The Nuttall Encyclopaedia
by
Edited by Rev. James Wood
Part 15 out of 53
Saxony, whom he accompanied in 1493 to the Holy Land; was engraver as
well as painter, skilled in portraiture as well as in historical scenes;
was intimately associated with the German reformers Luther and
Melanchthon, whose portraits he painted among others; the works of his
that remain are chiefly altar-pieces; his chief work is the "Crucifixion"
in Weimar, where he died (1472-1553).
CRANE, ICHABOD, a tall, lean, lank, Yankee schoolmaster in Irving's
"Legend of Sleepy Hollow."
CRANE, WALTER, poet and painter; has published various illustrated
books and poems illustrated by himself, and is an authority on decorative
art; _b_. 1845.
CRANMER, THOMAS, archbishop of Canterbury, born in Nottinghamshire;
educated at Jesus College, Cambridge; recommended himself to Henry VIII.
by favouring his divorce, writing in defence of it, and pleading for it
before the Pope, the latter in vain, as it proved; on his return was
elevated to the archbishopric, in which capacity he proved a zealous
promoter of the Reformation, by having the Bible translated and
circulated, and by the suppression of monasteries; pronounced sentence of
divorce of Catharine, and confirmed the king's marriage with Anne Boleyn;
by these and other compliances he kept the favour of Henry, but on the
accession of Mary he was committed to the Tower and persuaded to recant,
and even signed a recantation, but on being called to recant in public,
and refusing to do so, he was dragged to the stake, thrust his right hand
into the flames, and exclaimed, "Oh, this unworthy hand" (1489-1566).
CRANNOGE, a species of lake-dwelling and stronghold, of which
remains are found in Scotland and Ireland.
CRAPAUD, JEAN, a nickname of the Frenchmen.
CRASHAW, RICHARD, a minor poet, born in London; bred for the English
Church; went to Paris, where he became a Roman Catholic; fell into
pecuniary difficulties, but was befriended by Cowley and recommended to a
post; was an imitator of George Herbert, and his poems were of the same
class, but more fantastical; his principal poems were "Steps to the
Temple" and the "Delights of the Muses"; both Milton and Pope are
indebted to him (1616-1650).
CRASSUS, LUCIUS LICINIUS, the greatest Roman orator of his day,
became consul 55 B.C.; during his consulship a law was passed requiring
all but citizens to leave Rome, an edict which provoked the Social War
(140-91 B.C.).
CRASSUS, MARCUS LICINIUS, the triumvir with Pompey and Caesar; was
avaricious, and amassed great wealth; appointed to the province of Syria,
provoked out of cupidity war with the Parthians, in which he was
treacherously slain; Orodes, the king, cut off his head, and poured
melted gold into his mouth, saying as he did so, "Now sate thyself with
the metal of which thou wert so greedy when alive" (115-53 B.C.).
CRATES, a Greek cynic philosopher, disciple of Diogenes; 4th century
B.C.
CRATINUS, a Greek comic poet, born at Athens; limited the actors in
a piece to three, and the first to introduce into the drama attacks on
public men, wrote also satires on vice (519-424 B.C.).
CRATIPPUS, a Peripatetic philosopher of Mytilene, contemporary of
Pompey and Cicero; soothed the sunken spirit of the former after the
defeat at Pharsalia with the consolations of philosophy.
CRATYLUS, a dialogue of Plato's on the connection between language
and thought.
CRAWFORD, MARION, a novelist, born in Tuscany, of American origin,
son of the succeeding; spent a good deal of his early years in India, and
now lives partly in New York and partly in Italy; his works, which are
numerous, are chiefly novels, his first "Mr. Isaacs" (1882), original and
striking; an able writer, and a scholarly; _b_. 1854.
CRAWFORD, THOMAS, an American sculptor, studied at Rome under
Thorwaldsen; his "Orpheus in Search of Eurydice" brought him into notice,
and was followed by an array of works of eminent merit; died in London
from a tumour on the brain, after being struck with blindness
(1814-1857).
CRAWFORD AND BALCARRES, EARL OF, better known as Lord Lindsay, and
as the author of "Letters from the Holy Land," "Progression by
Antagonism," and "Sketches of the History of Christian Art"; died at
Florence, and was entombed at Dunecht, whence his body was abstracted and
found again in a wood near by after a seven months' search (1812-1880).
CRAYER, CASPAR DE, a celebrated Flemish painter, born at Antwerp;
pictures and altar-pieces by him are to be seen in Brussels and Ghent
(1582-1669).
CREAKLE, MR., a bullying schoolmaster in "David Copperfield."
CREASY, SIR EDWARD, chief-justice of Ceylon, author of "The Fifteen
Decisive Battles of the World," "Rise and Progress of the British
Constitution," &c. (1812-1878).
CREATIN, a substance found in the muscles of vertebrate animals, but
never in invertebrate.
CREBILLON, a French dramatist, born at Dijon, bred to the law,
devoted to literature and the composition of tragedies, of which he
produced several, mostly on classical subjects, such as "Atreus and
Thyestes," "Electra," of unequal merit, though at times of great power;
he ranked next Voltaire among the dramatists of the time (1674-1762).
CRECY, a French village, 12 m. NE. of Abbeville, where Edward III.,
with 30,000, defeated the French with 68,000, and destroyed the flower of
the chivalry of France, Aug. 26, 1346.
CREDIT FONCIER, a system of credit originating in France on the
security of land, whereby the loan is repayable so that principal and
interest are extinguished at the same time.
CREECH, WILLIAM, an Edinburgh bookseller, for 40 years the chief
publisher in the city; published the first Edinburgh edition of Burns's
poems (1745-1815).
CREEKS, a tribe of American Indians settled in Indian territory.
CREIGHTON, MANDELL, bishop of London, born at Carlisle; previously
bishop of Peterborough; has written on Simon de Montfort, on Wolsey, and
on the Tudors and the Reformation, but his great work is the "History of
the Papacy from the Great Schism to the Sack of Rome," a work of great
value; _b_. 1843.
CREMIEUX, a French advocate and politician, born at Nimes, of Jewish
birth; a member of the Provisional Government of 1848, and of the
National Defence in 1870; took a deep interest in the destiny of his race
(1796-1880).
CREMONA, old town on the Po, in Lombardy, 46 m. SE. of Milan;
interesting for its churches, with their paintings and frescoes; noted at
one time for the manufacture of violins.
CREMORNE (37), gardens in Chelsea; a popular place of amusement, now
closed.
CREOLE STATE, Louisiana, U.S.
CRESCENT CITY, New Orleans, U.S., as originally occupying a convex
bend of the Mississippi.
CRESCENTINI, a celebrated Italian soprano (1769-1846).
CRESCENTIUS, a patrician of Rome who, in the 10th century, sought to
destroy the imperial power and restore the republic; on this he was
defeated by Otho III., to whom he surrendered on promise of safety, but
who hanged and beheaded him; Stephano, his widow, avenged this treachery
by accepting Otho as her lover, and then poisoning him.
CRESPI, GIUSEPPE, an Italian painter; copied the works of Correggio,
Caracci, and other masters (1665-1747).
CRESWELL, SIR CRESWELL, judge, born in Newcastle; represented
Liverpool in Parliament; was raised to the bench by Peel, and, on the
establishment of the Divorce Court, was in 1858 named first judge
(1794-1863).
CRESWICK, THOMAS, an English landscape painter, born in Sheffield;
simple, pleasantly-suggestive, and faithfully-painted scenes from nature
were the subjects of his art; was employed a good deal in book
illustrations (1811-1869).
CRETE or CANDIA (295), a mountainous island in the
Mediterranean, 160 m. long and from 7 to 30 m. broad; in nominal
subjection to Turkey after 1669, it was in perpetual revolt. The rising
of 1895 led to the intervention of the great powers of Europe, and the
Turkish troops having been withdrawn in 1898 under pressure from Great
Britain, Russia, France, and Italy, Prince George of Greece was appointed
High Commissioner, ruling on behalf of these powers. Turkey still retains
the nominal suzerainty.
CRETINISM, a disease prevalent in valleys as those of the Alps,
characterised by mental imbecility, and associated with abnormal and
arrested physical development.
CREUSA, a wife of AEneas, fell behind her husband, lost her way in
escaping from Troy, and perished.
CREUSOT, LE (18), a town in the dep. Saone-et-Loire, near Autun,
which owes its importance to the large iron-works established there; is a
district rich in coal and iron.
CREUZER, a learned German philologist, born at Marburg; became
professor of Ancient History and Philology at Heidelberg; his chief work,
and one by which he is most widely known, "Symbolik und Mythologie der
Alten Voelker, besonders der Griechen," "Symbolism and Mythology of
Ancient Peoples, especially the Greeks"; left an autobiography
(1771-1858).
CREWE (29), a town in Cheshire, 43 m. SE. of Liverpool, a great
railway junction, and where the London and North-Western Railway Company
have their works.
CRICHTON, JAMES, surnamed The Admirable, a Scotchman of gentle, even
noble birth, educated at St. Andrews, had George Buchanan for tutor;
early developed the most extraordinary gifts of both body and mind;
travelled to Paris, Rome, Venice, Milan, and Mantua; astonished every one
by his strength and skill as an athlete, and his dexterity and agility in
debate; at Mantua he became tutor to the son of the Duke, when one night
he was attacked in the streets by a band of masked men, whom he overcame
by his skill, recognised his pupil among them, and presented to him his
sword, upon which, it is said, the young man immediately ran him through
with it (1560-1585).
CRIEFF (5), a town in Perthshire, at the foot of the Grampians, 18
m. W. of Perth, amid exquisite scenery; has a climate favourable for
invalids.
CRILLON, a French military captain, born at Mars, in Provence;
distinguished himself through five reigns, those of Henry II., Francis
II., Charles IX., Henry III., and Henry IV., of the last of whom he
became companion in arms, who designated him _Le brave des braves_, and
who wrote to him this famous note after the victory of Arques: "Where
were you, brave Crillon? we have conquered, and you were not there."
(1541-1615).
CRIMEA (250), a peninsula in the S. of Russia, almost surrounded by
the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, being connected with the mainland by
the narrow isthmus of Perekop; has a bold and precipitous coast 650 m. in
length; is barren in the N., but fertile and fruitful in the S.;
population chiefly Russians and Tartars.
CRIMEAN WAR, a war carried on chiefly in the Crimea, on the part of
Turkey aided by Britain and France, in which Sardinia eventually joined
them, against the encroachments of Russia in the E., and which was
proclaimed against Russia, March 24, 1854, and ended by the fall of
Sebastopol, September 8, 1855, the treaty of peace following having been
signed at Paris, March 1856.
