being derived perhaps from chole, bile, or from cholera, a water-spout or gutter. It is now universally employed in medicine as indicating one of two or three forms of disease, characterised by vomiting and purging, followed by great prostration of strength, amounting in severe cases to fatal collapse. The variety called cholera sicca (dry C.) by ancient writers (in which collapse and death take place without discharges) is comparatively rarely observed. The milder forms of C. occur almost every summer and autumn, even in temperate latitudes, and are hence termed by some-in reference to this country, and by way of contrast-British or Summer C.; while the more devastating and fatal forms of the disease are generally supposed to originate only in tropical countries-especially in India--and thence to be propagated epidemically over vast populations, and in a somewhat regular geographical course, reaching this country usually through Persia, the steppes of Tartary, Russia, and the Baltic, at the same time extending to Egypt, Turkey, and the south of Europe. These very fatal forms of the disease are commonly called Asiatic, Oriental, or Epidemic C.; sometimes Cholera Morbus, or Pestilential Cholera. The milder forms are sometimes also called Bilious C.; and the severer, Spasmodic C., from the character of the symptoms in each. Some writers of great authority are inclined to consider the two forms as one disease, varying in individual cases and according to season. It is certain that it is not always possible | to distinguish the one form from the other in particular instances; but the marked difference between the mortality of groups of cases of British C. on the one hand, and of Oriental or Asiatic C. on the other, renders it probable that there is something in the latter disease which amounts to a distinction in kind. Whether in the milder or severer form, C. is usually ushered in by a period of premonitory symptoms, when the more distinctive characters of the disease are not established, the case resembling one of common diarrhoea (q. v.) or looseness of the bowels. At this stage, it is very apt to be neglected, and unfortunately, in the severer epidemic forms of the disease this is the only stage much under control. Whenever, therefore, there is a reasonable suspicion that Epidemic C. is threatened, every person attacked with diarrhoea should make a point of placing himself under medical advice, and, if possible, of escaping from any situation in which epidemic disease is known to be prevalent. He should also be particularly attentive to diet, and especially to the purity of the water he drinks, and to its absolute freedom from contamination by animal matters filtering through the soil, or thrown into watercourses by sewers, &c. If water absolutely cannot be had in a pure state, it should be boiled before being used for drink, or indeed for any domestic purpose. Many cases of C., and several local epidemics, have been traced in the most positive manner to organic impurities of the drinking-water; and no single cause of the disease has been established by so much evidence as this. Hence, in all probability, arises the well-known preference of C. for low situations, and particularly for the low-lying flats on the banks of rivers, especially where the inhabitants are supplied with water from streams polluted by sewerage, and wells into which the contents of drains are permitted to filter from a superior elevation.-See Dr Snow's work on the Communication of Cholera, 2d edition, 1855; also the Report of the Registrar-general of England on the Cholera of 1848-1849, and his 17th Annual Report, for 1854.

It is hardly within the scope of a work such as this to present a minute description of fully developed C. in its severer or Asiatic variety. It is

truly an appalling pestilence,* too easily recognised by a few leading features. After some hours or days of simple relaxation of the bowels, vomiting com mences, and occurs again and again, accompanied by frequent and extremely copious discharges downwards, at first of matters coloured with bile as usual but in the end of colourless and turbid fluid resem bling water in which rice has been boiled. These discharges (often to the extent of gallons of liquid), succeeding each other with the most alarming rapidity, act as a drain upon the fluids of the body generally; and by the changes they effect upon the blood, contribute to bring about the state called collapse. In this condition, the patient lies motionless and apathetic, except when tormented by cramps, which are of frequent occurrence; the surface is cold; the finger-ends, lips, and tip of the nose become livid; the eyes are deeply sunk in the sockets, and often bloodshot; the tongue is clammy; the breath without any sensible warmth when caught on the hand; the pulse is suppressed at the wrist, the breathing extremely slow and feeble, the heart just audible through the stetho scope. Purging and vomiting have ceased; even the urinary secretion is dried at its source. In fact, all the vital processes are nearly brought to a stand, and unless reaction comes, a few minutes, or at most a few hours, suffice to bring life to a close. Reaction in the most favourable cases is gradual and without accident; it is not unfrequently, however, accompanied by fever, closely resembling typhus, and constituting, at least in the temperate zone, one of the chief dangers of the progress of cholera.

