OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Inaudi, Jacques

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​INAUDI, JACQUES (1867– ), Italian calculating prodigy, was born at Onorato, Piedmont, on the 15th of October 1867. When between seven and eight years old, at which time he was employed in herding sheep, he already exhibited an extraordinary aptitude for mental calculation. His powers attracted the notice of various showmen, and he commenced to give exhibitions. He was carefully examined by leading French scientists, including Charcot, from the physiological, psychological and mathematical point of view. The secret of his arithmetical powers appeared to reside in his extraordinary memory, improved by continuous practice. It appeared to depend upon hearing rather than sight, more remarkable results being achieved when figures were read out than when they were written.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Bloch, Mark Eliezer

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​BLOCH, MARK ELIEZER (c. 1723–1799), German naturalist, was born at Ansbach, of poor Jewish parents, about 1723. After taking his degree as doctor at Frankfort-on-Oder he established himself as a physician at Berlin. His first scientific work of importance was an essay on intestinal worms, which gained a prize from the Academy of Copenhagen, but he is best known by his important work on fishes (see Ichthyology). Bloch was fifty-six when he began to write on ichthyological subjects. To begin at his time of life a work in which he intended not only to give full descriptions of the species known to him from specimens or drawings, but also to illustrate each species in a style truly magnificent for his time, was an undertaking the execution of which most men would have despaired of. Yet he accomplished not only this task, but even more than he at first contemplated. He died at Carlsbad on the 6th of August 1799.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Block

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​BLOCK (from the Fr. bloc, and possibly connected with an Old Ger. Block, obstruction, cf. “baulk”), a piece of wood. The word is used in various senses, e.g. the block upon which people were beheaded, the block or mould upon which a hat is shaped, a pulley-block, a printing-block, &c. From the sense of a solid mass comes the expression, a “block” of houses, i.e. a rectangular space covered with houses and bounded by four streets. From the sense of “obstruction” comes a “block” in traffic, a block in any proceedings, and the block system of signalling on railways.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Bloemaert, Abraham

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​BLOEMAERT, ABRAHAM (1564–1651), Dutch painter and engraver, was born at Gorinchem, the son of an architect. He was first a pupil of Gerrit Splinter (pupil of Frans Floris) and of Joos de Beer, at Utrecht. He then spent three years in Paris, studying under several masters, and on his return to his native country received further training from Hieronymus Francken. In 1591 he went to Amsterdam, and four years later settled finally at Utrecht, where he became dean of the Gild of St Luke. He excelled more as a colourist than as a draughtsman, was extremely productive, and painted and etched historical and allegorical pictures, landscapes, still-life, animal pictures and flower pieces. Among his pupils are his four sons, Hendrick, Frederick, Cornelis and Adriaan (all of whom achieved considerable reputation as painters or engravers), the two Honthorsts and Jacob G. Cuyp.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Blister

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​BLISTER (a word found in many forms in Teutonic languages, cf. Ger. Blase; it is ultimately connected with the same root as in “blow,” cf. “bladder”), a small vesicle filled with serous fluid raised on the skin by a burn, by rubbing on a hard surface, as on the hand in rowing, or by other injury; the term is also used of a similar condition of the skin caused artificially, as a counter-irritant in cases of inflammation, by the application of mustard, of various kinds of fly (see Cantharides) and of other vesicatories. Similar small swellings, filled with fluid or air, on plants and on the surface of steel or paint, &c., are also called “blisters.”
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Block, Maurice

