pnugues/EB7 huggingface dataset:
SLINGING is used variously at sea, but chiefly for hoisting up casks or other heavy things with slings, that is, contrivances of ropes spliced into themselves at either end, with one eye big enough to receive the cask or whatever is to be slung. There are other slings, which are made longer, and with a small eye at each end, one of which is put over the breech of a piece of ordnance, and the other comes over the end of an iron crow, which is put into the mouth of the piece, to weigh and hoist the gun as they please. There are also slings by which the yards are bound fast to the cross-trees aloft, and to the head of the mast, with a strong rope or chain, that if the tie should happen to break, or to be shot to pieces in fight, the yard, nevertheless, may not fall upon the hatches.

Slinging a Man overboard, in order to stop a leak in a ship, is managed thus. The man is trussed up about the middle in a piece of canvass, and a rope to keep him from sinking, with his arms at liberty, a mallet in one hand, and a plug, wrapped in oakum and well tarred in a tarpauling clout, in the other, which he is to beat with all dispatch into the hole or leak.
SLIPPER Island, a small island in the Eastern sea. Long. 93. 30. E. Lat. 14. 8. N.
SLOBODSK-Urraine, a province of European Russia, which extends in north latitude from 48° 35' to 51º 16', and in east longitude from 34º 10' to 38° 21', comprehending 26,217 square miles. It is an elevated plain, over which few hills are to be seen. It contains but few forests, and the soil is generally dry, but by no means unfruitful. There are many small rivulets and rivers, which discharge their waters into either the Don or the Dnieper. The climate is considered healthy, though intensely hot in summer, and as severely cold in winter. The land varies in quality, but much of it is highly productive in com. The inhabitants are of various races, some of them of Little Russian origin, others Cossacs, others from Great Russia, many called colonists, consisting chiefly of Germans or Poles, a tew Kalmucks, and many Jews. The whole population is 718,500, the far greater part of whom adhere to the Greek church, but there are Arminians, Catholics, Lutherans, and a few Mahomedans and Pagans. The province is divided into twelve circles, and contains 15 cities, 547 parishes, with 1180 market-towns and villages. The capital is Charkow, or Kharkow, in latitude 49. 59. 20., and longitude 36. 10. E.
SLOT, in the sportsman’s language, a term used to express the mark of the foot of a stag or other animal proper for the chace in the clay or earth, by which they are enabled to guess when the animal passed, and which way he went. The slot, or treading of the stag, is very nicely studied on this occasion. If the slot be large, deeply imprinted in the ground, and with an open cleft, and, added to these marks, there is a large space between mark and mark, it is certain that the stag is an old one. If there be observed the slots or treadings of two, the one long and the other round, and both of one size, the long slot is always that of the larger animal. There is also another way of knowing the old ones from the young ones by the treading; which is, that the hinder feet of the old ones never reach to their fore feet, whereas those of the young ones do.
SLOUGH, a market town of the county of Buckingham, in the hundred of Stoke. Though a town it is not a parish, one part being within the parish of Upton, and another part in the parish of Stoke Poggis. It is twenty miles from London and two from Eton, and is furnished with excellent inns, being on the great road to Bath and Bristol. It has a market on Thursday. It is chiefly remarkable from having been the residence of the celebrated astronomer Dr. Herschel, who constructed, in a garden near the road, his large and invaluable telescope, and made those discoveries in the heavens which have immortalised his name.
SLUICE, a frame of timber, stone, or other matter, serving to retain and raise the water of a river, and on occasion to let it pass.

Such is the sluice of a mill, which stops and collects the water of a rivulet, to let it fall at length in greater plenty upon the mill-wheel; such also are those used as vents or drains to discharge water off land; and such are the sluices of Flanders, which serve to prevent the waters of the sea from overflowing the lower lands.

