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W.W. Jacobs - "The Understudy"

Lady I. A. Gregory - "The Kiltartan History Book"

Julia Pardoe - "The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3)"

Ambrose Bierce - "Write It Right"

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The Nuttall Encyclopaedia by Edited by Rev. James Wood

E >> Edited by Rev. James Wood >> The Nuttall Encyclopaedia





DAVOS-PLATZ, a village 5105 ft. above the sea-level, in a valley of
the East Grisons; a place frequented in winter by invalids suffering from
chest disease, the dry air and sunshine that prevail being favourable for
patients of that class.


DAVOUT, Duke of Auerstaedt, Prince of Eckmuehl, marshal of France,
born at Annoux, in Burgundy; was fellow-student with Napoleon at the
military school in Brienne; entered the army in 1788, served in the
Revolutionary wars under Dumouriez and Desaix, and became general; served
under Bonaparte in Egypt; distinguished himself at Austerlitz, Auerstaedt,
Eckmuehl, and Wagram; was made governor of Hamburg; accompanied Napoleon
to Moscow; returned to Hamburg, and defended it during a siege; was made
Minister of War in 1815, and assisted Napoleon in his preparations for
the final struggle at Waterloo; commanded the remains of the French army
which capitulated under the walls of Paris; adhered to the Bourbon
dynasty on its return, and was made a peer; was famous before all the
generals of Napoleon for his rigour in discipline (1770-1823).


DAVY, SIR HUMPHRY, a great English chemist, born at Penzance;
conceived early in life a passion for the science in which he made so
many discoveries; made experiments on gases and the respiration of them,
particularly nitrous oxide and carbonic acid; discovered the function of
plants in decomposing the latter in the atmosphere, and the metallic
bases of alkalies and earths; proved chlorine to be a simple substance
and its affinity with iodine, which he discovered; invented the
safety-lamp, his best-known achievement; he held appointments and
lectured in connection with all these discoveries and their applications,
and received knighthood and numerous other honours for his services; died
at Geneva (1778-1829).


DAVY JONES'S LOCKER, the sailors' familiar name for the sea as a
place of safe-keeping, though why called of Davy Jones is uncertain.


DAVY-LAMP, a lamp encased in gauze wire which, while it admits
oxygen to feed the flame, prevents communication between the flame and
any combustible or explosive gas outside.


DAWKINS, WILLIAM BOYD, geologist and palaeontologist, born in
Montgomeryshire; has written "Cave Hunting," "Early Man in Britain," &c.;
_b_. 1838.


DAWSON, GEORGE, a popular lecturer, born in London; educated in
Aberdeen and Glasgow; bred for the ministry by the Baptist body, and
pastor of a Baptist church in Birmingham, but resigned the post for
ministry in a freer atmosphere; took to lecturing on a purely secular
platform, and was for thirty years the most popular lecturer of the day;
no course of lectures in any institute was deemed complete if his name
was not in the programme; did much to popularise the views of Carlyle and
Emerson (1821-1876).


DAWSON, SIR JOHN WILLIAM, geologist and naturalist, born in Pictou,
Nova Scotia; studied in Edinburgh; distinguished himself as a
palaeontologist; published in 1872, "Story of the Earth and Man"; in 1877,
"Origin of the World"; and recently, "Geology and History"; called in
question the Darwinian theory as to the origin of species; _b_. 1820.


DAY, JOHN, an English dramatist, contemporary of Ben Jonson; author
of the "Parliament of Bees," a comedy in which all the characters are
bees.


DAY, THOMAS, an eccentric philanthropist, born in London; author of
"Sandford and Merton"; he was a disciple of Rousseau; had many a
ludicrous adventure in quest of a model wife, and happily fell in with
one to his mind at last; was a slave-abolitionist and a parliamentary
reformer (1748-1789).


DAYAKS. See DYAKS.


DAYTON (85), a prosperous town in Ohio, U.S.; a great railway
centre, with a court-house of marble, after the Parthenon in Athens.


D'AZARA, a Spanish naturalist, born in Aragon; spent 20 years in
South America; wrote a "Natural History of the Quadrupeds in Paraguay"
(1781-1811).


