The Nuttall Encyclopaedia
by
Edited by Rev. James Wood
Part 11 out of 53
CAPYBA`RA, the water-hog, the largest rodent extant, in appearance
like a small pig.
CARACALLA, a Roman emperor, son of Septimius Severus, born at Lyons;
his reign (211-217) was a series of crimes, follies, and extravagances;
he put to death 20,000 persons, among others the jurist Papinianus, and
was assassinated himself by one of his guards.
CARACAS or CARRACAS (72), the cap. of Venezuela, stands at an
altitude 3000 ft. above the level of the sea; subject to earthquakes, in
one of which (1812) 12,000 perished, and great part of the city was
destroyed; it contains the tomb of Bolivar.
CARACCI or CARRACCI, a family of painters, born at Bologna:
LUDOVICO, the founder of a new school of painting, the principle of
which was eclecticism, in consequence of which it is known as the
Eclectic School, or imitation of the styles of the best masters
(1555-1619); ANNIBALE, cousin and pupil, did "St. Roche distributing
Alms," and his chief, "Three Marys weeping over Christ"; went to Rome and
painted the celebrated Farnese gallery, a work which occupied him four
years (1560-1609); AGOSTINO, brother of above, assisted him in the
frescoes of the gallery, the "Communion of St. Jerome" his greatest work
(1557-1602).
CARACTACUS, a British chief, king of the Silures, maintained a
gallant struggle against the Romans for nine years, but was overthrown by
Ostorius, 50 A.D., taken captive, and led in triumphal procession
through Rome, when the Emperor Claudius was so struck with his dignified
demeanour, that he set him and all his companions at liberty.
CARADOC, a knight of the Round Table, famous for his valour and the
chastity and constancy of his wife.
CARAFFA, a distinguished Neapolitan family, which gave birth to a
number of distinguished ecclesiastics, Paul IV. one of them.
CARAGLIO, an eminent Italian engraver, born at Verona, engraved on
gems and medals as well as copper-plate, after the works of the great
masters (1500-1570).
CARAVAGGIO, an Italian painter, disdained the ideal and the ideal
style of art, and kept generally to crass reality, often in its grossest
forms; a man of a violent temper, which hastened his end; a painting by
him of "Christ and the Disciples at Emmaus" is in the National Gallery,
London (1569-1609).
CARAVANSERAI, a large unfurnished inn, with a court in the middle
for the accommodation of caravans and other travellers at night in the
East.
CARBOHYDRATES, a class of substances such as the sugars, starch,
&c., consisting of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen, the latter in the
proportion in which they exist in water.
CARBONARI (lit. _charcoal burners_), a secret society that, in the
beginning of the 19th century, originated in Italy and extended itself
into France, numbering hundreds of thousands, included Lord Byron, Silvio
Pellico, and Mazzini among them, the object of which was the overthrow of
despotic governments; they were broken up by Austria, and absorbed by the
Young Italy party.
CARDAN, JEROME, Italian physician and mathematician, born at Pavia;
was far-famed as a physician; studied and wrote on all manner of known
subjects, made discoveries in algebra, believed in astrology, left a
candid account of himself entitled "De Vita Propria"; was the author of
"Cardan's Formula" a formula for the solution of cubic equations; he is
said to have starved himself to death so as to fulfil a prophecy he had
made as to the term of his life (1501-1576).
CARDIFF (129), county town of Glamorganshire, S. Wales, on the river
Taff, the sea outlet for the mineral wealth and products of the district,
a town that has risen more rapidly than any other in the kingdom, having
had at the beginning of the century only 2000 inhabitants; it has a
university, a number of churches, few of them belonging to the Church of
England, and has also three daily papers.
CARDIGAN, EARL OF, a British officer; commanded the Light Cavalry
Brigade in the Crimean war, and distinguished himself in the famous
charge of the Six Hundred, which he led; his favourite regiment, the 11th
Hussars, on the equipment of which he lavished large sums of money
(1797-1868).
CARDIGANSHIRE (62), a county in S. Wales, low-lying on the coast,
level towards the coast, and mountainous in the interior, but with
fertile valleys.
CARDINAL VIRTUES, these have been "arranged by the wisest men of all
time, under four general heads," and are defined by Ruskin as "Prudence
or Discretion (the spirit which discerns and adopts rightly), Justice
(the spirit which rules and divides rightly), Fortitude (the spirit that
persists and endures rightly), and Temperance (the spirit which stops and
refuses rightly). These cardinal and sentinel virtues," he adds, "are not
only the means of protecting and prolonging life itself, but are the
chief guards or sources of the material means of life, and the governing
powers and princes of economy."
CARDINALISTS, name given to the partisans in France of Richelieu and
Mazarin.
CARDUCCI, Florentine artists, brothers, of the 17th century; did
their chief work in Spain.
CARDUCCI, GIOSUE, an Italian poet and critic; author of "Hymn to
Satan," "Odi Barbari," "Commentaries on Petrarch," &c.; _b_. 1837.
CAREW, THOMAS, English courtier poet; his poems, chiefly masks and
lyrics (1589-1639).
CAREY, HENRY, English poet and musician, excelled in ballads;
composed "Sally in Our Alley"; _d_. 1743.
CAREY, SIR ROBERT, warden of the Border Marches under Elizabeth;
present at her deathbed rode off post-haste on the occurrence of the
death with the news to Edinburgh to announce it to King James
(1560-1639).
CAREY, WILLIAM, celebrated Baptist missionary, born in
Northamptonshire; founder of the Baptist Missionary Society, and its
first missionary; founded the mission at Serampore and directed its
operations, distributing Bibles and tracts by thousands in native
languages, as well as preparing grammars and dictionaries; was 29 years
Oriental professor in the College of Fort William. Calcutta (1761-1834).
CARGILL, DONALD, a Scotch Covenanter, born in Perthshire; was
minister of the Barony Parish, Glasgow; fought at Bothwell Brig; suffered
at the Cross of Edinburgh for daring to excommunicate the king; died with
the faith and courage of a martyr (1619-1681).
CARIA, a SW. country in Asia Minor, bordering on the Archipelago, of
which the Maeander is the chief river.
CARIBBEAN SEA, an inland sea of the Atlantic, lying between the
Great Antilles and South America, subject to hurricanes; it corresponds
to the Mediterranean in Europe, and is the turning-point of the Gulf
Stream.
CARIBS, a race of American Indians, originally inhabiting the West
Indies, now confined to the southern shores of the Caribbean Sea, as far
as the mouth of the Amazon; they are a fine race, tall, and of
ruddy-brown complexion, but have lost their distinctive physique by
amalgamation with other tribes; they give name to the Caribbean Sea.
CARINTHIA (361), since 1849 crownland of Austria, near Italy; is a
mountainous and a mineral country; rears cattle and horses; manufactures
hardware and textile fabrics; the principal river is the Drave; capital,
Klagenfurt.
CARISBROOKE, a village in the Isle of Wight, in the castle of which,
now in ruins, Charles I. was imprisoned 13 months before his trial; it
was at one time a Roman station.
CARLEN, EMILIA, Swedish novelist; her novels, some 30 in number,
treat of the everyday life of the lower and middle classes (1807-1883).
CARLETON, WILLIAM, Irish novelist; his first work, and the
foundation of his reputation, "Traits and Stories of the Irish
Peasantry," followed by others of a like class (1794-1860).
CARLI, Italian archaeologist, numismatist, and economist, born at
Capo d'Istria; wrote as his chief work on political economy; president of
the Council of Commerce at Milan (1720-1795).
CARLILE, RICHARD, English Radical and Freethinker, born in
Devonshire; a disciple of Tom Paine's, and propagandist of his views with
a zeal which no prosecution could subdue, although he time after time
suffered imprisonment for it, as well as those who associated themselves
with him, his wife included; his principal organ was "The Republican,"
the first twelve volumes of which are dated from his prison; he was a
martyr for the freedom of the press, and in that interest did not suffer
in vain (1790-1843).
CARLISLE (39), county town of Cumberland, on the Eden; a great
railway centre; with an old castle of historical interest, and a
cathedral founded by William Rufus and dedicated to Henry I.
CARLISLE, GEORGE FREDERICK WILLIAM HOWARD, EARL OF, a Whig in
politics; supported the successive Whig administrations of his time, and
became eventually Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland under Palmerston
(1802-1864).
CARLISTS, a name given in France to the partisans of Charles X.
(1830), and especially in Spain to those of Don Carlos (1833), and those
of his grandson (1873-1874).
CARLOMAN, son of Charles Martel, and brother of Pepin le Bref, king
of Austrasia from 741 to 747; abdicated, and retired into a monastery,
where he died.
CARLOMAN, son of Pepin le Bref, and brother of Charlemagne, king of
Austrasia, Burgundy, and Provence in 768; _d_. 771.
CARLOMAN, king of France conjointly with his brother Louis III.;
_d_. 884.
CARLOS, DON, son of Philip II. of Spain, born at Valladolid, and
heir to the throne, but from incapacity, or worse, excluded by his father
from all share in the government; confessed to a priest a design to
assassinate some one, believed to be his father; was seized, tried, and
convicted, though sentence against him was never pronounced; died shortly
after; the story of Don Carlos has formed the subject of tragedies,
especially one by Schiller, the German poet (1545-1568).
CARLOS, DON, the brother of Ferdinand VII. of Spain, on whose death
he laid claim to the crown as heir, against Isabella, Ferdinand's
daughter who by the Salic law, though set aside in her favour by her
father, had, he urged, no right to the throne; his cause was taken up by
a large party, and the struggle kept up for years; defeated at length he
retired from the contest, and abdicated in favour of his son
(1785-1855).
CARLOS, DON, grandson of the preceding, and heir to his rights;
revived the struggle in 1870, but fared no better than his grandfather;
took refuge in London; _b_. 1848.
CARLOVINGIANS, or KARLINGS, the name of the second dynasty of
Frankish kings, in succession to the Merovingian, which had become
_faineant_; bore sway from 762 to 987, Pepin le Bref the first, and Louis
V. the last; Charlemagne was the greatest of the race, and gave name to
the dynasty.