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​BLOCK, MAURICE (1816–1901), French statistician, was born in Berlin of Jewish parents on the 18th of February 1816. He studied at Bonn and Giessen, but settled in Paris, becoming naturalized there. In 1844 he entered the French ministry of agriculture, becoming in 1852 one of the heads of the statistical department. He retired in 1862, and thenceforth devoted himself entirely to statistical studies, which have gained for him a wide reputation. He was elected a member of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques in 1880. He died in Paris on the 9th of January 1901. His principal works are: Dictionnaire de l’administration française (1856); Statistique de la France (1860); Dictionnaire général de la politique (1862); L’Europe politique et sociale (1869); Traité théorique et pratique de statistique (1878); Les Progrés de l’économie politique depuis Adam Smith (1890); he also edited from 1856 L’Annuaire de l’économie politique et de la statistique, and wrote in German Die Bevolkerung des französischen Kaiserreichs (1861); Die Bevolkerung Spaniens und Portugals (1861); and Die Machtstellung der europäischen Staaten (1862).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Blockhouse

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​BLOCKHOUSE, in fortification, a small roofed work serving as a fortified post for a small garrison. The word, common since 1500, is of uncertain origin, and was applied to what is now called a fort d’arrêt, a detached fort blocking the access to a landing, channel, pass, bridge or defile. The modern blockhouse is a building, sometimes of two storeys, which is loopholed on all sides, and not infrequently, in the case of two-storey blockhouses, provided with a mâchicoulis gallery. Blockhouses are built of wood, brick, stone, corrugated iron or any material available. During the South African War (1899–1902) they were often sent from England to the front in ready-made sections.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Bliss, Cornelius Newton

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​BLISS, CORNELIUS NEWTON (1833– ), American merchant and politician, was born at Fall River, Massachusetts, on the 26th of January 1833. He was educated in his native city and in New Orleans, where he early entered his step-father’s counting-house. Returning to Massachusetts in 1849, he became a clerk and subsequently a junior partner in a prominent Boston commercial house. Later he removed to New York City to establish a branch of the firm. In 1881 he organized and became president of Bliss, Fabyan & Company, one of the largest wholesale dry-goods houses in the country. A consistent advocate of the protective tariff, he was one of the organizers, and for many years president, of the American Protective Tariff League. In politics an active Republican, he was chairman of the Republican state committee in 1887 and 1888, and contributed much to the success of the Harrison ticket in New York in the latter year. He was treasurer of the Republican national committee from 1892 to 1904, and was secretary of the interior in President McKinley’s cabinet from 1897 to 1899.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Blizzard

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​BLIZZARD (origin probably onomatopoeic, cf. “blast,” “bluster”), a furious wind driving fine particles of choking, blinding snow whirling in icy clouds. The conditions to which the name was originally given occur with the northerly winds in rear of the cyclones crossing the eastern states of America during winter.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Lucretilis Mons

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​LUCRETILIS MONS, a mountain of the Sabine territory, mentioned by Horace (Od. i. 17, 1) as visible from his Sabine farm, and probably identical with the “Mons Lucretius” mentioned in the Liber Pontificalis (ed. Duchesne, i. 183), which speaks of “possessio in territorio Sabinensi quae cognominatur ad duas casas sub monte Lucretio” in the time of Constantine. The name “ad duas casas” is supposed to survive in the chapel of the Madonna della Casa near Rocca Giovane, and the Mons Lucretilis is generally (and rightly) identified with Monte Gennaro, a limestone peak 4160 ft. high, which forms a prominent feature in the view N.E. of Rome. Excavations on the supposed site of Horace’s farm were begun by Professor Pasqui in September 1909. (T. As.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Lucus Feroniae

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​LUCUS FERONIAE, an ancient shrine in Etruria. It was visited both by Latins and Sabines even in the time of Tullus Hostilius and was plundered by Hannibal in 211 B.C. It was undoubtedly in the territory of Capena (q.v.); but in imperial times it became an independent community receiving a colony of Octavian’s veterans (Colonia Iulia felix Lucoferensis) and possessing an amphitheatre. Its site has been disputed. Some authorities place it on the Colle Civitucola (but see Capena), others at the church of S. Abbondio near Rignano, others (and probably rightly) at Nazzano, which was reached by a branch road from the Via Flaminia, where remains of a circular temple have been found.
See E. Bormann in Corp. Inscr. Lat. xi. 569 sqq.; H. Nissen, Italische Landeskunde, ii. 369 sqq. (T. As.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Lucy, Richard de

