Bug, Harvest. See Acari.
BU′GLE (bu′gl). An elongated cylindrical glass bead. See Bead.
BUILDING STONES. Amongst the calcareous and magnesian stones used for building many of the fine-grained and porous varieties are liable to split into flakes after a few years’ exposure to the atmosphere, owing to the absorption by the stone of water, which, becoming frozen during severe weather, fractures the stone by its expansion. Brard invented a simple means of ascertaining whether a building stone is liable to this defect, which consists in taking a smoothly-cut block of the stone, one or two inches square, and placing it in a cold saturated solution of sodic sulphate. The temperature of the solution is gradually raised to the boiling point; it is allowed to boil for half an hour, and then the stone is left to cool in the liquid. When cold it is suspended over a dish, and once a day for a week or a fortnight plunged for a few moments into a cold saturated solution of sodic sulphate, and it is then again freely suspended in the air. The sulphate crystallises in the pores of the stone and splits off fragments of it. A similar experiment is made upon an equal-sized mass of stone which is known to be free from this defect. By the comparative weight of these fragments in the two cases the tendency of the stone to the defect in question may be estimated.
A stone that is placed in a building in a position similar to that in which it is found in the quarry, that is, with its seams lying horizontally, is found to resist the weather much more successfully than one that has not been so placed.
BUN. A well-known kind of light, sweet cake.
Prep. 1. Bath-buns:—As 6, but adding a little candied lemon and orange peel, and putting a little grated peel and a few caraway comfits on the top of each.
2. Cross-buns:—Flour, 21⁄2 lbs.; sifted sugar 1⁄2 lb.; coriander seeds, cassia, and mace, of each (powdered) a sufficiency; make a paste with butter, 1⁄2 lb.; (dissolved in) hot milk, 1⁄2 pint; work with three table-spoonfuls of yeast; set it before the fire for an hour to rise, then make it into buns, and set them before the fire on a tin for half an hour; lastly, brush them over with warm milk, and bake them to a nice brown in a moderate oven.
3. Madeira-buns:—Butter, 8 oz.; 2 eggs; flour, 1 lb.; powdered sugar, 6 oz.; half a nutmeg (grated); powdered ginger and caraway seeds, of each 1⁄2 teaspoonful; work well together, then add as much milk as required, and ferment; lastly, bake on tins in a quick oven.
4. Plain buns:—Flour, 2 lbs.; butter, 1⁄4 lb.; sugar, 6 oz.; a little salt, caraway and ginger; make a paste with yeast, 4 spoonfuls, and warm milk, q. s.; as before.
5. Penny-buns:—To the last add of currants, well washed, 1⁄2 lb.; and water, stained by steeping a little saffron in it, q. s., to give a light yellow tinge to them.