OBERLIN--OBESITY.

romance. From the French, O. was borrowed by the English poets, Chaucer, Spenser, and others, but he is most familiarly known from his appearance in Shakspeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. From old French sources, also, Wieland derived part of the materials of his poem of Oberon.

used as gnomons, placed in the public spaces, or afterwards made the basis of a popular prose erected in the spina of the circi. The first removal of obelisks to Rome took place in the reign of Augustus, who placed one in the circus, said to have been originally erected in the reign of Semenpserteus, 85 feet high; and another of 9 feet less, in the Campus Martius, and had it adjusted as a gnomon by the mathematician Facundus Novus; a OBE'SITY, or CORPULENCE, may be defined third obelisk was erected in the Circus of Caligula to be an accumulation of fat under the integuments and Nero in the Vatican, and originally dedicated or in the abdomen, or in both situations, to such an to the sun by Nuncoreus, the son of Sesosis, on amount as to embarrass the several voluntary the recovery of his sight. Two other small obelisks, functions.' A certain degree of fatness is not only which decorated the mausoleum of Augustus, and quite compatible with health, but, as has been were erected by Claudius or Vespasian and his shewn in the article FATS, ANIMAL, the fatty tissue sons, have been found. Other obelisks are known is of considerable use in the animal body, partly in to have been removed by Constantius, 354 A. D. P. consequence of its physical, and partly in conVictor, in his description of the quarters of ancient sequence of its chemical properties; and it is only Rome, reckons 6 of the largest size and 42 others. when the fatness begins to interfere with the The Romans added to them brazen spheres and discharge of any of the vital powers, that it can be other decorations. Some were removed to Constan- regarded as a morbid condition. Obesity may occur tinople by Theodosius the younger, and Valentinian, at any period of life, but it is most commonly after The translation of the inscription of one the fortieth year that the tendency to an inordinate of the Roman obelisks made by a Greek or Egyptian, accumulation of fat begins to shew itself. After named Hermapion, has been preserved by Ammianus that time, in the case of men, the pleasures of the Marcellinus. Kircher, Edipus Egyptiacus (tom. table are usually more attractive than in earlier life, iii. Rom. 1652-1654); Zoega, De Origine et Usu and much less muscular exercise is taken; while in Obeliscorum (fo. Rom. 1797); Cipriani, Sui Dodici women, the cessation of the power of child-bearing Obelisci di Roma (fo. Rom. 1823); L'Hôte, Notice induces changes which tend remarkably to the Historique sur les Obélisques Egyptiens (8vo, Paris, deposition of fat. The extent to which fat may 1836); Birch, Notes upon Obelisks, in the Museum of accumulate in the human body is enormous. Daniel Classical Antiquities (8vo, Lond. 1853), pp. 203-Lambert, who died at the age of forty years, weighed 239; Layard, Nineveh and its Remains, vol. i. p. 346; 739 lbs.; his exact height is not recorded, but, Sir II. Rawlinson, A Commentary on the Cuneiform Inscriptions (12mo, Lond. 1850).

390 A. D.

OBERLIN, JOHANN FRIEDRICH, distinguished for his active benevolence and usefulness, was born at Strasburg, 31st August 1740; and in 1766 became Protestant pastor of Waldbach, in the Ban de la Roche or Steinthal, a wild mountainous district of Alsace. Here he spent the remainder of his life, combining an affectionate diligence in the ordinary duties of the pastorate, with wise and earnest endeavours to promote the education and general prosperity of the people. The district had suffered terribly in the Thirty Years' War, and the scanty population which remained was sunk in poverty and ignorance. O. introduced better methods of cultivating the soil, and various branches of manufacture. The population, which was scarcely 500 when he entered on his labours, had increased to 5000 at the close of the century. Yet, though animated in all his actions by the most pure and disinterested piety, it may be questioned if he did not carry his moral supervision too far when he kept a register of the moral character of his parishioners, and searched with the minuteness though not the motives of an inquisitor, into the most insignificant details of their private life. O. was ably assisted in his reformatory labours by his pious housekeeper, Luise Schepler, who survived her master eleven years. He died 1st June 1826. Notwithstanding the humble sphere in wich his days were spent, his fame as a philanthropist has extended over the world, and his example has stimulated and guided many. See Brief Memorials of Oberlin, by the Rev. T. Sims, M.A. (Lond. 1830), and also Memoirs of Oberlin, with a short notice of Lou sa Schepler (Lond. 1838 and 1852).

