# The Nuttall Encyclopædia/R

R
Raab (20), a town in Hungary, 67 m. NW. of Buda Pesth, manufactures tobacco and cutlery.
Raasay, one of the Inner Hebrides, belonging to Inverness-shire, lies between Skye and Ross-shire; bare on the W., picturesque on the E.; has interesting ruins of Brochel Castle.
Rabant de St. Étienne, a moderate French Revolutionary; member of the Constituent Assembly; one of the Girondists; opposed the extreme party, and concealed himself between two walls he had built in his brother's house; was discovered, and doomed to the guillotine, as were also those who protected him (1743-1793).
Rabat (26), known also as New Sallee, a declining port in Morocco, finely situated on elevated ground overlooking the mouth of the Bu-Ragrag River, 115 m. SE. of Fez; is surrounded by walls, and has a commanding citadel, a noted tower, interesting ruins, &c.; manufactures carpets, mats, &c., and exports olive-oil, grain, wool, &c.
Rabbi (lit. my master), an appellation of honour applied to a teacher of the Law among the Jews, in frequent use among them in the days of Christ, who was frequently saluted by this title.
Rabbism, the name applied in modern times to the principles and methods of the Jewish Rabbis, particularly in the interpretation of the Jewish Scriptures.
Rabelais, François, great French humorist, born at Chinon, the son of a poor apothecary; was sent to a convent at nine; became a Franciscan monk; read and studied a great deal, but, sick of convent life, ran away at forty years of age; went to Montpellier, and studied medicine, and for a time practised it, particularly at Lyons; here he commenced the series of writings that have immortalised his name, his “Gargantua” and “Pantagruel,” which he finished as curé of Meudon, forming a succession of satires in a vein of riotous mirth on monks, priests, pedants, and all the incarnate solecisms of the time, yet with all their licentiousness revealing a heart in love with mankind, and a passionate desire for the establishment of truth and justice among men (1495-1553).
Races of Mankind. These have been divided into five, the Caucasian (q. v.) or Indo-European, the Mongolian or Yellow, the Negro or Black, the Malayan or Tawny, and the India or Copper-coloured.
Rachel, Eliza, a great French tragédienne, born in Switzerland, of Jewish parents; made her début in Paris in 1838, and soon became famous as the interpreter of the principal characters in the masterpieces of Racine and Corneille, her crowning triumph being the representation, in 1843, of Phèdre in the tragedy of Racine; she made a great impression wherever she appeared, realised a large fortune, and died of decline (1821-1858).
Racine (21), a flourishing city of Wisconsin, U.S.A., capital of Racine County, at the entrance of Root River into Lake Michigan, 62 m. N. of Chicago; has an Episcopal university: trades in lumber, flax, and the products of various factories.
Racine, Jean, great French tragic poet, born at La Ferté Milon, in the dep. of Aisne; was educated at Beauvais and the Port Royal; in 1663 settled in Paris, gained the favour of Louis XIV. and the friendship of Boileau, La Fontaine, and Molière, though he quarrelled with the latter, and finally lost favour with the king, which he never recovered, and which hastened his death; he raised the French language to the highest pitch of perfection in his tragedies, of which the chief are “Andromaque” (1667), “Britannicus” (1669), “Mithridate” (1673), “Iphigénie” (1774), “Phèdre” (1677), “Esther” (1688), and “Athalie” (1691), as well as an exquisite comedy entitled “Les Plaideurs” (1669); when Voltaire was asked to write a commentary on Racine, his answer was, “One had only to write at the foot of each page, beau, pathétique, harmonieux, admirable, sublime” (1639-1699).
Rack, an instrument of torture; consisted of an oblong wooden frame, fitted with cords and levers, by means of which the victim's limbs were racked to the point of dislocation; dates back to Roman times, and was used against the early Christians; much resorted to by the Spanish Inquisition, and also at times by the Tudor monarchs of England, though subsequently prohibited by law in England.
Radcliffe (20), a prosperous town of Lancashire, on the Irwell, 7 m. NW. of Manchester; manufactures cotton, calico, and paper; has bleaching and dye works, and good coal-mines.
Radcliffe, Mrs. Ann, née Ward, English novelist, born in London; wrote a series of popular works which abound in weird tales and scenes of old castles and gloomy forests, and of which the best known is the “Mysteries of Udolpho” (1764-1823).
Radcliffe, John, physician, born at Wakefield, studied at Oxford; commenced practice in London; by his art and professional skill rose to eminence; attended King William and Queen Mary; summoned to attend Queen Anne but did not, pleading illness, and on the queen's death was obliged to disappear from London; left £40,000 to found a public library in the University of Oxford (1650-1714).
Radetzky, Johann, Count von, Austrian field-marshal, born in Bohemia; entered the Austrian army in 1784; distinguished himself in the war with Turkey in 1788-89, and in all the wars of Austria with France; checked the Revolution in Lombardy in 1848; defeated and almost annihilated the Piedmontese army under Charles Albert in 1849, and compelled Venice to capitulate in the same year, after which he was appointed Governor of Lombardy (1766-1858).
Radicals, a class of English politicians who, at the end of the 18th century and the beginning of the 19th, aimed at the political emancipation of the mass of the people by giving them a share in the election of parliamentary representatives. Their Radicalism went no farther than that, and on principle could not go farther.
Radnorshire (22), the least populous of the Welsh counties; lies on the English border between Montgomery (N.) and Brecknock (S.); has a wild and dreary surface, mountainous and woody. Radnor Forest covers an elevated heathy tract in the E.; is watered by the Wye and the Teme. The soil does not favour agriculture, and stock-raising is the chief industry. Contains some excellent spas, that at Llandrindod the most popular. County town, Presteign.
Radowitz, Joseph von, Prussian statesman; entered the army as an artillery officer, rose to be chief of the artillery staff; by marriage became connected with the aristocracy; at length head of the Anti-Revolutionary party in the State, and the political adviser of William IV., in which capacity he endeavoured to effect a reform of the German Diet, and to give a political constitution to Germany (1797-1853).
Rae, John, Arctic voyager, born in Orkney, studied medicine in Edinburgh; first visited the Arctic regions as a surgeon; was engaged in three expeditions to these regions, of which he published reports; was made a LL.D. of Edinburgh University on the occasion of Carlyle's installation as Lord Rector (1813-1893).
Raeburn, Sir Henry, portrait-painter, born at Stockbridge, Edinburgh; was educated at George Heriot's Hospital; apprenticed to a goldsmith in the city, and gave early promise of his abilities as an artist; went to Italy; was introduced to Reynolds by the way, and after two years' absence settled in Edinburgh, and became famous as one of the greatest painters of the day; the portraits he painted included likenesses of all the distinguished Scotsmen of the period, at the head of them Sir Walter Scott; was knighted by George IV. a short time before his death (1756-1823).
Raff, Joachim, musical composer of the Wagner School, born at Lachen, in Switzerland; began life as a schoolmaster; was attracted to music; studied at Weimar; lived near Liszt, and became Director of the Conservatorium at Frankfort-on-Main; his works include symphonies, overtures, with pieces for the violin and the piano (1822-1882).
Raffles, Sir Thomas Stamford, English administrator, born in Jamaica; entered the East India Company's service, and rose in it; became Governor of Java, and wrote a history of it; held afterwards an important post in Sumatra, and formed a settlement at Singapore; returned to England with a rich collection of natural objects and documents, but lost most of them by the ship taking fire (1781-1826).
Rafn, Karl Christian, Danish archæologist, born in Fünen; devoted his life to the study of northern antiquities; edited numerous Norse MSS.; executed translations of Norse literature; wrote original treatises in the same interest, and by his researches established the fact of the discovery of America by the Norsemen in the 10th century (1796-1864).
Ragged Schools, a name given to the charity schools which provide education and, in most cases, food, clothing, and lodging for destitute children; they receive no Government support. The movement had its beginning in the magnanimous efforts of John Pounds (d. 1839), a shoemaker of Portsmouth; but the zeal and eloquence of Dr. Guthrie (q. v.) of Edinburgh greatly furthered the development and spread of these schools throughout the kingdom.
Raglan, Fitzroy Somerset, Lord, youngest son of the Duke of Beaufort; entered the army at sixteen; served with distinction all through the Peninsular War; became aide-de-camp to the Duke of Wellington, and his military secretary; lost his right arm at Waterloo; did diplomatic service at Paris in 1815, and held afterwards a succession of important military posts; was appointed commander-in-chief of the British forces in the Crimea, and was present at all the engagements till attacked by cholera, aggravated by a repulse and unjust reflections on his conduct of the war, he sank exhausted and died (1788-1855).
Ragman Roll, the name given to a record of the acts of fealty and homage done by the Scottish nobility and gentry in 1296 to Edward I. of England, and of value for the list it supplies of the nobles, gentry, burgesses, and clergy of the country at that period. The original written rolls of parchment have perished, but an abridged form is extant, and preserved in the Tower of London.
Ragnarök, in the Norse mythology the twilight of the gods, when it was predicted “the Divine powers and the chaotic brute ones, after long contest and partial victory by the former, should meet at last in universal, world-embracing wrestle and duel, strength against strength, mutually extinctive, and ruin, 'twilight' sinking into darkness, shall swallow up the whole created universe, the old universe of the Norse gods”; in which catastrophe Vidar and another are to be spared to found a new heaven and a new earth, the sovereign of which shall be Justice. “Insight this,” says Carlyle, “of how, though all dies, and even gods die, yet all death is but a Phoenix fire-death, and new birth into the greater and the better as the fundamental law of being.”
Ragusa, a decayed Austrian city on the Dalmatian coast, fronting the Adriatic; has interesting remains of its ancient greatness, and still contains several fine monastic and other buildings.
Rahel, wife of Varnhagen von Ense, born in Berlin, of Jewish parentage; was a woman of “rare gifts, worth, and true genius, and equal to the highest thoughts of her century,” and lived in intimate relation with all the intellectual lights of Germany at the time; worshipped at the shrine of Goethe, and was the foster-mother of German genius generally in her day; she did nothing of a literary kind herself; all that remains of her gifts in that line are her Letters, published by her husband on her death, which letters, however, are intensively subjective, and reveal the state rather of her feelings than the thoughts of her mind (1771-1833).
Raikes, Robert, the founder of Sunday Schools, born in Gloucester; by profession a printer; lived to see his pet institution established far and wide over England; left a fortune for benevolent objects (1735-1811).
Railway King, name given by Sydney Smith to George Hudson (q. v.), the great railway speculator, who is said to have one day in the course of his speculations realised as much in scrip as £100,000.
Rainy, Robert, eminent Scottish ecclesiastic, born in Glasgow; professor of Church History and Principal in the Free Church College, Edinburgh; an able man, a sagacious and an earnest, a distinguished leader of the Free Church; forced into that position more by circumstances, it is believed, than by natural inclination, and in that situation some think more a loss than a gain to the Church catholic, to which in heart and as a scholar he belongs; b. 1826.
Rajah, a title which originally belonged to princes of the Hindu race, who exercised sovereign rights over some tract of territory; now applied loosely to native princes or nobles with or without territorial lordship.
Rajmahal (4), an interesting old Indian town, crowns an elevated site on the Ganges, 170 m. NW. of Calcutta; has ruins of several palaces.
Rajon, Paul Adolphe, French etcher, born at Dijon; made his mark in 1866 with his “Rembrandt at Work”; carried off medals at the Salon; visited England in 1872, and executed notable etchings of portraits of J.S. Mill, Darwin, Tennyson, &c. (1842-1888).
Rajput, a name given to a Hindu of royal descent or of the high military caste. See Caste.
Rajputana (12,016), an extensive tract of country in the NW. of India, S. of the Punjab, embracing some twenty native States and the British district, Ajmere-Merwara. The Aravalli Hills traverse the S., while the Thar or Great Indian Desert occupies the N. and W. Jodhpur is the largest of the native territories, and the Rajputs, a proud and warlike people are the dominant race in many of the States.
Rakoczy March, the national anthem of the Hungarians, composed about the end of the 17th century by an unknown composer, and said to have been the favourite march of Francis Rakoczy II. of Transylvania.
Rakshasas, in the Hindu mythology a species of evil spirits, akin to ogres.
Raleigh, Sir Walter, courtier, soldier, and man of letters, born near Budleigh, in E. Devon, of ancient family; entered as student at Oxford, but at 17 joined a small volunteer force in aid of the Protestants in France; in 1580 distinguished himself in suppressing a rebellion in Ireland; was in 1582 introduced at court, fascinated the heart of the Queen by his handsome presence and his gallant bearing, and received no end of favours at her hand; joined his half-brother, Sir Humphrey Gilbert, in an expedition to North America, founded a colony, which he called Virginia in honour of the queen, and brought home with him the potato and the tobacco plants, till then unknown in this country; rendered distinguished services in the destruction of the Armada; visited and explored Guiana, and brought back tidings of its wealth in gold and precious things; fell into disfavour with the queen, but regained her esteem; under King James he became suspected of disloyalty, and was committed to the Tower, where he remained 12 years, and wrote his “History of the World”; on his release, but without a pardon, he set out to the Orinoco in quest of gold-mines there, but returned heart-broken and to be sentenced to die; he met his fate with calm courage, and was beheaded in the Old Palace Yard; of the executioner's axe he smilingly remarked, “A sharp medicine, but an infallible cure” (1552-1618).
Ralston, William Shedden, a noted Russian scholar and translator, born in London; studied at Cambridge, and in 1862 was called to the bar, but never practised; assistant in the British Museum library till 1875; visited Russia; his works embrace “Songs of the Russian People,” “Russian Folk-Tales,” &c. (1828-1889).
Râma, in the Hindu mythology an avatar of Vishnu, being the seventh, in the character of a hero, a destroyer of monsters and a bringer of joy, as the name signifies, the narrative of whose exploits are given in the “Râmâyana” (q. v.).
Ramadan, the ninth month of the Mohammedan year, a kind of Lent, held sacred as a month of fasting by all Moslems, being the month in the life of Mahomet when, as he spent it alone in meditation and prayer, his eyes were opened to see, through the shows of things, into the one eternal Reality, the greatness and absolute sovereignty of Allah.
Râmâyana, one of the two great epic poems, and the best, of the Hindus, celebrating the life and exploits of Râma, “a work of art in which an elevated religious and moral spirit is allied with much poetic fiction, ... written in accents of an ardent charity, of a compassion, a tenderness, and a humility at once sweet and plaintive, which ever and anon suggest Christian influences.”
Rambler, a periodical containing essays by Johnson in the Spectator vein, issued in 1750-52, but written in that “stiff and cumbrous style which,” as Professor Saintsbury remarks, “has been rather unjustly identified with Johnson's manner of writing generally.”
Rambouillet, Marquise de, a lady of wealth and a lover of literature and art, born in Rome, who settled in Paris, and conceiving the idea of forming a society of her own, gathered together into her salon a select circle of intellectual people, which, degenerating into pedantry, became an object of general ridicule, and was dissolved at her death (1588-1665).
Rameau, Jean Philippe, French composer, born at Dijon; wrote on harmony, and, settling in Paris, composed operas, his first “Hippolyte et Aricie,” and his best “Castor et Pollux” (1683-1764).
Rameses, the name of several ancient kings of Egypt, of which the most famous are R. II., who erected a number of monuments in token of his greatness, and at whose court Moses was brought up; and R. III., the first king of the twentieth dynasty, under whose successors the power of Egypt fell into decay.
Ramillies, Belgian village in Brabant, 14 m. N. of Namur; scene of Marlborough's victory over the French under Villeroy in 1706.
Rammohun Roy, a Brahman, founder of the Brahmo-Somaj, born at Burdwân, Lower Bengal; by study of the theology of the West was led to embrace deism, and tried to persuade his countrymen to accept the same faith, by proofs which he advanced to show that it was the doctrine of their own sacred books, in particular the Upanishads; with this view he translated and published a number of texts from them in vindication of his contention, as well as expounded his own conviction in original treatises; in doing so he naturally became an object of attack, and was put on his defence, which he conducted in a succession of writings that remain models of controversial literature; died in Bristol (1772-1833).
Ramsay, Allan, Scottish poet, born in Crawford, Lanarkshire; bred a wig-maker; took to bookselling, and published his own poems, “The Gentle Shepherd,” a pastoral, among the number, a piece which describes and depicts manners very charmingly (1686-1758).
Ramsay, Allan, portrait-painter, son of preceding; studied three years in Italy, settled in London, and was named first painter to George III. (1715-1764).
Ramsay, Edward Bannerman, dean of Edinburgh, born at Aberdeen, graduated at Cambridge; held several curacies; became incumbent of St. John's Episcopal Church, Edinburgh, in 1830, and dean of the diocese in 1840; declined a bishopric twice over; is widely known as the author of “Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character”; was a most genial, lovable man, a great lover of his country, and much esteemed in his day by all the citizens of Edinburgh (1793-1872).
Ramsbottom (17), a busy manufacturing town in Lancashire, on the Irwell, 4 m. N. of Bury, engaged in cotton-weaving, calico-printing, rope-making, &c.
Ramsden, Jesse, mathematical instrument-maker and inventor, born in Yorkshire; invented the theodolite for the Ordnance Survey of Great Britain (1735-1800).
Ramsey, a beautifully situated, healthy watering-place, 14 m. NE. of Douglas, in the Isle of Man.
Ramsgate (25), a popular watering-place in the Isle of Thanet, Kent, fronting the Downs, 72 m. E. by S. of London; has a famous harbour of refuge; to the W. lies Pegwell Bay with Ebbsfleet.
Ramus, Peter, or Pierre de la Ramée, a French philosopher and humanist, son of poor parents; became a servant in the College of Navarre; devoted his leisure to study, and became a great scholar; attacked scholasticism in a work against Aristotle as the main pillar of the system, and was interdicted from teaching philosophy, but the judgment was reversed by Henry II., and he was made a royal professor; he turned Protestant in the end, and was massacred on the eve of St. Bartholomew (1515-1572).
Ranavalona III., queen of Madagascar; was crowned in 1883, but her kingdom and capital were taken from her by the French in 1893, and she is now queen only in name; b. 1861.
Ranching, a term of Spanish derivation applied to the business of rearing cattle, as carried on in the southern and western States of America; vast herds of cattle in a half-wild condition are raised on the wide stretches of prairie land, and are tended by “cowboys,” whose free, adventurous life attracts men of all sorts and conditions.
Randall, James Ryder, American journalist; author of “Maryland, my Maryland,” “Stonewall Jackson,” and other popular lyrics, which greatly heartened the Southern cause in the Civil War; born in Baltimore; engaged in teaching till he took to journalism; b. 1839.
Randolph, John, a noted eccentric American politician, born at Cawsons, Virginia; entered Congress in 1799, and held a commanding position there as leader of the Democratic party; was a witty, sarcastic speaker; sat in the Senate from 1825 to 1827, and in 1830 was Minister to Russia; liberated and provided for his slaves (1773-1833).
Randolph, Sir Thomas, English diplomatist, was sent on diplomatic missions by Queen Elizabeth, and particularly mixed up in Scotch intrigues, and had to flee from Scotland for his life; left Memoirs (1523-1590).
Randolph, Thomas, English poet, wrote odes and sundry dramas, of which the “Muses' Looking-Glass” and “Amyntas” are the best, though not absolutely good (1605-1634).
Ranee, name given to a Hindu princess or queen; a rajah's wife.
Ranelagh, a place of resort in grounds at Chelsea of people of fashion during the last half of the 18th century, with a promenade where music and dancing were the chief attractions.
Rangoon (180), capital and chief port of British Burmah, situated 20 m. inland from the Gulf of Martaban, on the Hlaing or Rangoon River, the eastmost of the delta streams of the Irrawaddy; British since 1852; a well-appointed city of modern appearance, strongly fortified; contains the famous Shway-Dagon pagoda erected in the 6th century B.C.; has extensive docks, and negotiates the vast bulk of Burmese exports and imports; the former include teak, gums, spices, and rice.
