An excellent translation into French of "The Customs of the Sea," which are the most valuable portion of the Book of the Consulate, was published by Pardessus in the second volume of his Collection des lois maritimes (Paris, 1834), under the title of "La Compilation connue sous le nom de consulat de la mer." See introduction, by Sir Travers Twiss, to the Black Book of the Admiralty (London, 1874), which in the appendix to vol. iii. contains his translation of "The Customs of the Sea," with the Catalan text. (T. T.)



CONSUMPTION (Lat. consumere), literally, the act of consuming or destroying. Thus the word is popularly applied to phthisis, a "wasting away" of the lungs due to tuberculosis (q.v.). In economics the word has a special significance as a technical term. It has been defined as the destruction of utilities, and thus opposed to "production," which is the creation of utilities, a utility in this connexion being anything which satisfies a desire or serves a purpose. Consumption may be either productive or unproductive; productive where it is a means directly or indirectly to the satisfaction of any economic want, unproductive when it is devoted to pleasures or luxuries. Its place in the science of economics, and its close relation with production, are treated of in every text-book, but special reference may be made to W. Roscher, Nationaloekonomie, 1883, and G. Schoenberg, Handbuch d. polit. Oekonomie, 1890-1891.



CONSUS, an ancient Italian deity, originally a god of agriculture. The time at which his festival was held (after harvest and seed-sowing), the nature of its ceremonies and amusements, his altar at the end of the Circus Maximus always covered with earth except on such occasions, all point to his connexion with the earth. In accordance with this, the name has been derived from condere (= Condius, as the "keeper" of grain or the "hidden" god, whose life-producing influence works in the depths of the earth). Another etymology is from conserere ("sow," cf. Ops Consiva and her festival Opiconsivia). Amongst the ancients (Livy i. 9; Dion. Halic. ii. 31) Census was most commonly identified with [Greek: Poseidon Hippios] (Neptunus Equester), and in later Latin poets Consus is used for Neptunus, but this idea was due to the horse and chariot races which took place at his festival; otherwise, the two deities have nothing in common. According to another view, he was the god of good counsel, who was said to have "advised" Romulus to carry off the Sabine women (Ovid, Fasti, iii. 199) when they visited Rome for the first celebration of his festival (Consualia). In later times, with the introduction of Greek gods into the Roman theological system, Consus, who had never been the object of special reverence, sank to the level of a secondary deity, whose character was rather abstract and intellectual.

His festival was celebrated on the of August and the 15th of December. On the former date, the flamen Quirinalis, assisted by the vestals, offered sacrifice, and the pontifices presided at horse and chariot races in the circus. It was a day of public rejoicing; all kinds of rustic amusements took place, amongst them running on ox-hides rubbed with oil (like the Gr. [Greek: haskoliasmos]). Horses and mules, crowned with garlands, were given rest from work. A special feature of the games in the circus was chariot racing, in which mules, as the oldest draught beasts, took the place of horses. The origin of these games was generally attributed to Romulus; but by some they were considered an imitation of the Arcadian [Greek: hippokrateia] introduced by Evander. There was a sanctuary of Consus on the Aventine, dedicated by L. Papirius Cursor in 272, in early times wrongly identified with the altar in the circus.

See W. W. Fowler, The Roman Festivals (1899); G. Wissowa, Religion und Kultus der Roemer (1902); Preller-Jordan, Roemische Mythologie (1881).



CONTANGO, a Stock Exchange term for the rate of interest paid by a "bull" who has bought stock for the rise and does not intend to pay for it when the Settlement arrives. He arranges to carry over or continue his bargain, and does so by entering into a fresh bargain with his seller, or some other party, by which he sells the stock for the Settlement and buys it again for the next, the price at which the bargain is entered being called the making-up price. The rate that he pays for this accommodation, which amounts to borrowing the money involved until the next Settlement, is called the contango.



CONTARINI, the name of a distinguished Venetian family, who gave to the republic eight doges and many other eminent citizens. The story of their descent from the Roman family of Cotta, appointed prefects of the Reno valley (whence Cotta Reni or Conti del Reno), is probably a legend. One Mario Contarini was among the twelve electors of the doge Paulo Lucio Anafesto in 697. Domenico Contarini, elected doge in 1043, subjugated rebellious Dalmatia and recaptured Grado from the patriarch of Aquileia. He died in 1070. Jacopo was doge from 1275 to 1280. Andrea was elected doge in 1367, and during his reign the war of Chioggia took place (1380); he was the first to melt down his plate and mortgage his property for the benefit of the state. Other Contarini doges were: Francesco (1623-1624), Niccolo (1630-1631), who built the church of the Salute, Carlo (1655-1656), during whose reign the Venetians gained the naval victory of the Dardanelles, Domenico (1659-1675) and Alvise (1676-1684). There were at one time no less than eighteen branches of the family; one of the most important was that of Contarini dallo Zaffo or di Giaffa, who had been invested with the countship of Jaffa in Syria for their services to Caterina Cornaro, queen of Cyprus; another was that of Contarini degli Scrigni (of the coffers), so called on account of their great wealth. Many members of the family distinguished themselves in the service of the republic, in the wars against the Turks, and no less than seven Contarini fought at Lepanto. One Andrea Contarini was beheaded in 1430 for having wounded the doge Francesco Foscari (q.v.) on the nose. Other members of the house were famous as merchants, prelates and men of letters; among these we may mention Cardinal Gasparo Contarini (1483-1542), and Marco Contarini (1631-1689), who was celebrated as a patron of music and collected at his villa of Piazzola a large number of valuable musical MSS., now in the Marciana library at Venice. The family owned many palaces in various parts of Venice, and several streets still bear its name.

See J. Fontana, "Sulla patrizia famiglia Contarini," in Il Gondoliere (1843). (L. V.*)



CONTAT, LOUISE FRANCOISE (1760-1813), French actress, made her debut at the Comedie Francaise in 1766 as Atalide in Bajazet. It was in comedy, however, that she made her first success, as Suzanne in Beaumarchais's Mariage de Figaro; and in several minor character parts, which she raised to the first importance, and as the soubrette in the plays of Moliere and Marivaux, she found opportunities exactly fitted to her talents. She retired in 1809 and married de Parny, nephew of the poet. Her sister Marie Emilie Contat (1769-1846), an admirable soubrette, especially as the pert servant drawn by Moliere and de Regnard, made her debut in 1784, and retired in 1815.



CONTE, literally a "story," derived from the Fr. conter, to narrate, through low Lat. and Provencal forms contare and comtar. This word, although not recognized by the New English Dictionary as an English term, is yet so frequently used in English literary criticisms that some definition of it seems to be demanded. A conte, in French, differs from a recit or a rapport in the element of style; it may be described as an anecdote told with deliberate art, and in this introduction of art lies its peculiar literary value. According to Littre, there is no fundamental difference between a conte and a roman, and all that can be said is that the conte is the generic term, covering long stories and short alike, whereas the roman (or novel) must extend to a certain length. But if this is the primitive and correct signification of the word, it is certain that modern criticism thinks of a conte essentially as a short story, and as a short story exclusively occupied in illustrating one set of ideas or one disposition of character. As early as the 13th century, the word is used in French literature to describe an anecdote thus briefly and artistically told, in prose or verse. The fairy-tales of Perrault and the apologues of La Fontaine were alike spoken of as contes, and stories of peculiar extravagance were known as contes bleus, because they were issued to the common public in coarse blue paper covers. The most famous contes in the 18th century were those of Voltaire, who has been described as having invented the conte philosophique. But those brilliant stories, Candide, Zadig, L'Ingenu, La Princess de Babylone and Le Taureau blanc, are not, in the modern sense, contes at all. The longer of these are romans, the shorter nouvelles, not one has the anecdotical unity required by a conte. The same may be said of those of Marmontel, and of the insipid imitations of Oriental fancy which were so popular at the close of the 18th century. The most perfect recent writer of contes is certainly Guy de Maupassant, and his celebrated anecdote called "Boule de suif" may be taken as an absolutely perfect example of this class of literature, the precise limitations of which it is difficult to define. (E. G.)



CONTE, NICOLAS JACQUES (1755-1805), French mechanical genius, chemist and painter, was born at Aunou-sur-Orne, near Sees, on the 4th of August 1755, of a family of poor farm labourers. At the age of fourteen he displayed precocious artistic talent in a series of religious panels, remarkably fine in colour and composition, for the principal hospital of Sees, where he was employed to help the gardener. With the advice of Greuze he took up portrait painting, quickly became the fashion, and laid by in a few years a fair competency. From that time he gave free rein to his passion for the mechanical arts and scientific studies. He attended the lectures of J. A. C. Charles, L. N. Vaquelin and J. B. Leroy, and exhibited before the Academy of Science an hydraulic machine of his own invention of which the model was the subject of a flattering report, and was placed in Charles's collection. The events of the Revolution soon gave him an opportunity for a further display of his inventive faculty. The war with England deprived France of plumbago; he substituted for it an artificial substance obtained from a mixture of graphite and clay, and took out a patent in 1795 for the form of pencil which still bears his name. At this time he was associated with Monge and Berthollet in experiments in connexion with the inflation of military balloons, was conducting the school for that department of the engineer corps at Meudon, was perfecting the methods of producing hydrogen in quantity, and was appointed (1796) by the Directory to the command of all the aerostatic establishments. He was at the head of the newly created Conservatoire des arts et metiers, and occupied himself with experiments in new compositions of permanent colours, and in 1798 constructed a metal-covered barometer for measuring comparative heights, by observing the weight of mercury issuing from the tube. Summoned by Bonaparte to take part as chief of the aerostatic corps in the expedition to Egypt, he considerably extended his field of activity, and for three years and a half was, to quote Berthollet, "the soul of the colony." The disaster of Aboukir and the revolt of Cairo had caused the loss of the greater part of the instruments and munitions taken out by the French. Conte, who, as Monge says, "had every science in his head and every art in his hands," and whom the First Consul described as "good at everything," seemed to be everywhere at once and triumphed over apparently insurmountable difficulties. He made, in an almost uncivilized country, utensils, tools and machinery of every sort from simple windmills to stamps for minting coin. Thanks to his activity and genius, the expedition was provided with bread, cloth, arms and munitions of war; the engineers with the exact tools of their trade; the surgeons with operating instruments. He made the designs, built the models, organized and supervised the manufacture, and seemed to be able to invent immediately anything required. On his return to France in 1802 he was commissioned by the minister of the interior, Chaptal, to superintend the publication of the great work of the commission on Egypt, and an engraving machine of his construction materially shortened this task, which, however, he did not live to see finished. He died at Paris on the 6th of December 1805. Napoleon had included him in his first promotions to the Legion of Honour. A bronze statue was erected to his memory in 1852 at Sees, by public subscription.



