LACROSSE. 678 LACTIC ACID. the crosse or crooked stick with which it is played. It was taken up by white men about 1840, when a club in Montreal was formed. About 181)0 the game became popular in Canada, and in 18(il a notable game between the ilont- real and Beaver clubs, and the Caughnawtlga and Saint Regis Indians — twenty-five i)layers a side — was played before King Edward VII.. then Prince of Wales. In 18(i7 practical rules were formulated by Dr. W. G. Beers, the father of modern lacrosse, and in the same year the Na- tional Lacrosse Association of Canada was formed. A club was formed in Glasgow, Scot- land (1867), by a Canadian player, and an In- dian team was taken to England and France, where exhibition games were played. A second club was formed in London. Lacrosse was for a long time not much played in England, but it is now very popular there. There are live la- crosse associations in Canada, and the game has been developed by club and college players to a high point of excellence. Lacrosse was intro- diiced into the United -tates in the early seven- ties. A national association was formed in 1870, and the game is now much played in the East among athletic clubs and colleges. TiiE Game. The crosse is a light stick 5 or 6 feet long, crooked at the end so as to allow a loose network of cat-gut or deerskin to be stretched across — not so tightly as in a tennis racquet, nor so loosely as to form a bag. Tlie ball, 2V2 inches in diameter, is now made of india-rubber. The fundamental principle of the game is to drive the ball through the opponent's goal, while defending one's own goal from a similar attack. There are usually twelve players on each side, and the ball is put in play by being placed on the exact centre of the field, after which the two centres stoop down and place tlie backs of their crosses on either side of the ball, and at the word 'play' the crosses are drawn in toward the holders of them. The ball comes to one or the other. The players of the opposing teams at once begin a struggle for the ma.stcry of the ball. When scooped up from the ground it is carried horizontally on the crosse, the player running toward one of the goals and endeavoring to elude his antagonists, being helped on by his own team. If it seems prudent, lie pitches the ball off his crosse toward a colleague who may be in a better position to convey it toward the goal. The ball is not touched by the hand. The player with the ball, skillfully dodging his opponents, may succeed in shooting it between the goal-post-s. thus scoring a goal : or the ball thus thrown nuiy be inter- cepted and returned by the goalkeeper, when the play continues as before. The game is divided into two halves of half an hour, but the teams change sides after each goal is made, the ball being again put in play in the centre of the field. The side scoring the most goals during the game is the winner. Lacrosse is essentially a game of combination. Individual or 'star' play is usually fatal to success, and among the best clubs a selfish player is regarded as preferable only to a blind one. Consult: Beers, Lnrrosse, the National Game of Canada (New York, 1809) ; Lacrosse, in Spaulding's "Library of Sports" (New- York); Sachs, Lacroxse tor Be- ginners (London) : Melland, Bints on Lacrosse (Manchester, England). LACTANTIUS, lak-Uin'shi-us. In several MSS. desjgtiatcil Licil's C.Ei-if.s, or C.KCii.ius ElBMiAXi's Lactantius, an eminent Christian author, who flourished in the third and fourth centuries. He was perhaps of Italian descent, but studied at Sicca, in Africa, under the rhetorician Arnobius, and in A.n. .SOI settled as a teacher of rhetoric in Nicomedia. He was invited to Gaul by Constantinc Uie Great (a.d. 31-218), to act as tutor to his son Crispus, and is supposed to have died at Treves about .'i-25 or ."iSO. Lac- tantius's principal work is his Dirinarum Insti- tutionum Lihri VII., a production of both a po- lemical and an apologetic character. He was an ardent Cliristian, and a bitfer o|)ponent of the paganism iu which he had been brought up; but liis tendencies were toward -Manichcism atul cer- tain views iield as imorthodo.K by the Church. .mong his other writings are treatises, De Ira Dei and De Mortihus Perseeiitonim. Some ele- gies have also been ascribed to him, but er- roneously. His style is remarkable, and has deservedly earned for him the title of the Chris- tian Cicero. He was, besides, a man of very consideral)!e learning, but as he appears not to have become a Christian till he was advanced in years, his religious o|iiuions are often very crude and singular. T.actanfius was a great favorite during llie iliildlc Ages. The editio princcps of this writer is one of the oldest extant speci- mens of typography (Subiaco, 1465). His works are published in Migne, I'atrologia Latiiia, vols. vi. and vii. (Paris, 1844), and Laubmann and Brandt, Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiastiroriiin l.atinorum (Vienna, 1890). There is an Knglish translation by Fletcher in the series of the Ante- Xicene Fathers (1896), vol. vii. LACTATES. See Lactic Acid. LACTEAL (from Lat. lactctis, milky, from lac, Gk. yia. gala, milk), or Chtlikerous Vessel. One of the lymphatic (q.v. ) vessels of the small intestine, which absorb or take up the chyle. They were discovered in 162-2 by Aselli (q.v.). and received their name from conveying the milk-like product of digestion, the cliyle (q.v.). during the digestive process, to the tho- racic iluct (q.v.). by which it is transmitted to the blood. These vessels commence in the intes- tinal villi, and, passing between the layers of the mesentery (q.v.), enter the mesenteric glands and finally unite to form two or three large trunks, which terminate in the thoracic duct. LACTIC (from Lat. lac. milk) ACID, A name applied to several organic acids having the composition corresponding to the formula CjHeO,. (1) Ordinarii lactic acid, or ethylidene lactic acid. CH,CH('OH)COOH. is a characteristic constituent of sour milk, in which it was discov- ered by Scheele in 1780. It is formed, in gen- eral, whenever sugar or starch undergoes lactic fermentation in the presence of decaying nitro- genous matter, or when sugar is heated with alkalies. It is found in the stomach and intes- tines, as well as in the brain and in muscles. It may be readily prepared by keeping a mix- ture of cane-sugar solution and sour milk to which a little decaying cheese and some chalk have been added, for two weeks at a tempera- ture of about 40° C. (104° F.). 'Hie transforma- tion is caused by the activity of the so-called lactic ferment {Bacillus lacticus Hueppe), and