CALLOW (40), an inland county in Leinster, Ireland; also the county
town.
CARLOWITZ, a town on the Danube, 30 m. NW. of Belgrade, where a
treaty was concluded in 1699 between Turkey and other European powers,
very much to the curtailment of the territories of the former.
CARLSBAD (10), a celebrated watering-place in Bohemia, of
aristocratic resort, the springs being the hottest in Europe, the water
varying from 117 deg. to 165 deg.; population nearly trebled in the season; the
inhabitants are engaged in industries which minister to the tastes of the
visitors and their own profit.
CARLSCRONA (21), a Swedish town, strongly fortified, on the Baltic,
with a spacious harbour, naval station, and arsenal; it is built on five
rocky islands united by dykes and bridges.
CARLSRUHE (73), the capital of the Grand-Duchy of Baden, a great
railway centre; built in the form of a fan, its streets, 32 in number,
radiating so from the duke's palace in the centre.
CARLSTADT, a German Reformer, associated for a time with Luther, but
parted from him both on practical and dogmatical grounds; succeeded
Zwingli as professor at Basel (1483-1541).
CARLTON CLUB, the Conservative club in London, so called, as erected
on the site of Carlton House, demolished in 1828, and occupied by George
IV. when he was Prince of Wales.
CARLYLE, ALEXANDER, surnamed Jupiter Carlyle, from his noble head
and imposing person, born in Dumfriesshire; minister of Inveresk,
Musselburgh, from 1747 to his death; friend of David Hume, Adam Smith,
and Home, the author of "Douglas"; a leader of the Moderate party in the
Church of Scotland; left an "Autobiography," which was not published till
1860, which shows its author to have been a man who took things as he
found them, and enjoyed them to the full as any easy-going, cultured
pagan (1722-1805).
CARLYLE, THOMAS, born in the village of Ecclefechan, Annandale,
Dumfriesshire; son of James Carlyle, a stone-mason, and afterwards a
small farmer, a man of great force, penetration, and integrity of
character, and of Margaret Aitken, a woman of deep piety and warm
affection; educated at the parish school and Annan Academy; entered the
University of Edinburgh at the age of 14, in the Arts classes;
distinguished himself early in mathematics; enrolled as a student in the
theological department; became a teacher first in Annan Academy, then at
Kirkcaldy; formed there an intimate friendship with Edward Irving; threw
up both school-mastering and the church; removed to Edinburgh, and took
to tutoring and working for an encyclopedia, and by-and-by to translating
from the German and writing criticisms for the Reviews, the latter of
which collected afterwards in the "Miscellanies," proved "epoch-making"
in British literature, wrote a "Life of Schiller"; married Jane Welsh, a
descendant of John Knox; removed to Craigenputtock, in Dumfriesshire,
"the loneliest nook in Britain," where his original work began with
"Sartor Resartus," written in 1831, a radically spiritual book, and a
symbolical, though all too exclusively treated as a speculative, and an
autobiographical; removed to London in 1834, where he wrote his "French
Revolution" (1837), a book instinct with the all-consuming fire of the
event which it pictures, and revealing "a new moral force" in the
literary life of the country and century; delivered three courses of
lectures to the _elite_ of London Society (1837-1840), the last of them
"Heroes and Hero-Worship," afterwards printed in 1840; in 1840 appeared
"Chartism," in 1843 "Past and Present," and in 1850 "Latter-Day
Pamphlets"; all on what he called the "Condition-of-England-Question,"
which to the last he regarded, as a subject of the realm, the most
serious question of the time, seeing, as he all along taught and felt,
the social life affects the individual life to the very core; in 1845 he
dug up a hero literally from the grave in his "Letters and Speeches of
Oliver Cromwell," and after writing in 1851 a brief biography of his
misrepresented friend, John Sterling, concluded (1858-1865) his life's
task, prosecuted from first to last, in "sore travail" of body and soul,
with "The History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, called Frederick the
Great," "the last and grandest of his works," says Froude; "a book," says
Emerson, "that is a Judgment Day, for its moral verdict on men and
nations, and the manners of modern times"; lies buried beside his own
kindred in the place where he was born, as he had left instructions to
be. "The man," according to Ruskin, his greatest disciple, and at
present, as would seem, the last, "who alone of all our masters of
literature, has written, without thought of himself, what he knew to be
needful for the people of his time to hear, if the will to hear had been
in them ... the solitary Teacher who has asked them to be (before all)
brave for the help of Man, and just for the love of God" (1795-1881).
CARMAGNOLE, a Red-republican song and dance.
CARMARTHENSHIRE (30), a county in S. Wales, and the largest in the
Principality; contains part of the coal-fields in the district; capital
Carmarthen, on the right bank of the Towy, a river which traverses the
county.
CARMEL, a NW. extension of the limestone ridge that bounds on the S.
the Plain of Esdraelon, in Palestine, and terminates in a rocky
promontory 500 ft. high; forms the southern boundary of the Bay of Acre;
its highest point is 1742 ft. above the sea-level.
CARMELITES, a monastic order, originally an association of hermits
on Mount Carmel, at length mendicant, called the Order of Our Lady of
Mount Carmel, i. e. the Virgin, in consecration to whom it was founded
by a pilgrim of the name Berthold, a Calabrian, in 1156. The Order is
said to have existed from the days of Elijah.
CARMEN SYLVA, the _nom-de-plume_ of Elizabeth, queen of Roumania;
lost an only child, and took to literature for consolation; has taken an
active interest in the elevation and welfare of her sex; _b_. 1843.
CARMONTEL, a French dramatist; author of little pieces under the
name of "Proverbes" (1717-1806).
CARNAC, a seaside fishing-village in the Bay of Quiberon, in the
dep. of Morbihan, France, with interesting historical records,
particularly Celtic, many of them undecipherable by the antiquary.
CARNARVON, a maritime county in N. Wales, with the highest mountains
and grandest scenery in the Principality, and a capital of the same name
on the Menai Strait, with the noble ruins of a castle, in which Edward
II., the first Prince of Wales, was born.
CARNARVON, HENRY HOWARD, Earl of, Conservative statesman; held
office under Lord Derby and Disraeli; was a good classical scholar; wrote
the "Druses of Mount Lebanon" (1831-1890).
CARNATIC, an old prov. in the Madras Presidency of India that
extended along the Coromandel coast from Cape Comorin, 600 m. N.
CARNEADES, a Greek philosopher, born at Cyrene; his whole philosophy
a polemic against the dogmatism of the Stoics, on the alleged ground of
the absence of any criterion of certainty in matters of either science or
morality; conceded that truth and virtue were admirable qualities, but he
denied the reality of them; sent once on an embassy to Rome, he
propounded this doctrine in the ears of the Conscript Fathers, upon which
Cato moved he should be expelled from the senate-house and sent back to
Athens, where he came from (213-129 B.C.).
CARNEGIE, ANDREW, ironmaster, born in Dunfermline, the son of a
weaver; made a large fortune by his iron and steel works at Pittsburg,
U.S., out of which he has liberally endowed institutions and libraries,
both in America and his native country; _b_. 1835.
CARNIOLA (500), a crownland of the Austrian empire, SW. of Austria,
on the Adriatic, S. of Carinthia; contains quicksilver mines, second only
to those of Almaden, in Spain; the surface is mountainous, and the soil
is not grain productive, though in some parts it yields wine and fine
fruit.
CARNIVAL, in Roman Catholic countries the name given to a season of
feasting and revelry immediately preceding Lent, akin to the Saturnalia
of the Romans.
CARNOT, LEONARD SADI, son of Nicolas, founder of thermo-dynamics; in
his "Reflexions sur la Puissance du Feu" enunciates the principle of
Reversibility, considered the most important contribution to physical
science since the time of Newton (1796-1832). See DR. KNOTT'S
"PHYSICS."
CARNOT, MARIE FRANCOIS, civil engineer and statesman, born at
Limoges, nephew of the preceding; Finance Minister in 1879 and 1887;
became President in 1887; was assassinated at Lyons by an anarchist in
1894.
CARNOT, NICOLAS, French mathematician and engineer, born at Nolay,
in Burgundy; a member of the National Convention; voted for the death of
the king; became member of the Committee of Public Safety, and organiser
of the armies of the Republic, whence his name, the "organiser of
victory"; Minister of War under Napoleon; defender of Antwerp in 1814;
and afterwards Minister of the Interior (1753-1823).
CARO, ANNIBALE, an Italian author and poet, notable for his classic
style (1507-1566).
CARO, MARIE, a French philosopher, born at Poitiers; a popular
lecturer on philosophy, surnamed _le philosophe des dames_; wrote on
mysticism, materialism, and pessimism (1826-1887).
CAROLINA, NORTH, one of the original 13 States of N. America, on the
Atlantic, about the size of England, S. of Virginia, 480 m. from E. to W.
and 180 m. from N. to S.; has a fertile, well-watered subsoil in the high
lands; is rich in minerals and natural products; the mountains are
covered with forests, and the manufactures are numerous.
CAROLINA, SOUTH, S. of N. Carolina, is alluvial with swamps, 100 m.
inland from the coast, is well watered; produces rice and cotton in large
quantities and of a fine quality.
CAROLINE ISLANDS (36), a stretch of lagoon islands, 2000 m. from E.
to W., belonging to Spain, N. of New Guinea and E. of the Philippine
Islands; once divided into eastern, western, and central; the soil of the
western is fertile, and there is plenty of fish and turtle in the
lagoons.
CAROLINE OF BRUNSWICK, queen of George IV. and daughter of the Duke
of Brunswick; married George, then Prince of Wales, in 1795; gave birth
to the Princess Charlotte the year following, but almost immediately
after her husband abandoned her; she retired to a mansion at Blackheath;
was allowed to go abroad after a time; on the accession of her husband
she was offered a pension of L50,000 if she stayed out of the country,
but rejected it and claimed her rights as queen; was charged with
adultery, but after a long trial acquitted; on the day of the coronation
sought admission to Westminster Abbey, but the door was shut against her;
she died a fortnight after (1768-1821).
CARON, LIEUTENANT-COLONEL, under the first Empire; head of the
Belford conspiracy in 1820 under the Restoration; executed 1822.