DEAD SEA, called also the Salt Sea and 'the Asphalt Lake, a sea in
Palestine, formed by the waters of the Jordan, 46 m. long, 10 m. broad,
and in some parts 1300 ft. deep, while its surface is 1312 ft. below the
level of the Mediterranean, just as much as Jerusalem is above it; has no
outlet; its waters, owing to the great heat, evaporate rapidly, and are
intensely salt; it is enclosed E. and W. by steep mountains, which often
rise to a height of 6000 ft.


DEAK, FRANCIS, an eminent Hungarian statesman, born at Kehida, of an
ancient noble Magyar family; his aim for Hungary was the same as that of
CAVOUR (q. v.) for Italy, the establishment of constitutional
government, and he succeeded; standing all along as he did from Hungarian
republicanism on the one hand, and Austrian tyranny on the other, he
urged on the Emperor of Austria the demand of the Diet, of which he had
become leader, at first without effect, but after the humiliation of
Austria in 1866, all that he asked for was conceded, and the Austrian
Emperor received the Hungarian crown (1803-1876).


DEAL (9), a town, one of the old Cinque ports, oil the E. of Kent,
opposite the Goodwin Sands, 89 m. from London, with a fine sea-beach;
much resorted to for sea-bathing quarters.


DEAN, FOREST OF, a forest of 22,000 acres in the W. of
Gloucestershire, between the Severn and the Wye; the property of the
Crown for the most part; the inhabitants are chiefly miners, who at one
time enjoyed special privileges.


DEAN OF GUILD, a burgh magistrate in Scotland who has the care of
buildings, originally the head of the Guild brethren of the town.


DEAN OF ST. PATRICK'S, Jonathan Swift, who held that post from 1713
till his death.


DEANS, DAVIE, EFFIE, AND JEANIE, characters in the "Heart of
Midlothian."


DEBATS, JOURNAL DES, a daily paper, established in 1789; it defends
at present the Conservative Republican policy, and publishes often
remarkable literary articles.


DEBENTURE, a deed acknowledging a debt on a specified security.


DEBO`RAH, a Hebrew prophetess; reckoned one of the judges of Israel
by her enthusiasm to free her people from the yoke of the Canaanites;
celebrated for her song of exultation over their defeat, instinct at once
with pious devotion and with revengeful feeling; Coleridge calls her
"this Hebrew Boadicea."


DEBRECZEN (56), a Hungarian town, 130 m. E. of Buda-Pesth; is the
head-quarters of Protestantism in the country, and has an amply equipped
and a largely attended Protestant College; is a seat of manufactures and
a large trade.


DECAMERON, a collection of a hundred tales, conceived of as
rehearsed in ten days at a country-house during the plague at Florence;
are of a licentious character, but exquisitely told; were written by
Boccaccio; published in 1352; the name comes from _deka_, ten, and
_hemera_, a day.


DECAMPS, ALEXANDRA GABRIEL, a distinguished French painter, born in
Paris; brought up as a boy among the peasants of Picardy; represented
nature as he in his own way saw it himself, and visited Switzerland and
the East, where he found materials for original and powerful pictures;
his pictures since his death have brought great prices (1803-1860).


DE CANDOLLE, AUGUSTIN PYRAME, an eminent botanist, born at Geneva,
of Huguenot descent; studied in Paris; attracted the attention of Cuvier
and Lamarck, whom he assisted in their researches; published his "Flore
Francaise," in six vols.; became professor at Montpellier, and then at
Geneva; is the historical successor of Jussieu; his great contribution to
botanical science is connected with the classification of plants
(1778-1841).


DECA`TUR, STEPHEN, an American naval commodore; distinguished for
his feats of valour displayed in the war with Tripoli and with England
(1779-1820).


DECCAN, a triangular plateau of from 2000 to 3000 ft. of elevation
in the Indian peninsula, extending S. of the Vindhya Mountains; is
densely peopled, and contains some of the richest soil in the globe.


DECEMBER, the twelfth month of the year, so called, i. e. tenth,
by the Romans, as their year began with March.