Ranjit Singh, the maharajah of the Sikhs, after taking possession of Lahore, became undisputed master of the Punjab, and imposed on his subjects the monarchical form of government, which was shattered to fragments after his death; he was the possessor of the Koh-i-Nur diamond (1797-1839).
Ranjitsinhji, Indian prince, born at Sarodar; studied at Cambridge; devoted himself to cricket, and became famous for his brilliant play; b. 1872.
Ranke, Leopold von, distinguished German historian, born in Thüringia just 16 days after Thomas Carlyle; began life similarly as a teacher and devoted his leisure hours to the study of history and the publication of historical works; was in 1825 appointed professor of History at Berlin; was commissioned by the Prussian government to explore the historical archives of Vienna, Rome, and Venice, the fruit of which was seen in his subsequent historical labours, which bore not only upon the critical periods of German history, but those of Italy, France, and even England; of his numerous works, all founded on the impartial study of facts, it is enough to mention here his “History of the Popes in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries” and his “German History in the Times of the Reformation” (1795-1886).
Rankine, W. J. Macquorn, mathematician and physicist, born in Edinburgh; devoted himself to engineering, and held the chair of Engineering in Glasgow University; wrote extensively on mathematical and physical subjects, both theoretical and practical (1820-1872).
Rannoch, an elevated, dreary moorland in NW. of Perthshire, crossed by the West Highland Railway; Lochs Rannoch and Tummel lie to the E. and Loch Lydoch in the W.
Ranters, a name given to the Primitive Methodists who seceded from the Wesleyan body on account of a deficiency of zeal.
Ranz des Vaches, a simple melody, played on the horn by the Swiss Alpine herdsmen as they drive their cattle to or from the pasture, and which, when played in foreign lands, produces on a Swiss an almost irrepressible yearning for home.
Rape of the Lock, a dainty production of Pope's, pronounced by Stopford Brooke to be “the most brilliant occasional poem in the language.”
Raphael, one of the seven archangels and the guardian of mankind, conducted Tobias to the country of the Medes and aided him in capturing the miraculous fish, an effigies of which, as also a pilgrim's staff, is an attribute of the archangel.
Raphael, Santi, celebrated painter, sculptor, and architect, born at Urbino, son of a painter; studied under Perugino for several years, visited Florence in 1504, and chiefly lived there till 1508, when he was called to Rome by Pope Julius II., where he spent the rest of his short life and founded a school, several of the members of which became eminent in art; he was one of the greatest of artists, and his works were numerous and varied, which included frescoes, cartoons, madonnas, portraits, easel pictures, drawings, &c., besides sculpture and architectural designs, and all within the brief period of 37 years; he had nearly finished “The Transfiguration” when he died of fever caught in the excavations of Rome; he was what might be called a learned artist, and his works were the fruits of the study of the masters that preceded him, particularly Perugino and the Florentines, and only in the end might his work be called his own; it is for this reason that modern Pre-Raphaelitism is so called, as presumed to be observant of the simple dictum of Ruskin, “Look at Nature with your own eyes, and paint only what yourselves see” (1483-1520). See Pre-Raphaelitism.
Rapin de Thoyras, French historian, born at Castres; driven from France by the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, settled in Holland, came over to England with and served under the Prince of Orange, withdrew to Holland and wrote a “History of England,” deservedly much in repute for long, if not still (1661-1725).
Rapp, George, German fanatic, born in Würtemberg, emigrated to America, and founded a fraternity called Harmonites, who by tillage of land on the Ohio and otherwise amassed great wealth, to be kept in store for the service of Christ at His second coming (1770-1847).
Rapp, Jean, French general, born at Colmar; served under Napoleon with distinction all through his wars, held Danzig for a whole year against a powerful Russian army, was kept prisoner by the Russians after surrender, returned to France, and submitted to Louis XVIII. after Waterloo (1772-1821).
Rappahannock, a navigable river of Virginia State, rises in the Alleghanies, and after a course of 125 m. to the SE. discharges into Chesapeake Bay.
Rashi, a Jewish scholar and exegete, born at Troyes; was an expert in all departments of Jewish lore as contained in both the Scriptures and the Talmud, and indulged much in the favourite Rabbinical allegorical style of interpretation (1040-1105).
Rask, Rasmus Christian, Danish philologist, born near Odense; studied first the primitive languages of the North, chiefly Icelandic, and then those of the East, and published the results of his researches both by his writings and as professor of Oriental Languages and of Icelandic in the university of Copenhagen (1787-1832).
Raskolink (lit. a separatist), in Russia a sect, of which there are many varieties, of dissenters from the Greek Church.
Raspail, François Vincent, French chemist, physiologist, and socialist; got into trouble both under Louis Philippe and Louis Napoleon for his political opinions (1794-1878).
Rassam, Hormuzd, Assyriologist, born at Mosul; assisted Layard in his explorations at Nineveh, and was subsequently, under support from Britain, engaged in further explorations both there and elsewhere; being sent on a mission to Abyssinia, was put in prison and only released after the defeat of Theodore; b. 1826.
Rasselas, a quasi-novel written in 1759 by Johnson to pay the expenses of his mother's funeral, the subject of which is an imaginary prince of Abyssinia, and its aim a satire in sombre vein on human life.
Rastatt or Rastadt (12), a town in Baden, on the Murg, 15 m. SW. of Carlsruhe; is fortified, and manufactures hardware, beer, and tobacco.
Rataña, a brandy flavoured with kernels of fruits.
Rathlin (1), a picturesque, cliff-girt island (6½ by 1-1/3 m.) off the N. coast of Antrim; fishing is the chief industry; has interesting historical associations.
Ratich, Wolfgang, German educationalist, born in Wilster (Holstein); a forerunner of Comenius; his theory of education, which in his hands proved a failure, was based on Baconian principles; proceeded from things to names, and from the mother tongue to foreign ones (1571-1635).
Rational Horizon, a great circle parallel to the horizon, the centre of which is the centre of the earth.
Rationalism, Modern, a speculative point of view that resolves the supernatural into the natural, inspiration into observation, and revelation into what its adherents called reason, when they mean simply understanding, and which ends in stripping us naked, and leaving us empty of all the spiritual wealth accumulated by the wise in past ages, and bequeathed to us as an inheritance that had cost them their life's blood.
Ratisbo or Regensburg (38), one of the oldest and most interesting of German towns in Bavaria, on the Danube, 82 m. NE. of Münich; has a quaint and mediæval appearance, with Gothic buildings and winding streets; associated with many stirring historical events; till 1806 the seat of the imperial diet; does an active trade in salt and corn, and manufactures porcelain, brass, steel, and other wares.
Rattazzi, Urbano, Italian statesman, born at Alessandria; was leader of the extreme party in the Sardinian Chamber in 1849, and was several times minister, but was unstable in his politics (1808-1873).
Rauch, Christian, eminent Prussian sculptor, born in Waldeck; patronised by royalty; studied at Rome under Thorwaldsen and Canova; resided chiefly in Berlin; executed statues of Blücher, Dürer, Goethe, Schiller, and others, as well as busts; his masterpiece is a colossal monument in Berlin of Frederick the Great (1777-1857).
Rauhes Haus (“Rough House”), a remarkable institution for the reclamation and training of neglected children, founded (1831), and for many years managed by Johann Heinrich Wichern at Hoon, near Hamburg; it is affiliated to the German Home Mission.
Raumer, Friedrich Ludwig Georg von, German historian; was professor of History at Berlin; wrote the “History of the Hohenstaufen and their Times,” and a “History of Europe from the End of the 15th Century” (1781-1873).
Ravaillac, François, the assassin of Henry IV., born at Angoulême; a Roman Catholic fanatic, who regarded the king as the arch-enemy of the Church, and stabbed him to the heart as he sat in his carriage; was instantly seized, subjected to torture, and had his body torn by horses limb from limb (1578-1640).
Ravana, in the Hindu mythology the king of the demons, who carried off Sita, the wife of Râma, to Ceylon, which, with the help of the monkey-god Hanuman, and a host of quadrumana, Râma invaded and conquered, slaying his wife's ravisher, and bringing her off safe, a story which forms the subject of the Hindu epic, “Râmâyana.”
Ravenna (12), a venerable walled city of Italy; once a seaport, now 5 m. inland from the Adriatic, and 43 m. E. of Bologna; was capital of the Western Empire for some 350 years; a republic in the Middle Ages, and a papal possession till 1860; especially rich in monuments and buildings of early Christian art; has also picture gallery, museum, library, leaning tower, etc.; manufactures silk, linen, paper, etc.
Ravenna, Exarch of, the viceroy of the Byzantine Empire in Italy while the latter was a dependency of the former, and who resided at Ravenna.
Ravenscroft, Thomas, musical composer, born in London; was a chorister in St. Paul's Cathedral; composed many part-songs, etc., but is chiefly remembered for his “Book of Psalmes,” which he edited and partly composed; some of the oldest and best known Psalms (e. g. Bangor, St David's) are by him (1592-1640).
Ravenswood, a Scottish Jacobite, the hero of Scott's “Bride of Lammermoor.”
Ravignan, Gustave Delacroix de, a noted Jesuit preacher, born at Bayonne; won wide celebrity by his powerful preaching in Notre Dame, Paris; wrote books in defence of his order (1795-1858).
Rawal Pindi (74), a trading and military town in the Punjab, 160 m. NW. of Lahore; has an arsenal, fort, etc., and is an important centre for the Afghanistan and Cashmere trades.
Rawlinson, George, Orientalist, brother of following, Canon of Canterbury; has written extensively on Eastern and Biblical subjects: b. 1815.
Rawlinson, Sir Henry, Assyriologist, born in Oxfordshire; entered the Indian Army in 1827; held several diplomatic posts, particularly in Persia; gave himself to the study of cuneiform inscriptions, and became an authority in the rendering of them and matters relative (1810-1895).
Ray, John, English naturalist, born in Essex; studied at Cambridge; travelled extensively collecting specimens in the departments of both botany and zoology, and classifying them, and wrote works on both as well as on theology (1628-1705).
Rayleigh, Lord, physicist, was senior wrangler at Cambridge; is professor of Natural Philosophy in the Royal Institution; author of “The Theory of Sound”; discovered, along with Professor Ramsay, “argon” in the atmosphere; b. 1842.
Raymond, name of a succession of Counts of Toulouse, in France, seven in number, of which the fourth count, from 1088 to 1105, was a leader in the first crusade, and the sixth, who became Count in 1194, was stripped of his estate by Simon de Montfort.
Raynal, the Abbé, French philosopher; wrote “Histoire des Indes” and edited “Philosophic History,” distinguished for its “lubricity, unveracity, loose, loud eleutheromaniac rant,” saw it burnt by the common hangman, and his wish fulfilled as a “martyr” to liberty (1713-1796).
Raynouard, François, French littérateur and philologist, born in Provence; was of the Girondist party at the time of the Revolution, and imprisoned; wrote poems and tragedies, but eventually gave himself up to the study of the language and literature of Provence (1761-1836).
Ré, Isle of (16), small island, 18 m. by 3, off the French coast, opposite La Rochelle; salt manufacturing chief industry; also oysters and wine are exported. Chief town, St. Martin (2).
Reade, Charles, English novelist, born at Ipsden, in Oxfordshire; studied at Oxford; became a Fellow of Magdalen College, and was called to the bar in 1842; began his literary life by play-writing; studied the art of fiction for 15 years, and first made his mark as novelist in 1852, when he was nearly 40, by the publication of “Peg Woffington,” which was followed in 1856 by “It is Never too Late to Mend,” and in 1861 by “The Cloister and the Hearth,” the last his best and the most popular; several of his later novels are written with a purpose, such as “Hard Cash” and “Foul Play”; his most popular plays are “Masks and Faces” and “Drink” (1814-1884).
Reading (61), capital of Berkshire, on the Kennet, 36 m. N. of London; a town of considerable historic interest; was ravaged by the Danes; has imposing ruins of a 12th-century Benedictine abbey, &c.; was besieged and taken by Essex in the Civil War (1643); birthplace of Archbishop Laud; has an important agricultural produce-market, and its manufactures include iron-ware, paper, sauce, and biscuits.
Reading (79), capital of Berks Co., Pennsylvania, on the Schuylkill River, 58 m. NW. of Philadelphia; has flourishing iron and steel works; population includes a large German settlement.
Real, an old Spanish silver coin still in use in Spain, Mexico, and some other of the old Spanish colonies, also is a money of account in Portugal; equals one-fourth of the peseta, and varies in value from 2½ d. to 5d. with the rise and fall of exchange.
Real, a legal term in English law applied to property of a permanent or immovable kind, e. g. land, to distinguish it from personal or movable property.
Real Presence, the assumed presence, really and substantially, in the bread and wine of the Eucharist of the body and blood, the soul and divinity, of Christ, a doctrine of the Romish and certain other Churches.
Realism, as opposed to Nominalism, is the belief that general terms denote real things and are not mere names or answerable to the mere conception of them, and as opposed to idealism, is in philosophy the belief that we have an immediate cognition of things external to us, and that they are as they seem. In art and literature it is the tendency to conceive and represent things as they are, however unsightly and immoral they may be, without any respect to the beautiful, the true, or the good. In Ruskin's teaching mere realism is not art; according to him art is concerned with the rendering and portrayal of ideals.
Realm, Estates of the, the Sovereign, the House of Lords, and the House of Commons in Great Britain.
Real-schule, a German school in which languages, sciences, and arts are taught to qualify for apprenticeship in some special business or craft.
Reason, in philosophy is more than mere understanding or reasoning power; it is the constitutive and regulative soul of the universe assumed to live and breathe in the inner life or soul of man, as that develops itself in the creations of human genius working in accord with and revealing the deep purpose of the Maker.
Reason, in German Vernunft, defined by Dr. Stirling “the faculty that unites and brings together, as against the understanding,” in German Verstand, “the faculty that separates, and only in separation knows,” and that is synthetic of the whole, whereof the latter is merely analytic of the parts, sundered from the whole, and without idea of the whole, the former being the faculty which construes the diversity of the universe into a unity or the one, whereas the latter dissolves the unity into diversity or the many.
Reason, Goddess of, a Mrs. Momoro, wife of a bookseller in Paris, who, on the 10th November 1793, in the church of Notre Dame, represented what was called Reason, but was only scientific analysis, which the revolutionaries of France proposed, through her representing such, to install as an object of worship to the dethronement of the Church, l'infâme.
Réaumur, French scientist, born in La Rochelle; made valuable researches and discoveries in the industrial arts as well as in natural history; is best known as the inventor of the thermometer that bears his name, which is graduated into 80 degrees from the temperature of melting ice to that of boiling water (1683-1757).
Rebecca the Jewess, a high-souled Hebrew maiden, who is the heroine in Sir Walter Scott's “Ivanhoe.”
Rebeccaites, a band of Welsh rioters who in 1843, dressed as females, went about at nights and destroyed the toll-gates, which were outrageously numerous; they took their name from Gen. xxiv. 60.
Rebellion, name of two risings of Jacobites in Scotland to restore the exiled Stuart dynasty to the throne, one in behalf of the Pretender in 1715, headed by the Earl of Mar, and defeated at Sheriffmuir, and the other in behalf of the Young Chevalier, and defeated at Culloden in April 1746.
Récamir, Madame, Frenchwoman, born at Lyons; became at 15 the wife of a rich banker In Paris thrice her own age; was celebrated for her wit her beauty, and her salon; was a friend of Madame de Staël and Châteaubriand, whom she soothed in his declining years, and a good woman (1777-1849).
Recanati (6), a pretty Italian town, 15 m. S. of the Adriatic port Ancona, the birthplace of Leopardi; has a Gothic cathedral.
Recension, the name given to the critical revision of the text of an author, or the revised text itself.
Rechabites, a tribe of Arab origin and Bedouin habits who attached themselves to the Israelites in the wilderness and embraced the Jewish faith, but retained their nomadic ways; they abstained from all strong drink, according to a vow they had made to their chief, which they could not be tempted to break, an example which Jeremiah in vain pleaded with the Jews to follow in connection with their vow to the Lord (see Jer. xxxv.).
Recidivists, a name applied to the class of habitual delinquents or criminals of France.
Reciprocity, a term used in economics to describe commercial treaties entered into by two countries, by which it is agreed that, while a strictly protective tariff is maintained as regards other countries, certain articles shall be allowed to pass between the two contracting countries free of or with only light duties; this is the cardinal principle of Fair Trade, and is so far opposed to Free Trade.
Reclus, Elisée, a celebrated French geographer; from his extreme democratic opinions left France In 1851, lived much in exile, and spent much time in travel; wrote “Géographie Universelle,” in 14 vols., his greatest work; b. 1830.
Recorde, Robert, mathematician, born in Pembroke; a physician by profession, and physician to Edward VI. and Queen Mary; his works on arithmetic, algebra, &c., were written in the form of question and answer; died in the debtors' prison (1500-1558).
Recorder, an English law official, the chief Judicial officer of a city or borough; discharges the functions of judge at the Quarter-Sessions of his district; must be a barrister of at least five years' standing; is appointed by the Crown, but paid by the local authority; is debarred from sitting on the licensing bench, but is not withheld from practising at the bar; the sheriff in Scotland is a similar official.
Rector, a clergyman of the Church of England, who has a right to the great and small tithes of the living; where the tithes are impropriate he is called a vicar.
Recusants, a name given to persons who refused to attend the services of the Established Church, on whom legal penalties were first imposed in Elizabeth's reign, that bore heavily upon Catholics and Dissenters; the Toleration Act of William III. relieved the latter, but the Catholics were not entirely emancipated till 1829.
Red Cross Knight, St. George, the patron saint of England, and the type and the symbol of justice and purity at feud with injustice and impurity.
Red Cross Society, an internationally-recognised society of volunteers to attend to the sick and wounded in time of war, so called from the members of it wearing the badge of St. George.
Red Republicans, a party in France who, at the time of the Revolution of 1848, aimed at a reorganisation of the State on a general partition of Property.
Red River, an important western tributary of the Mississippi; flows E. and SE. through Texas, Arkansas, and Louisiana; has a course of 1600 m. till it joins the Mississippi; is navigable for 350 m.
Red River of the North, flows out of Elbow Lake, Minnesota; forms the boundary between North Dakota and Minnesota, and flowing through Manitoba, falls into Lake Winnipeg after a course of 665 m.; is a navigable river.
Red Sea, an arm of the Arabian Sea, and stretching in a NW. direction between the desolate sandy shores of Turkey in Asia and Africa; is connected with the Gulf of Aden in the SE. by the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb, and in the NW. divides into the Gulfs of Suez and Akaba, between which lies the Sinai Peninsula; the Suez Canal (q. v.) joins it to the Mediterranean; is 1200 m. long, and averages 180 in breadth; has a mean depth of 375 fathoms (greatest 1200); receives no rivers, and owing to the great evaporation its water is very saline; long coral reefs skirt its shores, and of many islands Jebel Zugur, in the Farisan Archipelago, and Dahlak are the largest; the dangerous Dædalus Reef is marked by a lighthouse; as a seaway between Europe and the East its importance was greatly diminished by the discovery of the Cape route, but since the opening of the Suez Canal it has much more than regained its old position; owes its name probably to the deep red tint of the water often seen among the reefs, due to the presence of microscopic organisms.
Redan, a rampart shaped like the letter V, with its apex toward the enemy.
Redditch (11), a flourishing town of Worcester, on the Warwick border, 13 m. SW. of Birmingham, busy with the manufacture of needles, pins, fish-hooks, &c.
Redemptionists, better known as Trinitarians (q. v.), a name bestowed on an order of monks consecrated to the work of redeeming Christian captives from slavery.
