Relations to Kant,! Schelling

Such is the system in outline. The historical position of the system lies in its relations to Kant, Schelling and Hegel. Cousin was opposed to Kant in asserting that the unconditioned in the form of infinite or absolute cause is but a mere unrealizable tentative or effort on the part of and Hegel. the mind, something different from a mere negation, yet not equivalent to a positive thought. With Cousin the absolute as the ground of being is grasped positively by the intelligence, and it renders all else intelligible; it is not as with Kant a certain hypothetical or regulative need.

With Schelling again Cousin agrees in regarding this supreme ground of all as positively apprehended, and as a source of development, but he utterly repudiates Schelling's method. The intellectual intuition either falls under the eye of consciousness, or it does not. If not, how do you know it and its object which are identical? If it does, it comes within the sphere of psychology; and the objections to it as thus a relative, made by Schelling himself, are to be dealt with. Schelling's intellectual intuition is the mere negation of knowledge.

Again the pure being of Hegel is a mere abstraction, a hypothesis illegitimately assumed, which he has nowhere sought to vindicate. The very point to be established is the possibility of reaching being per se or pure being; yet in the Hegelian system this is the very thing assumed as a starting-point. Besides this, of course, objections might be made to the method of development, as not only subverting the principle of contradiction, but as galvanizing negation into a means of advancing or developing the whole body of human knowledge and reality. The intellectual intuition of Schelling, as above consciousness, the pure being of Hegel, as an empty abstraction, unvindicated, illegitimately assumed, and arbitrarily developed, are equally useless as bases of metaphysics. This led Cousin, still holding by essential knowledge of being, to ground it in an analysis of consciousness,-in psychology.

*

The absolute or infinite-the unconditioned ground and source of all reality is yet apprehended by us as an immediate datum or reality; and it is apprehended in consciousness-under its condition, that, to wit, of distinguishing subject and object, knower and known. The doctrine of Cousin was criticized by Sir W. Hamilton in the Edinburgh Review of 1829, and it was animadverted upon about the same time by Schelling. Hamilton's objections are as follows. The correlation of the ideas of infinite and finite does not necessarily imply their correality, as Cousin supposes; on the contrary, it is a presumption that finite is simply positive and infinite negative of the same that the finite and infinite are simply contradictory relatives. Of these "the positive alone is real, the negative is only an abstraction of the other, and in the highest generality even an abstraction of thought itself." A study of the few sentences under this head might have obviated the trifling criticism of Hamilton's objection which has been set afloat recently, that the denial of a knowledge of the absolute or infinite implies a foregone knowledge of it. How can you deny the reality of that which you do not know? The answer to this is that in the case of contradictory statements-A and not A -the latter is a mere negation of the former, and posits nothing; and the negation of a notion with positive attributes, as the finite, does not extend beyond abolishing the given attributes as an object of thought. The infinite or non-finite is not necessarily known, ere the finite is negated, or in order to negate it; all that needs be known is the finite itself; and the contradictory negation of it implies no positive. Non-organized may or may not correspond to a positive-i.e. an object or notion with qualities contradictory of the organized; but the mere sublation of the organized does not posit it, or suppose that it is known beforehand, or that anything exists corresponding to it. This is one among many flaws in the Hegelian dialectic, and it paralyzes the whole of the Logic. Secondly, the conditions of intelligence, which Cousin allows, necessarily exclude the possibility of knowledge of the absolute-they are held to be incompatible with its unity. Here Schelling and Hamilton argue that Cousin's absolute is a mere relative. Thirdly, it is objected that in order to deduce

the conditioned, Cousin makes his absolute a relative; for he makes it an absolute cause, i.e. a cause existing absolutely under relation. As such it is necessarily inferior to the sum total of its effects, and dependent for reality on these in a word, a mere potence or becoming. Further, as a theory of creation, it makes creation a necessity, and destroys the notion of the divine. Cousin made no reply to Hamilton's criticism beyond alleging that Hamilton's doctrine necessarily restricted human knowledge and certainty to psychology and logic, and destroyed metaphysics by introducing nescience and uncertainty into its highest sphere--theodicy. The

reason.