CONTEMPT OF COURT, in English law, any disobedience or disrespect to the authority or privileges of a legislative body, or interference with the administration of a court of justice.

1. The High Court of Parliament. Each of the two houses of Parliament has by the law and custom of parliament power to protect its freedom, dignity and authority against insult, disregard or violence by resort to its own process and not to ordinary courts of law and without having its process interfered with by those courts. The nature and limits of this authority to punish for contempt have been the subject of not infrequent conflict with the courts of law, from the time when Lord Chief Justice Holt threatened to commit the speaker for attempting to stop the trial of Ashby v. White (1701), as a breach of privilege, to the cases of Burdett v. Abbott (1810), Stockdale v. Hansard and Howard v. Gosset (1842, 1843), and Bradlaugh v. Gosset (1834). It is now the accepted view that the power of either House to punish contempt is exceptional and derived from ancient usage, and does not flow from their being courts of record. Orders for committal by the Commons are effectual only while the House sits; orders by the Lords may be for a time specified, in which event prorogation does not operate as a discharge of the offender. It was at one time considered that the privilege of committing for contempt was inherent in every deliberative body invested with authority by the constitution, and consequently that colonial legislative bodies had by the nature of their functions the power to commit for contempt. But in Kielley v. Carson (1843; 4 Moore, P.C. 63) it was held that the power belonged to parliament by ancient usage only and not on the theory above stated, and in each colony it is necessary to inquire how far the colonial legislature has acquired, by order in council or charter or from the imperial legislature, power to punish breach of privilege by imprisonment or committal for contempt. This power has in some cases been given directly, in others by authority to make laws and regulations under sanctions like those enforced by the Houses of the imperial parliament. In the case of Nova Scotia the provincial assembly has power to give itself by statute authority to commit for contempt (Fielding v. Thomas, 1896; L.R.A.C. 600). In Barton v. Taylor (1886; 11 A.C. 197) the competence of the legislative assembly of New South Wales to make standing orders punishing contempt was recognized to exist under the colonial constitution, but the particular standing orders under consideration are held not to cover the acts which had been punished. (See May, Parl. Pr., 10th ed., 1896; Anson, Law and Custom of the Constitution, 3rd ed., 1897.)

2. Courts of Justice. The term contempt of court, when used with reference to the courts or persons to whom the exercise of the judicial functions of the crown has been delegated, means insult offered to such court or person by deliberate defiance of its authority, disobedience to its orders, interruption of its proceedings or interference with the due course of justice, or any conduct calculated or tending to bring the authority or administration of the law into disrespect or disregard, or to interfere with or prejudice parties or witnesses during the litigation. The ingenuity of the judges and of those who are concerned to defeat or defy justice have rendered contempt almost Protean in its character. But for practical purposes most, if not all, contempts fall within the classification which follows:—

(a) Disobedience to the judgment or order of a court commanding the doing or abstaining from a particular act, e.g. an order to execute a conveyance of property or an order on a person in a fiduciary capacity to pay into court trust moneys as to which he is an accounting party. This includes disobedience by the members of a local authority to a mandamus to do some act which they are by law bound to do; and proceedings for contempt have been taken in the case of guardians of the poor who have refused to enforce the Vaccination Acts, e.g. at Keighley and Leicester, and of town councillors who have refused to comply with an order to take specified measures to drain their borough (e.g. Worcester). This process for compelling obedience is in substance a process of civil execution for the benefit of the injured party rather than a criminal process for punishing the disobedience; and for purposes of appeal orders dealing with these forms of contempt have hitherto been treated as civil proceedings.

(b) Disobedience by inferior judges or magistrates to the lawful order of a superior court. Such disobedience, if amounting to wilful misconduct, would usually give ground for amotion or removal from office, or for prosecution or indictment or information for misconduct (Archbold, Criminal Pleading, 147, 23rd ed.).

(c) Disobedience or misconduct by executive officers of the law, e.g. sheriffs and their bailiffs or gaolers. The contempt consists in not complying with the terms of writs or warrants sent for execution. For instance, a judge of assize having ordered the court to be cleared on account of some disturbance, the high sheriff issued a placard protesting against "this unlawful proceeding," and "prohibiting his officer from aiding and abetting any attempt to bar out the public from free access to the court." The lord chief justice of England, sitting in the other court, summoned the sheriff before him and fined him L500 for the contempt, and L500 more for persisting in addressing the grand jury in court, after he had been ordered to desist. A sheriff who fails to attend the assizes is liable to severe fine as being in contempt (Oswald, 51). And in Harvey's case (1884, 26 Ch. D. 644) steps were taken to attach a sheriff who had failed to execute a writ of attachment for contempt of court in the mistaken belief that he was not entitled to break open doors to take the person in contempt. The Sheriffs Act 1887 enumerates many instances in which misconduct is punishable under that act, but reserves to superior courts of record power to deal with such misconduct as a contempt (s. 29).

(d) Misconduct or neglect of duty by subordinate officials of courts of justice, including solicitors. In these cases it is more usual for the superior authorities to remove the offender from office, or for disciplinary proceedings to be instituted by the Law Society. But in the case of an unqualified person assuming to act as a solicitor or in the case of breach of an undertaking given by a solicitor to the court, proceedings for contempt are still taken.

(e) Misconduct by parties, jurors or witnesses. Jurors who fail to attend in obedience to a jury summons and witnesses who fail to attend on subpoena are liable to punishment for contempt, and parties, counsel or solicitors who practise a fraud on the court are similarly liable.

(f) Contempt in facie curiae. "Some contempts," says Blackstone, "may arise in the face of the court, as by rude and contumelious behaviour, by obstinacy, perverseness or prevarication, by breach of the peace, or any wilful disturbance whatever"; in other words, direct insult to or interference with a sitting court is treated as contempt of the court. It is immaterial whether the offender is juror, party, witness, counsel, solicitor or a stranger to the case at hearing, and occasionally it is found necessary to punish for contempt persons under trial for felony or misdemeanour if by violent language or conduct they interrupt the proceedings at their trial. Judges have even treated as contempt the continuance outside the court-house after warning of a noise sufficient to disturb the proceedings of the court; and in Victoria Chief Justice Higginbotham committed for contempt a builder who persisted after warning in building operations close to the central criminal court in Melbourne, which interfered with the due conduct of the business of the sittings.

(g) Attempts to prevent or interfere with the due course of justice, whether made by a person interested in a particular case or by an outsider. This branch of contempt takes many forms, such as frauds on the court by justices, solicitors or counsel (e.g. by fraudulently circularizing shareholders of a company against which a winding-up petition had been filed), tampering with witnesses by inducing them through threats or persuasion not to attend or to withhold evidence or to commit perjury, threatening judge or jury or attempting to bribe them and the like; and also by "scandalizing the court itself" by abusing the parties concerned in a pending case, or by creating prejudice against such persons before their cause is heard.

Invectives against judges.

The locus classicus on the subject of contempt by attacks on judges is a judgment prepared by Sir Eardley-Wilmot in the case of an application for an attachment against J. Almon in 1765, for publishing a pamphlet libelling the court of king's bench. The judgment was not actually delivered as the case was settled, but has long been accepted as correctly stating the law. Sir Eardley-Wilmot said that the offence of libelling judges in their judicial capacity is the most proper case for an attachment, for the "arraignment of the justice of the judges is arraigning the king's justice; it is an impeachment of his wisdom and goodness in the choice of his judges; and excites in the minds of the people a general dissatisfaction with all judicial determinations, and indisposes their minds to obey them. To be impartial, and to be universally thought so, are both absolutely necessary for the giving justice that free, open and uninterrupted current which it has for many ages found all over this kingdom, and which so eminently distinguishes and exalts it above all nations upon the earth." Again, "the constitution has provided very apt and proper remedies for correcting and rectifying the involuntary mistakes of judges, and for punishing and removing them for any perversion of justice. But if their authority is to be trampled on by pamphleteers and news-writers, and the people are to be told that the power given to the judges for their protection is prostituted to their destruction, the court may retain its power some little time, but I am sure it will eventually lose all its authority."

The object of the discipline enforced by the court by proceedings for contempt of court is not now, if it ever was, to vindicate the personal dignity of the judges or to protect them from insult as individuals, but to vindicate the dignity and authority of the court itself and to prevent acts tending to obstruct the due course of justice. The question whether a personal invective against judges should be dealt with brevi manu by the court attacked, or by proceedings at the instance of the attorney-general by information or indictment for a libel on the administration of justice or on the judge attacked, or should be dealt with by a civil action for damages, depends on the nature and occasion of the attack on the judge.

