an ancient city in the plain country of the tribe of Judah, and one of those fortified by Rehoboam. The "cave of Adullam," in which David took refuge when pressed by the Philistines, is believed not to have been near the city, but towards the Dead Sea, not far from Bethlehem.
ADULT, an appellation given to any thing that is arrived at maturity; thus, we say an adult person, an adult plant, &c. Among civilians, it denotes a youth between 14 and 25 years of age.
ADULTERATION, the act of debasing, by mixing with any pure and genuine commodity a spurious article, or an inferior one of the same kind, for pecuniary profit; but it may also occur accidentally, as, for instance, by the action of acids and oils on vessels of copper or lead in culinary and other operations. (See Medical Jurisprudence.) But few articles of commerce, comparatively, are exempt from fraudulent deterioration; and although the adulteration of excisable commodities and of food are offences punishable by law, the risk too frequently is outweighed by the temptation of gain. In Paris, malpractices connected with the adulteration of food are investigated by the Conseil de Salubrité, and punished; but our laws are directed chiefly to the protection of such articles as affect the revenue. Adulterations of food, when wilful, have been made punishable by the laws of most countries. In Great Britain numerous acts have been passed for the prevention of adulterations: they are usually punished by a fine, determined by a summary process before a magistrate. In Turkey a culprit baker has his ears nailed to his door. By 5th and 6th Vict. c.93, §§ 1, 3, 8, manufacturers of tobacco or snuff are liable to a penalty of L200 for having in their possession any substance or liquid to be used, or capable of being used, as a substitute for tobacco or snuff, or to adulterate or give them weight. The preparer, vender, or disposer of such articles, is liable to the same. For actual adulteration the penalty is L300, and for having such adulterated goods in possession, L200. After a similar manner beer is protected by still heavier penalties; which laws extend to chemists, druggists, and beer retailers. See 56th Geo. III. c.58, 1st Will. IV. c.51, 64, 4th and 5th Will. IV. c.85. Tea, coffee, cocoa, pepper, &c. are protected by law, but the adulterations of these, as of most other articles of food, are almost endless. The mixture of chicory with coffee, is, however, authorized under certain conditions. A treasury minute of 27th July 1852 prohibiting the sale of "chicory or other vegetable substances mixed with coffee," was rescinded by a subsequent minute of 25th Feb. 1853, which permits dealers in coffee "to keep and sell chicory prepared and mixed with coffee, provided the packages in which such mixture is delivered to purchasers have printed distinctly thereon, according to directions which will be given by the Board of Inland Revenue, the whole of the following words, 'Mixture of Coffee and Chicory.'"
The following results were obtained by a recent series of analyses of some articles of common domestic consumption, purchased from different dealers, chiefly in the metropolis. In the several kinds of tea were found (partly, perhaps, accidentally present) exhausted tea-leaves, leaves of the beech, elm, horse-chestnut, plane, bastard-plane, fancy oak, willow, poplar, hawthorn, and sloe; catechu, rose-pink, blacklead, soapstone, sulphate of iron, logwood, indigo, starch, rice husks, excrement of silkworms, Prussian blue, sulphate of lime, verdigris, &c. Of 18 samples of chicory procured from manufacturers, 5 were adulterated with roasted wheat-flour; and of 16 samples of chicory purchased from different grocers, several were coloured with Venetian red, or ruddle. Of 68 samples of cocoa and chocolate, 39 contained coloured earthy substances; in some samples of cocoa, sugar and starch constituted more than half the article. Of 24 samples of bread, all contained more or less alum; and it may be observed that the quarterm loaf, as delivered at houses by 13 different bakers, showed deficiency in weight, the maximum being between 3 and 4 ounces. Out of 30 samples of oatmeal, 16 were adulterated with barley-meal; in one instance, apparently, much more than one-half. Of 36 samples of arrowroot, 18 were mixed with potato-flour, or potato-starch, sago-powder, or tapioca-starch, &c.; and 5 were almost entirely potato-starch. Of 26 samples of milk, 11 were mixed with water, in proportions varying from 10 to 50 per cent. Of 28 samples purchased as isinglass, 10 consisted entirely of gelatine. (See Lancet, vol. i. 1851.) It is well known that quack medicines frequently contain ingredients they are guaranteed not to contain; hence the evils resulting from their indiscriminate use. Nor are woollen, linen, and silk goods, exempt from inferior admixture; various substances are employed to give body to silk fabrics; as in China a gluey preparation from the Ficus Tenax is used to give them weight and gloss. The above facts will give some idea of the extent to which adulteration is practised in the most common articles of consumption. We may add that all legislative enactments on the subject will prove ineffectual unless the public exercise their own discrimination, and dealers who are discovered to have imposed spurious commodities are made to feel that honesty is the best policy.
