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patronised by the earls of Morton and Macclesfield. In 1739 he accompanied the former to the Orkney Isles, where he was employed in adjusting the geography of that part of Scotland. Mr. Short having returned to London, and established himself there, was in 1743 employed by lord Thomas Spencer to make for him a reflector of twelve feet focus, for which he received 600 guineas. He made several other telescopes of the same focal distance with greater improvements and higher magnifiers; and in 1752 finished one for the king of Spain, for which, with its whole apparatus, he received £1200. This was the noblest instrument of the kind that had then been constructed, and perhaps it has never yet been surpassed except by the astonishing reflectors of Herschel. See TELESCOPE. Mr. Short was wont to visit the place of his nativity once every two or three years during his residence in London, and in 1766 he visited it for the last time. On the 15th of June 1768 he died, after a short illness, at Newington Butts, near London, of a mortification in his bowels, having nearly completed his fifty-eighth year. He left a fortune of about £20,000, of which £15,000 was bequeathed to two nephews and the rest in legacies to his friends. In gratitude for the steady patronage of the earl of Morton, he left to his daughter, the Lady Mary Douglas, afterwards countess of Aboyne, £1000 and the reversion of his fortune, should his nephews die without issue; but this reversionary legacy the lady, at the desire of her father, generously relinquished by a deed in favor of Mr. Short's brother, Mr. Thomas Short, and his children. Mr. Short's eminence as an artist is universally known, and he is said to have been a man of amiable manners; but if, out of such a fortune, he left nothing to the hospital in which he received the rudiments of that education by which he acquired it, he was guilty of an omission highly criminal.

SHORTFORD, q. d. fore-close, an ancient custom in the city of Exeter, when the lord of the fee cannot be answered rent due to him out of his tenement, and no distress can be levied for the same. The lord is then to come to the tenement, and there take a stone, or some other dead thing off the tenement, and bring it before the mayor and bailiff, and thus he must do seven quarter days successively; and, if on the seventh quarter day the lord is not satisfied of his rent and arrears, then the tenement shall be adjudged to the lord to hold the same a year and a day; and forthwith proclamation is to be made in the court, that, if any man claims any title to the said tenement, he must appear within the year and day next following, and satisfy the lord of the said rent and arrears: but if no appearance be made, and the rent not paid, the lord comes again to the court, and prays that according to the custom the said tenement be adjudged to him in his demesne as of fee, which is done accordingly, so that the lord hath from thenceforth the said tenement, with the appurtenances to him and his heirs.

SHORT-HAND WRITING. See STENOGRAPHY. SHORT-JOINTED, in the manege. A horse is said to be short-jointed that has a short pastern; when this joint or the pastern is too short, the

horse is subject to have his fore legs from the knee to the cornet all in a straight line. Commonly short-jointed horses do not manege so well as the long-jointed; but out of the manege the short-jointed are the best for travel or fatigue.

See

SHORT-SIGHTEDNESS, myopia, that defect in the conformation of the eye wherein the crystalline, &c., being too convex, the rays reflected from different objects are refracted too much, and made to converge too fast, so as to unite before they reach the retina, by which means vision is rendered dim and confused. MYOPS. A learned author thinks it probable that, out of so great a number of short-sighted persons as are daily to be met with, few are born so; for it generally grows upon young people at the age of twenty or twenty-five, and therefore might possibly be prevented by using their eyes while young to all sorts of conformations, that is, by often looking through glasses of all sorts of figures, and by reading, writing, or working with spectacles of several degrees of convexity; for, whatever be the powers by which the eye conforms itself to distinct vision, they may possibly grow weak, or lose their extent one way or other, for want of variety of exercise. It seems an opinion without foundation to think that such an exercise of the eyes can any wise injure them, provided due care be taken to avoid looking at objects that are too bright.

Dr. Smith mentions a young gentleman who became short-sighted immediately after coming out of a cold bath, in which he did not totally immerse himself, and has ever since used a concave glass for many years. It is commonly thought that short-sightedness wears off in old age, on account of the eye becoming flatter: but the learned doctor questions whether this be matter of fact or hypothesis only.