according to the investigations of the late Dr Hutchinson (the inventor of the spirometer), the normal weight of a man six feet high should not exceed 178 lbs. Dr Elliotson has recorded the case of a female child, a year old, who weighed 60 lbs.; and those who are interested in the subject will find a large collection of cases of obesity in Wadd's Cursory Remarks on Corpulence.

a

The predisposing causes of obesity are peculiar habit of body, hereditarily transmitted; inactivity; sedentary occupations, &c.; while the more immediate or exciting causes are a rich diet, the body into fats, such as saccharine and starchy including fatty matters, and matters convertible in foods, and the partaking of such a diet to a greater extent than is necessary for balancing the daily Fat meats, butter, oily waste of the tissues. vegetable substances, milk, saccharine and farinaceous substances are the most fattening articles of food; whilst malt liquors, particularly rich and sweet ale are, of all beverages, the most conducive in promoting obesity. The fattening effect of figs and grapes, and of the sugar-cane, upon the natives of the countries where these are abundant, is well known. In various countries in Africa and the

East, where obesity is much admired in females, warm baths, indolence, and living upon saccharine and farinaceous articles, upon dates, the nuts from which palm-oil is obtained, and upon various oily seeds, are the means usually employed to produce this effect.'-Copland's Dictionary of Medicine, article 'Obesity.' The knowledge of the means of inducing obesity affords us the best clue to the belief that the administration of acids-vinegar, for rational treatment of this affection. It is a popular example, or one of the mineral acids-will check the deposition of fat; but if the desired effect is proO'BERON, the king of the Elves or Fairies. and duced, it is only at the cost of serious injury to the the husband of Titania. The name is derived by a digestive, and often to the urinary organs. The change of spelling from Auberon, more anciently employment of soap and alkalies, as advocated a Alberon, and that from the German Alberich, i. e. century ago by Dr Flemyng (A Discourse on the king of the Elves. O. is first mentioned as 'Roi du Nature, Causes, and Cure of Corpulency, 1760), is royaume de la féerie' in the old French poem of less objectionable than that of acids, but the proHuon de Bordeaux, par la France, which was I longed use even of these is usually prejudicial. The

OBIT-OBLIGATION.

efficacy of one of our commonest sea-weeds, sea-versary; and although the name obit was primitively wrack (Fucus vesiculosus), in this affection has applied only to the first, it has come to be used of lately been strongly advocated. It is prescribed in them all indiscriminately. the form of an extract, and its value is probably dependent on the iodine contained in it.

A very interesting Letter on Corpulence, recently (1863) published by Mr Banting, in which he

records the effect of diet in his own case after all medicinal treatment had failed, is well worthy of the attention of those who are suffering from

the affection of which this article treats. The following are the leading points in his case. He is 66 years of age, about 5 feet 5 inches in stature (and therefore, according to Dr Hutchinson's calculations, ought to weigh about 142 lbs.), and in August 1862 weighed 202 lbs. Few men,' he observes, 'have led a more active life

so that my corpulence and subsequent obesity were not through neglect of necessary bodily activity, nor from excessive eating, drinking, or self-indulgence of any kind, except that I partook of the simple aliments of bread, milk, butter, beer, sugar, and potatoes, more freely than my aged nature required. I could not stoop to tie my shoe, nor attend to the little offices humanity requires without considerable pain and difficulty; I have been compelled to go down stairs slowly backwards, to save the jar of increased weight upon the ankle and knee joints, and been obliged to puff and blow with every slight exertion' (pp. 10 and 14).