The attempt to render the laws of reason or thought impersonal by professing to find them in the sphere of spontaneous apperception, and above reflective necessity, can hardly be Criticism regarded as successful. It may be that we first of all of his primitively or spontaneously affirm cause, substance, sophy. time, space, &c., in this way. But these are still in Impersoneach instance given us as realized in a particular form. aty of In no single act of affirmation of cause or substance, much less in such a primitive act, do we affirm the universality of their application. We might thus get particular instances or cases of these laws, but we could never get the laws themselves in their universality, far less absolute impersonality. And as they are not supposed to be mere generalizations from experience, no amount of individual instances of the application of any one of them by us would give it a true universality. The only sure test we have of their universality in our experience is the test of their reflective necessity. We thus after all fall back on reflection as our ground for their universal application; mere spontaneity of apprehension is futile; their universality is grounded in their necessity, not their necessity in their universality. How far and in what sense this ground of necessity renders them personal are of course questions still to be solved. But if these three correlative facts are immediately given, it seems to be thought possible by Cousin to vindicate them in reflective consciousness. He seeks to trace the steps which the reason has spontaneously and consciously, but irreflectively, followed. And here the question arises-Can we vindicate in a reflective or mediate process this spontaneous apprehension of reality?

1

Once

The self is found to be a cause of force, free in its action, on the ground that we are obliged to relate the volition of consciousness to the self as its cause, and its ultimate cause. It is not clear from the analysis whether the self is immediately observed as an acting or originating cause, or whether reflection working on the principle of causality is compelled to infer its existence and character. If self is actually so given, we do not need the principle of causality to infer it; if it is not so given, causality could never give us either the notion or the fact of self as a cause or force, far less as an ultimate one. All that it could do would be to warrant a cause of some sort, but not this or that reality as the cause. And further, the principle of causality, if fairly carried out, as universal and necessary, would not allow us to stop at personality or will as the ultimate cause of its effect-volition. applied to the facts at all, it would drive us beyond the first antecedent or term of antecedents of volition to a still further cause or ground-in fact, land us in an infinite regress of causes. The same criticism is even more emphatically applicable to the influence of a not-self, or world of forces, corresponding to our sensations, and the cause of them. Starting from sensation as our basis, causality could never give us this, even though it be allowed that sensation is impersonal to the extent of being independent of our volition, Causality might tell us that a cause there is of sensation somewhere and of some sort; but that this cause is a force or sum of forces, existing in space, independently of us, and corresponding to our sensations, it could never tell us, for the simple reason that such a notion is not supposed to exist in our consciousness. Causality cannot add to the number of our notions, cannot add to the number of realities we know, All it can do is to necessitate us to think that a cause there is of a given change, but what that cause is it cannot of itself inform us, or even suggest to us, beyond implying that it must be adequate

for engraving purposes about the year 1823, Cousins and his contemporaries were compelled to work on it, because the soft copper previously used for mezzotint plates did not yield a sufficient number of fine impressions to enable the method to compete commercially against line engraving, from which much larger editions were obtainable. The painter-like quality which distinguished the 18th-century mezzotints on copper was wanting in his later works, because the hardness of the steel on which they were engraved impaired freedom of execution and richness of tone, and so enhanced the labour of scraping that he accelerated the work by stipple, etching the details instead of scraping them out of the "ground" in the manner of his predecessors. To this "mixed style," previously used by Richard Earlom on copper, Cousins added heavy roulette and rocking-tool textures, tending to fortify the darks, when he found that the "burr even on steel failed to yield enough fine impressions to meet the demand. The effect of his prints in this method after Reynolds and Millais was mechanical and out of harmony with the picturesque technique of these painters, but the phenomenal popularity which Cousins gained for his works at least kept alive and in favour a form of mezzotint engraving during a critical phase of its history. Abraham Raimbach, the line engraver, dated the decline of his own art in England from the appearance in 1837 of Cousins's print (in the "mixed style") after Landseer's "Bolton Abbey." Such plates as "Miss Peel," after Lawrence (published in 1833); "A Midsummer Night's Dream," after Landseer (1857); "The Order of Release" and "The First Minuet," after Millais (1856 and 1868); "The Strawberry Girl" and "Lavinia, Countess Spencer," after Reynolds; and "Miss Rich," after Hogarth (1873-1877), represent various stages of Cousins's mixed method. It reached its final development in the plates after Millais's "Cherry Ripe" and "Pomona," published in 1881 and 1882, when the invention of coating copper-plates with a film of steel to make them yield larger editions led to the revival of pure mezzotint on copper, which has since rendered obsolete the steel plate and the mixed style which it fostered. The fine draughtsmanship of Cousins was as apparent in his prints as in his original lead-pencil portraits exhibited in London in 1882. In 1885 he was elected a full member of the Royal Academy, to which institution he later gave in trust £15,000 to provide annuities for superannuated artists who had not been so successful as himself. One of the most important figures in the history of British engraving, he died in London, unmarried, on the 7th of May 1887.