DEC`EMVIRS, the patricians of Rome, with Consular powers, appointed
in 450 B.C. to prepare a code of laws for the Republic, which, after
being agreed upon, were committed first to ten, then to twelve tables,
and set up in the Forum that all might read and know the law they lived
under.


DECIUS, Roman emperor from 249 to 251; was a cruel persecutor of the
Christians; perished in a morass fighting with the Goths, who were a
constant thorn in his side all through his reign.


DECIUS MUS, the name of three Romans, father, son, and grandson, who
on separate critical emergencies (340, 295, 279 B.C.) devoted themselves
in sacrifice to the infernal gods in order to secure victory to the Roman
arms; the name is mostly employed ironically.


DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE, the immortal work of Gibbon,
of which the first volume was published in 1776.


DECRETALS, THE, a collection of laws added to the canon law of the
Church of Rome, being judicial replies of the Popes to cases submitted to
them from time to time for adjudication.


DEE, JOHN, an alchemist, born in London; a man of curious learning;
earned the reputation of being a sorcerer; was imprisoned at one time,
and mobbed at another, under this imputation; died in poverty; left 79
works, the majority of which were never printed, though still extant in
MS. in the British Museum and other places of safe-keeping (1527-1608).


DEFAUCONPRET, French litterateur; translator of the novels of Sir
Walter Scott and Fenimore Cooper (1767-1843).


DEFENDER OF THE FAITH, a title conferred by Pope Leo X. in 1521 upon
Henry VIII. for his defence of the Catholic faith in a treatise against
Luther, and retained ever since by the sovereigns of England, though
revoked by Pope Paul III. in 1535 in consequence of Henry's apostasy.


DEFFAND, MARIE, MARQUISE DU, a woman of society, famed for her wit
and gallantry; corresponded with the eminent philosophes of the time, in
particular Voltaire, as well as with Horace Walpole; her letters are
specially brilliant, and display great shrewdness; she is characterised
by Prof. Saintsbury as "the typical French lady of the eighteenth
century"; she became blind in 1753, but retained her relish for society,
though at length she entered a monastery, where she died (1697-1780).


DEFOE, DANIEL, author of "Robinson Crusoe," born in London; bred for
the Dissenting ministry; turned to business, but took chiefly to
politics; was a zealous supporter of William III.; his ironical treatise,
"The Shortest Way with Dissenters" (1703), which, treated seriously, was
burned by order of the House of Commons, led to his imprisonment and
exposed him for three days to the pillory, amidst the cheers, however,
not the jeers, of the mob; in prison wrote a "Hymn to the Pillory," and
started his _Review_; on his release he was employed on political
missions, and wrote a "History of the Union," which he contributed to
promote. The closing years of his life were occupied mainly with literary
work, and it was then, in 1719, he produced his world-famous "Robinson
Crusoe"; has been described as "master of the art of forging a story and
imposing it on the world for truth." "His circumstantial invention," as
Stopford Brooke remarks, "combined with a style which exactly fits it by
its simplicity, is the root of the charm of his great story" (1661-1731).


DEGE`RANDO, BARON, a French philanthropist and philosopher, born at
Lyons, of Italian descent; wrote "History of Philosophy," long in repute
as the best French work on the subject (1772-1842).


DEIANEIRA, the wife of Hercules, whose death she had been the
unwitting cause of by giving him the poisoned robe which NESSUS
(q. v.) had sent her as potent to preserve her husband's love; on
hearing the fatal result she killed herself in remorse and despair.


DEIPHOBUS, a son of Priam and Hecuba, second in bravery to Hector;
married Helen after the death of Paris, and was betrayed by her to the
Greeks.


DEIR-AL-KAMAR, a town in Syria, once the capital of the Druses, on a
terrace in the heart of the Lebanon Mountains.


DEISM, belief on purely rational grounds in the existence of God,
and distinguished from theism as denying His providence.


DEISTS, a set of free-thinkers of various shades, who in England, in
the 17th and 18th centuries, discarded revelation and the supernatural
generally, and sought to found religion on a purely rational basis.