By the advice of a medical friend, he adopted the following plan of diet: For breakfast I take four or five ounces of beef, mutton, kidneys, broiled fish, bacon, or cold meat of any kind except pork; a large cup of tea (without milk or sugar), a little biscuit, or one ounce of dry toast. For dinner, five or six ounces of any fish except salmon, any meat except pork, any vegetable except potato, one ounce of dry toast, fruit out of a pudding, any kind of poultry or game, and two or three glasses of good claret, sherry, or Madeira: champagne, port, and beer forbidden. For tea, two or three ounces of fruit, a rusk or two, and a cup of tea without milk or sugar. For supper, three or four ounces of meat or fish, similar to dinner, with a glass or two of claret (p. 18). I breakfast between eight and nine o'clock, dine between one and two; take my slight tea meal between five and six; and sup at nine" (p. 40). Under this treatment he lost in little more than a year (between the 26th of August 1862 and the 12th of September 1863) 46 lbs. of his bodily weight, while his girth round the waist was reduced 124 inches. He reports himself as restored to health, as able to walk up and down stairs like other men; to stoop with ease and freedom; and safely to leave off knee-bandages, which he had necessarily worn for twenty years past. He has made his own case widely known by the circulation of his pamphlet (which has now reached a third edition); and numerous reports sent with thanks by strangers as well as friends,' shew that (to use his own words) 'the system is a great success;' and that it is so we do not doubt, for it is based on sound physiological principles.

O'BIT (Lat. obitus, a 'going down,' 'death'), literally means the decease of an individual. But as a certain ecclesiastical service was fixed to be celebrated on the day of death (in die obitus), the name came to be applied to the service itself. Obit therefore signifies, in old church language, the service performed for the departed. It consisted, in the Roman Church, of those portions of the Officium Defunctorum which are called Matins and Lauds, followed by a Mass of the Dead, chanted, or occasionally read. Similar services are held on the day of the funeral. and on the 30th day, and the anni

may

OBJECT, in the language of Metaphysics, is that of which any thinking being or Subject can become cognizant. This subject itself, however, is capable of transmutation into an Object, for one tute a metaphysical object, actual existence is not think about his thinking faculty. To constinecessary; it is enough that it is conceived by the subject. Nevertheless, it is customary to employ the term objective as synonymous with real, so that a thing is said to be objectively' considered when regarded in itself, and according to its nature and properties, and to be 'subjectively' considered, when it is presented in its relation to us, or as it shapes itself in our apprehension. Scepticism denies the possibility of objective knowledge; i. e., it denies that we can ever become certain that our cognition of an object corresponds with the actual nature of that object. The verbal antithesis of objective and subjective representation is also largely employed in the fine arts, but even here, though the terms may be convenient, the difference expressed by them is only one of degree, and not of kind. When a liar genius of the author at the expense of a clear poem or a novel, for example, obtrudes the pecuand distinct representation of the incident and character appropriate to itself, we say it is a subof the author retires into the background, or disjective work; when, on the contrary, the personality appears altogether, we call it objective. The poems of Shelley and Byron; the novels of Jean Paul Richter, Bulwer Lytton, and Victor Hugo; and the paintings of the Pre-Raphaelites, belong essentially to the former class; the dramas of Shakspeare, the novels of Scott, and the poems of Goethe, to the latter.

OBJECT-GLASS, the glass in a Telescope (q. v.) or Microscope (q. v.), which is placed at the end of the tube nearest the object, and first receives the rays of light reflected from it.

The

O'BLATES (Lat. oblatus, oblata, 'offered up'), the name of a class of religious bodies in the Roman Catholic Church, which differ from the religious orders strictly so called, in not being bound by the solemn vows of the religious profession. The institute of oblates was one of the many reforms introduced in the diocese of Milan by St Charles Borromeo, towards the close of the 16th century. members consisted of secular priests who lived in community, and were merely bound by a promise to the bishop to devote themselves to any service which he should consider desirable for the interest of religion. St Charles made use of their services chiefly in the wild and inaccessible Alpine districts of his diocese. This institute still exists, and has been recently introduced into England. Still more modern are the 'Oblates of the blessed Virgin Mary,' a body of French origin, which arose in the present century, and has been very widely extended; and whose chief object is to assist the parochial clergy, by holding missions for the religious instruction of the people in any district to which they may be invited. This body also has been established in England and in Ireland. Other similar institutes might be enumerated, but the constitution of all is nearly the same.

There is also a female institute

of oblates, which was established in Rome, about 1440, by St Francisca of Rome, and which consists of ladies associated for charitable and religious objects, and living in community, but bound only by promise, and not by vow.