See George Pycroft, M.R.C.S.E., Memoir of Samuel Cousins, R.A., Member of the Legion of Honour (published for private circulation by E. E. Leggatt, London, 1899); Algernon Graves, Catalogue of the Works of Samuel Cousins, R.A. (published by H. Graves and Co., London, 1888); and Alfred Whitman, Samuel Cousins (published by George Bell & Sons, London, 1904), which contains a catalogue, good illustrations, and much detail useful to the collector and dealer. (G. P. R.)

COUSTOU, the name of a famous family of French sculptors. NICOLAS COUSTOU (1658–1733) was the son of a wood-carver at Lyons, where he was born. At eighteen he removed to Paris, to study under C. A. Coysevox, his mother's brother, who presided over the recently-established Academy of Painting and Sculpture; and at three-and-twenty he gained the Colbert prize, which entitled him to four years' education at the French Academy at Rome. He afterwards became rector and chancellor of the Academy of Painting and Sculpture. From the year 1700 he was a most active collaborator with Coysevox at the palaces of Marly and Versailles. He was remarkable for his facility; and though he was specially influenced by Michelangelo and Algardi, his numerous works are among the most typical specimens of his age now extant. The most famous are "La Seine et la Marne," "La Saône," the "Berger Chasseur" in the gardens of the Tuileries, the bas-relief "Le Passage du Rhin" in the Louvre, and the "Descent from the Cross" placed behind the choir altar of Notre Dame at Paris.

His younger brother, GUILLAUME Coustou (1677-1746), was a sculptor of still greater merit. He also gained the Colbert prize; but refusing to submit to the rules of the Academy, he

soon left it, and for some time wandered houseless through the streets of Rome. At length he was befriended by the sculptor Legros, under whom he studied for some time. Returning to Paris, he was in 1704 admitted into the Academy of Painting and Sculpture, of which he afterwards became director; and, like his brother, he was employed by Louis XIV. His finest works are the famous group of the "Horse Tamers," originally at Marly, now in the Champs Elysées at Paris, the colossal group "The Ocean and the Mediterranean" at Marly, the bronze "Rhône" which formed part of the statue of Louis XIV. at Lyons, and the sculptures at the entrance of the Hôtel des Invalides. Of these latter, the bas-relief representing Louis XIV. mounted and accompanied by Justice and Prudence was destroyed during the Revolution, but was restored in 1815 by Pierre Cartellier from Coustou's model; the bronze figures of Mars and Minerva, on either side of the doorway, were not interfered with.

Another GUILLAUME COUSTOU (1716-1777), the son of Nicolas, also studied at Rome, as winner of the Colbert prize. While to a great extent a copyist of his predecessors, he was much affected by the bad taste of his time, and produced little or nothing of permanent value.

See Louis Gougenot, Eloge de M. Coustou le jeune (1903); Arsène Houssaye, Histoire de l'art français au XVIIIe siècle (1860); Lady Dilke, Gazette des beaux-arts, vol. xxv. (1901) (2 articles).