Sometimes there is a kind of canal inclosed between two gates or sluices, in artificial navigations, to save the water, and render the passage of boats equally easy and safe, upwards and downwards; as in the sluices of Briare in France, which are a kind of massive wails built parallel to each other, at the distance of twenty or twenty-four feet, closed with strong gates at each end, between which is a kind of canal or chamber, considerably longer than broad; in which a vessel being inclosed, the water is let out at the first gate, by which the water is raised fifteen or sixteen feet, and passed out of this canal into another much higher. By such means a boat is conveyed out of the Loire into the Seine, though the ground between them rises above one hundred and fifty feet higher than either of those rivers.

Sluices are made in different ways, according to the use for which they are intended. When they serve for navigation, they are shut with two gates, presenting an angle towards the stream; when they are made near the sea, two pair of gates are made, the one to keep the water out and the other in, as occasion requires. In this case, the gates towards the sea present an angle that way, and the others the contrary way; and the space inclosed by those gates is called the chamber. When sluices are made in the ditches of a fortress, to keep up the water in some parts, instead of gates, shutters are marie so as to slide up and down in grooves; and when they are made to raise an inundation, they are then shut by means of square timbers let down in cullises, so as to lie close and firm.

The word sluice is formed of the French escluse, which Menage derives from the Latin exclusa, which is found in the Salic law in the same sense. But this is to be restricted to the sluices of mills, for as to those serving to raise vessels, they were wholly unknown to the ancients.
SLUR, in Musical Notation, a curved line drawn over two or more notes, signifying, that these are to be performed in a smooth and connected manner (legato.) When the slur is applied to two notes of the same degree, this generally occurs in what is called a syncopation, i.e . where a note of the accented time of the measure is united with a note of the same name belonging to the unaccented time immediately preceding, thus:
SLUYS, a town of Dutch Flanders, opposite the island of Cadsand, with a good harbour, ten miles north of Bruges, containing 14,000 inhabitants. Long. 3. 25. E. Lat. 51. 19. N.
SLUZK, a city, the capital of a circle of the same name, in the province of Minsk in West Russia, 715 miles from St. Petersburg. It is situated on a river which gives it its name, is the best city in the province, contains two Catholic, two Greek, a Lutheran, and a Reformed church, and 1000 houses, with 5800 inhabitants, among whom are many Jews. There is a public school or college, where mathematics and natural philosophy are taught. Its chief employment is in agriculture. Lat. 53. 3. Long. 27. 22. E.
SMACK, a small vessel, commonly rigged as a sloop or hoy, used in the coasting or fishing trade, or as a tender in the king’s service.
SMALAND, a province in the south of Sweden. See Calmar. [7:20:399]
SMALKALD, a town of Germany, in Franconia, and in the county of Henneberg; famous for the confederacy entered into by the German Protestants against the emperor, commonly called the league of Smalkald. The design of it was to defend their religion and liberties. It is seated on the river Werra, twenty-five miles south-west of Erford, and fifty north-west of Bamberg. Long. 10. 53. E. Lat. 50. 40. N. It is subject to the prince of Hesse-Cassel.
SMALL Key, a small island in the Eastern Sea. Long. 247. 16. W. Lat 10. 37. N.
