BAT
BAT
Hot bathing firft, and then ufing the cold bath immediately afterwards, is faid to be good for the {curvy, at leaft for that kind fo common in cold countries. This is confirmed by the practice of the Ruffians, and other northern nations. See Scurvy.
In violent pains, hot and cold bathing produce the fame effects, and in the fame way, in one refpect, viz. affuaging the pain, by taking off the attention from it. When one is much pained, withdrawing the action of the nerves correfponding to the affected part, employing many nerves, or fome of them violently, another way, will feldom fail of giving eafe. One pain is often a cure for another. Applying garlic to a diftant part, burning, and bliftering, cure all in this way. Med. Eff. Abr. Vol. i. p. 248.
The efficacy of hot and cold bathing is acknowledged in many cafes. How they act, feems a queftion not yet fully decided in the writings of phyficians.
Some, to account for the effects of cold bathings have had re- courfe to the additional preffure on our bodies by the preffure of the circumambient fluid. (See Bath, Cycl ) But confi- dering that this preffure is rarely -,' T , and in many cafes of domeftic bathing in a tub not T ' b - of the preffure of the atmo- fphere, and conhderlng alfo how little time people remain in a cold bath, the additional preffure feems a caufe very inade- quate to its great effects. The contraction of the fibres caufed hy the ftimulus of cold, feems a much more rational account of the matter.
It feems not very uncommon in medical writers to confound hot and warm bathing as one and the fame intention, only dif- fering in degree. But by fome experiments, we have feen, in relaxations from old fprains, the effects of warm and hot bath- ing feem diametrically oppofite ; the firft relaxing, and in- creaiing the diforder ; the latter ftrengthening, and fometimes healing radically. By hot bathings in this cafe, is to be un- derstood water heated to a degree as to give pain. Nor is this difficult to be accounted for, if we confider, that pain acting ^s a ftimulus, ftrongly contracts the parts ; whereas water of an agreeable warmth relaxes, both by its warmth and moif- ture.
It is therefore an inquiry worth making, what degrees of heat in baths are fuited to different diftempers and conftitutions j for to prefcribe warm and hot bathing indifcriminately, is like directing laxatives or aftringents for one and the fame cafe. Warm bathing, by adding to the heat of the blood, raifes a temporary fever, and by that means may have great efficacy " the cure of feveral diforders, as well as by the increafed per- fpiration it occafions. See Pediluvium. B a thin G a hawk or falcon is, when being weaned from her ramage fooleries, and alfo hired, rewarded, and throughly re- claimed, flie is offered fome water to bathe herfelf in, in a ba- fon, where flic may ftand up to the thighs, choofing a tempe- rate clear day for that purpofe. By the ufe of bathing fhe gains ftrength, with a fharp appetite, and fo grows bold. Vid. Nought. Collect. T. 3. p. 358. Diet. Ruftic. T. 1. in voc. Bathing, among the Copts and Ethiopians, denotes the day of Chrift's baptifm, reputed the 6th of January ; when, from an opinion of an extraordinary fanctity in the waters on that day, they not only, by antient cuftom, baptized their cate- chumens, but thcmfelves are all baptized anew. The water of this day they carry home to keep ; and Chryfo- ftom affures us, that it had often been known to remain fweet, uncornipted, for two or three years. Orat. 74. Vid. Seld. deSyncd. P. 3. c. is. Sehm. p. 82, feq. Bathing-?";^, in the Roman baths. There were two kinds of bathing-tubs, the one fixed, and the other moveable : among the latter, fome were contrived on purpofe to be fufpended in the air, whereby, to the pleafure of bathing, was added that of being fwung or rocked, by the motion given to the bathing-tub. Bu- rette, in Hi ft. Acad. Infcript. T. r. p. 123. BATHRUM, Mpv, a name given by antient furgeons to a kind of ftool or bench proper for the reduction of diflocated bones.
This is alfo called &«&fov'lmroK$xlmt, or the Hippocratic ftool. Galen, 1. de Artie.
Its defcription and ufe are reprefented at large by Scuitetus. Armam. Chirurg. P. 1. tab. 23. fig. 5. & tab. 46, 47, & 50. Caft. Lex. Med. p. 101. a. BA1 HYCHRUS Color, in painting, a term ufed by the Greeks to exprefs what the Romans call avflerus color. Such a colour was coarfe and dull, and wanted the life of the florid colours. See the articles Florid, Evanthus, and Austerus. BATILLUS, a mufical infriument madeof metal, in the form of a ftaff, furnifhed with metalline rings, which bein« ftruck, yielded a kind of harmonical founds, ufed by the Armenians in their church fervice. Vid. Hoffm. Lex. Univ. in voc. BATIS, in botany, a name by which Pliny and fome other au- thors call the fca-plant, which we know by the name of fam- phire, and eat as a pickle. Ger. emac. Ind. 2. B.atis, in ichthyology, a name given by fome old writers to the female skaite, or flaire. They called the male bates. See the articles Batos and Raia. BATISTE, in commerce, a fine white kind of linnen-cloth, manufactured in divers parts of the Spanifh Netherlands.— j
There are three kinds of hatijie ; the firft very thin -, the fe- cond lefs thin ; and the third much thicker, called holland hatijh, as coming very near the goodnefs of hollands. The chief ufe of batijh is for neck-cloths, head-cloths, fur- plices, (S>c. Savar, Diet. Comm. p. 302, feq. BATMAN, a weight in Turky conlifting of fix okes. Forty of thefe batmam make a camel's load, and amount to about fe- ven hundred and twenty pounds Englifh weight. Pocock's Egyp^ P- J 75.