Medicine is almost powerless against C., except in the earliest stages, in which the treatment usually pursued in diarrhoea (q. v.) has sometimes been found useful. Very remarkable temporary restor ative effects have been found to follow the injec tion into the veins of dilute solutions of saline matter, resembling as nearly as possible the salts of the blood which are drained away in the discharges. Unhappily, these experiments have as yet only very imperfectly succeeded. The patient is restored to life, as it were, from the very brink of the grave; but he revives only for a few hours, to fall back into his former condition.

The true medicine of C., so far as we yet know, is preventive medicine. The measures to be adopted have been partly pointed out above; in addition, it may be said that personal cleanliness is of the first importance; and that all unnecessary contact with the sick should be avoided, as the disease is probably to some extent contagious, though by no means in the highest degree. In short, all the precautions are to be taken which are recommended in the case of Epidemic Disease (q. v.).

CHOLE'STERINE is one of those bodies which are termed by chemists lipoids, or non-saponifiable fats. but is now recognised as an ordinary constituent It was originally discovered in gall-stones, (although occurring in very minute quantity) of bile, blood, and the tissue of the brain. It likewise morbid fluid products. occurs in pus, the contents of cysts, and other

It separates from its solutions in glistening nacreous scales, which, when examined under the microobtuse angles are 100° 30', and whose acute angles scope, appear as very thin rhombic tablets, whose are 79° 30'. Different formula have been assigned

The epidemic of 1848-1849 carried off 53,293 persons in England and Wales; and that of 1854, 20,097 See the Registrar-general's Report for the latter year. This estimate is exclusive of cases of fatal diarrhoea.

persons.

characters the epidemic dancing mania,' which, in Italy, was called Tarantism (q. v.).

CHO'RLEY, a town in Lancashire, on a hill on the Chor, 9 miles south-south-east of Preston. It has an ancient parish church, supposed to be of Norman origin, and manufactures of cotton-yarn, jaconets, muslins, fancy goods, calicoes, and ging hams. In the vicinity are several coal-mines, a lead-mine, besides mines and quarries of iron, alum, slates, millstones, &c. Pop. in 1861, 15,013.

CHORUS, among the ancients, meant a band of singers and dancers employed on festive occasions of great pomp, and also in the performance of tragedy and comedy on the stage. In the time of the Attic tragedy, the C. consisted of a group of persons, male and female, who remained on the stage during the whole performance as spectators, or rather as witnesses. When a pause took place in the acting, the C. either sang or spoke verses having reference to the subject represented, which served to increase the impression or sensation produced by the performers. At times, the C. seemed to take part with or against the persons in the drama, by advice, comfort, exhortation, or dissuasion. In early times, the C. was very large, sometimes consisting of upwards of fifty persons, but afterwards it was much reduced. Its leader was termed the Coryphæus. The charge of organising it was considered a great honour among the citizens of Athens. The person appointed for this purpose was called the choragus. The honour was very expensive, as the choragus had to pay all the expenses incurred in training the members of the C. to perform their parts efficiently. They were, besides, fed and lodged by him during training-time, and he had also to provide for them masks and dresses. At times, the C. was divided, and spoke or sang antiphonally. These divisions moved from side to side of the stage, from which movement originated the naming of the single songs or stanzas, such as Strophe, Antistrophe, and Epode. How the musical element of the ancient C. was constituted or composed, is not known with any certainty. Possibly, it was only a kind of rhythmical declamation, and doubtless very simple. It was accompanied by flutes in unison. With the decline of the ancient tragedy, the C. also fell into disuse; and only lately has there been an attempt to produce the same on the stage in the manner of the ancients, as, for example, in Schiller's Bride of Messina. The music which has been set in modern times to some of the Greek tragedies, does not give the least idea of the original music.