COUTANCES, WALTER OF (d. 1207), bishop of Lincoln and archbishop of Rouen, commenced his career in the chancery of Henry II., was elected bishop of Lincoln in 1182, and in 1184 obtained, with the king's help, the see of Rouen. Throughout his career he was much employed in diplomatic and administrative duties. He started with Richard I. for the Third Crusade, but was sent back from Messina to investigate the charges which the barons and the official class had brought against the chancellor, William Longchamp. There was no love lost between the two; and they were popularly supposed to be rivals for the see of Canterbury. The archbishop of Rouen sided with the barons and John, and sanctioned Longchamp's deposition-a step which was technically warranted by the powers which Richard had given, but by no means calculated to protect the interests of the crown. The Great Council now recognized the archbishop as chief justiciar, and he remained at the head of the government till 1193, when he was replaced by Hubert Walter. The archbishop did good service in the negotiations for Richard's release, but subsequently quarrelled with his master and laid Normandy under an interdict, because the border stronghold of Château Gaillard in the Vexin had been built on his land without his consent. After Richard's death the archbishop accepted John as the lawful heir of Normandy and consecrated him as duke. But his personal inclinations leaned to Arthur of Brittany, whom he was with difficulty dissuaded from supporting. The archbishop accepted the French conquest of Normandy with equanimity (1204), although he kept to his old allegiance while the issue of the struggle was in doubt. He did not long survive the conquest, and his later history is a blank.

See W. Stubbs's editions of Benedictus Abbas, Hoveden and Diceto (Rolls series); R. Howlett's edition of "William of Newburgh" and Henry II. and Richard I. (Rolls series). See also the preface to the "Richard of Devizes in Chronicles, &c., of the Reigns of Stephen, third volume of Stubbs's Hoveden, pp. lix.-xcviii.; J. H. Round's Commune of London, and the French poem on Guillaume le Maréchal (ed. P. Meyer, Soc. de l'Histoire de France). (H. W. C. D.)

COUTANCES, a town of north-western France, capital of an arrondissement of the department of Manche, 7 m. E. of the English Channel and 58 m. S. of Cherbourg on the Western railway. Pop. (1906) 6089. Coutances is beautifully situated on the right bank of the Soulle on a granitic eminence crowned by the celebrated cathedral of Notre-Dame. The date of this church has been much disputed, but while traces of Romanesque architecture survive, the building is, in the main, Gothic in style and dates from the first half of the 13th century. The slender turrets massed round the western towers and the octagonal central tower, which forms a lantern within, are conspicuous features of the church. In the interior, which comprises the

See Fr. Mège, Correspondance de Couthon. crate converti," comédie en deux actes de Couthon (Paris, 1872); and Nouveaux Documents sur Georges Couthon (Clermont-Ferrand, 1890); also F. A. Aulard, Les Orateurs de la Législative et de la Convention (Paris, 1885-1886), ii. 425-443.

Coutances is the ancient Cosedia, which before the Roman conquest was one of the chief towns in the country of the Unelli. Towards the end of the 3rd century its name was changed to Constantia, in honour of the emperor Constantius Chlorus, who fortified it. It became the capital of the pagus Constantinus (Cotentin), and in the middle ages was the seat of a viscount. It has been an episcopal see since the 5th century. In the 17th century it was the centre of the revolt of the Nu-pieds, caused by the imposition of the salt-tax (gabelle).

A good bibliography of general works and monographs on the archaeology and the history of the town and diocese of Coutances is given in U. Chevalier, Répertoire des sources, &c., Topo-Bibliographie (Montbéliard, 1894-1899), s.v.

