Cicerone

“ While the cicerone held forth, some merely wondered with foolish faces, some admired, some looked intelligent, and asked various questions, which were readily answered—all seemed pleased. Every thing was done in order: two [283] groups were never in the same apartment; but as one went out, another entered. Thus many hundreds of these poor people were gratified in the course of the day. ”

“ A cicerone appeared, a languid young man in a rather shabby livery, and led me about with a mixture of the impatient and the desultory, of con- descension and humility. I do not profess to under- stand the plan of Chambord, and I may add that I do not even desire to do so; for it is much more entertaining to think of it, as you can so easily, as an irresponsible, insoluble labyrinth. ”

“ A so-called cicerone, whose sole occupation really consists in providing a supply of the spurious article, hastens to introduce to the notice of the unsophisticated European a few women passably pretty, and tolerably well-made, who give themselves out to be bayaderes with the same facility as with us a man announces himself as a landed proprietor or a contributor to the newspapers. ”

“ Ten days later, my cicerone said that the first harvest would be in active progress, and he most cordially invited me to revisit him for the purpose of looking on. From the lees of the crushed berries a third and much inferior oil is made and used in the manufacture of soap, just as what is called piquette or sour wine is made in Brittany from the lees of crushed grapes. I was assured by this farmer that the impurity of olive oil we so often complain of in England, arises from adulteration at the hands of retailers. ”

“ The foundation of the walls, which are still standing, rests as it were on steps in the rocks.
Our cicerone is Don Michaele Vella, antiquary, residing at the house of Signore Cerio, near S. Maria's.
In planting the marsh-beans they proceed in the following way:—Holes are made in the earth at a convenient distance from each other, and a handful of dung is thrown in. A shower is then waited for, after which they put in the seed. The people here burn the bean-haulms, and wash their linen with the ashes. They never make use of soap. ”

“ A small pipe entering below the false bottom allows the air in the cistern to escape as it is displaced by the water or syrup. In some refineries this pipe, which is carried up to a higher level than the top of the cistern, is fitted with a whistle which sounds as long as the air escapes. When the sound ceases the cistern is known to be full, and the entrance of further water or syrup is stopped. The syrup in the cistern is allowed to remain for about twelve hours, by which time the char will have absorbed all the colouring matter in it, as well as the lime. ”

“ The famous hemlock potion of the Greeks by which criminals were put to death [1145] was essentially composed of the juice of this plant. The old Roman name of Conium was Cicuta; it prevails in the mediæval Latin literature, but was applied, about 1541, by Gesner (and probably before him by others) to Cicuta virosa L., another umbelliferous plant which is altogether wanting in Greece and in Southern Europe generally, and does not contain any poisonous alkaloid. ”

“ Anyone who knows how a cistern behaves can imagine the peculiar noises that issued. It seemed possessed by a demon bent on preventing sleep. It would s-s-siss for a few moments, then gurgle, then hiss, then a rush would come, followed by a steady tap, tap, tap that speedily became maddening. Water on the brain with a vengeance! Wet hair and running water in combination! This proximity to the cistern was, however, an accident carefully avoided the second night, but several poor unfortunates would always have to suffer it. It was, however, a minor evil compared with others. ”

“ They stand on an elevated stone step, so as to bring the cistern about mid-height of their body, and on the rough inclined level of its rim they slash and roll the clothes, or, opening them, flaunt them into the water, or gather them together, lifting their arms high above their heads, and always treating them with a violence which nothing but the coarsest material can resist. The air to which they chant their couplets is almost always a Campagna melody. ”

“ In Ibla, the thorax is reduced to a mere flap, and only two pairs of cirri exist in a most useless and rudimentary state, but there is a well organised mouth, stomach, and anus. In the males of Scalpellum vulgare, ornatum, and rutilum there is no mouth or stomach, but there is a thorax with four pairs of minute, modified cirri, and a large abdominal lobe. Here, in the male Alcippe, all these negatives are united, we have no mouth, no stomach, no thorax, no cirri, no abdomen! The archetype crustacean consists of twenty-one segments ”

