Commanded always by the greater gust; Such is the lightness of you common men. Id. Henry VI. Up to the Eastern tower, Whose height commands as subject all the vale, To see the sight. Id. Troilus and Cressida. Take pity of your town and of your people, While yet my soldiers are in my command. Id. Henry V. They plainly require some special commandment for Hooker. To prescribe the order of doing in all things, is a peculiar prerogative, which wisdom hath, as queen of sovereign commandress, over all other virtues. Id. The Romans, when commanders in war, spake to their army, and styled them, My soldiers. that which is exacted at their hands. Bacon's Apopthegms. Whatever hypocrites austerely talk Of purity, and place, and innocence, Defaming as impure what God declares Pure, and commands to some, leaves free to all. Our Maker bids increase: who bids abstain But our destroyer, foe to God and man? Milton. Those two commanding powers of the soul, the understanding and the will. South. The steepy stand, Which overlooks the vale with wide command. Dryden's Æneid. Be you commandress therefore, princess, queen Of all our forces, be thy word a law. Fairfax. Command and force may often create, but can never cure, an aversion; and whatever any one is brought to by compulsion, he will leave as soon as he can. Locke on Education. Should he, who was thy lord, command thee now With a harsh voice, and supercilious brow, To servile duties. Dryden's Pers. Sat. 5. Charles, Henry, and Francis of France, often ad ventured rather as soldiers than as commanders. Hayward. One side commands a view of the finest garden in Addison's Guardian. the world. And on his brow such awe majestic sate Gay. COMMANDERY, n. s. From command. A body of the knights of Malta, belonging to the same nation. COMMANDERY, or COMMANDRY, a kind of benefice belonging to a military order, and conferred on ancient knights who had done service to the order. There are regular commanderies, obtained by merit: there are others of favor, conferred by the grand master: there are also commanderies for the religious, in the orders of St. Bernard and St. Anthony. The commanderies of Malta are of different kinds; for knights, chaplains, and brothers servitor. The knight to whom one of these is given is called commander ; which agrees nearly with the præpositus set over the monks in places at a distance from the monasters. Thus, the simple commanders of Malta, are rather farmers of the order than beneficiaries, paying a certain tribute, called responsio, to the common treasure of the order. COMMANDINE, or COMMANDINUS (Frederic), born at Urbino in Italy, in the sixteenth century, and descended from a noble family. To great skill in mathematics he added a profound knowledge of the Greek Tongue. He translated several of the Greek mathematicians into Latin, as Archimedes, Apollonius, Euclid, &c. which no writer till then had attempted. COMMANOES, one of the small Virgin Isles, in the West Indies, situated to the N. N. E. of Tortula. Long. 63° 0′ W., lat. 18° 25′ N. COMMANTAWANA, a bay on the north coast of the island of St. Vincent, about a mile east of Tarrata Point. COMMATERIAL, adj. Lat. con and maCOMMATERIALITY, n. s. Steria. Resembling another thing, or consisting of the same matter. The beaks in birds are commaterial with teeth. COMMELIN (John), a celebrated Duch botanist, was born at Amsterdam in 1629. He, as well as his father, was a magistrate of that city, where he formed a well-managed botanical garden, and died in 1692. His works are, 1. Catalogus Plantarum Indigenarum Hollandiæ, 12mo. 2. Catalogus Plantarum, Horti Medici Amstel. Besides which he assisted in the Hortus Indicus Malabaricus. COMMELIN (Gaspar), physician and nephew of the above, was appointed professor in botany and director of the garden at Amsterdam. He published, 1. Flora Malabarica. 2. Præludia Anatomica, 4to. 3. Præludia Botanica. 4. Icones Plantarum, præsertim ex Indiis collectarum. 5. Botanographia Malabarica, folio. COMMELINA, in botany, a genus of the natural order sixth, ensatæ : COR. hexapetalous; monogynia order and triandria class of plants; nectaria three, of a cruciform figure, and inserted into their proper filaments. Species thirteen, all natives of warm climates. They are herbaceous plants, rising from two to four feet high, and adorned with blue or yellow flowers. Their culture is the same with that of the common exotics. application of these new facts. By hanging some coils of fine platinum wire, or a fine sheet of platinum or palladium, above the wick of the safe-lamp in the wire-gause cylinder, he has supplied the coal-miner with light in mixtures of fire-damp no longer explosive. Should the flame be extinguished, by the quantity of firedamp, the glow of the platinum will continue to guide him; and, by placing the lamp in different parts of the gallery, the relative brightness of the wire will show the state of the atmosphere in these parts. Nor can there be any danger, with