There has at times been a disposition by judges in colonial courts to use the process of the court to punish criticisms on their acts by counsel or parties or even outsiders, which the privy council has been prone to discourage. For instance in a Nova Scotia case a barrister was suspended from practice for writing to the chief justice of the province a letter relating to a case in which the barrister was suitor. The privy council while considering the letter technically a contempt, held the punishment inappropriate. In Macleod v. St Aubyn (1899, A.C. 549) it was said that proceedings for scandalizing the court itself were obsolete in England. But in 1900 the king's bench division, following the Almon case, summarily punished a scurrilous personal attack on a judge of assize with reference to his remarks in a concluded ease, published immediately after the conclusion of the case (R. v. Gray, 1900, 2 Q.B. 36). The same measure may be meted out to those who publish invectives against judges or juries with the object of creating suspicion or contempt as to the administration of justice. But the existence of this power does not militate against the right of the press to publish full reports of trials and judgments or to make with fairness, good faith, candour and decency, comments and criticisms on what passed at the trial and on the correctness of the verdict or the judgment. To impute corruption is said to go beyond the limits of fair criticism. Shortt (Law relating to Works of Literature) states the law to be that the temperate and respectful discussion of judicial determination is not prohibited, but mere invective and abuse, and still more the imputation of false, corrupt and dishonest motives is punishable. In an information granted in 1788 against the corporation of Yarmouth for having entered upon their books an order "stating that the assembly were sensible that Mr W. (against whom an action had been brought for malicious prosecution, and a verdict for L3000 returned, which the court refused to disturb) was actuated by motives of public justice, of preserving the rights of the corporation to their admiralty jurisdiction, and of supporting the honour and credit of the chief magistrate," Mr Justice Butler said, "The judge and jury who tried the case, confirmed by the court of common pleas, have said that instead of his having been actuated by motives of public justice, or by any motives which should influence the actions of an honest man, he had been actuated by malice. These opinions are not reconcilable; if the one be right the other must be wrong. It is therefore a direct insinuation that the court had judged wrong in all they have done in this case, and is therefore clearly a libel on the administration of justice."

The exact limits of the power to punish for contempt of court in respect of statements or comments on the action of judges and juries, or with reference to pending proceedings, have been the subject of some controversy, owing to the difficulty of reconciling the claims of the press to liberty and of the public to free discussion of the proceedings of courts of justice with the claims of the judges to due respect and of the parties to litigation that their causes should not be prejudiced before trial by outside interference. As the law now stands it is permissible to publish contemporaneous reports of the proceedings in cases pending in any court (Law of Libel Amendment Act 1888, s. 3), unless the proceedings have taken place in private (in camera), or the court has in the interests of justice prohibited any report until the case is concluded, a course now rarely, if ever, adopted. But it is not permissible to make any comments on a pending case calculated to interfere with the due course of justice in the case, nor to publish statements about the cause or the parties calculated to have that effect. This rule applies even when the case has been tried and the jury has disagreed if a second trial is in prospect. Applications are frequently made to commit proprietors and editors who comment too freely or who undertake the task of trying in their newspapers a pending case. The courts are now slow to move unless satisfied that the statements or comments may seriously affect the course of justice, e.g. by reaching the jurors who have to try the case.

The difference between pending and decided cases has been frequently recognized by the courts. What would be a fair comment in a decided case may tend to influence the mind of the judge or the jury in a case waiting to be heard, and will accordingly be punished as a contempt. In Tichborne v. Mostyn the publisher of a newspaper was held to have committed a contempt by printing in his paper extracts from affidavits in a pending suit, with comments upon them. In the case of R. v. Castro it was held that after a true bill has been found, and the indictment removed into the court of queen's bench, and a day fixed for trial, the case was pending; and it was a contempt of court to address public meetings, alleging that the defendant was not guilty, that there was a conspiracy against the defendant, and that he could not have a fair trial; and the court ordered the parties to answer for their contempt. In the case of the Moat Farm murder (1903) the high court punished as contempt a series of articles published in a newspaper while the preliminary inquiry was proceeding and before the case went to a jury (R. v. Parker, 1903, 2 K.B. 432). The like course was followed in 1905 in the case of statements made in a Welsh newspaper about a woman awaiting trial for attempted murder (R. v. Davies, 1906, 1 K.B. 32); and in the case of the Weekly Dispatch in 1902 (R. v. Tibbits and Windust, 1 K.B. 77), two journalists were tried on indictment, and held to have been rightly convicted, for conspiring to prevent the course of justice by publishing matter calculated to interfere with the fair trial of persons who were under accusation.

Courts having jurisdiction.

"In the superior courts the power of committing for contempt is inherent in their constitution, has been coeval with their original institution and has been always exercised" (Oswald, On Contempt, 3). The high court in which these courts are merged is the only court which has a general jurisdiction to deal summarily with all forms of contempt. Each division of that court deals with the particular contempts arising with reference to proceedings before the division; but the king's bench division, in the exercise of the supervisory authority inherited from the old court of king's bench as custos morum, also from time to time deals with acts constituting interference with justice in other inferior courts whether of record or not. The nature and limits of this jurisdiction after much discussion have been defined by decisions in 1903 and 1905 in attempts to try by newspapers cases under inquiry by justices or awaiting trial at assizes or quarter sessions. The exercise of this authority in the king's bench division, being in a criminal cause or matter, is not the subject of appeal to any higher court.

Inferior courts of record have, as a general rule, power to punish only those contempts which are committed in facie curiae or consist in disobedience to the lawful orders or judgments of the court. For instance, a county court may summarily punish persons who insult the judge or any officer of the court or any juror or witness, or wilfully interrupt the proceedings, or misbehave in the court-house (County Court Act 1888, s. 162), and may also attack persons who having means refuse to comply with an order to pay money, or refuse to comply with an order to deliver up a specific chattel or disobey an injunction. A court of quarter sessions has at common law a like power as to contempts in facie curiae and is said to have power to punish its officials for contempt in non-attendance or neglect of duty.

Punishment.

Contempt of court is a misdemeanour and is punishable by fine and imprisonment or either at discretion. The offence may be tried summarily, or may be prosecuted on information or on indictment as was done in the case of the Weekly Dispatch already mentioned. The prerogative of pardon extends to all contempts of court which are dealt with by a sentence of clearly punitive character; but it is doubtful whether it extends to committals for disobedience to orders made in aid of the execution of a civil judgment.

Contempt is usually dealt with summarily by the court contemned in the case of contempt in facie curiae. The offender may be instantly apprehended and without further proof or examination fined or sent to prison. In the case of other contempts the High Court not only can deal with contempts affecting itself, but can also intervene summarily to protect inferior courts from contempts. This jurisdiction was asserted and exercised in the Moat Farm case (1903) and the South Wales Post case (1905) already mentioned.

Except in cases of contempt in facie curiae evidence on oath as to the alleged contempt must be laid before the court, and application made for the "committal" or "attachment" of the offender. The differences between the two modes are technical rather than substantial.

The procedure for dealing with contempt of court varies somewhat according as the contempt consists in disobeying an order of the High Court made in a civil cause, or consists in interference with the course of justice by persons not present in court nor parties to the cause. In the first class of cases the court proceeds by order of committal or giving leave to issue writ of attachment. In either case the person said to be in contempt must have full notice of the proposed motion and of the grounds on which he is said to be in contempt; and the rules regulating such proceedings must be strictly complied with (R. v. Tuck, 1906, 2 Ch. 692). In proceedings on the crown side of the king's bench division it is still usual to apply in the first place for a rule nisi for leave to attach the alleged offender who is given an opportunity of explaining, excusing or justifying the incriminated acts. It is essential that before punishment the alleged offender should have had full notice as to the specific offence charged and opportunity of answering to it. The king's bench procedure is that generally used for interference with the due course of criminal justice or disobedience to prerogative writs such as mandamus.

An order of committal is an order in execution specifying the nature of the detention to be suffered, or the penalty to be paid. The process of attachment merely brings the accused into court; he is then required to answer on oath interrogatories administered to him, so that the court may be better informed of the circumstances of the contempt. If he can clear himself on oath he is discharged; if he confesses the court will punish him by fine or imprisonment, or both, at its discretion. But in very many cases on proper apology and submission, and undertaking not to repeat the contempt, and payment of costs, the court allows the proceedings to drop without proceeding to fine or imprison.

From time to time proposals have been made to deprive the superior courts of the power to deal summarily with contempts not committed in facie curiae, and to require proceedings on other charges for contempt to go before a jury. This distinction has already been made in some British colonies, e.g. British Guiana, by an ordinance of 1900 (No. 31). Recent decisions in England have so fully defined the limits of the offence and declared the practice of the courts that it would probably only result in undue licence of the press if the power now carefully and judicially exercised of dealing summarily with journalistic interference with the ordinary course of justice were taken away and the delay involved in submitting the case to a jury were made inevitable. The courts now only act in clear cases, and in cases of doubt can always send the question to a jury. The experience of other countries makes it undesirable to part with the summary remedy so long as it is in the hands of a trusted judicature.

Scotland.—In Scotland the courts of session and justiciary have, at common law, and exercise the power of punishing contempt committed during a judicial proceeding by censure, fine or imprisonment proprio motu without formal proceedings or a summary complaint. The nature of the offence is there in substance the same as in England (see Petrie, 1889: 7 Rettie Justiciary 3; Smith, 1892: 20 Rettie Justiciary 52).

Ireland.—In Ireland the law of contempt is on the same lines as in England, but conflicts have arisen between the bench and popular opinion, due to political and religious differences, which have led to proposals for making juries and not judges arbiters in cases of contempt.

British Dominions beyond Seas.—The courts of most British possessions have acquired and freely exercise the power of the court of king's bench to deal summarily with contempt of court; and, as already stated, it is not infrequently the duty of the privy council to restrain too exuberant a vindication of the offended dignity of a colonial court. (W. F. C.)



CONTI, PRINCES OF. The title of prince of Conti, assumed by a younger branch of the house of Conde, was taken from Conti-sur-Selles, a small town about 20 m. S.W. of Amiens, which came into the Conde family by the marriage of Louis of Bourbon, first prince of Conde, with Eleanor de Roye in 1551.

FRANCOIS (1558-1614), the third son of this marriage, was given the title of marquis de Conti, and between 1581 and 1597 was elevated to the rank of a prince. Conti, who belonged to the older faith, appears to have taken no part in the wars of religion until 1587, when his distrust of Henry, third duke of Guise, caused him to declare against the League, and to support Henry of Navarre, afterwards King Henry IV. of France. In 1589 after the murder of Henry III., king of France, he was one of the two princes of the blood who signed the declaration recognizing Henry IV. as king, and he continued to support Henry, although on the death of Charles cardinal de Bourbon in 1590 he himself was mentioned as a candidate for the throne. In 1605 Conti, whose first wife Jeanne de Coeeme, heiress of Bonnetable, had died in 1601, married the beautiful and witty Louise Marguerite (1574-1631), daughter of Henry duke of Guise and Catherine of Cleves, whom, but for the influence of his mistress Gabrielle d'Estrees, Henry IV. would have made his queen. Conti died in 1614. His only child Marie having predeceased him in 1610, the title lapsed. His widow followed the fortunes of Marie de' Medici, from whom she received many marks of favour, and was secretly married to Francois de Bassompierre (q.v.), who joined her in conspiring against Cardinal Richelieu. Upon the exposure of the plot the cardinal exiled her to her estate at Eu, near Amiens, where she died. The princess wrote Aventures de la cour de Perse, in which, under the veil of fictitious scenes and names, she tells the history of her own time.

