 1858 he received the special thanks of both houses of parliament, and in the same year the dignity of baronet with an annuity of £1000. When, on account of shattered health, he returned finally to England in 1860, a movement was set on foot to mark the sense entertained, not only of his military achievements, but of his constant exertions on behalf of the natives of India, whose “weal,” in his own words, “he made his first object.” The movement resulted in the presentation of a public testimonial and the erection of statues in London and Calcutta. He died on the 11th of March 1863, and was buried in Westminster Abbey, where the marble slab on his grave bears the pregnant epitaph “The Bayard of India.”
See Sir F. J. Goldsmid, James Outram, a Biography (2 vols., 1880), and L. J. Trotter, The Bayard of India (1903).
OVAL (Lat. ovum, egg), in geometry, a closed curve, generally more or less egg-like in form. The simplest oval is the ellipse; more complicated forms are represented in the notation of
analytical geometry by equations of the 4th, 6th, 8th . . .
degrees. Those of the 4th degree, known as bicircular quartics,
are the most important, and of these the special forms named
after Descartes and Cassini are of most interest. The Cartesian
ovals presented themselves in an investigation of the section of
a surface which would refract rays proceeding from a point
in a medium of one refractive index into a point in a
medium of a different refractive index. The most convenient
equation is 𝑙𝑟±𝑚𝑟′＝𝑛 where 𝑟,𝑟′ are the distances of a point on
the curve from two fixed and given points, termed the foci,
𝑙, 𝑚, 𝑛 are constants. The curve is obviously symmetrical about
the line joining the foci, and has the important property that the
normal at any point divides the angle between the radii into
segments whose sines are in the ratio 𝑙 : 𝑚. The Cassinian oval
has the equation 𝑟𝑟′＝𝑎2 , where 𝑟,𝑟′ are the radii of a point on the
curve from two given foci, and 𝑎 is a constant. This curve is
symmetrical about two about two perpendicular axes. It may consist of
a single closed curve or of two curves, according to the value of 𝑎;
the transition between the two types being a figure of 8, better
known as Bernoulli’s lemniscate (q.v.).
See Curve; also Salmon, Higher Plane Curves.
OVAR, a town of Portugal, in the district of Aveiro and at the
northern extremity of the Lagoon of Aveiro (q.v.); 21 m. S. of
Oporto by the Lisbon-Oporto railway. Pop. (1900) 10,462.
Ovar is the centre of important fisheries and has some trade in
wine and timber. It is visited by small coasting vessels which
ply to and from north-west Africa. Millet, wheat and vegetables—especially
onions—are the chief products of the low-lying
and unhealthy region, in which Ovar is situated.
OVARIOTOMY, the operation for removal of one or of both
of the female ovaries (for anatomy see Reproductive System).
The progress of modern surgery has been conspicuously successful
in this department. From 1701, the date when Houston of
Carluke, Lanarkshire, carried out his successful partial extirpation,
progress was arrested for some time, although the Hunters (1780)
indicated the practicability of the operation. In 1809 Ephraim
M‘Dowell of Kentucky, inspired by the lectures of John Bell,
his teacher in Edinburgh, performed ovariotomy, and, continuing
to operate with success, established the possibility of
surgical interference. He was followed by others in the United
States. The cases brought forward by Lizars of Edinburgh
were not sufficiently encouraging; the operation met with great
opposition; and it was not until Charles Clay, Spencer Wells,
Baker Brown and Thomas Keith began work that the procedure
was placed on a firm basis and was regarded as justifiable.
Improved methods were introduced, and surgeons vied with one
another in trying to obtain good results. Eventually, by the
introduction of the antiseptic system of treating wounds, this
operation, formerly regarded as one of the most grave and anxious
in the domain of surgery, came to be attended with a lower
mortality than any other of a major character.
To give an idea of the terrible record associated with the operation in the third quarter of the 19th century, a passage may be quoted from the English translation of the Life of Pasteur: “As it was supposed that the infected air of the hospitals might be the cause of the invariably fatal results of the operation, the Assistance Publique hired an isolated house in the Avenue de Meudon, near Paris, a salubrious spot. In 1863, ten women in succession were sent to that house; the neighbouring inhabitants watched those ten patients entering the house, and a short time afterwards their ten coffins being taken away.” But as time went on, the published statistics showed an increasing success in the practice of almost every operator. Spencer Wells states that in his first five years one patient in three died; in his second and third five years one in four; in his fourth five years one in five; in 1876–1877, one in ten. After the introduction of antiseptics (1878–1884) he lost only 10.9% of his operation cases, but this series showing a marked absence of septic complications. These figures have been greatly improved upon in later years, and at the present time the mortality may be taken at somewhere about 5, 7 or 9%.
Removal of the ovaries is performed when the ovaries are the seat of cystic and other morbid changes; for fibroid tumours of the womb, in which case, by operating, one hastens the menopause and causes the tumours to grow smaller; and in cases where dysmenorrhoea is wearing out and rendering useless the life of the patient less severe treatment having proved ineffectual. Oophorectomy, by which is meant removal of the ovaries with the view of producing a curative effect upon some other part, was introduced in 1872 by Robert Battey of Georgia (1828–1895). The operation is sometimes followed by loss of sexual feeling, and has been said to unsex the patient, hence strong objections have been urged against it. The patient and her friends should clearly understand the object of the operation and the results likely to be gained by it. Lastly, the ovaries are sometimes removed with the hope of checking the progress of inoperable cancer of the breast.
From the time that the operation of ovariotomy was first established as a recognized and lawful surgical procedure, there has been much disputation as to how the pedicle of the ovary, which consists of a fold of peritoneum (the broad ligament) with included blood-vessels, should be treated. Some operators were in favour of tying it with strong silk, and bringing the ends of the ligatures outside