CARPACCIO, VITTORE, a Venetian painter of great celebrity,
particularly in his early pieces, for his truth of delineation, his
fertile imagination, and his rich colouring; his works are numerous, and
have nearly all of them sacred subjects; an Italian critic says of him,
"He had truth in his heart" (1450-1522).
CARPATHIANS, a range of wooded mountains in Central Europe, 880 m.
long, which, in two great masses, extend from Presburg to Orsova, both on
the Danube, in a semicircle round the greater part of Hungary,
particularly the whole of the N. and E., the highest of them Negoi, 8517
ft., they are rich in minerals, and their sides clothed with forests,
principally of beech and pine.
CARPEAUX, JEAN BAPTISTE, sculptor, born at Valenciennes; adorned by
his art, reckoned highly imaginative, several of the public monuments of
Paris, and the facade of the Opera House (1827-1875).
CARPENTARIA, GULF OF, a broad, deep gulf in the N. of Australia;
contains several islands, and receives several rivers.
CARPENTER, MARY, a philanthropist, born at Exeter, daughter of Dr.
Lant Carpenter, Unitarian minister; took an active part in the
establishment of reformatory and ragged schools, and a chief promoter of
the Industrial Schools Act; her philanthropic efforts extended to India,
which, in her zeal, she visited four times, and she was the founder of
the National Indian Association (1807-1877).
CARPENTER, WILLIAM BENJAMIN, biologist, brother of the preceding;
author, among other numerous works, of the "Principles of General and
Comparative Physiology" (1838); contributed to mental physiology; held
several high professional appointments in London; inaugurated deep-sea
soundings, and advocated the theory of a vertical circulation in the
ocean (1813-1877).
CARPI, GIROLAMO DA, Italian painter and architect, born at Ferrara;
successful imitator of Correggio (1501-1556).
CARPI, UGO DA, Italian painter and wood engraver; is said to have
invented engraving in chiaroscuro (1486-1530).
CARPINI, a Franciscan monk, born in Umbria; headed an embassy from
Pope Innocent IV. to the Emperor of the Mogul Tartars to persuade him out
of Europe, which he threatened; was a corpulent man of 60; travelled from
Lyons to beyond Lake Baikal and back; wrote a report of his journey in
Latin, which had a quieting effect on the panic in Europe (1182-1252).
CARPIO, a legendary hero of the Moors of Spain; is said to have
slain Roland at Roncesvalles.
CARPOC`RATES, a Gnostic of Alexandria of the 2nd century, who
believed in the transmigration of the soul and its final emancipation
from all external bonds and obligations, by means of concentrated
meditation on the divine unity, and a life in conformity therewith; was
the founder of a sect called after his name.
CARRARA (11), a town in N. Italy, 30 m. NW. of Leghorn; famous for
its quarries of white statuary marble, the working of which is its staple
industry; these quarries have been worked for 2000 years, are 400 in
number, and employ as quarrymen alone regularly over 3000 men.
CARREL, ARMAND, French publicist, born at Rouen; a man of high
character, and highly esteemed; editor of the _National_, which he
conducted with great ability, and courage; died of a wound in a duel with
Emile de Girardin (1800-1836).
CARRICK, the southern division of Ayrshire. See AYRSHIRE.
CARRICKFERGUS (9), a town and seaport N. of Belfast Lough, 91/2 m.
from Belfast, with a picturesque castle.
CARRIER, JEAN BAPTISTE, one of the most blood-thirsty of the French
Revolutionists, born near Aurillac; an attorney by profession; sent on a
mission to La Vendee; caused thousands of victims to be drowned,
beheaded, or shot; was guillotined himself after trial by a Revolutionary
tribunal (1756-1794). See NOYADES.
CARRIERE, MORITZ, a German philosopher and man of letters, born in
Hesse, author of works on aesthetics and art in its relation to culture
and the ideal; advocated the compatibility of the pantheistic with the
deistic view of the world (1817-1893).
CARROL, LEWIS, pseudonym of C. L. DODGSON (q. v.), the
author of "Alice in Wonderland," with its sequel, "Through the
Looking-Glass."
CARSE, the name given in Scotland to alluvial lands bordering on a
river.
CARSON, KIT, American trapper, born in Kentucky; was of service to
the States in expeditions in Indian territories from his knowledge of the
habits of the Indians (1809-1878).
CARSTAIRS, WILLIAM, a Scotch ecclesiastic, born at Cathcart, near
Glasgow; sent to Utrecht to study theology; recommended himself to the
regard of the Prince of Orange, and became his political adviser;
accompanied him to England as chaplain in 1688, and had no small share in
bringing about the Revolution; controlled Church affairs in Scotland; was
made Principal of Edinburgh University; was chief promoter of the Treaty
of Union; was held in high esteem by his countrymen for his personal
character as well as his public services; was a most sagacious man
(1649-1715).
CARSTENS, ASMUS JAKOB, Danish artist, born in Sleswig; on the
appearance of his great picture, "The Fall of the Angels," rose at once
into fame; was admitted to the Berlin Academy; afterwards studied the
masters at Rome; brought back to Germany a taste for art; was the means
of reviving it; treated classical subjects; quarrelled the Academy; died
in poverty at Rome (1754-1798).
CARTAGENA (86), a naval port of Spain, on the Mediterranean, with a
capacious harbour; one of the oldest towns in it, founded by the
Carthaginians; was once the largest naval arsenal in Europe. Also capital
(12) of the Bolivar State in Colombia.
CARTE, THOMAS, historian, a devoted Jacobite, born near Rugby; wrote
a "History of England," which has proved a rich quarry of facts for
subsequent historians (1686-1754).
CARTE-BLANCHE, a blank paper with a signature to be filled up with
such terms of an agreement as the holder is authorised to accept in name
of the person whose signature it bears.
CARTER, ELIZABETH, an accomplished lady, born at Deal, friend of Dr.
Johnson, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and others; a great Greek and Italian
scholar; translated Epictetus and Algarotti's exposition of Newton's
philosophy; some of her papers appear in the _Rambler_ (1717-1806).
CARTERET, JOHN, EARL GRANVILLE, eminent British statesman, orator,
and diplomatist, entered Parliament in the Whig interest; his first
speech was in favour of the Protestant succession; after service as
diplomatist abroad, was made Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, in which
capacity he was brought into contact with Swift, first as an enemy but at
length as a friend, and proved a successful viceroy; in Parliament was
head of the party opposed to Sir Robert Walpole and of the subsequent
administration; his foreign policy has been in general approved of; had
the satisfaction of seeing, which he was instrumental in securing, the
elder Pitt installed in office before he retired; was a "fiery, emphatic
man" (1690-1763).
CARTERET, PHILIP, English sailor and explorer, explored in the
Southern Seas, and discovered several islands, Pitcairn's Island among
the number; _d_. 1796.
CARTHAGE, an ancient maritime city, on a peninsula in the N. of
Africa, near the site of Tunis, and founded by Phoenicians in 850 B.C.;
originally the centre of a colony, it became the capital of a wide-spread
trading community, which even ventured to compete with, and at one time
threatened, under Hannibal, to overthrow, the power of Rome, in a series
of protracted struggles known as the Punic Wars, in the last of which it
was taken and destroyed by Publius Cornelius Scipio in 146 B.C., after a
siege of two years, though it rose again as a Roman city under the
Caesars, and became a place of great importance till burned in A.D. 698
by Hassan, the Arab; the struggle during the early part of its history
was virtually a struggle for the ascendency of the Semitic people over
the Aryan race in Europe.
CARTHUSIANS, a monastic order of a very severe type, founded by St.
Bruno in 1086, each member of which had originally a single cell,
eventually one consisting of two or three rooms with a garden, all of
them opening into one corridor; they amassed considerable wealth, but
were given to deeds of benefaction, and spent their time in study and
contemplation, in consequence of which they figure not so much in the
outside world as many other orders do.
CARTIER, a French navigator, born at St. Malo, made three voyages to
N. America in quest of a North-West passage, at the instance of Francis
I.; took possession of Canada in the name of France, by planting the
French flag on the soil (1494-1554).
CARTOONS, drawings or designs made on stiff paper for a fresco or
other paintings, transferred by tracing or pouncing to the surface to be
painted, the most famous of which are those of Raphael.
CARTOUCHE, a notorious captain of a band of thieves, born in Paris,
who was broken on the wheel alive in the Place de Greve (1698-1721).
CARTWRIGHT, EDMUND, inventor of the powerloom and the carding
machine, born in Nottinghamshire; bred for the Church; his invention, at
first violently opposed, to his ruin for the time being, is now
universally adopted; a grant of L10,000 was made him by Parliament in
consideration of his services and in compensation for his losses; he had
a turn for versifying as well as mechanical invention (1743-1823).
CARTWRIGHT, JOHN, brother of the preceding; served in the navy and
the militia, but left both services for political reasons; took to the
study of agriculture, and the advocacy of radical political reform much
in advance of his time (1740-1824).
CARUS, KARL GUSTAV, a celebrated German physiologist, born at
Leipzig; a many-sided man; advocate of the theory that health of body and
mind depends on the equipoise of antagonistic principles (1789-1869).
CARY, HENRY FRANCIS, translator of Dante, born at Gibraltar; his
translation is admired for its fidelity as well as for its force and
felicity (1772-1844).
CARYATIDES, draped female figures surmounting columns and supporting
entablatures; the corresponding male figures are called Atlantes.
CASA, Italian statesman, Secretary of State under Pope Paul IV.;
wrote "Galateo; or, the Art of Living in the World" (1503-1556).
CASABIANCA, LOUIS, a French naval officer, born in Corsica, who, at
the battle of Aboukir, after securing the safety of his crew, blew up his
ship and perished along with his son, who would not leave him
(1755-1798).
CASA`LE (17), a town on the Po; manufactures silk twist.
CASANOVA, painter, born in London, of Venetian origin; painted
landscapes and battle-pieces (1727-1806).
