(2) The use of the word "bull," for a verbal blunder, involving a contradiction in terms, is of doubtful origin. In this sense it is used with a possible punning reference to papal bulls in Milton's True Religion, "and whereas the Papist boasts himself to be a Roman Catholick, it is a mere contradiction, one of the Pope's Bulls, as if he should say a universal particular, a Catholick schismatick." Probably this use may be traced to a M.E. word bul, first found in the Cursor Mundi, c. 1300, in the sense of falsehood, trickery, deceit; the New English Dictionary compares an O.Fr. boul, boule or bole, in the same sense. Although modern associations connect this type of blunder with the Irish, possibly owing to the many famous "bulls" attributed to Sir Boyle Roche (q.v.), the early quotations show that in the 17th century, when the meaning now attached to the word begins, no special country was credited with them.
(3) Bulla (Lat for "bubble"), which gives us another "bull" in English, was the term used by the Romans for any boss or stud, such as those on doors, sword-belts, shields and boxes. It was applied, however, more particularly to an ornament, generally of gold, a round or heart-shaped box containing an amulet, worn suspended from the neck by children of noble birth until they assumed the toga virilis, when it was hung up and dedicated to the household gods. The custom of wearing the bulla, which was regarded as a charm against sickness and the evil eye, was of Etruscan origin. After the Second Punic War all children of free birth were permitted to wear it; but those who did not belong to a noble or wealthy family were satisfied with a bulla of leather. Its use was only permitted to grown-up men in the case of generals who celebrated a triumph. Young girls (probably till the time of their marriage), and even favourite animals, also wore it (see Ficoroni, La Bolla d' Oro, 1732; Yates, Archaeological Journal, vi., 1849; viii., 1851). In ecclesiastical and medieval Latin, bulla denotes the seal of oval or circular form, bearing the name and generally the image of its owner, which was attached to official documents. A metal was used instead of wax in the warm countries of southern Europe. The best-known instances are the papal bullae, which have given their name to the documents (bulls) to which they are attached. (See Diplomatic; Seals; Curia Romana; Golden Bull.)
BULLER, CHARLES (1806-1848), English politician, son of Charles Buller (d. 1848), a member of a well-known Cornish family (see below), was born in Calcutta on the 6th of August 1806; his mother, a daughter of General William Kirkpatrick, was an exceptionally talented woman. He was educated at Harrow, then privately in Edinburgh by Thomas Carlyle, and afterwards at Trinity College, Cambridge, becoming a barrister in 1831. Before this date, however, he had succeeded his father as member of parliament for West Looe; after the passing of the Reform Bill of 1832 and the consequent disenfranchisement of this borough, he was returned to parliament by the voters of Liskeard. He retained this seat until he died in London on the 29th of November 1848, leaving behind him, so Charles Greville says, "a memory cherished for his delightful social qualities and a vast credit for undeveloped powers." An eager reformer and a friend of John Stuart Mill, Buller voted for the great Reform Bill, favoured other progressive measures, and presided over the committee on the state of the records and the one appointed to inquire into the state of election law in Ireland in 1836. In 1838 he went to Canada with Lord Durham as private secretary, and after rendering conspicuous service to his chief, returned with him to England in the same year. After practising as a barrister, Buller was made judge-advocate-general in 1846, and became chief commissioner of the poor law about a year before his death. For a long time it was believed that Buller wrote Lord Durham's famous "Report on the affairs of British North America." However, this is now denied by several authorities, among them being Durham's biographer, Stuart J. Reid, who mentions that Buller described this statement as a "groundless assertion" in an article which he wrote for the Edinburgh Review. Nevertheless it is quite possible that the "Report" was largely drafted by Buller, and it almost certainly bears traces of his influence. Buller was a very talented man, witty, popular and generous, and is described by Carlyle as "the genialest radical I have ever met." Among his intimate friends were Grote, Thackeray, Monckton Milnes and Lady Ashburton. A bust of Buller is in Westminster Abbey, and another was unveiled at Liskeard in 1905. He wrote "A Sketch of Lord Durham's mission to Canada," which has not been printed.
See T. Carlyle, Reminiscences (1881); and S.J. Reid, Life and Letters of the 1st earl of Durham (1906).
BULLER, SIR REDVERS HENRY (1839-1908), British general, son of James Wentworth Buller, M.P., of Crediton, Devonshire, and the descendant of an old Cornish family, long established in Devonshire, tracing its ancestry in the female line to Edward I., was born in 1839, and educated at Eton. He entered the army in 1858, and served with the 60th (King's Royal Rifles) in the China campaign of 1860. In 1870 he became captain, and went on the Red River expedition, where he was first associated with Colonel (afterwards Lord) Wolseley. In 1873-74 he accompanied the latter in the Ashantee campaign as head of the Intelligence Department, and was slightly wounded at the battle of Ordabai; he was mentioned in despatches, made a C.B., and raised to the rank of major. In 1874 he inherited the family estates. In the Kaffir War of 1878-79 and the Zulu War of 1879 he was conspicuous as an intrepid and popular leader, and acquired a reputation for courage and dogged determination. In particular his conduct of the retreat at Inhlobane (March 28, 1879) drew attention to these qualities, and on that occasion he earned the V.C.; he was also created C.M.G. and made lieutenant-colonel and A.D.C. to the queen. In the Boer War of 1881 he was Sir Evelyn Wood's chief of staff; and thus added to his experience of South African conditions of warfare. In 1882 he was head of the field intelligence department in the Egyptian campaign, and was knighted for his services. Two years later he commanded an infantry brigade in the Sudan under Sir Gerald Graham, and was at the battles of El Teb and Tamai, being promoted major-general for distinguished service. In the Sudan campaign of 1884-85 he was Lord Wolseley's chief of staff, and he was given command of the desert column when Sir Herbert Stewart was wounded. He distinguished himself by his conduct of the retreat from Gubat to Gakdul, and by his victory at Abu Klea (February 16-17), and he was created K.C.B. In 1886 he was sent to Ireland to inquire into the "moonlighting" outrages, and for a short time he acted as under-secretary for Ireland; but in 1887 he was appointed quartermaster-general at the war office. From 1890 to 1897 he held the office of adjutant-general, attaining the rank of lieutenant-general in 1891. At the war office his energy and ability inspired the belief that he was fitted for the highest command, and in 1895, when the duke of Cambridge was about to retire, it was well known that Lord Rosebery's cabinet intended to appoint Sir Redvers as chief of the staff under a scheme of reorganization recommended by Lord Hartington's commission. On the eve of this change, however, the government was defeated, and its successors appointed Lord Wolseley to the command under the old title of commander-in-chief. In 1896 he was made a full general.