COUTHON, GEORGES (1755-1794), French revolutionist, was born at Orcet, a village in the district of Clermont in Auvergne. He studied law, and was admitted advocate at Clermont in 1785. At this period he was noted for his integrity, gentle-heartedness and charitable disposition. His health was feeble and both legs were paralysed. In 1787 he was a member of the provincial assembly of Auvergne. On the outbreak of the Revolution Couthon, who was now a member of the municipality of Clermont-Ferrand, published his L'Aristocrate converti, in which he revealed himself as a liberal and a champion of constitutional monarchy. He became very popular, was appointed president of the tribunal of the town of Clermont in 1791, and in September of the same year was elected deputy to the Legislative Assembly. His views had meanwhile been embittered by the attempted flight of Louis XVI., and he distinguished himself now by his hostility to the king. A visit to Flanders for the sake of his health brought him into close intercourse and sympathy with Dumouriez. In September 1792 Couthon was elected member of the National Convention, and at the trial of the king voted for the sentence of death without appeal. He hesitated for a time as to which party he should join, but finally decided for that of Robespierre, with whom he had many opinions in common, especially in matters of religion. He was the first to demand the arrest of the proscribed Girondists. On the 30th of May 1793 he became a member of the Committee of Public Safety, and in August was sent as one of the commissioners of the Convention attached to the army before Lyons. Impatient at the slow progress made by the besieging force, he decreed a levée en masse in the department of Puy-de-Dôme, collected an army of 60,000 men, and himself led them to Lyons. When the city was taken, on the 9th of October 1793, although the Convention ordered its destruction, Couthon did not carry out the decree, and showed moderation in the punishment of the rebels. The Republican atrocities began only after Couthon was replaced, on the 3rd of November 1793, by Collot d'Herbois. Couthon returned to Paris, and on the 21st of December was elected president of the Convention. He contributed to the prosecution of the Hébertists, and was responsible for the law of the 22nd Prairial, which in the case of trials before the Revolutionary Tribunal deprived the accused of the aid of counsel or of witnesses or their defence, on the pretext of shortening the proceedings. During the crisis preceding the 9th Thermidor, Couthon showed considerable courage, giving up a journey to Auvergne in order, as he wrote, that he might either die or

COUTTS, THOMAS (1735–1822), English banker and founder of the banking house of Coutts & Co., was born on the 7th of September 1735. He was the fourth son of John Coutts (16991751), who carried on business in Edinburgh as a corn factor and negotiator of bills of exchange, and who in 1742 was elected lord provost of the city. The family was originally of Montrose, but one of its members had settled at Edinburgh about 1696. Soon after the death of John Coutts the business was divided into two branches, one carried on in Edinburgh, the other in London. The banking business in London was in the hands of James and Thomas Coutts, sons of John Coutts. From the death of his brother in 1778, Thomas, as surviving partner, became sole head of the firm; and under his direction the banking house rose to the highest distinction. His ambition was to establish his character as a man of business and to make a fortune; and he lived to succeed in this aim and long to enjoy his reputation and wealth. A gentleman in manners, hospitable and benevolent, he counted amongst his friends some of the literary men and the best actors of his day. Of the enormous wealth which came into his hands he made munificent use. His private life was not without its romantic elements. Soon after his settlement in London he married Elizabeth Starkey, a young woman of humble origin, who was in attendance on the daughter of his brother James. They lived happily together, and had three daughters— Susan, married in 1796 to the 3rd earl of Guilford; Frances, married in 1800 to John, ist marquess of Bute; and Sophia, married in 1793 to Sir Francis Burdett. Mrs Coutts dying in 1815, her husband soon after married the popular actress, Harriet Mellon; and to her he left the whole of his immense fortune. He died in London on the 24th of February 1822. His widow married in 1827 the 9th duke of St Albans, and died ten years later, having bequeathed her property to Angela, youngest daughter of Sir Francis Burdett, who then assumed the additional name and arms of Coutts. In 1871 this lady was created Baroness Burdett-Coutts (q.v.).

See C. Rogers, Genealogical Memoirs of the Families of Colt and Coutts (1879); and R. Richardson, Coutts & Co. (1900).

COUTURE, THOMAS (1815-1879), French painter, was born at Senlis (Oise), and studied under Baron A. J. Gros and Paul Delaroche, winning a Prix de Rome in 1837. He began exhibiting historical and genre pictures at the Salon in 1840, and obtained several medals. His masterpiece was his "Romans in the Decadence of the Empire" (1847), now in the Luxembourg; and his "Love of Money" (1844; at Toulouse), "Falconer (1855), and "Damocles" (1872), are also good examples. COUVADE (literally a "brooding," from Fr. couver, to hatch, Lat. cubare, to lie down), a custom so called in Béarn, prevalent among several peoples in different parts of the world, requiring that the father, at and sometimes before the birth of his child, shall retire to bed and fast or abstain from certain kinds of food, receiving the attentions generally shown to women at their confinements. The existence of the custom in ancient classical times is testified to by Apollonius Rhodius, Diodorus (who refers to its existence among the Corsicans), and Strabo (who noticed it among the Spanish Basques, by whom, as well as by the Gascons, it has been said to be still observed, though the most recent researches entirely discredit this). Travellers, from the time of Marco Polo, who relates its observance in Chinese Turkestan, have found the custom to prevail in China, India, Borneo, Siam, Africa and the Americas. Even in Europe it cannot be said to have entirely disappeared. In certain of the Baltic provinces of Russia the husband, on the lying-in of the wife, takes to his bed and groans in mock pain. One writer believes he found traces of

