an area of land on which stock is kept. The hedge, i.e. a row of bushes or small trees, forms a characteristic feature of the scenery of England, especially in the midlands and south; it is more rarely found in other countries. Its disadvantages as a fence are that it is not portable, that it requires cutting and training while young, that it harbours weeds and vermin and that it occupies together with the ditch which usually borders it a considerable space of ground, the margins of which cannot be cultivated. For these reasons it is to some extent superseded by the fence proper, especially where shelter for cattle is not required. In Great Britain the hawthorn (q.v.) is by far the most important of hedge plants. Holly resembles the hawthorn in its amenability to pruning and in its prickly nature and closeness of growth, which make it an effective barrier to, and shelter for, stock, but it is less hardy and more slow-growing than the hawthorn. Hornbeam, beech, myrobalan or cherry plum and blackthorn also have their advantages, hornbeam being proof against great exposure, blackthorn thriving on poor land and possessing great impenetrability and so on. Box, yew, privet and many other plants are used for ornamental hedging; in the United States the osage orange and honey locust are favourite hedge plants. As fences, wooden posts and rails and stone walls may be conveniently used in districts where the requisite materials are plentiful. But the most modern form of fence is formed of wire strands either smooth or barbed (see Barbed Wire), strained between iron standards or wooden or concrete posts. The wire may be interwoven with vertical strands or, if necessary, may be kept apart by iron droppers between the standards. Fences of a lighter description are machine-made with pickets of split chestnut or other wood closely set, woven with a few strands of wire; they are braced by posts at intervals.
From the fact that tramps and vagabonds frequently sleep under hedges the word has come to be used as a term of contempt, as in “hedge-priest,” an inferior and illiterate kind of parson at one time existing in England and Ireland, and in “hedge-school,” a low class school held in the open air, formerly very common in Ireland. From the sense of “hedge” as an enclosure or barrier the verb “to hedge” means to enclose, to form a barrier or defence, to bound or limit. As a sporting term the word is used in betting to mean protection from loss, by betting on both sides, by “laying off” on one side, after laying odds on another or vice versa. The word was early used figuratively in the sense of to avoid committing oneself.
See articles in the Cyclopaedia of American Agriculture, vol. i., ed. by L. H. Bailey (New York, 1907); in the Standard Cyclopaedia of Modern Agriculture, ed. by R. P. Wright (London, 1908–1909); and in the Encyclopaedia of Agriculture, vol. ii., ed. by C. E. Green and D. Young (Edinburgh, 1908).
HEDON, a municipal borough in the Holderness parliamentary
division of the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, 8 m. E. of
Hull by a branch of the North-Eastern railway. Pop. (1901),
1010. It stands in a low-lying, flat district bordering the
Humber. It is 2 m. from the river, but was formerly reached
by a navigable inlet, now dry, and was a considerable port.
There is a small harbour, but the prosperity of the port has passed
to Hull. The church of St Augustine is a splendid cruciform
building with central tower. It is Early English, Decorated
and Perpendicular, the tower being of the last period. The west
front is particularly fine, and the church, with its noble proportions
and lofty clerestories, resembles a cathedral in miniature.
There are a manufacture of bricks and an agricultural trade.
The corporation consists of a mayor, 3 aldermen and 9
councillors; and possesses a remarkable ancient mace, of 15th-century
workmanship. Area, 321 acres.
According to tradition the men of Hedon received a charter of liberties from King Æthelstan, but there is no evidence to prove this or indeed to prove any settlement in the town until after the Conquest. The manor is not mentioned in the Domesday Survey, but formed part of the lordship of Holderness which William the Conqueror granted to Odo, count of Albemarle. A charter of Henry II., which is undated, contains the first certain evidence of settlement. By it the king granted to William, count of Albemarle, free borough rights in Hedon so that his burgesses there might hold of him as freely and quietly as the burgesses of York or Lincoln held of the king. An earlier charter granted to the inhabitants of York shows that these rights included a trade gild and freedom from many dues not only in England but also in France. King John in 1200 granted a confirmation of these liberties to Baldwin, count of Albemarle, and Hawisia his wife and for this second charter the burgesses themselves paid 70 marks. In 1272 Henry III. granted to Edmund, earl of Lancaster, and Avelina his wife, then lord and lady of the manor, the right of holding a fair at Hedon on the eve, day, and morrow of the feast of St Augustine and for five following days. After the countess’s death the manor came to the hands of Edward I. In 1280 it was found by an inquisition that the men of Hedon “were few and poor” and that if the town were demised at a fee-farm rent the town might improve. The grant, however, does not appear to have been made until 1346. Besides this charter Edward III. also granted the burgesses the privilege of electing a mayor and bailiffs every year. At that time Hedon was one of the chief ports in the Humber, but its place was gradually taken by Hull after that town came into the hands of the king. Hedon was incorporated by Charles II. in 1661, and James II. in 1680 gave the burgesses another charter granting among other privileges that of holding two extra fairs, but of this they never appear to have taken advantage. The burgesses returned two members to parliament in 1295, and from 1547 to 1832 when the borough was disfranchised.
See Victoria County History, Yorkshire; J. R. Boyle, The Early History of the Town and Port of Hedon (Hull and York, 1895); G. H. Park, History of the Ancient Borough of Hedon (Hull, 1895).
HEDONISM (Gr. ἡδονή, pleasure, from ἡδύς, sweet, pleasant),
in ethics, a general term for all theories of conduct in which the
criterion is pleasure of one kind or another. Hedonistic theories
of conduct have been held from the earliest times, though they
have been by no means of the same character. Moreover,
hedonism has, especially by its critics, been very much misrepresented
owing mainly to two simple misconceptions. In the
first place hedonism may confine itself to the view that, as a
matter of observed fact, all men do in practice make pleasure the
criterion of action, or it may go further and assert that men ought
to seek pleasure as the sole human good. The former statement
takes no view as to whether or not there is any absolute good:
it merely denies that men aim at anything more than pleasure.
The latter statement admits an ideal, summum bonum—namely,
pleasure. The second confusion is the tacit assumption that the
pleasure of the hedonist is necessarily or characteristically of a
purely physical kind; this assumption is in the case of some
hedonistic theories a pure perversion of the facts. Practically all
hedonists have argued that what are known as the “lower”
pleasures are not only ephemeral in themselves but also productive
of so great an amount of consequent pain that the wise
man cannot regard them as truly pleasurable; the sane hedonist
will, therefore, seek those so-called “higher” pleasures which
are at once more lasting and less likely to be discounted by
consequent pain. It should be observed, however, that this
choice of pleasures by a hedonist is conditioned not by “moral”
(absolute) but by prudential (relative) considerations.
The earliest and the most extreme type of hedonism is that of the Cyrenaic School as stated by Aristippus, who argued that the only good for man is the sentient pleasure of the moment. Since (following Protagoras) knowledge is solely of momentary sensations, it is useless to try, as Socrates recommended, to make calculations as to future pleasures, and to balance present enjoyment with disagreeable consequences. The true art of life is to crowd as much enjoyment as possible into every moment. This extreme or “pure” hedonism regarded as a definite philosophic theory practically died with the Cyrenaics, though the same spirit has frequently found expression in ancient and modern, especially poetical, literature.
The confusion already alluded to between “pure” and “rational” hedonism is nowhere more clearly exemplified than in the misconceptions which have arisen as to the doctrine of