“ It is on this account that leaden vessels are used with such impunity, the crust which forms upon the metal entirely preventing all further action. However, as this crust consists partially of carbonate of lead, which is a very dangerous poison, great care should be taken on cleaning or scraping such cisterns to avoid using the water in which particles of the salt may have become diffused. Leaden cisterns are sometimes rendered unsafe in consequence of iron or zinc pipes being soldered or let into them, thus giving rise to galvanic action, which greatly facilitates the solution of the lead. ”

“ With a sufficient and properly-distributed public supply of water, no cistern ought to be required.
Cisterns.—Cisterns for the supply of potable water may be made of iron, slate, stone, glass, glazed earthenware, or brick lined with Portland cement. Other materials have been used, as timber, lead, and zinc. Timber is inadvisable, as it easily rots; lead is very objectionable, owing to the possible solvent action of the water on it. Zinc or galvanized iron cisterns are also acted on by soft water; but they may be used with most waters. Galvanized iron is iron coated with a thin layer of zinc. ”

“ Where there are no running streams or springs, and the nature of the ground does not favor the digging of wells, the people rely upon cisterns to supply their wants. A cistern is simply a large excavation in the earth or rock; if in the former, it is lined with stone and cement to make it water-proof, but if it is hewn in the solid rock no such precaution is necessary. Water is collected here during the rainy season and treasured up for use in the dry summer. ”

“ But, without a divine revelation, reason only, as it were, casts a wishful glance over into another world.—It is matter of fact, that the wisest and best among the learned Greeks and Romans rather hoped, than believed, that there will be a future state—Cicero, the prince of Roman Eloquence, who was at once an orator, a moralist, a philosopher, and theologian, in one of his learned works, sums up all that the most celebrated philosophers of his own time, and earlier days, had said or written on the grand subject of the immortality of the soul. ”

“ To contain this enormous quantity of fluid, Nature has formed large cisterns within him, from which, once filled, he draws at pleasure the quantity he wants, and pours it into his stomach with the same effect as if he then drew it from a spring, and with this he travels, patiently and vigorously, all day long, carrying a prodigious load upon him, through countries infected with poisonous winds, and glowing with parching and never-cooling sands. ”

“ A mixture of iron filings and citric acid, in powder, with barely sufficient water to cover it, is kept in a warm situation for some days, occasionally stirring the mass, and replacing the water as it evaporates. A saturated solution is next made in distilled water, there being previously added more citric acid (about half the weight of the acid first used) , as required; it is then neutralised with liquor of ammonia (about 11⁄4 oz. of liquor of ammonia, sp. gr. ·882, to every gallon of the solution of sp. gr. 1·025) , and the solution is concentrated by evaporation ”

“ The chlorine is conveyed by glass tubes into a cylindrical stone cistern, containing milk of lime. The furnace of the sand baths is made of cast iron, and has brick partitions, to give each retort its own fire. The smoke of all these fires goes off by a flue into sheet iron pipes. The cistern is made of siliceous sandstone. Its cover is of wood, coated with a resinous cement; and it fits at its edges into grooves cut in the stone. A wheel serves to agitate the liquid continually ”

“ In soil consisting of hard pan, cisterns in some parts of the country are built without brick walls, the walls of the excavation being simply cemented. I do not approve of such cheap construction, particularly where the cistern is located near a privy or cesspool. Pollution of cistern water is often due to the cracking of the cement lining. Overflows of cisterns should never be connected with a drain, sewer, or cesspool. Run the overflow into some surface ditch and provide the mouth with a fine wire screen, to exclude small animals. It is not recommended to build cisterns in cellars of houses. ”