OBLIGA'TION is a term used in Scotch Law to denote the binding effect of any legal contract, and

OBLIGATO-OBSERVANTISTS.

is often used synonymously with contract or promise. in the political proceedings of any party. He died in An obligation is said to be pure when it may be 1864. instantly demanded (called in England an absolute OBSCENE PRINTS, BOOKS, or PICTURES, contract). An obligation is conditional when it depends, for its legal effect, on some event which exhibited in public render the person so doing may or may not happen. Obligations are also divided into verbal and written.

OBLIGA'TO, in Music. When a musical composition is constructed in more than one part, any part is said to be obligato which is not merely employed to strengthen the others, but is necessary to the melodic perfection of the whole. An accompaniment is said to be obligato which does not consist of mere chords, but has its own melody.

O'BOE. See HAUTBOY.

liable to be indicted for a misdemeanour. Persons. exposing them in streets, roads, or public places, are also liable to be punished as rogues and vagabonds with hard labour. An important change in the law was effected by Lord Campbell's Act (20 and 21 Vict. c. 83), which was passed to suppress the traffic in obscene books, pictures, prints, and other articles. Any two justices of the peace, or any police magistrate, upon complaint made before him on oath that such books, &c., are kept in any house, shop, room, or other place, for the purpose of sale, or distribution, or exhibition for gain or on hire, and that such things have been sold, &c., may authorise a constable to enter in the daytime, and, if necessary, use force by breaking open doors, or otherwise to search for and seize such books, &c., and carry them before the magistrate or justices, who may, after giving due notice to the occupier of the house, and being satisfied as to the nature and object of keeping the articles, cause them to be destroyed.

O'BOLUS (Gr. obolos or obelos, a spit), the smallest of the four common Greek coins and weights, was originally, as is generally supposed, a small piece of iron or copper, similar in form to the head of a spit, or spear head, whence its name. In this form it was used as a coin, and a handful of 'oboli' was equivalent to a Drachma (q. v.). It was subsequently coined of silver, and in the ordinary round form, but still retained its original name; its value, both as a coin and a weight, was now fixed as the thin derision, to a party who are supposed to look part of a drachma, so that in the Attic system it was equivalent to 1ğd. and 15% Troy grains respectively; while the Æginetan obolus was worth 2ad. as a coin, and 253 Troy grains as a weight. Multiples and submultiples of this coin were also used, and pieces of the value of 5, 4, 3, 2, 14 oboli, and of 1, 3, and 4 of an obolus respectively, are to be found

in collections of coins.

3

O'BRIEN, WILLIAM SMITH, born in 1803, was the second son of the late Sir Edward O'Brien, Bart. of Dromoland, in the county of Clare, Ireland, and brother of the present Lord Inchiquin; that ancient barony having recently passed to the Dromoland, O'Briens on the failure of the elder branch. W. S. O. was educated at Harrow School, whence he passed to Trinity College, Cambridge. He entered parliament for the borough of Ennis in 1826, and was a warm supporter of Catholic emancipation. In 1835, he was returned on advanced liberal principles for the county of Limerick, and for several years strongly advocated the claims of Ireland to a strictly equal justice with England, in legislative as well as executive measures. Professing his inability to effect this in the united legislature, and having embroiled himself with the Speaker by refusing to serve on committees (for which refusal he was committed to prison in the House by the Speaker's order), he withdrew from attendance in parliament in 1841, and joined actively with Daniel O'Connell (q. v.) in the agitation for a repeal of the legislative union between England and Ireland. In the progress of that agitation, a division having arisen on the question of moral as against physical force between O'Connell and the party known as 'Young Ireland,' O. sided with the latter; and when the political crisis of 1848 eventuated in a recourse to arms, he took part in an attempt at rebellion in the south of Ireland, which in a few days came to an almost ludicrous conclusion. He was in consequence arrested, and having been convicted, was sentenced to death. The sentence, however, was commuted to transportation for life; and after the restoration of tranquillity in the public mind in Ireland, he, in common with the other political exiles, was permitted to return to his native country. After that date (1856) he spent much of his time in foreign travel; and although he wrote more than once in terms of strong disapproval of the existing state of things, he abstained from all active share

