Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 4.djvu/721

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collected in a hot dry day, which are macerated in water, and distilled after fermenting for a night. As imported into Europe it has a greenish colour owing to the presence of a minute proportion of copper, which can be separated, leaving the oil perfectly colourle&s. This oil is extremely pungent to the taste, and has the odour of a mixture of turpentine and camphor. When dropped in water, it diffuses itself over the surface, and then entirely evaporates. Chemically, the oil consists in large part of the bihydrate of cajputene, from which cajputene having a hyacinthine odour can be obtained by distillation from anhydrous phosphoric acid. Like other volatile oils, the cajeput is a powerful stimulant, and is used medicinally where such medicines are required. Some practitioners have given it a high character as a remedy for cholera ; but it does not appear to have any claim as a specific in the treatment of that disease. The dose taken internally as a stimulant, antispasmodic, and diaphoretic, is about five drops. It is used externally as a rubefacient, and is also resorted to occasionally with advan tage in toothache. The oil from some species of Eucalyptus

bears a close resemblance in odour and properties to cajeput.

CAJETAN, Cardinal (14G9-1534), was born at Cajeta in the kingdom of Naples in 1469. His proper name was Thomas de Vio, but he adopted that of Cajetan from his birthplace. He entered the order of the Dominicans at the, age of sixteen, was for some time professor of divinity, and in 1508 became general of the order. For his zeal in defending the Papal pretensions, in a work entitled Of the Power of the Pope, he obtained the bishopric of Cajeta. He was afterwards raised to the archiepiscopal see of Palermo, and in 1517 was made a cardinal by Leo X. The year following he went as legate into Germany, to quiet the commotions raised by Luther against indulgences ; but the Pieformer, under protection of Frederick elector of Saxony, S jt him at defiance ; for though he obeyed the cardinal s summons in repairing to Augsburg, yet he rendered all his proceedings ineffectual. Cajetan was employed in several other negotiations and transactions, being as able in business as in letters. He died in 1534. He wrote commentaries upon portions of Aristotle, and upon the Summa of Aquinas, and made a careful translation of the Old and New Testa ments, excepting Solomon s Song, the Prophets, and the Revelation of St John.

CALABAR is a district of somewhat indefinite boundaries, situated on the West Coast of Africa, in the Bight of P.iafra, between 4 20 and 6 N. lat., and between 6 30 and 9 E. long. The name corresponds to no geographical or political unity, but is convenient as provisionally com prehending a stretch of country of considerable commercial importance. The coast line is frequently regarded as extending from the Nun mouth of the Niger, to the neighbourhood of the Cameroon Mountains, and thus includes the estuaries of the Brass River or Tuwon-Toro, the San Nicholas or Kola Toro, the New Calabar, and the Bonny, which are all deltaic branches of the Niger, as well as the San Pedro or Kan Toro, and the important embouchure of the united streams of the Cross River, the Old Calabar, and the Great Qua River. The interior of the country is still unexplored, and the inland boundary is left completely vague. The soil of the whole country, for 150 miles or further from the sea, is purely alluvial ; and the surface is literally covered with bush except in the very limited areas under cultivation. Further inland, especially in the direction of the Cameroon Mountains, the elevation increases, the soil becomes more varied and decidedly rocky, and the forest grows clearer of underwood. This higher region is rich in natural productions, furnishing besides the palm-oil which forms the main article of foreign trade on the coast ebony, bamboos, sugar, pepper, yams, Indian corn, plantains, and a variety of woods.

Leaving the western portion which belongs to the delta of the Niger for treatment in the article on that river, we will confine our attention here to the district watered by the Old Calabar, the Cross River, and the Qua, which more particularly deserves the name of Calabar. The common estuary of these three rivers enters the ocean about 5 N. lat. and 8 20 E. long. It is about 10 or 12 miles wide at its mouth, and maintains nearly the same width for about thirty miles above the bar. At the junction with the Cross River the Old Calabar forms quite a labyrinth of channels and islands, and it is also united with the Qua by a number of creeks.

The exact position of the sources of these rivers has never been ascertained, but, according to native report, that of the Old Calabar is situated in the neighbourhood of Iko, which is not very far beyond Uyanga, the furthest point inland reached by Captain Hopkins and the Rev. Samuel Edgerley in their journey of exploration in 1872. The truth of this report is rendered almost certain by the diminished size of the stream in the vicinity of Uyanga ; and it is thus probable that the mountains in which both it and its sister streams take their rise are the Rimsby range, forming a western extension of the Cameroons. The Qua River is comparatively small, and navigation is impeded, at no great distance up, by sand-banks and fallen trees. Further inland its course is also broken by rapids and several cataracts.

The country watered by these rivers is occupied by a great number of separate tribes, such as the Efik, the Ekoi, the Ibami, the Okoyong, and the Aqua, who are politically independent of each other and speak separate languages. Of these the most important are the Efik, or people of Calabar in the strictest sense of that word, which was originally applied by the Portuguese discoverers to the tribes on the coast at the time of their arrival, when as yet the present inhabitants were unknown in the district. It was not till the early part of the 18th century that the Efik, owing to civil war with their kindred the Ibibio, migrated from the neighbourhood of the Niger to the shores of the Old Calabar, and established themselves at Ikoritungko or Creek Town. In order to get a better share in the European trade at the mouth of the river a body of colonists from this city migrated further down and built Obutong or Old Town, and shortly afterwards a rival colony established itself at Aqua Akpa or Duke Town.

For a time it seemed as if Creek Town would disappear

before its younger competitors, but it was again raised to power by King Eyo Eyo, who defied the interference of his rivals. The only political bond of union between the various towns is the Egbo, a kind of secret society into which admittance is obtained on the payment of a certain fee to each of the existing members. The power of this association is almost unlimited, and is used principally for the benefit of its members. Formerly it was one of the greatest curses of the country, from the barbarous customs mingled with its rites ; but it is, under European direction, being turned into a means of promulgating a more civilized code of laws through the various towns, and it forms a kind of constitutional defence against the despotism of individual kings. However unsatisfactory the condition of the country still is, there is no doubt European influence of a beneficial kind is gradually making itself felt. The universal belief in the most terrible kinds of witchcraft is slowly being shaken ; the use of the esere or Calabar bean as an ordeal, and for purposes of religious purgation, is becoming much less frequent ; the murder of twin children is no longer a national custom ; and the massacre of his slaves on the death of a king has been abolished. The present king of Creek Town is at least nominally a

Christian ; and, according to Consul Livingstone, "hundreds