Redesdale, in Northumberland, the valley of the river Reed, which rises in the Cheviots and flows SE. through pastoral and in part dreary moorland till it joins the North Tyne; at the S. end is the field of Otterburn (q. v.).
Redeswire, Raid of the, a famous Border fight took place in July 1575 at the Cheviot pass which enters Redesdale; through the timely arrival of the men of Jedburgh the Scots proved victorious; is the subject of a Border ballad.
Redgauntlet, an enthusiastic Jacobite character in Sir Walter Scott's novel of the name, distinguished by a “horse-shoe vein on his brow, which would swell up black when he was in anger.”
Redgrave, Richard, painter, born at Pimlico, in London; studied at the Royal Academy, won his first success in “Gulliver on the Farmer's Table,” became noted for his genre and landscape paintings, held Government appointments, and published among other works “Reminiscences” and “A Century of English Painters” (1804-1888).
Reding, Aloys von, a Swiss patriot, born in Schwyz; was the bold defender of Swiss independence against the French, in which he was in the end defeated (1755-1818).
Redoubt Kali, a Russian fort on the E. coast of the Black Sea, 10 m. N. of Poti, the chief place for shipping Circassian girls to Turkey; captured by the British in 1854.
Redruth (10), a town of Cornwall, on a hilly site nearly 10 m. SW. of Truro, in the midst of a tin and copper mining district.
Red-tape, name given to official formality, from the red-tape employed in tying official documents, whence “red-tapism.”
Rees, Abraham, compiler of “Rees' Cyclopedia” (45 vols.), born in Montgomeryshire; became a tutor at Hoxton Academy, and subsequently ministered in the Unitarian Chapel at Old Jewry for some 40 years (1743-1825).
Reeve, name given to magistrates of various classes in early English times, the most important of whom was the shire-reeve or sheriff, who represented the king in his shire; others were borough-reeves, port-reeves, &c.
Reeve, Clara, an English novelist, born, the daughter of a rector, at Ipswich; the best known of her novels is “The Champion of Virtue,” afterwards called “The Old English Baron,” a work of the school of Mrs. Radcliffe and of Walpole (1725-1803).
Reeves, John Sims, distinguished singer, born at Shooter's Hill, Kent; made his first appearance at the age of 18 as a baritone at Newcastle, and then as a tenor, and the foremost in England at the time; performed first in opera and then as a ballad singer at concerts, and took his farewell of the public on May 11, 1891, though he has frequently appeared since; b. 1822.
Referendum, a practice which prevails in Switzerland of referring every new legislative measure to the electorate in the several electoral bodies for their approval before it can become law.
Reform, the name given in England to successive attempts and measures towards the due extension of the franchise in the election of the members of the House of Commons.
Reformation, the great event in the history of Europe in the 16th century, characterised as a revolt of light against darkness, on the acceptance or the rejection of which has since depended the destiny for good or evil of the several States composing it, the challenge to each of them being the crucial one, whether they deserved and were fated to continue or perish, and the crucial character of which is visible to-day in the actual conditions of the nations as they said “nay” to it or “yea,” the challenge to each at bottom being, is there any truth in you or is there none? Austria, according to Carlyle, henceforth “preferring steady darkness to uncertain new light”; Spain, “people stumbling in steep places in the darkness of midnight”; Italy, “shrugging its shoulders and preferring going into Dilettantism and the Fine Arts”; and France, “with accounts run up on compound interest,” had to answer the “writ of summons” with an all too indiscriminate “Protestantism” of its own.
Reformation, Morning Star of the, the title given to John Wycliffe (q. v.).
Reformatories, schools for the education and reformation of convicted juvenile criminals (under 16). Under an order of court offenders may be placed in one of these institutions for from 2 to 5 years after serving a short period of imprisonment. They are supported by the State, the local authorities, and by private subscriptions and sums exacted from parents and guardians. Rules and regulations are supervised by the State. The first one was established in 1838. There are now 62 in Great Britain and Ireland; but the numbers admitted are diminishing at a remarkable rate.
Reformed Church, the Churches in Switzerland, Holland, Scotland, and elsewhere under Calvin or Zwingle, or both, separated from the Lutheran on matter of both doctrine and policy, and especially in regard to the doctrine of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist.
Refraction. Light travels in straight lines; but when a ray travelling through one medium passes obliquely into another of either greater or less density it is bent at the point of incidence. This bending or breaking is called refraction. The apparent bend in a stick set sloping in a sheet of water is due to this phenomenon, as are also many mirages and other optical illusions.
Regalia, the symbols of royalty, and more particularly those used at a coronation. The English regalia include the crown, the sceptre with the cross, the verge or rod with the dove, St. Edward's staff (in reality dating from Charles II.'s coronation), the orbs of king and queen, the sword of mercy called Curtana, the two swords of spiritual and temporal justice, the ring of alliance with the nation, bracelets, spurs, vestments, &c. These are to be seen in the Tower of London, and are valued at £3,000,000. The regalia of Scotland consist of the crown, the sceptre, and sword of State, and are on exhibition in the Crown-room in Edinburgh Castle.
Regeneration, the, “new or second birth” required of Christ before any one can become a member of His kingdom, and which, when achieved, is a resolute and irreversible No to the spirit of the world, and a no less resolute and irreversible Yea to the spirit of Christ, the No being as essential to it as the Yea. For as in the philosophy of Hegel, so in the religion of Christ, the negative principle is the creative or the determinative principle. Christianity begins in No, subsists in No, and survives in No to the spirit of the world; this it at first peremptorily spurns, and then disregards as of no account, what things were gain in it becoming loss. A stern requirement, but, as Carlyle says, and knew, one is not born the second time any more than the first without sore birth-pangs. See his “Everlasting No” in “Sartor,” last paragraph.
Regeneration, Baptismal, the doctrine that the power of spiritual life, forfeited by the Fall, is restored to the soul in the sacrament of baptism duly administered.
Regensburg. See Ratisbon.
Reggio (24), an Italian seaport; capital of a province of the same name; occupies a charming site on the Strait of Messina; built on the ruins of ancient Rhegium; is the seat of an archbishop; manufactures silks, gloves, hose, &c.
Regicides, murderers of a king, but specially applied to the 67 members of the court who tried and condemned Charles I. of England, amongst whom were Cromwell, Bradshaw, Ireton, and others, of whom 10 living at the time of the Restoration were executed, and 25 others imprisoned for life.
Regillus, Lake, celebrated in ancient Roman history as the scene of a great Roman victory over the Latins in 496 B.C.; site probably near the modern town of Frascati.
Regina, St., a virgin martyr of the 3rd century, usually depicted as undergoing the torments of martyrdom, or receiving spiritual consolation in prison by a beautiful vision of a dove on a luminous cross.
Regiomontanus, name adopted by Johann Müller, a celebrated German astronomer and mathematician, born at Königsberg, in Franconia; appointed professor of Astronomy in Vienna (1461); sojourned in Italy; settled in Nüremberg, where much of his best work was done; assisted Pope Sixtus IV. in reforming the Calendar; was made Bishop of Ratisbon; died at Rome; was regarded as the most learned astronomer of the time in Europe, and his works were of great value to Columbus and other early navigators (1436-1476).
Registrar-General, an official appointed to superintend registration, specially of births, deaths, and marriages.
Regium Donum, an annual grant formerly voted by Parliament to augment the stipends of the Presbyterian clergy in Ireland, discontinued from 1869.
Regnard, Jean François, comic dramatist, born in Paris; inherited a fortune, which he increased by gambling; took to travelling, and was at 22 captured by an Algerine pirate, and when ransomed continued to travel; on his return to Paris wrote comedies, twenty-three in number, the best of them being “Le Joueur” and “Le Légataire,” following closely in the steps of Molière; he was admired by Boileau (1656-1710).
Regnault, Henri, French painter, born in Paris; son of following; a genius of great power and promise, of which several remarkable works by him are proof; volunteered in the Franco-German War, and fell at Buzenval (1843-1871).
Regnault, Henri Victor, a noted French physicist, born at Aix-la-Chapelle; from being a Paris shopman he rose to a professorship in Lyons; important discoveries in organic chemistry won him election to the Academy of Sciences in 1840; lectured in the “Collège de France and the École Polytechnique;” became director of the imperial porcelain manufactory of Sèvres; did notable work in physics and chemistry, and was awarded medals by the Royal Society of London (1810-1878).
Regnier, Mathurin, French poet, born at Chartres; led when young a life of dissipation; ranks high as a poet, but is most distinguished in satire, which is instinct with verve and vigour (1572-1613).
Regulars, in the Romish Church a member of any religious order who has taken the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience.
Regulus, a Roman of the Romans; was twice over Consul, in 267 and 256 B.C.; defeated the Carthaginians, both by sea and land, but was at last taken prisoner; being sent, after five years' captivity, on parole to Rome with proposals of peace, dissuaded the Senate from accepting the terms, and despite the entreaties of his wife and children and friends returned to Carthage according to his promise, where he was subjected to the most excruciating tortures.
Regulus, St., or St. Rule, a monk of the East who, in the 4th century, it is said, came to Scotland with the bones of St. Andrew, and deposited them at St. Andrews.
Rehan, Ada, actress, born in Limerick; made her début at 16 in Albany, New York; came to London in 1884, and again in 1893; plays Rosalind in “As You Like It,” Lady Teazle in “School for Scandal,” and Maid Marian in the “Foresters,” and numerous other parts; b. 1859.
Rehoboam, the king of the Jews on whose accession at the death of Solomon, in 976 B.C., the ten tribes of Israel seceded from the kingdom of Judah.
Reich, The, the old German Empire.
Reichenbach, Karl, Baron von, expert in the industrial arts, particularly in chemical manufacture; he was a zealous student of animal magnetism, and the discoverer of Od (1788-1869).
Reichenberg (31), a town in North Bohemia, on the Neisse, 86 m. NE. of Prague; chief seat of the Bohemian cloth manufacture.
Reichenhall (4), a popular German health resort, in South-East Bavaria, 10 m. SW. of Salzburg; is charmingly situated amidst Alpine scenery, and has a number of mineral springs; is the centre of the great Bavarian salt-works.
Reichsrath, the Parliament of the Austrian Empire.
Reichstadt, Duke of, the son and successor of Napoleon as Napoleon II.; died at Vienna in 1832.
Reichstag, the German Imperial Legislature, representative of the German nation, and which consists of 397 members, elected by universal suffrage and ballot for a term of five years.
Reid, Sir George, a distinguished portrait-painter, born in Aberdeen; his portraits are true to the life, and are not surpassed by those of any other living artist; b. 1841.
Reid, Right Hon. G. H., Premier of Australia, born at Johnstone, Renfrewshire; emigrated with his parents in 1852; adopted law as his profession; became Minister of Education in 1883; became Premier of N.S.W. in 1894; is a great Free Trader, and visited England for the Jubilee in 1897; Prime Minister of the Australian Commonwealth, 1904; b. 1845.
Reid, Captain Mayne, novelist, born in Co. Down; led a life of adventure in America, and served in the Mexican War, but settled afterwards in England to literary work, and wrote a succession of tales of adventure (1819-1883).
Reid, Thomas, Scottish philosopher, and chief of the Scottish school, born in Kincardineshire, and bred for the Scotch Church, in which he held office as a clergyman for a time; was roused to philosophical speculation by the appearance in 1730 of David Hume's “Treatise on Human Nature,” and became professor of Philosophy in Aberdeen in 1752, and in Glasgow in 1763, where the year after he published his “Inquiry into the Human Mind,” which was followed in course of time by his “Philosophy of the Intellectual and Active Powers”; his philosophy was a protest against the scepticism of Hume, founded on the idealism of Berkeley, by appeal to the “common-sense” of mankind, which admits of nothing intermediate between the perceptions of the mind and the reality of things (1710-1796).
Reid, Sir Wemyss, journalist and man of letters, born in Newcastle-on-Tyne; editor of the Leeds Mercury (1870-86), and of the Speaker since 1890; has written novels and biographies; is President of the Institute of Journalists, and was knighted in 1894; b. 1842.
Reid, Sir William, soldier and scientist; served in the Royal Engineers with distinction under Wellington; became Governor successively of Bermudas, Barbadoes, and Malta, and was the author of a scientific work on “The Law of Storms” (1791-1858).
Reigate (23), a flourishing market-town in Surrey, 21 m. S. of London; is a busy railway centre; has interesting historic ruins; an old church, among others containing the grave of Lord Howard of Effingham.
Reign of a Hundred Days, the period during which Napoleon reigned in Paris from his return from Elba in the beginning of March till he left on the 12th June 1815 to meet the Allies in the Netherlands.
Reign of Terror, the name given to the bloody consummation of the fiery French Revolution, including a period which lasted 420 days, from the fall of the Girondists on the 31st May 1793 to the overthrow of Robespierre and his accomplices on 27th July 1794, the actors in which at length, seeing nothing but “Terror” ahead, had in their despair said to themselves, “Be it so. Que la Terreur soit à l'ordre du jour (having sown the wind, come let us reap the whirlwind). One of the frightfulest things ever born of Time. So many as four thousand guillotined, fusilladed, noyaded, done to dire death, of whom nine hundred were women.”
Reimarus, a philosopher of the Aufklärung (q. v.), born at Hamburg; author of the “Wolfenbüttel Fragments,” published by Lessing in 1777, and written to disprove the arguments for the historical truth of the Bible, and in the interest of pure deism and natural religion (1694-1768).
Reis Effendi, one of the chief Ministers of State in Turkey, who is Lord Chancellor, and holds the bureau of foreign affairs.
Reiters, the cavalry of the German Empire in the 14th and 15th centuries.
Relativity of Knowledge, the doctrine that all knowledge is of things as they appear to us and not of things as they are in themselves, is subjective and not objective, is phenomenal and not noumenal.
Relief, prominence of a sculpture from a plain surface; works in relief are of three kinds: alto-relievo, high relief; mezzo-relievo, medium relief; basso-relievo, low relief.
Religio Medici, a celebrated work of Sir Thomas Browne's, characterised as a “confession of intelligent, orthodox, and logical supernaturalism couched in some of the most exquisite English ever written.”
Religion, a sense, affecting the whole character and life, of dependence on, reverence for, and responsibility to a Higher Power; or a mode of thinking, feeling, and acting which respects, trusts in, and strives after God, and determines a man's duty and destiny in this universe, or “the manner in which a man feels himself to be spiritually related to the unseen world.”
Religious Tract Society, society founded in 1799 for the circulation of religious works in home and foreign parts, has published in 220 languages, and is conducted by an annually elected body, consisting of four ministers and eight laymen in London.
Reliquary, name given to a portable shrine or case for relics of saints or martyrs; they assumed many forms, and were often rich in material and of exquisite design.
Rembrandt or Van Rejn, a celebrated Dutch historical and portrait painter as well as etcher, born at Leyden, where he began to practise as an etcher; removed in 1630 to Amsterdam, where he spent the rest of his life and acquired a large fortune, but lost it in 1656 after the death of his first wife, and sank into poverty and obscurity; he was a master of all that pertains to colouring and the distribution of light and shade (1608-1669).
Remigius, St., bishop and confessor of the 6th century, represented as carrying or receiving a vessel of holy oil, or as anointing Clovis, who kneels before him.
Remington, Philo, inventor of the Remington breech-loading rifle, born at Litchfield, in New York State; 25 years manager of the mechanical department in his father's small-arms factory; Remington type-writer also the outcome of his inventive skill; retired in 1886; b. 1816.
Remonstrance, The, the name given to a list of abuses of royal power laid to the charge of Charles I. and drawn up by the House of Commons in 1641, and which with the petition that accompanied it contributed to bring matters to a crisis.
Remonstrants, a name given to the Dutch Arminians who presented to the States-General of Holland a protest against the Calvinist doctrine propounded by the Synod of Dort in 1610.
Remus, the twin-brother of Romulus, and who was slain by him because he showed his scorn of the city his brother was founding by leaping over the wall.
Rémusat, Abel, Orientalist, born in Paris; studied and qualified in medicine, but early devoted himself to the study of Chinese literature and in 1814 became professor of Chinese in the College of France; wrote on the language, the topography, and history of China, and founded the Asiastic Society of Paris (1788-1832).
Rémusat, Charles, Comte de, French politician and man of letters, born in Paris; was a Liberal in politics; drew up a protest against the ordinances of Polignac, which precipitated the revolution of July; was Minister of the Interior under Thiers, was exiled after the coup d'état, and gave himself mainly to philosophical studies thereafter (1797-1875).
Renaissance, the name given to the revolution in literature and art in Europe during the 15th and 16th centuries, caused by the revival of the study of ancient models in the literature and art of Greece and Rome, especially the former, and to the awakening in the cultured classes of the free and broad humanity that inspired them, an epoch which marks the transition from the rigid formality of mediæval to the enlightened freedom of modern times.
Renaix (17), a busy manufacturing town in East Flanders, Belgium, 22 m. SW. of Ghent; has large cotton and linen factories, breweries, and distilleries.
Renan, Ernest, Orientalist and Biblical scholar, born in Brittany, son of a sailor, who, dying, left him to the care of his mother and sister, to both of whom he was warmly attached; destined for the Church, he entered the seminary of St. Sulpice, where his studies threw him out of the relation with the Church and obliged him to abandon all thoughts of the clerical profession; accomplished in Hebrew, he was appointed professor of that language in the College of France in 1861, though not installed till 1870, and made a member of the French Academy in 1878; having distinguished himself by his studies in the Semitic languages, and in a succession of essays on various subjects of high literary merit, he in 1863 achieved a European reputation by the publication of his “Vie de Jésus,” the first of a series bearing upon the origin of Christianity and the agencies that contributed to its rise and development; he wrote other works bearing more immediately on modern life and its destiny, but it is in connection with his views of Christ and Christianity that his name will be remembered; he entertained at last an overweening faith in science and scientific experts, and looked to the latter as the elect of the earth for the redemption of humanity (1823-1893).
Rendsburg (12), a fortified town in Schleswig-Holstein, on the North Sea and Baltic Canal, 19 m. W. of Kiel; manufactures cotton, chemicals, brandy &c.
René I., titular king of Naples, born at Angers, son of Louis II., Duke of Anjou and Count of Provence; on the death of his father-in-law, Duke of Lorraine, he in 1431 claimed the dukedom; was defeated and imprisoned; bought his liberty and the dukedom in 1437, in which year he also made an ineffectual attempt to make good his claim to the throne of Naples and Sicily; settled down in Provence and devoted himself to literature and art and to developing the country (1409-1480).
Renfrew (7), a royal burgh and county-town of Renfrewshire, situated on the Clyde, 6 m. below Glasgow; dates back to the 12th century as a burgh; industries include thread, cotton cloths, shawl factories, and shipbuilding.
Renfrewshire (291), a south-western county of Scotland; faces the Firth of Clyde on the W., between Ayr on the S. and SW., and the river Clyde on the N.; bordered on the E. by Lanark; hilly on the W. and S., flat on the E.; is watered by the Gryfe, the Black Cart, and the White Cart; dairy-farming is carried on in extensive scale, stimulated by the proximity of Glasgow; nearly two-thirds of the county is under cultivation; coal and iron are mined, and in various parts the manufacture of thread, cotton, chemicals, shipbuilding, &c., is actively engaged in.
Rennell, James, geographer, born near Chudleigh, Devonshire; passed from the navy to the military service of the East India Company; became surveyor-general of Bengal; retired in 1782; author of many works on the topography of India, hydrography, &c.; the “Geographical System of Herodotus Examined and Explained” is his most noted work (1742-1830).