“ Acetic acid in the form of common vinegar, even when much diluted, attacks and dissolves metallic lead, if by exposing the surface of the fluid to the air, a constant supply of oxygen be maintained to produce oxidation. The citric acid will attack it under the same circumstances, but acts more slowly. In a solution of five grains of citric acid in twenty-four parts or two drachms of water, three lead rods lost two grains in weight in nine weeks. The greater part of the citrate of lead separated slowly in white powdery crystals ”

“ Ciccio had gone to bed without washing.
“Why does the bed rustle?” she asked him.
It was stuffed with dry maize-leaves, the dry sheathes from the cobs—stuffed enormously high. He rustled like a snake among dead foliage.
Alvina washed her hands. There was nothing to do with the water but throw it out of the door. Then she washed her face, thoroughly, in good hot water. What a blessed relief! She sighed as she dried herself.
“It does one good!” she sighed.
Ciccio watched her as she quickly brushed her hair. She was almost stupefied with weariness and the cold, bruising air. ”

“ Cyrus Harding and Herbert, after having examined that part of the Far West where the cycas grew, took their bearings, and returned to Granite House, where they made known their discovery. The next day the settlers went to collect some, and returned to Granite House with an ample supply of cycas stems. The engineer constructed a press, with which to extract the juice mingled with the fecula, and he obtained a large quantity of flour, which Neb soon transformed into cakes and puddings. ”

“ The precipitate is collected and washed with 30 of water. Citric acid 3 is dissolved in 8 of water by the aid of a water bath, and the ferric hydrate, well drained, added; stir together until dissolved, and add the quinine, stirring well until all is dissolved, and allow to cool; add 11⁄2 of solution of ammonia diluted with 2 of water, stirring the solution briskly until the quinine at first thrown down by the ammonia is redissolved; filter and evaporate to a syrup, drying in thin layers on flat porcelain or glass plates at a temperature of 100°. ”

“ In Ibla, the males are attached low down within the sack of the female; they may be said to consist of a mouth surmounted on a long peduncle, for there is no capitulum or general covering, and the whole thorax is in a rudimentary condition, the cirri being reduced to two distorted pairs. As these males certainly moult several times and grow a little, they must feed; and as they have no cirri fit for action, they must seize their food by the contortions of their peduncle, which we know homologically consists of the three first segments of the head. ”

“ Pliny informs us that the word Cicuta, amongst the ancients, was not indicative of any particular species of plant, but of vegetable poisons in general; this is a circumstance to which I am particularly anxious to fix your attention; it is by no means uncommon to find a word which is used to express general characters, subsequently become the name of a specific substance in which such characters are predominant; and we shall find that some important anomalies in nomenclature may be thus explained. ”

“ In the third series of experiments Professor Bolton found that many species which resist the brief action of a boiling concentrated solution of citric acid are more or less completely decomposed by prolonged contact with the same solution at the ordinary temperature of the work-room. He has drawn up a table, in accordance with the last series of tests, of thirty-two minerals or classes of minerals which are classified as those that are quickly, slowly, very slowly, or not, decomposed by citric acid. ”

“ Ever since the far-off days of this patriarch of materia medica, the Provençal peasant has retained his faith in the remedy revealed to him by the Greeks who brought the olive, the fig-tree and the vine from Phocæa. One thing alone is changed: Dioscorides advises us to eat our Cicadæ roasted; nowadays they are boiled and taken as an infusion.
The explanation given of the insect’s diuretic properties is wonderfully ingenuous. The Cicada, as all of us here know, shoots a sudden spray of urine, as it flies away, in the face of any one who tries to take hold of it. ”

“ To my delight, on this particular occasion, the cistern was in excellent form, honking, whistling and booming like a railway terminus. I gave the noise five minutes' start, and when I calculated that the sleepers would have finished cursing me and put their heads under the clothes to shut out the din, I reduced the flow of water to a small stream and left the bathroom, taking good care to leave the light burning and lock the door after me. Then I picked up my pauper and carried him upstairs as lightly as possible. ”