OBSCURAʼNTISTS, the name given, originally with dislike and apprehension on the progress of knowledge, and to regard its general diffusion among men, taken as they are ordinarily found, as prejudicial to their religious welfare, and possibly injurious to their material interests. Of those who and defend it, it is only just to say that they avow such a doctrine, and have written to explain profess earnestly to desire the progress of all true knowledge as a thing good in itself; but they regard the attempt to diffuse it among men, indiscriminately, as perilous, and often hurtful, by producing presumption and discontent. They profess but to reduce to practice the motto

A little learning is a dangerous thing. It cannot be doubted, however, that there are fanatics of ignorance as well as fanatics of science.

OBSERVANTISTS, or OBSERVANT FRANCISCANS. Under the head FRANCISCANS (q. v.) has been detailed the earlier history of the controversies in that order on the interpretation of the original rule and practice established by St Francis for the brethren, and of the separate organisation of the two parties at the time of Leo X. The advocates of the primitive rigour were called Observantes, or Strictioris Observantia, but both bodies were still reputed subject, although each free to practise its own rule in its own separate houses, to the general administrator of the order, who, as the rigorists were by far the more numerous, was a member of that school. By degrees, a second reform arose among a party in the order, whose zeal the rigour of the O. was insufficient to satisfy, and Clement VII. permitted two Spanish friars, Stephen Molena and Martin Guzman, to carry out in Spain these views in a distinct branch of the order, who take the name of Reformati, or Reformed. This body has in later times been incorporated with the O. under one head. Before the French Revolution, they are said to have numbered above 70,000, distributed over more than 3000 convents. Since that time, their number has, of course, been much diminished; but they still are a very numerous and widespread body, as well in Europe as in the New World, and in the missionary districts of the East. In Ireland and England, and for a considerable time in Scotland, they maintained themselves throughout all the rigour of the penal

OBSERVATION AND EXPERIMENT-OBSERVATORY.

OBSERVATORY-OBSIDIAN.

throughout the kingdom has been determined.

accurately necessary information to mariners, chronometermakers, and professional raters of chronometers. The observatory of Cambridge had its building On the 8th January 1858, the observatory was completed in 1824, and its first director was Pro-, transferred by an act of parliament to the Mersey fessor Woodhouse. It is now (1864) under the direction of Mr Adams, well known in connection with the discovery of the planet Neptune. The observatory was at first furnished only with a 10-feet transit instrument by Dollond. To this was added, in 1832, an 8-feet mural circle by Troughton and Simms, and a 5-feet equatorial by Jones. The Northumberland Telescope, so called from its donor the Duke of Northumberland, was erected under the direction of Mr Airy in 1838. This fine telescope, which is equatorially mounted, is of nearly 20 feet focal length, and has an object-glass with a clear aperture of 11 inches. It has been actively employed in observations of the planets and planetoids. The observatory has also been furnished with a transit circle, on the principle of the Greenwich instrument (1854). It was while in the Cambridge Observatory that Mr Airy first introduced the principle which he has since actively followed up, and which has been extensively imitated, of thoroughly reducing every observation before its publication.

The Radcliffe Observatory at Oxford was erected about the year 1774. In July 1861 was purchased for this observatory Mr Carrington's transit circle, formerly used by him at Red Hill. It possesses a fine heliometer, erected in 1850 by the Messrs Repsold of Hamburg, the object-glass by Messrs Merz of Munich, of 10 feet focal length, and 7 inches aperture.

The Royal Observatory of Edinburgh is situated on the Calton Hill there. It had its origin in a private astronomical institution; but it has been transferred to the crown, on condition of the latter taking upon itself the sole charge of defraying the expenses of the establishment, and of providing for its adequate and perpetual maintenance. It has recently taken a distinguished place as a timekeeping observatory, and by means of its meantime clock, fitted with a pendulum on the principle of Mr Jones's recent invention (see ELECTRIC CLOCK), time-guns are fired from Edinburgh Castle, at Newcastle, and in Glasgow precisely at one o'clock. The present astronomer is Mr Piazzi Smyth, who has taken an active part in the introduction of these useful measures.

