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natural law; and died there in 1733. He wrote several mathematical works.

HERMANNIA, in botany, a genus of the pentandria order and monadelphia class of plants; natural order thirty-seventh, columnifera; CAPS. quinquelocular; the petals at the base are semitubulated and oblique. There are twenty-two species.

1. H. alnifolia, has a shrubby stalk and branches growing irregularly four or five feet high, with pale yellow flowers in short spikes from the sides and ends of the branches, appearing in April or May.

2. H. althæifolia, has a shrubby stalk, and soft woolly branches, growing two feet high, with numerous yellow flowers in short spikes growing at the end of the branches, and making their appearance in July.

3. H. grossularifolia has a shrubby stalk and spreading branches, growing three or four feet high, with bright yellow flowers coming out in great numbers at the ends of all the shoots and branches in April or May.

4. H. hyssopifolia has a shrubby upright stalk, branching out laterally six or seven feet high, with pale yellow flowers in clusters from the sides of the branches, appearing in May and June.

5. II. lavendulifolia has a shrubby stalk and slender branches, very bushy, about a foot and a half high, small spear-shaped, obtuse and hairy leaves, with clusters of small yellow flowers along the sides of the branches continuing from June to Autumn. All these plants are natives of Africa, and therefore must be kept in a greenhouse during the winter in this country. They are propagated by cuttings of their young shoots, which may be planted in pots of rich earth from April to July.

HERMANNSTADT, or Szeben, the ancient Cibinium, or Hermanopolis, is a large fortified town of Transylvania, of which it was formerly the capital, and stands on the river Szeben, in a beautiful plain. It is not considered healthy: and its streets and general accommodations are inferior to most towns of Europe of the same size. As the chief town of the Saxon settlers in Transylvania, it is the place of their archives, and the seat of a Protestant university. It has also a convent and three monasteries, one of which belongs to the Greek monks of St. Basil. The principal square contains a fine statue and fountain. The orphan hospital, the barracks outside of the town, the theatre, and the residence of baron Bruckenthal, are also worth notice. The last contains a good library, and a valuable collection of pictures, antiquities, and natural history. Its chief manufacture is soap and candles. Thirty miles south-east of Weissenburg, and 392 south-east of Vienna.

HERMANT (Godfrey), a learned doctor of the Sorbonne, born at Beauvais in 1617. He wrote many works; the principal of which are, 1. The Lives of St. Athanasius, St. Basil, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Chrysostom, and St. Ambrose. 2. Four pieces in defence of the rights of the university of Paris against the Jesuits. 3. A French Translation of St. Chrysostom's Treatise of Providence, and Basil's

Ascetics. 4. Extracts from the Councils; published after his death, under the title of Clavis disciplinæ Ecclesiasticæ. He died suddenly at Paris, in 1690.

HERMAPHRODITE, n. s. Į Fr. herma HERMAPHRODIT'ICAL, adj. Sphrodite, from pune and appodirn. An animal uniting two

sexes.

Man and wife make but one right
Canonical hermaphrodite.

Cleaveland. There may be equivocal seeds and hermaphroditical. principles, that contain the radicality of different The chosen knight

forms.

Browne.

And free companion of the gallant Bourbon,
Late Constable of France; and now to be
Lord of the city which hath been Earth's lord
Under its emperors, and changing sex,
Not sceptre, an hermaphrodite of empire—
Lady of the Old World.

Byron. Deformed Transformed. A HERMAPHRODITE is generally understood to signify a human creature possessed of both sexes,. or who has the parts of generation both of male and female. The term, however, is applied also to other animals, and even to plants. The word is a compound of Epuns, Mercury, and Appodern, Venus;, q. d. a mixture of Mercury and Venus, i. e. of male and female. By Mr. Hunter, hermaphrodites are divided into natural and unnatural, or monstrous. The first belongs to the more simple orders of animals, of which there is a much greater number than of the more perfect. The unnatural takes place in every tribe of animals having distinct sexes, but is more common in some than in others. The human species, he imagines, has the fewest, never having seen them in that species, nor in dogs; but in the horse, sheep, and black cattle, they are very frequent. From Mr. Hunter's account, however, it does not appear that such a creature as a perfect hermaphrodite has ever existed. All the hermaphrodites which he had the opportunity of seeing had the appearance of females, and were generally thought such. In the horse they are very. frequent. In most species of animals, the production of hermaphrodites appears to be the effect of chance; but in the black cattle it seems to be an established principle of their propagation. It is a well-known fact, and, as far as has yet been discovered, appears to be universal, that when a cow brings forth two calves, one of them a bull, and the other a cow to appearance, the cow is unfit for propagation, but the bull-calf becomes a very proper bull. The cows are known not to breed; they do not even show the least. inclination for the bull, nor does the bull ever take the least notice of them. Among the country-people in England, this kind of calf is called a free-martin; and this singularity is just as well known among the farmers as either cow. or bull., When they are preserved, it is for the purposes of an ox or spayed heifer, viz. to yoke with the oxen, or fatten for the table. They are much larger than either the bull or the cow, and the horns grow longer and bigger, being very similar to those of an ox. The bellow of a free-martin is similar to that of an ox, and the meat is similar to that of the ox or spayed heifer, viz much finer in the fibre than either the bull or cow;

