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OF

UNIVERSAL KNOWLEDGE.

BEING

A REPRINT ENTIRE OF THE LAST (1879) EDINBURGH AND LONDON EDITION
OF CHAMBERS'S ENCYCLOPÆDIA ;

A Dictionary of Universal Knowledge for the People.

WITH VERY LARGE ADDITIONS UPON TOPICS OF SPECIAL
INTEREST TO AMERICAN READERS.

IN TWENTY VOLUMES.

VOL 3.

NEW YORK:

AMERICAN BOOK EXCHANGE
No. 55 BEEKMAN STREET,

1879.

B. Lab 9108.79

Botan, Lab

1898 June 23

HARVARD COLLEGE LIBRARY

TRANSFERRED FROM

BOTANICAL MUSEUM LIBRARY

FEB, 26, 1934

LIBRARY OF

UNIVERSAL KNOWLEDGE.

BIRS, a small but famous affluent of the Rhine. It rises in the canton of Bern, Switzerland, near the pass of the Jura called Pierre Pertuis, flows in a north-easterly direction through the Münsterthal, and enters the Rhine near Basel. In a narrow gorge through which the stream breaks, at a little distance from that city, 500 confederate Swiss died heroically, on the 26th August 1444, in battle against the French army under the Dauphin Louis. On the same river, near the village of Dornbach, about a mile and a half south of Basel, 6000 confederate Swiss gained a splendid victory over 15,000 Austrians, under Fürstenberg, on the 22d of July 1499; in consequence of which, the Emperor Maximilian signed a peace at Basel on the 21st of September following.

BIRTH. The act of coming into life has an important legal bearing in regard to the evidence of its legitimacy or illegitimacy. These qualities are variously determined by the regulations of different systems of jurisprudence. The ancient Roman law, as well as the modern Prussian and French Codes, in particular, contain anxious provisions on the subject. In England, no precise time appears to be prescribed for fixing legitimacy or illegitimacy of birth. Forty weeks is considered, in practice, the more usual time for legitimate births; but a discretion to allow a longer time is exercised, when, in the opinion of medical men, or under the peculiar circumstances of the case, protracted gestation may be anticipated, or is likely to occur. In Scotland. the law is more distinct. There, in order to fix bastardy on a child, the husband's absence must continue till within six lunar months of the birth, and a child born after the tenth month is accounted a bastard. The fact of legitimacy or illegit:macy may be judicially determined by an Action of Declarator in the Court of Session, which concludes, according to the nature of the case, for the legitimacy or illegitimacy of the party whose birth is the subject of the legal inquiry. In England, legitimacy may be ascertained by proceedings in the Court for Divorce and Matrimonial Causes, under the 21 and 22 Vict. c. 93, called the Legitimacy Declaration Act, 1858;" but there the remedy is not so complete as that afforded by the Scotch declarator, which may decree not only legitimacy, but also illegitimacy. See BASTARDY, HEIR, INHERITANCE.

BIRTH, Concealment of, is an offence against the public economy, and punishable as a misdemeanor. By the 9 Geo. IV. c. 31, s. 14, it is enacted that any woman endeavoring to conceal the birth of a child, shall be liable to be imprisoned, with or without hard labor, for any term not more than two years: and it shall not be necessary to prove whether the child died before, at, or after its birth. It is also provided, that if any woman tried for the murder of her child shall be acquitted thereof, it shall be lawful for the jury, so acquitting her, to find her guilty (if the case be so) of concealing the birth: upon which the court may pass the same sentence as if she had been committed upon an indictment for the concealment.

In Scotland, the law on this subject appears to be regulated by the 49 Geo. III. c. 14, by which it is enacted, that if a woman shall conceal her being with child during the whole period of her pregnancy, and shall not call for, or make use of help or assistance in the birth; and if the child shall be found dead, or be amissing, she shall be imprisoned for a period not exceeding two years. It has, however, been decided, that disclosure by the mother to the putative father is a sufficient (1)

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