Rennes (65), a prosperous town in Brittany, capital of the department of Ille-et-Vilaine, situated at the junction of the Ille and the Vilaine; consists of a high and low town, separated by the river Vilaine, mostly rebuilt since the disastrous fire in 1720; has handsome buildings, a cathedral, &c.; is the seat of an archbishop, a military centre, and manufactures sail-cloth, linen, shoes, hats, &c.; where the court-martial was held which condemned Captain Dreyfus on a second trial in 1899.
Rennie, John, civil engineer, born in East Linton, East Lothian; employed by the firm of Messrs. Boulton & Watt at Soho, Birmingham, and entrusted by them to direct in the construction of the Albion Mills, London, he became at once famous for his engineering ability, and was in general request for other works, such as the construction of docks, canals, and bridges, distinguishing himself most in connection with the latter, of which Waterloo, Southwark, and London over the Thames, are perhaps the finest (1761-1821).
Rente, name given to the French funds, or income derivable from them.
Renton (5), a town in Dumbartonshire, on the Leven, 2 m. N. of Dumbarton; engaged in calico-printing, dyeing, &c.; has a monument in memory of Tobias Smollett, who was born in the neighbourhood.
Renwick, James, Scottish martyr, born at Moniaive, Dumfriesshire; educated at Edinburgh University, but was refused his degree for declining to take the oath of allegiance; completed his studies in Holland, and in 1683 was ordained at Gröningen; came to Scotland; was outlawed in 1684 for his “Apologetic Declaration”; refused to recognise James II. as king; was captured after many escapes, and executed at Edinburgh, the last of the martyrs of the Covenant (1662-1688).
Repealer, an advocate of the repeal of the Union of Great Britain and Ireland.
Replica, is properly the copy of an original picture done by the hand of the same master.
Repoussé, a name applied to a style of raised ornamentation in metal obtained by beating out from behind a convex design, which is then chased in front; was known to the Greeks, and carried to a high pitch of perfection by Benvenuto Cellini in the 16th century; has been successfully revived, especially in France, in this century.
Repton (2), a village of Derbyshire, 6½ m. SW. of Derby, dates back to the 7th century, and is associated with the establishment of Christianity in England; has a fine Public school, founded in 1556.
Republic, the name given to a State in which the sovereign power is vested in one or more elected by the community, and held answerable to it though in point of fact, both in Rome and the Republic of Venice the community was not free to elect any one outside of a privileged order.
Republicans, The, the name given latterly in the United States to the party opposed to the Democrats (q. v.) and in favour of federalism.
Requiem, a mass set to music, sung for the repose of the soul of a dead person.
Reredos, the name given to the decorated portion of the wall or screen behind and rising above a church altar; as a rule it is richly ornamented with niches and figures, and stands out from the east wall of the church, but not unfrequently it is joined to the wall; splendid examples exist at All Souls' College, Oxford, Durham Cathedral, St. Albans, &c.
Resina (14), a town of South Italy, looks out upon the sea from the base of Vesuvius, 4 m. SE. of Naples, built on the site of ancient Herculaneum; manufactures wine and silk.
Responsions, the first of the three examinations for a degree at Oxford University, or the Little Go.
Ressaidar, in India, a native cavalry officer in command of a Ressalah, or a squadron of native cavalry.
Restoration, The, the name given in English history to the re-establishment of monarchy and the return of Charles II. to the throne, 29th May 1660, after the fall of the Commonwealth.
Restorationists, name of a sect in America holding the belief that man will finally recover his original state of purity.
Resurrectionist, one who stealthily exhumed bodies from the grave and sold them for anatomical purposes.
Retford, East (11), market-town of Nottinghamshire, on the Idle, 24 m. E. by S. of Sheffield; has foundries, paper and flour mills, &c.
Retina, a retiform expansion of the sensatory nerves, which receives the impression that gives rise to vision, or visual perception.
Retributive Justice, justice which rewards good deeds, and inflicts punishment on offenders.
Retz, Cardinal de, born at Montmirail, of Italian descent, and much given to intrigue, obtained the coadjutorship of the archbishopric of Paris, plotted against Mazarin, played an important part in the troubles of the Fronde, and was in 1652 thrown into prison, from which he escaped; he left “Memoirs” which are valuable as a record of the times, though the readers are puzzled to construe from them the character of the author (1614-1679).
Retz, Gilles de, marshal of France, born in Brittany; distinguished himself under Charles VII. against the English; was condemned to be burned alive at Nantes in 1440 for his unnatural crimes and his cruelties.
Retzch, Moritz, painter and engraver, born at Dresden, where he became a professor of Painting; is famous for his etchings illustrative of Goethe's “Faust,” of certain of Shakespeare's plays, as well as of Fouqué's “Tales”; the “Chess-Players” and “Man versus Satan,” which is considered his masterpiece (1779-1857).
Reuchlin, Johann, a learned German humanist, born in the Black Forest, devoted himself to the study of Greek and Hebrew, and did much to promote the study of both in Germany, and wrote “Rudiments of the Hebrew Language”; though he did not attach himself to the Reformers, he contributed by his works and labours to advance the cause of the Reformation; his special enemies were the Dominicans, but he was backed up against them by all the scholars of Germany (1455-1522).
Reunion (formerly Île de Bourbon) (166), mostly Creoles, a French island in the Indian Ocean, 358 m. E. of Madagascar, 38 m. by 28; a volcanic range intersects the island; the scenery is fine; streams plentiful, but small; one-third of the land is uncultivated, and grows fruits, sugar (chief export), coffee, spices, &c. St. Denis (33), on the N. coast, is the capital; has been a French possession since 1649.
Reuss, name of two German principalities stretching between Bavaria on the S. and Prussia on the N.; they belong to the elder and younger branches of the Reuss family. The former is called Reuss-Greiz (63), the latter Reuss-Schleiz-Gera (120); both are hilly, well wooded, and well watered; farming and textile manufacturing are carried on. Both are represented in the Reichstag; the executive is in the hands of the hereditary princes, and the legislative powers are vested in popularly elected assemblies.
Reuter, Fritz, a German humourist, born in Mecklenburg-Schwerin; when a student at Jena took part in a movement among the students in behalf of German unity; was arrested and condemned, after commutation of sentence of death, to thirty years' imprisonment, but was released, after seven of them, in broken health; and after eleven more took to writing a succession of humorous poems in Low German, which placed him in the front rank of the humourists of Germany (1810-1874).
Reuter, Baron Paul Julius, the organiser of the conveyance of news by telegraph, born at Cassel; commenced with Berlin for centre in 1851; transferred his head-quarters to London, and now the “system,” which is in the hands of a limited liability company, has connections with even the remotest corner of the globe; b. 1818.
Reutlingen (19), a picturesque old town in Würtemberg, on the Echatz, 20 m. S. of Stuttgart; formerly one of the free imperial cities of the Swabian League; has a splendid Gothic church; manufactures cloth, cutlery, leather, woollen and cotton yarns, &c.
Revel or Reval (52), capital of the government of Esthonia, in Russia, is a flourishing seaport on the S. side of the Gulf of Finland, 232 m. W. of St. Petersburg; has a castle, fortifications, cathedral, mediæval antiquities, &c.; chiefly engaged in commerce; exports largely oats and other cereals, spirits, flax, &c.
Revelation, name properly applicable to the knowledge of God, or of divine things, imparted to the mind of man, by the operation of the Divine Spirit in the human soul, and as apprehended by it.
Revelation, Book of, or The Apocalypse, the book that winds up the accepted canon of Holy Scripture, of the fulfilment of the prophecies of which there are three systems of interpretation: the Præteritist, which regards them all as fulfilled; the Historical, which regards them as all along fulfilling; and the Futurist, which regards them as still all to be fulfilled. The first is the one which finds favour among modern critics, and which regards it as a forecast of the struggle then impending between the Church under the headship of Christ and the civil power under the emperor of Rome, though this view need not be accepted as excluding the second theory, which regards it as a forecast of the struggle of the Church with the world till the cup of the world's iniquity is full and the day of its doom is come. The book appears to have been written on the occurrence of some fierce persecution at the hands of the civil power, and its object to confirm and strengthen the Church in her faith and patience by a series of visions, culminating in one of the Lamb seated on the throne of the universe as a pledge that all His slain ones would one day share in His glory.
Revels, Master of the, also called Lord of Misrule, in olden times an official attached to royal and noble households to superintend the amusements, especially at Christmas time; he was a permanent officer at the English court from Henry VIII.'s reign till George III.'s, but during the 18th century the office was a merely nominal one.
Reverberatory Furnace, a furnace with a domed roof, from which the flames of the fire are reflected upon the vessel placed within.
Revere, Paul, American patriot, born in Boston, U.S., bred a goldsmith; conspicuous for his zeal against the mother-country, and one of the first actors in the revolt (1735-1818).
Reverend, a title of respect given to the clergy, Very Reverend to deans, Right Reverend to bishops, and Most Reverend to archbishops.
Réville, Albert, a distinguished French Protestant theologian, born at Dieppe; was from 1851 to 1872 pastor at Rotterdam, in 1880 became professor of the History of Religions in the College of France, and six years later was made President of the Section des Études Religieuses at the Sorbonne, Paris; has been a prolific writer on such subjects as “The Native Religions of Mexico and Peru” (Hibbert Lectures for 1884), “Religions of Non-civilised Peoples,” “The Chinese Religion,” &c.; b. 1826.
Revival of Letters, revival in Europe in the 15th century of the study of classical, especially Greek, literature, chiefly by the arrival in Italy of certain learned Greeks, fugitives from Constantinople on its capture by the Turks in 1453, and promoted, by the invention of printing, to the gradual extinction of the dry, barren scholasticism previously in vogue. See Renaissance.
Revival of Religion, a reawakening of the religious consciousness after a period of spiritual dormancy, ascribed by many to a special outpouring of the Spirit in answer to prayer, and in connection with evangelical preaching.
Revolution, a sudden change for most part in the constitution of a country in consequence of internal revolt, particularly when a monarchy is superseded by a republic, as in France in 1789, in 1848, and 1870, that in 1830 being merely from one branch of the Bourbon family to another, such as that also in England in 1658. The French Revolution of 1798 is the revolution by pre-eminence, and the years 1848-49 were years of revolutions in Europe.
Revue des Deux Mondes, a celebrated French review, devoted to literature, science, art, politics, &c., established in 1829, and conducted afterwards by Buloz.
Reybaud, Marie Roch Louis, a versatile littérateur and politician, born at Marseilles; travelled in India, established himself as a Radical journalist in Paris in 1829, and edited important works of travel, wrote popular novels, published important studies in social science; elected a member of the Academy of Moral Sciences (1850); was an active politcian, investigated for government the agricultural colonies in Algeria; author of “Scenes in Modern Life,” “Industry in Europe,” &c. (1799-1879).
Reykjavik (i. e. reeky town), (3), capital of Iceland, situated in a barren misty region on the SW. coast, practically a village of some 100 wooden houses; has a brick cathedral, and is the see of a bishop.
Reynard the Fox, an epic of the Middle Ages, in which animals represent men, “full of broad rustic mirth, inexhaustible in comic devices, a world Saturnalia, where wolves tonsured into monks and nigh starved by short commons, foxes pilgrimaging to Rome for absolution, cocks pleading at the judgment-bar, make strange mummery.” The principal characters are Isengrim the wolf and Reynard the fox, the former representing strength incarnated in the baron and the latter representing cunning incarnated in the Church, and the strife for ascendency between the two one in which, though frequently hard pressed, the latter gets the advantage in the end.
Reynolds, John Fulton, an American general, born at Lancaster, Pennsylvania; graduated at 21 at West Point, entered the army, distinguished himself during the Civil War, especially at the second battle of Bull Run; was killed at the battle of Gettysburg (1820-1863).
Reynolds, Sir Joshua, the chief of English portrait-painters, born near Plymouth; went to London in 1740 to study art, and remained three years; visited Italy and the great centres of art there, when he lost his hearing, and settled in London in 1752, where he began to paint portraits, and had as the subjects of his art the most distinguished people, “filled England with the ghosts of her noble squires and dames”; numbered among his friends all the literary notabilities of the day; he was the first President of the Royal Academy, and though it was no part of his duty, delivered a succession of discourses to the students on the principles and practice of painting, 15 of which have been published, and are still held in high esteem (1723-1792).
Rhabdomancy, a species of divination by means of a hazel rod to trace the presence of minerals or metals under ground.
Rhadamanthus, in the Greek mythology a son of Zeus and Europa, and a brother of Minos (q. v.), was distinguished among men for his strict justice, and was after his death appointed one of the Judges of the dead in the nether world along with Æacus and Minos.
Rhapsodists, a class of minstrels who in early times wandered over the Greek cities reciting the poems of Homer, and through whom they became widely known, and came to be translated with such completeness to us.
Rhea, in the Greek mythology a goddess, the daughter of Uranus and Gaia, the wife of Kronos, and mother of the chief Olympian deities, Zeus, Pluto, Poseidon, Hera, Demeter, and Hestia, and identified by the Greeks of Asia Minor with the great earth goddess Cybele, and whose worship as such, like that of all the other earth deities, was accompanied with wild revelry.
Rhea Silvia, a vestal virgin, the mother of Romulus and Remus, twins, whom she bore to Mars, the god of war, who had violated her.
Rheims (104), an important French city in the department of Marne, on the Vesle, 100 m. NE. of Paris; as the former ecclesiastical metropolis of France it has historical associations of peculiar interest; the French monarchs were crowned in the cathedral (a Gothic structure of unique beauty) from 1179 to 1825; has a beautiful 12th-century Romanesque church, an archiepiscopal palace, a Roman triumphal arch, a Lycée, statues, &c.; situated in a rich wine district, it is one of the chief champagne entrepôts, and is also one of the main centres of French textiles, especially woollen goods; is strongly fortified.
Rheingau, a fruitful wine district in the Rhine Valley, stretching along the right bank of the river in Hesse-Nassau; has a sunny, sheltered situation, and its wines are famed for their quality.
Rhenish Prussia (4,710), the most westerly and most densely populated of the Prussian provinces, lies within the valleys of the Rhine and the Lower Moselle, and borders on Belgium and the Netherlands; is mountainous and forest-clad, except in the fertile plains of the N. and in the rich river valleys, where vines, cereals, and vegetables are extensively cultivated; large quantities of coal, iron, zinc, and lead are mined; as an industrial and manufacturing province it ranks first in Germany. Coblenz (capital), Aix-la-Chapelle, Bonn, and Cologne are among its chief towns; was formed in 1815 out of several smaller duchies.
Rheochord, a wire to measure the resistance or variability of an electric current.
Rheometry, measurement of the force or the velocity of an electric current.
Rhesus, a monkey held sacred in several parts of India.
Rhetoric, the science or art of persuasive or effective speech, written as well as spoken, and that both in theory and practice was cultivated to great perfection among the ancient Greeks and Romans, and to some extent in the Middle Ages and later, but is much less cultivated either as a science or an art to-day.
Rhine, one of the chief rivers of Europe; of several small Alpine head-streams, the Nearer and the Farther Rhine are the two principal, issuing from the eastern flanks of Mount St Gothard; a junction is formed at Reichenau, whence the united stream—the Upper Rhine—flows N. to Lake Constance, and issuing from the NW. corner curves westward to Basel, forming the boundary between Switzerland and Germany. From Basel, as the Middle Rhine, it pursues a northerly course to Mainz, turns sharply to the W. as far as Bingen, and again resumes its northward course. The Rhine-Highland between Bingen and Bonn is the most romantic and picturesque part of its course. As the Lower Rhine it flows in a sluggish, winding stream through the Rhenish Lowlands, enters Holland near Clèves, at Nimeguen bends to the W., and flowing through Holland some 100 m. reaches the German Ocean, splitting in its lowest part into several streams which form a rich delta, one-third of Holland. It is 800 m. in length; receives numerous affluents, e.g. Neckar, Main, Moselle, Lippe; is navigable for ships to Mannheim.
Rhinoplastic Operation, an operation of repairing destroyed portions of the nose by skin from adjoining parts.
Rhode Island (346), the smallest but most densely populated of the United States, and one of the original 13; faces the Atlantic between Connecticut (W.) and Massachusetts (N. and E.); is split into two portions by Narragansett Bay (30 m. long); hilly in the N., but elsewhere level; enjoys a mild and equable climate, and is greatly resorted to by invalids from the S.; the soil is rather poor, and manufactures form the staple industry; coal, iron, and limestone are found. Providence, Pawtucket, and Newport are the chief towns.
Rhodes (10), a Turkish island in the Mediterranean, 12 m. distant from the SW, coast of Asia Minor, area 49 m. by 21 m.; mountainous and woody; has a fine climate and a fertile soil, which produces fruit in abundance, also some grain; it is ill developed, and has a retrogressive population, most of whom are Greeks; sponges, chief export; figures considerably in ancient classic history; was occupied by the Knights Hospitallers of St. John for more than two centuries, and was taken from them by the Turks in 1523.
Rhodes, Cecil, statesman, born in Hertfordshire, son of a vicar; went to South Africa; became director of the diamond mines at Kimberley, and amassed a large fortune; entered the Cape Parliament, and became Prime Minister in 1890; he has been active and successful to extend the British territories in South Africa, aiming at destroying the race prejudices that prevail in it, and at establishing among the different colonies a federated union; b. 1853.
Rhodesia, the territory in South Africa occupied and administered by the British South Africa Company, under the leadership of Mr. Cecil Rhodes, and founded by royal charter in 1889, hence the name it goes under, is bounded on the E. by Portuguese East Africa, on the N. by German East Africa and the Congo Free State, on the W. by Angola and German South-West Africa, and on the S. by Bechuanaland and the Transvaal; is traversed by the Zambesi, which divides it into Northern and Southern Rhodesia; the Northern has been little prospected, though the land is being cultivated, crops raised, and cattle-breeding commenced, besides a new industry started in fibre; the Southern is divided into two provinces, Mashonaland (q. v.) and Matabeleland (q. v.); in Rhodesia public roads have been made to the extent of 2230 miles, and telegraph lines to the extent of 1856 miles of line and 2583 of wire; it is favourable to the breeding of stock, though the rinderpest raged in it disastrously for a time; the climate is suitable for the cultivation of cereals of all kinds, and vegetables, tobacco, india-rubber, and indigo are indigenous, and well repay cultivation; there are forests of timber, and gold, silver, copper, coal, tin, &c., have been discovered; it is, roughly speaking, as large as the German Empire, and in consequence of the Jameson raid the control of the military forces, formerly under the control of the Company, is now in the hands of the Imperial Government.
Rhône, one of the four great rivers of France, rises on Mount St. Gothard, in the Swiss Alps; passes through the Lake of Geneva, and flowing in a south-westerly course to Lyons, is there joined by its chief affluent, the Saône, hence it flows due S.; at Arles it divides into two streams, which form a rich delta before entering the Gulf of Lyons, in the Mediterranean; length, 504 m.; navigable to Lyons, but the rapid current and shifting sandbanks greatly impede traffic.
Rhône (807), a department of France lying wholly within the western side of the Saône and Rhône basin, hilly and fruitful; wine is produced in large quantities; has an active industrial population; capital, Lyons.
Rhumb Line, a circle on the earth's surface making a given angle with the meridian; applied to the course of a ship in navigation.
Rhyl (6), a popular watering-place of Flintshire, North Wales, situated on the coast at the mouth of the Clwyd, 16 m. E. of Conway; has a fine promenade pier, esplanade, gardens, &c.
Rhymer, Thomas the, or True Thomas, Thomas of Ercildoune, or Earlston, a Berwickshire notability of the 13th century, famous for his rhyming prophecies, who was said, in return for his prophetic gift, to have sold himself to the fairies.
Rhys, John, Celtic scholar, born in Wales; professor of Celtic at Oxford; has written on subjects related to that of the chair; b. 1840.
Ribbonism, the principles of secret associations among the lower Irish Catholics, organised in opposition to Orangeism, the name being derived from a green ribbon worn as a badge in a button-hole by the members; they were most active between 1835 and 1855.
