CH A tlie Soil, that crops to be raised from it, receive no benefit what- ever, arid it totally loses its invigo- rating • C, ■ s water: hence for drying precipitates, lakes, earthy powders that have been levigated with water, and other moist preparations. Its domestic uses for cleaning and polishing metallic or glass utensils, are known ; for which pathoses it is pounded, and by washing it, i 1 ever gritt it may contain, and then called ti/kiting. Ic is also of conskl. raWe
- c oil ship-board, when mix-
ed in the proportion of half an ounce to a gallon of distilled sea- water, which may thus be sweet- ened, and kept perf . In medicine, chalk is reputed to be one of the most useful ab ents, and in this light only, deserves notice; as the astringent virtue.-,, which some have attributed to it, are utterly unfounded, unless in so far as the earth is saturated with acid, in which combination it forms a saline concrete, that is manifest- ly astringent. Several years since, a person at Edinburgh pretended to have discovered a specific for curing every kind of those erythe- matous or inflammatory eruptions, which often attend the chronic erysipelas, or tie rose, on the legs, merely by applying powder- iaik to the parts affected : and though we have had no experience of this remedy, it does not appear, to us, as proper and safe as hot jimr, the. good effects of which, on such occasions, we have fre- quently witnessed. Chalk Lands are thus deno- minated, from their consisting principally of chalk, with a thin CH A [& layer of mould, or soil over it. They are wed calculated for the grov. ley and v ich will tfariVfc on any kind of cha: y land, however indirF.-rent. It naturally produces a small species of vetch, $ the smooth nodded tare, or
- ire, Ervum t ■;
- , L.
together with poppies. A; ay-weed, &c. — Sainfoin, and hop-; : lover, will also succeed on and, where they are of u sort, the hare's-foot trefoil, T.ifb- UJtfn Urvense, L. will thrive. The best manures for this species of soil are, dung, old rags, and the dung left after folding .sheep ; a practice which is particularly use- ' ere, and which, we hope, (cotrfe more gem -rai. CHALYBEATE, in medicine, is an appellation given to any li- quid, as wine or water, impregnat- ed with particles of iron or steel. Chalybeate medicines operate, like other preparations of iron, both as aperients and as astringents, the only difference being in degree. — ■ They are likewise supposed to dif- fer according to the nature of the acid miked with the metal : thus, table acids impart to -them a detergent and aperient, virtue ; — when combined with the vitriolic acid, they operate en the ffrst-pas- as powerful aperients ; the nitrous acid" renders them very styptic, and the muriatic produces the same effect, in the highest de- gree. The use of chalybeates has, oc- casionally, been attended with great success, when united with cathartics, especially in cases of chlorosis, pains of die stomach, and palpitations of the heart; but we think it our duty to caution the reader against resorting indiscri- minately
