Each of these 16 subjects appears in only one of the 6 encyclopedias on this shelf. None is long enough to carry a page by itself, so they are gathered here by letter. Anything that grows moves out to a page of its own.
JOHN, and RICHARD ROE, two fictitious personages of the English law who formerly appeared in a suit of ejectment. This fictitious form of procedure was abolished in 1852. In the United States John Doe and Jane Doe are used in many parts of legal proceedings where the real names of offenders cannot be ascertained, or where there are reasons for concealing them.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
a close-woven, fine-twilled woolen cloth, usually dyed black. It is used in the manufacture of men's fine clothing. In weaving this fabric, the twist of the yarn and the twill move in the same direction, which produces a flat, smooth surface. The cloth on leaving the loom is fulled, and finished in several styles, called doeskin finish, melton finish, worsted finish, etc. In doeskin finish the surface has a soft, lustrous appearance, the twill weave being almost entirely concealed by the nap. Melton finish has a nap similar to that of velvet. In other finishes the cloth is sheared to display the weave. The name doeskin has reference to the smooth, soft, even texture of the goods, supposed to resemble the skin of a doe. See Twill ; Fulling
Only in Aiton's Encyclopedia
the popular name of a plant, Peltidea canina, common on damp ground, stones, and trunks of trees. It was formerly supposed to be a specific for hydrophobia. It is also known as ash-colored ground liverwort .
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
a common plant in hedges and thickets; also called the wild brier. The fruit is known as the hep or hip. The ripe fruit is used to prepare confection or conserve of hips, which is used in the preparation of certain kinds of pills.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
The screws with half heads by which a movement is held in its case.
Only in American Watchmaker and Jeweler
a small genus of meadow grasses, of which the crested species is esteemed alike for pastures and lawns.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
a general name applied to numerous species of fishes resembling small sharks. They are eighteen inches to eight feet long. They follow up schools of cod, herring, and mackerel, and other food fishes in hungry packs, whence their name. Fishermen dread them for the mischief they do, breaking nets, cutting lines, but chiefly driving away the schools of fish. The sea may be alive with mackerel and the fishermen reaping a harvest, when the back fins of a pack of dog-fish are seen cutting the water and all is over. The fish have gone elsewhere and must be sought anew.
Only in Aiton's Encyclopedia
a name for Sirius, the star that gives its name to the dog days.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
a liliaceous plant which owes its name partly to the color of its flowers, partly to the toothlike bulb, a frequent inmate of the rock garden or herbaceous border, presenting a characteristic appearance, not only in March and April, from its large, abundant flowers, but on account of its peculiarly blotched leaves. In Tartary its bulbs yield starch, and in they are used medicinally.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
an absurd night-constable in Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing . Dogberry is ignorant, self-satisfied, and over-bearing, but talkative and good natured. See Much Ado About Nothing Hound. Bloodhound. Pointer. Irish Setter. English Setter. Dogs Hound. Bloodhound. Pointer. Setters. Dogs
Only in Aiton's Encyclopedia
the name given to any species of the genus Scylium, the type of the family Scylliidæ. Dogfish are like small sharks. They are, moreover, oviparous. Of the known species, which are about 11, the small-spotted dogfish, the large-spotted dogfish, and the blackmouthed dogfish are the best known . The egg cases are curious bodies, like purses. They are popularly known as mermaid's purses, sea purses, etc.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
an extensive sand bank of the German Ocean, celebrated for its codfishery. It begins about miles E. of Flamborough Head and extends E. N. E. to within 60 miles of Jutland, in some places attaining a breadth of about 60 miles, though it terminates merely in a point. Where shallowest the water over it is nine fathoms . Here on the night of Oct. 21 1904, the Russian Baltic fleet under Admiral Rozhdestvenski, en route for Japan, mistook Hull fishing boats for hostile ships and sank a trawler, causing the death of two men .
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
in the Septuagint and New Testament, signified a decree or precept; by classical Greek writers it is used in the sense of a philosophical tenet . Its general meaning is a principle or maxim laid down in the form of a positive assertion, and hence "the Dogmatic Method" is the method pursued in such a science as mathematics, which starts from axioms and postulates, and deduces everything from these by means of But where the fundamental proofs. principles are either unknown or much contested, the dogmatist is one who assumes certain principles without proof as the foundation of his system. The word dogma is especially used to signify the whole (or any one) of the doctrinal forms in which the religious experience of the Christian Church has from time to time authoritatively expressed itself, as distinguished from the opinions held by Church-teachers individually .
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
in ecclesiastical history, one belonging to one of the three orders of theologians before the Reformation . These orders were thus classed : (1) The Dogmatics, so called because they based their systems or dogmas on the authority of Scripture, and the judgment of the fathers. (2) The Mystics, who, in disparagement of Scripture, framed their opinions according to the dictates of spiritual intuition. ( 3) the Scholastics, who paid an almost sacred deference to the Aristotelian philosophy. The word was also applied to one of a sect of physicians founded by Hippocrates who based their rules of practice on general principles or conclusions deduced from theoretical influences. They were opposed to the Empirics and Methodists.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
a systematic arrangement of the articles of Christian faith 1 (dogmas), or the branch of theology that deals with them. The first attempt to furnish a complete and coherent system of Christian dogmas was made by Origen in the 3d century.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia
in architecture, an ornament or molding used from late Norman to early decorated, in the form of a four-leaved flower, with the center projecting.
Only in Collier's New Encyclopedia