Ribera, Jusepe, a Spanish painter, born near Valencia; indulged in a realism of a gruesome type; had Salvator Rosa and Giordano for pupils (1588-1656).
Ricardo, David, political economist, born in London, of Jewish parentage; realised a large fortune as a member of the Stock Exchange; wrote on political economy on abstract lines, and from a purely mercantile and materialistic standpoint (1772-1823).
Ricasoli, Baron, Italian statesman, born at Florence; devoted to the cultivation of the vine, the olive, and the mulberry; was drawn into political life in 1847 in the interest of Italian unity, succeeded Cavour as Prime Minister, but retired from political life in 1866; his “Letters and Papers,” in 5 vols., were published posthumously (1806-1880).
Ricci, Lorenzo, last general of the Jesuits, born in Florence; entered the order when 15; became general in 1736; on the suppression of the order retired to the castle of St. Angelo, where he died 1775.
Ricci, Matteo, founder of the Jesuit mission in China, born in Macerato, Italy; accommodated himself to the manners of the Chinese, and won their confidence (1552-1610).
Riccio, David. See Rizzio.
Rice, James, novelist, born at Northampton, educated at Cambridge; designed for the law, but took to literature; owned and edited Once a Week; best known as the successful collaborateur of Walter Besant (q. v.) in such popular novels as “The Golden Butterfly,” “Ready-Money Mortiboy,” &c. (1844-1882).
Rich, Edmund. See Edmund, St.
Richard I., (surnamed Coeur de Lion), king of England from 1189 to 1199, third son and successor of Henry II.; his early years were spent in Poitou and Aquitaine, where he engaged in quarrels with his father; after his accession to the throne he flung himself with characteristic ardour into the Crusade movement; in 1190 joined his forces with Philip Augustus of France in the third crusade; upheld the claims of Tancred in Sicily; captured Cyprus, and won great renown in the Holy Land, particularly by his defeat of Saladin; was captured after shipwreck on the coast on his way home by the Archduke of Austria, and handed over to the Emperor Henry VI. (1193); was ransomed at a heavy price by his subjects, and landed in England in 1194; his later years were spent in his French possessions warring against Philip, and he died of an arrow wound at the siege of Chalus; not more than a year of his life was spent in England, and his reign is barren of constitutional change (1157-1199).
Richard II., king of England from 1377 to 1399, son of the Black Prince, born at Bordeaux; succeeded his grandfather, Edward III.; during his minority till 1389 the kingdom was administered by a council; in 1381 the Peasants' Revolt broke out, headed by Wat Tyler, as a result of the discontent occasioned by the Statutes of Labour passed in the previous reign, and more immediately by the heavy taxation made necessary by the expense of the Hundred Years' War still going on with France; a corrupt Church called forth the energetic protests of Wycliffe, which started the Lollard (q. v.) movement; an invasion of Scotland (1385), resulting in the capture of Edinburgh, was headed by the young king; coming under French influence, and adopting despotic measures in the later years of his reign, Richard estranged all sections of his people; a rising headed by Henry of Lancaster forced his abdication, and by a decree of Parliament he was imprisoned for life in Pontefract Castle, where he died (probably murdered) soon after (1367-1400).
Richard III., king of England from 1483 to 1486, youngest brother of Edward IV., and last of the Plantagenets, born at Fotheringhay Castle; in 1461 was created Duke of Gloucester by his brother for assisting him to win the crown; faithfully supported Edward against Lancastrian attacks; married (1473) Anne, daughter of Warwick, the King-Maker; early in 1483 was appointed Protector of the kingdom and guardian of his young nephew, Edward V.; put to death nobles who stood in the way of his ambitious schemes for the throne; doubts were cast upon the legitimacy of the young king, and Richard's right to the throne was asserted; in July 1483 he assumed the kingly office; almost certainly instigated the murder of Edward and his little brother in the Tower; ruled firmly and well, but without the confidence of the nation; in 1488 Henry, Earl of Richmond, head of the House of Lancaster, invaded England, and at the battle of Bosworth Richard was defeated and slain (1452-1485).
Richard of Cirencester, an English chronicler, born at Cirencester; flourished in the 14th century; was a monk in the Benedictine monastery of St. Peter, Westminster; wrote a History of England from 447 to 1066; for long the reputed author of a remarkable work on Roman Britain, now proved to be a forgery; d. 1401.
Richards, Alfred Bate, journalist and author; turned from law to literature; author of a number of popular dramas, volumes of poems, essays, &c.; was the first editor of the Daily Telegraph, and afterwards of the Morning Advertiser; took an active interest in the volunteer movement (1820-1876).
Richardson, Sir Benjamin Ward, a distinguished physician and author, born at Somerby, Leicestershire; took the diploma of the Royal College of Physicians in 1850, and graduated in medicine at St. Andrews four years later; founded the Journal of Public Health in 1855, and The Asclepiad in 1861, and the Social Science Review in 1862; won the Fothergilian gold medal and the Astley-Cooper prize of 300 guineas; made many valuable medical inventions, and was an active lecturer on sanitary science, &c.; was knighted in 1893 (1828-1896).
Richardson, Charles, lexicographer; was trained for the bar, but took to literature and education; pensioned in 1852; his chief works are “Illustrations of English Philology” and the “New Dictionary of the English Language” (1837), according to Trench the best dictionary of his day (1775-1865).
Richardson, Sir John, M.D., naturalist and Arctic explorer, born at Dumfries; graduated at Edinburgh; for some time a navy surgeon; accompanied Franklin on the expeditions in 1819-22 and 1825-27, and later commanded one of the Franklin search expeditions (1848); held government appointments, and was knighted in 1846 (1787-1865).
Richardson, Samuel, novelist, born in Derbyshire, the son of a joiner; was apprenticed to a printer in London, whose daughter he married; set up in the business for himself, and from his success in it became Master of the Stationers Company in 1754, and King's Printer in 1761; was 50 before he came out as a novelist; published his “Pamela” in 1740, his masterpiece “Clarissa,” written in the form of letters, in 1748, and “Sir Charles Grandison” in 1753; they are all three novels of sentiment, are instinct with a spirit of moral purity, and are more praised than read (1689-1761).
Richelieu, Armand-Jean Duplessis, Cardinal de, born in Paris, of a noble family; was minister of Louis XIII., and one of the greatest statesmen France ever had; from his installation as Prime Minister in 1624 he set himself to the achievement of a threefold purpose, and rested not till he accomplished it—the ruin of the Protestants as a political party, the curtailment of the power of the nobles, and the humiliation of the House of Austria in the councils of Europe; his administration was signalised by reforms in finance, in the army, and in legislation; as the historian Thierry has said of him, “He left nothing undone that could be done by statesmanship for the social amelioration of the country; he had a mind of the most comprehensive grasp, and a genius for the minutest details of administration”; he was a patron of letters, and the founder of the French Academy (1585-1642).
Richmond, 1, an interesting old borough (4) in Yorkshire, on the Swale, 49 m. N.W. of York; has a fine 11th-century castle, now partly utilised as barracks, remains of a Franciscan friary, a racecourse, &c. 2, A town (23) in Surrey, 9 m. W. of London; picturesquely situated on the summit and slope of Richmond Hill, and the right bank of the Thames; has remains of the royal palace of Sheen, a magnificent deer park, a handsome river bridge, &c.; supplies London with fruit and vegetables; has many literary and historical associations. 3, Capital (85) of Virginia, U.S.; has a hilly and picturesque site on the James River, 116 m. S. of Washington; possesses large docks, and is a busy port, a manufacturing town (tobacco, iron-works, flour and paper mills), and a railway centre; as the Confederate capital it was the scene of a memorable, year-long siege during the Civil War, ultimately falling into the hands of Grant and Sheridan in 1865.
Richmond, Legh, an evangelical clergyman of the Church of England, born in Liverpool, famed for a tract “The Dairyman's Daughter” (1772-1827).
Richter, Jean Paul Friedrich, usually called Jean Paul simply, the greatest of German humourists, born at Wunsiedel, near Baireuth, in Bavaria, the son of a poor German pastor; had a scanty education, but his fine faculties and unwearied diligence supplied every defect; was an insatiable and universal reader; meant for the Church, took to poetry and philosophy, became an author, putting forth the strangest books with the strangest titles; considered for a time a strange, crack-brained mixture of enthusiast and buffoon; was recognised at last as a man of infinite humour, sensibility, force, and penetration; his writings procured him friends and fame, and at length a wife and a settled pension; settled in Baireuth, where he lived thenceforth diligent and celebrated in many departments of literature, and where he died, loved as well as admired by all his countrymen, and more by those who had known him most intimately ... his works are numerous, and the chief are novels, “'Hesperus' and 'Titan' being the longest and the best, the former of which first (in 1795) introduced him into decisive and universal estimation with his countrymen, and the latter of which he himself, as well as the most judicious of his critics, regarded as his masterpiece” (1763-1825).
Richthofen, Baron von, traveller and geographer, born in Carlsruhe, Silesia; accompanied in 1861 the Prussian expedition to Eastern Asia, travelled in 1862-68 in California, and in 1869-72 in China; has since been professor of Geography successively at Bonn, Leipzig, and Berlin; has written a great work on China; b. 1833.
Ricord, Philippe, a famous French physician, born at Baltimore, U.S.; came to Paris, was a specialist in a department of surgery, and surgeon-in-chief to the hospital for venereal diseases (1800-1889).
Ridley, Nicolas, martyred bishop, born in Northumberland, Fellow and ultimately Master of Pembroke College, Cambridge; on a three years' visit to the Continent fell in with certain of the Reformers and returned convinced of and confirmed in the Protestant faith; became king's chaplain, bishop of Rochester, and finally of London; favoured the cause of Lady Jane Grey against Mary, who committed him to the Tower, and being condemned as a heretic was at Oxford burnt at the stake along with Latimer (1500-1555).
Riehm, Edward, Protestant theologian, born at Diersburg, Baden, was professor at Halle; wrote many theological works, among them “Handwörterbuch des biblischen Alterthums” (1830-1888).
Rienzi, Cola di, Roman tribune, born at Rome, of humble origin; gave himself to the study of the ancient history of the city, became inspired with a noble ambition to restore its ancient glory, and being endowed with an eloquent tongue, persuaded, with sanction of Pope Clement VI., who was then at Avignon, his fellow-citizens to rise against the tyranny to which they were subjected at the hands of the nobles, in which he at length was successful; but his own rule became intolerable, and he was assassinated in an émeute just seven years after the commencement of his political career (1313-1354).
Riesengebirge (i. e. Giant Mountains), a range dividing Bohemia from Silesia; Schneekoppe (5260 ft.) is the highest peak; is a famous summer resort for Germans.
Rifacimento, a literary work recast to adapt it to a change in the circumstances of the time.
Riff, the name given to the N. coast-lands of Morocco from Tangiers to Algeria; is a mountainous and woody region, with a rugged foreshore, inhabited by lawless Berbers.
Riga (182), the third seaport of Russia and capital of Livonia, on the Dwina, 7 m. from its entrance into the Gulf of Riga (a spacious inlet on the E. side of the Baltic); has some fine mediæval buildings; is the seat of an archbishop, and is a busy and growing commercial and manufacturing town, exporting grain, timber, flax, linseed, wool, &c.
Rigdum Funnidos, Scott's nickname for John Ballantyne (q. v.).
Rights, Declaration of, a declaration of the fundamental principles of the constitution drawn up by the Parliament of England and submitted to William and Mary on their being called to the throne, and afterwards enacted in Parliament when they became king and queen. It secures to the people their rights as free-born citizens and to the Commons as their representatives, while it binds the sovereign to respect these rights as sacred.
Rigi, an isolated mountain, 5900 ft. high, in the Swiss canton of Schwyz, with a superb view from the summit, on which hotels have been built for the convenience of the many who visit it; is reached by two toothed railways with a gradient of 1 ft. in 4.
Rigveda, the first of the four sections into which the Vedas (q. v.) are divided, and which includes the body of the hymns or verses of invocation and praises; believed to have issued from a narrow circle of priests, and subsequently recast many of them.
Rimini (11, with suburbs 20), a walled city of N. Italy, of much historic interest both in ancient and mediæval times, on the small river Marecchia, spanned by a fine Roman bridge close to its entrance into the Adriatic, 69 m. SE. of Bologna; has a 15th-century Renaissance cathedral, an ancient castle, and other mediæval buildings, a Roman triumphal arch, &c.; manufactures silks and sail-cloth.
Rimmon, name of a Syrian god who had a temple at Damascus called the house of Rimmon, a symbol of the sun, or of the fertilising power of nature.
Rinaldo, one of Charlemagne's paladins, of a violent, headstrong, and unscrupulous character, who fell into disgrace, but after adventures in the Holy Land was reconciled to the Emperor; Angelica, an infidel princess, fell violently in love with him, but he turned a deaf ear to her addresses, while others would have given kingdoms for her hand.
Rinderpest or Cattle Plague, a fever of a malignant and contagious type; the occurrence of it in Britain is due to the importation of infected cattle from the Asiatic steppes.
Ring and the Book, a poem by Browning of 20,000 lines, giving different versions of a story agreeably to and as an exhibition of the personalities of the different narrators.
Rio de Janeiro (423), capital and chief seaport of Brazil, charmingly situated on the E. coast of Brazil, on the W. shore of a spacious and beautiful bay, 15 m. long, which forms one of the finest natural harbours in the world; stretches some 10 m. along the seaside, and is hemmed in by richly clad hills; streets are narrow and ill kept; possesses a large hospital, public library (180,000 vols.), botanical gardens, arsenal, school of medicine, electric tramways, &c.; has extensive docks, and transacts half the commerce of Brazil; coffee is the chief export; manufactures cotton, jute, silk, tobacco, &c. Great heat prevails in the summer, and yellow fever is common.
Rio Grande (known also as Rio Bravo del Norte), an important river of North America, rises in the San Juan Mountains in Colorado; flows SE., dividing Texas from Mexico, and enters the Gulf of Mexico after a course of 1800 m.; is navigable for steamboats some 500 m.; chief tributary, Rio Pecos; also the name given to the head-stream of the river Paraná in Brazil and Argentina.
Rio Grande do Norte (310), a maritime State in the NE. corner of Brazil, called after the Rio Grande, which flows NE. and enters the Atlantic at Natal, the capital of the State.
Rio Grande do Sul (645), the southmost state in Brazil, lies N. of Uruguay, fronting the Atlantic; capital, Rio Grande (18).
Rio Negro, 1, One of the larger tributaries of the Amazon, rises as the Guainia in SE. Columbia; crosses Venezuela and Brazil in a more or less SE. direction, and joins the Amazon (the Marañon here) near Manaos after a course of 1350 m.; some of its tributaries connect the Orinoco with the Amazon. 2, Has its source in a small lake in the Chilian Andes, flows NE. and E. to the Atlantic, is some 500 m. long, and easily navigated.
Rioja (80), a province of W. Argentina, embraces some of the most fruitful valleys of the Andes which grow cereals, vines, cotton, &c.; some mining in copper, silver, and gold is done. The capital, Rioja (6), is prettily planted in a vine and orange district at the base of the Sierra Velasco 350 m. NW. of Cordoba.
Riom (10), a pretty little French town in the dep. of Puy-de-Dôme, noted for its many quaint old houses of the Renaissance period; does a good trade in tobacco, linen, &c.
Rip Van Winkle, a Dutch colonist of New York who, driven from home by a termagant wife strolls into a ravine of the Katskill Mountains, falls in with a strange man whom he assists in carrying a keg, and comes upon a company of odd-looking creatures playing at ninepins, but never uttering a word, when, seizing an opportunity that offered, he took up one of the kegs he had carried, fell into a stupor, and slept 20 years, to find his beard and all the world about him quite changed.
Ripley, 1, a manufacturing town (7) of Derbyshire, situated 10 m. NE. of Derby, in a busy coal and iron district; manufactures silk lace. 2. A Yorkshire village on the Nidd, 3½ m. NW. of Harrowgate; has an interesting castle, old church, &c.
Ripley, George, American transcendentalist, born in Massachusetts; a friend of Emerson's and founder of Brook Farm (q. v.); took to Carlyle as Carlyle to him, though he was “grieved to see him” taken up with the “Progress of Species” set, and “confusing himself” thereby (1802-1880).
Ripon, Frederick John Robinson, Earl of, statesman, younger son of Lord Grantham, entered Parliament in 1806 as a Tory; rose to be Chancellor of the Exchequer, and was for a few months in 1827 Prime Minister; was subsequently in different Cabinets Colonial Secretary, Lord Privy Seal, and President of the Board of Trade; created an Earl In 1833 (1782-1859).
Ripon, George Frederick Samuel Robinson, Marquis of, statesman, born in London, son of preceding; entered House of Commons in 1852 as a Liberal; became Secretary for War (1863), and three years later for India; was President of the Council in 1868, a popular Viceroy of India (1880-84), First Lord of the Admiralty in 1886, and Colonial Secretary in 1892-95; was created Marquis in 1871; went over to the Catholic Church in 1874, resigning in consequence the Grand-Mastership of the Freemasons; b. 1827.
Rishanger, William (“Chronigraphus”), an annalist and monk of St. Albans; wrote what is in effect a continuation of Matthew Paris's (q. v.) “Chronicle,” and practically a history of his own times from 1259 to 1307, which is both a spirited and trustworthy account, albeit in parts not original; b. 1250.
Rishis (i. e. seers), a name given by the Hindus to seven wise men whose eyes had been opened by the study of the sacred texts of their religion, the souls of whom are fabled to be incarnated in the seven stars of the Great Bear.
Ristori, Adelaide, distinguished Italian tragédienne; was one of a family of strolling players; her career on the stage was a continuous triumph; the rôle in which she specially shone was that of Lady Macbeth; she was married in 1847 to the Marquis del Grillo, and is known as Marquise; b. 1821.
Ritschl, Albrecht, Protestant theologian, born at Berlin; studied at Rome, where in 1853 he became professor extraordinarius of theology, and in 1860 ordinary professor; after which he was in 1864 transferred to Göttingen, where he spent the rest of his life, gathering year after year around him a large circle of students, and enriching theological literature by his writings; the work which defines his position as a German theologian is entitled “The Christian Doctrine of Justification and Reconciliation,” in which he seeks to draw the line between Christianity as exhibited respectively in the theology of the Reformation and that of modern Pietism; by his lectures and his writings he became the founder of what is called the Göttingen School of Theology, and exercised an influence on the religious philosophy of the time, such as has not been witnessed in Germany since the days of Schleiermacher; his teaching is distinguished by the prominence it gives to the ethical side of Christianity, and that it is only as exhibited on the ethical side that it becomes the exponent and medium of God's grace to mankind (1822-1889).
Ritschl, Friedrich Wilhelm, German philologist, born near Erfurt; became professor of Philology successively at Breslau, Bonn, and Leipzig; his influence on philological study was great, and his greatest work was an edition of Plautus (1806-1876).
Ritson, Joseph, a whimsical and crabbed antiquary; his industry was great, his works numerous, among them one entitled “Ancient English Metrical Romances,” containing a long and still valuable dissertation (1752-1803).
Ritter, Heinrich, German philosopher, born in Anhalt; professor successively at Berlin, Kiel, and Göttingen; is distinguished as the author of an able “History of Philosophy” (1791-1860).
Ritter, Karl, celebrated geographer, born at Quedlinburg; the founder of comparative geography; professor of geography at Berlin; his chief works “Geography in its Relation to Nature,” and the “History of Man” (1779-1859).
Ritualism, respect for forms in the conduct of religious worship, particularly in connection with the administration of the sacraments of the Church, under the impression or on the plea that they minister, as they were ordained in certain cases to minister, to the quickening and maintenance of the religious life.