In 1629 the title of prince de Conti was revived in favour of ARMAND DE BOURBON (1629-1666), second son of Henry II. of Bourbon, prince of Conde, and brother of Louis, the great Conde. He was destined for the church and studied theology at the university of Bourges, but although he received several benefices he did not take orders. He played a conspicuous part in the intrigues and fighting of the Fronde, became in 1648 commander-in-chief of the rebel army, and in 1650 was with his brother Conde imprisoned at Vincennes. Released when Mazarin went into exile, he wished to marry Mademoiselle de Chevreuse (1627-1652), daughter of the famous confidante of Anne of Austria, but was prevented by his brother, who was now supreme in the state. He was concerned in the Fronde of 1651, but soon afterwards became reconciled with Mazarin, and in 1654 married the cardinal's niece, Anne Marie Martinozzi (1639-1672), and secured the government of Guienne. He took command of the army which in 1654 invaded Catalonia, where he captured three towns from the Spaniards. He afterwards led the French forces in Italy, but after his defeat before Alessandria in 1657 retired to Languedoc, where he devoted himself to study and mysticism until his death. At Clermont Conti had been a fellow student of Moliere's for whom he secured an introduction to the court of Louis XIV., but afterwards, when writing a treatise against the stage entitled Traite de la comedie et des spectacles selon les traditions de l'Eglise (Paris, 1667), he charged the dramatist with keeping a school of atheism. Conti also wrote Lettres sur la grace, and Du devoir des grands et des devoirs des gouverneurs de province.

LOUIS ARMAND DE BOURBON, prince de Conti (1661-1685), eldest son of the preceding, succeeded his father in 1666, and in 1680 married Marie Anne, a daughter of Louis XIV. and Louise de la Valliere. He served with distinction in Flanders in 1683, and against the wish of the king went to Hungary, where he assisted the Imperialists to defeat the Turks at Gran in 1683. After a dissolute life he died at Fontainebleau from smallpox.

FRANCOIS LOUIS DE BOURBON, prince de Conti (1664-1709), younger brother of the preceding, was known until 1685 as prince de la Roche-sur-Yon. Naturally of great ability, he received an excellent education and was distinguished both for the independence of his mind and the popularity of his manners. On this account he was not received with favour by Louis XIV.; so in 1683 he assisted the Imperialists in Hungary, and while there he wrote some letters in which he referred to Louis as le roi an theatre, for which on his return to France he was temporarily banished to Chantilly. Conti was a favourite of his uncle the great Conde, whose grand-daughter Marie Therese de Bourbon (1666-1732) he married in 1688. In 1689 he accompanied his intimate friend Marshal Luxembourg to the Netherlands, and shared in the French victories at Fleurus, Steinkirk and Neerwinden. On the death of his cousin, Jean Louis Charles, duc de Longueville (1646-1694), Conti in accordance with his cousin's will, claimed the principality of Neuchatel against Marie, duchesse de Nemours (1625-1707), a sister of the duke. He failed to obtain military assistance from the Swiss, and by the king's command yielded the disputed territory to Marie, although the courts of law had decided in his favour. In 1697 Louis XIV. offered him the Polish crown, and by means of bribes the abbe de Polignac secured his election. Conti started rather unwillingly for his new kingdom, probably, as St Simon remarks, owing to his affection for Francoise, wife of Philip II., duke of Orleans, and daughter of Louis XIV. and Madame de Montespan. When he reached Danzig and found his rival Augustus II., elector of Saxony, already in possession of the Polish crown, he returned to France, where he was graciously received by Louis, although St Simon says the king was vexed to see him again. But the misfortunes of the French armies during the earlier years of the war of the Spanish Succession compelled Louis to appoint Conti, whose military renown stood very high, to command the troops in Italy. He fell ill before he could take the field, and died on the 9th of February 1709, his death calling forth exceptional signs of mourning from all classes.

LOUIS ARMAND DE BOURBON, prince de Conti (1606-1727), eldest son of the preceding, was treated with great liberality by Louis XIV., and also by the regent, Philip duke of Orleans. He served under Marshal Villars in the War of the Spanish Succession, but he lacked the soldierly qualities of his father. In 1713 he married Louise Elisabeth (1693-1775), daughter of Louis Henri de Bourbon, prince de Conde, and grand-daughter of Louis XIV. He was a prominent supporter of the financial schemes of John Law, by which he made large sums of money.

LOUIS FRANCOIS DE BOURBON, prince de Conti (1717-1776), only son of the preceding, adopted a military career, and when the war of the Austrian Succession broke out in 1741 accompanied Charles Louis, duc de Belle-Isle, to Bohemia. His services there led to his appointment to command the army in Italy, where he distinguished himself by forcing the pass of Villafranca and winning the battle of Coni in 1744. In 1745 he was sent to check the Imperialists in Germany, and in 1746 was transferred to the Netherlands, where some jealousy between Marshal Saxe and himself led to his retirement in 1747. In this year a faction among the Polish nobles offered Conti the crown of that country, where owing to the feeble health of King Augustus III. a vacancy was expected. He won the personal support of Louis XV. for his candidature, although the policy of the French ministers was to establish the house of Saxony in Poland, as the dauphiness was a daughter of Augustus. Louis therefore began secret personal relations with his ambassadors in eastern Europe, who were thus receiving contradictory instructions; a policy known later as the secret du roi. Although Conti did not secure the Polish throne he remained in the confidence of Louis until 1755, when his influence was destroyed by the intrigues of Madame de Pompadour; so that when the Seven Years' War broke out in 1756 he was refused the command of the army of the Rhine, and began the opposition to the administration which caused Louis to refer to him as "my cousin the advocate." In 1771 he was prominent in opposition to the chancellor Maupeou. He supported the parlements against the ministry, was especially active in his hostility to Turgot, and was suspected of aiding a rising which took place at Dijon in 1775. Conti, who died on the 2nd of August 1776, inherited literary tastes from his father, was a brave and skilful general, and a diligent student of military history. His house, over which the comtesse de Boufflers presided, was the resort of many men of letters, and he was a patron of Jean Jacques Rousseau.

LOUIS FRANCOIS JOSEPH, prince de Conti (1734-1814), son of the preceding, possessed considerable talent as a soldier, and distinguished himself during the Seven Years' War. He took the side of Maupeou in the struggle between the chancellor and the parlements, and in 1788 declared that the integrity of the constitution must be maintained. He emigrated owing to the weakness of Louis XVI., but refused to share in the plans for the invasion of France, and returned to his native country in 1790. Arrested by order of the National Convention in 1793, he was acquitted, but was reduced to poverty by the confiscation of his possessions. He afterwards received a pension, but the Directory banished him from France, and as he refused to share in the plots of the royalists he lived at Barcelona till his death in 1814, when the house of Conti became extinct.

See F. de Bassompierre, Memoires (Paris, 1877); G. Tallemant des Reaux, Historiettes (Paris, 1854-1860); L. de R. duc de Saint Simon, Memoires (Paris, 1873); C. E. duchesse d'Orleans, Memoires (Paris, 1880); R. L. Marquis d'Argenson, Journal et memoires (Paris, 1859-1865); F. J. de P. cardinal de Bernis, Memoires et lettres (Paris, 1878); J. V. A. duc de Broglie, Le Secret du roi (Paris, 1878); P. A. Cheruel, Histoire de la minorite de Louis XIV et du ministere de Mazarin (Paris, 1879); E. Boutaric, Correspondence secrete de Louis XV sur la politique etrangere (Paris, 1866); P. Foncin, Essai sur le ministere de Turgot (Paris, 1877); E. Bourgeois Neuchatel et la politique prussienne en Franche-Comte (Paris, 1877).



CONTI, NICOLO DE' (fl. 1419-1444), Venetian explorer and writer, was a merchant of noble family, who left Venice about 1419, on what proved an absence of 25 years. We next find him in Damascus, whence he made his way over the north Arabian desert, the Euphrates, and southern Mesopotamia, to Bagdad. Here he took ship and sailed down the Tigris to Basra and the head of the Persian Gulf; he next descended the gulf to Ormuz, coasted along the Indian Ocean shore of Persia (at one port of which he remained some time, and entered into a business partnership with some Persian merchants), and so reached the gulf and city of Cambay, where he began his Indian life and observations. He next dropped down the west coast of India to Ely, and struck inland to Vijayanagar, the capital of the principal Hindu state of the Deccan, destroyed in 1555. Of this city Conti gives an elaborate description, one of the most interesting portions of his narrative. From Vijayanagar and the Tungabudhra he travelled to Maliapur near Madras, the traditional resting-place of the body of St Thomas, and the holiest shrine of the native Nestorian Christians, then "scattered over all India," the Venetian declares, "as the Jews are among us." The narrative next refers to Ceylon, and gives a very accurate account of the Cingalese cinnamon tree; but, if Conti visited the island at all, it was probably on the return journey. His outward route now took him to Sumatra, where he stayed a year, and of whose cruel, brutal, cannibal natives he gained a pretty full knowledge, as of the camphor, pepper and gold of this "Taprobana." From Sumatra a stormy voyage of sixteen days brought him to Tenasserim, near the head of the Malay Peninsula. We then find him at the mouth of the Ganges, and trace him ascending and descending that river (a journey of several months), visiting Burdwan and Aracan, penetrating into Burma, and navigating the Irawadi to Ava. He appears to have spent some time in Pegu, from which he again plunged into the Malay Archipelago, and visited Java, his farthest point. Here he remained nine months, and then began his return by way of Ciampa (usually Cochin-China in later medieval European literature, but here perhaps some more westerly portion of Indo-China); a month's voyage from Ciampa brought him to Coloen, doubtless Kulam or Quilon, in the extreme south-west of India. Thence he continued his homeward route, touching at Cochin, Calicut and Cambay, to Sokotra, which he describes as still mainly inhabited by Nestorian Christians; to the "rich city" of Aden, "remarkable for its buildings"; to Gidda or Jidda, the port of Mecca; over the desert to Carras or Cairo; and so to Venice, where he arrived in 1444.