respect to respiration, wherever the wire continues ignited; for even this phenomenon ceases when the foul air forms about two-fifths of the volume of the atmosphere. Into a wire-gause safe-lamp a small cage of fine wire of platinum, of 1-70th of an inch in thickness, was introduced, and fixed by means of a thick wire of platinum, about two inches above the lighted wick. This apparatus was placed in a large receiver, in which, by means of a gas-holder, the air could be contaminated to any extent with coal gas. As soon as there was a slight admixture of coal gas the platinum became ignited. The ignition continued to increase till the flame of the wick was extinguished, and till the whole cylinder became filled with flame. It then diminished. When the quantity of coal gas was increased, so as to extinguish the flame, the cage of platinum, at the moment of extinction, became white-hot, presenting a most brilliant light. By increasing the quantity of the coal gas still further, the ignition of the platinum became less vivid. When its light was barely sensible small quantities of air were admitted, and it speedily increased. By regulating the admission of coal gas and air it again became white-hot, and soon after lighted the flame in the cylinder, which as usual, by the addition of more atmospheric air, rekindled the flame of the wick. "This beautiful experiment has been very often repeated, and always with the same results. When the wire for the support of the cage, whether of platinum, silver, or copper, was very thick it retained sufficient heat to enable the fine platinum wire to rekindle in a proper mixture, half a minute after its light had been entirely destroyed by an atmosphere of pure coal gas. The phenomenon of the ignition of the platinum takes place feebly in a mixture consisting of two of air and one of coal gas; and brilliantly in a mixture consisting of three of air and one of coal gas. The greater the quantity of heat produced, the greater may be the quantity of the coal gas, so that a large tissue of wire made white-hot will burn in a more inflammable mixture (that is containing more inflammable gas) than one made red-hot. If a mixture of three parts of air and one of fire-damp be introduced into a bottle, and inflamed at its point of contact with the atmosphere, it will not explode, but will burn like a pure inflammable substance. If a fine wire of platinum, coiled at its end, be slowly passed through the flame, it will continue ignited in the body of the mixture, and the same gaseous matter will be found to be inflammable, and to be a supporter of combustion. When a large cage of wire of platinum is introduced into a very small safe-lamp, even explosive mixtures of fire-damp are burned without flame; and, by placing any cage of platinum in the bottom of the lamp round the wick, the wire is prevented from being smoked. Care should be taken, of course, that no filament of the platinum protrude through the wire-gause. It is truly wonderful that a slender tissue of platinum, which does not cost one shilling, and which is imperishable, should afford in the dark and dangerous recesses of a coal-mine, a most brilliant light, perfectly safe in atmospheres in which the flame of the safety-lamp is extinguished; and which glows in every mixture of carbureted hydrogen gas that is respirable. When the atmosphere becomes again explosive the flame is relighted. It is no less surprising, that thus also we can burn any inflammable vavapor, either with or without flame, at pleasure, and make a slender wire consume it, either with a white or red heat.' COMBUSTION, SPONTANEOUS. The spontaneous combustion of the human body is a topic of singular interest, and great scientific curiosity. When we reflect on the great quantity of wood or coals required for the burning of a dead human body, and the slowness with which this process is effected, its spontaneous occurrence, and rapid completion in the living body, at a mean temperature, and without the sensible intervention of any ignited material, is a circumstance not lightly to be credited. Nothing, however, is more certain than that such a phenomenon does take place; and, to philosophy, the contemplation of it is highly interesting. Accidents of this kind, indeed, involve many important questions: the character or life of an innocent person may be implicated in their investigation. Hence arises the necessity of acquiring precise knowledge respecting their nature, so that we may not rashly attribute to premeditated crime, the consequences resulting from a very different cause. This remark is illustrated by the history of a man, whose wife perished at Rheims, in 1725, by the mysterious operation of spontaneous combustion. Her remains were discovered in the kitchen, about a foot and a-half from the fireplace: some parts of the head and lower limbs only, with few of the joints of the back-bone, had escaped the conflagration. A young and handsome female lived in the