and they are more susceptible of growing fat with good food. By some they are supposed to exceed the ox and heifer in delicacy of taste, and bear a higher price at market. The Romans, who called bull taurus, spoke also of tauræ, in the feminine gender, different from vacca or cows. Stephens observes, that it was thought they meant by this word barren cows, which obtained this name because they did not conceive any more than bulls. He quotes a passage from Columella: And, like the tauræ, which occupy the place of fertile cows, should be rejected or sent away.' He likewise quotes Varro, De re Rusticâ: The cow which is barren is called taura.' Among the reptile tribe, such as worms, snails, leeches, &c., hermaphrodites are very frequent. In the Memoirs of the French Academy, we have an account of this very extraordinary kind of hermaphrodites, which not only have both sexes, but do the office of both at the same time. Such are earth-worms, round-tailed worms found in the intestines of men and horses, land snails, and those of fresh waters, and all the sorts of leeches. And, as all these are reptiles, and without bones, M. Poupart concludes it probable, that all other insects which have these two characters are also hermaphrodites. The method of coupling practised in this class of hermaphrodites, may be illustrated in the instance of earthworms. These creep, two by two, out of holes proper to receive them, where they dispose their bodies in such a manner as that the head of the one is turned to the tail of the other. Being thus stretched lengthwise, a little conical button or papilla is thrust forth by each, and received into an aperture of the other. Among the insects of the soft or boneless kind, there are great numbers which are so far from being hermaphrodites, that they are of no sex at all. Of this kind are all the caterpillars, maggots, and worms, produced of the eggs of flies of all kinds: but the reason of this is plain; these are not animals in a perfect state, but disguises under which animals lurk. In the collection of insects belonging to professor Germar are the following hermaphrodite butterflies: 1. Papilio atalanta. The deft side male, the right side female; the left pair of wings is smaller, and more deeply notched than the right: the left antenna shorter than the right. 2. Papilio antiopa; the right side male, and left side female. The right antenna much shorter than the left. 3. Papilio phobe; left side male left antenna shorter than the right; and the left pair of wings smaller, but the color and margin same as the right pair: hinder part of the body same as in male. 4. Sphinx euphorbiæ; left side male, and smaller than the right or female side the distribution of the color is remarkable; the whole under side of the body is divided by a line, in the direction of its length; the male side is covered with a green powder, while the female side has a white antenna, rose red breast, and the abdomen marked with white denticulations. 5. Sphinx galli; left side male; the right antenna and the right pair of wings longer than those of the male side; but there is no difference of color in the delineation of the two parts.

HERMAPHRODITE FLOWERS, in botany, are

so called by the sexualists on account of their containing both the anthera and stigma, the organs of generation, within the same calyx and petals. Of this kind are the flowers of all the classes in Linnæus's sexual method, except the classes monecia and diœcia; in the former of which, male and female flowers are produced on the same root; in the latter, on distinct plants from the same seed. In the class polygamia, there are always hermaphrodite flowers mixed with male or female, or both, either on the same or distinct roots. In the plantain tree the flowers are all hermaphrodite; in some, however, the anthera, or male organ, in others the stigma or female organ, proves abortive. The flowers in the former class are styled female hermaphrodites; in the latter, male hermaphrodites. Hermaphrodites are thus as frequent in the vegetable kingdom as they are rare in the animal one. See BOTANY.