It is remarkable that short-sighted persons commonly write a small hand, and love a small print, because they can see more of it at a view. That it is customary with them not to look at the person they converse with, because they cannot well see the motion of his eyes and features, and are therefore attentive to his words only. That they see more distinctly, and somewhat farther off, by a strong light than by a weak one; because a strong light causes a contraction of the pupil, and consequently of the pencils, both here and at the retina, which lessens their mixture, and consequently the apparent confusion; and, therefore, to see more distinctly, they almost close their eye-lids, for which reason they were anciently called myopes.-Smith's Optics, vol. ii. Rem. p. 10, &c.

Jurin observes that persons who are much and long accustomed to view objects at small distances, as students in general, watch-makers, gravers, painters in miniature, &c., see better at small distances, and not so well at great distances, as the rest of mankind. The reason is, that in the eye, as well as in other parts, the muscles, by constant exercise, are enabled to contract themselves with more strength, and by disuse are brought to less strength. Hence, in the persons before-mentioned, the greater muscular ring of the uvea contracts more casily and strongly, and the cornea more rea

dily obeys the contraction of the ring, whence they see better at small distances. And the cornea, by being thus often and long bent into a greater convexity, does by degrees lose something of its elasticity, so as not to return to its natural elasticity, when the muscular ring ceases to act upon it. This is one cause of their not seeing so well at great distances: also the ligamentum ciliare, being seldom employed to lessen the convexity of the capsula, does by degrees become less capable of performing that office: and the capsula, being seldom drawn out and put into tension, must lose something of its distensile quality, so as less easily to comply with the action of the ligament. And this is another cause of their not seeing so well at great distances.—Jurin, Essay on Dist. and Indist. Vision. The general remedy for short-sightedness is a concave lens, held before the eye, which, making the rays diverge, or at least diminishing much of their convergency, makes amends for the too great convexity of the crystalline.

see. The act of shoot

SHOT, part. & n. s. s. The pret. and part. SHOTFREE, adj. pass. of SHOOт, which SHOTTEN, adj. ing: the path or flight of a missile; the missile emitted; a gun charged; Fr. escot, an account: shotfree is clear of the reckoning: not to be hurt by shot: shotten is having shot or ejected the

spawn.

She sat over against him, a good way off, as it were a bow shot. Genesis xxi. 16.

Their tongue is as an arrow shot out, it speaketh deceit. Jeremiah.

A shot unheard gave me a wound unseen. Sidney. On the other side a pleasant grove Was shot up high, full of the stately tree That dedicated is to Olympick Jove.

Faerie Queene. Shakspeare. Cymbeline. Proud death!

I shall here abide the hourly shot
Of angry eyes.

What feast is towered in thy infernal cell,
That thou so many princes at a shot
So bloodily hast struck?

Id. Hamlet.

Though I could 'scape shotfree at London, I fear the shot here: here's no scorning but upon the pate. Id. Henry IV.

Go thy ways, old Jack; die when thou wilt, if good manhood be not forgot upon the earth, then am I a shotten herring.

Id.

At this booty they were joyful, for that they were supplied thereby with good store of powder and shot. Hayward.

As the fund of our pleasure, let each pay his

shot;

Far hence be the sad, the lewd fop, and the sot. Ben Jonson.

The fortifier of Pendennis made his advantage of the commodiousness afforded by the ground, and shot rather at a safe preserving the harbour from sudden attempts of little fleets, than to withstand any great

navy.

Carew.

He caused twenty shot of his greatest cannon to be made at the king's army.

He only thought to crop the flower, New shot up from a vernal shower.

From before her vanished night,

Clarendon,

Milton.

Shot through with orient beams. Id. Paradise Lost.
Impatient to revenge the fatal shot,
His ght hand doubly to his left succeeds.

Dryden.

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Swift.

SHOT (Fr. boulet, et en général toutes sortes de charges pour les canons), a name given to all sorts of balls used for artillery and fire-arms, from the pistol to the cannon: those for cannon and carronades being of iron, and those for smallarms of lead.