CASANOVA DE SEINGALT, a clever Venetian adventurer and scandalous
impostor, of the Cagliostro type, who insinuated himself into the good
graces for a time of all the distinguished people of the period,
including even Frederick the Great, Voltaire, and others; died in Bohemia
after endless roamings and wrigglings, leaving, as Carlyle would say,
"the smell of brimstone behind him"; wrote a long detailed, brazen-faced
account of his career of scoundrelism (1725-1798).
CASAS, BARTOLOMEO DE LAS, a Spanish prelate, distinguished for his
exertions in behalf of the Christianisation and civilisation of the
Indians of S. America (1474-1566).
CASAUBON, ISAAC, an eminent classical scholar and commentator, born
in Geneva; professor of Greek at Geneva and Montpellier, and afterwards
of belles-lettres at Paris, invited thither by Henry IV., who pensioned
him; being a Protestant he removed to London on Henry's death, where
James I. gave him two prebends; has been ranked with Lepsius and Scaliger
as a scholar (1559-1614).
CASAUBON, MERIC, son of preceding; accompanied his father to
England; held a church living under the Charleses; became professor of
Theology at Oxford, and edited his father's works (1599-1671).
CASCADE MOUNTAINS, a range in Columbia that slopes down toward the
Pacific from the Western Plateau, of which the Rocky Mountains form the
eastern boundary; they are nearly parallel with the coast, and above 100
m. inland.
CASERTA (35), a town in Italy, 20 m. from Naples, noted for a
magnificent palace, built after plans supplied by Vanvitelli, one of the
architects of St. Peter's at Rome.
CASHEL, a town in Tipperary, Ireland, 49 m. NE. of Cork; a bishop's
see, with a "Rock" 300 ft. high, occupied by interesting ruins; it was
formerly the seat of the kings of Munster.
CASHMERE or KASHMIR (2,543), a native Indian State, bordering
upon Tibet, 120 m. long and 80 m. wide, with beautiful scenery and a
delicious climate, in a valley of the Himalayas, forming the basin of the
Upper Indus, hemmed in by deep-gorged woods and snow-peaked mountains,
and watered by the Jhelum, which spreads out here and there near it into
lovely lakes; shawl weaving and lacquer-work are the chief occupations of
the inhabitants.
CASIMIR, the name of five kings of Poland; the most eminent, Casimir
III., called the Great, after distinguishing himself in wars against the
Teutonic Knights, was elected king in 1333; recovered Silesia from
Bohemia in two victories; defeated the Tartars on the Vistula, and
annexed part of Lithuania; formed a code of laws, limiting both the royal
authority and that of the nobles (1309-1370).
CASIMIR-PERIER, president of the French Republic, born in Paris; a
man of moderate views and firm character; was premier in 1893; succeeded
Carnot in 1894; resigned 1895, because, owing to misrepresentation, the
office had become irksome to him; _b_. 1847.
CASINO, a club-house or public building in Continental towns
provided with rooms for social gatherings, music, dancing, billiards, &c.
CASIRI, a Syro-Maronite religious, and a learned Orientalist
(1710-1791).
CASPARI, KARL PAUL, German theologian, born at Dessau; professor at
Christiania (1814-1892).
CASPIAN SEA, an inland sea, partly in Europe and partly in Asia, the
largest in the world, being 600 m. from N. to S. and from 270 to 130 m.
in breadth, with the Caucasus Mts. on the W. and the Elburz on the S., is
the fragment of a larger sea which extended to the Arctic Ocean; shallow
in the N., deep in the S.; the waters, which are not so salt as the
ocean, abound in fish, especially salmon and sturgeon.
CASS, LEWIS, an eminent American statesman, a member of the
Democratic party, and openly hostile to Great Britain; though in favour
of slave-holding, a friend of Union; wrote a "History of the U.S.
Indians" (1782-1867).
CASSAGNAC, GRANIER DE, a French journalist; at first an Orleanist,
became a supporter of the Empire; started several journals, which all
died a natural death; edited _Le Pays_, a semi-official organ; embroiled
himself in duels and lawsuits without number (1806-1880).
CASSAGNAC, PAUL, son of preceding; editor of _Le Pays_ and the
journal _L'Autorite_; an obstinate Imperialist; _b_. 1843.
CASSANDER, king of Macedonia, passed over in the succession by his
father Antipater; allied himself with the Greek cities; invaded Macedonia
and ascended the throne; married Thessalonica, the sister of Alexander
the Great, but put Alexander's mother to death, thus securing himself
against all rival claimants; left his son Philip as successor
(354-297 B.C.).
CASSANDRA, a beautiful Trojan princess, daughter of Priam and
Hecuba, whom Apollo endowed with the gift of prophecy, but, as she had
rejected his suit, doomed to utter prophecies which no one would believe,
as happened with her warnings of the fate and the fall of Troy, which
were treated by her countrymen as the ravings of a lunatic; her name is
applied to any one who entertains gloomy forebodings.
CASSANO, a town in the S. of Italy; also a town near Milan, scene of
a French victory under Vendome in 1705, and a French defeat under Moreau
in 1799.
CASSATION, COURT OF, a court of highest and last appeal in France,
appointed in the case of appeal to revise the forms of a procedure in an
inferior court; it consists of a president and vice-president, 49 judges,
a public prosecutor called the _procureur-general_, and six
advocates-general; it consists of three sections: first, one to determine
if the appeal should be received; second, one to decide in civil cases;
and third, one to decide in criminal cases.
CASSEL (72), capital of Hesse-Cassel, an interesting town, 120 m.
from Frankfort-on-Main; it is the birthplace of Bunsen.
CASSELL, JOHN, the publisher, born in Manchester; a self-made man,
who knew the value of knowledge and did much to extend it (1817-1865).
CASSIANUS, JOANNUS, an Eastern ascetic; came to Constantinople, and
became a pupil of Chrysostom, who ordained him; founded two monasteries
in Marseilles; opposed the extreme views of Augustine in regard to grace
and free-will, and human depravity; and not being able to go the length
of Pelaganism, adopted SEMI-PELAGIANISM, q. v. (360-448).
CASSINI, name of a family of astronomers of the 17th and 18th
centuries, of Italian origin; distinguished for their observations and
discoveries affecting the comets, the planets, and the moon; they
settled, father and son and grandson, in Paris, and became in succession
directors of the observatory of Paris, the last of whom died in 1864,
after completing in 1793 a great topographical map of France begun by his
father.
CASSIODO`RUS, a Latin statesman and historian, born in Calabria;
prime minister of Theodoric the Great and his successor; retired into a
monastery about 70, and lived there nearly 30 years; wrote a history of
the Goths, and left letters of great historical value (468-568).
CASSIOPE`IA, queen of Ethiopia, mother of Andromeda, placed after
death among the constellations; a constellation well north in the
northern sky of five stars in the figure of a W.
CASSIQUIA`RI, a remarkable river in Venezuela, which, like a canal,
connects the Rio Negro, an affluent of the Amazon, with the Orinoco.
CASSITER`IDES, islands in the Atlantic, which the Phoenician sailors
visited to procure tin; presumed to have been the Scilly Islands or
Cornwall, which they adjoin.
CASSIUS, CAIUS, chief conspirator against Caesar; won over Brutus to
join in the foul plot; soon after the deed was done fled to Syria, made
himself master of it; joined his forces with those of Brutus at Philippi;
repulsed on the right, thought all was lost; withdrew into his tent, and
called his freedmen to kill him; Brutus, in his lamentation over him,
called him the "last of the Romans"; _d_. 42 B.C.
CASSIUS, SPURIUS, a Roman, thrice chosen consul, first time 502
B.C.; subdued the Sabines, made a league with the Latins, promoted an
agrarian law, the first passed, which conceded to the plebs a share in
the public lands.
CASSIVELLAUNUS, a British warlike chief, who unsuccessfully opposed
Caesar on his second invasion of Britain, 52 B.C.; surrendered after
defeat, and became tributary to Rome.
CASTALIA, a fountain at the foot of Parnassus sacred to the Muses;
named after a nymph, who drowned herself in it to escape Apollo.
CASTANET, bishop of Albi; procured the canonisation of St. Louis
(1256-1317).
CASTANOS, a Spanish general; distinguished for his victory over the
French under Dupont, whom he compelled to surrender and sign the
capitulation of Baylen, in 1808; after this he served under Wellington in
several engagements, and was commander of the Spanish army, ready, if
required, to invade France in 1815 (1758-1852).
CASTE, rank in society of an exclusive nature due to birth or
origin, such as prevails among the Hindus especially. Among them there
are originally two great classes, the twice-born and the once-born, _i.
e_. those who have passed through a second birth, and those who have not;
of the former there are three grades, Brahmans, or the priestly caste,
from the mouth of Brahma; Kshatriyas, or the soldier caste, from the
hands of Brahma; and Vaisyas, or the agricultural caste, from the feet of
Brahma; while the latter are of one rank and are menial to the other,
called Sudras, earth-born all; notwithstanding which distinction often
members of the highest class sink socially to the lowest level, and
members of the lowest rise socially to the highest.
CASTEL, RENE-RICHARD, French poet and naturalist (1758-1832).
CASTELAR, EMILIO, a Spanish republican, born in Cadiz; an eloquent
man and a literary; appointed dictator of Spain in 1873, but not being
equal to the exigency in the affairs of the State, resigned, and made way
for the return of monarchy, though under protest; wrote a history of the
"Republican Movement in Europe" among other works of political interest;
_b_. 1832.
CASTELLAMARE (15), a port on the coast of Italy, 115 m. SE. of
Naples, the scene of Pliny's death from the eruption of Vesuvius in A.D.
79. It takes its name from a castle built on it by the Emperor Frederick
II.; has a cathedral, arsenal, and manufactures.
CASTELLIO, Protestant theologian, a protege of Calvin's for a time,
till he gave expression to some heretical views, which led to a rupture;
he ventured to pronounce the Song of Solomon a mere erotic poem
(1515-1563).
CASTIGLIONE, a town of Sicily, on N. slope of Etna, 35 m. SW. of
Messina; famed for hazel nuts.
