BOA, a name formerly applied to all large Serpents, which, devoid of poison fangs, killed their prey by constriction; but now confined to that section of them occurring in America, the Old World forms being known as Pythons. The true boas are widely distributed throughout tropical America, occurring most abundantly in Guiana and Brazil, where they are found in dry sandy localities, amid forests, on the banks of rivers and lakes, and in the water itself, according to the habits of the various species. They feed chiefly on the smaller quadrupeds, in search of which they often ascend trees, suspending, themselves from the branches by the tail, and thus awaiting motionless the approach of their victim. While so hanging they are partly supported by two spine-like hooks, situated one on each side of the vent, which are connected with several small bones concealed beneath the skin and attached to the main skeleton. These bones, terminating thus in an external claw, are characteristic of the family Boidoe, and are recognized by anatomists as the rudiments of those which form the hind limbs in all quadrupeds. The size of the boa’s prey often seems enormously beyond its apparent capacity for swallowing, a difficulty which disappears on acquaintance with the peculiar structure of the creature’s jaws. The bones composing these are not knit together as in Mammals, but are merely connected by ligaments, which can be distended at pleasure. The mouth of the boa can thus be made to open transversely as well as vertically; and in addition to this the two jaws are not connected directly as in other animals, but by the intervention of a distinct bone, which adds greatly to the extent of its gape. It has also the power of moving one half of the jaw independently of the other, and can ...

BOADICEA, a British queen in the time of the Emperor Nero. She was wife of Prasutagus, king of the Iceni, a people inhabiting the eastern coast of Britain. On his deathbed, 60 A.D., Prasutagus named the emperor heir to his accumulated treasures conjointly with his own two daughters, in expectation of securing thereby Nero’s protection for his family and people; but he was no sooner dead than the emperor’s officers seized all. Boadicea’s opposition to these unjust proceedings was resented with such cruelty, that orders were given that she should be publicly whipped, and her daughters exposed to the brutality of the soldiers. The Britons took up arms, with Boadicea at their head, to shake off the Roman yoke; the colony of Camalodunum or Colchester was taken, and the Romans were massacred wherever they could be found. The whole province of Britain would have been lost to Rome, if Suetonius Paulinus had not hastened from the Isle of Mona, and at the head of 10,000 men engaged the Britons, who are said to have amounted to 230,000. A great battle was fought, which resulted in the complete defeat of the Britons (62 a.d.) Boadicea, who had displayed extraordinary valour, soon after despatched herself by poison. (Tac. Ann. xiv. Agric., 15-16; Dion Cass, lxii.)

This word is neither Hebrew nor Syriac, and some have thought that the transcribers have not exactly copied it, and that the word was _benereen_, βενερεὲν, which expresses the sound of the Hebrew of the phrase, “sons of thunder.” Parkhurst judges the word to be the Galilean pronunciation of the Hebrew בנירעש expressed in Greek letters. Now, רעש properly signifies a violent trembling or commotion, and may therefore be well rendered by βροντὴ, _thunder_, which is a violent commotion in the air; so, _vice versâ_, any violent commotion is figuratively, and not unusually, in all languages, called thunder. When our Saviour named the sons of Zebedee, Boanerges, he perhaps had an eye to that prophecy of Haggai, “Yet once, and I will shake the heavens and the earth,” ii, 6; which is by the Apostle to the Hebrews, xii, 26, applied to the great alteration made in the economy of the Jews by the publication of the Gospel. The name Boanerges, therefore, given to James and John, imports that they should be eminent instruments in accomplishing the wondrous change, and should, like an earthquake or thunder, mightily bear down all opposition, by their inspired preaching and miraculous powers. That it does not relate to their _mode_ of preaching is certain; for that clearly appears to have been calmly argumentative, and sweetly persuasive--the very reverse of what is usually called a thundering ministry.

BOAR, Wild(Sus scrofa), an important species of Suidoe, a family of Pachydermatous Mammals, and generally regarded as the original stock of our domestic breeds of swine. In size it is equal to the largest of the domestic kinds, while exceeding them all in strength of body and in ferocity of disposition. It is of a greyish-black colour, covered with short woolly hair, thickly interspersed with coarse stiff bristles, which assume the form of a mane along the spine. The canine teeth are’ largely developed, forming two pairs of prism-shaped tusks, which thus become formidable weapons. In old age those tusks in the lower jaw gradually curve inwards and upwards over the snout until they are ren ere.l useless for purposes of attack, when, according to Darwin, they become serviceable for defence in the frequent fights which take place during the rutting season At the same time, the canines of the upper jaw begin to develop outwards and upwards, and these take the place of the lower ones as offensive weapons. The wild boar is a native of the temperate regions of Europe and Asia, where it inhabits the deepest recesses of forests and marshy grounds* Vambery, in his recent journey through Central Asia, found them in enormous numbers in the extensive swamps of Turkestan. They appear to have been denize113 of British forests at least till the reign of Henry IL, after which they are not heard of till the time of Charles I., when an attempt to restock the New Forest with them failed. In the reign of William the Conqueror any one killing a wild boar was liable to have his eyes put out. After reaching maturity the boar becomes a solitary animal, unless during the breeding season, when it seeks the female, and at this time they engage in fierce contests with each other, although these, ...

חזיר. The wild boar is considered as the parent stock of our domestic hog. He is smaller, but at the same time stronger and more undaunted, than the hog. In his own defence, he will turn on men or dogs; and scarcely shuns any denizen of the forests, in the haunts where he ranges. His colour is always an iron grey, inclining to black. His snout is longer than that of the common breed, and his ears are comparatively short. His tusks are very formidable, and all his habits are fierce and savage. It should seem, from the accounts of ancient authors, that the ravages of the wild boar were considered as more formidable than those of other savage animals. The conquest of the Erymanthian boar was one of the fated labours of Hercules; and the story of the Calydonian boar is one of the most beautiful in Ovid. The destructive ravages of these animals are mentioned in Psalm lxxx, 14. Dr. Pococke observed very large herds of wild boars on the side of Jordan, where it flows out of the sea of Tiberias; and saw several of them on the other side lying among the reeds by the sea. The wild boars of other countries delight in the like moist retreats. These shady marshes then, it should seem, are called in the Scripture, “woods;” for it calls these animals, “the wild boars of the woods.”