HERMAPHRODITUS, in the pagan mythology, the son of Hermes, or Mercury, and Aphrodite, or Venus. Being educated on Mount Ida by the Naiades, Salmacis, one of these nymphs, fell desperately in love with him; but he refusing to gratify her passion, she watched him one day, while he was bathing in a fountain in Caria, and leaping into it, seized him, entwined herself about him, and by her prayers, obtained of the gods to have his body and hers united into one. Whereupon Hermaphroditus, finding himself thus metamorphosed, prayed his celestial parents, that in future every man who should bathe in that fountain should possess both sexes, which, according to Ovid, was also granted. Some explain the fable, that Hermaphroditus was represented as the son of Mercury and Venus, to exhibit the union between eloquence or commerce, whereof Mercury was god, with plea sure, whereof Venus was the deity.

HERMAS, an ecclesiastical author of the first century; and, according to Origen, Eusebius, and Jerome, the same whom St. Paul salutes in the end of his first epistle to the Romans. He wrote a book in Greek some time before Domitian's persecution, A. D. 95, entitled The Pastor, from his representing an angel speaking to him in it under the form of a shepherd. The Greek text is lost, but a very ancient Latin version of it is extant. Some of the fathers have considered this book as canonical. The best edition of it is that of 1698, where it is to be found among the other apostolical fathers, illustrated with the notes and corrections of Cotelerius and Le Clerc. With these it was translated into English by archbishop Wake, the best edition of which is that of 1710.

HERMAS, in botany, a genus of the monœcia order, belonging to the polygamia class of plants. The umbel in the hermaphrodite is terminal; there is a universal involucrum and partial ones. The rays of the small umbels are lobed; the central one flower-bearing; there are five petals, and five barren stamina; the seeds are two-fold and suborbicular. In the male the lateral umbels have universal and partial involucra; the small umbels are many-flowered; there are five petals, and five fertile stamina.

HERMELIN (Samuel Gustavus, baron), a

scientific Swedish nobleman, was a native of Stockholm, in which metropolis he was born in 1744. Having travelled over a great part of the European continent, he was entrusted with the conduct of a mission to the United States of America. On his return in 1784 he visited England; after which more than fifteen years of his life were devoted to his Swedish atlas. Through his exertions also, and principally at his own expense, great improvements were introduced among the mining establishments of Bothnia. After fifty-four years spent in important active services, he retired from public life in 1815, retaining his salary, with an additional pension of 1000 rix dollars. Besides a variety of tracts printed among the transactions of the Academy of Stockholm, the following treatises were published by him separately:-A Mineralogical Description of Lapland and Westro-Bothnia, with tables of the population and industry of the latter province; Mineralogical Charts of the Southern Provinces of Sweden; On the Melting and Casting of Copper Minerals; On the use of Stones found in the Swedish Quarries; and an Essay on the Resources of the Swedish Provinces. M. Hermelin closed his long and useful life on the 4th of May, 1820.

HERMES, Gr. EPMHE, from Epμnvevc, an interpreter. The Greek name of the god Mercury. See MERCURY.

HERMES, surnamed Trismegistus, i. e. thrice greatest, an Egyptian or Phoenician priest and philosopher, and according to some a king; which triple office, they say, was the reason of this surname; though Suidas alleges, it was given him because he taught the doctrine of the Trinity. It is more probable, however, that he was so named on account of his great learning; for he is said to have written thirty-six books on divinity and philosophy, and six on physic. Clemens Alexandrinus has given a catalogue of his works; but none of them are extant, except a piece entitled Poemander, which is reckoned spurious. He taught the Egyptians chemistry, the art of land-measuring, the cultivation of the olive, the division of time into hours, and the use of hieroglyphics. He is supposed to have flourished under Niaus or Osiris, about A. M. 2076. HERMES, OF HERMA, among antiquaries, a sort of Square or cubical figure of the god Mercury, usually made of marble, though sometimes of brass or other materials, without arms or legs, and planted by the Greeks and Romans in their cross-ways. Servius gives us the origin thereof, in his comment on the eighth book of the Æneid. Some shepherds,' says he, having one day caught Mercury asleep on a mountain, cut off his hands; from which he, as well as the mountain where the action was done, became denominated Cyllenius, from xvλog, maimed; and thence certain statues without arms are denominated Hermeses or Hermæ.' But this etymology of the epithet of Cyllenius contradicts most of the other ancient authors; who derive it from Mercury's birth-place, Cyllene, a city of Elis, or the mountain Cyllene, which had been so named before him. Suidas gives a moral explication of this custom of making statues of Mercury without arms. The Hermeses,' says he,

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were statues of stone placed at the vestibules or porches of the doors and temples at Athens; for this reason, that, as Mercury was held the god of speech and of truth, square and cubical statues were peculiarly proper; having this, in common with truth, that on what side soever they are viewed, they always appear the same. Athens abounded more than any other place in Hermeses: there were abundance of very signal ones in various parts of the city, and they were indeed among the principal ornaments of the place. They were also placed in the high roads and cross-ways, because Mercury, who was the courier of the gods, presided over the highways; whence he had his surnames of Trivius and Viacus.