the C. far exceed anything attempted a century ago; but this is not always an advantage, for the which has a sluggish effect; while increase in the tempi must necessarily be taken much more slowly, number of voices does not always produce a greater voices from the pope's chapel, who sang at the power of sound. The C. of thirty-five well-trained coronation of Napoleon L., in the cathedral of Notre Dame, Paris, produced a far greater and more wonderful effect when they entered singing the Tu es Petrus, than another C. of hundreds of voices, and eighty harps, that had been assembled and trained for the same occasion, in expectation of surpassing all that man could imagine. The greater the number, the greater is the difficulty in obtaining unity.-C., in organ-building, is the name given to stops of the mixture species, some of which contain 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, or more pipes to each note, tuned at consonant intervals in relation to the fundamental stops.

CHOSE IN ACTION, in the law of England, is that kind of property which consists not in possession, but in the legal right to possess. As this right can, in general, be vindicated and made available only by means of an action, the property to which it relates, whether real or personal, is called a thing (res or chose) in action, to distinguish it from a thing already in possession. Money due upon bonds and bills, goods bought and not yet delivered, are examples of choses in action, as is also the right to compensation for damage occasioned by breach of contract. By the strict rule of the ancient common law, no chose in action could be assigned or granted over, because it was thought to be a great encouragement to litigiousness, if a man were allowed to make over to a stranger his right of going to law. [See CHAMPERTY.] But this nicety is now not so far regarded as to render such a transaction really ineffectual. It is, on the contrary, in substance, a valid and constant practice; though, in compliance with the ancient principle, the form of assigning a chose in action is in the nature of a declaration of trust, and an agreement to permit the assignee to make use of the name of the assigner, in order to recover possession. The king is an exception to this general rule, for he might always either grant or receive a chose in action by assignment; and our courts of equity, making the rule itself give way to the expediency, in a commercial point of view, of facilitating the transfer of property, allow the assignment of a chose in action as freely and directly as the law does that of a chose in possession.'-Stephen's Commentaries, ii. p. 45. One would imagine that the more convenient and philosophical arrangement would be, by the interposition of the legislature, to make law conform at once to equity and expediency.

In

not worked. The natives are little better than barbarians some of the tribes, females as well as males, going entirely naked. From the elevation of the tract, the temperature varies more considerably. than in most parts of India, ranging in winter from 32° to 62, and in summer from 78° to 98°.

CHOTY'N, or CHO'CZIM. See KHOTIN. CHOUANS were bands of insurgent Royalists, who, during the French Revolution, organised a reactionary movement in Brittany. They obtained their name from their leader, Jean Cottereau. This

of Chouan-a corruption, it is said, of chat-huant ('screech-owl')-because, while he and his accomplices were engaged in their nocturnal work, they were wont to be warned of their danger by some one on the watch imitating the cry of this bird. At the period of the revolt, however, he followed the humble occupation of a clog-maker. The first indications of an anti-revolutionary spirit in Brittany manifested themselves in the beginning of 1791, when several trees of liberty were destroyed at night, and other more serious outrages committed. These disturbances were fomented by seditious priests. In 1792, an insurrection was planned by the Marquis de la Rouarie, with the sanction and approval of the two brothers of Louis XVI. The agents of the marquis entered into communications with Jean Cottereau-well known for the reckless audacity of his character-and other smugglers; but having the misfortune to be arrested, the carrying out of the insurrection devolved upon the latter. The Chouanerie, as the insurrection was called, at first disgraced itself, both by the drunken licence and the cruelty which marked it. After several successful exploits of the guerrilla sort, Jean Cottereau perished in an engagement which took place on the 28th July 1794, near the wood of Misdon, the theatre of his first efforts. Before this, however, other and more illustrious leaders had appeared in Brittany to direct the movement, the chief of whom were Georges Cadoudal (q. v.) and Charette. Through their endeavours it was more widely extended, and for a time seemed likely to imperil the security of France, but was suppressed towards the close of 1799. Petty spurts of insurrection, however, broke out till about 1803, when the Chouanerie ceased for awhile. In 1814 1815, it again made its appearance on both banks of the Loire; and after the July revolution, was once more excited by the Duchess of Berry on behalf of the Duke of Bordeaux, but crushed by the energetic measures taken by M. Thiers.