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​LUCY, RICHARD DE (d. 1179), called the “loyal,” chief justiciar of England, appears in the latter part of Stephen’s reign as sheriff and justiciar of the county of Essex. He became, on the accession of Henry II., chief justiciar conjointly with Robert de Beaumont, earl of Leicester; and after the death of the latter (1168) held the office without a colleague for twelve years. The chief servant and intimate of the king he was among the first of the royal party to incur excommunication in the Becket controversy. In 1173 he played an important part in suppressing the rebellion of the English barons, and commanded the royalists at the battle of Fornham. He resigned the justiciarship in 1179, though pressed by the king to continue in office, and retired to Lesues Abbey in Kent, which he had founded and where he died. Lucy’s son, Godfrey de Lucy (d. 1204), was bishop of Winchester from 1189 to his death in September 1204; he took a prominent part in public affairs during the reigns of Henry II., Richard I. and John.
See J. H. Round, Geoffrey de Mandeville (1892); Sir J. H. Ramsay, Angevin Empire (1903); and W. Stubbs, Constitutional History, vol. i.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Luddites

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​LUDDITES, the name given to organized bands of English rioters for the destruction of machinery, who made their first appearance in Nottingham and the neighbouring districts towards the end of 1811. The origin of the name is given in Pellew’s Life of Lord Sidmouth (iii. 80). In 1779 there lived in a village in Leicestershire a person of weak intellect, called Ned Ludd, who was the butt of the boys of the village. On one occasion Ludd pursued one of his tormentors into a house where were two of the frames used in stocking manufacture, and, not being able to catch the boy, vented his anger on the frames. Afterwards, whenever any frames were broken, it became a common saying that Ludd had done it. The riots arose out of the severe distress caused by the war with France. The leader of the riotous bands took the name of “General Ludd.” The riots were specially directed against machinery because of the widespread prejudice that its use produced a scarcity in the demand for labour. Apart from this prejudice, it was inevitable that the economic and social revolution implied in the change from manual labour to work by machinery should give rise to great misery. The riots began with the destruction of stocking and lace frames, and, continuing through the winter and the following spring, spread into Yorkshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire and Leicestershire. They were met by severe repressive legislation, introduced by Lord Liverpool’s government, a notable feature in the opposition to which was Lord Byron’s speech in the House of Lords. In 1816 the rioting was resumed, caused by the depression which followed the peace of 1815 and aggravated by one of the worst of recorded harvests. In that year, although the centre of the rioting was again in Nottingham, it extended over almost the whole kingdom. The rioters were also thoroughly organized. While part of the band destroyed the machinery, sentinels were posted to give warning of the approach of the military. Vigorous repressive measures, and, especially, reviving prosperity, brought the movement to an end.
See G. Pellew, Life and Correspondence of H. Addington, 1st Viscount Sidmouth (London, 1847); Spencer Walpole, History of England, vol. i. (London, 1890); and the Annual Register for 1811, 1812 and 1816.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Ludington

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​LUDINGTON, a city and the county-seat of Mason county, Michigan, U.S.A., on Lake Michigan, at the mouth of the Marquette river, about 85 m. N.W. of Grand Rapids. Pop. (1900) 7166 (2259 foreign-born); (1904, state census) 7259; (1910) 9132. It is served by the Père Marquette, and the Ludington and Northern railways, and by steamboat lines to Chicago, Milwaukee and other lake ports. To Manitowoc, Milwaukee, Kewanee and Two Rivers, Wisconsin, on the W. shore of Lake Michigan, cars, especially those of the Père Marquette railway, are ferried from here. Ludington was formerly well known as a lumber centre, but this industry has greatly declined. There are various manufactures, and the city has a large grain trade. On the site of the city Père Marquette died and was buried, but his body was removed within a year to Point St Ignace. Ludington was settled about 1859, and was chartered as a city in 1873. It was originally named Père Marquette, but was renamed in 1871 in honour of James Ludington, a local lumberman.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Lucrinus Lacus