As a penance for his (compulsory) renunciation of the Christian faith during his wanderings, Eugenius IV. ordered him to relate his history to Poggio Bracciolini, the papal secretary. The narrative closes with Conti's elaborate replies to Poggio's question on Indian life, social classes, religion, fashions, manners, customs and peculiarities of various kinds. Following a prevalent fashion, the Venetian divides his Indies into three parts, the first extending from Persia to the Indus; the second from the Indus to the Ganges; the third including all beyond the Ganges; this last he considered to excel the others in wealth, culture and magnificence, and to be abreast of Italy in civilization. We may note, moreover, Conti's account of the bamboo in the Ganges valley; of the catching, taming and rearing of elephants in Burma and other regions; of Indian tattooing and the use of leaves for writing; of various Indian fruits, especially the jack and mango; of the polyandry of Malabar; of the cockfighting of Java; of what is apparently the bird of Paradise; of Indian funeral ceremonies, and especially suttee; of the self-mutilation and immolation of Indian fanatics; and of Indian magic, navigation ("they are not acquainted with the compass"), justice, &c. Several venerable legends are reproduced; and Conti's name-forms, partly through Poggio's vicious classicism, are often absolutely unrecognizable; but on the whole this is the best account of southern Asia by any European of the 15th century; while the traveller's visit to Sokotra is an almost though not quite unique performance for a Latin Christian of the middle ages.

The original Latin is in Poggio's De varietate Fortunae, book iv.; see the edition of the Abbe Oliva (Paris, 1723). The Italian version, printed in Ramusio's Navigationi et viaggi, vol. i., is only from a Portuguese translation made in Lisbon. An English translation with short notes was made by J. Winter Jones for the Hakluyt Society in the vol. entitled India in the Fifteenth Century (London, 1857); an introductory account of the traveller and his work by R. H. Major precedes. (C. R. B.)



CONTINENT (from Lat. continere, "to hold together"; hence "connected," "continuous"), a word used in physical geography of the larger continuous masses of land in contrast to the great oceans, and as distinct from the submerged tracts where only the higher parts appear above the sea, and from islands generally.

On looking at a map of the world, continents appear generally as wedge-shaped tracts pointing southward, while the oceans have a polygonal shape. Eurasia is in some sense an exception, but all the southern terminations of the continents advance into the sea in the form of a wedge—South America, South Africa, Arabia, India, Malaysia and Australia connected by a submarine platform with Tasmania. It is difficult not to believe that these remarkable characters have some relation to the structure of the great globe-mass, and according to T. C. Chamberlin and R. D. Salisbury, in their Geology (1906), "the true conception is perhaps that the ocean basins and continental platforms are but the surface forms of great segments of the lithosphere, all of which crowd towards the centre, the stronger and heavier—the ocean basins—taking precedence and squeezing the weaker and lighter ones—the continents—between them." "The area of the most depressed, or master segments, is almost exactly twice that of the protruding or squeezed ones. This estimate includes in the latter about 10,000,000 sq. m. now covered with shallow water. The volume of the hydrosphere is a little too great for the true basins, and it runs over, covering the borders of the continents" (see Continental Shelf). Several theories have been advanced to account for the roughly triangular shape of the continents, but that presenting the least difficulty is the one expressed above, "since in a spherical surface divided into larger and smaller segments the major part should be polygonal, while the minor residual segments are more likely to be triangular."

As bearing on this geological idea, it is interesting to notice in this connexion that the areas of volcanic activity are mostly where continent and ocean meet; and that around the continents there is an almost continuous "deep" from 100 to 300 m. broad, of which the Challenger Deep (11,400 ft.) and the great Tuscarora Deep are fragments. If on a map of the world a broad inked brush be swept seawards round Africa, passing into the Mediterranean, round North and South America, round India, then continuously south of Java and round Australia south of Tasmania and northward to the tropic, this broad band will represent the encircling ribbon-like "deep," which gives strength to the suggestion that the continents in their main features are permanent forms and that their structural connexion with the oceans is not temporary and accidental. The great protruding or "squeezed" segments are the Eurasian (with an area roughly of twenty-four, reckoning in millions of square miles), strongly ridged on the south and east, and relatively flat on the north-west; the African (twelve), rather strongly ridged on the east, less abruptly on the west and north; the North American (ten), strongly ridged on the west, more gently on the east, and relatively flat on the north and in the interior; the South American (nine), strongly ridged on the west and somewhat on the north-east and south-east, leaving ten for the smaller blocks. The sum of these will represent one-third of the earth's surface, while the remaining two-thirds is covered by the ocean. The foundation structure of the continents is everywhere similar. Their resulting rocks and soils are due to differential minor movements in the past, by which deposits of varying character were produced. These movements, taking place periodically and followed by long periods of rest, produce continued stability for the development and migration of forms of life, the grading of rivers, the development of varied characteristic land forms, the migration and settlement of human beings, the facility or difficulty of intelligent intercourse between races and communities, with finally the commercial interchange of those commodities produced by varying climatic conditions upon different parts of the continental surface; in short, for those geographical factors which form the chief product of past and present human history. (See Geography.)



CONTINENTAL SHELF, the term in physical geography for the submerged platform upon which a continent or island stands in relief. If a coin or medal be partly sunk under water the image and superscription will stand above water and represent a continent with adjacent islands; the sunken part just submerged will represent the continental shelf and the edge of the coin the boundary between it and the surrounding deep, called by Professor H. K. H. Wagner the continental slope. If the lithosphere surface be divided into three parts, namely, the continent heights, the ocean depths, and the transitional area separating them, it will be found that this transitional area is almost bisected by the coast-line, that nearly one-half of it (10,000,000 sq. m.) lies under water less than 100 fathoms deep, and the remainder 12,000,000 sq. m. is under 600 ft. in elevation. There are thus two continuous plain systems, one above water and one under water, and the second of these is called the continental shelf. It represents the area which would be added to the land surface if the sea fell 600 ft. This shelf varies in width. Round Africa—except to the south—and off the western coasts of America it scarcely exists. It is wide under the British Islands and extends as a continuous platform under the North Sea, down the English Channel to the south of France; it unites Australia to New Guinea on the north and to Tasmania on the south, connects the Malay Archipelago along the broad shelf east of China with Japan, unites north-western America with Asia, sweeps in a symmetrical curve outwards from north-eastern America towards Greenland, curving downwards outside Newfoundland and holding Hudson Bay in the centre of a shallow dish. In many places it represents the land planed down by wave action to a plain of marine denudation, where the waves have battered down the cliffs and dragged the material under water. If there were no compensating action in the differential movement of land and sea in the transitional area, the whole of the land would be gradually planed down to a submarine platform, and all the globe would be covered with water. There are, however, periodical warpings of this transitional area by which fresh areas of land are raised above sea-level, and fresh continental coast-lines produced, while the sea tends to sink more deeply into the great ocean basins, so that the continents slowly increase in size. "In many cases it is possible that the continental shelf is the end of a low plain submerged by subsidence; in others a low plain may be an upheaved continental shelf, and probably wave action is only one of the factors at work" (H. R. Mill, Realm of Nature, 1897).



CONTINUED FRACTIONS. In mathematics, an expression of the form

b2 a1 +- —————- b3 a2 +- —————- b4 a3 +- ————— b5 a4 +- —— a5 +- ...,

where a1, a2, a3, ... and b2, b3, b4, ... are any quantities whatever, positive or negative, is called a "continued fraction." The quantities a1 ..., b2 ... may follow any law whatsoever. If the continued fraction terminates, it is said to be a terminating continued fraction; if the number of the quantities a1 ..., b2 ... is infinite it is said to be a non-terminating or infinite continued fraction. If b2/a2, b3/a3 ..., the component fractions, as they are called, recur, either from the commencement or from some fixed term, the continued fraction is said to be recurring or periodic. It is obvious that every terminating continued fraction reduces to a commensurable number.

The notation employed by English writers for the general continued fraction is

b2 b3 b4 a1 +- — — — ... a2 +- a3 +- a4 +-

Continental writers frequently use the notation

b2 b3 b4 b2 b3 b4 a1 +- +- +- +- ..., or a1 +- +- +- +- ... a2 a3 a4 a2 a3 a4

The terminating continued fractions

b2 b2 b3 b2 b3 b4 a1, a1 + —, a1 + — —, a1 + — — —, ... a2 a2 + a3 a2 + a3 + a4

reduced to the forms

a1 a1a2 + b2 a1a2a3 + b2a3 + b2a1 —, ————-, ——————————, 1 a2 a2a3 + b3

a1a2a3a4 + b2a3a4 + b3a1a4 + b4a1a2 + b2b4 —————————————————————, ... a2a3a4 + a4b3 + a2b4

are called the successive convergents to the general continued fraction.

Their numerators are denoted by p1, p2, p3, p4...; their denominators by q1, q2, q3, q4....

We have the relations

pn = a{n}p{n-1} + b{n}p{n-2}, qn = a{n}q{n-1} + b{n}q{n-2}.

b2 b3 b4 In the case of the fraction a1 - — — — ..., we have the a2 - a3 - a4 -

relations

pn = a{n}p{n-1} - b{n}p{n-2}, qn= a{n}q{n-1} - b{n}q{n-2}.

Taking the quantities a1 ..., b2 ... to be all positive, a continued

b2 b3 fraction of the form a1 + — — ... is called a _continued fraction a2 + a3 +

b2 b3 b4 of the first class_; a continued fraction of the form — — — ... a2 - a3 - a4 -

called a continued fraction of the second class.