CRINAN CANAL, a canal for vessels of light burden, 9 m. long, from
Loch Fyne, in Argyllshire, constructed to avoid sailing round the Mull of
Kintyre, thereby saving a distance of 115 m.
CRISPI, FRANCESCO, an Italian statesman, born in Sicily; co-operated
with Garibaldi in the Sicilian Revolution, and since active as a member
of the Government in the kingdom of Italy; _b_. 1819.
CRISPIN, the patron saint of shoemakers, of noble birth, who with
his brother had to flee from persecution in Rome to Gaul, where they
settled at Soissons; preached to the people and supported themselves by
shoemaking; they finally suffered martyrdom in 287. Festival, Oct. 25.
CRITIAS, a pupil of Socrates, who profited so little by his master's
teaching that he became the most conspicuous for his cruelty and rapacity
of all the thirty tyrants set up in Athens by the Spartans
(450-402 B.C.).
CRITON, a rich Athenian, friend and disciple of Socrates; supported
him by his fortune, but could not persuade him to leave the prison,
though he had procured the means of escape.
CROA`TIA AND SLAVONIA (2,201), a Hungarian crownland, lying between
the Drave and Save, tributaries of the Danube, and stretching westward to
the Adriatic. It is half as large as Ireland, wooded and mountainous,
with marshy districts along the river courses. The soil is fertile,
growing cereals, fibres, tobacco, and grapes; silkworms and bees are a
source of wealth; horses, cattle, and swine are raised in large numbers.
The province is poor in minerals, and lacks a harbour. The people are
Slavs, of Roman Catholic faith; backward in education, but showing signs
of progress.
CROCKETT, SAMUEL RUTHERFORD, novelist, born near New Galloway,
Kirkcudbright; bred for the Church, and for some time Free Church
minister at Penicuik, Midlothian, a charge he resigned in 1895, having
previously published a volume of sketches entitled "The Stickit
Minister," which was so received as to induce him to devote himself to
literature, as he has since done with more or less success; _b_. 1859.
CROESUS, the last of the kings of Lydia, in the 6th century B.C.;
celebrated for his wealth, so that his name became a synonym for a man
overwhelmed by the favours of fortune; being visited by Solon, he asked
him one day if he knew any one happier than he was, when the sage
answered, "No man can be counted happy till after death." Of the truth of
this Croesus had ere long experience; being condemned to death by Cyrus,
who had defeated him and condemned him to be burnt, and about to be led
to the burning pile, he called out thrice over the name of Solon; when
Cyrus, having learned the reason, moved with pity, ordered his release,
retained him among his counsellors, and commended him when dying to the
care of his son.
CROKER, JOHN WILSON, a politician and man of letters, born in
Galway, though of English descent; bred for the bar; wrote in advocacy of
Catholic emancipation; represented Downpatrick in Parliament; was in 1809
appointed Secretary to the Admiralty, a post he held for 20 years; was
one of the founders of the _Quarterly Review_, to which, it is said, he
contributed 200 articles; edited Boswell's "Life of Johnson" with Notes;
was an obstinate Tory, satirised by Disraeli and severely handled by
Macaulay; founded the Athenaeum Club (1780-1857).
CROKER, T. CROFTON, Irish folk-lorist, born in Cork; held a
well-paid clerkship in the Admiralty; collected and published stories,
legends, and traditions of the S. of Ireland; he wrote with a humour
which was heartily Irish; his most original work being "The Adventures of
Barney Mahoney"; he was a zealous antiquary; he was a brilliant
conversationalist (1798-1854).
CROLL, JAMES, a geologist, born near Coupar-Angus; contributed
materially to geology by his study of the connection between alterations
of climate and geological changes (1821-1890).
CROLY, GEORGE, a versatile author; designed for the Church; took to
literature, and wrote in all kinds, poetry, biography, and romance; his
best romance "Salathiel"; died rector of St. Stephen's, Walbrook
(1780-1860).
CROMARTY, a county in the N. of Scotland, consisting of ten
fragments scattered up and down Ross-shire; the county town, the
birthplace of Hugh Miller, being on the N. side of Cromarty Firth, which
opens eastward into the Moray Firth, and forms a large harbour 1 m. long
and 7 broad, protected at the mouth by two beetling rocks called Sutors,
one on each side, 400 and 463 ft. high.
CROME, JOHN, usually called Old Crome, a landscape-painter, born in
Norwich, of poor parents; began as a house-painter and then a
drawing-master; one of the founders of the Norwich Society of Artists;
took his subjects from his native county, and treated them with fidelity
to nature; his pictures have risen in value since his death (1768-1821).
CROMPTON, SAMUEL, inventor of the spinning-mule, born near Bolton;
for five years he worked at his project, and after he got it into shape
was tormented by people prying about him and trying to find out his
secret; at last a sum was raised by subscription to buy it, and he got
some L60 for it, by which others became wealthy, while he had to spend,
and end, his days in comparative poverty, all he had to subsist on being
a life annuity of L63 which some friends bought him (1753-1827).
CROMWELL, OLIVER, Lord-Protector of the commonwealth of England,
born at Huntingdon, the son of Robert Cromwell, the younger son of Sir
Henry Cromwell, and of Elizabeth Steward, descended from the royal family
of Scotland, their third child and second boy; educated at Huntingdon and
afterwards at Cambridge; left college at his father's death, and occupied
himself in the management of his paternal property; entered Parliament in
1629, and represented Cambridge in 1640, where to oppose the king he, by
commission in 1642 from Essex, raised a troop of horse, famous afterwards
as his "Ironsides"; with these he distinguished himself, first at Marston
Moor in 1644, and next year at Naseby; crushed the Scots at Preston in
1648, who had invaded the country in favour of the king, now in the hands
of the Parliament, and took Berwick; sat at trial of the king and signed
his death-warrant, 1649; sent that same year to subdue rebellion in
Ireland, he sternly yet humanely stamped it out; recalled from Ireland,
he set out for Scotland, which had risen up in favour of Charles II., and
totally defeated the Scots at Dunbar, Sept. 3, 1650, after which Charles
invaded England and the Royalists were finally beaten at Worcester, Sept.
3, 1651, upon which his attention was drawn to affairs of government;
taking up his residence at Hampton Court, his first step was to dissolve
the Rump, which he did by military authority in 1653; a new Parliament
was summoned, which also he was obliged to dismiss, after being declared
Lord-Protector; from this time he ruled mainly alone, and wherever his
power was exercised, beyond seas even, it was respected; at last his
cares and anxieties proved too much for him and wore him out, he fell ill
and died, Sept. 3, 1658, the anniversary of his two great victories at
Dunbar and Worcester; they buried him in Westminster, but his body was
dug up at the Restoration, hanged at Tyburn, and buried under the
gallows; such treatment his body was subjected to after he was gone, and
for long after he was no less ignobly treated by several succeeding
generations as a hypocrite, a fanatic, or a tyrant; but now, thanks to
Carlyle, he is come to be regarded as one of the best and wisest rulers
that ever sat on the English throne (1599-1658). See "Cromwell's Letters
and Speeches," edited by Carlyle.
CROMWELL, RICHARD, son of the Protector; appointed to succeed him;
was unequal to the task, and compelled to abdicate, April 26, 1659;
retired into private life; went after the Restoration for a time abroad;
returned under a feigned name, and lived and died at Cheshunt
(1626-1712).
CROMWELL, THOMAS, minister of Henry VIII., and _malleus monachorum_,
the "mauler of the monks," born at Putney; the son of a blacksmith; led a
life of adventure for eight or nine years on the Continent; settled in
England about the beginning of Henry's reign; came under notice of
Wolsey, whose confidant he became, and subordinate agent in suppressing
the smaller monasteries; on his master's fall rose into favour with Henry
by suggesting he should discard the supremacy of the Pope, and assume the
supremacy of the Church himself; attained, in consequence, the highest
rank and authority in the State, for the proposal was adopted, with the
result that the Crown remains the head of ecclesiastical authority in
England to this day; the authority he thus acquired he employed in so
high-handed a fashion that he lost the favour of both king and people,
till on a sudden he was arrested on charges of treason, was condemned to
death, and beheaded on Tower Hill (1485-1540).
CRONSTADT (42), the port of St. Petersburg, at the mouth of the
Neva; a strongly fortified place, and the greatest naval station in the
country; it is absolutely impregnable.
CROOKES, WILLIAM, an eminent chemist and physicist, born in London;
distinguished for researches in both capacities; discovered the metal
thallium, and invented the radiometer; _b_. 1832.
CROSS, MRS., George Eliot's married name.
CROSS, SOUTHERN, a bright constellation in the southern hemisphere,
consisting of four stars.
CROSS, VICTORIA, a naval and military decoration instituted in 1854;
awarded for eminent personal valour in the face of the enemy.
CROSS FELL, one of the Pennine range of mountains in the N. of
England, 2892 ft., on the top of which five counties meet.
CROSSE, ANDREW, electrician, born at Somersetshire; made several
discoveries in the application of electricity; he was a zealous
scientist, and apt to be over-zealous (1784-1855).
CROSSRAGUEL, an abbey, now in ruins, 2 m. SW. of Maybole, Ayrshire,
where John Knox held disputation with the abbot, and of which in his
"History of the Reformation" he gives a humorous account (1562).
CROTCH, WILLIAM, musical composer of precocious gifts, and writer in
music, born in Norwich; became, in 1797, professor of Music in Oxford,
and in 1822 Principal of the Royal Academy; his anthems are well known
(1775-1847).
CROTONA, an ancient large and flourishing Greek city, Magna Graecia,
in Italy; the residence of the philosopher Pythagoras and the athlete
Milo.
CROWE, EYRE EVANS, historian and miscellaneous writer, born in
Hants; editor of the _Daily News_; author of the "History of France" and
"Lives of Eminent Foreign Statesmen" (1799-1868).
CROWE, SIR JAMES ARCHER, writer on art and a journalist, born in
London, son of the preceding; is associated with Cavalcaselle in several
works on art and famous artists; _b_. 1825.
CROWNE, JOHN, playwright, born in Nova Scotia, a contemporary and
rival of Dryden; supplied the stage with plays for nearly 30 years
(1640-1705).