CASTIGLIONE, COUNT, an accomplished Italian, born in Mantua; author
of "II Cortegiano," a manual for courtiers, called by the Italians in
admiration of it "The Golden Book"; had spent much of his time in courts
in England and Spain, as well as Rome, and was a courtly man (1478-1529).
CASTILE, a central district of Spain, divided by the mountains of
Castile into Old Castile (1,800) in the N., and New Castile (3,500) in
the S.: the former consisting of a high bare plateau, bounded by
mountains on the N. and on the S., with a variable climate, yields wheat
and good pasturage, and is rich in minerals; the latter, also tableland,
has a richer soil, and yields richer produce, breeds horses and cattle,
and contains besides the quicksilver mines of Almaden. Both were at one
time occupied by the Moors, and were created into a kingdom in the 11th
century, and united to the crown of Spain in 1469 by the marriage of
Ferdinand and Isabella.
CASTLE GARDEN, the immigration depot of New York where immigrants
land, report themselves, and are advised where to settle or find work.
CASTLE OF INDOLENCE, a poem of Thomson's, a place in which the
dwellers live amid luxurious delights, to the enervation of soul and
body.
CASTLEFORD (14), a town 10 m. SE. of Leeds, with extensive
glass-works, especially bottles.
CASTLEREAGH, LORD, entered political life as a member of the Irish
Parliament, co-operated with Pitt in securing the Union, after which he
entered the Imperial Parliament, became War Minister (1805), till the
ill-fated Walcheren expedition and a duel with Canning obliged him to
resign; became Foreign Secretary in 1812, and the soul of the coalition
against Napoleon; represented the country in a congress after Napoleon's
fall; succeeded his father as Marquis of Londonderry in 1821, and
committed suicide the year following; his name has been unduly defamed,
and his services to the country as a diplomatist have been entirely
overlooked (1769-1822).
CASTLES IN SPAIN, visionary projects.
CASTLETOWN, a seaport in the Isle of Man, 11 m. SW. of Douglas, and
the former capital.
CASTLEWOOD, the heroine in Thackeray's "Esmond."
CASTOR AND POLLUX, the Dioscuri, the twin sons of Zeus by Leda;
great, the former in horsemanship, and the latter in boxing; famed for
their mutual affection, so that when the former was slain the latter
begged to be allowed to die with him, whereupon it was agreed they should
spend a day in Hades time about; were raised eventually to become stars
in the sky, the Gemini, twin signs in the zodiac, rising and setting
together; this name is also given to the electric phenomenon called
ST. ELMO'S FIRE (q. v.).
CASTREN, MATHIAS ALEXANDER, an eminent philologist, born in Finland,
professor of the Finnish Language and Literature in Helsingfors;
travelled all over Northern Europe and Asia, and left accounts of the
races he visited and their languages; translated the "KALEVALA"
(q. v.) the epic of the Finns; died prematurely, worn out with his
labours (1813-1852).
CASTRES (22), a town in the dep. of Tarn, 46 m. E. of Toulouse; was
a Roman station, and one of the first places in France to embrace
Calvinism.
CASTRO, GUILLEN DE, a Spanish dramatist, author of the play of "The
Cid," which gained him European fame; he began life as a soldier, got
acquainted with Lope de Vega, and took to dramatic composition
(1569-1631).
CASTRO, INEZ DE, a royal heiress of the Spanish throne in the 14th
century, the beloved wife of Don Pedro, heir of the Portuguese throne;
put to death out of jealousy of Spain by the latter's father, but on his
accession dug out of her grave, arrayed in her royal robes, and crowned
along with him, after which she was entombed again, and a magnificent
monument erected over her remains.
CASTRO, JUAN DE, a Portuguese soldier, born at Lisbon, distinguished
for his exploits in behalf of Portugal; made viceroy of the Portuguese
Indies, but died soon after in the arms of Francis Xavier (1500-1548).
CASTRO, VACA DE, a Spaniard, sent out by Charles V. as governor of
Peru, but addressing himself to the welfare of the natives rather than
the enrichment of Spain, was recalled, to pine and die in prison in 1558.
CASTROGIOVANNI (18), a town in a strong position in the heart of
Sicily, 3270 ft. above the sea-level; at one time a centre of the worship
of Ceres, and with a temple to her.
CASTRUCCIO-CASTRACANI, Duke of Lucca, and chief of the Ghibelline
party in that town, the greatest war-captain in Europe in his day; lord
of hundreds of strongholds; wore on a high occasion across his breast a
scroll, inscribed, "He is what God made him," and across his back
another, inscribed, "He shall be what God will make"; _d_. 1328, "crushed
before the moth."
CATACOMBS, originally underground quarries, afterwards used as
burial-places for the dead, found beneath Paris and in the neighbourhood
of Rome, as well as elsewhere; those around Rome, some 40 in number, are
the most famous, as having been used by the early Christians, not merely
for burial but for purposes of worship, and are rich In monuments of art
and memorials of history.
CATALANI, ANGELICA, a celebrated Italian singer and prima donna,
born near Ancona; began her career in Rome with such success that it led
to engagements over all the chief cities of Europe, the enthusiasm which
followed her reaching its climax when she came to England, where, on her
first visit, she stayed eight years; by the failure of an enterprise in
Paris she lost her fortune, but soon repaired it by revisiting the
capitals of Europe; died of cholera in Paris (1779-1840).
CATALONIA (1,900), old prov. of Spain, on the NE.; has a most
fertile soil, which yields a luxuriant vegetation; chief seat of
manufacture in the country, called hence the "Lancashire of Spain"; the
people are specially distinguished from other Spaniards for their
intelligence and energy.
CATAMAR`CA (ISO), NW. prov. of the Argentine Republic; rich in
minerals, especially copper.
CATA`NIA (123), an ancient city at the foot of Etna, to the S., on a
plain called the Granary of Sicily; has been several times devastated by
the eruptions of Etna, particularly in 1169, 1669, and 1693; manufactures
silk, linen, and articles of amber, &c., and exports sulphur, grain, and
fruits.
CATANZA`RO (20), a city in Calabria, 6 m. from the Gulf of
Squillace, with an old castle of Robert Guiscard.
CATEGORICAL IMPERATIVE, Kant's name for the self-derived moral law,
"universal and binding on every rational will, a commandment of the
autonomous, one and universal reason."
CATEGORIES are either classes under which all our Notions of things
may be grouped, or classes under which all our Thoughts of things may be
grouped; the former called Logical, we owe to Aristotle, and the latter
called Metaphysical, we owe to Kant. The Logical, so derived, that group
our notions, are ten in number: Substance or Being, Quantity, Quality,
Relation, Place, Time, Position, Possession, Action, Passion. The
Metaphysical, so derived, that group our thoughts, are twelve in number:
(1) as regards _quantity_, Totality, Plurality, Unity; (2) as regards
_quality_, Reality, Negation, Limitation; (3) as regards _relation_,
Substance, Accident, Cause and Effect, Action and Reaction; (4) as
regards _modality_, Possibility and Impossibility, Existence and
Nonexistence, Necessity and Contingency. John Stuart Mill resolves the
categories into five, Existence, Co-existence, Succession, Causation, and
Resemblance.
CATESBY, MARK, an English naturalist and traveller, wrote a natural
history of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahamas (1680-1750).
CATESBY, ROBERT, born in Northamptonshire, a Catholic of good birth;
concerned in the famous Gunpowder Plot; shot dead three days after its
discovery by officers sent to arrest him (1573-1605).
CATH`ARI, OR CATHARISTS, i. e. purists or puritans, a sect of
presumably Gnostic derivation, scattered here and there under different
names over the S. and W. of Europe during the Middle Ages, who held the
Manichaean doctrine of the radically sinful nature of the flesh, and the
necessity of mortifying all its desires and affections to attain purity
of soul.
CATHARINE, ST., OF ALEXANDRIA, a virgin who, in 307, suffered
martyrdom after torture on the wheel, which has since borne her name; is
represented in art as in a vision presented to Christ by His Mother as
her sole husband, who gives her a ring. Festival, Nov. 25.
CATHARINE I., wife of Peter the Great and empress of Russia,
daughter of a Livonian peasant; "a little stumpy body, very brown,...
strangely chased about from the bottom to the top of the world,... had
once been a kitchen wench"; married first to a Swedish dragoon, became
afterwards the mistress of Prince Menschikoff, and then of Peter the
Great, who eventually married her; succeeded him as empress, with
Menschikoff as minister; for a time ruled well, but in the end gave
herself up to dissipation, and died (1682-1727).
CATHARINE II. THE GREAT, empress of Russia, born at Stettin,
daughter of Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst; "a most-clever, clear-eyed,
stout-hearted woman"; became the wife of Peter III., a scandalous mortal,
who was dethroned and then murdered, leaving her empress; ruled well for
the country, and though her character was immoral and her reign despotic
and often cruel, her efforts at reform, the patronage she accorded to
literature, science, and philosophy, and her diplomatic successes,
entitle her to a high rank among the sovereigns of Russia; she reigned
from 1763 to 1796, and it was during the course of her reign, and under
the sanction of it, that Europe witnessed the three partitions of Poland
(1729-1796).
CATHARINE DE' MEDICI, daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici, wife of Henry
II. of France, and mother of his three successors; on the accession of
her second son, Charles IX.--for the reign of her first, Francis II., was
very brief--acted as regent during his minority; joined heart and soul
with the Catholics in persecuting the Huguenots, and persuaded her son to
issue the order which resulted in the massacre of St. Bartholomew; on his
death, which occurred soon after, she acted as regent during the minority
of her third son, Henry III., and lived to see both herself and him
detested by the whole French people, and this although she was during her
ascendency the patroness of the arts and of literature (1519-1589).
CATHARINE OF ARAGON, fourth daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of
Spain, and wife of Henry VIII., her brother-in-law as widow of Arthur,
from whom, and at whose instance, after 18 years of married life, and
after giving birth to five children, she was divorced on the plea that,
as she had been his brother's wife before, it was not lawful for him to
have her; after her divorce she remained in the country, led an austere
religious life, and died broken-hearted. The refusal of the Pope to
sanction this divorce led to the final rupture of the English Church from
the Church of Rome, and the emancipation of the nation from priestly
tyranny (1483-1536).