Rivarol, a French writer, born at Bagnols, in the department of Var; famed for his caustic wit; was a Royalist emigrant at the time of the Revolution, and aided the cause by his pamphlets; he was styled by Burke “The Tacitus of the Revolution” (1753-1801).
Rive-de-Gier (13), a flourishing town in the department of Loire, France, on the Gier, 13 m. NE. of St. Étienne; is favourably situated in the heart of a rich coal district; has manufactures of silk, glass, machinery, steel, &c.
Rivers, Richard Woodville, Earl, a prominent figure in the reigns of Henry VI. and Edward IV.; was knighted in 1425; espoused the cause of the Lancastrians in the Wars of the Roses, but changed sides on the marriage of his daughter with Edward IV., who created him an earl in 1460; fell out of jealousy into disfavour with the nobility, and was beheaded in 1469; his son Anthony, who succeeded to the title, after acting on the Council of Regency during Edward V.'s reign, was put to death by Richard (III.), Duke of Gloucester, in 1483.
Riviera, an Italian term for coast-land flanked by mountains, especially applied to the strip of land lying around the Gulf of Genoa from Nice to Leghorn, which is divided by Genoa into the Western and Eastern Riviera, the former the more popular as a health resort; but the whole coast enjoys an exceptionally mild climate, and is replete with beautiful scenery. Nice, Monaco, Mentone, and San Remo are among its most popular towns.
Rivière, Briton, celebrated painter of animals, born in London; among his pictures, which are numerous, are “Daniel in the Lions' Den,” “Ruins of Persepolis,” “Giants at Play,” and “Væ Victis”; b. 1840.
Rivoli, 1, town (5) in North Italy, 8 m. W. of Turin; has two royal castles, and manufactures silks, woollens, &c. 2, An Italian village, 12 m. NW. of Verona; scene of Napoleon's crushing victory over the Austrians in 1797.
Rixdollar, a silver coin current on the Continent, of varying value.
Rizzio, David, favourite of Mary, Queen of Scots, born in Turin; the son of a dancing-master; was employed by the queen as her secretary, and being offensive to the nobles, was by a body of them dragged from the queen's presence and stabbed to death, 9th March 1566.
Roanne (31), an old French town in the department of Loire, on the river Loire, 49 m. NW of St. Étienne; has interesting ruins, a college flourishing cotton and hat factories, dye-works, tanneries, &c.
Roanoke (16), a flourishing city of Virginia, U.S., on the Roanoke River; has rapidly sprung into a busy centre of steel, iron, machinery, tobacco, and other factories.
Roaring Forties, a sailor's term for the Atlantic lying between 40° and 50°N. latitude, so called from the storms often encountered there.
Rob Roy, a Highland freebooter, second son of Macgregor of Glengyle; assumed the name of Campbell on account of the outlawry of the Macgregor clan; traded in cattle, took part in the rebellion of 1715, had his estates confiscated, and indemnified himself by raiding (1671-1734).
Robben Island, a small island at the entrance of Table Bay, 10 m. NW. of Cape Town; has a lunatic asylum and a leper colony.
Robbia, Luca Delia, Italian sculptor, born in Florence, where he lived and worked all his days; executed a series of bas-reliefs for the cathedral, but is known chiefly for his works in enamelled terra-cotta, the like of which is named after him, “Robbia-ware” (1400-1482).
Robert I. See Bruce.
Robert II., king of Scotland from 1371 to 1390, son of Walter Stewart and Marjory, only daughter of Robert the Bruce; succeeded David II., and became the founder of the Stuart dynasty; was a peaceable man, but his nobles were turbulent, and provoked invasions on the part of England by their forays on the Borders (1316-1390).
Robert III., king of Scotland from 1390 to 1406, son of Robert II.; was a quite incompetent ruler, and during his reign the barons acquired an ascendency and displayed a disloyalty which greatly diminished the power of the Crown both in his and succeeding reigns; the government fell largely into the hands of the king's brother, the turbulent and ambitious Robert, Duke of Albany; an invasion (1400) by Henry IV. of England and a retaliatory expedition under Archibald Douglas, which ended in the crushing defeat of Homildon Hill (1402), are the chief events of the reign (1340-1406).
Robert the Devil, the hero of an old French romance identified with Robert, first Duke of Normandy, who, after a career of cruelty and crime, repented and became a Christian, but had to expiate his guilt by wandering as a ghost over the earth till the day of judgment; he is the subject of an opera composed by Meyerbeer.
Roberts, David, painter, born in Edinburgh; began as a house-painter; became a scene-painter; studied artistic drawing, and devoted himself to architectural painting, his first pictures being of Rouen and Amiens cathedrals; visiting Spain he published a collection of Spanish sketches, and after a tour in the East published in 1842 a magnificently-illustrated volume entitled the “Holy Land, Syria, Idumæa, Arabia, Egypt, and Nubia;” a great number of his pictures are ecclesiastical interiors (1796-1864).
Roberts, Lord, born at Cawnpore, educated in England; entered the Bengal Artillery in 1851; served throughout the Indian Mutiny, commanded in the Afghan War, and achieved a brilliant series of successes, which were rewarded with honours on his return to England; was made commander-in-chief of the Madras army in 1881, commander-in-chief in India in 1885, and commander of the forces in Ireland in 1895; b. 1832.
Robertson, Frederick William, distinguished preacher, born in London; a graduate of Brasenose College, Oxford, entered the Church in 1840, was curate first at Winchester, next at Cheltenham, and finally settled in Brighton; is known far and wide by his printed sermons for his insight into, and his earnestness in behalf of, Christian truth (1816-1853).
Robertson, Joseph, antiquary, born and educated at Aberdeen; apprenticed to a lawyer, but soon took to journalism, and became editor of the Aberdeen Constitutional, and afterwards of the Glasgow Constitutional; in 1849 was editor of the Edinburgh Evening Courant, and four years later received the post of curator of the historical department of the Edinburgh Register House; author of various historical, antiquarian, and topographical works (1810-1866).
Robertson, Thomas William, a popular dramatist, the son of an actor, born at Newark-on-Trent; brought up amongst actors, he naturally took to the stage, but without success; always ready with his pen, he at last made his mark with “David Garrick,” and followed it up with the equally successful “Ours,” “Caste,” “School,” &c. (1829-1871).
Robertson, William, historian, born in Borthwick, Midlothian; was educated in Edinburgh; entered the Church; became minister of Gladsmuir; distinguished himself in the General Assembly of the Church; became leader of the Moderate party; one of the ministers of Greyfriars Church, Edinburgh, and Principal of the University, having previously written his “History of Scotland,” which brought him other honours, and which was followed by a “History of Charles V.” and a “History of America,” all of which contributed to awaken an interest in historical studies; he was what is called a “Moderate” to the backbone, and his cronies were men more of a sceptical than a religious turn of mind, David Hume being one of the number; while his history of Scotland, however well it may be written, as Carlyle testifies, is no history of Scotland at all (1721-1793)
Robespierre, Maximilien, leader of the Jacobins in the French Revolution, born in Arras, of Irish origin; bred to the bar; became an advocate and a judge; he resigned because he could not brook to sentence a man to death; inspired by the gospel of Rousseau, became a red-hot Republican and an “Incorruptible” (q. v.); carried things with a high hand; was opposed by the Girondists, and accused, but threw back the charge on them; carried the mob along with him, and with them at his back procured sentence of death against the king; head of the Committee of Public Safety, he laid violent hands first on the queen and then on all who opposed or dissented from the extreme course he was pursuing; had the worship of reason established in June 1794, and was at the end of the month following beheaded by the guillotine, amid the curses of women and men (1758-1794).
Robin Hood, a famous outlaw who, with his companions, held court in Sherwood Forest, Nottingham, and whose exploits form the subject of many an old English ballad and tale. He was a robber, but it was the rich he plundered and not the poor, and he was as zealous in the protection of the weak as any Knight of the Round Table; he was an expert in the use of the bow and the quarter-staff (q. v.), and he and his men led a merry life together.
Robins, Benjamin, father of the modern science of artillery, born, the son of a Quaker, at Bath; established himself in London as a teacher of mathematics, as also his reputation by several mathematical treatises; turned his attention to the theoretical study of artillery and fortification; upheld Newton's principle of ultimate ratios against Berkeley, and in 1742 published his celebrated work, the “New Principles of Gunnery,” which revolutionised the art of gunnery; was appointed engineer-in-general to the East India Company (1749), and planned the defences of Madras (1707-1751).
Robinson, Edward, Biblical scholar, born in Connecticut; author of “Biblical Researches in Palestine”; a professor in New York (1794-1863).
Robinson, Henry Crabb, literary dilettante, born at Bury St. Edmunds; lived some years at Weimar, and got acquainted with Goethe and his circle; called to the English bar, and on quitting practice at it with a pension, became acquainted with the literary notabilities in London, and left a diary full of interesting reminiscences (1775-1807).
Robinson, Hercules George Robert, Lord Rosmead, born, son of an admiral, in 1824; withdrew from the army shortly after his first commission, and gave himself to Government Colonial service; received a knighthood, and held Governorship of Hong-Kong in 1859; was successively governor of Ceylon, New South Wales, New Zealand, Cape of Good Hope, &c.; created Lord Rosmead in 1896 (1824-1898).
Robinson, Mary, poetess, born at Leamington; author of various poetical works, a translation of Euripides' “Hippolytus,” a Life of Emily Brontë, &c.; married in 1886 to M. Darmesteter, a noted French Orientalist; b. 1857.
Robson, Frederick (stage name of F. R. Brownhill), a noted comedian, born at Margate; took to the stage in 1844 after serving some time as an apprentice to a London engraver; his greatest triumphs were won after 1853 on the boards of the Olympic Theatre, London; he combined in a high degree all the gifts of a low comedian with a rare power of rising to the grave and the pathetic (1821-1864).
Rochambeau, Comte de, marshal of France, born at Vendôme; commanded the troops sent out by France to assist the American colonies in their rebellion against the mother-country (1725-1807).
Rochdale (72), a flourishing town and cotton centre in Lancashire, prettily situated on the Roche, 11 m. NE. Of Manchester; its woollen and cotton trade (flannels and calicoes) dates back to Elizabeth's time; has an interesting 12th century parish church.
Roche, St., the Patron saint of the plague-stricken; being plague-smitten himself, and overtaken with it in a desert place, he was discovered by a dog, who brought him a supply of bread daily from his master's table till he recovered.
Rochefort, Comte de, commonly known as Henri Rochefort, French journalist and violent revolutionary, who was deported for his share in the Commune in 1871, but escaped and was amnestied, and went back to Paris under eclipse; b. 1830.
Rochelle, La (23), a fortified seaport of France, on an inlet of the Bay of Biscay, 95 m. NW. of Bordeaux; capital of the department of Charente-Inférieure; has a commodious harbour, noteworthy public buildings, a fine promenade and gardens; shipbuilding, glass-works, sugar-refineries, &c., are among its chief industries.
Rochester, 1, an interesting old city (26), of Kent, 29 m. SE. of London, on the Medway, lying between and practically forming one town with Strood and Chatham; the seat of a bishop since 604; has a fine cathedral, which combines in its structure examples of Norman, Early English, and Decorated architecture; a hospital for lepers founded in 1078; a celebrated Charity House, and a strongly posted Norman castle. 2, Capital (163), of Monroe County, New York, on the Genesee River, near Lake Ontario, 67 m. NE. of Buffalo; is a spacious and well-appointed city, with a university, theological seminary, &c.; has varied and flourishing manufactures.
Rochester, John Wilmot, Earl of, a witty profligate of the court of Charles II.; wrote poems, many of them licentious, among them, however, some exquisite songs; killed himself with his debauchery; died penitent; he was the author of the epitaph, accounted the best epigram in the English language, “Here lies our sovereign Lord the king,” &c. (1648-1680).
Rochet, a linen vestment worn by bishops, abbots, and other dignitaries, in the form of a surplice, but shorter and open at the sides.
Rock Island (14), capital of Rock Island county, Illinois, on the Mississippi; a busy centre of railway and river traffic; derives its name from an island in the river, where there is an extensive Government arsenal; a fine bridge spans the river.
Rock Temples, temples hewn out of solid rock, found in Western India especially, such as those at Ellora (q. v.) and Elephanta (q. v.).
Rockall, a remarkable peak of granite rock, rising some 70 ft. above the sea-level from the bed of an extensive sandbank in the Atlantic, 184 m. W. of St. Kilda; a home and haunt for sea-birds.
Rock-butter, a soft mineral substance found oozing from alum slates, and consisting of alum, alumina, and oxide of iron.
Rockford (24), a busy manufacturing town, capital of Winnebago County, Illinois, on the Rock River, 86 m. NW. of Chicago.
Rockhampton (12), the chief port of Central Queensland, Australia, on the Fitzroy, 35 m. from its mouth; in the vicinity are rich gold-fields, also copper and silver; engaged in tanning, meat-preserving, &c.; is connected by a handsome bridge with its suburb North Rockhampton.
Rocking Stones or Logans, large stones, numerous in Cornwall, Wales, Yorkshire, &c., so finely poised as to rock to and fro under the slightest force.
Rockingham, Charles Watson Wentworth, Marquis of, statesman, of no great ability; succeeded to the title in 1750; opposed the policy of Bute, and headed the Whig opposition; in 1762 became Prime Minister, and acted leniently with the American colonies, repealing the Stamp Act; was a bitter opponent of North's American policy of repression; held the Premiership again for a few months in 1782 (1730-1782).
Rocky Mountains, an extensive and lofty chain of mountains in North America, belonging to the Cordillera system, and forming the eastern buttress of the great Pacific Highlands, of which the Sierra Nevada and Cascade Mountains form the western buttress, stretching in rugged lines of almost naked rock, interspersed with fertile valleys, from New Mexico through Canada to the Arctic Ocean, broken only by a wonderfully beautiful tract of elevated plateau in southern Wyoming, over which passes the Union Pacific Railroad; reaches its greatest height in Colorado (Gray's Peak, 14,341 ft.); gold, silver, &c., are found abundantly.
Rococo, name given to a debased style of architecture, overlaid with a tasteless, senseless profusion of fantastic ornamentation, without unity of design or purpose, which prevailed in France and elsewhere in the 18th century.
Rocroi (2), a small fortified town of France, about 3 m. from the Belgian frontier, in the dep. of Ardennes; memorable for a great victory of the French under Condé over the Spaniards in 1643.
Rodbertus, Johann Karl, Socialist, born in Greifswald; believed in a Socialism that would in course of time realise itself with the gradual elevation of the people up to the Socialistic ideal (1815-1875).
Roderic, the last king of the Visigoths in Spain, was slain in battle with the Moors, who had invaded Spain during a civil war, and his army put to flight in 711.
Roderick Random, the hero of a novel of Smollett's, a young Scotch scapegrace, rough and reckless, and bold enough.
Rodez (15), a town of France, in the dep. of Aveyron; crowns an eminence at the foot of which flows the Aveyron, 80 m. NE. of Toulouse; has a beautiful Gothic cathedral, interesting Roman remains; manufactures textiles, leather, paper, &c.
Rodin, Auguste, eminent French sculptor, born in Paris, distinguished for his statues and busts; b. 1840-1917.
Rodney, Lord, English admiral, born at Walton-on-Thames; entered the navy at the age of 12, and obtained the command of a ship in 1742; did good service in Newfoundland; was made Admiral of the Blue in 1759, and in that year destroyed the stores at Havre de Grace collected for the invasion of England; in 1780 defeated the Spanish fleet off Cape St. Vincent; in 1782 defeated the French fleet under Count de Grasse by breaking the enemy's line; was first made a baronet and then a peer, with a pension of £2000, for his services to the country (1718-1792).
Rodosto (19), a Turkish town on the N. coast of the Sea of Marmora, 60 m. W. of Constantinople; is the seat of an archbishop of the Greek Church, has many mosques; fruitful vineyards in the vicinity produce excellent wine.
Rodriguez (2), an interesting volcanic island lying far out in the Indian Ocean, 380 m. NE. of Mauritius, of which it is a dependency; agriculture is the chief employment; has a good climate, but is subject to severe hurricanes.
Roe, Edward Payson, American novelist, born in New Windsor, New York; studied for the ministry and served as a chaplain during the Civil War; settled down as a pastor of a Presbyterian church at Highland Fells; made his mark as a novelist in 1872 with “Barriers Burned Away”; took to literature and fruit-gardening, and won a wide popularity with such novels as “From Jest to Earnest,” “Near to Nature's Heart,” &c. (1838-1888).
Roebuck, John Arthur, English Radical politician, born at Madras; represented first Bath and then Sheffield in Parliament, contributed to the downfall of the Aberdeen Government, and played in general an independent part; his vigorous procedure as a politician earned for him the nickname of “Tear 'em” (1802-1879).
Roermond (12), an old Dutch town in Limburg, at the confluence of the Roer and the Meuse, 29 m. N. by E. of Maestricht; has a splendid 13th-century cathedral; manufactures cottons, woollens, &c.
Roeskilde, an interesting old Danish city, situated on a fjord, 20 m. W. by S. of Copenhagen, dates back to the 10th century; has a fine 13th-century cathedral, the burying-place of most of the Danish kings.
Rogation Days, the Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday preceding Ascension Day, on which special litanies are sung or recited by the Roman Catholic clergy and people in public procession; has its origin in an old custom dating from the 6th century. In England the practice ceased after the Reformation.
Roger I., the youngest of the 12 sons of Tancred of Hauteville; conquered Sicily from the Saracens after a war of 30 years, and governed it under the title of count in part from 1071 and wholly from 1089 to 1101.
Roger II., son and successor of the preceding, was crowned king of the two Sicilies by the Pope; waged war advantageously against the Emperor of the East and the Saracens of North Africa; ruled the country well and promoted industry (1097-1154).
Roger of Wendover, an early English chronicler, lived in the 13th century; was a monk of St. Albans and subsequently prior of Belvoir; wrote a history of the world down to Henry III.'s reign, the only valuable portion of it being that which deals with his own times.
Rogers, Henry, English essayist; contributed for years to the Edinburgh Review; author of the “Eclipse of Faith” (1806-1877).
Rogers, James E. Thorwold, political economist, born in Hampshire; became professor of Political Economy at Oxford; author of a “History of Agriculture and Prices in England” and “Six Centuries of Work and Wages,” an abridgment of it (1823-1890).
Rogers, John, the first of the Marian martyrs, born at Birmingham; prepared a revised edition of the English Bible, preached at Paul's Cross against Romanism the Sunday after Mary's entrance into London, and was after a long imprisonment tried for heresy, and condemned to be burned at Smithfield (1505-1555).
Rogers, Samuel, English poet, born in London, son of a banker, bred to banking, and all his life a banker—took to literature, produced a succession of poems: “The Pleasures of Memory” in 1792, “Human Life” in 1819, and “Italy,” the chief, in 1822; he was a good conversationalist, and told lots of good stories, of which his “Table-Talk,” published in 1856, is full; he issued at great expense a fine edition of “Italy” and early poems, which were illustrated by Turner and Stothard, and are much prized for the illustrations (1763-1855).
Roget, Peter Mark, physician, born in London; was professor of Physiology at the Royal Institution; wrote on physiology in relation to natural theology; was author of a “Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases” (1779-1869).
Rohan, Prince Louis de, a profligate ecclesiastic of France who attained to the highest honours in the Church; became archbishop and cardinal, but who had fallen out with royalty; was debarred from court, tried every means to regain the favour of Marie Antoinette, which he had forfeited, was inveigled into buying a necklace for her in hope of thereby winning it back, found himself involved in the scandal connected with it, and was sent to the Bastille (1783-1803). See “Diamond Necklace” in Carlyle's “Miscellanies.”