Batman, or Battemant, is a weight ufed in Turky and Pcrfia. The Turkifh batman is of two kinds ; the larger containing fix ekes, or ocquos, at three pounds three quarters Paris weight the aequo; fo that the batman amounts to about twenty-two Paris pounds and an half 5 the fmaller, compofed like wife of fix ocquos, at fifteen ounces the ocquo, amounting to five pounds ten ounces.
The Perfian batman is Hkewife of two kinds ; one called the king's weight, batman eh chahi, or chcray, ufed for weighing moft of the neceffaries of life, equivalent to about twelve pounds and an half Paris weight ; the other called batman of Tauris, equal to fix pounds four ounces Paris or AmfterJarn weight. Savar. Diet. Comm. p. 303, feq. Thefe, at leaft, are the proportions given by Tavermer. Char- din rates the Perfian batmans fomewhat lower, viz. tbe for- mer at twelve pounds twelve ounces ; and the latter at five pounds fourteen ounces. BATON, in botany, a name by which fome authors call the
true turpentine-tree. Ger. emac. Ind. 2. BATOONS of St. Paul, Bastoncini di San Paolo, in natural hiftory, a name given by fome of the Italian writers, as Ac;uf- tino, Scilla, and others, to the lapides judcici, or other fptnes of echini. Thefe are found in vaft abundance in the ifland of Malta, and as every thing there is commemorated with fome title, with St. Paul at the end of it, thefe are called iaculi Sti. Pauli, or St. Paul's batoons. BATOS, in ichthyology, the name given by Ariftotle, and all the old writers, to the skaite, or flaire. They have generally called the male batos, and the female batis. It is a fpecies of the raja, and is diftinguifhed by Artedi, by the name of the variegated ray, with the middle of the back fmooth, and with one row of fpines on the tail. Albertus calls it the rayte, and rubus. Seethe article Raia. BATRACHIAS Lapis, the frog flow, a name applied by differ- ent writers to two very different fubftances ; fome undcrftand- ing by it lumps of common flint, which have accidentally formed themfelves into tin's figure ; and others thofe pieces of amber, which contain either a whole frog, or any part of one. See Batrachites, Cycl. and Suppl. BATRACHITE_S(C^/.)-Pliny fpeaks of three ftones under this denomination ; una?n rana: fimilcm colore, alteram cbori, (or rather, according to Hardouin's correction, ebeni) tertiam rubent'is e nigra.
The batrachites differed from the modern bufonites, which does not appear to have been known to the antients. Mcrcat. Metalloth. arm. 8. c. 8. p 185. See Bufonites. BATRACHOMYOMACHIA (Cy f /.)-Suidas = and Plutarch afcribe this 1 poem 10 one Pigres, a brother of Artemifia ; and Proclus, Euftathijs, and the anonymous author "of Homer's life, publifhed by Allatius, leave the matter in doubt. Hciu- fius and others rejeft the piece as fpurious, and unworthy of the prince of poets b : jet Geddi fcruples not to affert, that the batracho?nyo?nachia is preferable, and comes nearer to perfection, than either the UiaJ or Odyffey, excelling them both in judg- ment as well as genius c .— [ a Snid. Lex, T. 3. p. 1 12. b Vid. Fabric. Bibl. Gnec. 1. 2. c. 1. §. 1. ^ Geddi, de Script, non Ecclef. p. 208. J
Several authors have compofed pieces in imitation of the batra- chomyomachia; fuch is the Molbhiea by Merlin Coccus of Man- tua, written in elegiac Latin verfe, defcribing the war of the flies and the ants : fuch is alfo the galeomyomachia, or the battle of the cat and the mice, in Greek iambics, publifhed in i 549j together with the batrachomyomachia ; and the three books of Elyfiis Calentinus on the war between the frogs and the mice d . Van der Hardt has publifhed a work under the title of @<3fa.xopvopxxi,a., wherein he endeavours to fhew, that Homer's poem is a fymbolical defcription of the war between the Trachinii and Myoncnfes °. The feveral editions and verfions of the batrachomyo?nachia are recited by Fabricius f . — [ d Fabric, loc. cit. §. 2. e Reim. Catal. Bibl. Theol. p. 75 r. f Fabric. Bibl. Grac. 1. 2. c 1. §. 3. J BATRACHOSALIAS, in ichthyology, a name given by many of the Greek authors to the lophius, or rana pifcatrix, of au- thors. See the article Lophius. BATTALIA, an army ranged in order of battle, or ready for engagement. Vid. Jquin. Lex. Milit. T. 1. p. 119. Miiit. Inftr. for Cavalry, P. 1. c. 32.
The word feems formed from the Latin batualia, fometimes alfo written batalia, denoting a fort of military or gladiatorial exercife, as fighting with foils, or tilting at a poft. Vid. Pi- tifc. Lex. Ant. T. 1. p. 268. b.
In this fenfe,_\ve meet with the depth of a battalia; to march in battalia, with the bagagge in the middle ; to break the bat- talia, &c. In the Roman battalia, the haftati made the front. Ricbel. Diet. T. 1. p. 186. a, See Hastatj.
1 BATTA-
