HOUNDS-TONGUE. 359 HOUSE- ANT. adhere to the wool of sheep and to other animals. VynoglossuM Virginianum, known as wild com- I'rey, is a common plant from Canada to !• lorida. The species of Echinospermum, formerly united with C'ynoglossum, are weeds, Echinospermum being the beggar's lice or stick-tights. The qual- ity of sheep's wool is often considerably lowered from the abundance of their burs in it. HOUNS'LOW HEATH. A region west of the townsliip of lluun.iluw, London, covering in 1546 an extent of 4:i93 acres. It was formerly notori- ous as the resort of highwaj'men, and it was cus- tomary to leave the bodies of those who had been executed hanging on gibbets along the road. In 1G86 James II. established a camp on the Heath for the purpose of overawing the Londoners. Extensive barracks were erected in 1793, and part of the land is now occupied by powder-mills. The region is in great part imder cultivation and inclosed. HOUR (Ai'. ure, OF. ure, hure, ore, hore, Fr. hettre, from Lat. hora, from Gk. apa, hour, sea- son ) . A measure of time equal to one twenty- fourth part of a day ( q.v. ) . As there are two kinds of da}?, the solar and sidereal, so there are two kinds of hours, the solar and sidereal. The latter is shorter than the former by 9.850 tolar seconds. Sidereal time is used by astron- omers in discussing the motions of the stars; but in the ordinary affairs of life solar time only is emplojed. Twenty-four ordinary solar liours correspond to an interval of time equal to the mean or average period elapsing between two successive returns of the sun to any given meridian. The first hour of the civil or ordinary day is numbered XII, and commences at mid- night. The following hours are then numbered I, II, etc., up to XII, which number is attached to the hour beginning at noon. In Italy, until Xovember, 1893, when the standard time was adopted, time was reckoned from sunset con- tinuously, from 1 to 24 hours. On the Continent, France is today the only country that is outside the time-zone, i.e. that uses local time. HOUR-GLASS. An instrument for measur- ing intervals of time. It is made of glass, and consists of two bulbs united by a narrow neck ; one of the bulbs is nearly filled with dry sand, fine enough to run freely through the orifice in the neck, and the quantity of sand is just as mueii as can run through the orifice in an hour, if the instrument is to be an hour-glass ; in a minute, if a minute-glass, etc. The obvious de- fects of this instrument are the expansion or contraction of the orifice produced by heat or cold, and the variations in the dryness of the sand, all of which produce deviations from the true measurement of time. Instruments con- structed on this principle are still used by navi- gators in 'Iieaving the log,' for the purpose of measuring the time during which the log-line is allowed to run out. Similar instruments are also employed bv cooks in fixing the proper time for boiling eggs. HOURI, hou'ri (Ar. hawrd, woman with bright black eyes, from haicira, to have brilliant black eyes). The beautiful celestial maidens, de- scribed in the Koran (Sura Ivi. 24; Iv. 55; et al.) and Mohammedan tradition as dwelling in Para- dise, whose companionship is one of the rewards held out to the pious Mussulman. Numerous de- scriptions amplifying the notices in the Koran are found in Mohammedan writers. They repose on gorgeous couches in pavilions of pearl. Their countenances are so bright one can see his face reHected from a houri's cheek. They are made b}' 'a peculiar creation,' not of clay, like ordinary women, but of musk, saffron, incense, and amber. While retaining all the qualities of virgins, they have none of the failings of women, remain ever young and free from physical defect, and have the power to conceive and bear children al will, who within an hour grow to maturity. The later Mohammedan theologians, like Ghazali (q.v.), whose more refined instincts were offended by this rather sensual picture of Paradise, en- deavored to place an allegorical interpretation upon the houri; but there can be little doubt that to Mohammed and to his immediate follow- ers, as to the bulk of present-day Mohammedans, they represent an intense reality. This follows from the details of the houri given by iloham- med and amplified by subsequent writers, on the basis of tradition, which accord with the general view of Paradise as a place where life will be full of secret delights, where there will be plenty of water, delicious fruits, with attendants waiting on the pleasure of the inhab- itants, and the like, ilohammed's conception of Paradise, while based in part on the current .Jew- ish, and more particularly Christian views, em- bodies as its original factors the adaptation of these views to his own mental horizon and to that of his surroundings ; and one is inclined to conjecture that the houri represent the reverse of the popular conception of demoniac beings, frequently pictured as female spirits, who plague and torture man in this world. HOURS, in m-thologY. See Hob.e. HOURS OF LABOR. See L.bor Legisla- tion'. HOUSATONIC, hoo'sa-ton'Ik. A river of Xew England, rising in the Berkshire Hills, Massachusetts, and (lowing south through Con- necticut (Map: Connecticut, C 4). It empties into Long Island Sound, four miles east of Bridgeport, after a course of 150 miles through a region full of wild and beautiful scenery. It supplies water-power to numerous manufactories. HOUSE-ANT. The little red ant of house- holds i Monomorium I'hnraonis) , a species which has accommodated itself perfectly to the condi- tions of civilization. It nests in the walls of houses or in rubbish in cellars or old closets, and feeds on all sorts of household stores. It becomes a great nui- sance, not so much from the amount it eats as from its in- ordinate propensityfor getting into things, es- pecially Sugar, syrup, and sweet substances generally. Careful watching will some- times reveal the crack from which most of them come, and the nest may thus be found and de- stroyed. They may be trapped by thousands by a sponge moistened with sweetened water, which is daily relieved of its burden of ants by plung- ing it into scalding water. The cracks by which the ants enter storerooms and pantries may be plugged with cotton soaked with kerosene, or RED BOrs'S-ANT. a, fpniale : b, worker ; ia relative proportioDS.