CROWTHER, SAMUEL ADJAI, bishop of the Niger Territory; an African by
birth; was captured to be sold as a slave, but released by an English
cruiser; baptized a Christian in 1825; joined the first Niger Expedition
in 1841; sent out as a missionary in 1843; appointed bishop in 1864, the
duties of which he discharged faithfully, zealously, and well
(1810-1891).
CROYDON (103), the largest town in Surrey, on the Wandle, 10 m. SW.
of London Bridge, and practically now a suburb of London.
CRUDEN, ALEXANDER, author of a "Complete Concordance of the Holy
Scriptures," with which alone his name is now associated; born in
Aberdeen; intended for the Church, but from unsteadiness of intellect
not qualified to enter it; was placed frequently in restraint; appears to
have been a good deal employed as a press corrector; gave himself out as
"Alexander the Corrector," commissioned to correct moral abuses
(1701-1770).
CRUIKSHANK, GEORGE, a richly gifted English artist, born in London,
of Scotch descent; the first exhibition of his talent was in the
illustration of books for children, but it was in the line of humorous
satire he chiefly distinguished himself; and he first found scope for his
gifts in this direction in the political squibs of William Hone, a
faculty he exercised at length over a wide area; the works illustrated by
him include, among hundreds of others, "Grimm's Stories," "Peter
Schlemihl," Scott's "Demonology," Dickens's "Oliver Twist," and
Ainsworth's "Jack Shepherd"; like Hogarth, he was a moralist as well as
an artist, and as a total abstainer he consecrated his art at length to
dramatise the fearful downward career of the drunkard; his greatest work,
done in oil, is in the National Gallery, the "Worship of Bacchus," which
is a vigorous protestation against this vice (1792-1878).
CRUSADES, THE, military expeditions, organised from the 11th century
to the 13th, under the banner of the Cross for the recovery of the Holy
Land from the hands of the Saracens, to the number of eight. _The First_
(1096-1099), preached by Peter the Hermit, and sanctioned by the Council
of Clermont (1095), consisted of two divisions: one, broken into two
hordes, under Peter the Hermit and Walter the Penniless respectively,
arrived decimated in Syria, and was cut to pieces at Nicaea by the sultan;
while the other, better equipped and more efficiently organised, laid
siege to and captured in succession Nicaea, Antioch, and Jerusalem, where
Godfrey of Bouillon was proclaimed king. _The Second_ (1147-1149),
preached by St. Bernard, consisting of two armies under Conrad III. of
Germany and Louis VII. of France, laid siege in a shattered state to
Damascus, and was compelled to raise the siege and return a mere remnant
to Europe. _The Third_ (1189-1193), preached by William, archbishop of
Tyre, and provoked by Saladin's capture of Jerusalem, of which one
division was headed by Barbarossa, who, after taking Iconium, was drowned
while bathing in the Orontes, and the other, headed by Philippe Augustus
and Richard Coeur de Lion, who jointly captured Acre and made peace with
Saladin. _The Fourth_ (1202-1204), under sanction of Pope Innocent III.,
and undertaken by Baldwin, count of Flanders, having got the length of
Venice, was preparing to start for Asia, when it was called aside to
Constantinople to restore the emperor to his throne, when, upon his death
immediately afterwards, the Crusaders elected Baldwin in his place,
pillaged the city, and left, having added it to the domain of the Pope.
_The Fifth_ (1217-1221), on the part of John of Brienne, king of
Jerusalem, and Andrew II., king of Hungary, who made a raid upon Egypt
against the Saracens there, but without any result. _The Sixth_
(1228-1229), under conduct of Frederick II. of Germany, as heir through
John of Brienne to the throne of Jerusalem, who made a treaty with the
sultan of Egypt, whereby the holy city, with the exception of the Mosque
of Omar, was made over to him as king of Jerusalem. _The Seventh_
(1248-1254), conducted by St. Louis in the fulfilment of a vow, in which
Louis was defeated and taken prisoner, and only recovered his liberty by
payment of a heavy ransom. _The Eighth_ (1270), also undertaken by St.
Louis, who lay dying at Tunis as the towns of Palestine fell one after
another into the hands of the Saracens. The Crusades terminated with the
fall of Ptolemais in 1291.
CRUSOE, ROBINSON, the hero of Defoe's fiction of the name, a
shipwrecked sailor who spent years on an uninhabited island, and is
credited with no end of original devices in providing for his wants. See
SELKIRK.
CSOMA DE KOeROeS, ALEXANDER, a Hungarian traveller and philologist,
born in Koeroes, Transylvania; in the hope of tracing the origin of the
Magyar race, set out for the East in 1820, and after much hardship by the
way arrived in Thibet, where, under great privations, though aided by the
English Government, he devoted himself to the study of the Thibetan
language; in 1831 settled in Calcutta, where he compiled his Thibetan
Grammar and Dictionary, and catalogued the Thibetan works in the library
of the Asiatic Society; died at Darjeeling just as he was setting out for
fresh discoveries (1784-1836).
CTESIAS, Greek physician and historian of Persia; was present with
Artaxerxes Mnemon at the battle of Cunaxa, 401 B.C., and stayed
afterwards at the Persian court, where he got the materials for his
history, of which only a few fragments are extant.
CTESIPHON, an Athenian who, having proposed that the city should
confer a crown of gold on Demosthenes, was accused by AEschines of
violating the law in so doing, but was acquitted after an eloquent
oration by Demosthenes in his defence.
CUBA (1,500), the largest of the West India Islands, 700 m. long and
from 27 m. to 290 m. in breadth; belonged to Spain, but is now under the
protection of the United States; is traversed from E. to W. by a range of
mountains wooded to the summit; abounds in forests--ebony, cedar,
mahogany, &c.; soil very fertile; exports sugar and tobacco; principal
town, Havana.
CUBBIT, SIR WILLIAM, an eminent English engineer, born in Norfolk;
more or less employed in most of the great engineering undertakings of
his time (1785-1861).
CUDWORTH, RALPH, an eminent English divine and philosopher, born in
Somerset; his chief work, a vast and discursive one, and to which he owes
his fame, "The True Intellectual System of the Universe," in which he
teaches a philosophy of the Platonic type, which ascribes more to the
abiding inner than the fugitive outer of things; he defends revealed
religion on grounds of reason against both the atheist and the
materialist; his candour and liberality exposed him to much
misconstruction, and on that account was deemed a latitudinarian. "He
stands high among our early philosophers for his style, which, if not
exactly elegant and never splendid, is solid and clear" (1617-1688).
CUENCA, a fine old city in Spain, 83 m. E. of Madrid; also a
high-lying city of Ecuador, over 100 m. S. of Quito, with a delightful
climate; both in provinces of the same name.
CUJAS, or CUJACIUS, a celebrated French jurist, born at
Toulouse; devoted to the study of Roman law in its historical
development, and the true founder of the Historical school in that
department (1522-1590).
CULDEES, fraternities of uncertain origin and character scattered up
and down Ireland, and especially Scotland, hardly at all in England, from
the 9th or 10th to the 14th century; instituted, as would appear, to keep
alive a religious spirit among themselves and disseminate it among their
neighbours, until on the establishment of monastic orders in the country
they ceased to have a separate existence and lost their individuality in
the new communities, as well as their original character; they appear to
have been originally, whatever they became at length, something like
those fraternities we find later on at Deventer, in Holland, with which
Thomas a Kempis was connected, only whereas the former sought to plant
Christianity, the latter sought to purify it. The name disappears after
1332, but traces of them are found at Dunkeld, St. Andrews, Brechin, and
elsewhere in Scotland; in Ireland they continued in Armagh to the
Reformation, and were resuscitated for a few years in the 17th century.
CULLEN, PAUL, Cardinal, Catholic primate of Ireland, born in
Kildare; was an extreme Ultramontanist; vigorously opposed all secret
societies in the country with revolutionary aims, as well as the system
of mixed education then in force (1803-1878).
CULLEN, WILLIAM, physician, born at Hamilton; studied in Glasgow;
held successively the chairs of Chemistry, the Institutes of Medicine,
and Medicine in Edinburgh University; author of several medical works;
did much to advance the science of medicine; the celebrated Dr. Black was
one of his pupils in chemistry (1710-1790).
CULLODEN, a moor, 5 m. NE. of Inverness, where the Duke of
Cumberland defeated Prince Charles in 1746, and finally wrecked the
Stuart cause in the country.
CULPEPER, NICHOLAS, a herbalist, born in London, who practised
medicine and associated therewith the art of the astrologer as well as
the faith of a Puritan; was a character and a phenomenon of his time
(1616-1654).
CULVERWEL, NATHANIEL, an English author, born in Middlesex; educated
at Cambridge, and one of the Platonist school there; wrote "Light of
Nature," "Spiritual Optics," "Worth of Souls," &c., works which evince
vigour of thinking as well as literary power (1633-1651).
CUMAE, a considerable maritime city of Campania, now in ruins;
alleged to be the earliest Greek settlement in Italy; famous as the
residence of the SIBYL (q. v.), and a place of luxurious resort
for wealthy Romans.
CUMBERLAND (250), a county in N. of England, of mountain and dale,
with good agricultural and pasture land, and a rich coal-field on the
coast, as well as other minerals in the interior.
CUMBERLAND, DR. RICHARD, bishop of Peterborough, born in London,
educated at Cambridge, wrote several works, the chief "An Inquiry into
the Laws of Nature," in reply to Hobbes, in which he elevates the
tendency to produce happiness into something like a moral principle;
wrought hard, lived to a great age, and is credited with the saying,
"Better wear out than rust out" (1631-1718).
CUMBERLAND, RICHARD, dramatist, great-grandson of the preceding; was
a prolific writer for the stage; the play "The West Indian," which
established his reputation, was his best (1732-1811).
CUMBERLAND, WILLIAM AUGUSTUS, DUKE OF, second son of George II., was
defeated at Fontenoy by the French in 1745; defeated the Pretender next
year at Culloden; earned the title of "The Butcher" by his cruelties
afterwards; was beaten in all his battles except this one (1721-1765).
CUMBRIA, a country of the Northern Britons which, in the 6th
century, extended from the Clyde to the Dee, in Cheshire.
CUMMING, GORDON, the African lion-hunter, of Celtic origin; served
for a time in the army; wrote an account of his hunting exploits in his
"Five Years of a Hunter's Life" (1820-1866).
CUMMING, JOHN, a Scotch clergyman, popular in London, born at
Fintray, in Aberdeenshire; of a highly combative turn, and rather
foolhardy in his interpretations of prophecy (1807-1881).
CUNARD, SIR SAMUEL, founder of Cunard Line of Steamships, born in
Halifax, Nova Scotia (1787-1865).
