NOSE (O.Eng. nosu, cf. Dutch neus, Swed. nos, snout; the Connexion with O.Eng. nasu is obscure, cf. Ger. Nase, Lat. nares, nostrils, nasus, nose, Fr. nez), the organ of the sense of smell (q.v.) in man and other animals (see Olfactory System). The projecting feature above the mouth, to which the word is usually restricted in man, is, in the case of the lower animals, called snout or muzzle, or, if much prolonged, proboscis or trunk. “Nostril,” the external opening into the nose, is from O.Eng. nosthyrl (thyrl or thirl, hole or opening).
NOSOLOGY (Gr. νόσος, disease, and λόγος, science), that branch of medical science which deals with the classification of diseases; the term is applied also to a collection of diseases, and to the special character of a particular disease and the different opinions concerning it.
NOSSEN, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Saxony, pleasantly situated on the Freiberger Mulde, 51 m. S.E. from Leipzig by the railway to Dresden via Döbeln, and at the junction of a line to Moldau. Pop. (1905), 4879. It possesses an ancient castle crowning a height above the river, and has extensive manufactures of boots and shoes, leather and paper. In the immediate vicinity are the ruins of the Cistercian monastery of Altenzella, or Altzella, founded in 1145, and a noted school of philosophy during the 13th-15th centuries. In the chapel, which was built in 1347 and restored in 1787, lie the remains of ten margraves of Meissen, members of the family of Wettin. The foundation was secularized in 1544. The valuable annals, Chronicon vetere Cellense majus and Chronicon minus, giving a history of Saxony during the 13th and 14th centuries, were removed to the university library of Leipzig in 1544. They are printed in Band xvi. of the Monumenta Germaniae historica. scriptores (1859).
See E. Beyer, Das Cistercienstift und Kloster Alt-Celle (Dresden, 1855).
NOSSI-BÉ, properly Nòsy-bé, i.e. “Great island,” an island about 8 m. off the N.W coast of Madagascar, in 13° 23′ S., 48° 15′ E. It is 14 m. long by 10 broad, and has an area of 130 sq. m. Nossi-bé is volcanic, the N. and S. parts of older, the central part of more modern date. Besides a number of true volcanic craters (Lòkobé, the highest point, is 1486 ft. above the sea) there are numerous crater-lakes level with the ground (see Nature, March 1877, p. 417). The climate is similar to that of Mayotte (see Comoro Islands), and the neighbouring islet of Nossi-komba, about 2000 ft. above the sea, serves for a sanatorium. Pop. (1902), 9291. Hellville, the chief town (so called after De Hell, governor of Réunion at the time of the French annexation), is a port of call for the Messageries Maritimes and a centre for the coasting trade along the western shores of Madagascar. There is excellent anchorage, and a pier 800 ft. long. The soil is very fertile, and there are forests of palms and bamboos. The chief products are coffee, sesame, the sugar-cane, cocoa, vanilla and tobacco. There are numerous sugar factories and rum distilleries.
In 1837 Tsioméko, chieftainess of one of the numerous divisions of the western Malagasy known under the common name of Sàkalàva, was expelled by the Hova and fled to Nossi-bé and Nossi-komba. Failing assistance from the imam of Muscat, she accepted French protection in 1840, ceding such rights as she possessed on the N.W. coast of the mainland. The French took possession in 1841, and in 1849 an unsuccessful attempt was made to expel them. The administration was entrusted to a subordinate of the governor of Mayotte until 1896, when Nossi-bé was placed under the administration of Madagascar (q.v.) (J. Si.*)
NOSTALGIA (Gr. νόστος, return home, and ἄλγος, grief), home-sickness, the desire when away to return home, amounting sometimes to a form of melancholia.
NOSTRADAMUS (1503–1566), the assumed name of Michel de Notredame, a French astrologer, of Jewish origin, who was born at St Remi in Provence on the 13th of December 1503. After studying humanity and philosophy at Avignon, he took the degree of doctor of medicine at Montpellier in 1529. He settled at Agen, and in 1544 established himself at Salon near Aix in Provence. Both at Aix and at Lyons he acquired great distinction by his labours during outbreaks of the plague. In 1555 he published at Lyons a book of rhymed prophecies under the title of Centuries, which secured him the notice of Catherine de' Medici; and in 1558 he published an enlarged edition with a dedication to the king. The seeming fulfilment of some of his predictions increased his influence, and Charles IX. named him physician in ordinary. He died on the 2nd of July 1566.
The Centuries of Nostradamus have been frequently reprinted, and have been the subject of many commentaries. In 1781 they were condemned by the papal court, being supposed to contain a prediction of the fall of the papacy. Nostradamus was the author of a number of smaller treatises. See Bareste, Nostradamus (Paris, 1840).
NOSTRUM (neuter of Lat. noster, our), the name given to preparations of which the ingredients are not made publicly known, a patent or “quack” medicine; it is taken from the label (“of our own make”) formerly attached to such medicines.
NOTARY, or Notary Public. In Roman law the notarius was originally a slave or freedman who took notes (notae) of judicial proceedings in shorthand. The modern notary corresponds rather to the tabellio or tabularius than to the notarius. In canon law it was a maxim that his evidence was worth that of two unskilled witnesses.
The office of notary in England is a very ancient one. It is mentioned in the Statute of Provisors, 25 Edward III. stat. 4. The English notary is an ecclesiastical officer, nominated, since the Peterpence Dispensations Act 1533–1534, by the archbishop of Canterbury through the master of the faculties (now the judge of the provincial courts of Canterbury and York), in order to secure evidence as to the attestation of important documents. All registrars of ecclesiastical courts must be notaries. A notary’s duties, however, are mainly secular. “The general functions of a notary consist in receiving all acts and contracts which must or are wished to be clothed with an authentic form; in conferring on such documents the required authenticity; in establishing their date; in preserving originals or minutes of them which, when prepared in the style and with the seal of the notary, obtain the name of original acts; and in giving authentic copies of such acts” (Brooke, On the Office of a Notary, chap. iii.). The act of a notary in authenticating or certifying a document is technically called a “notarial act.” In most countries the notarial act is received in evidence as a semi-judicial matter, and the certificate of a notary is probative of the facts certified. But English law does not recognize the notarial act to this extent. An English court will, in certain cases, take judicial notice of the seal of a notary, but not that the facts that he has certified are true, except in the case of a bill of exchange protested abroad.
The most important part of an English notary’s duty is the noting and protest of foreign bills of exchange in case of non-acceptance or non-payment. This must be done by a notary in order that the holder may recover. He also prepares ship protests and protests relating to mercantile matters, and authenticates and certifies copies of documents and attests instruments to be sent abroad. The office of notary is now usually held by a solicitor. In London he must be free of the Scriveners' Company.
In Scotland, before the reign of James III., papal and imperial notaries practised until the 29th of November 1469, when an act was passed declaring that notaries should be made by the king. It would appear, however, that for some time afterwards there were in Scotland clerical and legal notaries—the instruments taken by the latter bearing faith in civil matters. In 1551 an act was passed directing sheriffs to bring or send both kinds of notaries to the lords of session to be examined; and in a statute, passed in 1555, it was ordained that no notary, “by whatsoever power he be created,” should use the office “except he first present himself to the said lords, showing his creation, and be admitted by them thereto.” It does not appear that this statute vested the right of making notaries in the court of session; but in 1563 it was by law declared that no person should take on him the office, under the pain of death, unless created by the sovereign’s
