IMPETIGO, a cutaneous eruption, generally in clusters, of yellow-scaled pustules, which grow thicker and larger; common among children ill fed and ill cared for.

IMPEY, SIR ELIJAH, Indian judge, born at Hammersmith; educated at Cambridge, and called to the bar in 1756; was sent out to Bengal as first Chief-Justice in 1774; he supported Warren Hastings’s administration, and presided over the court which sentenced Nuncomar to death for forgery; in the quarrel over Hastings’s alleged resignation he decided in favour of the governor; was recalled and impeached for his conduct of the Nuncomar trial in 1783, but was honourably acquitted; resigning in 1789, he sat in Parliament for New Romney till 1796 (1732-1809).

IMPONDERABLES, the name given to light, heat, and electricity when they were supposed to be material substances, but without weight.

IMPRESSIONISM, a term in painting that denotes the principle of a new school originating in France before 1870, and introduced into this country some 10 years later; it is a revolt against traditionalism in art, and aims at reproducing on canvas not what the mind knows or by close study observes is in nature, but the “impression” which eye and mind gather.  The influence of the movement has been strong, and promises to be lasting both here and in Germany, and not the least interesting work of the kind has of late years issued from the “Glasgow School” and the “London Impressionists.”

IMPRESSMENT, legalised enforcement of service in the British navy, which has for years been in abeyance, and is not likely to be ever again revived.

IMPROPRIATION, the transference of the revenues of a benefice to a layman or lay body to be devoted to spiritual uses.

IMPUTATION, the theological dogma of the transference of guilt or merit from one to another who is descended naturally or spiritually from the same stock as the former, as of Adam’s guilt to us by nature or Christ’s righteousness to us by faith; although in Scripture the term generally, if not always, denotes the reckoning to a man of the merit or the demerit involved in, not another’s doings, but his own, as in a single act of faith or a single act of unbelief, the one viewed as allying him with all that is good, or as a proof of his essential goodness, and the other as allying him with all that is evil, or as a proof of his essential wickedness.

IN CAENA DOMINI (i. e. in the Supper of the Lord), a papal bull promulgated in the Middle Ages, denouncing excommunication against all who dispute the claims of the Church, and the promulgation of which was felt on all hands to be intolerable; the promulgation has been discontinued since 1773.

INACHOS, in Greek legend the first king of Argos, son of Oceanus and Tethys.

IN-AND-IN, a term applied to the breeding of animals from the same parentage.

INCA, a king or royal prince of the ancient original people of Peru.