CUNAXA, a town in Babylonia, on the Euphrates, 60 m. N. of Babylon.
CUNCTATOR, a name given to Fabius Maximus on account of the
tantalising tactics he adopted to wear out his adversary Hannibal.
CUNE`IFORM, an epithet applied to the wedge-shaped characters in
which the Assyrian and other ancient monumental inscriptions are written.
CUNNINGHAM, ALLAN, poet and man of letters, born in the parish of
Keir, Dumfriesshire; bred to the mason craft, but devoted his leisure
hours to study and the composition of Scottish ballads, which, when
published, gained him the notice of Sir Walter Scott; in 1810 he went to
London, where he wrote for periodicals, and obtained employment as
assistant to Chantrey the sculptor, in which post he found leisure to
cultivate his literary proclivities, collating and editing tales and
songs, editing Burns with a Life, and writing the Lives of famous
artists, and died in London; "a pliant, _Naturmensch_," Carlyle found him
to be, "with no principles or _creed_ that he could see, but excellent
old _habits_ of character" (1784-1842).
CUNNINGHAM, PETER, son of the preceding, author of the "Life of
Drummond of Hawthornden," "Handbook of London," &c. (1816-1867).
CUNNINGHAM, WILLIAM, a Scotch divine, born in Hamilton, well read in
the Reformation and Puritan theology, a vigorous defender of Scottish
orthodoxy, and a stanch upholder of the independence of the Church of
State control; was a powerful debater, and a host in any controversy in
which he embarked (1805-1861).
CUPID, or AMOR, the god of love, viewed as a chubby little boy,
armed with bow and arrows, and often with eyes bandaged.
CUPID AND PSYCHE, an allegorical representation of the trials of the
soul on its way to the perfection of bliss, being an episode in the
"Golden Ass" of Apuleius. See PSYCHE.
CURACA`O (26), one of Antilles, in the West Indies, belonging to the
Dutch, 36 m. long by about 8 broad; yields, along with other West Indian
products, an orange from the peel of which a liqueur is made in Holland.
CURE OF MEUDON, Rabelais.
CURE`TES, priests of Cybele, in Crete, whose rites were celebrated
with clashing of cymbals.
CURETON, WILLIAM, Syriac scholar, born in Shropshire,
assistant-keeper of MSS. at the British Museum; applied himself to the
study and collation of Syriac MSS., and discovered, among other relics, a
version of the Epistle of Ignatius; was appointed canon of Westminster
(1808-1864).
CURIATII, three Alban brothers who fought with the three Horatii
Roman brothers, and were beaten, to the subjection of Alba to Rome.
CURLE, EDMUND, a London bookseller, notorious for the issue of
libellous and of obscene publications, and for prosecutions he was
subjected to in consequence (1675-1747).
CURLING, a Scottish game played between rival clubs, belonging
generally to different districts, by means of cheese-shaped stones hurled
along smooth ice, the rules of which are pretty much the same as those in
bowling.
CURRAN, JOHN PHILPOT, an Irish orator and wit, born in co. Cork;
became member of Parliament in 1784; though a Protestant, employed all
his eloquence to oppose the policy of the Government towards Ireland,
together with the Union; retired on the death of Pitt; was Master of the
Rolls for a time; was Irish to the core (1750-1817).
CURRIE, JAMES, a Liverpool physician, born in Kirkpatrick-Fleming,
Dumfriesshire; was the earliest biographer and editor of Burns, in 4
vols., a work he undertook for behoof of his widow and family, and which
realised L1400, involved no small labour, was done _con amore_, and done
well (1756-1805).
CURRIE, SIR PHILIP, her Majesty's ambassador at Constantinople since
1893; has been connected with the Foreign Office since 1854; had been
attache at St. Petersburg, and was secretary to Lord Salisbury; _b_.
1834.
CURTIS, GEORGE WILLIAM, an American writer, born in Rhode Island,
distinguished as contributor or editor in connection with several
American journals and magazines; _b_. 1824.
CURTIUS, a noble youth of Roman legend who leapt on horseback
full-armed into a chasm in the Forum, which the soothsayers declared
would not close unless at the sacrifice of what Rome held dearest, and
which he did, judging that the wealth of Rome lay in its citizens, and
tradition says the chasm thereupon immediately closed.
CURTIUS, ERNST, a German archaeologist and philosopher, born at
Luebeck; travelled in Greece and Asia Minor; contributed much by his
researches to the history of Greece, and of its legends and works of art;
his jubilee as a professor was celebrated in 1891, when he received the
congratulations of the Emperor William II., to whose father he at one
time had acted as tutor; _b_. 1814.
CURTIUS, GEORG, German philologist, born at Luebeck, brother of the
preceding; held professorial appointments in Prague, Kiel, and Berlin;
one of the best Greek scholars in Germany, and contributed largely to the
etymology and grammar of the Greek language (1820-1885).
CURTIUS, QUINTUS RUFUS, a Roman historian of uncertain date; wrote a
history of Alexander the Great in ten books, two of which have been lost,
the rest surviving in a very fragmentary state.
CURTMANTLE, a surname of Henry II., from a robe he wore shorter than
that of his predecessors.
CURULE CHAIR, a kind of ivory camp-stool, mounted on a chariot, on
which a Roman magistrate, if consul, praetor, censor, or chief edile, sat
as he was conveyed in state to the senate-house or some public function.
CURWEN, JOHN, an Independent clergyman, born in Yorkshire; the
founder of the Tonic Sol-fa system in music; from 1864 gave himself up to
the advocacy and advancement of his system (1816-1880).
CURZON, GEORGE NATHANIEL, LORD, English statesman, son of a
clergyman, educated at Eton and Oxford; became Fellow of All Souls;
became Under-Secretary for India in 1891; travelled in the East, and
wrote on Eastern topics, on which he became an authority; was appointed
Viceroy of India in 1899; _b_. 1859.
CUSHING, an American jurist and diplomatist (1800-1879).
CUSHMAN, CHARLOTTE, an American actress, born in Boston;
represented, among other characters, Lady Macbeth, Rosalind, Meg
Merilees, and Romeo (1810-1876).
CUSTINE, COUNT DE, a French general, born at Metz; seized and
occupied Mayence, 1792; was forced out of it by the Prussians and obliged
to retreat; was called to account and sent to the guillotine;
"unsuccessfulness," his crime; "had fought in America; was a proud, brave
man, and his fortune led him _hither_" (1746-1793)
CUeSTRIN, a strong little town, 68 or 70 m. E. of Berlin, where young
Frederick the Great was kept in close confinement by his father.
CUTCH, a native State in the Bombay Presidency, in the country
called Gujarat.
CUTCH, RANN OF, a salt-water morass between Gujarat and Scinde,
which becomes a lake during the SW. monsoon.
CUTHBERT, a monk of Jarrow, a disciple of Bede; was with him when he
died, and wrote in a letter a graphic and touching account of his death.
CUTHBERT, ST., born in Northumbria; originally a shepherd; saw a
vision in the night-watches of the soul of St. Aidan ascending to heaven,
which determined his destiny, and he became a monk; entered the monastery
of Melrose, and eventually became prior, but devoted most of his time to
mission-work in the surrounding districts; left Melrose to be prior of
Lindisfarne, but longing for an austerer life, he retired to, and led the
life of a hermit on, an island by himself; being persuaded to come back,
he acted as bishop of Lindisfarne, and continued to act as such for two
years, but his previous longings for solitude returned, and he went back
to a hermit life, to spend a short season, as it happened, in prayer and
meditation; when he died; what he did, and the memory of what he did,
left an imperishable impression for good in the whole N. of England and
the Scottish borders; his remains were conveyed to Lindisfarne, and ere
long to Durham (635-687).
CUTTACK (47), capital of a district in S. of Bengal, at the apex of
the delta formed by the Mahanuddy; noted for its gold and silver filigree
work.
CUVIER, GEORGES, a celebrated naturalist, born at Montebeliard, of
Huguenot ancestry; the creator of comparative anatomy and palaeontology;
was educated at Stuttgart, where he studied natural science; but the
observation of marine animals on the coast of Normandy, where he held a
tutorship, first led him to the systematic study of anatomy, and brought
him into correspondence with Geoffroy St. Hilaire and others, who invited
him to Paris, where he prosecuted his investigations, matured his views,
and became professor of Comparative Anatomy at the Jardin des Plantes, a
member of the French Institute, and Permanent Secretary of the Academy of
Sciences, and eventually a peer of France; his labours in the science to
which he devoted his life were immense, but he continued to the last a
determined opponent of the theory, then being broached and now in vogue,
of a common descent (1769-1832).
CUXHAVEN, a German watering-place at the mouth of the Elbe, on the
southern bank.
CUYP, ALBERT, a celebrated Dutch landscape-painter, son of Jacob
Cuyp, commonly called Old Cuyp, also a landscapist, born at Dort; painted
scenes from the banks of the Meuse and the Rhine; is now reckoned a rival
of Claude, though he was not so in his lifetime, his pictures selling now
for a high price; he has been praised for his sunlights, but these, along
with Claude's, have been pronounced depreciatively by Ruskin as
"colourless" (1605-1691).
CUZCO (20), a town in Peru, about 11,440 ft. above the sea-level,
the ancient capital of the Incas; still retains traces of its former
extent and greatness, the inhabitants reckoned as then numbering 200,000,
and the civilisation advanced.
CYBELE, a nature-goddess worshipped in Phrygia and W. Asia, whose
worship, like that of the nature divinities generally, was accompanied
with noisy, more or less licentious, revelry; identified by the Greeks
with RHEA (q. v.), their nature-goddess.
CYCLADES, islands belonging to Greece, on the East or the AEgean
Sea, so called as forming a circle round Delos, the most famous of the
group.
CYCLIC POETS, poets who after Homer's death caught the contagion of
his great poem and wrote continuations, additions, &c.
CYCLOPEAN WALLS, a name given to structures found in Greece, Asia
Minor, Italy, and Sicily, built of large masses of unhewn stone and
without cement, such as it is presumed a race of gigantic strength like
the Cyclops (3) must have reared.
CYCLOPS, a name given to three distinct classes of mythological
beings: (1) a set of one-eyed savage giants infesting the coasts of
Sicily and preying upon human flesh; (2) a set of Titans, also one-eyed,
belonging to the race of the gods, three in number, viz., Brontes,
Steropes, and Arges--three great elemental powers of nature, subjected by
and subject to Zeus; and (3) a people of Thrace, famed for their skill in
building.