Rohilkhand (5,343), a northern division of the North-West Provinces, British India; is a flat, well-watered, fertile district, crossed by various railways; takes its name from the Rohillas, an Afghan tribe, who had possession of it in the 18th century.
Rohillas (i. e. hillmen), a tribe of Afghans who settled in a district N. of Oudh, called Rohilkhand after them, and rose to power in the 18th century, till their strength was broken by the British in 1774.
Rohlfs, F. Gerard, German traveller, born near Bremen, travelled in various directions through North Africa; undertook missions to Abyssinia, and has written accounts of his several journeys; b. 1832.
Rokitansky, Baron, eminent physician, born at Königgrätz, professor of Pathological Anatomy at Vienna, and founder of that department of medicine (1804-1878).
Roland, one of the famous paladins of Charlemagne, and distinguished for his feats of valour, who, being inveigled into the pass of Roncesvalles, was set upon by the Gascons and slain, along with the flower of the Frankish chivalry, the whole body of which happened to be in his train.
Roland, Madame, a brave, pure-souled, queen-like woman with “a strong Minerva face,” the noblest of all living Frenchwomen, took enthusiastically to the French Revolution, but when things went too far supported the Moderate or Girondist party; was accused, but cleared herself before the Convention, into whose presence she had been summoned, and released; but two days after was arrested, imprisoned in Charlotte Corday's apartments, and condemned; on the scaffold she asked for pen and paper “to write the strange thoughts that were rising in her,” which was refused; looking at the statue of Liberty which stood there, she exclaimed bitterly before she laid her head on the block, “O Liberty, what crimes are done in thy name!” (1754-1793).
Roland de la Platière, Jean Marie, husband of Madame Roland, was Inspector of Manufactures at Lyons; represented Lyons in the Constituent Assembly; acted with the Girondists; fled when the Girondist party fled, and on hearing of his wife's fate at Rouen bade farewell to his friends who had sheltered him, and was found next morning “sitting leant against a tree, stiff in the rigour of death, a cane-sword run through his heart” (1732-1793).
Rollin, Charles, French historian, born in Paris; rector of the University; wrote “Ancient History” in 13 vols., and “Roman History” in 16 vols., once extremely popular, but now discredited and no longer in request (1661-1741).
Rollo, a Norwegian, who became the chief of a band of Norse pirates who one day sailed up the Seine to Rouen and took it, and so ravaged the country that Charles the Simple was glad to come to terms with them by surrendering to them part of Neustria, which thereafter bore from them the name of Normandy; after this Rollo embraced Christianity, was baptized by the Bishop of Rouen, and was the first Duke of Normandy (860-932).
Romagna, the former name of a district in Italy which comprised the NE. portion of the Papal States, embracing the modern provinces of Ferrara, Bologna, Ravenna, and Forli.
Romaine, William, evangelical divine of the English Church, born at Hartlepool, author of works once held in much favour by the evangelicals, entitled severally “The Life, the Walk, and the Triumph of Faith” (1714-1795).
Roman Empire, Holy, or the Reich, the name of the old German Empire which, under sanction of the Pope, was established by Otho the Great in 962, and dissolved in 1806 by the resignation of Francis II., Emperor of Austria, and was called “Holy” as being Christian in contrast with the old pagan empire of the name.
Romance Languages, the name given to the languages that sprung from the Latin, and were spoken in the districts of South Europe that had been provinces of Rome.
Romanes, George John, naturalist, born at Kingston, Canada; took an honours degree in science at Cambridge; came under the influence of Darwin, whose theory of evolution he advocated and developed in lectures and various works, e. g. “Scientific Evidences of Organic Evolution,” “Mental Evolution in Animals,” “Mental Evolution in Man”; his posthumous “Thoughts on Religion” reveal a marked advance from his early agnosticism towards a belief in Christianity; founded the Romanes Lectures at Oxford (1848-1894).
Romanoff, the name of an old Russian family from which sprung the reigning dynasty of Russia, and the first Czar of which was Michael Fedorovitch (1613-1645).
Romans (17), a town in the dep. Drôme, France, on the Isère, 12 m. NE. of Valence; a 9th-century bridge spans the river to the opposite town Péage; has a 9th-century abbey; manufactures silk, &c.
Romans, Epistle to the, an epistle written from Corinth, in the year 59, by St. Paul to the Church at Rome to correct particularly two errors which he had learned the Church there had fallen into, on the part, on the one hand, of the Jewish Christians, that the Gentiles as such were not entitled to the same privileges as themselves, and, on the other hand, of the Gentile Christians, that the Jews by their rejection of Christ had excluded themselves from God's kingdom; and he wrote this epistle to show that the one had no more right to the grace of God than the other, and that this grace contemplates the final conversion of the Jews as well as the Gentiles. The great theme of this epistle is that faith in Christ is the one way of salvation for all mankind, Jew as well as Gentile, and its significance is this, that it contains if not the whole teaching of Paul, that essential part of it which presents and emphasises the all-sufficiency of this faith.
Romanticism, the name of the reactionary movement in literature and art at the close of last century and at the beginning of this against the cold and spiritless formalism and pseudo-classicism that then prevailed, and was more regardful of correctness of expression than truth of feeling and the claims of the emotional nature; has been defined as the “reproduction in modern art and literature of the life and thought of the Middle Ages.”
Rome (423), since 1871 capital of the modern kingdom of Italy (q. v.), on the Tiber, 16 m. from its entrance into the Tyrrhenian Sea; legend ascribes its foundation to Romulus in 753 B.C., and the story of its progress, first as the chief city of a little Italian kingdom, then of a powerful and expanding republic (510 B.C. to 30 B.C.), and finally of a vast empire, together with its decline and fall in the 5th century (476 A.D.), before the advancing barbarian hordes, forms the most impressive chapter in the history of nations; as the mother-city of Christendom in the Middle Ages, and the later capital of the Papal States (q. v.) and seat of the Popes, it acquired fresh glory; it remains the most interesting city in the world; is filled with the sublime ruins and monuments of its pagan greatness and the priceless art-treasures of its mediæval period; of ruined buildings the most imposing are the Colosseum (a vast amphitheatre for gladiatorial shows) and the Baths of Caracalla (accommodated 1600 bathers); the great aqueducts of its Pre-Christian period still supply the city with water from the Apennines and the Alban Hills; the Aurelian Wall (12 m.) still surrounds the city, enclosing the “seven hills,” the Palatine, Capitoline, Aventine, &c., but suburbs have spread beyond; St. Peter's is yet the finest church in the world; the Popes have their residence in the Vatican; its manufactures are inconsiderable, and consist chiefly of small mosaics, bronze and plaster casts, prints, trinkets, &c.; depends for its prosperity chiefly on the large influx of visitors, and the court expenditure of the Quirinal and Vatican, and of the civil and military officials.
Romford (8), an old market-town of Essex, on the Bourne or Rom, 12 m. NE. of London; noted for its cattle and corn markets; industries include brewing, market-gardening, foundries, &c.
Romilly, Sir Samuel, English lawyer, born in London, of a Huguenot family; was a Whig in politics, and was Solicitor-General for a time; devoted himself to the amendment of the criminal law of the country, and was a zealous advocate against slavery and the spy system (1751-1818).
Romney, George, English portrait-painter, born in Lancashire; married at Kendal, left his wife and two children there, and painted portraits in London for 35 years in rivalry with Reynolds and Gainsborough, and retired at the end of that time to Kendal to die, his wife nursing him tenderly, though in the whole course of the term referred to, he had visited her only twice (1734-1862).
Romney, New (1), one of the old Cinque Ports (q. v.), in S. Kent, 8 m. SW. of Hythe; the sea has receded from its shores, leaving it no longer a port; as centre of a fine pastoral district it has an important sheep fair; the little village of Old Romney lies 1½ m. inland.
Romola, a novel by George Eliot, deemed her greatest by many, being “a deep study of life in the city of Florence from an intellectual, artistic, religious, and social point of view.”
Romsay (4), a town in Hampshire, on the Test, 8 m. NW. of Southampton; has a remarkably fine old Norman church and a corn exchange; birthplace of Lord Palmerston.
Romulus, legendary founder of Rome, reputed son of Mars and Rhea Silvia (q. v.), daughter of Numitor, king of Alba Longa; exposed at his birth, along with Remus, his twin-brother (q. v.); was suckled by a she-wolf and brought up by Faustulus, a shepherd; opened an asylum for fugitives on one of the hills of Rome, and founded the city in 753 B.C., peopling it by a rape of Sabine women, and afterwards forming a league with the Sabines (q. v.); he was translated to heaven during a thunderstorm, and afterwards worshipped as Quirinus, leaving Rome behind him as his mark.
Ronaldshay, North and South, two of the Orkney Islands; North Ronaldshay is the most northerly of the Orkney group; South Ronaldshay (2) lies 6¼ m. NE. of Duncansby Head; both have a fertile soil, and the coast fisheries are valuable.
Roncesvalles, a valley of the Pyrenees, 23 m. NE. of Pampeluna, where in 775 the rear of the army of Charlemagne was cut in pieces by the Basques, and Roland (q. v.) with the other Paladins was slain.
Ronda (19), one of the old Moorish towns of Spain, built amid grand scenery on both sides of a great ravine (bridged in two places), down which rushes the Guadiaro, 43 m. W. of Malaga; is a favourite summer resort.
Rondeau, a form of short poem (originally French) which, as in the 15th century, usually consists of 13 lines, eight of which have one rhyme and five another; is divided into three stanzas, the first line of the rondeau forming the concluding line of the last two stanzas; Swinburne has popularised it in modern times.
Rondo, a form of musical composition which corresponds to the rondeau (q. v.) in poetry; consists of two or more (usually three) strains, the first being repeated at the end of each of the other two, but it admits of considerable variation.
Ronsard, Pierre, celebrated French poet, born near Vendôme; was for a time attached to the Court; was for three years of the household of James V. of Scotland in connection with it, and afterwards in the service of the Duke of Orleans, but having lost his hearing gave himself up to literature, writing odes and sonnets; he was of the Pléiade school of poets (q. v.), and contributed to introduce important changes in the idiom of the French language, as well as in the rhythm of French poetry (1521-1585).
Röntgen, Wilhelm Konrad von, discoverer of the Röntgen rays, born at Lennep, in Rhenish Prussia; since 1885 has been professor of Physics at Würzburg; his discovery of the X-rays was made in 1898, and has won him a wide celebrity; b. 1845.
Röntgen Rays, described by Dr. Knott as “rays of light that pass with ease through many substances that are optically opaque, but are absorbed by others.” “For example,” he says, “the bony structures of the body are much less transparent than the fleshy parts; hence by placing the hand between a fluorescent screen and the source of these rays we see the shadow of the skeleton of the hand with a much fainter shadow of the flesh and skin bordering it.” See Dr. Knott's “Physics.”
Rooke, Sir George, British admiral, born at Canterbury; distinguished himself at the battle of Cape La Hogue in 1692; in an expedition against Cadiz destroyed the Plate-fleet in the harbour of Vigo in 1702; assisted in the capture of Gibraltar from the Spaniards in 1704, and fought a battle which lasted a whole day with a superior French force off Malaga the same year (1650-1709).
Roon, Count von, Prussian general, born in Pomerania; was Minister of War in 1859 and of Marine in 1861; was distinguished for the important reforms he effected in the organisation of the Prussian army, conspicuous in the campaigns of 1866 and 1871-72 (1803-1879).
Root, George Frederick, a popular American song-writer, born at Sheffield, Massachusetts; was for some time a music teacher in Boston and New York; took to song writing, and during the Civil War leaped into fame as the composer of “Tramp, tramp, tramp the Boys are Marching,” “Just before the Battle, Mother,” “The Battle Cry of Freedom,” and other songs; was made a Musical Doctor by Chicago University in 1872 (1820-1895).
Root and Branch Men, name of a party in the Commons who in 1641 supported a petition for the abolition of Episcopacy in England, and even carried a bill through two readings, to be finally thrown out.
Ropemaker, The Beautiful. See Labé, Louise.
Rorke's Drift, a station on the Tugela River, Zululand, the defence of which was on the night of the 24th January 1879 successfully maintained by 80 men of the 24th Regiment against 4000 Zulu warriors.
Rosa, Carl, father of English opera, born at Hamburg; introduced on the English stage the standard Italian, French, and German operas with an English text (1842-1889).
Rosa, Salvator, Italian painter, born near Naples, a man of versatile ability; could write verse and compose music, as well as paint and engrave; his paintings of landscape were of a sombre character, and generally representative of wild and savage scenes; he lived chiefly in Rome, but took part in the insurrection of Masaniello at Naples in 1647 (1615-1673).
Rosamond, Fair, a daughter of Lord Clifford, and mistress of Henry II., who occupied a bower near Woodstock, the access to which was by a labyrinth, the windings of which only the king could thread. Her retreat was discovered by Queen Eleanor, who poisoned her.
Rosario (51), an important city of the Argentine Republic, on the Paraná, 190 m. NW. of Buenos Ayres; does a large trade with Europe, exporting wool, hides, maize, wheat, &c.
Rosary, a string of beads used by Hindus, Buddhists, Mohammedans, and Roman Catholics as an aid to the memory during devotional exercises; the rosary of the Roman Catholics consists of beads of two sizes, the larger ones mark the number of Paternosters and the smaller the number of Ave Marias repeated; of the former there are usually five, of the latter fifty.
Rosas, Jean Manuel, Argentine statesman, born at Buenos Ayres; organised the confederation, became dictator, failed to force the Plate River States into the confederation, and took refuge in England, where he died (1793-1877).
Roscher, Wilhelm, distinguished political economist, born at Hanover, professor at Göttingen and Leipzig, the head of the historical school of political economy; his chief work a “System of Political Economy” (1817-1894).
Roscius, Quintus, famous Roman comic actor, born near Lanuvium, in the Sabine territory; was a friend of Cicero, and much patronised by the Roman nobles; was thought to have reached perfection in his art, so that his name became a synonym for perfection in any profession or art.
Roscoe, Sir Henry, chemist, born in London, grandson of succeeding, professor at Owens College, Manchester; author of treatises on chemistry; b. 1834.
Roscoe, William, historian, born in Liverpool; distinguished as the author of the “Life of Lorenzo de' Medici” and of “Leo X.,” as well as of “Handbooks of the Italian Renaissance” and a collection of poems (1753-1831).
Roscommon (114), an inland county of Connaught, SW. Ireland; is poorly developed; one-half is in grass, and a sixth mere waste land; crops of hay, potatoes, and oats are raised, but the rearing of sheep and cattle is the chief industry; the rivers Shannon and Suck lie on its E. and W. borders respectively; there is some pretty lake-scenery, interesting Celtic remains, castle, and abbey ruins, &c. The county town, 96 m. NW. of Dublin, has a good cattle-market, and remains of a 13th-century Dominican abbey and castle.
Roscrea (3), an old market-town of Tipperary, 77 m. SW. of Dublin; its history reaches back to the 7th century, and it has interesting ruins of a castle, round tower, and two abbeys.
Rosebery, Archibald Philip Primrose, Earl of, born in London; educated at Eton and Christ's Church, Oxford; succeeded to the earldom in 1868; was twice over Secretary for Foreign Affairs under Mr. Gladstone, in 1885 and 1892; was first Chairman of London County Council; became Prime Minister on March 1894 on Mr. Gladstone's retirement, and resigned in June 1895; he is one of the most popular statesmen and orators of the day, and held in deservedly high esteem by all classes; b. 1847.
Rosecrans, William Starke, American general, born at Kingston, Ohio; trained as an engineer, he had settled down to coal-mining when the Civil War broke out; joined the army in 1861, and rapidly came to the front; highly distinguished himself during the campaigns of 1862-63, winning battles at Iuka, Corinth, and Stone River; but defeated at Chickamauga he lost his command; reinstated in 1864 he drove Price out of Missouri; has been minister to Mexico, a member of Congress, and since 1885 Registrar of the U.S. Treasury; b. 1819.
Rosenkranz, Karl, philosopher of the Hegelian school, born at Magdeburg; professor of Philosophy at Königsberg; wrote an exposition of the Hegelian system, a “Life of Hegel,” on “Goethe and his Works,” &c. (1805-1879).
Roses, Wars of the, the most protracted and sanguinary civil war in English history, fought out during the reigns of Henry VI., Edward IV., and Richard III. between the adherents of the noble houses of York and Lancaster—rival claimants for the throne of England—whose badges were the white and the red rose respectively; began with the first battle of St. Albans (1455), in which Richard, Duke of York, defeated Henry VI.'s forces under the Duke of Somerset; but not till after the decisive victory at Towton (1461) did the Yorkists make good their claim, when Edward (IV.), Duke of York, became king. Four times the Lancastrians were defeated during his reign. The war closed with the defeat and death of the Yorkist Richard III. at Bosworth, 1485, and an end was put to the rivalry of the two houses by the marriage of Henry VII. of Lancaster with Elizabeth of York, 1486.
Rosetta (18), a town on the left branch of the delta of the Nile, 44 m. NE. of Alexandria, famous for the discovery near it by M. Boussard, in 1799, of the Rosetta stone with inscriptions in hieroglyphic, demotic and Greek, and by the help of which archæologists have been able to interpret the hieroglyphics of Egypt.
Rosicrucians, a fraternity who, in the beginning of the 15th century, affected an intimate acquaintance with the secrets of nature, and pretended by the study of alchemy and other occult sciences to be possessed of sundry wonder-working powers.
Rosinante, the celebrated steed of Don Quixote, reckoned by him superior to the Bucephalus of Alexander and the Bavieca of the Cid.
Roslin, a pretty little village of Midlothian, by the wooded side of the North Esk, 6½ m. S. of Edinburgh; has ruins of a 14th-century castle, and a small chapel of rare architectural beauty, built in the 16th century as the choir of a projected collegiate church.
Rosmini, Antonio Rosmini-Serbati, distinguished Italian philosopher, born at Rovereto, entered the priesthood, devoted himself to the study of philosophy, founded a system and an institute called the “Institute of the Brethren of Charity” at Stresa, W. of Lake Maggiore, on a pietistic religious basis, which, though sanctioned by the Pope, has encountered much opposition at the hands of the obscurantist party in the Church (1797-1865).
Ross, Sir John, Arctic explorer, born in Wigtownshire; made three voyages, the first in 1811 under Parry; the second in 1829, which he commanded; and a third in 1850, in an unsuccessful search for Franklin, publishing on his return from them accounts of the first two, in both of which he made important discoveries (1777-1856).
Rossano (19), a town of Southern Italy, in Calabria, 2 m. from the SW. shore of the Gulf of Taranto; has a fine cathedral and castle; valuable quarries of marble and alabaster are wrought in the vicinity.
Rossbach, a village in Prussian Saxony, 9 m. SW. of Merseburg, where Frederick the Great gained in 1767 a brilliant victory with 22,000 men over the combined arms of France and Austria with 60,000.
Rosse, William Parsons, third Earl of, born in York; devoted to the study of astronomy; constructed reflecting telescopes, and a monster one at the cost of £30,000 at Parsonstown, his seat in Ireland, by means of which important discoveries were made, specially in the resolution of nebulæ (1800-1867).
Rossetti, Charles Dante Gabriel, poet and painter, born in London, the son of Gabriele Rossetti; was as a painter one of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (q. v.), and is characterised by Ruskin as “the chief intellectual force in the establishment of the modern romantic school in England,... as regarding the external world as a singer of the Romaunts would have regarded it in the Middle Ages, and as Scott, Burns, Byron, and Tennyson have regarded it in modern times,” and as a poet was leader of the romantic school of poetry, which, as Stopford Brooke remarks, “found their chief subjects in ancient Rome and Greece, in stories and lyrics of passion, in mediæval romance, in Norse legends, in the old English of Chaucer, and in Italy” (1828-1882).