ADULTERATION of Wines. The various substances used in the manufacture to flavour and to colour wines (such as almonds, raisins, orange root, brown sugar, brandy, logwood, whortleberries, elderberries, &c.), must be distinguished from others which are directly deleterious, such as alum, used to impart astringency, and litharge and ceruse, to dulcify "pricked" or sour wines. The following is an excellent test for any of the preparations of lead: mix an aqueous solution of tartaric acid with liquid sulphuretted hydrogen; when added to the suspected wine, should any copper or iron be present, they are kept in solution by the tartaric acid, while the lead is thrown down by the sulphuretted hydrogen as a dark precipitate. Red wine should be decolorized before using the test, which is conveniently done by mixing the wine with an equal weight of milk, and filtering it. When the tartrate of lead is found in the bottom of the cask, it may easily be detected by calcining a portion of the insoluble matter, and reducing it by the blowpipe on charcoal. A portion of the sediment may be digested with vinegar, which would give, by evaporation, acetate of lead; and it may be tried by sulphuretted hydrogen. Alum may be precipitated from white wine by carbonate of soda gradually added until no more falls down; filter; on the filter will be found alumine. The sulphate of potassa remains in the solution; but the quantity present may be found by precipitating the sulphuric acid by muriate of baryta. Iron is sometimes accidentally present in wines; but it is not dangerous, and may be detected by nutgalls. Copper sometimes occurs from the use of copper stopcocks: it is detected by the addition of ammonia; and, if much, by a plate of polished iron left some time in the wine. Arsenic has occasionally occurred from the sulphuring of the cask. After decoloration by animal charcoal, pass a stream of sulphuretted hydrogen through the wine, and a yellow precipitate will fall, which may be reduced to the metallic state by charcoal and soda. The same tests are applicable to all fermented liquors.
—See Henderson's Hist. of Ancient and Modern Wines.
ADULTERATION of Coin. This has been accounted among all nations, both in ancient and modern times a very grave offence, and punishable by death in several ways. It was formerly considered as treason in Great Britain, and ri- Adulterers are severely punished with death; but in the amelioration of our criminal code by Lord John Russell's act (Will. IV., c. 34, Vict. 1), the punishment has been commuted to transportation for any period not less than seven years, or by imprisonment for not more than four years, at the discretion of the judge.
The specific gravity of pure gold = 19.30; standard gold = 18.88; pure silver = 10.51; standard silver = 10.34. The proportion of alloy in the gold and silver coin of Britain is copper, which gives durability. A genuine coin, unless it be cracked, is quite sonorous; yet even this quality is not an invariable test for counterfeit money. Much false coin is in circulation, especially in the metropolis, a statement confirmed by its very frequent reception as change. Besides the frauds by clipping, filing, casing, electroplating, &c., the debasement of coin has been effected by boring the edge of a piece, and plugging the cavity with inferior metal; in this manner has platinum been inserted in gold. Another method has been practised by sawing a gold piece laterally, and skilfully filling the centre with platinum; a fraud which cutting alone could detect.