CYMBELINE, a legendary British king, and the hero of Shakespeare's
romance play of the name.
CYNAEGIRUS, a brother of AEschylus; distinguished himself at Marathon;
is famed for his desperate attempt to seize a retreating ship.
CYNEWULF, a Saxon poet, flourished at the second half of the 8th
century; seems to have passed through two phases, first as a glad-hearted
child of nature, and then as a devout believer in Christ; at the former
stage wrote "Riddles" and "Ode to the West Wind," at the latter his
themes were the lives of Christ and certain Saints.
CYNICS, a sect of Greek philosophers, disciples of Antisthenes, who
was a disciple of Socrates, but carried away with him only part of
Socrates' teaching and enforced that as if it were the whole, dropped all
regard for humanity and the universal reason, and taught that "virtue lay
wholly in the avoidance of evil, and those desires and greeds that bind
us to enjoyments," so that his disciples were called the "Capuchins of
the Old World." These in time went further than their master, and
conceived a contempt for everything that was not self-derived; they
derived their name from the gymnasium in Athens, where their master
taught.
CYPRIAN, ST., one of the Fathers of the Church, born at Carthage,
about the year 200, converted to Christianity in 245; devoted himself
thereafter to the study of the Bible, with the help of Tertullian his
favourite author; became bishop of Carthage in 248; on the outbreak of
the Decian persecution had to flee for his life, ministering to his flock
the while by substitutes; on his return, after two years, he was involved
in the discussion about the reception of the lapsed; under the Valerian
persecution was banished; being recalled, he refused to sacrifice to the
gods, and suffered martyrdom in 258; he was a zealous bishop of the High
Church type, and the father of such, only on broader lines. Festival,
Sept. 16.
CYPRUS (21), a fertile, mountainous island in the Levant, capital
Nicosia (12); geographically connected with Asia, and the third largest
in the Mediterranean, being 140 m. long and 60 m. broad; government ceded
to Great Britain in 1878 by the Sultan, on condition of an annual
tribute; is a British colony under a colonial governor or High
Commissioner; is of considerable strategic importance to Britain; yields
cereals, wines, cotton, &c., and has 400 m. of good road, and a large
transit trade.
CYRENAICS, a sect of Greek philosophers, disciples of Aristippus,
who was a disciple of Socrates, but who broke away from his master by
divorcing virtue from happiness, and making "pleasure, moderated by
reason, the ultimate aim of life, and the supreme good."
CYRE`NE, a town and Greek colony in Africa, E. of Egypt, extensive
ruins of which still exist, and which was the capital of the State,
called Cyrenaica after it, and the birthland of several illustrious
Greeks.
CYRIL, ST., surnamed the PHILOSOPHER, along with his brother
Methodius, the "Apostle of the Slavs," born in Thessalonica; invented the
Slavonic alphabet, and, with his brother's help, translated the Bible
into the language of the Slavs; _d_. 868. Festival, March 9.
CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA, ST., born at Alexandria, and bishop there; an
ecclesiastic of a violent, militant order; persecuted the Novatians,
expelled the Jews from Alexandria, quarrelled with the governor, excited
a fanaticism which led to the seizure and shameful murder of Hypatia; had
a lifelong controversy with Nestorius, and got him condemned by the
Council of Ephesus, while he himself was condemned by the Council at
Antioch (608), and both cast into prison; after release lived at peace
(376-444). Festival, Jan. 28.
CYRIL OF JERUSALEM, ST., patriarch of Jerusalem, elected 351, and a
Father of the Greek Church; in the Arian controversy then raging was a
Semi-Arian, and was persecuted by the strict Arians; joined the Nicene
party at the Council of Constantinople in 381; was an instructor in
church doctrine to the common people by his catechisms (315-386).
Festival, March 18.
CYROPAEDIA, a work by Xenophon, being an idealistic account of the
"education of Cyrus the Great."
CYRUS, surnamed the GREAT, or the ELDER, the founder of
the Persian empire; began his conquests by overthrowing his grandfather
Astyages, king of the Medes; subdued Croesus, king of Lydia; laid siege
to Babylon and took it, and finished by being master of all Western Asia;
was a prince of great energy and generosity, and left the nations he
subjected and rendered tributary free in the observances of their
religions and the maintenance of their institutions; this is the story of
the historians, but it has since been considerably modified by study of
the ancient monuments (560-529 B.C.).
CYRUS, surnamed the YOUNGER, second son of Darius II.;
conspired against his brother Artaxerxes Mnemon, was sentenced to death,
pardoned, and restored to his satrapy in Asia Minor; conspired anew,
raised a large army, including Greek mercenaries, marched against his
brother, and was slain at Cunaxa, of which last enterprise and its fate
an account is given in the "Anabasis" of Xenophon; _d_. 401 B.C.
CYTHERA, the ancient name of Cerigo; had a magnificent temple to
Venus, who was hence called Cytheraea.
CZARTORYSKI, a Polish prince, born at Warsaw; passed his early years
in England; studied at Edinburgh University; fought under Kosciusko
against the Russians, and was for some time a hostage in Russia; gained
favour at the Court there, and even a high post in the State; in 1830
threw himself into the revolutionary movement, and devoted all his
energies to the service of his country, becoming head of the government;
on the suppression of the revolution his estates were confiscated; he
escaped to Paris, and spent his old age there, dying at 90 (1770-1861).
CZECHS, a branch of the Slavonic family that in the later half of
the 6th century settled in Bohemia; have a language of their own, spoken
also in Moravia and part of Hungary.
CZERNO`WITZ (54), the capital of the Austrian province of Bukowina,
on the Pruth.
CZERNY, CHARLES, a musical composer and pianist, born at Vienna;
had Liszt and Thalberg for pupils (1791-1857).
CZERNY, GEORGE, leader of the Servians in their insurrection against
the Turks; assisted by Russia carried all before him; when that help was
withdrawn the Turks gained the advantage, and he had to flee; returning
after the independence of Servia was secured, he was murdered at the
instigation of Prince Milosch (1766-1817).
D
DACCA (82), a city 150 m. NE. of Calcutta, on a branch of the
Brahmaputra, once the capital of Bengal, and a centre of Mohammedanism;
famous at one time for its muslins; the remains of its former grandeur
are found scattered up and down the environs and half buried in the
jungle; it is also the name of a district (2,420), well watered, both for
cultivation and commerce.
DACIA, a Roman province, N. of the Danube and S. of the Carpathians.
DACIER, ANDRE, a French scholar and critic, born at Castres, in
Languedoc; assisted by his wife, executed translations of various
classics, and produced an edition of them known as the "Delphin Edition"
(1651-1722).
DACIER, MADAME, distinguished Hellenist and Latinist, wife of the
preceding, born in Saumur (1651-1720).
DACOITS, gangs of semi-savage Indian brigands and robbers, often 40
or 50 in a gang.
DA COSTA, ISAAC, a Dutch poet, born at Amsterdam, of Jewish parents;
turned Christian, and after the death of Bilderdijk was chief poet of
Holland (1798-1860).
DAEDALUS, an architect and mechanician in the Greek mythology;
inventor and constructor of the Labyrinth of Crete, in which the Minotaur
was confined, and in which he was also imprisoned himself by order of
Minos, a confinement from which he escaped by means of wings fastened on
with wax; was regarded as the inventor of the mechanic arts.
DAGHESTAN (529), a Russian province W. of the Caspian Sea, traversed
by spurs of the Caucasus Mountains; chief town Derbend.
DAGO, a marshy Russian island, N. of the Gulf of Riga, near the
entrance of the Gulf of Finland.
DAGOBERT I., king of the Franks, son of Clotaire II., reformed the
laws of the Franks; was the last of the Merovingian kings who knew how to
rule with a firm hand; the sovereign power as it passed from his hands
was seized by the mayor of the palace; _d_. 638.
DAGON, the national god of the Philistines, represented as half-man,
sometimes half-woman, and half-fish; appears to have been a symbol to his
worshippers of the fertilising power of nature, familiar to them in the
fruitfulness of the sea.
DAGUERREOTYPE, a process named after its inventor, Louis Daguerre, a
Frenchman, of producing pictures by means of the camera on a surface
sensitive to light and shade, and interesting as the first step in
photography.
DAHL, a Norwegian landscape-painter, born at Bergen; died professor
of Painting at Dresden (1788-1857).
DAHLGREN, JOHN ADOLPH, a U.S. naval officer and commander; invented
a small heavy gun named after him; commanded the blockading squadron at
Charleston (1809-1870).
DAHLMANN, FRIEDRICH CHRISTOPH, a German historian and politician,
born at Wismar; was in favour of constitutional government; wrote a
"History of Denmark," "Histories of the French Revolution and of the
English Revolution"; left an unfinished "History of Frederick the Great"
(1785-1860).
DAHN, FELIX, a German jurist, historian, novelist, and poet, born in
Hamburg; a man of versatile ability and extensive learning; became
professor of German jurisprudence at Koenigsberg; _b_. 1834.
DAHNA DESERT, the central division of the Arabian Desert.
DAHOMEY (150), a negro kingdom of undefined limits, and under French
protectorate, in W. Africa, N. of the Slave Coast; the religious rites of
the natives are sanguinary, they offer human victims in sacrifice; is an
agricultural country, yields palm-oil and gold dust, and once a great
centre of the slave-trade.
DAIRI, the Mikado's palace or his court, and sometimes the Mikado
himself.
DAKO`TA, NORTH and SOUTH (400), three times as large as
England, forming two States of the American Union; consist of prairie
land, and extend N. from Nebraska as far as Canada, traversed by the
Missouri; yield cereals, especially wheat, and raise cattle.
DALAI-LAMA, chief priest of Lamaism, reverenced as a living
incarnation of deity, always present on earth in him. See LAMAISM.
DALAYRAC, celebrated French composer; author of a number of comic
operas (1753-1809).
DALBERG, BARON DE, an eminent member of a noble German family;
trained for the Church; was a prince-bishop; a highly cultured man, held
in high esteem in the Weimar Court circles, and a friend of Goethe and
Schiller; an ecclesiastic, as one might suppose, only in name
(1744-1817).
DALBERG, DUC DE, nephew of the preceding; contributed to political
changes in France in 1814, and accompanied Talleyrand to the Congress of
Vienna (1773-1833).
D'ALBRET, JEANNE, queen of Navarre, and mother of Henry IV. of
France; came to Paris to treat about the marriage of her son to Charles
IX.'s sister; died suddenly, not without suspicion of foul-play, after
signing the treaty; she was a Protestant (1528-1572).