Cannon shot is distinguished by the nature of the ordnance for which it is intended; as fortytwo, thirty-two, twenty-four, eighteen, twelve, nine-pounders, &c., and those for small-arms by the names of the pieces; as musket, carbine, pistol, &c.

SHOT, PATENT MILLED, is thus made: sheets of lead, whose thickness corresponds with the size of the shot required, are cut into small pieces, or cubes, of the form of a die. A great quantity of these little cubes are put into a large hollow iron cylinder, which is mounted horizontally and turned by a winch; when by their friction against one another, and against the sides of the cylinder, they are rendered perfectly round, and very smooth. The other patent shot is cast in moulds, in the same way as bullets are.

SHOT, SMALL, or that used for fowling, should be well sized, and of a moderate bigness; for should it be too great, then it flies thin, and scatters too much; or if too small, then it hath not weight and strength to penetrate far, and the fore, to have it suitable to the occasion, it not bird is apt to fly away with it. In order, there being always to be had in every place fit for the purpose, we shall set down the true method of making all sorts and sizes under the name of mould shot. Its principal good properties are to be round and solid. Take any quantity of lead you think fit, and melt it down in an iron vessel; and as it melts keep it stirring with an iron ladle, skimming off all impurities whatsoever that may arise at the top; when it begins to look of a greenish color, strew on it as much auripigmentum or yellow orpiment, finely powdered, as will lie on a shilling, to every twelve together, the orpiment will flame. The ladle or fourteen pounds of lead; then, stirring them

should have a notch on one side of the brim, for more easily pouring out the lead; the ladle must remain in the melted lead, that its heat may be the same with that of the lead, to prevent inconveniences which otherwise might happen by its being either too hot or too cold: then, to try your lead, drop a little of it into water,

and, if the drops prove round, then the lead is of a proper heat; if otherwise, and the shot have tails, then add more orpiment to increase the heat, till it be found sufficient. Then take a plate of copper, about the bigness of a trencher, which must be made with a hollowness in the middle, about three inches compass, within which must be bored about forty holes according to the size of the shot which you intend to cast; the hollow bottom should be thin; but the thicker the brim, the better it will retain the heat. Place this plate on a frame of iron, over a tub or vessel of water, about four inches from the water, and spread burning coals on the plate, to keep the lead melted upon it: then take some lead and pour it gently on the coals on the plate, and it will make its way through the holes into the water, and form itself into shot; do thus till all your lead be run through the holes of the plate, taking care, by keeping your coals alive, that the lead do not cool, and so stop up the holes. While your are casting in this manner, another person with another ladle may catch some of the shot, placing the ladle four or five inches underneath the plate in the water, by which means you will see if they are defective, and rectify them. Keep the lead in a just degree of heat, that it be not so cold as to stop up the holes in your plate, nor so hot as to cause the shot to crack; to remedy the heat, you must refrain working till it is of a proper coolness; and, to remedy the coolness of your lead and plate, you must blow your fire; observing that the cooler your lead is, the larger will be your shot; as the hotter it is, the smaller they will be. After casting, take them out of the water, and dry them over the fire with a gentle heat, stirring them continually that they do not melt; when dry, separate the great shot from the small, by the help of a sieve made for that purpose, according to their several sizes. But those who would have very large shot, make the lead trickle with a stick out of the ladle into the water, without the plate. If it stop on the plate, and yet the plate be not too cool, give but the plate a little knock, and it will run again; care must be had that none of your implements be greasy, oily, or the like; and when the shot, being separated, are found too large or too small for your purpose, or otherwise imperfect, they will serve again at the next operation. The sizes of common shot for fowling are from No. 1 to 6, and smaller, which is called mustard seed, or dust shot; but No. 5 is small enough for any shooting whatsoever. The No. 1 may be used for wild geese; the No. 2 for ducks, widgeons, and other water-fowl the No. 3 for pheasants, partridges after the first month, and all the fen-fowl; the No. 4 for partridges, woodcocks, &c.; and the No. 5 for snipes and all the smaller birds.