SMALT, a kind of glass of a dark blue colour, which when levigated appears of a most beautiful colour; and if it could be made sufficiently fine, would be an excellent succedaneum for ultramarine, as not only resisting all kinds of weather, but even the most violent fires. It is prepared by melting one part of calcinated cobalt with two of flint powder, and one of potash. At the bottoms of the crucibles in which the smalt is manufactured, we generally find a regulus of a whitish colour inclined to red, and extremely brittle. This is melted afresh, and when cold, separated into two parts; that at the bottom is the cobaltic regulus, which is employed to make more of the smalt; the other is bismuth.
SMELL, a word which in most languages has two meanings, signifying either that sensation of mind of which we are conscious, in consequence of certain impressions made on the nostrils, and conveyed to the brain by the olfactory nerves; or that unknown virtue, or quality in bodies, which is the cause of our sensations of smell.
SMITHERY, a smith’s shop; also the art of a smith, by which iron is wrought into any shape by means of fire, hammering, and filing.
SMITING-Line, in a ship, is a small rope fastened to the mizen-yard-arm, below at the deck, and is always furled up with the mizen-sail, even to the upper end of the yard, and thence it comes down to the poop. Its use is to loosen the mizen-sail without striking down the yard, which is easily done, because the mizen-sail is furled up only with rope-yarns; and therefore when this rope is pulled hard, it breaks all the rope-yarns, and so the sail falls down of itself. The sailor’s phrase is, smite the mizen, that is, haul by this rope that the sail may fall down.
SMOAKY Cape, on the east coast of New Holland. Long. 153. 42. Lat. 30. 55. S.
SMOLENSKO, a circle or government of the eastern side of the Russian empire. It was formerly a part of Lithuania, and being gained by Russia in 1654, was then called White Russia. It is 10,980 square miles in extent, and contains 1,031,860 inhabitants, who are a mixture of Russians, Poles, and Jews. The city from which the province takes its name, stands in a valley, watered by the river Dnieper, which runs from east to west, and which is navigable for barges. The city, which has been rebuilt since the war, is now said to contain 15,000 inhabitants. For this population there are upwards of twenty churches. It has a cathedral for both Catholic and Greek Christians, an ecclesiastical seminary, and a gymnasium or high grammar school. It is a frontier and fortified town, and is remarkable for the great battle fought under the walls of the city, on the 16th of August 1812.
SMOOTH Island, on the east coast, of Van Diemen’s Land, in Norfolk Bay, about three-quarters of a mile long.
SMUGGLERS, persons who import or export prohibited goods without paying the duties appointed by the law. When we consider the nature, and still more the history of mankind, we must allow that the enacting of severe penal laws is not the way to prevent crimes. It is indeed much to be wished that there were no such thing as a political crime; for the generality of men, but especially the poorer classes, not discerning the propriety or utility of such laws, consider them as oppressive and tyrannical, and never hesitate to violate them when they can do it with impunity. Instead therefore of punishing smugglers, it would be much better to remove the temptation. But the high duties which have been imposed upon the importation of many different sorts of foreign goods, in order to discourage their consumption in Great Britain, have in many cases served only to encourage smuggling; and in all cases have reduced the revenue of the customs below what more moderate duties would have afforded. The saying of Dr. Swift, that in the arithmetic of the customs two and two, instead of making four, make sometimes only one, holds perfectly true with regard to such heavy duties, which never could have been imposed, had not the mercantile system taught us, in many cases, to employ taxation as an instrument, not of revenue, but of monopoly.

