Blennerhassett
HARMAN, an Englishman of Irish descent, noted for his connection with Aaron Burr's conspiracy, born in Hampshire, Oct. 8, 1764 or 1765; was educated at Trinity College, Dublin; studied law; and came to the United States in 1797. In the following year he built a beautiful residence on a little island in the Ohio river below Parkersburg where Aaron Burr was a guest after New York became unsafe for him to live in. Burr proposed his scheme for taking Mexico, where, in case of success, Burr was to be Emperor and Blennerhassett a duke and ambassador to England. Large sums were expended to fit out the expedition and when Burr was arrested, and Blennerhassett as a suspected person with him, creditors seized the island and home, and Blennerhassett found himself bankrupt. After this all projects failed with him. In his last years he was supported by the charity of a relative. He died on the island of Guernsey, Feb. 1, 1831. His wife was a daughter of Governor Agnew, of the Isle of Man, and the author of many poems, including "The Deserted Isle," etc.
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Blennius
a genus of spiny finned fishes, the typical one of the family blenniidæ. The species are small, agile fishes of no economic value, often left behind in pools by the retreating tide. They have long dorsal and large pectoral fins, while their heads are often furnished with tentacles, simple or branched.
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Blennorrhea
a genus of diseases, including those which consist of mucous discharges, especially from the genital and microscopical research claims to have shown that this class of diseases are the product of idiopathic conditions, such as catarrh, or of lack of cleanliness.
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Blenny
the English name of the several fishes belonging to the genus blennius. BLÉRÉ (blā-rā'), a French town, in the department of Indre-et-Loire, on the Cher, 15 miles E. S. E. of Tours. In the vicinity is the Château Chénonceaux, built in the time of Francis I., and still in excellent preservation. It was given by Henry II. to his mistress, Diana de Poitiers, who was dispossessed on the death of Henry by Catherine de Medici. In the latter part of the 18th century it was frequented by Fontenelle, Voltaire, Rousseau, and all the wits of the time, who were drawn together by the then owner of the château, Madame Dupin, widow of a fermier général who died in 1799.
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Bleriot
Louis, the first person to cross the English Channel by means of an aero-plane. See Airship
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Blesbok
an antelope of south Africa with a white marked face, a general purplish chocolate color, and a saddle of a bluish color; found in great numbers in the late Boer republics in south Africa and much hunted.
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Blessed Thistle
the English name of several thistles. (1) Cnicus benedictus, formerly called Centaurea benedicta. Both the English name and the Latin specific appellation refer to the fact that formerly it was believed to destroy intestinal worms, to cure fevers, the plague, and even the most stubborn ulcers and cancers, an opinion for which there seems to have been no foundation whatever. (2) Carduus benedictus ["United States Pharmacopæia"], the blessed thistle of modern medicine, in which it has an honorable place as a tonic and diaphoretic. (3) Carthamus lanatus is also in some localities called the blessed thistle.
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Blessington
MARGARET, COUNTESS OF, an Irish author, born near Clonmel, Sept. 1, 1789. She was the daughter of Edmund Power, an improvident man of good family, and at the age of 15 was married to a Captain Farmer, who died in 1817; and a few months after his death his widow married Charles John Gardiner, Earl of Blessington. In 1822 the they went abroad, residing there till the Earl's death in 1829, when Lady Blessington took up her abode in Gore House, Kensington. Her residence became the fashionable resort for all the celebrities of the time. She contributed to the "New Monthly Magazine," "Conversations with Lord Byron"; wrote numerous novels, including "The Belle of a Season," and the "Victims of Society"; and acted as editor for several years of "Heath's Book of Beauty," the "Keepsake," and the "Gems of Beauty." She died in Paris, June 4, 1849.
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Blicher
STEEN STEENSEN (blich'er), a Danish poet and novelist, born in Viborg in 1782. His first work was a translation of "Ossian" (2 vols., 1807-1809), and his first original poems appeared in 1814, but attracted little notice. He quickly won a national reputation with his novels, and in 1842 appeared his masterpiece of novel writing, "The Knitting Room," a collection of short stories in the Jutland dialect. He died in 1848. BLIGHIA (named after Captain Bligh), a genus of plants belonging to the order sapindaceæ (soapworts). B. sapida is the ash leaved akee tree. Blighia is now considered only a synonym of cupania.
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Blight
a diseased state of cultivated plants, especially cereals and grasses.
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Blimbing
the Indian name of the fruit of averrhoa bilimbi, a small tree, family oxalidaceæ, called also cucumber tree, the fruit being acid and resembling a small cucumber. The carambola belongs to the same genus.
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Blind Fish
the name of several species of fish, family amblyopsidæ, inhabiting the American cave streams. The They are all small, the largest not exceeding five inches. In the typical species (amblyopsis spelæus) of the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, the eyes are reduced to a useless rudiment hidden under the skin, the body is translucent and colorless, and the head and body are covered with numerous rows of sensitive papillæ, which form very delicate organs of touch. BLIND WORM (so called from the small size of its eyes), the English name of a reptile, the anguis fragilis, formerly considered a serpent, but now classed with the most aberrant of the lizards. It is more commonly called the slow worm. It is not venomous. It feeds on slugs.
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Blindfolding a Corpse
The Afritans of the Shari River in Central America were wont to blindfold a corpse before burying it, to prevent it from returning to haunt the survivors.
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Blister Fly
the name for any fly, using that term in its widest sense to designate any flying insect. The more common blister flies are beetles, and they are in consequence sometimes called blister beetles. That most frequently employed by medical men for raising raising blisters on the skin is the lytta vesicatoria, formerly called cantharis vesicatorius. It feeds on the ash. It is indigenous in the south of Europe, and being, among other places, imported from Spain, is often called the Spanish fly.
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