HERMETICAL, adj.
HERMETIC, adj.
HERMETICALLY, adv.
inventor of chemistry.

French, hermetique, from Hermes, or Mercury, the imagined Chemical.

The tube was closed at one end with diachylon, instead of an hermetical seal.

Boyle.

An hermetical seal, or to seal any thing hermetically, is to heat the neck of a glass 'till it is just ready to melt, and then with a pair of hot pincers to twist it close together. Quincy.

He suffered those things to putrefy in hermetically sealed glasses, and vessels close covered with paper, and not only so, but in vessels covered with fine lawn, so as to admit the air, and, keep out the insects: no Bentley.

living thing was ever produced there.

HERMETICAL ART, a name given to chemistry, on a supposition that Hermes Trismegistus was the inventor of the art, or that he excelled

therein. See HERMES.

HERMETICAL SEAL, a manner of closing glass vessels, for chemical operations, so very accurately, that nothing can exhale, not even the most subtile spirits. It is performed by heating the neck of the vessel in the flame of a lamp till it be ready to melt, and then with a pair of pincers twisting it close together. This chemists call putting on Hermes's seal.

HERMHARPOCRATES, or HERMARPOCRATES, in antiquity, a deity, or figure of a deity, composed of Mercury and Harpocrates, the god of silence. M. Spon gives a hermharpocrates in his Rech. Cur. de l' Antiquité, having wings on his feet like Mercury, and laying his finger on his mouth like Harpocrates. It has been suggested that this combination was intended to show that silence is sometimes eloquent.

HERMIANI, or HERMIATITE, a sect of heretics in the second century, thus called from their leader Hermias, and also denominated Seleuciani. One of their distinguishing tenets was, that God is corporeal; another, that Jesus Christ did not ascend into heaven with his body, but left it in the sun.

HERMIAS, a heretic of the second century, the founder of the above sect, born in Galatia. He maintained that the deity is material, the world eternal, and that the human soul is composed of fire and spirit.

HERMILLY (Vaquette d'), a French historian, born at Amiens in 1707. He wrote the history of Majorca and Minorca, and translated Feijoo's Critical Theatre, and Ferara's History of Spain.

HERMIONE, in fabulous history, the daughter of Menelaus and Helen, who was betrothed to her cousin Orestes, but afterwards married to Pyrrhus, whom Orestes therefore killed in the temple of Apollo, and recovered Hermione.

HERMIONE, in ancient geography, a considerable city of Argolis. It was in ruins, except a few temples, in the time of Pausanias; who says, that the new city was at the distance of four stadia from the promontory on which the temple of Neptune stood.

HERMIT is derived from the Greek sonμoç, a desert, and therefore should, rather be written eremite, Paul, surnamed the Hermit, is usually reckoned the first hermit; though St. Jerome, at the beginning of the Life of that saint, says it is not known who was the first. Some think John the Baptist, others Elias; others make St. Anthony the founder of the eremetical life; but others say, that he only rekindled and heightened the fervor thereof, and that his disciples owned St. Paul of Thebes for the first that practised it. The persecutions of Decius and Valerian are supposed to have been the occasion. Several of the ancient hermits, though they lived in deserts, had numbers of religious accompanying them. There are also various orders and congregations of religious distinguished by the title of hermits; as, hermits of St. Augustine, of St. John Baptist, of St. Jerome, of St. Paul, &c.

HERMITAGE is also applied to any religious cell, built and endowed in a recluse place, and annexed to some large abbey, of which the superior was called a hermit.

HERMITAGE, in geography, a hill of France on the side of the Rhone, opposite Tournon, famous for its vineyards, and the production of the red and white hermitage wine: on the top is the ancient chapel which gave name to the hill.

HE'RMODACTYL, n. s. Gr. ἑρμῆς and

· δάκτυλος.