CATHARINE OF BRAGANZA, the wife of Charles II. of England, of the
royal house of Portugal; was unpopular in the country as a Catholic and
neglected by her husband, on whose death, however, she returned to
Portugal, and did the duties ably of regent for her brother Don Pedro
(1638-1705).
CATHARINE OF SIENNA, born at Sienna, a sister of the Order of St.
Dominic, and patron saint of the Order; celebrated for her ecstasies and
visions, and the marks which by favour of Christ she bore on her body of
His sufferings on the Cross (1347-1380). Festival, April 30. Besides her,
are other saints of the same name.
CATHARINE OF VALOIS, daughter of Charles VI. of France, and wife of
Henry V. of England, who, on his marriage to her, was declared heir to
the throne of France, with the result that their son was afterwards,
while but an infant, crowned king of both countries; becoming a widow,
she married Owen Tudor, a Welsh gentleman, whereby a grandson of his
succeeded to the English throne as Henry VII., and the first of the
Tudors (1401-1438).
CATHARINE PARR, the sixth wife of Henry VIII. and the daughter of a
Westmoreland knight; was of the Protestant faith and obnoxious to the
Catholic faction, who trumped up a charge against her of heresy and
treason, from which, however, she cleared herself to the satisfaction of
the king, over whom she retained her ascendency till his death; _d_.
1548.
CATHARINE THEOT, a religious fanatic, born in Avranches; gave
herself out as the Mother of God; appeared in Paris in 1794, and declared
Robespierre a second John the Baptist and forerunner of the Word; the
Committee of Public Safety had her arrested and guillotined.
CATHAY, the name given to China by mediaeval writers, which it still
bears in Central Asia.
CATHCART, EARL, a British general and diplomatist, born in
Renfrewshire; saw service in America and Flanders; distinguished himself
at the bombardment of Copenhagen; represented England at the court of
Russia and the Congress of Vienna (1755-1843).
CATHCART, SIR GEORGE, a lieutenant-general, son of the preceding;
enlisted in the army; served in the later Napoleonic wars; was present at
Quatre-Bras and Waterloo; was governor of the Cape; brought the Kaffir
war to a successful conclusion; served in the Crimea, and fell at
Inkerman (1794-1854).
CATHEDRAL, the principal church in a diocese, and which contains the
throne of the bishop as his seat of authority; is of a rank corresponding
to the dignity of the bishop; the governing body consists of the dean and
chapter.
CATHELINEAU, JACQUES, a famous leader of the Vendeans in their
revolt against the French Republic on account of a conscription in its
behalf; a peasant by birth; mortally wounded in attacking Nantes; he is
remembered by the peasants of La Vendee as the "Saint of Anjou"
(1759-1793).
CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION, the name given to the emancipation in 1829 of
the Roman Catholics of the United Kingdom from disabilities which
precluded their election to office in the State, so that they are
eligible now to any save the Lord Chancellorship of England and offices
representative of royalty.
CATHOLIC EPISTLES, the name, equivalent to encyclical, given to
certain epistles in the New Testament not addressed to any community in
particular, but to several, and given eventually to all not written by
St. Paul.
CATHOLIC MAJESTY, a title given by the Pope to several Spanish
monarchs for their zeal in the defence of the Catholic faith.
CATILINE, or LUCIUS SERGIUS CATILINA, a Roman patrician, an
able man, but unscrupulously ambitious; frustrated in his ambitious
designs, he formed a conspiracy against the State, which was discovered
and exposed by Cicero, a discovery which obliged him to leave the city;
he tried to stir up hostility outside; this too being discovered by
Cicero, an army was sent against him, when an engagement ensued, in
which, fighting desperately, he was slain, 62 B.C.
CATINAT, NICOLAS, a marshal of France, born in Paris; one of the
greatest military captains under Louis XIV.; defeated the Duke of Savoy
twice over, though defeated by Prince Eugene and compelled to retreat;
was an able diplomatist as well as military strategist (1637-1712).
CATLIN, GEORGE, a traveller among the North American Indians, and
author of an illustrated work on their life and manners; spent eight
years among them (1796-1872).
CATO DIONYSIUS, name of a book of maxims in verse, held in high
favour during the Middle Ages; of unknown authorship.
CATO, MARCUS PORTIUS, or CATO MAJOR, surnamed Censor, Priscus,
and Sapiens, born at Tusculum, of a good old family, and trained to
rustic, frugal life; after serving occasionally in the army, removed to
Rome; became in succession censor, aedile, praetor, and consul; served in
the second Punic war, towards the end of it, and subjugated Spain; was a
Roman of the old school; disliked and denounced all innovations, as
censor dealt sharply with them; sent on an embassy to Africa, was so
struck with the increasing power and the threateningly evil ascendency of
Carthage, that on his return he urged its demolition, and in every speech
which he delivered afterwards he ended with the words, _Ceterum censeo
Carthaginem esse delendam_, "But, be that as it may, my opinion is
Carthage must be destroyed" (234-149 B.C.).
CATO, MARCUS PORTIUS, or CATO THE YOUNGER, or UTICENSIS,
great-grandson of the former, and a somewhat pedantic second edition of
him; fortified himself by study of the Stoic philosophy; conceived a
distrust of the public men of the day, Caesar among the number; preferred
Pompey to him, and sided with him; after Pompey's defeat retired to
Utica, whence his surname, and stabbed himself to death rather than fall
into the hands of Caesar (95-46 B.C.).
CATO-STREET CONSPIRACY, an insignificant, abortive plot, headed by
one Thistlewood, to assassinate Castlereagh and other ministers of the
crown in 1820; so called from their place of meeting off the Edgeware
Road, London.
CATRAIL, an old Roman earthwork, 50 m. long, passing S. from near
Galashiels, through Selkirk and Roxburgh, or from the Cheviots; it is
known by the name of the "Devil's Dyke."
CATS, JACOB, a Dutch poet and statesman, venerated in Holland as
"Father Cats"; his works are written in a simple, natural style, and
abound in wise maxims; he did service as a statesman; twice visited
England as an envoy, and was knighted by Charles I. (1577-1660).
CATSKILL MOUNTAINS, a group of mountains, of steep ascent, and with
rocky summits, in New York State, W. of the Hudson, none of them
exceeding 4000 feet; celebrated as the scene of Rip Van Winkle's long
slumber; belong to the Appalachians.
CATTEGAT, an arm of the sea, 150 m. in length and 84 of greatest
width, between Sweden and Jutland; a highway into the Baltic, all but
blocked up with islands; is dangerous to shipping on account of the
storms that infest it at times.
CATTERMOLE, GEORGE, artist, born in Norfolk; illustrated Britton's
"English Cathedrals," "Waverley Novels," and the "Historical Annual" by
his brother; painted mostly in water-colour; his subjects chiefly from
English history (1800-1868).
CATTLE PLAGUE, or RINDERPEST, a disease which affects
ruminants, but especially bovine cattle; indigenous to the East, Russia,
Persia, India, and China, and imported into Britain only by contagion of
some kind; the most serious outbreaks were in 1865 and 1872.
CATULLUS, CAIUS VALERIUS, the great Latin lyric poet, born at
Verona, a man of wealth and good standing, being, it would seem, of the
equestrian order; associated with the best wits in Rome; fell in love
with Clodia, a patrician lady, who was the inspiration, both in peace and
war, of many of his effusions, and whom he addresses as Lesbia; the death
of a brother affected him deeply, and was the occasion of the production
of one of the most pathetic elegies ever penned; in the civic strife of
the time he sided with the senate, and opposed Caesar to the length of
directing against him a coarse lampoon (84-54 B.C.).
CAUCA, a river in Colombia, S. America, which falls into the
Magdalena after a northward course of 600 m.
CAUCASIA, a prov. of Russia, geographically divided into
Cis-Caucasia on the European side, and Trans-Caucasia on the Asiatic side
of the Caucasus, with an area about four times as large as England.
CAUCASIAN RACE, a name adopted by Blumenbach to denote the
Indo-European race, from the fine type of a skull of one of the race
found in Georgia.
CAUCASUS, an enormous mountain range, 750 m. in length, extending
from the Black Sea ESE. to the Caspian, in two parallel chains, with
tablelands between, bounded on the S. by the valley of the Kur, which
separates it from the tableland of Armenia; snow-line higher than that of
the Alps; has fewer and smaller glaciers; has no active volcanoes, though
abundant evidence of volcanic action.
CAUCHON, bishop of Beauvais, infamous for the iniquitous part he
played in the trial and condemnation of Joan of Arc; _d_. 1443.
CAUCHY, AUGUSTIN LOUIS, mathematician, born in Paris; wrote largely
on physical subjects; his "Memoir" on the theory of the waves suggested
the undulatory theory of light; professor of Astronomy at Paris; declined
to take the oath of allegiance to Napoleon III., and retired (1789-1857).
CAUCUS, a preliminary private meeting to arrange and agree on some
measure or course to propose at a general meeting of a political party.
CAUDINE FORKS, a narrow mountain gorge in Samnium, in which, during
the second Samnite war, a Roman army was entrapped and caught by the
Samnites, who obliged them to pass under the yoke in token of
subjugation, 321 B.C.
CAUDLE, MRS., an imaginary dame, a conception of Douglas Jerrold,
famous for her "Curtain Lectures" all through the night for 30 years to
her husband Mr. Job Caudle.
CAUL, a membrane covering the head of some children at birth, to
which a magical virtue was at one time ascribed, and which, on that
account, was rated high and sold often at a high price.
CAULAINCOURT, ARMAND DE, a French general and statesman of the
Empire, a faithful supporter of Napoleon, who conferred on him a peerage,
with the title of Duke of Vicenza, of which he was deprived at the
Restoration; represented Napoleon at the Congress of Chatillon
(1772-1827).
CAUS, SALOMON DE, a French engineer, born at Dieppe; discovered the
properties of steam as a motive force towards 1638; claimed by Arago as
the inventor of the steam-engine in consequence.
CAUSALITY, the philosophic name for the nature of the relation
between cause and effect, in regard to which there has been much
diversity of opinion among philosophers.