Among the observatories in the British dominions, that at the Cape of Good Hope, founded in 1821, in pursuance of an order in council made in 1820 at the instigation of the then existing Board of Longitude, holds a distinguished place, both with regard to the excellence of its instruments and the importance of the observations which have been there made by several of its directors.

Among foreign observatories, those of most note are the observatory of Paris, commenced under the directorship of the celebrated Dominique Cassini; the observatory of Berlin, of recent date, but fitted with excellent instruments; the observatories of Göttingen and Königsberg; those of Dorpat and Pulkowa, in Russia; and those of Milan, Florence, &c., in Italy.

Of observatories especially devoted to particular and practical objects, the observatory of Liverpool, as conducted under its present able director, Mr Hartnup, deserves especial mention. This observatory was established in 1844 by the corporation of Liverpool, in order to obtain, with all practicable accuracy, the longitude of Liverpool, and then to obtain and preserve the Greenwich time for the benefit of the port of Liverpool, by rating and testing chronometers, and by giving the

Docks and Harbour Board. The principal instruments possessed by the observatory for the carrying out of the main object-namely, that of obtaining and preserving correct time—are an excellent transit instrument of about four feet focal length, a sidereal clock, and a mean-time clock. Besides these means of obtaining accurate time, there is now in use an admirable arrangement for testing the rates of chronometers at various temperatures, in which branch of practical horology, as well as in the adaptation of electricity to the publication of time through the contrivance patented by Mr R. L. Jones of Chester, this observatory has taken the lead of all other establishments (see ELECTRIC CLOCK, HOROLOGY, WATCH). When it is remembered that each error of 4" in a chronometer corresponds to a geographical mile of longitude upon the equator, the importance of extreme accuracy in these rating observations cannot be overestimated. The Liverpool observatory is also provided with excellent meteorological instruments, especially a self-registering barometer on a new construction by Mr King of Liverpool, and an anemometer, which registers the force and direction of the wind. The record kept by all these instruments consists of tracings on a paper, by which the registered phenomena during any twenty-four hours are seen at a glance. The observatory also possesses a good equatorial, which has been extensively used for determining with accuracy the positions of the small members of the solar system revolving between Mars and Jupiter-a class of observations to which the instrument is peculiarly adapted, and which are important towards supplying data for increasing the accuracy of navigation.

There are eighteen observatories in the United States, though at many of them no real astronomical work is done. Systematic astronomical observations are made at the U. S. Naval Obs., the Cambridge and Dearborn, those of Hamilton Coll. and Ann Arbor. The only systematic magnetical observations are now made (1871) at Washington by the U. S. Coast Survey. The following is a list of the usually recognised observatories in America: Dartmouth Coll., Hanover, N. H.; Cambridge, Cambridge, Mass.; Yale Coll., N. Haven, Conn.; Vassar Coll., Poughkeepsie, N.Y.; Dudley Obs., Albany, N. Y.; Litchfield Obs. of Hamilton Coll., Clinton, N. Y.; Alfred Obs., Alfred Centre, N. Y.; Halstead Obs., Princeton, N. J.; Philadelphia High School, Philada., Pa.; Lafayette Coll., Easton, Pa.; Lehigh Univ., Bethlehem, Pa.; Alleghany Obs., Alleghany, Pa.; U. States Naval Obs., Washington, D. C.; Cincinnati Obs., Cincinnati, O.; Hudson Obs., Hudson, O.; Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Mich.; Dearborn Obs., Chicago, Ill.; and Univ. of California, San Francisco, Cal.

OBSIDIAN, a mineral accurately described by Pliny under the name which it still bears. It is a true kind of native glass, composed of silica (from 70 to 80 per cent.), alumina, lime, soda, potash, and oxide of iron. It is hard and brittle, with remarkably vitreous lustre, and perfectly conchoidal fracture, the edges of the fractures very sharp and cutting like glass. It varies from semitrans sparency to translucency only on the edges. It is often black, or very dark gray; sometimes green, red, brown, striped, or spotted; and sometimes chatoyant or avanturine. It occurs in volcanic situations, and often in close connection with pumice, in roundish compact pieces, in grains, and in fibres. It is capable of being polished, but is apt to break in the process. It is made into boxes, buttons, eardrops, and other ornamental articles; and before