DEJAZET, VIRGINIE, a celebrated French actress, born in Paris; made
her _debut_ at five years of age (1797-1875).


DEKKER, THOMAS, a dramatist, born in London; was contemporary of Ben
Jonson, between whom and him, though they formerly worked together, a
bitter animosity arose; wrote lyrics as well as dramas, which are light
comedies, and prose as well as poetry; the most famous among his prose
works, "The Gull's Hornbook," a pamphlet, in which he depicts the life of
a young gallant; his pamphlets are valuable (1570-1641).


DE LA BECHE, SIR HENRY THOMAS, geologist, born in London; wrote the
"Depth and Temperature of the Lake of Geneva," and published a "Manual of
Geology" and the "Geological Observer"; was appointed head of the
Geological Survey in England (1796-1855).


DELACROIX, EUGENE, a French painter, born at Charenton, dep. of
Seine; one of the greatest French painters of the 19th century; was the
head of the French Romantic school, a brilliant colourist and a daring
innovator; his very first success, "Dante crossing Acheron in Charon's
Boat," forms an epoch in the history of contemporary art; besides his
pictures, which were numerous, he executed decorations and produced
lithographic illustrations of "Hamlet," "Macbeth," and Goethe's "Faust"
(1799-1863).


DELAGOA BAY, an inlet in the SE. of Africa, E. of the Transvaal,
subject to Portugal; stretches from 25 deg. 30' to 26 deg. 20' S.; extends 52 m.
inland, where the Transvaal frontier begins, and between which and it a
railway of 52 m., constructed by an English company, extends.


DELAISTRE, a French statuary, born in Paris (1836-1891).


DELAMBRE, JEAN JOSEPH, an eminent French astronomer, born at Amiens,
a pupil of Lalande; measured with Mechain the arc of the meridian between
Dunkirk and Barcelona towards the establishment of the metric system;
produced numerous works of great value, among others "Theoretical and
Practical Astronomy" and the "History of Astronomy" (1749-1822).


DELANE, JOHN THADEUS, editor of the _Times_, born in London; studied
at Oxford; after some experience as a reporter was put on the staff of
the _Times_, and in 1841 became editor, a post he continued to hold for
36 years; was the inspiring and guiding spirit of the paper, but wrote
none of the articles (1817-1879).


DELAROCHE, PAUL, a French historical painter and one of the
greatest, born in Paris; was the head of the modern Eclectic school, so
called as holding a middle place between the Classical and Romantic
schools of art; among his early works were "St. Vincent de Paul preaching
before Louis XIII." and "Joan of Arc before Cardinal Beaufort"; the
subjects of his latest pictures are from history, English and French,
such as "The Princes in the Tower" and "Cromwell contemplating the corpse
of Charles I.," a great work; but the grandest monument of his art is the
group of paintings with which he adorned the wall of the semicircle of
the Palais des Beaux Arts in Paris, which he completed in 1841
(1797-1856).


DELAUNAY, LE VICOMTE, the _nom de plume_ of Mme. Delphine, under
which she published her "Parisian Letters."


DELAUNAY, LOUIS ARSENE, a great French actor, born in Paris; made
his _debut_ in 1846, retired 1887.


DELAVIGNE, CASIMIR, a popular French lyric poet and dramatist, born
at Havre; his verse was conventional and without originality (1793-1843).


DELAWARE (168), one of the Atlantic and original States of the
American Union, as well as the smallest of them; the soil is rather poor,
but porcelain clay abounds.


DELCASSE, THEOPHILE, French Minister of Foreign Affairs, born at
Pamiers; began life as a journalist; was elected to the Chamber in 1889;
became Colonial Minister; advocated colonial expansion; dealt skilfully
with the Fashoda affair as Foreign Minister; _b_. 1852.


DELECTABLE MOUNTAINS, mountains covered with sheep in the "Pilgrim's
Progress," from which the pilgrim obtains a view of the Celestial City.


DELESCLUZE, a French Communist, born at Dreux; was imprisoned and
transported for his extreme opinions; started a journal, the _Reveil_, in
1868, to advocate the doctrines of the International; was mainly
answerable for the atrocities of the Paris Commune; was killed in the
barricades (1809-1871).