house, and horrible suspicions were awakened against the husband, who underwent all the rigor of a criminal prosecution. He appealed from his first sentence; and, in the interval, the woman's death was ascertained to have been occasioned by spontaneous combustion: the unfortunate man, in consequence, was delivered at once from infamy and the scaffold. It is unnecessary to revert for facts demonstrative of spontaneous combustion, to those remote periods when the mind, credulous from its ignorance of the physical sciences, blindly admitted the reality of appearances the most strange and incredible later times have exhibited instances of it, sufficiently numerous and authentic to dissipate every doubt respecting its actual occurrence. In attempting to explain these, it is proper to bear in view, that they take place in the living body; and, consequently, that we on the physical and chemical laws which regulate inanimate bodies. must banish all explanations founded exclusively the dissection of several gin-drinkers of both sexes, in whom no alcoholic odor, but inflammation of the stomach, could be detected. No weight, in fine, can be allowed to the resemblance of the flame, in human combustions, to that of burning alcohol, since it is common also to other inflammable substances, as hydrogen gas, and its combinations with carbon and sulphur. Το these objections, may be added the fact, that intemperance cannot be imputed to all those persons, without exception, who have perished from spontaneous combustion. As to the state of corpulence or emaciation, it will be invariably found that the fat of the body is never sufficiently deprived of its aqueous part, and the wasting never sufficiently decided, to admit the supposition of a degree of dryness favorable to rapid conflagration. From the observations already on record, it appears, that almost all the victims of spontaneous combustion were addicted to the use of strong spirits. Hence, it has been concluded, that the different parts of the bodies of such persons had undergone an alcoholic impregnation, and thus contracted a degree of combustibility sufficient to render them easily inflammable. This opinion seems, at first sight, to be supported by the dissection of persons who have died of intoxication, and whose bodies gave out a spirituous odor. It has been remarked, also, that the flame in these combustions exactly resembles burning spirits; that the individuals to whom this accident happens, were commonly very fat or very thin; and that, in the former case, the fat supports the flame, while in the latter, combustion is supported by the deficiency of moisture. But, on the other hand, can we, in sound physiology, admit the assimilation of any given substance, without its first undergoing certain changes? Vitality, or the living principle, destroys some combinations, and forms others. This faculty may, indeed, be modified by disease; yet it never entirely ceases but with life. We may even regard, as characteristic of vital action, the power it possesses of forming bodies more complicated than the products of inorganic nature. By this action are frequently modified the substances which come to it from the external world; and it then produces bodies, regarded by chemists as incapable of decomposition. Calcareous earth has been obtained from cones of pine growing upon a barren sand, which contained not one atom of that substance; and vegetables yield earthy constituents which form no part of the soil that gives them nourishment. Certain substances, nevertheless, preserve some of their properties after being assimilated, such as color and odor. Madder, when taken into the stomach, reddens the bones; log-wood communicates to the urine a red, and rhubarb a yellow tinge. Agaric, with which the natives of Kamtschatka intoxicate themselves, imparts its inebriating quality to their urine; and, by frictions with garlic, the breath is impregnated with the smell of this vegetable. But, it may be asked, are these substances really in the same state of combination, wherein they existed previously to their being submitted to digestion or absorption? Even on the supposition that alcohol might traverse the animated body, as it soaks a sponge, would not its extreme affinity for water oppose an insurmountable obstacle to its combustion? Do not, moreover, the inflammable eructations Sometimes observed in gin-drinkers, show that the spirituous liquor has already undergone some modification in the stomach; since the vapor of ardent spirits is not susceptible of taking fire by simple contact with the atmosphere. Anatomical inspection of dead bodies does not afford inferences more conclusive, provided the gin, taken abundantly a short time before death, has not penetrated their structure, when that structure could no longer offer any vital resistance to its progress. This last supposition is confirmed by VOL. VI. When the different cases of spontaneous human combustion have been classified, for the purpose of deducing general conditions from them, it will be found, 1. That women are much more subject to it than men ; now, it is evident, that the skin and cellular membrane of females are more tender and lax than those of man, and that women are more disposed to corpulence. 