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​LUCRINUS LACUS, or Lucrine Lake, a lake of Campania, Italy, about 1/2 m. to the N. of Lake Avernus, and only separated from the sea (Gulf of Pozzuoli) by a narrow strip of land, traversed by the coast road, Via Herculanea, which runs on an embankment, the construction of which was traditionally attributed to Heracles in Strabo’s time—and the modern railway. Its size has been much reduced by the rise of the crater of the Montenuovo in 1538. Its greatest depth is about 15 ft. In Roman days its fisheries were important and were let out by the state ​to contractors. Its oyster-beds were, as at the present day, renowned; their foundation is attributed to one Sergius Orata, about 100 B.C. It was also in favour as a resort for pleasure excursions from Baiae (cf. Martial i. 63), and its banks were covered with villas, of which the best known was Cicero’s Academia, on the E. bank. The remnants of this villa, with the village of Tripergola, disappeared in 1538.
See J. Beloch, Campanien, ed. 2 (Breslau, 1890), 172.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Ludhiana

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​LUDHIANA, a town and district of British India, in the Jullundur division of the Punjab. The town is 8 m. from the present left bank of the Sutlej, 228 m. by rail N.W. of Delhi. Pop. (1901) 48,649. It is an important centre of trade in grain, and has manufactures of shawls, &c., by Kashmiri weavers, and of scarves, turbans, furniture and carriages. There is an American Presbyterian mission, which maintains a medical school for Christian women, founded in 1894.
The District of Ludhiana lies south of the river Sutlej, and north of the native states of Patiala, Jind, Nabha and Maler Kotla. Area 1455 sq. m. The district consists for the most part of a broad plain, without hills or rivers, stretching northward from the native borders to the ancient bed of the Sutlej. The soil is a rich clay, broken by large patches of shifting sand. On the eastern edge, towards Umballa, the clay is covered by a bed of rich mould, suitable for the cultivation of cotton and sugar-cane. Towards the west the sand occurs in union with the superficial clay, and forms a light friable soil, on which cereals form the most profitable crop. Even here, however, the earth is so retentive of moisture that good harvests are reaped from fields which appear mere stretches of dry and sandy waste. These southern uplands descend to the valley of the Sutlej by an abrupt terrace, which marks the former bed of the river. The principal stream has shifted to the opposite side of the valley, leaving an alluvial strip, 10 m. in width, between its ancient and its modern bed. The Sutlej itself is here only navigable for boats of small burden. A branch of the Sirhind canal irrigates a large part of the western area. The population in 1901 was 673,097. The principal crops are wheat, millets, pulse, maize and sugar-cane. The district is crossed by the main line of the North-Western railway from Delhi to Lahore, with two branches.
During the Mussulman epoch, the history of the district is bound up with that of the Rais of Raikot, a family of converted Rajputs, who received the country as a fief under the Sayyid dynasty, about 1445. The town of Ludhiana was founded in 1480 by two of the Lodi race (then ruling at Delhi), from whom it derives its name, and was built in great part from the prehistoric bricks of Sunet. The Lodis continued in possession until 1620, when it again fell into the hands of the Rais of Raikot. Throughout the palmy days of the Mogul empire the Raikot family held sway, but the Sikhs took advantage of the troubled period which accompanied the Mogul decadence to establish their supremacy south of the Sutlej. Several of their chieftains made encroachments on the domains of the Rais, who were only able to hold their own by the aid of George Thomas, the famous adventurer of Hariana. In 1806 Ranjit Singh crossed the Sutlej and reduced the obstinate Mahommedan family, and distributed their territory amongst his co-religionists. Since the British occupation of the Punjab, Ludhiana has grown in wealth and population.
See Ludhiana District Gazetteer (Lahore, 1907).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Puerto Cabello

