BOLAN PASS 90 rivers, the chief of which is the Oxus or Amu Daria, forming the southern boundary and runnin:^ close to the bound- ary on the W. The climate is warm m summer, but severe in winter; there^ is very little rain, and artificial irrigation is necessary. Besides cereals, cotton and tobacco are cultivated, and also a good deal of fruit. The total population, about 1,250,000, consists of the Usbek Tartars, who are the ruling race, and to whom the Emir belongs; the Tajiks, who form the majority; Kirghiz, with Turcomans, Ara- bians, Persians, etc. The only two towns of importance are the capital, Bokhara, and Karshi. The rule of the Emir is the- oretically absolute. The manufactures are unimportant, but there is a very con- siderable caravan trade, cotton, rice, silk and indigo being exported, and woven goods, sugar, iron, etc., being imported. The Russian Transcaspian railway crosses the country and reaches Tash- kent. History. — Bokhara was the ancient Sogdiana or Maracanda; capital, Sam- arkand; was conquered by the Arabs in the 8th century, by Genghis Khan in 1220, and by Timur in 1370; and was finally seized by the Usbeks in 1505. It has recently suffered much from the ad- vances of the Russians, who, in 1868, compelled the cession of Samarkand and Important tracts of territory. Since then the Emir Musaffer-Eddin has sunk more and more into a position of dependency on Russia. After the Russian expedition to Khiva in 1873, an agreement was reached between Russia and Bokhara by which Bokhara received a portion of the territory ceded by Khiva to Russia, while the Russians received various privileges in return. The khanate was largely dom- inated by Russia until the World War. In 1917 the Emir promised a democratic constitution. Bokhara, the capital, is 8 or 9 miles in circuit, and surrounded by a mud wall. The streets are narrow and the houses poorly built* principal edi- fices : the palace of the khan, crowning a height near the center of the town and surrounded by a brick wall 70 feet high ; and numerous mosques, schools, bazaars, and caravanseries. The trade was for- merly large with India, but was later almost completely absorbed by Russia. Pop. about 90,000. BOLAN PASS, a remarkable and dan- gerous defile in western Asia, traversing the province of Sarawan, in the N. E. corner of Baluchistan. The pass grad- ually ascends from the plain a length of 55 miles, rising in its progress at the rate of 90 feet every mile, till it reaches the summit, which is 5,793 feet above the BOLEYN level of the sea. It is in many places walled in by stupendous rocks, where a few hundred resolute men might hold the passage against an army. The pass was formerly, befose its occupancy by the British in 1877, infested by bands of law- less Baluchees. BOLDREWOOD, ROLF, pseudonym of Thomas Alexander Browne, an Aus- tralian author, born in England in 1827. He was a son of Capt. Sylvester J. Browne, a founder of Melbourne, Aus- tralia. He was educated in Sidney Col- lege, and has written "Ups and Downs: a Story of Australian Life" (London, 1879); "Robbery Under Arms: Life and Adventures in the Bush" (1888); "A Squatter's Dream Story" (1890); and "A Modern Buccaneer" (1894) ; "The Last Chance" (1905); "A Tale of the Golden West" (1906). He died in 1915. BOLE, a brownish,yellowish, or reddish colored unctuous clay. It contains more or less oxide of iron, which is the color- ing matter in it; there is besides about 24 per cent, of water. Dana ranks it as a variety of halloysite, but considers that some of the specimens belong to other varieties. BOLERO, a national dance of Spain and Spanish America, usually accom- panied with the castanets, and the zither or guitar, and sometimes with the voice. The dance is intended to represent a love story. BOLETUS, a genus of fungi belonging to the order hymenomycetas or agaricallse. It may be distinguished at a glance from agaHcus, by having the under surface of the cap or pileus full of pores, in place of its being divided in a radiated man- ner, as agaricus is, into lamallje or gills. Several species, boletus edulis, B. grami- latus and B. subtomentosus, are eatable. Other species are poisonous. They grow on the ground or on the trunks of old trees. BOLEYN, ANNE (b5'len or bul-an'), second wife of Henry VIII. of England, eldest daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn and Elizabeth Howard, daughter of the Duke of Norfolk, born, according to some accounts, in 1507, but more probably about 1501. She attended Mary, sister of Henry, on her marriage with Louis XII., to France, as lady of honor, re- turning to England about 1523, and be- coming lady of honor to Queen Catherine. The king, who soon grew passionately enamored of her, without waiting for the official completion of his divorce from Catherine, married Anne in January, 1533, having previously created her