CAUTERETS, a fashionable watering-place in the dep. of the
Hautes-Pyrenees, 3250 ft. above the sea, with sulphurous springs of very
ancient repute, 25 in number, and of varying temperature.
CAVAIGNAC, LOUIS EUGENE, a distinguished French general, born in
Paris; appointed governor of Algeria in 1849, but recalled to be head of
the executive power in Paris same year; appointed dictator, suppressed
the insurrection in June, after the most obstinate and bloody struggle
the streets of Paris had witnessed since the first Revolution; stood
candidate for the Presidency, to which Louis Napoleon was elected; was
arrested after the _coup d'etat_, but soon released; never gave in his
adherence to the Empire (1802-1857).
CAVALCASELLE, GIOVANNI BATTISTA, Italian writer on art; joint-author
with J. A. Crowe of works on the "Early Flemish Painters" and the
"History of Painting in Italy"; chief of the art department under the
Minister of Public Instruction in Rome; _b_. 1820.
CAVALIER, JEAN, leader of the CAMISARDS (q. v.), born at
Ribaute, in the dep. of Gard; bred a baker; held his own against
Montreval and Villars; in 1704 concluded peace with the latter on
honourable terms; haughtily received by Louis XIV., passed over to
England; served against France, and died governor of Jersey (1679-1740).
CAVALIERS, the royalist partisans of Charles I. in England in
opposition to the parliamentary party, or the Roundheads, as they were
called.
CAVALLO, a distinguished Italian physicist, born at Naples
(1749-1809).
CAVAN (111), inland county S. of Ulster, Ireland, with a poor soil;
has minerals and mineral springs.
CAVE, EDWARD, a London bookseller, born in Warwickshire; projected
the Gentleman's Magazine, to which Dr. Johnson contributed; was the first
to give Johnson literary work, employing him as parliamentary reporter,
and Johnson was much attached to him; he died with his hand in Johnson's
(1691-1754).
CAVE, WILLIAM, an English divine; author of works on the Fathers of
the Church and on primitive Christianity, of high repute at one time
(1637-1713).
CAVENDISH, the surname of the Devonshire ducal family, traceable
back to the 14th century.
CAVENDISH, GEORGE, the biographer of Wolsey; never left him while he
lived, and never forgot him or the lesson of his life after he was dead;
this appears from the vivid picture he gives of him, though written 30
years after his death (1500-1561).
CAVENDISH, LORD FREDERICK, brother of the ninth Duke of Devonshire,
educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, and a Liberal; was made
Chief-Secretary for Ireland in 1882, but chancing to walk home one
evening through the Phoenix Park, he fell a victim, stabbed to the heart,
of a conspiracy that was aimed at Mr. Burke, an unpopular subordinate,
who was walking along with him, and came to the same fate. Eight months
after, 20 men were arrested as concerned in the murder, when one of the
20 informed; five of them were hanged; the informer Carey was afterwards
murdered, and his murderer, O'Donnel, hanged (1836-1882).
CAVENDISH, HENRY, natural philosopher and chemist, born at Nice, of
the Devonshire family; devoted his entire life to scientific
investigations; the first to analyse the air of the atmosphere, determine
the mean density of the earth, discover the composition of water, and
ascertain the properties of hydrogen; was an extremely shy, retiring man;
born rich and died rich, leaving over a million sterling (1731-1810).
CAVENDISH, SPENCER COMPTON, ninth Duke of Devonshire, for long known
in public life as Marquis of Hartington; also educated at Trinity
College, and a leader of the Liberal party; served under Gladstone till
he adopted Home Rule for Ireland, but joined Lord Salisbury in the
interest of Union, and one of the leaders of what is called the
Liberal-Unionist party; _b_. 1833.
CAVENDISH, THOMAS, an English navigator, fitted out three vessels to
cruise against the Spaniards; extended his cruise into the Pacific;
succeeded in taking valuable prizes, with which he landed in England,
after circumnavigating the globe; he set out on a second cruise, which
ended in disaster, and he died in the island of Ascension broken-hearted
(1555-1592).
CAVENDISH, WILLIAM, English courtier and cavalier in the reigns of
James I. and Charles I.; joined Charles II. in exile; returned at the
Restoration; was made Duke of Newcastle; wrote on horsemanship
(1592-1676).
CAVENDISH, WILLIAM, first Duke of Devonshire; friend and protector
of Lord William Russell; became a great favourite at court, and was
raised to the dukedom (1640-1707).
CAVIARE, the roe (the immature ovaries) of the common sturgeon and
other kindred fishes, caught chiefly in the Black and Caspian Seas, and
prepared and salted; deemed a great luxury by those who have acquired the
taste for it; largely imported from Astrakhan.
CAVOUR, COUNT CAMILLO BENSO DE, one of the greatest of modern
statesmen, born the younger son of a Piedmontese family at Turin; entered
the army, but was precluded from a military career by his liberal
opinions; retired, and for 16 years laboured as a private gentleman to
improve the social and economic condition of Piedmont; in 1847 he threw
himself into the great movement which resulted in the independence and
unification of Italy; for the next 14 years, as editor of _Il
Risorgimento_, member of the chamber of deputies, holder of various
portfolios in the government, and ultimately as prime minister of the
kingdom of Sardinia, he obtained a constitution and representative
government for his country, improved its fiscal and financial condition,
and raised it to a place of influence in Europe; he co-operated with the
allies in the Crimean war; negotiated with Napoleon III. for the
expulsion of the Austrians from Italy, and so precipitated the successful
war of 1859; he encouraged Garibaldi in the expedition of 1860, which
liberated Sicily and Southern Italy, and saw the parliament of 1861
summoned, and Victor Emmanuel declared king of Italy; but the strain of
his labours broke his health, and he died a few months later (1810-1861).
CAWNPORE (188), a city on the right bank of the Ganges, in the
North-Western Provinces of India, 40 m. SW. of Lucknow, and 628 NW. of
Calcutta; the scene of one of the most fearful atrocities, perpetrated by
Nana Sahib, in the Indian Mutiny in 1857.
CAXTON, WILLIAM, the first English printer, born in Kent, bred a
mercer, settled for a time in Bruges, learned the art of printing there,
where he printed a translation of the "Recuyell of the Historyes of
Troyes," and "The Game and Playe of Chesse"; returning to England, set up
a press in Westminster Abbey, and in 1477 issued "Dictes and Sayings of
the Philosophers," the first book printed in England, which was soon
followed by many others; he was a good linguist, as well as a devoted
workman (1422-1491).
CAYENNE (10), cap. and port of French Guiana, a swampy, unhealthy
place, rank with tropical vegetation; a French penal settlement since
1852.
CAYLA, COUNTESS OF, friend and confidante of Louis XVIII.
(1784-1850).
CAYLEY, ARTHUR, an eminent English mathematician, professor at
Cambridge, and president of the British Association in 1883 (1821-1895).
CAYLEY, CHARLES BAGOT, a linguist, translated Dante into the metre
of the original, with annotations, besides metrical versions of the
"Iliad," the "Prometheus" of AEschylus, the "Canzoniere" of Petrarch, &c.
(1823-1883).
CAYLUS, COUNT, a distinguished archaeologist, born in Paris; author
of a "Collection of Antiquities of Egypt, Etruria," &c., with excellent
engravings (1692-1765).
CAYLUS, MARQUISE DE, born in Poitou, related to Mme. de Maintenon;
left piquant souvenirs of the court of Louis XIV. and the house of St.
Cyr (1672-1729).
CAZALES, a member of French Constituent Assembly, a dragoon captain,
a fervid, eloquent orator of royalism, who "earned thereby," says
Carlyle, "the shadow of a name" (1758-1805).
CAZOTTE, author of the "Diable Amoureux"; victim as an enemy of the
French Revolution; spared for his daughter's sake for a time, but
guillotined at last; left her a "lock of his old grey hair" (1720-1792).
CEAN-BERMUDEZ, a Spanish writer on art; author of a biographical
dictionary of the principal artists of Spain (1749-1834).
CEARA (35), cap. of the prov. (900) of the name, in N. of Brazil.
CE`BES, a Greek philosopher, disciple and friend of Socrates,
reputed author of the "Pinax" or Tablet, a once popular book on the
secret of life, being an allegorical representation of the temptations
that beset it.
CECIL, ROBERT, EARL OF SALISBURY, succeeded his father, Lord
Burleigh, as first Minister under Elizabeth, and continued in office
under James I., whose friendship he sedulously cultivated before his
accession, and who created him earl (1565-1612). See BURLEIGH,
LORD.
CECILIA, ST., a Roman virgin and martyr, A.D. 230, patron saint of
music, especially church music, and reputed inventor of the organ;
sometimes represented as holding a small organ, with her head turned
heavenwards as if listening to the music of the spheres, and sometimes as
playing on an organ and with a heavenly expression of face. Festival,
Nov. 22.
CECROPS, the mythical first king and civiliser of Attica and founder
of Athens with its citadel, dedicated by him to Athena, whence the name
of the city.
CEDAR RAPIDS (25), a manufacturing town in Iowa, U.S.; a great
railway centre.
CELADON, poetical name for a languid swain, all sighs and longings.
CELAENO, name of one of the HARPIES (q. v.).
CELEBES (1,000), an island in the centre of the Eastern Archipelago,
third in size, in the shape of a body with four long limbs, traversed by
mountain chains, and the greater part of it a Dutch possession, though it
contains a number of small native states; it yields among its mineral
products gold, copper, tin, &c.; and among its vegetable, tea, coffee,
rice, sugar, pepper, &c.; capital. Macassar.
CELESTE, MME., a dancer, born in Paris; made her _debut_ in New
York; in great repute in England, and particularly in the States, where
she in her second visit realised L40,000 (1814-1882).
CELESTIAL EMPIRE, China, as ruled over by a dynasty appointed by
Heaven.
CELESTINE, the name of five Popes: C. I., Pope from 422 to 432; C.
II., Pope from 1143 to 1144; C. III., Pope from 1191 to 1198; C. IV.,
Pope for 18 days in 1241; C. V., Pope in 1294, a hermit for 60 years;
nearly 80 when elected against his wish; abdicated in five months;
imprisoned by order of Boniface VIII.; _d_. 1296; canonised 1313.