DELFT (27), a Dutch town, S m. NW. of Rotterdam, once famous for its
pottery; is intersected by canals; has an important polytechnic school.


DELGADO, a cape of E. Africa, on the border between Zanzibar and
Mozambique.


DELHI (192), on the right bank of the Jumna, once the capital of the
Mogul empire and the centre of the Mohammedan power in India; it is a
great centre of trade, and is situated in the heart of India; it contains
the famous palace of Shah Jahan, and the Jama Masjid, which occupies the
heart of the city, and is the largest and finest mosque in India, which
owes its origin to Shah Jahan; it is walled, is 51 m. in circumference,
and divided into Hindu, Mohammedan, and European quarters; it was
captured by Lord Lake in 1803, and during the Mutiny by the Sepoys, but
after a siege of seven days retaken in 1857.


DELIGHT OF MANKIND, the Roman Emperor Trajan.


DELILAH, the Philistine woman who beguiled and betrayed Samson.


DELILLE, JACQUES, a French poet, born at Aigues Perse, in Auvergne;
translator of the "Georgics" of Virgil into verse, afterwards the "AEneid"
and "Paradise Lost," besides producing also certain didactic and
descriptive works; was a good versifier, but properly no poet, and much
overrated; died blind (1738-1813).


DELITZSCH, FRANZ, a learned biblical scholar and exegete, born at
Leipzig; his commentaries, which are numerous, were of a conservative
tendency; he wrote on Jewish antiquities, biblical psychology, and
Christian apologetics; was professor at Erlangen and Leipzig
successively, where his influence on the students was distinctly marked
(1813-1899).


DELIUS, NICOLAUS, a German philologist, born at Bremen;
distinguished especially as a student of Shakespeare and for his edition
of Shakespeare's works, which is of transcendent merit (1813-1888).


DELIA CRUSCANS, a set of English sentimental poetasters, the leaders
of them hailing from Florence, that appeared in England towards the close
of the 18th century, and that for a time imposed on many by their
extravagant panegyrics of one another, the founder of the set being one
Robert Merry, who signed himself _Della Crusca_; he first announced
himself by a sonnet to Love, in praise of which Anne Matilda wrote an
incomparable piece of nonsense; "this epidemic spread for a term from
fool to fool," but was soon exposed and laughed out of existence.


DELLYS (3), a seaport in Algeria, 49 m. E. of Algiers.


DELOLME, JOHN LOUIS, a writer on State polity, born at Geneva, bred
to the legal profession; spent some six years in England as a refugee;
wrote a book on the "Constitution of England," and in praise of it, which
was received for a time with high favour in the country, but is now no
longer regarded as an authority; wrote a "History of the Flagellants,"
and on "The Union of Scotland with England" (1740-1806).


DELORME, a French architect, born at Lyons; studied in Rome; was
patronised by Catherine de Medici; built the palace of the Tuileries, and
contributed to the art of building (1518-1577).


DELORME, MARION, a Frenchwoman celebrated for her wit and
fascination, born at Chalons-sur-Marne; came to Paris in the reign of
Louis XIII., where her drawing-room became the rendezvous of all the
celebrities of the time, many of whom were bewitched by her charms; she
gave harbour to the chiefs of the Fronde, and was about to be arrested
when she died; the story that her death was a feint, and that she had
subsequent adventures, is distrusted; she is the subject of a drama by
Victor Hugo (1612-1650).


DELOS, the smallest and central island of the Cyclades, the
birthplace of Apollo and Artemis, and where the former had a famous
oracle; it was, according to the Greek mythology, a floating island, and
was first fixed to the spot by Zeus to provide Leda with a place, denied
her elsewhere by Hera, in which to bring forth her twin offspring; it was
at one time a centre of Apollo worship, but is now uninhabited, and only
frequented at times by shepherds with their flocks.


DELPHI, a town of ancient Greece in Phocis, at the foot of
Parnassus, where Apollo had a temple, and whence he was wont to issue his
oracles by the mouth of his priestess the Pythia, who when receiving the
oracle used to sit on a tripod over an opening in the ground through
which an intoxicating vapour exhaled, deemed the breath of the god, and
that proved the vehicle of her inspiration; the Pythian games were
celebrated here.