1 1 1 A continued fraction of the form a1 + — — — ..., where a2 + a3 + a4 +

a1, a2, a3, a4 ... are all positive integers, is called a simple continued fraction. In the case of this fraction a1, a2, a3, a4 ... are called the successive partial quotients. It is evident that, in this case,

p1, p2, p3 ..., q1, q2, q3 ...,

are two series of positive integers increasing without limit if the fraction does not terminate.

b2 b3 b4 The general continued fraction a1 + — — — ... is evidently a2 + a3 + a4 +

equal, convergent by convergent, to the continued fraction

[lambda]2b2 [lambda]2[lambda]3b3 [lambda]3[lambda]4b4 a1 + —————- —————————— —————————— ..., [lambda]2a2 + [lambda]3a3 + [lambda]4a4 +

where [lambda]2, [lambda]3, [lambda]4, ... are any quantities whatever, so that by choosing [lambda]2b2 = 1, [lambda]2[lambda]3b3 = 1, &c., it can be reduced to any equivalent continued fraction of the form

1 1 1 a1 + — — — ... d2 + d3 + d4 +

Simple Continued Fractions.

1. The simple continued fraction is both the most interesting and important kind of continued fraction.

Any quantity, commensurable or incommensurable, can be expressed uniquely as a simple continued fraction, terminating in the case of a commensurable quantity, non-terminating in the case of an incommensurable quantity. A non-terminating simple continued fraction must be incommensurable.

In the case of a terminating simple continued fraction the number of partial quotients may be odd or even as we please by writing the last

1 partial quotient, an as an - 1 + —. 1

The numerators and denominators of the successive convergents obey the law p{n}q{n-1} - p{n-1}qn = (-1)^n, from which it follows at once that every convergent is in its lowest terms. The other principal properties of the convergents are:—

The odd convergents form an increasing series of rational fractions continually approaching to the value of the whole continued fraction; the even convergents form a decreasing series having the same property.

Every even convergent is greater than every odd convergent; every odd convergent is less than, and every even convergent greater than, any following convergent.

Every convergent is nearer to the value of the whole fraction than any preceding convergent.

Every convergent is a nearer approximation to the value of the whole fraction than any fraction whose denominator is less than that of the convergent.

The difference between the continued fraction and the n^{th} convergent

1 a_{n+2} is less than ——————, and greater than ——————. These limits q_{n}q_{n+1} q_{n}q_{n+2}

may be replaced by the following, which, though not so close, are

1 1 simpler, viz. ———- and ————————— . q^{2}n qn(qn + q{n+1})

Every simple continued fraction must converge to a definite limit; for its value lies between that of the first and second convergents and, since

pn p{n-1} 1 pn p{n-1} —- ~ ———- = ——————, Lt. ——- = Lt. ———-, qn q{n-1} q{n}q{n-1} qn q{n-1}

so that its value cannot oscillate.

The chief practical use of the simple continued fraction is that by means of it we can obtain rational fractions which approximate to any quantity, and we can also estimate the error of our approximation. Thus a continued fraction equivalent to [pi] (the ratio of the circumference to the diameter of a circle) is

1 1 1 1 1 1 3 + - — — —- — — 7 + 15 + 1 + 292 + 1 + 1 + ...

of which the successive convergents are

3 22 333 355 103993 —, —, —-, —-, ———, &c., 1 7 106 113 33102

the fourth of which is accurate to the sixth decimal place, since the error lies between 1/q4q5 or .0000002673 and a6/q4q6 or .0000002665.

Similarly the continued fraction given by Euler as equivalent to 1/2(e -1) (e being the base of Napierian logarithms), viz.

1 1 1 1 1 — — — — — 1 + 6 + 10 + 14 + 18 + ...,

may be used to approximate very rapidly to the value of e.

For the application of continued fractions to the problem "To find the fraction, whose denominator does not exceed a given integer D, which shall most closely approximate (by excess or defect, as may be assigned) to a given number commensurable or incommensurable," the reader is referred to G. Chrystal's Algebra, where also may be found details of the application of continued fractions to such interesting and important problems as the recurrence of eclipses and the rectification of the calendar (q.v.).

Lagrange used simple continued fractions to approximate to the solutions of numerical equations; thus, if an equation has a root between two integers a and a + 1, put x = a + 1/y and form the equation in y; if the equation in y has a root between b and b + 1, put y = b + 1/z, and so on. Such a method is, however, too tedious, compared with such a method as Homer's, to be of any practical value.

The solution in integers of the indeterminate equation ax + by = c may be effected by means of continued fractions. If we suppose a/b to be converted into a continued fraction and p/q to be the penultimate convergent, we have aq - bp = +1 or -1, according as the number of convergents is even or odd, which we can take them to be as we please. If we take aq-bp = +1 we have a general solution in integers of ax + by = c, viz. x = cq - bt, y = at - cp; if we take aq - bp = -1, we have x = bt - cq, y = cp - at.

An interesting application of continued fractions to establish a unique correspondence between the elements of an aggregate of m dimensions and an aggregate of n dimensions is given by G. Cantor in vol. 2 of the Acta Mathematica.

Applications of simple continued fractions to the theory of numbers, as, for example, to prove the theorem that a divisor of the sum of two squares is itself the sum of two squares, may be found in J. A. Serret's Cours d'Algebre Superieure.

2. Recurring Simple Continued Fractions.—The infinite continued fraction

1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 a1 + — — —- — — —- — — —- — a2 + a3 ... + a_n + b1 + b2 ... + b_n + b1 + b2 ... + b_n + b1 + ...,

where, after the n^{th} partial quotient, the cycle of partial quotients b1, b2, ..., b_n recur in the same order, is the type of a recurring simple continued fraction.

The value of such a fraction is the positive root of a quadratic equation whose coefficients are real and of which one root is negative. Since the fraction is infinite it cannot be commensurable and therefore its value is a quadratic surd number. Conversely every positive quadratic surd number, when expressed as a simple continued fraction, will give rise to a recurring fraction. Thus

_ 1 1 1 1 1 2 - / 3 = — — — — — 3 + 1 + 2 + 1 + 2 + ...,

_ 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 / 28 = 5 + — — — — — — — — 3 + 2 + 3 + 10 + 3 + 2 + 3 + 10 + ...

The second case illustrates a feature of the recurring continued fraction which represents a complete quadratic surd. There is only one non-recurring partial quotient a1. If b1, b2, ..., b_n is the cycle of recurring quotients, then b_n = 2a1, b1 = b_{n-1}, b2 = b_{n-2}, b3 = b_{n-3}, &c.

In the case of a recurring continued fraction which represents [sqr]N, where N is an integer, if n is the number of partial quotients in the recurring cycle, and p{nr}/q{nr} the nr^{th} convergent, then p^2{nr} -Nq^2{nr} = (-1)^{nr}, whence, if n is odd, integral solutions of the indeterminate equation x squared - Ny squared = +-1 (the so-called Pellian equation) can be found. If n is even, solutions of the equation x squared -Ny squared = +1 can be found.

The theory and development of the simple recurring continued fraction is due to Lagrange. For proofs of the theorems here stated and for applications to the more general indeterminate equation x squared -Ny squared = H the reader may consult Chrystal's Algebra or Serret's Cours d'Algebre Superieure; he may also profitably consult a tract by T. Muir, The Expression of a Quadratic Surd as a Continued Fraction (Glasgow, 1874).

The General Continued Fraction.

1. _The Evaluation of Continued Fractions._—The numerators and denominators of the convergents to the general continued fraction both satisfy the difference equation u_n = a_{n}u_{n-1} + b_{n}u_{n-2}. When we can solve this equation we have an expression for the n^{th} convergent to the fraction, generally in the form of the quotient of two series, each of n terms. As an example, take the fraction (known as Brouncker's fraction, after Lord Brouncker)

1 1 squared 3 squared 5 squared 7 squared — — — — — 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 + 2 + ...

Here we have

u_{n+1} = 2u_n + (2n-1) squaredu_{n-1},

whence

u{n+1} - (2n + 1)un = -(2n - 1){un - (2n - 1)u{n-1}},

and we readily find that

pn 1 1 1 1 ——- = 1 - — + — - — + ... +- ———, qn 3 5 7 2n + 1

whence the value of the fraction taken to infinity is 1/4[pi].

It is always possible to find the value of the n^{th} convergent to a recurring continued fraction. If r be the number of quotients in the recurring cycle, we can by writing down the relations connecting the successive p's and q's obtain a linear relation connecting

p_{nr+m}, p_{(n-1)r+m}, p_{(n-2)r+m},

in which the coefficients are all constants. Or we may proceed as follows. (We need not consider a fraction with a non-recurring part). Let the fraction be

a1 a2 ar a1 — — —- — b1 + b2 + ... + br + b1 + ...

p_{nr+m} a1 a2 a_r Let u_n = ————; then u_n = — — ——————, leading q_{nr+m} b1 + b2 + ... + b_r + u_{n1}

to an equation of the form Au{n}u{n-1} + Bun + Cu{n-1} + D = 0, where A, B, C, D are independent of n, which is readily solved.

2. _The Convergence of Infinite Continued Fractions._—We have seen that the simple infinite continued fraction converges. The infinite general continued fraction of the first class cannot diverge for its value lies between that of its first two convergents. It may, however, oscillate. We have the relation p_{n}q_{n-1} - p_{n-1}q_n = (-1)^{n}b2b3...b_n,

p_n p_{n-1} b2b3 ... b_n from which —- - ———- = (-1)^n ——————, and the limit of the q_n q_{n-1} q_{n}q_{n-1}

right-hand side is not necessarily zero.

The tests for convergency are as follows:

Let the continued fraction of the first class be reduced to the form

1 1 1 d1 + — — — , then it is convergent if at least one of the d2 + d3 + d4 + ...

series d3 + d5 + d7 + ..., d2 + d4 + d6 + ... diverges, and oscillates if both these series converge.

For the convergence of the continued fraction of the second class there is no complete criterion. The following theorem covers a large number of important cases.

"If in the infinite continued fraction of the second class an [>=] bn + 1 for all values of n, it converges to a finite limit not greater than unity."

3. The Incommensurability of Infinite Continued Fractions.—There is no general test for the incommensurability of the general infinite continued fraction.