2. That spontaneous combustion has commonly occurred in aged persons, almost all those who have perished from it being past their sixtieth year. 3. That, independently of the state of debility proper to such age, these persons had suffered from particular debilitating affections, 4. That their debility must still further have been augmented by the circumstances of an inactive life. 5. That many among them were corpulent; now, corpulence, at an advanced age, almost invariably implies a relaxed state, particularly of the system called lymphatic; hence dropsy and constitutional infirmity are very common in such persons. 6. That the greater number of the victims of spontaneous combustion, were addicted to the use of ardent spirits, 7. That, near the place of the catastrophe, has almost constantly been found an ignited body of some kind, however small, as a lamp, or burning coals. 8. That the conflagration has been exceedingly rapid, and gained every part of the body ere succour could arrive. 9. That the flame was very light and unsteady, difficult of extinction by water; and only attacked the combustible substances around, when remaining for a considerable time in contact with them 10. That the place where the combustion happened, exhaled a strong empyreumatic odor; and that the walls, ashes, and cinders, were covered with a fœtid moisture and with fat. 11. That the trunk of the body, with the exception of a few bones, was commonly consumed; and that there remained, in most cases, a portion of the head and extremities, more or less considerable: and, 12, That, in the majority of these instances, the accident has taken place at a low temperature of the atmosphere, consequently in winter. For a correct explanation of the singular appearances now under consideration, it will be necessary, first of all, to distinguish the combustibility from the combustion itself, or, in other words, the cause exciting it. The combustibility of the human body becomes here, as we may R this kind befel a Bohemian peasant he died in the presence of many witnesses, from a column of air taking fire upon its extrication from the stomach, and baffling all the ordinary means of extinction. In such cases, the decomposition of alcohol, and of animal substance contained in the stomach, has generated a quantity of phosphureted hydrogen, which instantly inflames upon contact with atmospheric air. This process, however, extends no farther; because the other parts of the body do not possess the conditions requisite for a more general conflagration. suppose, a peculiar condition; since, in the atmosphere. Some years since, an accident of healthy state, it ranks in the class of substances most difficultly combustible. This combustibility, then, is determined by the debility consequent upon age, diseases, bodily inactivity, and intemperance. The abuse of strong liquors, especially gin, debilitates the absorbent system in a signal degree; and this state may give rise, in certain cases, to the formation of a mass of substance, alike inflammable and susceptible of accumulating, in greater or less quantity, in different parts of the body, according to their different structure. The combustible substance ought, therefore, to possess the property of penetrating easily into the interstices of the body, and of losing nothing of its combustibility by contact with liquids. These conditions are, in no class of substances, better combined than in the inflammable gases; nor, independently of them, can the fact now claiming attention, be well explained. It is necessary, therefore, for the production of the spontaneous combustion, that an inflammable gas accumulate in the cells of the cellular membrane, as the fluid of dropsy is accumulated; and, without admitting the preexistence of the whole quantity of gas requisite for the completion of the process, it may reasonably be supposed that it terminates in giving rise to a fresh extrication of gas from those parts of the burning body surcharged with hydrogen. By this theory is obviated the objection which the absence of a previously emphysematous state in the victims of spontaneous combustion has suggested; with some among them, however, this state seems really to have existed. Hydrogen constitutes one of the principal elements of the animal body, and combinations the most various are there formed by it with caloric, carbon, sulphur, and phosphorus: after death, as in life, its presence is unequivocally detected. It may be useful, in this place, to review the different phenomena which, in demonstrating that truth, connect it most intimately with the subject of spontaneous human combustion. A fame was observed to issue from the