D'ALEMBERT, a French philosopher, devoted to science, and especially
to mathematics; along with Diderot established the celebrated
"Encyclopedie," wrote the Preliminary Discourse, and contributed largely
to its columns, editing the mathematical portion of it; trained to quiet
and frugality, was indifferent to wealth and honour, and a very saint of
science; no earthly bribe could tear him away from his chosen path of
life (1717-1783).
DALGARNO, LORD, a heartless profligate in the "Fortunes of Nigel."
DALGETTY, DUGALD, a swaggering soldier of fortune in the "Legend of
Montrose," who let out his services to the highest bidder.
DALHOUSIE, JAMES ANDREW BROUN-RAMSAY, MARQUIS OF, Governor-General
of India, third son of the ninth Earl; as Lord Ramsay served in
Parliament as member for Haddingtonshire; on his father's death in 1838
entered the House of Lords; held office under Sir Robert Peel and Lord
Russell; went to India as Governor-General in 1848; ruled vigorously,
annexed territory, developed the resources of the country, projected and
carried out important measures for its welfare; his health, however, gave
way at the end of eight years, and he came home to receive the thanks of
the Parliament, elevation in the peerage, and other honours, but really
to end his days in pain and prostration; dying without male issue, he was
succeeded in the earldom by Fox Maule, Lord Panmure (1812-1860).
DALKEITH (7), a grain-market town in Midlothian, 6 m. SE. of
Edinburgh, with a palace adjoining, a seat of the Duke of Buccleuch.
DALLAS, GEORGE MIFFLIN, an American diplomatist, born in
Philadelphia; represented the United States as ambassador at St.
Petersburg and at London, and was from 1844 to 1849 Vice-President
(1792-1864).
DALMATIA (527), a crownland of Austria, lying along the NE. coast of
the Adriatic, and bounded on the land side by Croatia, Bosnia, and
Herzegovina; half the land is pasture, only one-ninth of it arable, which
yields cereals, wine, oil, honey, and fruit.
DALRI`ADS, a Celtic race who came over from Ireland to Argyllshire,
and established a kingdom in the SW. of Scotland, till King Kenneth
Macalpin succeeded in 843, who obtained rule both over it and the
northern kingdom of the Picts, and became the first king of Scotland.
DALRYMPLE, ALEXANDER, hydrographer to the Admiralty and the East
India Company, born at New Hailes, and brother of Lord Hailes; produced
many good maps (1737-1808).
DALTON, JOHN, chemist and physicist, born near Cockermouth, of a
Quaker family; took early an interest in meteorology, and kept through
life a record of meteorological observations; taught mathematics and
physics in Manchester; made his first appearance as an author in 1793 in
a volume of his observations and essays, and in 1808 published "A New
System of Chemical Philosophy," which he finished in 1810; famous for his
experiments on the elastic force of steam, for his researches on the
proportional weights of simple bodies, for his discovery of the atomic
theory, as also for his investigations on colour-blindness by
experimenting on himself and his brother, who along with himself was
colour-blind (1766-1844).
DALTONISM, COLOUR-BLINDNESS (q. v.). See DALTON, JOHN.
DALZIEL, THOMAS, general, born in Linlithgowshire; being hand-idle
at home, entered the Russian service against the Turks; returning at the
request of Charles II., was appointed commander-in-chief in Scotland;
suppressed a rising of the Covenanters at Pentland in 1666; never once
shaved his beard after the execution of Charles I. (1599-1685).
DAMAN, a Portuguese settlement with a port of the same name in
Gujarat, India, 100 m. N. of Bombay.
DAM`ARALAND, a territory on the W. coast of South Africa, N. of
Namaqualand; the chief industry is pastoral; the mountain districts,
which are rich in minerals, particularly copper, are inhabited by
Damaras, who are nomads and cattle-rearers; it is a German protectorate
since 1890.
DAMAS, COLONEL COMTE DE, a devoted adherent of Louis XVI., and one
of his convoys on his attempt at flight.
DAMASCUS (220), the capital of Syria, one of the oldest cities in
the world; stands 2260 ft. above the sea-level; is a great centre of the
caravan trade; is embosomed in the midst of gardens and orchards, hence
its appearance as the traveller approaches it is most striking; its
history goes as far back as the days of Abraham; it was the scene of two
great events in human destiny--the conversion of St. Paul, and, according
to Moslem tradition, a great decisive moment in the life of Mahomet, when
he resolutely turned his back once for all on the pleasures of the world.
DAMASUS, ST., Pope from 366 to 384, a Spaniard; a zealous opponent
of the Arians and a friend of St. Jerome, who, under his sanction,
executed his translation of the Bible into the Vulgate; there was a
Damasus II., Pope in 1048.
DAME AUX CAMELIAS, LA, a romance and a drama by Alexander Dumas
_fils_, one of his best creations.
DAMIEN, FATHER, a French priest, born at Louvain; devoted his life
to nurse and instruct the lepers in an island of the Hawaian group, and,
though after 12 years infected with the disease himself, continued to
minister to them till his death (1841-1889).
DAMIENS, ROBERT FRANCOIS, the would-be assassin of Louis XV., born
near Arras; aimed at the king as he was entering his carriage at Trianon,
but failed to wound him mortally; was mercilessly tortured to death; was
known before as _Robert le Diable_; his motive for the act was never
known (1715-1757).
DAMIETTA (36), a town, the third largest, in Egypt, on an eastern
branch of the Nile, 8 m. from its mouth; has a trade in grain, rice,
hides, fish, &c.; was taken by St. Louis in 1249, and restored on payment
of his ransom from captivity.
DAMOCLES, a flatterer at the court of the elder Dionysius, tyrant of
Syracuse, whom, after one day extravagantly extolling the happiness of
kings, Dionysius set down to a magnificent banquet, but who, when seated
at it, looked up and saw a sword hanging over his head suspended by a
single hair; a lesson this which admonished him, and led him to change
his views of the happiness of kings.
DAMON AND PYTHIAS, two Pythagoreans of Syracuse of the days of
Dionysius I., celebrated for their friendship; upon the latter having
been condemned to death, and having got leave to go home to arrange his
affairs beforehand, the former pledged his life for his return, when just
as, according to his promise, he presented himself at the place of
execution, Pythias turned up and prepared to put his head on the block;
this behaviour struck the tyrant with such admiration, that he not only
extended pardon to the offender, but took them both into his friendship.
DAMPIER, WILLIAM, an English navigator and buccaneer; led a roving
and adventurous life, and parting company with his comrades, set off on a
cruise in the South Seas; came home and published a "Voyage Round the
World"; this led to his employment in further adventures, in one of which
Alexander Selkirk accompanied him, but was wrecked on Juan Fernandez; in
his last adventure, it is said, he rescued Selkirk and brought him home
(1652-1715).
DANA, CHARLES ANDERSON, American journalist, member of BROOK
FARM (q. v.), and became editor of the _New York Tribune_, the
_Sun_, and a cyclopaedia: _b_. 1829.
DANA, JAMES DWIGHT, American mineralogist and geologist, born at
Utica, New York State; was associated as scientific observer with
Commodore Wilkes on his Arctic and Antarctic exploring expeditions, on
the results of which he reported; became geological professor in Yale
College; author of works on mineralogy and geology, as also on South Sea
volcanoes (1813-1895).
DANA, RICHARD HENRY, an American poet and critic; editor of the
_North American Review_, author of the "Dying Raven," the "Buccaneer,"
and other poems (1787-1879).
DANA, RICHARD HENRY, a son of the preceding, lawyer; author of "Two
Years before the Mast" (1815-1882).
DANAE, daughter of Acrisius, king of Argos, confined by her father
in an inaccessible tower of brass to prevent the fulfilment of an oracle
that she should be the mother of a son who would kill him, but Zeus found
access to her in the form of a shower of gold, and she became the mother
of Perseus, by whose hand Acrisius met his fate. See PERSEUS.
DANA`IDES, daughters of Danaues, who, for murdering their husbands on
the night after marriage, were doomed in the nether world to the
impossible task of filling with water a vessel pierced with holes. See
DANAUeS.
DANAUeS, son of Belus, and twin-brother of AEgyptus, whom fearing, he
fled from with his fifty daughters to Argos, where he was chosen king;
by-and-by the fifty sons of AEgyptus, his brother, came to Argos to woo,
and were wedded to, their cousins, whom their father provided each with a
dagger to murder her husband, which they did, all except Hypermnestra,
whose husband, Lynceus, escaping, succeeded her father as king, to the
defeat of the old man's purpose in the crime.
DANBY, FRANCIS, painter, born near Wexford; settled for a time in
Bristol, then in Switzerland, and finally at Exmouth; his works are
mostly landscape, instinct with feeling, but some of them are historical,
the subjects being taken from Scripture, as the "Passage of the Red Sea,"
or from pagan sources, as "Marius among the Ruins of Carthage"
(1793-1861).
DANCE, GEORGE, English architect; was architect to the City of
London, and designed the Mansion House, his chief work (1700-1768).
GEORGE, his son, built Newgate Prison (1740-1825).
DANCE OF DEATH, an allegorical representation in a dramatic or
pictorial form of Death, figuring, originally as a skeleton, and
performing his part as a chief actor all through the drama of life, and
often amid the gayest scenes of it; a succession of woodcuts by Holbein
in representation of this dance is well known.
DANCING MANIA, an epidemic of frequent occurrence, especially in
German towns, during the Middle Ages, of the nature of hysteria, showing
itself in convulsive movements beyond the control of the will, and in
delirious acts, sometimes violently suicidal; the most signal occurrence
of the mania was at Aix-la-Chapelle in July 1374.
DANCOURT, FLORENT CARTON, French dramatist, a prolific author; a
favourite of Louis XIV.; wrote comedies, chiefly on the follies of the
middle classes of the time (1661-1725).
DANDIE DINMONT, a humorous, jovial store-farmer in "Guy Mannering."
DANDIN, GEORGE, one of Moliere's comedies, illustrative of the folly
a man commits when he marries a woman of higher rank than his own, George
being his impersonation of a husband who has patiently to endure all the
extravagant whims and fancies of his dame of a wife.
DANDIN, PERRIN, a simple citizen in the "Pantagruel" of Rabelais,
who seats himself judge-wise on the first stump that offers, and passes
offhand a sentence in any matter of litigation; a character who figures
similarly in a comedy of Racine's, and in a fable of La Fontaine's.