The bounties which are sometimes given upon the exportation of home produce and manufactures, and the drawbacks which are paid upon the re-exportation of the greater part of foreign goods, have given occasion to many frauds, and to a species of smuggling more destructive of the public revenue than any other. In order to obtain the bounty or drawback, the goods, it is well known, are sometimes shipped and sent to sea, but soon afterwards clandestinely relanded in some other part of the country.

Heavy duties being imposed upon almost all goods imported, our merchant importers smuggle as much, and make entry of as little as they can. Our merchant exporters, on the contrary, make entry of more than they export; sometimes out of vanity, and to pass for great dealers in goods which pay no duty; and sometimes to gain a bounty or a drawback. Our exports, in consequence of these different frauds, appear upon the custom-house books greatly to overbalance our imports; to the unspeakable comfort of those[7:20:429] politicians who measure the national prosperity by what they call the balance of trade.
SNAFFLE, in the manege, is a very slender bit-mouth without any branches. It is much used in England, the true bridles being reserved for war.
SNAITH, a town in the Wapentake of Osgoldeross, in the West Riding of the county of York, one hundred and seventy-four miles from London. It stands on the navigable river Aire, in a pleasant situation. The inhabitants were in 1801, 688; in 1811, 743; in 1821, 834; and in 1831, 885; but the inhabitants of the whole parish are 8530.
SNAKE, in Zoology. See Serpents.
SNARES, a cluster of seven craggy islands in the South Pacific Ocean, discovered by Vancouver. Long. 166. 20. E. Lat. 48. 3. S.
SNEEK, a town in the Netherlands, in the province of Friesland, the capital of a circle of the same name. It is situated on a canal connected with Leuwarden, a place of much activity, having many saw and oil mills, and some manufactories of pottery ware, and exporting much corn. It contains two churches, a stadthouse, and 6455 inhabitants.
SNIGGLING, a method of fishing for eels, chiefly used in the day time, when they are found to hide themselves near wears, mills, or flood-gates.
SNIPE. See Ornithology.
SNOWDON, one of the highest mountains in Wales. It is within the county of Carnarvon, but extends to the borders of Merionethshire. The highest point of the range is 3571 feet above the level of the sea. The snow begins to fall on it in November, and is seldom melted till the middle of June. It is easily accessible in several directions. The view from the summit is extensive and grand, on a clear day, which does not often occur. The hills of Scotland are to be seen, with a part of the coast, as well as the Isle of Man; and the hills of Lancashire, Westmoreland, and Cumberland, and, in some very translucent days, the hills of Kerry, in Ireland, have been perceived. The mountain of Snowdon was held sacred by the ancient Britons.
SNYDERS, Francis, a Flemish painter, born at Antwerp in 1579, and bred under his countryman Henry Van Balen. His genius first displayed itself in painting fruit; he afterwards attempted animals, huntings, &c., in which he exceeded all his predecessors. He also painted kitchens, &c, and gave dignity to subjects that seemed incapable of it. He was made painter to Ferdinand and Isabella, archduke and duchess, and became attached to the house of the cardinal infant of Spain. The king of Spain and the elector Palatine adorned their palaces with huntings by this artist. Rubens, Jordaens, and Snyders, used to co-operate in the enriching of each other’s pictures according to their several talents; and thus they became more valuable than if finished by either of them singly. Snyders died in 1657.
SOAGHIM, a town of Hindustan, in the Mahratta territories, province of Malwah, sixty miles west from Ooojain. Long. 74.50. E. Lat. 23. 12. N.
SOANE River has its rise on the east of the table land of Omercuntire, in the province of Gundwana. It flows through Pindarah, where, being joined by numerous other streams from the north-east side of this mountainous territory, it proceeds in a northerly course to the Ganges, which it joins in the province of Bahar, after a winding course of about five hundred miles.
SOANK, a small river of Hindustan, in the province of Bahar, whence it flows in a southerly direction, and being joined by the small river Borkee, their united streams form the Braminy Noddy river.
SOCAGE, in its most general and extensive signification, seems to denote a tenure by any certain and determinate service. And in this sense it is by our ancient writers constantly put in opposition to chivalry or knight-service, where the tenure was precarious and uncertain. The service must therefore be certain, in order to denominate it socage; as to hold by fealty and twenty shillings rent; or, by homage, fealty, and twenty shillings rent; or, by homage and fealty without rent; or, by fealty and certain corporal service, as ploughing the lord’s land for three days; or, by fealty only without any other service; for all these are tenures in socage.

Socage is of two sorts: free -socage, where the services are not only certain but honourable; and villein socage, where the services, though certain, are of a baser nature. Such as hold by the former tenure are called, in Glanville and other subsequent authors, by the name of liberi sohe-manni, or tenants in free-socage. The word is derived from the Saxon appellation soc, which signifies liberty or privilege, and, being joined to an usual termination, it forms socage, in Latin socagium, signifying a free or privileged tenure.

It seems probable that the socage-tenures were the relics of Saxon liberty; retained by such persons as had neither forfeited them to the king, nor been obliged to exchange their tenure for the more honourable, as it was called, but at the same time more burthensome, tenure of knight-service. This is peculiarly remarkable in the tenure which prevails in Kent, called gavelkind, which is generally acknowledged to be a species of socage-tenure; and its preservation from the innovations of the Norman conqueror is a fact universally known. And those who thus preserved their liberties were said to hold in free and common socage.
SOCIETY, a number of rational and moral beings, united for their common preservation and happiness. There are shoals of fishes, herds of quadrupeds, and flocks of birds. We call crows and beavers, and several other species of animals, gregarious; but it is hardly good English to say that they are social. It is only human society that can be regarded in this light, and the phenomena which it presents are highly worthy of our notice.