skin of a pig, at the moment of its being cut into with a knife; and two eminent anatomists saw a vapor exhaling from the stomach of a woman whom they had just opened: it took fire on the approach of a lighted candle. A similar fact also occurred in examining the stomach of another female, who, in the four days preceding her death, had taken no food. In some other cases, the gas inflamed without the intervention of any ignited body, merely by contact with the atmosphere. On the opening of an ox, which had been for some time sick, an explosion took place, and flame bursting from the stomach, to the height of more than five feet, scorched the butcher, as well as a little girl who stood beside him. It lasted several minutes, and gave out a most disgusting odor. The production of hydrogen gas, during life, cannot be doubted. It is known to be daily extricated in the bowels, and observations analagous to these just enumerated are by no means rare. Inflammable eructations frequently occur, particularly in northern regions, where persons, after an immoderate indulgence in gin, have been exposed to a cold Since, then, we cannot deny that the inflammable gases are developed in the human body, it cannot surely be going too far to admit their occasional accumulation in the cellular structure, in quantity proportioned to the laxity of that structure. Hence, it happens that the softest parts, and consequently the trunk, are most subject to these gaseous accumulations. But the human body, thus rendered highly combustible, cannot yet take fire without the intervention of an inflaming spark; for, even admitting that part of the inflammable principle consists of phosphureted hydrogen gas, we are unable to explain adequately, and in all cases, the general conflagration which ensues. By some, the presence of ignited bodies has been considered as the cause of this catastrophe; and others even assert that, strictly speaking, what really originates in accident, cannot be called spontaneous combustion. We are unable, however, from this view of the subject, to conceive how the burning should be so rapid, general, and complete, as it commonly is; and still less, on what part of the body it is first manifested. Instances of human combustion, moreover, have occurred, in which the presence of no ignited body could be suspected. In comparing these various considerations, with the fatal accident detailed in the subsequent history, the mind is led to regard electricity as exerting considerable influence in human combustion, or even as the occasional cause of this extraordinary phenomenon. No one can doubt, for a moment, the ideoelectricity of many animals; and this state exists, in a very remarkable degree, with many individuals of the human species. Experiments were made, during a severe frost, upon a woman whose ideo-electricity was such, that sparks issued from her hair as often as it was combed: a Leyden phial was even charged, and alcohol inflamed, with these sparks. Sparks of electricity, indeed, have often been emitted from stockings of wool and silk, when being taken off the limbs: examples of this kind might be multiplied to an indefinite extent. Inflammable substances, accumulated in the bodies of those who have perished from spontaneous combustion, must, by their nature, increase the electric state. Warmth will equally favor the explosion of the inflaming sparks. Thus, the proximity of fire or a lighted candle may, in some instances, have aided the process of human combustion: in others, the same effect may have been produced by violent exercise or other causes capable of exciting elec tricity. The electric spark, thus developed, tra verses with extreme rapidity, bodies in any way impregnated with inflammable matter; and the atter, taking fire upon every point, can no longer be quenched by the fluid parts. Thus, the ourning usually proceeds with such celerity, that the miserable victim has no time to call for assistance. The flame, as is proved by observation, at first spreads upon the surface of the body; because there, in contact with the air of the atmosphere, it is fitted to support combustion: it is subsequently propagated to the more deepseated parts. This theory will explain, without difficulty, the following circumstances already alluded to, and which we again detail with their reasons. I. Women are more subject than men to spontaneous combustion, because their more relaxed structure is favorable to gaseous accumulations. II. Spontaneous combustion most frequently takes place in aged persons; because such are more addicted than the young to the use of ardent spirits; they employ less exercise; and their vital energy, particularly that of the lymphatic system, is weaker. III. The characters of the flame, its lightness, mobility, and resistance to the action of water, are those of hydrogen gas. The natural phenomena in the production of which this gas enjoys a principal share, as ignes fatui and certain meteors, exhibit