Hermodactyl is a root of a determinate and regular figure, and represents the common figure of a heart cut in two, from half an inch to an inch in length. This drug was first brought into medicinal use by the Arabians, and comes from Egypt and Syria, where the people use them, while fresh, as a vomit or purge; and have a way of roasting them for food, which they

eat in order to make themselves fat. The dried roots are a gentle purge, now little used. Hill.

HERMODACTYLS are brought from Turkey, and are of a white color, compact, yet easily cut or powdered, of a viscous whitish taste, with a light degree of acrimony. They were of great repute among the ancients as a cathartic; but those now sold in the shops have very little purgative virtue. Neumann declares he never found them to have any effect. The hermodactyl is the root of the colchicum variegatum, according to some; others suppose it to be that of the iris tuberosa.

HERMODORUS, a philosopher of Ephesus, who, coming to Rome, advised the making of the laws called the Twelve Tables; on which account a statue was erected to his memory.

HERMOGENES, the first and most celebrated architect of antiquity, was, according to Vitruvius, born at Alanbada, a city in Caria. He built a temple of Diana at Magnesia; an

other of Bacchus at Tros. He wrote a book on architecture, which is lost.

HERMOGENES, of Tarsus, an ancient orator, who was in every respect a prodigy. At seventeen years of age he published his System of Rhetoric, and at twenty his Philosophic Ideas; but at twenty-five totally lost his memory. His body being opened after his death, his heart was found of an extraordinary size, and hairy all over. He died about A. A. Č. 168.. His works were published by Aldus in 1509.

HERMOGENES, a heretic of the second century, born in Africa. He held matter to be the first principle; and, regarding it as the fountain of all evil, he maintained that the world, and every thing contained in it, as well as the souls of men and other spirits, were formed by the Deity from an uncreated and eternal mass of corrupt matter.

HERMOGENIANS, a sect of ancient heretics, so denominated from their leader Hermogenes. Their opinions were warmly opposed by Tertullian. They were divided into several branches under their respective chieftains, viz. Hermians, Seleucians, Materiari, &c.

HERMON, or AERMON, in ancient geography, a mountain of the Amorites, called Sanior by the Phoenicians, and Sanir or Senir by the Amorites, on the east of Jordan. It is also called Sion by Moses, but must not be confounded with the Sion of Jerusalem. By the Sidonians it was called Scirion; in the Vulgate it is called Sarion. Joshua informs us that it was the dominion of Og, king of Bashan; which must be understood of its south side. It is never particularly mentioned by profane writers, being comprised under Libanus, or Antilibanus, with which it is joined on the east. It is also called Hermonim, plurally, Psalm xlii. 6, because it was extensive, and contained several mountains.

HERMUND,or HELMUND, a river of Afghaunistaun, the Etymander of Arian. It rises to the west of Cabul, and, running to the south-west, is joined by the Urghundab, and empties itself, after a course of 360 miles, into the sea of Zerra, or Aria Pales. It is in general fordable, but, in winter, is very deep and broad. There was formerly an embankment, called the Bundi Rustem, across this stream; from which, perhaps, it was said to lose itself in the sands.

HERMUS, in ancient geography, a river of Ionia; which, rising near Dorylæum, a town of Phrygia, in a mountain sacred to Cybele, touched Mysia, and ran through the Regio Combusta, then through the plains of Smyrna down to the sea, carrying along with it the waters of the Pactolus, Hyllus, and other rivers. It was said, by Virgil and other poets, to roll down gold.

see.

