ilicate, is characteristic of
certain very basic rocks, the melilite-basalts. It is pale yellow or
colourless in thin sections, and yields peculiar and characteristic dark
blue polarization colours. This rare group of rocks is known to occur in
Bohemia, Swabia and South Africa. Perofskite, in small dark brown cubic
crystals, is a constant accessory in these rocks. The augite is usually
violet coloured, and shows zonal and hour-glass structures. Green augite
may occur in the nepheline-basalts, and aegerine (soda-iron-augite) is
occasionally found in them.

The distribution of basalts is world-wide; and in some places [v.03 p.0458]
they occur in immense masses, and cover great areas. In Washington, Oregon,
and Idaho many thousands of square miles are occupied by basaltic-lava
flows. In the Sandwich Islands and Iceland they are the prevalent lavas;
and the well-known columnar jointed basalts of Skye, Staffa, and Antrim
(Giant's Causeway) form a southward extension of the Icelandic volcanic
province, with which they are connected by the similar rocks of the Faeroe
Islands. In the Deccan in India great basaltic lava fields are known; and
Etna and Vesuvius emit basaltic rocks. In older geological periods they
were not less common; for example, in the Carboniferous in Scotland.

(J. S. F.)

BASCOM, JOHN (1827- ), American educationalist and philosophical writer,
was born at Genoa, New York, on the 1st of May 1827. He graduated at
Williams College in 1849 and at the Andover Theological Seminary in 1855,
was professor of rhetoric at Williams College from 1855 to 1874, and was
president of the University of Wisconsin and professor of mental and moral
philosophy there from 1874 to 1887. In 1887-1891 and in 1901-1903 he was
lecturer in sociology, and in 1891-1901 professor of economics in Williams
College. He retired in 1903. Among his publications may be mentioned:
_Aesthetics_ (1862); _Philosophy of Rhetoric_ (1865); _Science, Philosophy
and Religion_ (1871); _Philosophy of English Literature_ (1874);
_Philosophy of Religions_ (1876); _Problems in Philosophy_ (1885); _The New
Theology_ (1891); _Social Theory_ (1895); _Evolution and Religion_ (1896);
_Growth of Nationality in the United States_ (1899); and _God and His
Goodness_ (1901).

BASE. (1) (Fr. _bas_, Late Lat. _bassus_, low; cf. Gr. [Greek: bathus]) an
adjective meaning low or deep, and so mean, worthless, or wicked. This
sense of the word has sometimes affected the ne