similar appearances. IV. The furniture and other surrounding ocjects are, on these occasions, little damaged; because hydrogen gas, in combustion, implicates the generality of combustible bodies, only when remaining in intimate contact with them. V. The moisture which invariably covers the walls where the conflagration takes place, as well as the charred relics of the body, is furnished by the combustion of the hydrogen gas, and also by the evaporation of the liquids of the body itself. The oily appearance of it arises from the fat which the heat has fused; and the fœtid odor proceeds from the empyreumatic oil. VI. The trunk of the body has always suffered more from this kind of combustion than other parts; this circumstance is explained by the size of its cavities, and the looseness of their cellular structure: and, VII. Winter is the season in which spontaneous human combustion most frequently occurs; because the cold air, which is a bad conductor of electricity, favors the ideo-electric state of the animal body. This view of its nature is founded on inductions afforded by many (more than 100) well authenticated histories of spontaneous human combustion, recorded by diligent and faithful observers, in very different eras and countries. There would be little propriety, however, in swelling the present article by unnecessary extracts from these: yet there is one which possesses extraordinary interest, as the subject of it, having survived the accident for a time, was enabled to give an account of the various circumstances by which it was preceded and followed. The case was published in one of the Journals of Florence, for October, 1776, by Mr. Battaglia, the surgeon who attended the unfortunate sufferer. It is related nearly in the following terms : 'Gio Maria Bertholi, resiuent priest at Monte Volere, went on business to a neighbouring fair; and, having spent the day in walking about the country, arrived in the evening at Femile, intending to sleep at the house of his brother-inlaw. Immediately on his arrival, he was conducted to his chamber at his own request, when he had a handkerchief placed between his shirt and shoulders; and, being now left alone, he betook himself to his devotions. Scarcely had a few minutes elapsed, when an uncommon noise, mingled with cries, was heard issuing from his apartment. The people of the house were alarmed; and rushing in, found the priest stretched upon the floor, and surrounded by a light flame, which receded as they approached, and ultimately vanished. He was instantly placed in bed, and on the following morning visited by the surgeon, who, on examination, found the skin of the right arm and fore-arm detached from the muscles, and hanging loose. From the shoulders to the thighs, the integuments were similarly injured. These detached portions of skin having been altogether removed; and, mortification being perceived on the right hand, which had suffered most severely, the parts were scarified. Notwithstanding this precaution, it had fallen by the next day into a state of complete gangrene. On the third day, all the other scorched parts were discovered to have degenerated into the same condition. The unhappy man complained of unquenchable thirst, and was horribly convulsed. The discharges from his bowels were putrid and bilious, and his strength was exhausted by continual vomitings, accompanied with delirium, and a burning fever. lying two hours in a state of insensibility, he expired on the fourth day. While he lay in this lethargic sleep, his attendant observed, with astonishment, that putrefaction had made considerable progress, so that the body exhaled an intolerable odor: worms crawled from it on the bed, and the nails were spontaneously detached from the fingers of the left hand. After "This unfortunate man informed the surgeon that first of all he had felt a blow, like that inflicted by a cudgel, upon the right arm; and that, at the same moment, he saw a light blue flame attach itself to his shirt, which was instantaneously reduced to ashes; yet his wrist-bands, at the same time, remained utterly untouched. The handkerchief, which, as formerly mentioned, had been introduced between his shoulders and shirt, was entire and free from every trace of burning. His drawers and breeches had equally escaped; but his cap was entirely consumed, although not a hair of his head had suffered from the flame. That this flame, says Mr. Battaglia, dispersed under the form of elementary fire, had destroyed the skin, and reduced the shirt and cap to ashes, without implicating the hair of the head, is a fact which I most confidently assert. Moreover, all the symptoms of the disease were those of a severe burn. The night of the accident was calm; the atmosphere very clear; no empyreumatic or bituminous smell; no appearance of smoke was perceived in the chamber; but the lamp, before full of oil, was become dry, and its wick reduced to a cinder.' Such is the outline of this very |