DELPHIN CLASSICS, an edition of the Greek and Roman classics, edited
by Bossuet and Huet, assisted by thirty-nine scholars, for the use of the
dauphin of Louis XIV.; of little use now.


DELPHINE, a novel by Mme. de Stael; presumed to be an idealised
picture of herself.


DELTA, the signature of D. Macbeth Moir in _Blackwood's Magazine_.


DELUC, JEAN ANDRE, geologist, born in Geneva; lived in England; was
reader to Queen Charlotte, and author of several works (1727-1817).


DELUGE, name given to the tradition, common to several races, of a
flood of such universality as to sweep the land, if not the earth, of all
its inhabitants, except the pair by whom the land of the earth was
repeopled.


DEM`ADES, an Athenian orator, a bitter enemy of Demosthenes, in the
interest of Philip of Macedon; put to death for treason by Antipater, 318
B.C.; was a man of no principle, but a great orator.


DEMARA`TUS, king of Sparta from 510 to 491 B.C.; dispossessed of
his crown, fled to Persia and accompanied Xerxes into Greece.


DEMAVEND, MOUNT, an extinct volcano, the highest peak (18,600 ft.)
of the Elburz chain, in Persia.


DEMBEA, a lake, the largest in Abyssinia, being 60 m. long and 6000
ft. above the sea-level, from which the Blue Nile issues.


DEMBINSKI, HENRY, a Polish general, born near Cracow; served under
Napoleon against Russia, under Kossuth against Austria; fled to Turkey on
the resignation of Kossuth; died in Paris (1791-1864).


DEMERARA, a division of British Guiana; takes its name from the
river, which is 200 m. long, and falls into the Atlantic at Georgetown.


DEMETER (lit. Earth-mother), the great Greek goddess of the earth,
daughter of Kronos and Rhea and sister of Zeus, and ranks with him as one
of the twelve great gods of Olympus; is specially the goddess of
agriculture, and the giver of all the earth's fruits; the Latins call her
Ceres.


DEMETRIUS, the name of two kings of Macedonia who ruled over the
country, the first from 290 to 289 B.C., and the second from 240 to 229
B.C.


DEMETRIUS, or DIMITRI, the name of several sovereigns of
Russia, and of four adventurers called the four false Dimitri.


DEMETRIUS I., Soter (i. e. saviour), king of Syria from 162 to 150
B.C.; was grandson of Antiochus the Great. D. II., Nicator (i. e.
conqueror), king of Syria from 143 to 125 B.C. D. III., Eucaeros
(i. e. the happy), king of Syria in 95, died in 84 B.C.


DEMETRIUS PHALEREUS, an eminent Athenian orator, statesman, and
historian, born at Phalerus, a seaport of Athens; was held in high honour
in Athens for a time as its political head, but fell into dishonour,
after which he lived retired and gave himself up to literary pursuits;
died from the bite of an asp; left a number of works (345-283 B.C.).


DEMIDOFF, a Russian family distinguished for their wealth, descended
from a serf of Peter the Great, and who amassed a large fortune by
manufacturing firearms for him, and were raised by him to the rank of
nobility; they were distinguished in the arts, in arms, and even
literature; ANATOL in particular, who travelled over the SE. of
Europe, and wrote an account of his travels, a work magnificently
illustrated.


DEMIGOD, a hero elevated in the imagination to the rank of a
divinity in consequence of the display of virtues and the achievement of
feats superior to those of ordinary men.


DEMI-MONDE, a class in Parisian society dressing in a fashionable
style, but of questionable morals.


DEMIURGUS, a name employed by Plato to denote the world-soul, the
medium by which the idea is made real, the spiritual made material, the
many made one, and it was adopted by the Gnostics to denote the
world-maker as a being derived from God, but estranged from God, being
environed in matter, which they regarded as evil, and so incapable as
such of redeeming the soul from matter, from evil, such as the God of the
Jews, and the Son of that God, conceived of as manifest in flesh.