DAN`DOLO, a Venetian family that furnished four Doges to the
Republic, ENRICO being the most illustrious; chosen Doge in his
eighty-fourth year, assisted the Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade with
ships; joined them, when blind and aged 90, in laying siege to
Constantinople; led the attack by sea, and was the first to leap ashore;
was offered the imperial crown, but declined it; died instead "despot" of
Roumania in 1205, at 97.
DANEGELT, originally a tax imposed on land to buy off the Danes from
the shores of England, and subsequently for other objects, such as the
defence of the coast; abolished by Henry II., though re-imposed
subsequently under other names.
DANELAGH, a district in the E. of England, N. of the Thames;
dominated at one time more or less by the Danes; of vague extent.
DANGEAU, MARQUIS, author of "Memoirs" affecting the court of Louis
XIV. and its manners (1638-1720).
D'ANGOULEME, DUCHESSE, daughter of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette;
was released from restraint after the execution of her parents in
exchange for prisoners in the Royalist's hands; fled to Vienna, where she
was driven forth; married her cousin, to whom she was early betrothed;
could find no place of safe refuge but in England; returned to France on
Napoleon's exile to Elba, and headed a body of troops against him on his
return; after Waterloo, returned to France and stayed till July 1830, and
lived to see Louis Philippe, in 1848, driven from the throne; Napoleon
called her "the only man of her family"; left "Memoirs" (1778-1851).
DANGS, THE, a forest district in the N. of the Presidency of Bombay,
occupied by fifteen wild tribes, each under a chief.
DANIEL, a Hebrew of fine physique and rare endowment, who was, while
but a youth, carried captive to Babylon, and trained for office in the
court of the king; was found, after three years' discipline, to excel "in
wisdom and understanding" all the magicians and enchanters of the realm,
of which he gave such proof that he rose step by step to the highest
official positions, first in the Babylonian and then in the Persian
empire. He was a Hebrew prophet of a new type, for whereas the old
prophet had, for the most part, more regard to the immediate present and
its outlooks, his eye reached forth into the future and foresaw in
vision, as his book has foretold in symbol, the fulfilment of the hope
for which the fathers of his race had lived and died.
DANIEL, SAMUEL, English poet, born near Taunton; wrote dramas and
sonnets; his principal production a "History of the Civil Wars" of York
and Lancaster, a poem in seven books; is called the "Well-Englished
Daniel," and is much admired for his style; in prose he wrote a "History
of England," and a "Defence of Rhyme," which Swinburne pronounces to be
"one of the most perfect examples of sound sense, of pure style, and of
just judgment in the literature of criticism"; he is associated with
Warner and Drayton as having given birth to "a poetry which has devoted
itself to extol the glory of England" (1562-1619).
DANIELL, JOHN FREDERICK, a distinguished chemist, born in London;
professor of Chemistry in King's College, London; wrote "Meteorological
Essays," and "Introduction to Chemical Philosophy"; invented a hygrometer
and an electric battery (1790-1845).
DANIELL, WILLIAM, an eminent draughtsman; spent his early life in
India; author of "Oriental Scenery," in six folio vols. (1769-1837).
DANITES, or Destroying Angels, a band of Mormons organised to
prevent the entrance into Mormon territory of other than Mormon
immigrants, but whose leader, for a massacre they perpetrated, was in
1827 convicted and shot.
DANNECKER, JOHANN HEINRICH VON, a distinguished German sculptor,
born near Stuttgart, and educated by the Duke of Wuertemberg, who had
become his patron; became professor of Sculpture in the Academy at
Stuttgart; his earlier subjects were from the Greek mythology, and his
later Christian, the principal of the latter being a colossal "Christ,"
which he took eight years to complete; he executed besides busts of
contemporaries, which are wonderful in expression, such as those of
Schiller, Lavater, and Glueck; "Ariadne on the Panther" is regarded as his
masterpiece (1758-1841).
DANTE ALIGHIERI, the great poet of Italy, "the voice of ten silent
centuries," born in Florence; was of noble birth; showed early a great
passion for learning; learned all that the schools and universities of
the time could teach him "better than most"; fought as a soldier; did
service as a citizen; at thirty-five filled the office of chief
magistrate of Florence; had, while but a boy of ten, "met a certain
Beatrice Portinari, a beautiful girl of his own age and rank, and had
grown up in partial sight of her, in some distant intercourse with her,"
who became to him the ideal of all that was pure and noble and good;
"made a great figure in his poem and a great figure in his life"; she
died in 1290; he married another, "not happily, far from happily; in some
civic Guelf-Ghibelline strife he was expelled the city, and his property
confiscated; tried hard to recover it, even 'with arms in his hand,' but
could not, and was doomed, 'whenever caught, to be burned alive'; invited
to confess his guilt and return, he sternly answered: 'If I cannot return
without calling myself guilty, I will never return.'" From this moment he
was without home in this world; and "the great soul of Dante, homeless on
earth, made its home more and more in that awful other world ... over
which, this time-world, with its Florences and banishments, flutters as
an unreal shadow." Dante's heart, long filled with this, brooding over it
in speechless thought and awe, bursts forth at length into "mystic
unfathomable song," and this, his "DIVINE COMEDY" (q. v.), the
most remarkable of all modern Books, is the result. He died after
finishing it, not yet very old, at the age of 56. He lies buried in his
death-city Ravenna, "shutout from my native shores." The Florentines
begged back his body in a century after; the Ravenna people would not
give it (1265-1321). See CARLYLE'S "HEROES AND HERO-WORSHIP," and
Dean Plumptre's "LIFE OF DANTE."
DANTON, GEORGES JACQUES, "The Titan of the Forlorn Hope" of the
French Revolution, born at Arcis-sur-Aube, "of good farmer people ... a
huge, brawny, black-browed man, with a waste energy as of a Hercules"; an
advocate by profession, "esurient, but with nothing to do; found Paris
and his country in revolt, rose to the front of the strife; resolved to
do or die"; the cause threatened, he threw himself again and again into
the breach defiant, his motto "to dare, and to dare, and again to dare,"
so as to put and keep the enemy in fear; "Let my name be blighted," he
said, "what am I? The cause alone is great, and will live and not
perish"; but the "SEA-GREEN" (q. v.) viewed him with jealousy,
held him suspect, had him arrested, brought before the Revolutionary
Tribunal, the severity of whose proceedings under him he had condemned,
and sentenced to the guillotine; a reflection of his in prison has been
recorded: "Oh, it were better to be a poor fisherman than to meddle with
governing of men." "No weakness, Danton," he said to himself on the
scaffold, as his heart began to sink within him as he thought of his
wife. His last words were to Samson the headsman: "Thou wilt show my head
to the people, it is worth showing"; words worthy of the brother of
Mirabeau, who died saying, "I wish I could leave my head behind me,
France needs it just now"; a man fiery-real, as has been said, genuine to
the core, with many sins, yet lacking that greatest of sins, cant. "He
was," says Mr. Belloc, "the most French, the most national, the nearest
to the mother of all the Revolutionary group. He summed up France ...
when we study him, we see France" (1759-1794). See CARLYLE'S "FRENCH
REVOLUTION."
DANTZIG (116), the capital of W. Prussia, once a Hanse town, on the
Vistula, 4 m. from the mouth; one of the great ports and trading centres
of Germany and in the N. of Europe; it is traversed by canals, and many
of the houses are built on piles of wood; exports grain brought down the
river on timber rafts from the great grain country in the S.; it is one
of the chief stations of the German navy.
DANUBE, THE, the great south-eastward-flowing river of Europe, 1750
m. in length, rises in the Black Forest, and is divided into Upper,
Middle, and Lower; the Upper extends as far as Pressburg, begins to be
navigable to Ulm, flows NE. as far as Ratisbon, and then bends SE. past
Vienna; the Middle extends from Pressburg to the Iron Gate, enclosing
between its gorges a series of rapids, below Orsova; and the Lower
extends from the Iron Gate to the Black Sea. It receives numerous
tributary rivers, 60 of them navigable, in its course; forms with them
the great water highway of the SE. of Europe, and is of avail for traffic
to all the races and nations whose territories it traverses; the
navigation of the river is free indeed to all nations.
DANUBIAN PRINCIPALITIES, Moldavia and Wallachia.
DANVILLE, the name of several towns in the United States.
D'ANVILLE, geographer to the king of France; left numerous valuable
maps and geographical works (1697-1782).
DAPHNE (lit. a laurel), a nymph chased by Apollo, transformed into
a laurel as he attempts to seize her; henceforth sacred to the god.
DAPHNIS, a Sicilian shepherd, the mythical inventor of pastoral
poetry.
DAPSANG, the highest of the Karakorum Mountains.
D'ARBLAY, MADAME, a distinguished novelist, daughter of Dr. Burney,
the historian of music; authoress of "Evelina" and "Cecilia," the first
novels of the time, which brought her into connection with all her
literary contemporaries, Johnson in chief; left "Diary and Letters"
(1752-1840).
DARBOY, GEORGES, archbishop of Paris: was a defender of the Gallican
liberties of the Church; had been assiduous in offices of benevolence
during the siege of Paris; was arrested as a hostage by the Communists,
and shot (1813-1871).
DARBY AND JOAN, a married couple celebrated for their mutual
attachment.
DARBYITES, the PLYMOUTH BRETHREN (q. v.), from the name of
one of their founders, a man of scholarly ability and culture, and the
chief expounder of their views (1800-1852).
DARDANELLES, a strait extending between the Archipelago and the Sea
of Marmora, anciently called the Hellespont, 40 m. long, from 1 to 4
broad; commanded by Turkey, both sides of the strait being strongly
fortified.
DARDANUS, a son of Zeus and Electra, mythical ancestor of the
Trojans; originally a king in Greece.
DARFUR (500), a district in the Egyptian Soudan, in which vegetation
is for the most part dormant all the year round, except from June to
September, when it is rank and rich; was snatched from Egypt by the
Mahdi, but is now restored.
D'ARGENS, MARQUIS, born at Aix; disinherited owing to his
misconduct; turned author, and became a protege of Frederick the Great,
but lost caste with him too, and was deprived of his all once more
(1704-1771).
D'ARGENSON, COMTE, an eminent French statesman, head of the police
in Paris; introduced _lettres de cachet_, and was a patron of the French
philosophes; had the "Encyclopedie" dedicated to him; fell out of favour
at Court, and had to leave Paris, but returned to die there (1696-1764).
DARIC, a gold coin current in ancient Persia, stamped with an archer
kneeling, and weighing little over a sovereign.