it in the little island of Marken in the Zuyder Zee. Even in rural | England, notably in East Anglia, a curiously obstinate belief survives (the prevalence of which in earlier times is proved by references to it in Elizabethan drama) that the pregnancy of the woman affects the man, and the young husband who complains of a toothache is assailed by pleasantries as to his wife's condition. In Guiana the custom is observed in its most typical form. The woman works to within a few hours of the birth, but some days before her delivery the father leaves his occupations and abstains from certain kinds of animal food lest the child should suffer. Thus the flesh of the agouti is forbidden, lest the child should be lean, and that of the capibara or water-cavy, for fear he should inherit through his father's gluttony that creature's projecting teeth. A few hours before delivery the woman goes alone, or with one or two women-friends, into the forest, where the baby is born She returns as soon as she can stand, to her work, and the man then takes to his hammock and becomes the invalid. He must do no work, must touch no weapons, is forbidden all meat and food, except at first a fermented liquor and after the twelfth day a weak gruel of cassava meal. He must not even smoke, or wash himself, but is waited on hand and foot by the women. So far is the comedy carried that he whines and groans as if in actual pain. Six weeks after the birth of the child he is taken in hand by his relatives, who lacerate his skin and rub him with a decoction of the pepper-plant. A banquet is then held from which the patient is excluded, for he must not leave his bed till several days later; and for six months he must eat the flesh of neither fish nor bird. Almost identical ceremonies have been noticed among the natives of California and New Mexico; while in Greenland and Kamchatka the husband may not work for some time before and after his wife's confinement. Among the Larkas of Bengal a period of isolation and uncleanness, syn-. chronous with that compulsory on the woman, is imperative for the man, on the conclusion of which the child's parentage is publicly proclaimed..

No certain explanation can be offered for the custom. The most reasonable view is that adopted by E. B. Tylor, who traces in it the transition from the earlier matriarchal to the later patriarchal system of tribe-organization. Among primitive Among primitive tribes, and probably in all ages, the former order of society, in which descent and inheritance are reckoned through the mother alone, as being the earliest form of family life, is and was very | common, if not universal. The acknowledgment of a relationship between father and son is characteristic of the progress of society towards a true family life. It may well be that the Couvade arose in the father's desire to emphasize the bond of blood between himself and his child. It is a fact that in some countries the father has to purchase the child from its mother; and in the Roman ceremony of the husband raising the baby from the floor we may trace the savage idea that the male parent must formally proclaim his adoption of and responsibility for the offspring. Max Müller, in his Chips from a German Workshop, endeavoured to find an explanation in primitive "henpecking,' asserting that the unfortunate husband was tyrannized over by "his female relatives and afterwards frightened into superstition," -that, in fact, the whole fabric of ceremony is reared on nothing but masculine hysteria; but this theory can scarcely be taken seriously. The missionary, Joseph François Lafitau, suspected a psychological reason, assuming the custom to be a dim recollection of original sin, the isolation and fast types of repentance. The explanation of the American Indians is that if the father engaged in any hard or hazardous work, e.g. hunting, or was careless in his diet, the child would suffer and inherit the physical faults and peculiarities of the animals eaten. This belief that a person becomes possessed of the nature and form of the animal he eats is widespread, being as prevalent in the Old World as in the New, but it is insufficient to account for the minute ceremonial details of La Couvade as practised in many lands. It is far more likely that so universal a practice has no trivial beginnings, but is to be considered as a mile-stone marking a great transitional epoch in human progress.