To ascertain the adulteration of silver and gold coin by excess of copper, the following processes will suffice: dissolve a given weight of the silver in nitric acid, and precipitate by a solution of common salt; dry, and weigh the precipitate, which is the chloride of silver, and contains 75.5 per cent. of the metal; or it may be reduced on charcoal before the blowpipe, when a button of pure silver will be obtained, by weighing which, the proportions of silver and of copper will be known. Silver coin is very frequently imitated by some white alloy, generally of tin, antimony, and lead; it may be known by its pliancy and dull appearance, or it may be tested for silver, as described above. German silver, a beautiful imitation of silver by nickel and copper, may be detected by its deficient specific gravity, and its emitting, when briskly rubbed, a faint, coppery odour; or by dissolving it in nitric acid, and adding a solution of common salt, when it will give no precipitate. The amount of alloy in gold may readily be ascertained, for ordinary purposes, by the streak on touchstone, and comparing that with the streak of the gold needles made for the purpose; or more nicely by this process; file off a given weight of the gold, and dissolve in aqua regia, then precipitate the gold by immersing in the solution a plate of silver or copper; or more quickly, by weak galvanic action; or the gold may be thrown down by addition of an alkaline solution, or by adding the muriate of tin, which throws down the purple powder of Cassius, from which the quantity of gold may be easily ascertained, by oxidising with the blowpipe a given weight of the powder, and so obtaining a button of pure gold.
The purity of copper is ascertained by dissolving a given weight in any of the mineral acids, and obtaining copper of cementation by immersing a plate of iron or zinc in the solution; or by decomposing the salt of copper by charcoal, alkali, and heat, in the usual way. See CHEMISTRY. It may be noticed as a curious fact, that the copper coinsage of Will. IV. was found to contain gold, from which discovery these coins speedily became scarce.
ADULTERINE, in the Civil Law, is particularly applied to a child issued from an adulterous amour or commerce. Adulterine children are more odious than the illegitimate offspring of single persons. The Roman law even refuses them the title of natural children, as if nature disowned them, and the Canon law discouraged their admission to orders. Those are not deemed adulterine who are begotten of a woman openly married through ignorance of a former wife being alive. By a decree of the parliament of Paris, adulterine children are declared not legitimised by the subsequent marriage of the parties, even though a papal dispensation be had for such marriage, where- adulterine in is a clause of legitimation.
ADULTERINE Marriages, in St Augustine's sense, denote second marriages contracted after a divorce.
ADULTERY, an unlawful commerce between one married person and another, or between a married and unmarried person.
Punishments have been annexed to adultery in most ages and nations, though of different degrees of severity. In many it has been capital; in others venial, and attended only with slight pecuniary mulcts. Some of the penalties are serious, and even cruel; others of a jocose and humorous kind. Even contrary things have been enacted as punishments for adultery. By some laws the criminals are forbidden marrying together in case they become single; by others they are forbidden to marry any besides each other; by some they are incapacitated from ever committing the like crime again; by others they are glutted with it till it becomes nauseous.
Among the rich Greeks, adulterers were allowed to redeem themselves by a pecuniary fine; the woman's father, in such cases, returned the dower he had received from her husband, which some think was refunded by the adulterer. Another punishment was putting out the eyes of adulterers. The Athenians had an extraordinary way of punishing adulterers, called ἀποστραβωμένοι καὶ παραλήγων, practised at least on the poorer sort who were not able to pay the fines. This was an awkward sort of empalement, performed by thrusting one of the largest radishes up the anus of the adulterer, or, in defect thereof, a fish with a large head, called mugil, mullet. One Alexius is said to have died in this way, though it is doubted whether the punishment was reputed mortal. Juvenal and Catullus speak of this custom as received also among the Romans, though not authorized by an express law, as it was among the Greeks.
There are various conjectures concerning the ancient punishment of adultery among the Romans. Some will have it to have been made capital by a law of Romulus, and again by the twelve tables; others, that it was first made capital by Augustus; and others, not before the time of Constantine. The truth is, the punishment of it in early days was very various, much being left to the discretion of the husband and parents of the adulterous wife, who exercised it differently, rather with the acquiescence and countenance of the magistrate, than by any formal authority from him. Thus, we are told the wife's father was allowed to kill both parties, when caught in the fact, provided he did it immediately, killed both together, and as it were with one blow. The same power ordinarily was not indulged the husband, except the crime were committed with some mean or infamous person; though, in other cases, if his rage carried him to put them to death, he was not punished as a murderer. On many occasions, however, revenge was not carried so far; but mutilating, castrating, cutting off the ears, noses, &c., served the turn. The punishment allotted by the lex Julia was not, as many have imagined, death, but rather banishment or deportation, being interdicted fire and water, though Octavius appears in several instances to have gone beyond his own law, and to have put adulterers to death. Under Macrinus, many were burnt at a stake. Constantine first by law made the crime capital. Under Constantius and Constans, adulterers were burnt, or sewed in sacks and thrown into the sea. Under Leo and Marcian, the penalty was abated to perpetual banishment, or cutting off the nose. Under Justinian, a further mitigation was granted, at least in favour of the wife, who was only to be scourged, lose her dower, and be shut up in a monastery. After two years, the husband was at liberty to take her back again; or, if he refused, she was shaven, and made a nun for life. In the case Adultery, of the husband the crime continued capital. The reason alleged for this difference was, that the woman is the weaker vessel. Matthew declaims against the Empress Theodora, who is supposed to have been the cause of this law, as well as of others in favour of that sex by the emperor.