CELESTINES, an order of monks founded by Celestine V. before he was
elected Pope in 1354; they followed the rule of the Benedictine Order,
and led a contemplative life.
CELLINI, BENVENUTO, a celebrated engraver, sculptor, and goldsmith,
a most versatile and erratic genius, born at Florence; had to leave
Florence for a bloody fray he was involved in, and went to Rome; wrought
as a goldsmith there for 20 years, patronised by the nobles; killed the
Constable de Bourbon at the sack of the city, and for this received
plenary indulgence from the Pope; Francis I. attracted him to his court
and kept him in his service five years, after which he returned to
Florence and executed his famous bronze "Perseus with the Head of
Medusa," which occupied him four years; was a man of a quarrelsome
temper, which involved him in no end of scrapes with sword as well as
tongue; left an autobiography, from its self-dissection of the deepest
interest to all students of human nature (1500-1571).
CELSIUS, a distinguished Swedish astronomer, born at Upsala, and
professor of Astronomy there; inventor of the Centigrade thermometer
(1701-1744).
CELSUS, a celebrated Roman physician of the age of Augustus, and
perhaps later; famed as the author of "De Medicina," a work often
referred to, and valuable as one of the sources of our knowledge of the
medicine of the ancients.
CELSUS, a philosopher of the 2nd century, and notable as the first
assailant on philosophic grounds of the Christian religion, particularly
as regards the power it claims to deliver from the evil that is inherent
in human nature, inseparable from it, and implanted in it not by God, but
some inferior being remote from Him; the book in which he attacked
Christianity is no longer extant, only quotations from it scattered over
the pages of the defence of Origen in reply.
CELTIBE`RI, an ancient Spanish race occupying the centre of the
peninsula, sprung from a blending of the aborigines and the Celts, who
invaded the country; a brave race, divided into four tribes;
distinguished in war both as cavalry and infantry, and whom the Romans
had much trouble in subduing.
CELTS. The W. of Europe was in prehistoric times subjected to two
invasions of Aryan tribes, all of whom are now referred to as Celts. The
earlier invaders were Goidels or Gaels; they conquered the Ivernian and
Iberian peoples of ancient Gaul, Britain, and Ireland; their successors,
the Brythons or Britons pouring from the E., drove them to the
westernmost borders of these countries, and there compelled them to make
common cause with the surviving Iberians in resistance; in the eastern
parts of the conquered territories they formed the bulk of the
population, in the W. they were in a dominant minority; study of
languages in the British Isles leads to the conclusion that the Irish,
Manx, and Scottish Celts belonged chiefly to the earlier immigration,
while the Welsh and Cornish represent the latter; the true Celtic type is
tall, red or fair, and blue-eyed, while the short, swarthy type, so long
considered Celtic, is now held to represent the original Iberian races.
CENCI, THE, a Roman family celebrated for their crimes and
misfortunes as well as their wealth. FRANCESCO CENCI was twice
married, had had twelve children by his first wife, whom he treated
cruelly; after his second marriage cruelly treated the children of his
first wife, but conceived a criminal passion for the youngest of them, a
beautiful girl named BEATRICE, whom he outraged, upon which, being
unable to bring him to justice, she, along with her stepmother and a
brother, hired two assassins to murder him; the crime was found out, and
all three were beheaded (1599); this is the story on which Shelley
founded his tragedy, but it is now discredited.
CENIS, MONT, one of the Cottian Alps, over which Napoleon
constructed a pass 6884 ft. high in 1802-10, through which a tunnel 71/2 m.
long passes from Modane to Bardonneche, connecting France with Italy; the
construction of this tunnel cost L3,000,000, and Napoleon's pass a tenth
of the sum.
CENSORS, two magistrates of ancient Rome, who held office at first
for five years and then eighteen months, whose duty it was to keep a
register of the citizens, guard the public morals, collect the public
revenue, and superintend the public property.
CEN`TAURS, a savage race living between Pelion and Ossa, in
Thessaly, and conceived of at length by Pindar as half men and half
horses, treated as embodying the relation between the spiritual and the
animal in man and nature, in all of whom the animal prevails over the
spiritual except in Chiron, who therefore figures as the trainer of the
heroes of Greece; in the mythology they figure as the progeny of
Centaurus, son of IXION (q. v.) and the cloud, their mothers
being mares.
CENTRAL AMERICA (3,000), territory of fertile tableland sloping
gradually to both oceans, occupied chiefly by a number of small
republics, lying between Tehuantepec and Panama in N. America; it
includes the republics of Guatemala, Honduras, St. Salvador, Nicaragua,
and Costa Rica, and a few adjoining fractions of territory.
CENTRAL INDIA (10,000), includes a group of feudatory States lying
between Rajputana in the N. and Central Provinces in the S.
CENTRAL PROVINCES (12,944), States partly British and partly native,
occupying the N. of the Deccan, and lying between the Nerbudda and the
Godavary.
CEOS, one of the Cyclades, a small island 13 m. by 8 m., yields
fruits; was the birthplace of Simonides and Bacchylides.
CEPHALONIA (80), the largest of the Ionian Islands, 30 m. long, the
ancient Samos; yields grapes and olive oil.
CEPHALUS, king of Thessaly, who having involuntarily killed his wife
Procris, in despair put himself to death with the same weapon.
CERAM` (195), the largest of S. Moluccas; yields sago, which is
chiefly cultivated and largely exported.
CERBERUS, the three-headed or three-throated monster that guarded
the entrance to the nether world of Pluto, could be soothed by music, and
tempted by honey, only Hercules overcame him by sheer strength, dragging
him by neck and crop to the upper world.
CERES, the Latin name for DEMETER (q. v.); also the name of
one of the asteroids, the first discovered, by Piazzi, in 1801.
CERI`GO (14), an Ionian island, the southernmost, the ancient
Cythera; yields wine and fruits.
CERINTHUS, a heresiarch of the first century, whom, according to
tradition, St. John held in special detestation, presumably as denying
the Father and the Son.
CERRO DE PASCO, a town in Peru, 14,200 ft. above the sea-level, with
the richest silver mine in S. America.
CERUTTI, a Jesuit, born at Turin; became a Revolutionary in France;
pronounced the funeral oration at the grave of Mirabeau in 1789.
CERVANTES-SAAVEDRA, MIGUEL DE, the author of "Don Quixote," born at
Alcala de Henares; was distinguished in arms before he became
distinguished in letters; fought in the battle of Lepanto like a very
hero, and bore away with him as a "maimed soldier" marks of his share in
the struggle; sent on a risky embassy, was captured by pirates and
remained in their hands five years; was ransomed by his family at a cost
which beggared them, and it was only when his career as a soldier closed
that he took himself to literature; began as a dramatist before he
devoted himself to prose romance; wrote no fewer than 30 dramas; the
first part of the work which has immortalised his name appeared in 1605,
and the second in 1615; it took the world by storm, was translated into
all the languages of Europe, but the fortune which was extended to his
book did not extend to himself, for he died poor, some ten days before
his great contemporary, William Shakespeare; though carelessly written,
"Don Quixote" is one of the few books of all time, and is as fresh to-day
as when it was first written (1547-1616).
CERVIN, MONT, the French name for the Matterhorn, 705 ft., the
summit of the Pennine Alps, between Valais and Piedmont.
CESAREWITCH, the eldest son and heir of the Czar of Russia.
CE`SARI, GIUSEPPE, sometimes called ARPINO, an eminent Italian
painter; painted a series of frescoes in the Conservatorio of the
Capitol, illustrative of events in the history of Rome (1568-1640).
CESAROTTI, an Italian poet, translator of the "Iliad" and "Ossian"
into Italian (1730-1808).
CESTUS, a girdle worn by Greek and Roman women, specially the girdle
of Aphrodite, so emblazoned with symbols of the joys of love that no
susceptible soul could resist the power of it; it was borrowed by Hera to
captivate Zeus.
CETINJE, the capital of Montenegro, in a valley 2000 ft. high;
smallest of capital cities, with a population under 2000.
CETTE (36), a seaport, trading, and manufacturing town, on a tongue
of land between the lagoon of Thau and the Mediterranean, 23 m. SW. of
Montpellier, with a large safe harbourage.
CE`UTA (12), a port opposite Gibraltar belonging to Spain, on the
coast of Morocco, guarded by a fort on one of the Pillars of Hercules,
overlooking it; of importance as a military and convict station.
CEVENNES, a range of low mountains on the eastern edge of the
central plateau of France, separating the basin of the Rhone from those
of the Loire and Garonne; average height from 3000 to 4000 ft.; the chief
scene of the dragonnades against the Huguenots under Louis XIV.
CEYLON (3,008), a pear-shaped island about the size of Scotland,
separated from India, to which it geographically belongs, and SE. of
which it lies, by Palk Strait, 32 m. broad; comprises a lofty, central
tableland with numerous peaks, the highest Tallagalla, 8000 ft., and a
broad border of well-watered plains. It was an ancient centre of
civilisation; the soil is everywhere fertile; the climate is hot, but
more equitable than on the mainland; the chief products are tea,
cinnamon, and tobacco; the forests yield satin-wood, ebony, &c.; the
cocoa-nut palm abounds; there are extensive deposits of iron, anthracite,
and plumbago; precious stones, sapphires, rubies, amethysts, &c., are in
considerable quantities; the pearl fisheries are a valuable government
monopoly. The chief exports are tea, rice, cotton goods, and coals.
Two-thirds of the people are Singhalese and Buddhists, there are 6000
Europeans. The island is a crown colony, the largest in the British
Empire, administered by a governor with executive and legislative
councils; the capital and chief port is Colombo (127).
CHABAS, FRANCOIS, a French Egyptologist, born in Briancon; his works
have contributed much to elucidate the history of the invasion and
repulsion of the Hyksos in Egypt (1817-1882).
CHABOT, a member of the National Convention of France, a "disfrocked
Capuchin," adjured "Heaven," amid enthusiasm, "that at least they may
have done with kings"; guillotined (1759-1794).
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