BORON I A, in botany, a genus of the Oetanctria Monogynia class and order. Cal) x four-parted ; petals four ; anthers: pedicelled below the summits of the fila ments; style, from the top of the germ, very short ; stigma capitate ; capsule fbur-united ; seeds coated. There are four species, natives of New South Wales. BOROUGH, or BURGH, in a general sense, signifies a town, or a corporation, which is not a city. The word, in its ori ginal signification, is by some supposed to have meant a company, consisting of ten families, which were bound together at each other's pledge. Afterwards, as Verstegan has it, borough came to signi fy a tots n, having a wall, or some kind of enclosure, around it. And all places that in old times had the name of bo rough, it is said, were fortified, or fenced in some shape or other. Borough is a place of safety and privilege ; and some are called free burghs, and the tradesmen in them free• burgesses, from a freedom they had granted to them originally, to buy and sell without disturbance, and ex empt them from toll.
Borough is now particularly appropri ated to such towns or villages as send burgesses or representatives to parlia ment, whether they may be incorporated or not.
They are distinguished into those by charter or statute, and those by prescrip tion or custom ; the number m England is one hundred and forty-nine, some of which send one, but the most of them two representatives.
Boum:Gus, royal, in Scotland, are cor porations made for the advantage of trade, by charters granted by several of heir kings, having the privilege of send .ng commissioners to represent them in parliament, besides other peculiar immu mities. They form a body of themselves, : 'Id send commissioners each to an an mal convention at Edinburgh, to con Alt for the benefit of trade, and their ge eral interest.
. lloimeon, English, a customary descent f lands or tenements, in certain places, y which they descend to the youngest instead of the eldest son ; or, if -the_ owner have no issue, to the younger in stead of the elder brother. The custom goes with the land, although there be a devise or feoffment at the common law to the contrary. The reason of this custom, says Littleton, is, because the youngest is presumed, in law, to be least able to pro vide for himself.