In 1898 he took command of the troops at Aldershot, and when the Boer War broke out in 1899 he was selected to command the South African Field Force (see Transvaal), and landed
at Cape Town on the 31st of October. Owing to the Boer investment of Ladysmith and the consequent gravity of the military situation in Natal, he unexpectedly hurried thither in order to supervise personally the operations, but on the 15th of December his first attempt to cross the Tugela at Colenso (see Ladysmith) was repulsed. The government, alarmed at the situation and the pessimistic tone of Buller's messages, sent out Lord Roberts to supersede him in the chief command, Sir Redvers being left in subordinate command of the Natal force. His second attempt to relieve Ladysmith (January 10-27) proved another failure, the result of the operations at Spion Kop (January 24) causing consternation in England. A third attempt (Vaalkrantz, February 5-7) was unsuccessful, but the Natal army finally accomplished its task in the series of actions which culminated in the victory of Pieter's Hill and the relief of Ladysmith on the 27th of February. Sir Redvers Buller remained in command of the Natal army till October 1900, when he returned to England (being created G.C.M.G.), having in the meanwhile slowly done a great deal of hard work in driving the Boers from the Biggarsberg (May 15), forcing Lang's Nek (June 12), and occupying Lydenburg (September 6). But though these latter operations had done much to re-establish his reputation for dogged determination, and he had never lost the confidence of his own men, his capacity for an important command in delicate and difficult operations was now seriously questioned. The continuance, therefore, in 1901 of his appointment to the important Aldershot command met with a vigorous press criticism, in which the detailed objections taken to his conduct of the operations before Ladysmith (and particularly to a message to Sir George White in which he seriously contemplated and provided for the contingency of surrender) were given new prominence. On the 10th of October 1901, at a luncheon in London, Sir Redvers Buller made a speech in answer to these criticisms in terms which were held to be a breach of discipline, and he was placed on half-pay a few days later. For the remaining years of his life he played an active part as a country gentleman, accepting in dignified silence the prolonged attacks on his failures in South Africa; among the public generally, and particularly in his own county, he never lost his popularity. He died on the 2nd of June 1908. He had married in 1882 Lady Audrey, daughter of the 4th Marquess Townshend, who survived him with one daughter.
A Memoir, by Lewis Butler, was published in 1909.
BULLET (Fr. boulet, diminutive of boule, ball). The original meaning (a "small ball") has, since the end of the 16th century, been narrowed down to the special case of the projectile used with small arms of all kinds, irrespective of its size or shape. (For details see Ammunition; Gun; Rifle, &c.)
BULL-FIGHTING, the national Spanish sport. The Spanish name is tauromaquia (Gr. ταῦρος, bull, and μαχή, combat). Combats with bulls were common in ancient Thessaly as well as in the amphitheatres of imperial Rome, but probably partook more of the nature of worrying than fighting, like the bull-baiting formerly common in England. The Moors of Africa also possessed a sport of this kind, and it is probable that they introduced it into Andalusia when they conquered that province. It is certain that they held bull-fights in the half-ruined Roman amphitheatres of Merida, Cordova, Tarragona, Toledo and other places, and that these constituted the favourite sport of the Moorish chieftains. Although patriotic tradition names the great Cid himself as the original Spanish bull-fighter, it is probable that the first Spaniard to kill a bull in the arena was Don Rodrigo Diaz de Vivar, who about 1040, employing the lance, which remained for centuries the chief weapon used in the sport, proved himself superior to the flower of the Moorish knights. A spirited rivalry in the art between the Christian and Moorish warriors resulted, in which even the kings of Castile and other Spanish princes took an ardent interest. After the Moors were driven from Spain by Ferdinand II., bull-fighting continued to be the favourite sport of the aristocracy, the method of fighting being on horseback with the lance. At the time of the accession of the house of Austria it had become an indispensable accessory of every court function, and Charles V. ensured his popularity with the people by killing a bull with his own lance on the birthday of his son, Philip II. Philip IV. is also known to have taken a personal part in bull-fights. During this period the lance was discarded in favour of the short spear (rejoncillo), and the leg armour still worn by the picadores was introduced. The accession of the house of Bourbon witnessed a radical transformation in the character of the bullfight, which the aristocracy began gradually to neglect, admitting to the combats professional subordinates who, by the end of the 17th century, had become the only active participants in the bull-ring. The first great professional espada (i.e. swordsman, the chief bull-fighter, who actually kills the bull) was Francisco Romero, of Ronda in Andalusia (about 1700), who introduced the estoque, the sword still used to kill the bull, and the muleta, the red flag carried by the espada (see below), the spear falling into complete disuse.