Two cases have been given by Legendre as follows:—

If a2, a3, ..., an, b2, b3, ...,bn are all positive integers, then

b2 b3 b{n} I. The infinite continued fraction — — ——- converges a2 + a3 + ... + a{n} + ...

to an incommensurable limit if after some finite value of n the condition a{n} [not <] b{n} is always satisfied.

b2 b3 b{n} II. The infinite continued fraction — — ——- a2 - a3 - ... - a{n} - ...

converges to an incommensurable limit if after some finite value of n the condition a{n} [>=] b{n} + 1 is always satisfied, where the sign > need not always occur but must occur infinitely often.

Continuants.

The functions p{n} and q{n}, regarded as functions of a1, ..., a{n}, b2, ..., b{n} determined by the relations

p{n} = a{n}p{n-1} + b{n}p{n-2}, q{n} = a{n}q{n-1} + b{n}q{n-2},

with the conditions p1 = a1, p0 = 1; q2 = a2, q1 = 1, q0 = 0, have been studied under the name of continuants. The notation adopted is

/ b2,...,b_{n} p_{n} = K ( ), a1, a2,...,a_{n}/

and it is evident that we have

/ b3,...,b_{n} q_{n} = K ( ). a2, a3,...,a_{n}/

The theory of continuants is due in the first place to Euler. The reader will find the theory completely treated in Chrystal's Algebra, where will be found the exhibition of a prime number of the form 4p + 1 as the actual sum of two squares by means of continuants, a result given by H. J. S. Smith.

The continuant

/ b2, b3, ..., b{n} K ( ) is also equal to the determinant a1, a2, a3, ..., a{n}/

is also equal to the determinant

a1 b2 0 0 . . . 0 -1 a2 b3 0 . . . 0 0 -1 a3 b4 . . . 0 0 0 -1 a4 b5 . . u -1 a_{n-1} b_{n} 0 0 0 0 -1 a_{n} ,

from which point of view continuants have been treated by W. Spottiswoode, J. J. Sylvester and T. Muir. Most of the theorems concerning continued fractions can be thus proved simply from the properties of determinants (see T. Muir's Theory of Determinants, chap. iii.).

Perhaps the earliest appearance in analysis of a continuant in its determinant form occurs in Lagrange's investigation of the vibrations of a stretched string (see Lord Rayleigh, Theory of Sound, vol. i. chap. iv.).

The Conversion of Series and Products into Continued Fractions.

1. A continued fraction may always be found whose n^{th} convergent shall be equal to the sum to n terms of a given series or the product to n factors of a given continued product. In fact, a continued fraction

b1 b2 b{n} — — ——- can be constructed having for the a1 + a2 + ... + a{n} + ...

numerators of its successive convergents any assigned quantities p1, p2, p3, ..., p{n}, and for their denominators any assigned quantities q1, q2, q3, ..., q{n} ...

The partial fraction b{n}/a{n} corresponding to the n^{th} convergent can be found from the relations

pn = a{n}p{n-1} + b{n}p{n-2}, qn = a{n}q{n-1} + b{n}q{n-2};

and the first two partial quotients are given by

b1 = p1, a1 = q1, b1a2 = p2, a1a2 + b2 = q2.

If we form then the continued fraction in which p1, p2, p3, ..., p{n} are u1, u1 + u2, u1 + u2 + u3, ..., u1 + u2 + ..., u{n}, and q1, q2, q3, ..., q{n} are all unity, we find the series u1 + u2 + ..., u{n} equivalent to the continued fraction

u1 u2/u1 u3/u2 un/u{n-1} — ——— ——— ————— 1 - u2 u3 u{n} 1 + — - 1 + — - ... - 1 + ———- u1 u2 u{n-1}

which we can transform into

u1 u2 u1u3 u2u4 u{n-2}u{n} — ———- ———- ———- ———————-, 1 - u1 + u2 - u2 + u3 - u3 + u4 - ... - u{n-1} + u{n}

a result given by Euler.

2. In this case the sum to n terms of the series is equal to the n^{th} convergent of the fraction. There is, however, a different way in which a Series may be represented by a continued fraction. We may require to represent the infinite convergent power series a0 + a1x + a2x squared + ... by an infinite continued fraction of the form

[beta]0 [beta]1 x [beta]2 x [beta]3 x ———- ————- ————- ————- 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 - ...

Here the fraction converges to the sum to infinity of the series. Its n^{th} convergent is not equal to the sum to n terms of the series. Expressions for [beta]0, [beta]1, [beta]2, ... by means of determinants have been given by T. Muir (Edinburgh Transactions, vol. xxvii.).

A method was given by J. H. Lambert for expressing as a continued fraction of the preceding type the quotient of two convergent power series. It is practically identical with that of finding the greatest common measure of two polynomials. As an instance leading to results of some importance consider the series

x x squared F(n,x) = 1 + ———————- + ———————————————— + ... ([gamma] + n)1! ([gamma] + n)([gamma] + n + 1)2!

We have

x F(n + 1,x) - F(n,x) = - ——————————————— F(n + 2,x), ([gamma] + n)([gamma] + n + 1)

whence we obtain

F(1,x) 1 x/[gamma]([gamma] + 1) x/([gamma] + 1)([gamma] + 2) ——— = — ——————————— —————————————— F(0,x) 1 + 1 + 1 + ...,

which may also be written

[gamma] x x ———- —————- —————- [gamma] + [gamma] + 1 + [gamma] + 2 + ...

By putting +- x squared/4 for x in F(0,x) and F(1,x), and putting at the same time [gamma] = 1/2, we obtain

x x squared x squared x squared x x squared x squared x squared tan x = — — — — tanh x = — — — — 1 - 3 - 5 - 7 - ... 1 + 3 + 5 + 7 + ...

These results were given by Lambert, and used by him to prove that [pi] and [pi] squared incommensurable, and also any commensurable power of e.

Gauss in his famous memoir on the hypergeometric series

F([alpha], [beta], [gamma], x) =

[alpha].[beta] [alpha]([alpha] + 1)[beta]([beta] + 1) ———————x + ——————————————————— x squared + ... 1.[gamma] 1.2.[gamma].([gamma] + 1)

gave the expression for F([alpha], [beta] + 1, [gamma] + 1, x) / F([alpha], [beta], [gamma], x) as a continued fraction, from which if we put [beta] = 0 and write [gamma] - 1 for [gamma], we get the transformation

[alpha] [alpha]([alpha] + 1) 1 + ———-x + ——————————x squared + [gamma] [gamma]([gamma] + 1)

[alpha]([alpha] + 1)([alpha] + 2) ————————————————-x cubed + ... = [gamma]([gamma] + 1)([gamma] + 2)

1 [beta]1 x [beta]2 x — ————- ————- where 1 - 1 - 1 - ...

[alpha] ([alpha] + 1)[gamma] [beta]1 = ———-, [beta]3 = —————————————, ..., [gamma] ([gamma] + 1)([gamma] + 2)

([alpha] + n - 1)([gamma] + n - 2) [beta]_{2n-1} = ——————————————————, ([gamma] + 2n - 3)([gamma] + 2n - 2)

[gamma] - [alpha] 2([gamma] + 1 - [alpha]) [beta]2 = ——————————, [beta]4 = —————————————, [gamma]([gamma] + 1) ([gamma] + 2)([gamma] + 3)

n([gamma] + n - 1 - [alpha]) ..., [beta]_{2n} = ——————————————————. ([gamma] + 2n - 2)([gamma] + 2n - 1)

From this we may express several of the elementary series as continued fractions; thus taking [alpha] = 1, [gamma] = 2, and putting x for -x,

x 1 squaredx 1 squaredx 2 squaredx 2 squaredx 3 squaredx 3 squaredx we have log(1 + x) = — —- —- —- —- —- —- 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + ...

Taking [gamma] = 1, writing x/[alpha] for x and increasing [alpha] indefinitely, we have

1 x x x x x e^x = — — — — — — 1 - 1 + 2 - 3 + 2 - 5 + ...

For some recent developments in this direction the reader may consult a paper by L. J. Rogers in the Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society (series 2, vol. 4).

Ascending Continued Fractions.

There is another type of continued fraction called the ascending continued fraction, the type so far discussed being called the descending continued fraction. It is of no interest or importance, though both Lambert and Lagrange devoted some attention to it. The notation for this type of fraction is

b5 + b4 + —— a5 b3 + ————- a4 b2 + ——————— a3 a1 + —————————- a2

It is obviously equal to the series

b2 b3 b4 b5 a1 + — + —— + ——— + ———— + ... a2 a2a3 a2a3a4 a2a3a4a5

Historical Note.

The invention of continued fractions is ascribed generally to Pietro Antonia Cataldi, an Italian mathematician who died in 1626. He used them to represent square roots, but only for particular numerical examples, and appears to have had no theory on the subject. A previous writer, Rafaello Bombelli, had used them in his treatise on Algebra (about 1579), and it is quite possible that Cataldi may have got his ideas from him. His chief advance on Bombelli was in his notation. They next appear to have been used by Daniel Schwenter (1585-1636) in a Geometrica Practica published in 1618. He uses them for approximations. The theory, however, starts with the publication in 1655 by Lord Brouncker of the continued fraction

1 1 squared 3 squared 5 squared — — — — as an equivalent of [pi]/4. This he is supposed 1 + 2 + 2 + 2 + ...

to have deduced, no one knows how, from Wallis' formula for

3 . 3 . 5 . 5 . 7 . 7 ... 4/[pi], viz. ————————————- 2 . 4 . 4 . 6 . 6 . 8 ...

John Wallis, discussing this fraction in his Arithmetica Infinitorum (1656), gives many of the elementary properties of the convergents to the general continued fraction, including the rule for their formation. Huygens (Descriptio automati planetarii, 1703) uses the simple continued fraction for the purpose of approximation when designing the toothed wheels of his Planetarium. Nicol Saunderson (1682-1739), Euler and Lambert helped in developing the theory, and much was done by Lagrange in his additions to the French edition of Euler's Algebra (1795). Moritz A. Stern wrote at length on the subject in Crelle's Journal (x., 1833; xi., 1834; xviii., 1838). The theory of the convergence of continued fractions is due to Oscar Schloemilch, P. F. Arndt, P. L. Seidel and Stern. O. Stolz, A. Pringsheim and E. B. van Vleck have written on the convergence of infinite continued fractions with complex elements.