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​PUERTO CABELLO, a city and port of Venezuela, in the state of Carabobo, 20 m. N. by W. of Valencia, the capital of the state. Pop. (1891), 10,145. Puerto Cabello has railway connexions with Valencia and Caracas. It stands on a small peninsula which partly shelters a large bay, called “ Golfo Triste,” by the early Spanish navigators. After La Guayra the harbour is the principal port of Venezuela, and it is provided with mole, wharves, railway communication with the interior, and other facilities for the handling of merchandise and produce. The town and harbour were strongly fortified in colonial times, but the port defences were greatly damaged in 1902 in a bombardment by some German vessels of the allied blockading fleet. Among the exports are coffee, cacao, dyewoods, hides, skins, and copper ores. Puerto Cabello suffered much in the War of Independence, changing hands several times and remaining in the possession of Spain down to 1823.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Puerto Real

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​PUERTO REAL, a seaport of southern Spain, in the province of Cadiz; on the north shore of the inner arm of the Bay of Cadiz and on the Seville-Cadiz railway. Pop. (1900), 10,535. Puerto Real (Port Royal) is the Portus Gaditanus of the Romans, and is probably the most ancient trading-station on the Bay of Cadiz. It owes its modern name to the fact that it was rebuilt in 1488 by Ferdinand and Isabella. The port has good quays, a dry dock of the Spanish Transatlantic Company, connected with their important works, and safe anchorage close to the wharves for the largest steamers. The town has fine squares, and broad, well-built streets, a handsome town-hall, many schools, a bull-ring, several convents, and a 16th-century Gothic parish church, with three naves and a remarkable atrium. There is an active trade in wine and oils; other industries are the construction and repairing of ships, and the production of salt.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Puente Genil

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​ PUENTE GENIL, or Puente Jenil, a town of southern Spain, in the province of Cordova; on the right bank of the river Genil or Jenil, a tributary of the Guadalquivir. Pop, (1900), 12,956. Puente Genil is on the Cordova-Malaga railway, and is the starting-point of the line to Linares. A bridge across the Genil, from which the name of the town is derived, joins the lower part of Puente Genil with the higher, which is built on rising ground extending to the olive groves above. There are several convents, schools for primary and higher education, hospitals, a municipal library and a theatre. The principal industry is the manufacture of olive oil. There are also flour-mills and linen factories. The alhondiga or permanent market is always well stocked with grain, vegetables and livestock.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Puerto Cortes

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​PUERTO CORTES (Cortez or Caballos), a seaport on the Atlantic coast of Honduras; in 15° 51' N. and 87° 56' W., at the northern terminus of the transcontinental railway from Fonseca Bay, and near the mouth of the river Chamalecon. Pop. (1905), about 2500. The harbour, an inlet of the Gulf of Honduras, is deep, spacious and secure, and there is a railway pier at which vessels can load and discharge. The exports include bananas, coffee, cabinet woods, rubber, sarsaparilla, livestock, deer skins and gold. The harbour was discovered in 1527 by Gonzalo d'Avila, and the town was founded a few years later by order of Hernando Cortes, from whom it derives its name.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Puerperal Fever

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​PUERPERAL FEVER (Lat. puerpera, from puer, child, and parere, to bring forth), the name given to the varieties of general infection, long regarded as a specific disease (" child-bed fever," " lying-in fever "), to which women are subject after parturition, owing to the genital tract being peculiarly exposed, in septic surroundings, to the invasion of pathogenic bacteria (see Sepsis). Owing largely to the labours of I. P. Semmelweiss (q.v.) the grave mortality formerly attending this condition has been enormously reduced; and the necessity of rigid cleanliness in the treatment of lying-in cases is fully recognized. When unhappily this is not the case, and infection takes place, its complications must be treated according to the circumstances, antiseptic douching being employed, or preferably curetting the endometrium with a sharp curette and swabbing with disinfectant solution. In definitely septicaemia cases antistreptococcic serum may be useful.