Shot thus made is not without considerable imperfections. The exterior coat of the lower part of the drop becoming suddenly fixed by the contact of the water, its superior portion, which

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is still liquid, as it also cools and contracts, necessarily pits, like the surface of metal in the channel of a mould, so that the greater part of the shot are somewhat hollow, and of an irregular form; consequently too light for the purpose to which they are destined, and liable to unequal resistance in their passage through the air. These defects are remedied in the patentshot, the manufacture of which differs only from that of the preceding kind in the addition of a larger portion of arsenic, which varies according to the quality of the lead; in dropping it from such a height that it becomes solid before it enters the water, which is from forty to 100 feet; and, in some subsequent operations, which are as follows:-it is first dried and sifted. It is then boarded, which consists in scattering it on several polished slabs or trays of hard wood, with rims, in the form of a II, except that the sides converge towards the lower part, to which a slight inclination and alternate motion in their own planes are given by boys employed in the manufacture. The shot, whose form is imperfect, are detected by the sluggishness of their motion, and remain behind, whilst the others roll off from the board. The last operation is the polishing; which is performed by agitating it with the addition of a very small quantity of black lead, not exceeding two spoonfuls to a ton, in an iron vessel, turning on an horizontal axis like a butter churn. It does not appear that any higher degree of perfection than that which is thus attained remains to be desired. The argentine brilliancy of the shot when newly made, the beautiful accuracy of its form, and the curious instance of inanimate tactics which it presents when scattered on a plate, render it even an agreeable object of contemplation.

The shot now used in the royal navy is principally confined to three sorts, namely, round, grape, and case or canister.

Round-shot (Fr. boulet rond) is the most simple, and composed of a ball or globe of cast-iron, whose weight is in proportion to the size of the cannon, or to the diameter of its bore.

Grape-shot (Fr. charge à la suédoise, ou charge en grappe) is a combination of balls, fig. 6, plate V., put into a canvas bag, and corded strongly together, so as to form a sort of cylinder, whose diameter is equal to that of the ball which is adapted to the cannon.

Case or canister-shot (Fr. charge à mitraille), fig. 7, is formed by putting a quantity of small shot into a case or canister.

The tin case is cylindrical, in diameter a little less than the calibre of the gun or howitzer. It is filled with lead balls, so as to make up the weight of the shot. These balls are seldom less than one ounce and a quarter in weight. But little effect is to be expected from firing caseshot beyond 300 yards, from the very great divergency of the balls. The proportions of shot for the royal navy are,

560 round each gun for Chan. Serv. 80

Middle, upper, and $70 quarter-deck

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Grape and case-shot are supplied each in the proportion of from five to twelve rounds for every gun, as the nature of the service may require. There are other sorts of shot formerly used, such as the chain, cross-bar, langrel, &c., but these are now nearly discontinued in the British navy.

Chain-shot (Fr. boulets enchaînés), fig. 8, consists of two balls linked together, being principally designed to destroy the masts and rigging, which they are better fitted to perform than the single bullets.

Double-headed or bar-shot (Fr. boulet ramé, ou boulet à deux têtes), fig. 9, is a ball cut into two equal parts, and joined together by a bar of iron. In the French service the middle is sometimes filled with a composition, and the whole covered with linen dipped in brimstone; the cannon in firing also inflames the combustibles or composition of this ball, which sets fire to the sails of the vessel. One of the heads of this ball has a hole to receive a fuse, which communicates with the charge of the cannon.

Spherical case-shot, or Shrapnell's shell, so termed from the inventor colonel Shrapnell, of the royal artillery. See SHELL.

Star-SHOT consists of four pieces of iron, whose bases, when separate, form the quadrant of a circle; so that the whole, being joined, forms a cylinder equal to the shot of the cannon. Each of those pieces is furnished with an iron bar, the extremity of which is attached to a sort of link, as keys are strung upon a ring. Being discharged from the gun, the four branches or arms extend every way from the link in the centre. These also are chiefly intended to destroy the sails or rigging, but their flight and execution are very precarious at a tolerable distance.