CHOUGH (Fregilus), a genus of birds of the crow family (Corvida), but approaching to the characters and appearance of the starlings (Sturnida).

The length of the bill has induced some naturalists, among whom was Cuvier, to place them beside the hoopoes, but this is now generally regarded as an error; they agree with crows in having their

and in their habits. The beak is longer than the head, strong, arched, and pointed. The tail is slightly rounded. The only European species is the common C., sometimes called the Cornish C., or Red-legged Crow (F. graculus), a widely distributed but very local bird, inhabiting the Swiss Alps, the high mountains of Spain, of Greece, of India, and of Persia, the south of Siberia, the north of Africa, and some parts of the British sea-coasts; but almost exclusively confined to situations where there are high cliffs. In these it generally makes its nest; sometimes, however, in ruined towers. Its long hooked claws enable it to cling easily to a rough rock, but it seems unwilling even to set its feet on turf. It lives in societies like the rook. It feeds on insects, berries, grubs, and grain. It is easily tamed, becomes very familiar and forward, and exhibits in the highest degree the curiosity, the pilfering disposition, and the delight in brilliant or glittering objects, which also characterise others of the crow family.-Other species of C. are known, natives of Australia, Java, &c. Some naturalists unite the chocards and the choughs into one genus.

CHOYA. See CHAY ROOT.

CHRISM (Gr. chrisma, ointment) is the name given to the oil consecrated on Holy Thursday, in bishop, and used in baptism, confirmation, orders, and the Roman Catholic and Greek Churches, by the extreme unction. There are two kinds of C.-the one, a mixture of oil and balsam, is used in baptism, confirmation, and orders; the other, which is merely plain oil, is used in extreme unction.

·

CHRI'SOME, the name of the white vesture laid by the priest on the child in former times at baptism, to signify its innocence. It was generally presented by the mother as an offering to the church, but if the child died before the mother was churched' again, it was used as a shroud. By a common abuse of words, C. came to be applied to the child itself. A C. child is a child in a C. cloth. As late as Jeremy Taylor (Holy Dying, c. i., s. 2), we have the following: Every morning creeps out of a dark cloud, leaving behind it an ignorance and silence deep as midnight, and undis cerned as are the phantasms that make a chrisome child to smile.'

CHRIST, a title of our Saviour (see JESUS), now in general use almost as a name or as part of his name. It is originally Greek, signifies anointed, and corresponds exactly in meaning and use with the Hebrew word MESSIAH (q. v.); so that this title given to Jesus of Nazareth, is an acknowledgment of him as the Saviour long promised to the house of Jacob and to the human race. As prophets, priests, and kings were anointed on being called to their several offices (1 Kings i. 34, 39; 1 Sam. xvi. 13; Exod. xxix. 7), so the Saviour was anointed as at once prophet, priest, and king; the Holy Spirit, often represented under this figure, being given to him to qualify his human nature for all that belonged to his mediatorial office and work.

The whole system of Christianity depends on the doctrine of the PERSON OF CHRIST. An essential difference necessarily exists on almost every point between the systems of doctrine maintained by those who do and by those who do not acknowledge a union of the divine and human natures in his person. Some of the early heretics maintained an opinion, which has long ceased to have any supporters, that the body of C. was not a real body, but a mere visionary appearance. See DOCETE and GNOSTICS. The opposite extreme is that of Socinians (q. v.), by whom C. is regarded as a mere man; whilst Arians (q. v.) regard him as in his