REFERENCES.—For the further history of continued fractions we may refer the reader to two papers by Gunther and A. N. Favaro, Bulletins di bibliographia e di storia delle scienze mathematische e fisicke, t. vii., and to M. Cantor, Geschichte der Mathematik, 2nd Bd. For text-books treating the subject in great detail there are those of G. Chrystal in English; Serret's Cours d'algebre superieure in French; and in German those of Stern, Schloemilch, Hatterdorff and Stolz. For the application of continued fractions to the theory of irrational numbers there is P. Bachmann's Vorlesungen ueber die Natur der Irrationalzahnen (1892). For the application of continued fractions to the theory of lenses, see R. S. Heath's Geometrical Optics, chaps. iv. and v. For an exhaustive summary of all that has been written on the subject the reader may consult Bd. 1 of the Encyklopaedie der mathematischen Wissenschaften (Leipzig). (A. E. J.)



CONTOUR, CONTOUR-LINE (a French word meaning generally "outline," from the Med. Lat. contornare, to round off), in physical geography a line drawn upon a map through all the points upon the surface represented that are of equal height above sea-level. These points lie, therefore, upon a horizontal plane at a given elevation passing through the land shown on the map, and the contour-line is the intersection of that horizontal plane with the surface of the ground. The contour-line of 0, or datum level, is the coastal boundary of any land form. If the sea be imagined as rising 100 ft., a new coast-line, with bays and estuaries indented in the valleys, would appear at the new sea-level. If the sea sank once more to its former level, the 100-ft. contour-line with all its irregularities would be represented by the beach mark made by the sea when 100 ft. higher. If instead of receding the sea rose continuously at the rate of 100 ft. per day, a series of levels 100 ft. above one another would be marked daily upon the land until at last the highest mountain peaks appeared as islands less than 100 ft. high. A record of this series of advances marked upon a flat map of the original country would give a series of concentric contour-lines narrowing towards the mountain-tops, which they would at last completely surround. Contour-lines of this character are marked upon most modern maps of small areas and upon all government survey and military maps at varying intervals according to the scale of the map.



CONTRABAND (Fr. contrebande, from contra, against, and bannum, Low Lat. for "proclamation"), a term given generally to illegal traffic; and particularly, as "contraband of war," to goods, &c., which subjects of neutral states are forbidden by international law to supply to a belligerent.

According to current practice contraband of war is of two kinds: (1) absolute or unconditional contraband, i.e. materials of direct application in naval or military armaments; and (2) conditional contraband, consisting of articles which are fit for, but not necessarily of direct application to, hostile uses. There is much difference of opinion among international jurists and states, however, as to the specific materials and articles which may rightfully be declared by belligerents to belong to either class. There is also disagreement as to the belligerent right where the immediate destination is a neutral but the ultimate an enemy port.

An attempt was made at the Second Hague Conference to come to an agreement on the chief points of difference. The British delegates were instructed even to abandon the principle of contraband of war altogether, subject only to the exclusion by blockade of neutral trade from enemy ports. In the alternative they were to do their utmost to restrict the definition of contraband within the narrowest possible limits, and to obtain exemption of food-stuffs destined for places other than beleaguered fortresses and of raw materials required for peaceful industry. Though the discussions at the conference did not result in any convention, except on the subject of mails, it was agreed among the leading maritime states that an early attempt should be made to codify the law of naval war generally, in connexion with the establishment of an international prize court (see Prize).

Mails.

Meanwhile, on the subject of mails, important articles were adopted which figure in the "Convention on restrictions in the right of capture" (No. 11 of the series as set out in the General Act, see Peace Conference). They are as follows:—

ART. I.—The postal correspondence of neutrals or belligerents, whatever its official or private character may be, found on the high seas on board a neutral or enemy ship is inviolable. If the ship is detained, the correspondence is forwarded by the captor with the least possible delay.

The provisions of the preceding paragraph do not apply, in case of violation of blockade, to correspondence destined for, or proceeding from, a blockaded port.

ART. II.—The inviolability of postal correspondence does not exempt a neutral mail ship from the laws and customs of maritime war as to neutral merchant ships in general. The ship, however, may not be searched except when absolutely necessary, and then only with as much consideration and expedition as possible.

Foodstuffs and pre-emption.

As regards food-stuffs Great Britain has long and consistently held that provisions and liquors fit for the consumption of the enemy's naval or military forces are contraband. Her Prize Act, however, provides a palliative, in the case of "naval or victualling stores," for the penalty attaching to absolute contraband, the lords of the admiralty being entitled to exercise a right of pre-emption over such stores, i.e. to purchase them without condemnation in a prize court. In practice, purchases are made at the market value of the goods, with an additional 10% for loss of profit.

On the continent of Europe no such palliative has yet been adopted; but moved by the same desire to distinguish unmistakable from, so to speak, constructive contraband, and to protect trade against the vexation of uncertainty, many continental jurists have come to argue conditional contraband away altogether. This change of opinion has especially manifested itself in the discussions on the subject in the Institute of International Law, a body composed exclusively of recognized international jurists. The rules this body adopted in 1896, though they do not represent the unanimous feeling of its members, may be taken as the view of a large proportion of them. The majority comprised German, Danish, Italian, Dutch and French specialists. The rules adopted contain a clause, which, after declaring conditional contraband abolished, states that: "Nevertheless the belligerent has, at his option and on condition of paying an equitable indemnity, a right of sequestration or pre-emption as to articles (objets) which, on their way to a port of the enemy, may serve equally in war or in peace." This rule, it is seen, is of wider application than the above-mentioned provision of the British Prize Act. To become binding in its existing form, either an alteration of the text of the Declaration of Paris or a modification in the wording of the clause would be necessary, seeing that under the Declaration of Paris "the neutral flag covers enemy goods, except contraband of war." It may be said that, in so far as the continent is concerned, expert opinion is, on the whole, favourable to the recognition of conditional contraband in the form of a right of sequestration or pre-emption and within the limits Great Britain has shown a disposition to set to it as against herself.

Coal.

As regards coal there is no essential difference between the position of coal to feed ships and that of provisions to feed men. Neither is per se contraband. At the West African Conference in 1884 the Russian representative protested against its inclusion among contraband articles, but the Russian government included it in their declaration as to contraband on the outbreak of the Russo-Japanese War. In 1898 the British foreign office replied to an inquiry of the Newport Chamber of Commerce on the position of coal that: "Whether in any particular case coal is or is not contraband of war, is a matter prima facie for the determination of the Prize Court of the captor's nationality, and so long as such decision, when given, does not conflict with well-established principles of international law, H.M.'s government will not be prepared to take exception thereto." The practical applications of the law and usage of contraband in the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-5, however, brought out vividly the need of reform in these "well-established principles."

Controversy with Russia in Russo-Japanese War.

The Japanese regulations gave rise to no serious difficulties. Those issued by Russia, on the other hand, led to much controversy between the British government and that of Russia, in connexion with the latter's pretension to class coal, rice, provisions, forage, horses and cotton with arms, ammunition, explosives, &c., as absolute contraband. On June 1, 1904, Lord Lansdowne expressed the surprise with which the British government learnt that rice and provisions were to be treated as unconditionally contraband—"a step which they regarded as inconsistent with the law and practice of nations." They furthermore "felt themselves bound to reserve their rights by also protesting against the doctrine that it is for the belligerent to decide what articles are as a matter of course, and without reference to other considerations, to be dealt with as contraband of war, regardless of the well-established rights of neutrals"; nor would the British government consider itself bound to recognize as valid the decision of any prize court which violated those rights. It did not dispute the right of a belligerent to take adequate precautions for the purpose of preventing contraband of war, in the hitherto accepted sense of the words, from reaching the enemy; but it objected to the introduction of a new doctrine under which "the well-understood distinction between conditional and unconditional contraband was altogether ignored, and under which, moreover, on the discovery of articles alleged to be contraband, the ship carrying them was, without trial and in spite of her neutrality, subjected to penalties which are reluctantly enforced even against an enemy's ship." (See section 40 of Russian Instructions on Procedure in Stopping, Examining and Seizing Merchant Vessels, published in London Gazette of March 18, 1904.) In particular circumstances provisions might acquire a contraband character, as, for instance, if they should be consigned direct to the army or fleet of a belligerent, or to a port where such fleet might be lying, and if facts should exist raising the presumption that they were about to be employed in victualling the fleet of the enemy. In such cases it was not denied that the other belligerent would be entitled to seize the provisions as contraband of war, on the ground that they would afford material assistance towards the carrying on of warlike operations. But it could not be admitted that if such provisions were consigned to the port of a belligerent (even though it should be a port of naval equipment) they should therefore be necessarily regarded as contraband of war. The test was whether there were circumstances relating to any particular cargo to show that it was destined for military or naval use.

The Russian government replied that they could not admit that articles of dual use when addressed to private individuals in the enemy's country should be necessarily free from seizure and condemnation, since provisions and such articles of dual use, though intended for the military or naval forces of the enemy, would obviously, under such circumstances, be addressed to private individuals, possibly agents or contractors for the naval or military authorities.

Lord Lansdowne in answer stated that while H.M. government did not contend that the mere fact that the consignee was a private person should necessarily give immunity from capture, they held that to take vessels for adjudication merely because their destination was the enemy's country would be vexatious, and constitute an unwarrantable interference with neutral commerce. To render a vessel liable to such treatment there should be circumstances giving rise to a reasonable suspicion that the provisions were destined for the enemy's forces, and it was in such a case for the captor "to establish the fact of destination for the enemy's forces before attempting to procure their condemnation" (September 30, 1904).

The protests of Great Britain led to the reference of the subject by the Russian government to a departmental committee, with the result that on October 22, 1904, a rectifying notice was issued declaring that articles capable of serving for a warlike object, including rice and food-stuffs, should be considered as contraband of war, if they are destined for the government of the belligerent power or its administration or its army or its navy or its fortresses or its naval ports; or for the purveyors thereof; and that in cases where they were addressed to private individuals these articles should not be considered as contraband of war; but that in all cases horses and beasts of burden were to be considered as contraband. As regards cotton, explanations were given by the Russian government (May 11, 1904) that the prohibition of cotton applied only to raw cotton suitable for the manufacture of explosives, and not to yarn or tissues.