DARIEN, GULF OF, an inlet of the Caribbean Sea, NW. of S. America.
For isthmus of, see PANAMA.
DARIEN SCHEME, a project to plant a colony on the Atlantic side of
the Isthmus, which was so far carried out that some 1200 left Scotland in
1698 to establish it, but which ended in disaster, and created among the
Scotch, who were the chief sufferers, an animus against the English, whom
they blamed for the disaster, an animus which did not for long die out.
DARIUS I., eldest son of Hystaspes, king of the Persians; subdued
subject places that had revolted, reorganised the empire, carried his
conquests as far as India, subdued Thrace and Macedonia, declared war
against the Athenians; in 492 B.C. sent an expedition against Greece,
which was wrecked in a storm off Athos; sent a second, which succeeded in
crossing over, but was defeated in a famous battle at Marathon, 490 B.C.
DARIUS II., called OCHUS or NOTHUS, king of the Persians;
subject to his eunuchs and his wife Parysatis; his reign was a succession
of insurrections; he supported the Spartans against the Athenians, to the
ascendency of the former in the Peloponnesus; _d_. 405 B.C.
DARIUS III., surnamed CODOMANNUS, king of the Persians, a
handsome man and a virtuous; could not cope with Alexander of Macedon,
but was defeated by him in successive engagements at Granicus, Issus, and
Arbela; was assassinated on his flight by BESSUS (q. v.), one of
his satraps, in 330 B.C.; with him the Persian empire came to an end.
DARJEELING (14), a sanitary station and health resort in the Lower
Himalayas, and the administrative head-quarters of the district, 7167 ft.
above the level of the sea; it has greatly increased of late years.
DARLEY, GEORGE, poet and critic, born in Dublin; author of "Sylvia"
and "Nepenthe"; wrote some good songs, among them "I've been Roaming,"
once very popular; much belauded by Coleridge; contributed to the
_Athenaeum_ (1795-1846).
DARLING, a tributary of the Murray River, in Australia, now
stagnant, now flooded.
DARLING, GRACE, a young maiden, daughter of the lighthouse keeper of
one of the Farne Islands, who with her father, amid great peril, saved
the lives of nine people from the wreck of the _Forfarshire_, on Sept. 7,
1838; died of consumption (1815-1842).
DARLINGTON (38), a town in S. of Durham, on the Tees, with large
iron and other works; a considerable number of the inhabitants belong to
the Society of Friends.
DARMESTETER, JAMES, Orientalist, born in Lorraine, of Jewish
descent; a distinguished Zend scholar and authority in Zend literature;
in the interpretation of the Zend and other ancient literatures was of
the modern critical school (1849-1894).
DARMSTADT (55), the capital of the grand-duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt,
on the Darm, an affluent of the Rhine, 15 m. S. of Frankfort; is divided
into an old and a new town; manufactures tobacco, paper, carpets,
chemicals, &c.
DARNLEY, HENRY STUART, LORD, eldest son of the Earl of Lennox and
grand-nephew of Henry VIII.; husband of Queen Mary; was murdered on Feb.
5, 1567, in Kirk-o'-Field, which stood on the site of the present
University of Edinburgh.
DARTMOOR, moor in Devonshire, a tableland of an average height of
1200 ft. above the sea-level, and of upwards of 120,000 acres in extent,
incapable of cultivation, but affording pasturage for sheep, of which it
breeds a small hardy race; it has rich veins of minerals; abounds in
British remains, and contains a large convict prison.
DARU, COMTE, a French administrator and litterateur, born at
Montpellier; translated Horace when in prison during the Reign of Terror;
served as administrator under Napoleon; on the return of the Bourbons
devoted himself to letters, and wrote the "History of the Republic of
Venice" (1767-1829).
DARWIN, CHARLES ROBERT, great English naturalist and biologist, born
at Shrewsbury, grandson of Erasmus Darwin on his father's side, and of
Josiah Wedgwood on his mother's; studied at Edinburgh and Cambridge; in
1831 accompanied as naturalist without salary the _Beagle_ in her voyage
of exploration in the Southern Seas, on the condition that he should have
the entire disposal of his collections, all of which he got, and which he
ultimately distributed among various public institutions; he was absent
from England for five years, and on his return published in 1836 his
"Naturalist's Voyage Round the World," in 1839-43 accounts of the fruits
of his researches and observations in the departments of geology and
natural history during that voyage, in 1842 his treatise on the
"Structure and Distribution of Coral Reefs," and in 1859 his work on the
"Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection," a work which has
proved epoch-making and gone far to revolutionise thought in the
scientific study of, especially, animated nature, and is being applied to
higher spheres of being; this work was followed by others more or less
confirmatory, finishing off with "The Descent of Man" in 1871, in which
he traces the human race to an extinct quadrumanous animal related to
that which produced the orang-outang, the chimpanzee, and the gorilla. He
may be said to have taken evolution out of the region of pure
imagination, and by giving it a basis of fact, to have set it up as a
reasonable working hypothesis. Prof. A. R. Wallace claims for Darwin
"that he is the Newton of natural history, and has ... by his discovery
of the law of natural selection and his demonstration of the great
principles of the preservation of useful variations in the struggle for
life, not only thrown a flood of light on the process of development of
the whole organic world, but also established a firm foundation for the
future study of nature." He was buried in Westminster Abbey (1809-1882).
DARWIN, ERASMUS, physician and natural philosopher, born in
Nottinghamshire; studied at Cambridge and Edinburgh; practised medicine
in Lichfield, and finally settled in Derby; occupied his mind with the
study of fanciful analogies in the different spheres of nature, and
committed his views, often not without genuine poetic sentiment and
melody of expression, to verse, while in the views themselves there have
been recognised occasional glimpses of true insight, and at times a
foreshadow of the doctrine developed on strict scientific lines by his
illustrious grandson. His chief poetic works were the "Botanic Garden"
and the "Zoonomia; or, The Laws of Organic Life," deemed, in the
philosophy of them, not unworthy of criticism by such sane thinkers as
Paley and Dugald Stewart (1731-1802).
DARWINIAN THEORY, the theory established by Darwin that the several
species of plants and animals now in existence were not created in their
present form, but have been evolved by natural law of descent, with
modifications of structure, from cruder forms. See DARWIN, C. R.
DASENT, SIR GEORGE WEBBE, Icelandic scholar, born at St. Vincent,
West Indies; studied at Oxford; from 1845 to 1870 was assistant-editor of
the _Times_; has translated "The Prose, or Younger, Edda" and Norse tales
and sagas; written also novels, and contributed to reviews and magazines;
_b_. 1817.
DASH, COUNTESS, the _nom de plume_ of the Viscountess de Saint-Mars,
a French novelist, born at Poitiers; in straits for a living, took
desperately to writing; treated of aristocratic life and its hollow
artificialities and immoralities (1804-1872).
DASHKOFF, a Russian princess of note; played a part in the
conspiracy which ended in the elevation of Catharine II. to the throne;
was a woman of culture; founded the Russian Academy; projected and
assisted in the compilation of a Russian dictionary; died at Moscow
(1744-1810).
DATES OF EPOCH-MAKING EVENTS, the Ascendency in Athens of Pericles
(445 B.C.); the Fall of the Persian Empire (330 B.C.); the Death of
Alexander the Great (323 B.C.); the Reduction of Greece to a Roman
province, and the Ruin of Carthage (146 B.C.); the Battle of Actium (31
B.C.); Birth of Christ, 14th year of Augustus; Commencement of the
Middle Ages (395); Ruin of the Roman Empire by the Barbarians (476);
Clovis, ruler of Gaul (509); the Flight of Mahomet (622); Charlemagne,
Emperor of the West (800); Treaty of Verdun (843); the Crusades
(1096-1291); Employment of Cannon at Crecy (1346); Invention of Printing
(1436); Taking of Constantinople by Mahomet II. (1453); Discovery of
America by Columbus (1492); Copernican System published (1500); Accession
of Leo X. as Pope (1513); the Reformation of Luther (1517); Publication
of Bacon's "Novum Organon" (1620); Publication of Descartes's "Discourse
on Method" (1637); the Peace of Westphalia (1648); Reign of Louis XIV. at
its Height, and Peace of Nimeguen (1678); Publication of Newton's Theory
of Gravitation (1682); Watt's Invention of the Steam-Engine (1769);
Independence of the United States (1776); _Coup d'etat_ of 10th Brumaire
(1799); Waterloo, and Congress of Vienna (1815); Introduction of
Railroads into England (1830); First Attempt at Electric Telegraphy in
France (1837); Africa traversed by Livingstone (1852-1854); Publication
of Darwin's "Origin of Species" (1859); Opening of the Suez Canal (1869);
Proclamation of the German Empire (1871); Congress of Berlin (1878).
DAUBENTON, LOUIS JEAN MARIE, a French naturalist, born at Montbard;
associated with Buffon in the preparation of the first 15 vols. of his
"Histoire Naturelle," and helped him materially by the accuracy of his
knowledge, as well as his literary qualifications; contributed largely to
the "Encyclopedie," and was 50 years curator of the Cabinet of Natural
History at Paris (1716-1799).
DAUBENY, CHARLES, English chemist and botanist, author of "A
Description of Active and Extinct Volcanoes," an "Introduction to the
Atomic Theory," and other works, all like the latter more or less related
to chemistry (1795-1867).
D'AUBIGNE, MERLE, a popular Church historian, born near Geneva;
studied under Neander at Berlin; became pastor at Hamburg, court-preacher
at Brussels, and professor of Church History at Geneva; his reputation
rests chiefly on his "History of the Reformation in the Sixteenth
Century" (1794-1872).
D'AUBIGNE, THEODORE AGRIPPA, a historian, bred to the military
profession; held appointments under Henry IV., on whose assassination he
returned to Geneva, where he wrote his "Histoire Universelle," which had
the honour to be burned by the common hangman in Paris; was a satirical
writer; grandfather to Mme. de Maintenon (1550-1630).
DAUBIGNY, CHARLES FRANCOIS, a French landscape painter and skilful
etcher, born in Paris, attained distinction as an artist late in life
(1817-1878).
D'AUBUSSON, PIERRE, grand-master of the order of St. John of
Jerusalem, of French origin; served under the Emperor Sigismund against
the Turks; went to Rhodes; became a knight of St. John, and was chosen
grand-master; defended Rhodes against 100,000 Turks, and thus stayed the
career of Mahomet II., who, after establishing himself in Constantinople,
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