AUTHORITIES.-E. B. Tylor's Early History of Man (1865; 2nd

ed. p. 301); F. Max Müller, Chips from a German Workshop (18681875), ii. 281; Lord Avebury, Origin of Civilisation (1900); Brett's Indian Tribes of Guiana; Johann Baptist von Spix and Karl F. P. von Martius, Travels in Brazil (1823-1831), ii. 281; J. F. Lafitau, Mœurs des sauvages américains (1st ed., 1724); W. Z. Ripley, Races of Europe (1900); A. H. Keane's Ethnology (1896), p. 368 and footnote; A. Giraud-Teulon, Les Origines du mariage et de la famille (Paris, 1884).

COVE, a word mostly used in the sense of a small inlet or sheltered bay in a coast-line. In English dialect usage it is also applied to a cave or to a recess in a mountain-side. The word in O. Eng. is cofa, and cognate forms are found in the Ger. Koben, Norwegian kove, and in various forms in other Teutonic languages. It has no connexion with "alcove," recess in a room or building, which is derived through the Span. alcoba from Arab. al, the, and qubbah, vault, arch, nor with "cup" or "coop," nor with "cave" (Lat. cava). The use of the word was first confined to a small chamber or cell or inner recess in a room or building. From this has come the particular application in architecture to any kind of concave moulding, the term being usually applied to the quadrantal curve rising from the cornice of a lofty room to the moulded borders of the horizontal ceiling. The term "coving" is given in half-timbered work to the curved soffit under a projecting window, or in the 18th century to that occasionally found carrying the gutter of a house. In the Musée Plantin at Antwerp the hearth of the fireplace of the upper floor is carved on coving, which forms part of the design of the chimney-piece in the room below. The slang use of "cove" for any male person, like a "fellow," "chap," &c., is found in the form "cofe" in T. Harman's Caveat for Cursetors (1587) and other early quotations. This seems to be identical with the Scots word "cofe," a pedlar, hawker, which is formed from "coff," to sell, purchase, cognate with the Ger. kaufen, to buy, and the native English "cheap." The word "cove," therefore, is in ultimate origin the same as "chap," short for "chapman," a pedlar.

COVELLITE, a mineral species consisting of cupric sulphide, CuS, crystallizing in the hexagonal system. It is of less frequent occurrence in nature than copper-glance, the orthorhombic cuprous sulphide. Crystals are very rare, the mineral being usually found as compact and earthy masses or as a blue coating on other copper sulphides. Hardness 1-2; specific gravity 4.6. The dark indigo-blue colour is a characteristic feature, and the mineral was early known as indigo-copper (Ger. Kupferindig). The name covellite is taken from N. Covelli, who in 1839 observed crystals of cupric sulphide encrusting Vesuvian lava, the mineral having been formed here by the interaction of hydrogen sulphide and cupric chloride, both of which are volatile volcanic products. Covellite is, however, more commonly found in copper-bearing veins, where it has resulted by the alteration of other copper sulphides, namely chalcopyrite, copper-glance and erubescite. It is found in many copper mines; localities which may be specially mentioned are Sangerhausen in Prussian Saxony, Butte in Montana, and Chile; in the Medicine Bow Mountains of Wyoming a platiniferous covellite is mined, the platinum being present as sperrylite (platinum arsenide). (L. J. S.)

COVENANT (an O. Fr. form, later convenant, from convenir, to agree, Lat. convenire), a mutual agreement of two or more parties, or an undertaking made by one of the parties, In the Bible the Hebrew word , běrith, is used widely for many kinds of agreements; it is then applied to a contract between two persons or to a treaty between two nations, such as the covenant made between Abimelech and Isaac, representing a treaty between the Israelites and the Philistines (Gen. xxvi. 26 seq.); more particularly to an engagement made between God and men, or such agreements as, by the observance of a religious rite, regarded God as a party to the engagement. Two suggestions have been made for the derivation of běrith: (1) tracing the word from a root "to cut," and the reference is to the primitive rite of cutting victims into parts, between which the parties to an agreement passed, cf. the Greek öρкia TéμVELV, and the account (Gen. xv. 17) of the covenant between God and Abraham, where "a smoking furnace and burning lamp passed