Such are the advantages which each individual evidently derives from living in a social state; and so helpless does any human being appear in a solitary state, that we are naturally led to conclude, that if there ever was a period at which mankind were solitary beings, that period could not be of long duration; for their aversion to solitude and love of society would soon induce them to enter into social union. Such is the opinion which we are led to conceive when we compare our own condition as members of civilised and enlightened society with that of the brutes around us, or with that of savages in the earlier and ruder periods of social life. When we hear of Indians wandering naked through the woods, destitute of arts, unskilled in agriculture, scarcely capable of moral distinctions, void of all religious sentiments, or possessed with the most absurd notions concerning superior powers, and procuring means of subsistence in a manner equally precarious with that of the beasts of prey, we look down with pity on their condition, or turn from it with horror. When we view the order of cultivated society, and consider our institutions, arts, and manners, we rejoice over our superior wisdom and happiness. Man in a civilized state appears a being of a superior order to man in a savage state; yet some philosophers tell us, that it is only he who, having been educated in society, has been taught to depend upon others, that can be helpless or miserable when placed in a solitary state. They view the savage who exerts himself with intrepidity to supply his wants, or bears them with fortitude, as the greatest hero, and possessing the greatest happiness.

Whatever be the supposed advantages of a solitary state, certain it is that mankind, at the earliest periods, were united in society. Various theories have been formed concerning the circumstances and principles which gave rise to this union; but it has been sufficiently proved, that the greater part of them are founded in error; that they suppose the original state of man to have been that of savages; and that such a supposition is contradicted by the most authentic records of antiquity. For though the records of the earlier ages are generally obscure, fabulous, and imperfect, yet happily there is one free from the imperfections of the rest, and of undoubted authenticity, to which we may safely have recourse. This record is the Pentateuch of Moses, which presents us with a genuine account of the origin of man and of society.[7:20:434]
SOCINIANS, in church history, a sect of Christian heretics, so called from their founder Faustus Socinus. They maintain, “that Jesus Christ was a mere man, who had no existence before he was conceived by the Virgin Mary; that the Holy Ghost is no distinct person, but that the Father is truly and properly God. They own, that the name of God is given in the Holy Scriptures to Jesus Christ; but contend, that it is onlv a deputed title, which however in-[7:20:435] vests him with an absolute authority over all created beings, and renders him an object of worship to men and angels. They deny the doctrines of satisfaction and imputed righteousness; and say that Christ only preached the truth to mankind, set before them in himself an example of heroic virtue, and sealed his doctrines with his blood. Original sin anti absolute predestination they esteem scholastic chimeras. They likewise maintain the sleep of the soul, which they say becomes insensible at death, and is raised again with the body at the resurrection, when the good shall be established in the possession of eternal felicity, while the wicked shall be consigned to a fire that will not torment them eternally, but for a certain duration in proportion to their demerits.”

This sect has long been indignant at being styled Socinians. They disclaim every human leader; and professing to be guided solely by the word of God and the deductions of reason, they call themselves Unitarians, and affect to consides all other Christians, even their friends the Arians, as Polytheists. Modern Unitarianism, as taught by Dr. Priestley, is, however, a very different thing from Socinianism, as we find it in the Racovian Catechism and other standard works of the sect.
SOCOTARA, an bland of the Indian Ocean, about forty leagues to the eastward of Cape Guardafui. It is mountainous, with a bold shore and excellent harbours, and the inhabitants are in general civil to strangers. The principal produce is aloes. The town has a handsome appearance, the houses being built of stone, and some with several mosques. The residence of the king is in long. 53. 33. E. Lat. 12. 39. N.
Socrates was also the name of an ecclesiastical historian of the fifth century, born at Constantinople in the beginning of the reign of Theodosius: he professed the law and pleaded at the bar, whence he obtained the name of Scholasticus. He wrote an ecclesiastical history from the year 309, when Eusebius ended, down to the year 440; and wrote with great exactness and judgment. His work is to be found in different editions of Eusebius, Sozomenus, and the other Greek writers on the history of the church.
SODA, the name given by the French chemists to the mineral alkali, which is found native in many parts of the world.