Under Theodosius, women convicted of this crime were punished after a very singular manner; being locked up in a narrow cell, and forced to admit to their embraces all the men that would offer themselves. This custom was abolished by the same prince.
By the Jewish law, adultery was punished with death in both parties, where they were both married, or only the woman. The Jews had a particular trial or ordeal for a woman suspected of the crime, by making her drink the bitter waters of jealousy; which were supposed, in the case of guilt, to cause the body to swell.
Amongst the Mingrelians, according to Chardin, adultery is punished with the forfeiture of a hog, which is usually eaten in good friendship between the paramour, the adulteress, and the husband. In some parts of the East, it is said any man's wife is permitted to prostitute herself to him who will give an elephant for the use of her; and it is reputed no small glory to her to have been rated so high. Adultery is said to be so frequent in Ceylon, that there is not a woman who does not practise it, notwithstanding its being punishable with death. Among the Japanese, and divers other nations, adultery is only penal in the woman. In the Marian islands, the woman is not punishable for adultery; but if the man go astray he pays severely; the wife and her relations waste his lands, turn him out of his house, &c.
In Spain they punished adultery in men by cutting off the instrument of the crime. In Poland, before Christianity was established, they punished adultery and fornication in a peculiar manner: they carried the criminal to the marketplace, and there fastened him by the offending part with a nail, laying a razor within his reach, and leaving him under a necessity either of doing justice upon himself, or of perishing in that condition.
In England adultery by the ancient laws was severely punished. King Edmund the Saxon ordered it to be punished in the same manner as homicide; and Canute the Dane ordered that a man who committed adultery should be banished, and that the woman should have her nose and ears cut off. In the time of Henry I. it was punished with the loss of eyes and genitals.
In Britain adultery is now reckoned a spiritual offence, that is, cognizable by the spiritual courts, where it is punished by fine and penance. The common law takes no farther notice of it than to allow the party aggrieved an action and damages. This practice is often censured by foreigners, as making too light of a crime, the bad consequences of which, public as well as private, are so great. It has been answered, that perhaps this penalty, by civil action, joined with the ignominy attached to it, is more calculated to prevent the frequency of the offence, which ought to be the end of all laws, than a severer punishment.
Adultery is, both in England and Scotland, a ground of divorce. In England, a complete divorce or dissolution of the marriage can only be obtained through an act of parliament; but in Scotland, a complete divorce may be effected by proceedings in the Court of Session, as succeeding to the old commissary jurisdiction. The adulterous parties are by the law of Scotland prohibited from intermarrying. Fraser on Personal and Domestic Relations, vol. i. p. 82. See Divorce.
Adultery is used in Scripture for idolatry, or departing from the true God to the worship of a false one.
Adultery is used by ecclesiastical writers for a person's invading or intruding into a bishopric during the former bishop's life. The reason of the appellation is, that a bishop is supposed to contract a kind of spiritual marriage with his church. The translation of a bishop from one see to another was also reputed a species of adultery, on the supposition of its being a kind of second marriage, which in those days was esteemed a degree of adultery. This conclusion was founded on the text of St Paul, Let a bishop be the husband of one wife; by a forced construction of church for wife, and of bishop for husband.
Adultery is used by ancient naturalists for the act of ingrating one plant upon another; in which sense Pliny speaks of the adulteries of trees, arborum adulteria, which he represents as contrary to nature, and a piece of luxury or needless refinement.
ADUNATI, ἀδυνάτοι, those persons at Athens who from bodily defects or infirmity, were unable to support themselves, and had a maintenance from the state.