The Sea of Azov is exceedingly shallow, being only about 6 fathoms in its deepest part, and it is largely influenced by the river Don. Its water is considerably fresher than the Black Sea, varying from 1.55 to 0.68%. It freezes more readily and is not affected by the Mediterranean current.
See N. Andrusov, “Physical Exploration of the Black Sea,” in Geographical Journal, vol. i. p. 49.
[1] The early Greek navigators gave it the epithet of axenus, i.e. unfriendly to strangers, but as Greek colonies sprang up on the shores this was changed to euxinus, friendly to strangers.
BLACK SEA (Russ. Chernomorskaya), a military district of the province of Kuban, formerly an independent province of Transcaucasia, Russia; it includes the narrow strip of land along the N.E. coast of the Black Sea from Novorossiysk to the vicinity of Pitsunda, between the sea and the crest of the main range of the Caucasus. Area, 2836 sq. m. Pop. (1897) 54,228; (1906, estimate) 71,900. It is penetrated by numerous spurs of this range, which strike the sea abruptly at right angles to the coast, and in many cases plunge down into it sheer. Owing to its southern exposure, its sheltered position, and a copious rainfall, vegetation, in part of a sub-tropical character, grows in great profusion. In consequence, however, of the mountainous character of the region, it is divided into a large number of more or less isolated districts, and there is little intercourse with the country north of the Caucasus, the passes over the range being few and difficult (see [Caucasus]). But since the Russians became masters of this region, its former inhabitants (Circassian tribes) have emigrated in thousands, so that the country is now only thinly inhabited. It is divided into three districts—Novorossiysk, with the town (pop. in 1897, 16,208) of the same name, which acts as the capital of the Black Sea district; Velyaminovsk; and Sochi. Novorossiysk is connected by rail, at the west end of the Caucasus, with the Rostov-Vladikavkaz line, and a mountain road leads from Velyaminovsk (or Tuapse) to Maikop in the province of Kuban.
BLACKSTONE, SIR WILLIAM (1723-1780), English jurist, was born in London, on the 10th of July 1723. His parents having died when he was young, his early education, under the care of his uncle, Dr Thomas Bigg, was obtained at the Charterhouse, from which, at the age of fifteen, he was sent to Pembroke College, Oxford. He was entered in the Middle Temple in 1741. In 1744 he was elected a fellow of All Souls’ College. From this period he divided his time between the university and the Temple, where he took chambers in order to attend the law courts. In 1746 he was called to the bar. Though but little known or distinguished as a pleader, he was actively employed, during his occasional residences at the university, in taking part in the internal management of his college. In May 1749, as a small reward for his services, and to give him further opportunities of advancing the interests of the college, Blackstone was appointed steward of its manors. In the same year, on the resignation of his uncle, Seymour Richmond, he was elected recorder of the borough of Wallingford in Berkshire. In 1750 he became doctor of civil law. In 1753 he decided to retire from London work to his fellowship and an academical life, still continuing the practice of his profession as a provincial counsel.
His lectures on the laws of England appear to have been an early and favourite idea; for in the Michaelmas term immediately after he abandoned London, he entered on the duty of reading them at Oxford; and we are told by the author of his Life, that even at their commencement, the high expectations formed from the acknowledged abilities of the lecturer attracted to these lectures a very crowded class of young men of the first families, characters and hopes. Bentham, however, declares that he was a “formal, precise and affected lecturer—just what you would expect from the character of his writings—cold, reserved and wary, exhibiting a frigid pride.” It was not till the year 1758 that the lectures in the form they now bear were read in the university. Blackstone, having been unanimously elected to the newly-founded Vinerian professorship, on the 25th of October read his first introductory lecture, afterwards prefixed to the first volume of his celebrated Commentaries. It is doubtful whether the Commentaries were originally intended for the press; but many imperfect and incorrect copies having got into circulation, and a pirated edition of them being either published or preparing for publication in Ireland, the author thought proper to print a correct edition himself, and in November 1765 published the first volume, under the title of Commentaries on the Laws of England. The remaining parts of the work were given to the world in the course of the four succeeding years. It may be remarked that before this period the reputation which his lectures had deservedly acquired for him had induced him to resume practice in London; and, contrary to the general order of the profession, he who had quitted the bar for an academic life was sent back from the college to the bar with a considerable increase of business. He was likewise elected to parliament, first for Hindon, and afterwards for Westbury in Wilts; but in neither of these departments did he equal the expectations which his writings had raised. The part he took in the Middlesex election drew upon him many attacks as well as a severe animadversion from the caustic pen of “Junius.” This circumstance probably strengthened the aversion he professed to parliamentary attendance, “where,” he said, “amidst the rage of contending parties, a man of moderation must expect to meet with no quarter from any side.” In 1770 he declined the place of solicitor-general; but shortly afterwards, on the promotion of Sir Joseph Yates to a seat in the court of common pleas, he accepted a seat on the bench, and on the death of Sir Joseph succeeded him there also. He died on the 14th of February 1780.
The design of the Commentaries is exhibited in his first Vinerian lecture printed in the introduction to them. The author there dwells on the importance of noblemen, gentlemen and educated persons generally being well acquainted with the laws of the country; and his treatise, accordingly, is as far as possible a popular exposition of the laws of England. Falling into the common error of identifying the various meanings of the word law, he advances from the law of nature (being either the revealed or the inferred will of God) to municipal law, which he defines to be a rule of civil conduct prescribed by the supreme power in a state commanding what is right and prohibiting what is wrong. On this definition he founds the division observed in the Commentaries. The objects of law are rights and wrongs. Rights are either rights of persons or rights of things. Wrongs are either public or private. These four headings form respectively the subjects of the four books of the Commentaries.