HERN, n. s. Contracted from HERON; which

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scribe, the natural productions of Spanish America. His pecuniary allowance for this purpose appears to have been ample; and he spared no expense to make himself acquainted with such objects as he was in search of. He wrote an account of their nature and properties, but it does not appear that he lived to superintend the publication of his labors; for in 1651 the result of his enquiries was edited at Rome, under the care of the Lyncæan Academy, established in that city; the papers of Hernandez having been purchased by Frederic Cesi, a young nobleman who founded, and was perpetual president of the Lyncæi. This work had originally been published in the Spanish language at Mexico, under the name and care of Francis Ximenes but the Roman edition, in small folio, came out in Latin, having the following title, Nova Plantarum, Animalium et Mineralium Mexicanorum Historia, a Francisco Hernandez, Medico in Indiis Præstantissimo, primùm Compilata.' The original drawings of this work were procured by Hernandez, who payed the immense sum of 60,000 ducats for them; they had been drawn at the time when Joseph à Costa was in America; but the numerous wood-cuts which accompany this volume are by no means equal to what might have been expected from the account we have of the drawings; and this called forth an observation of regret from Linnæus, that the work did not answer the trouble and expense which had been bestowed upon it. It must, however, be remarked, that no blame should attach to the memory of Hernandez, but to his editors on this account. What became of him is not recorded, but his drawings were consumed by a fire in the Escurial. Among the figures are some curious animals; but the plants compose the chief bulk of the work. Some of his representations are so extraordinary that their truth have been doubted; for intance, his macpalxochiquahvitl, the form of which is so strange that some error was reasonably expected. His accuracy, however, has lately been verified even in this instance. The plant, whose large united stamens exactly resemble a bird's foot, is of the malvaceous order, and is recently figured in a splendid French work. A specimen of this plant is preserved in spirits at Sir Joseph Banks's. Hernandez does not appear to have published any other works on natural history; but this will entitle him to our gratitude, for having first unfolded to European botanists the treasures of that then little known quarter of the world. The Mexican names are always given, and his medical observations are general and good. A history of the church of Mexico has been ascribed to our author, but without certainty.

:

HERNANDRIA, Jack-in-a-box tree: a genus of the trandria order, and monocia class of plants; natural order thirty-eighth, tricocca MALE CAL. tripartite: CCR. tripetalous: FEMALE CAL. truncated, quite entire : COR. hexapetalous; the plum hollow, and open at the mouth or upper part, with a loose kernel. 1. H. ovigera, grows many feet high, garnished with large oval leaves, not peltated; and monoecious flowers, succeeded by swollen fruit, open at the end, and a nut within. 2. H. sonora, or common Jack

in-a-box, is a native of both the Indies. It grows twenty or thirty feet high, and is garnished with broad peltated leaves, and monœcious flowers, succeeded by a large swollen hollow fruit, formed of the calyx, having a hole or opening at the end, and a hard nut within. The wind blowing into the cavity of this fruit makes a very whistling and rattling noise, whence the name. Both these species, being tender exotics, must be planted in pots of rich earth, and always kept in a hot-house; in which, notwith standing all the care that can be taken, they seldom flower, and never grow beyond the height of common shrubs, though in the places where they are natives they arrive at the height of trees. They are propagated by seeds procured from the West Indies.

Wiseman.

HE'RNIA, n. s. Latin. Any kind of rupture, diversified by the name of the part affected. A hernia would certainly succeed. HERNIA, in medicine, from Greek ɛpwos, a branch, is the name by which surgical writers distinguish the disease more commonly and vulgarly called a rupture, from a false idea that the case is attended with a laceration of the peritonæum. Sir Astley Cooper defines it as a preternatural tumor occasioned by some of the viscera of the abdomen being displaced out of that cavity.' The places in which these swellings most frequently make their appearance are the groin, the navel, the labia pudendi, and the upper and fore part of the thigh; they occur at every point of the anterior part of the abdomen, and there are several less common instances in which hernial tumors present themselves at the foramen ovale in the perinæum, in the vagina at the eschiatic notch.

If the situation of such tumors be various, the viscera which produce them are still more so; instances having occurred of the stomach, uterus, liver, spleen, and bladder, being found to form their contents. But a part of the intestina. canal, or a portion of the omentum, are from experience known to be the most frequent cause of their formation. From these circumstances of situation and contents, all the different appellations are derived by which herniæ are distinguished. Thus they are termed inguinal, scrotal, femoral, umbilical, and ventral; from their appearing in the groin, scrotum, thigh, navel, or belly. When the tumor is confined to the groin, the hernia is said to be incomplete, and is termed bubonocele; but, when the swelling reaches down to the bottom of the scrotum, the rupture is then supposed to be complete, and the disease obtains the name of scrotal rupture, or oscheocele.

Of these disorders, the inguinal hernia is by much the most frequent; next to that is the femoral. The umbilical is seldom observed in men, or even in women who have not borne children. The causes which tend to the production of hernia in its more usual form are these: 1. The containing parts of the abdomen are elastic and compressible; whatever, therefore, tends to produce a diminution of capacity, in the cavity of the abdomen, must occasion a proportional degree of risk of some of the contained parts being pushed from their natural situations. Violent coughing, crying, laughter, or great bodily exertion, are attended with more or less

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