A SHOT of a most destructive nature has been invented by a Mr. Fane, and experiments on its effects were exhibited in 1811, before the lords of the admiralty. It is a four-pounder shot, wrapped round with a prepared cotton, and made very hard, so as to appear like a large cannonball-on firing of which, it has the usual effect of a cannon-shot; but, the moment it starts from the cannon's mouth, it presents one solid mass of fire; and whatever it may happen to strike, whether rigging or hull of a ship, it will immediately take fire.

To find the weight of an iron shot, whose diameter is given; and the contrary. Rule.-Double the cube of the diameter in inches, and multiply it by 7; so will the product (rejecting the two last or right hand figures) be the weight in pounds. Example.-What is the weight of an iron shot of seven inches diameter? The cube of 7 is 343, which doubled is 686, and this multiplied by 7 produces 4802, which, with the

right hand figures rejected, gives 48 lbs., the weight required.

To find the diameter of the shot, when the weight is given. Rule.-Multiply the cube root of the weight in pounds by 1·923, and the product is the diameter in inches. Example.-What is the diameter of an iron shot of 52 lbs? The cube root of 52 is 3.732, which, multiplied by 1923, gives 7·177 inches, the diameter required. Rule, by logarithms :

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To one-third of the logarithm of 52 0.572001 Add the constant logarithm

Logarithm of the diameter

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If at any time case-shot cannot be procured, or tin for the purpose of making cases, a very good substitute may be made by the following method:-Take a wooden bottom of one-fourth of an inch less than the ordinary size, roll strong cartridge paper which has been sponged over two or three times with water, and nearly dry, on a former of the same diameter to the proper dimensions; paste down the exterior edge of the cylindrical case, and nail it on to the bottom with small tacks; when dry, pour in a quantity of hot pitch and rosin, or kitt composition; then a layer of musket-balls; continuing them alternately till the case is filled in length equal to two diameters of a round shot, independent of the wooden bottom; over the last tier put another bottom two inches in thickness, and nail it on.

To SHOT THE GUNS (Fr. mettre les boulets dans les canons) is to load the pieces of ordnance with the necessary quantity of gunpowder and

ball.

SHOT, TIN CASE, in artillery, is formed by putting a great quantity of small iron shot into a cylindrical tin box called a cannister, that just fits the bore of the gun. Leaden bullets are sometimes used in the same manner; and it must be observed that, whatever number of sizes of the shots are used, they must weigh with their cases nearly as much as the shot of the piece.

SHOT FLAGGON, a sort of flaggon somewhat bigger than ordinary, which in some counties, particularly Derbyshire, it is the custom for the host to serve his guests in, after they have drunk above a shilling.

SHOT OF A CABLE, on ship-board, is the splicing of two cables together, that a ship may ride safe in deep waters and in great roads; for a ship will ride easier by one shot of a cable, than by three short cables out a-head.

SHOT-BOXES (Fr. caisse à munitions) are boxes in which grape, case, and small-arms' shot, are packed for service.

SHOTE, n. s. Sax. rceora; Lat. trutta minor. A fish.

Oz. No. lbs. oz. Oz. No. lbs. oz.

1632

170 91 90 38 55 12

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The shote, peculiar to Devonshire and Cornwall, in shape and colour resembleth the trout; howbeit in bigness and goodness cometh far behind him.

Carew. SHOT-GUAGE, an instrument for measuring the diameter of shot.

SHOT-RACKS, wooden frames bolted to the coamings and head-ledges round the hatch-ways on the decks, to contain the different species of shot. SHOVE, v. a., v. n., & n. s. Sax. rcufan; Belg. schuyven; Swed. skufwa. To push by main strength; drive; rush against; impel: to push before one; move by a pole in a boat: the act of shoving or pushing.

The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on.
Shakspeare.

In the corrupted currents of this world,
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice;
And oft the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law.

Than how to scramble at the shearer's feast,
Of other care they little reckoning make,
And shove away the worthy bidden guest.

Id.

Milton.

There the British Neptune stood, Beneath them to submit the officious flood, And with his trident shoved them off the sand.

Dryden.

I'll mount.
Shoving back this earth on which I sit,
Id. Tyrannick Love.
He grasped the oar,
Received his guest aboard, and shoved from shore.

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