Rossetti, Christina Georgina, poetess, born in London, sister of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and of kindred temper with her brother, but with distinct qualities of her own; her first volume, called the “Goblin-Market,” contains a number of very beautiful short poems; she exhibits, along with a sense of humour, a rare pathos, which, as Professor Saintsbury remarks, often “blends with or passes into the utterance of religious awe, unstained and unweakened by any craven fear” (1830-1894).
Rossetti, Gabriele, Italian poet and orator, born at Vasto; had for his patriotic effusions to leave Italy, took refuge in London, and became professor of Italian in King's College, London; was a man of strong character, and student of literature as well as man of letters himself; was the father of Dante Gabriel and Christina (1783-1854).
Rossi, Pellegrino, an Italian jurist and politician, born at Carrara, educated at Bologna, where he became professor of Law in 1812; four years later was appointed to a chair in Geneva, where he also busied himself with politics as a member of the Council and deputy in the Diet; settled in Paris in 1833, became professor at the Collège de France, was naturalised and created a peer, returned to Rome, broke off his connection with France, won the friendship of Pius IX., and rose to be head of the ministry; was assassinated (1787-1848).
Rossini, Gioacchino, celebrated Italian composer of operatic music, born at Pesaro; his operas were numerous, of a high order, and received with unbounded applause, beginning with “Tancred,” followed by “Barber of Seville,” “La Gazza Ladra,” “Semiramis,” “William Tell,” &c.; he composed a “Stabat Mater,” and a “Mass” which was given at his grave (1792-1868).
Rostock (44), a busy German port in Mecklenburg, on the Warnow, 7 m. from its entrance into the Baltic; exports large quantities of grain, wool, flax, &c., has important wool and cattle markets; shipbuilding is the chief of many varied industries, owns a flourishing university, a beautiful Gothic church, a ducal palace, &c.
Rostoff, 1, a flourishing town (67) of South Russia, on the Don, 34 m. E. of Taganrog; manufactures embrace tobacco, ropes, leather, shipbuilding, &c. 2, One of the oldest of Russian market-towns (12), on the Lake of Rostoff, 34 m. SW. of Jaroslav, seat of an archbishop; manufactures linens, silks, &c.
Rostopchine, Count, Russian general, governor of Moscow; was charged with having set fire to the city against the entrance of the French in 1812; in his defence all he admitted was that he had set fire to his own mansion, and threw the blame of the general conflagration on the citizens and the French themselves (1763-1826).
Rostrum (lit. a beak), a pulpit in the forum of Rome where the orators delivered harangues to the people, so called as originally constructed of the prows of war-vessels taken at the first naval battle in which Rome was engaged.
Rothe, Richard, eminent German theologian, born at Posen, professor eventually at Heidelberg; regarded the Church as a temporary institution which would decease as soon as it had fulfilled its function by leavening society with the Christian spirit; he wrote several works, but the greatest is entitled “Theological Ethics” (1799-1867).
Rotherham (42), a flourishing town in Yorkshire, situated on the Don, 5 m. NE. of Sheffield; its cruciform church is a splendid specimen of Perpendicular architecture; manufactures iron-ware, chemicals, pottery, &c.
Rothesay (9), popular watering-place on the W. coast of Scotland, capital of Buteshire, charmingly situated at the head of a fine hill-girt bay on the NE. side of the island of Bute, 19 m. SW. of Greenock; has an excellent harbour, esplanade, &c.; Rothesay Castle is an interesting ruin; is a great health and holiday resort.
Rothschild, Meyer Amschel, the founder of the celebrated banking business, born at Frankfort-on-the-Main, a Jew by birth; began his career as a money-lender and made a large fortune (1743-1812); left five sons, who were all made barons of the Austrian empire—Amselm von R., eldest, head of the house at Frankfort (1773-1855); Solomon von R., the second, head of the Vienna house (1774-1855); Nathan von R., the third, head of the London house (1777-1836); Karl von R., the fourth, head of the house at Naples (1755-1855); and Jacob von R., the fifth, head of the Paris house (1792-1868).
Rotrou, Jean de, French poet, born at Dreux; was a contemporary of Corneille and a rival, wrote a number of plays, almost all tragedies, on romantic and classical subjects, some of which have kept the stage till now (1609-1650).
Rotterdam (223), the chief port and second city of Holland, situated at the junction of the Rotte with the Maas, 19 m. from the North Sea and 45 m. SW. of Amsterdam; the town is cut in many parts by handsome canals, which communicate with the river and serve to facilitate the enormous foreign commerce; the quaint old houses, the stately public buildings, broad tree-lined streets, canals alive with fleets of trim barges, combine to give the town a picturesque and animated appearance. Boymans' Museum has a fine collection of Dutch and modern paintings, and the Groote Kerk is a Gothic church of imposing appearance; there is also a large zoological garden; shipbuilding, distilling, sugar-refining, machine and tobacco factories are the chief industries.
Rotti (60), a fertile hilly island in the Indian Archipelago, SW. of Timor, a Dutch possession.
Roubaix (115), a busy town in the department of Nord, N. of France; situated on a canal 6 m. NE. of Lille; is of modern growth; actively engaged in the manufacture of all kinds of textiles, in brewing, &c.
Roubilliac, Louis François, sculptor, born at Lyons; studied in Paris, came to London; executed there statues of Shakespeare in the British Museum, Sir Isaac Newton at Cambridge, and Händel at London (1693-1762).
Rouble, a silver coin of the value of 3s. 2d.; the unit of the Russian monetary system; a much depreciated paper rouble is also in circulation; the rouble is divided into 100 copecks.
Rouen (112), the ancient capital of Normandy, a busy manufacturing town on the Seine, 87 m. NW of Paris; a good portion of the old, crowded, picturesque town has given place to more spacious streets and dwellings; the old ramparts have been converted into handsome boulevards; has several Gothic churches unrivalled in beauty, a cathedral (the seat of an archbishop), &c.; the river affords an excellent waterway to the sea, and as a port Rouen ranks fourth in France; is famed for its cotton and other textiles; Joan of Arc was burned here in 1431.
Rouget de Lisle, officer of the Engineers, born at Lons-le-Saulnier; immortalised himself as the author of the “Marseillaise” (q. v.); was thrown into prison by the extreme party at the Revolution, but was released on the fall of Robespierre; fell into straitened circumstances, but was pensioned by Louis Philippe (1760-1836).
Rouge-et-Noir (i. e. red and black), a gambling game of chance with cards, so called because it is played on a table marked with two red and two black diamond-shaped spots, and arranged alternately in four different sections of the table.
Rouher, Eugène, French Bonapartist statesman, born at Riom, where he became a barrister; entered the Constituent Assembly in 1848, and in the following year became Minister of Justice; was more or less in office during the next 20 years; he became President of the Senate in 1869; fled to England on the fall of the Empire; later on re-entered the National Assembly, and vigorously defended the ex-emperor Napoleon III. (1814-1884).
Roulers (20), a manufacturing town in West Flanders, 19 m. SW. of Bruges; engaged in manufacturing cottons, lace, &c.; scene of a French victory over the Austrians in 1794.
Roulette, a game of chance, very popular in France last century, now at Monaco; played with a revolving disc and a ball.
Roumania (5,800), a kingdom of SE. Europe, wedged in between Russia (N.) and Bulgaria (S.), with an eastern shore on the Black Sea; the Carpathians on the W. divide it from Austro-Hungary; comprises the old principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia, which, long subject to Turkey, united under one ruler in 1859, and received their independence in 1878, in which year the province of Dobrudja was ceded by Russia; in 1881 the combined provinces were recognised as a kingdom; forms a fertile and well-watered plain sloping N. to S., which grows immense quantities of grain, the chief export; salt-mining and petroleum-making are also important industries; the bulk of the people belong to the Greek Church; peasant proprietorship on a large scale is a feature of the national life; government is vested in a hereditary limited monarch, a council of ministers, a senate, and a chamber of deputies; Bucharest (q. v.) is the capital, and Galatz (q. v.) the chief port.
Roumelia, a former name for a district which embraced ancient Thrace and a portion of Macedonia; the territory known as East Roumelia was incorporated with Bulgaria in 1885.
Round Table, The, the name given to the knighthood of King Arthur: a larger, from including as many as 150 knights; and a smaller, from including only 12 of the highest order.
Round Towers, ancient towers, found chiefly in Ireland, of a tall, round, more or less tapering structure, divided into storeys, and with a conical top, erected in the neighbourhood of some church or monastery, and presumably of Christian origin, and probably used as strongholds in times of danger; of these there are 118 in Ireland, and three in Scotland—at Abernethy, Brechin, and Eglishay (Orkney).
Roundheads, the name of contempt given by the Cavaliers to the Puritans or Parliamentary party during the Civil War, on account of their wearing their hair close crept.
Rous, Francis, provost of Eton, born in Cornwall; sat in the Westminster Assembly, and was the author of the metrical version of the Psalms, as used in Presbyterian churches (1579-1659).
Rousseau, Jean Baptiste, French lyric poet, born in Paris, the son of a shoemaker; gave offence by certain lampoons ascribed to him which to the last he protested were forgeries, and was banished; his satires were certainly superior to his lyrics, which were cold and formal; died at Brussels in exile (1670-1741).
Rousseau, Jean Jacques, a celebrated French philosopher, and one or the great prose writers of French literature, born in Geneva, the son of a watchmaker and dancing-master; was apprenticed to an engraver, whose inhuman treatment drove him at the age of 16 into running away; for three years led a vagrant life, acting as footman, lackey, secretary, &c.; during this period was converted to Catholicism largely through the efforts of Madame de Warens, a spritely married lady living apart from her husband; in 1731 he took up residence in his patroness's house, where he lived for nine years a life of ease and sentiment in the ambiguous capacity of general factotum, and subsequently of lover; supplanted in the affections of his mistress, he took himself off, and landed in Paris in 1741; supported himself by music-copying, an occupation which was his steadiest means of livelihood throughout his troubled career; formed a liaison with an illiterate dull servant-girl by whom he had five children, all of whom he callously handed over to the foundling hospital; acquaintance with Diderot brought him work on the famous Encyclopédie, but the true foundation of his literary fame was laid in 1749 by “A Discourse on Arts and Sciences,” in which he audaciously negatives the theory that morality has been favoured by the progress of science and the arts; followed this up in 1753 by a “Discourse on the Origin of Inequality,” in which he makes a wholesale attack upon the cherished institutions and ideals of society; morosely rejected the flattering advances of society, and from his retreat at Montlouis issued “The New Héloïse” (1760), “The Social Contract” (1762), and “Émile” (1762); these lifted him into the widest fame, but precipitated upon him the enmity and persecution of Church (for his Deism) and State; fled to Switzerland, where after his aggressive “Letters from the Mountains,” he wandered about, the victim of his own suspicious, hypochondriacal nature; found for some time a retreat in Staffordshire under the patronage of Hume; returned to France, where his only persecutors were his own morbid hallucinations; died, not without suspicion of suicide, at Ermenonville; his “Confessions” and other autobiographical writings, although unreliable in facts, reflect his strange and wayward personality with wonderful truth; was one of the precursive influences which brought on the revolutionary movement (1712-1778).
Rousseau, Pierre Étienne Théodore, an eminent French artist, born in Paris; at 19 exhibited in the Salon; slowly won his way to the front as the greatest French landscape painter; in 1848 settled down in Barbizon, in the Forest of Fontainebleau, his favourite sketching ground; his pictures (e. g. “The Alley of Chestnut Trees,” “Early Summer Morning”) fetch immense prices now (1812-1867).
Roveredo (10), an Austrian town in the Tyrol, pleasantly situated on the Leno, in the Lägerthal; is the centre of the Tyrolese silk trade.
Row, John, a Scottish reformer; graduated LL.D. in Padua; came over from the Catholic Church in 1558, and two years later helped to compile the “First Book of Discipline”; settled as a minister in Perth, and was four times Moderator of the General Assembly (1525-1580). His son, John Row, was minister of Carnock, near Dunfermline, and author of an authoritative “History of the Kirk of Scotland” (1568-1646).
Rowe, Nicholas, dramatist and poet-laureate, born at Barford, Bedfordshire; was trained for the law, but took to literature, and made his mark as a dramatist, “The Fair Penitent,” “Jane Shore,” &c., long maintaining their popularity; translated Lucan's “Pharsalia,” which won Dr. Johnson's commendation; edited Shakespeare; became poet-laureate in 1715; held some government posts; was buried at Westminster Abbey (1674-1718).
Rowlandson, Thomas, caricaturist, born in London; studied art in Paris; gambled and lived extravagantly; led a roving life in England and Wales; displayed great versatility and strength in his artistic work, e. g. in “Imitations of Modern Drawings,” illustrations to Sterne's “Sentimental Journey,” “Munchausen's Travels,” &c.; ridiculed Napoleon in many cartoons (1756-1827).
Rowley Regis (31), a flourishing town of Staffordshire, 3 m. SE. of Dudley; has large iron-works, potteries, &c.
Rowton Heath, in the vicinity of Chester, scene of a great Parliamentary victory over the forces of Charles I. in September 1645.
Roxburghshire (54), in Border pastoral county of Scotland, between Berwick (NE.) and Dumfries (SW.); the Cheviots form its southern boundary; lies almost wholly within the basin of the Tweed, which winds along its northern border, receiving the Teviot, Jed, &c.; includes the fine pastoral districts of Teviotdale and Liddesdale, where vast flocks of sheep are reared; agriculture and woollen manufactures are important industries; Hawick is the largest town, and Jedburgh the county town; near Kelso stood the royal castle and town of Roxburgh, which gave its name to the county, destroyed in 1460.
Royal Academy of Arts, in London; was instituted in 1768 by George III. as a result of a memorial presented to him by 29 members who had seceded from “The Incorporated Society of Artists of Great Britain” (founded 1765); for some years received grants from the privy purse, and was provided with rooms in Somerset House; removed to Trafalgar Square in 1836, and to its present quarters at Burlington House in 1869; receives now no public grant; holds yearly exhibitions, and supports an art school; membership comprises 42 Royal Academicians, besides Associates. The present President is Sir Edward John Poynter. The Royal Hibernian Academy (founded 1823) and the Scottish Academy (1826) are similar institutions.
Royal Society of Edinburgh, The, was incorporated by royal charter in 1783 through the efforts of Robertson the historian, and superseded the old Philosophical Society; held fortnightly meetings (December till June) in the Royal Institution; receives a grant of £300; publishes Transactions; has a membership of some 550, including foreign and British Fellows.
Royal Society of London, incorporated by royal charter in 1662, but owing its origin to the informal meetings about 1645 of a group of scientific men headed by Theodore Haak, a German, Dr. Wilkins, and others; in 1665 the first number of their Philosophical Transactions was published which, with the supplementary publication, Proceedings of the Royal Society, begun in 1800, constitute an invaluable record of the progress of science to the present day; encouragement is given to scientific investigation by awards of medals (Copley, Davy, Darwin, &c.), the equipping of scientific expeditions (e. g. the Challenger), &c.; weekly meetings are held at Burlington House (quarters since 1857) during the session (November till June); membership comprises some 500 Fellows, including 40 foreigners; receives a parliamentary grant of £4000 a year, and acts in an informal way as scientific adviser to Government.
Royan (6), a pretty seaside town of France, on the estuary of the Gironde, 60 m. NW. of Bordeaux; trebles its population in the summer.
Royer-Collard, Pierre Paul, politician and philosopher, born at Sompuis; called to the Paris bar at 20; supported the Revolution, but refused to follow the Jacobins, and during the Reign of Terror sought shelter in his native town; was elected to the Council of the Five Hundred in 1797, retired in 1804, and betook himself to philosophic studies; became professor of Philosophy in Paris 1811, and exercised great influence; re-entered political life in 1815, and was actively engaged in administrative work till his retirement in 1842; was all through his life a doctrinaire and rather unpractical (1763-1842).
Royton (13), a busy cotton town in Lancashire, 2 m. NW. of Oldham.
Ruabon (18), a mining town in Denbighshire, 4½ m. SW. of Wrexham; has collieries and iron-works.
Rubens, Peter Paul, the greatest of the Flemish painters, born at Siegen, in Westphalia; came with his widowed mother in 1587 to Antwerp, where he sedulously cultivated the painter's art, and early revealed his masterly gift of colouring; went to Italy, and for a number of years was in the service of the Duke of Mantua, who encouraged him in his art, and employed him on a diplomatic mission to Philip III. of Spain; executed at Madrid some of his finest portraits; returned to Antwerp in 1609; completed in 1614 his masterpiece, “The Descent from the Cross,” in Antwerp Cathedral; with the aid of assistants he painted the series of 21 pictures, now in the Louvre, illustrating the principal events in the life of Maria de' Medici during 1628-1629; diplomatic missions engaged him at the Spanish and English Courts, where his superabundant energy enabled him to execute many paintings for Charles I.—e. g. “War and Peace,” in the National Gallery—and Philip IV.; was knighted by both; in all that pertains to chiaroscuro, colouring, and general technical skill Rubens is unsurpassed, and in expressing particularly the “tumult and energy of human action,” but he falls below the great Italian artists in the presentation of the deeper and sublimer human emotions; was a scholarly, refined man, an excellent linguist, and a successful diplomatist; was twice married; died at Antwerp, and was buried in the Church of St. Jacques; his tercentenary was celebrated in 1877 (1577-1640).
Rubicon, a famous river of Italy, associated with Julius Cæsar, now identified with the modern Fiumecino, a mountain torrent which springs out of the eastern flank of the Apennines and enters the Adriatic N. of Ariminum; marked the boundary line between Roman Italy and Cisalpine Gaul, a province administered by Cæsar; when he crossed it in 49 B.C. it was tantamount to a declaration of war against the Republic, hence the expression “to cross the Rubicon” is applied to the decisive step in any adventurous undertaking.
Rubinstein, Anton, a famous Russian pianist and composer, born, of Jewish parents, near Jassy, in Moldavia; studied at Moscow, under Liszt in Paris, and afterwards at Berlin and Vienna; established himself at St. Petersburg in 1848 as a music-teacher; became director of the Conservatoire there; toured for many years through Europe and the United States, achieving phenomenal success; resumed his directorship at St. Petersburg in 1887; composed operas (e. g. “The Maccabees,” “The Demon”), symphonies (e. g. “Ocean”), sacred operas (e. g. “Paradise Lost”), chamber music, and many exquisite songs; as a pianist he was a master of technique and expression; was ennobled by the Czar in 1869; published an autobiography; his works as well as his performances display both vigour and sensibility (1829-1894).
Rubrics, a name, as printed originally in red ink, applied to the rules and instructions given in the liturgy of the Prayer-Book for regulating the conduct of divine service, hence applied in a wider significance to any fixed ecclesiastical or other injunction or order; was used to designate the headings or title of chapters of certain old law-books and MSS., formerly but not now necessarily printed in red characters.
Ruby, a gem which in value and hardness ranks next to the diamond; is dichroic, of greater specific gravity than any other gem, and belongs to the hexagonal system of crystals; is a pellucid, ruddy-tinted stone, and, like the sapphire, a variety of corundum, also found (but rarely) in violet, pink, and purple tints; the finest specimens come from Upper Burmah; these are the true Oriental rubies, and when above 5 carats exceed in value, weight for weight, diamonds; the Spinel ruby is the commoner jeweller's stone; is of much less value, specific gravity and hardness, non-dichroic, and forms a cubical crystal.
Rückert, Friedrich, German poet, born at Schweinfurt, in Bavaria; at Würzburg University showed his talent for languages, and early devoted himself to philology and poetry; was for 15 years professor of Oriental Languages at Erlangen; introduced German readers, by excellent translations, to Eastern poetry; filled for some time the chair of Oriental Languages in Berlin; takes rank as a lyrist of no mean powers; essayed unsuccessfully dramatic composition (1788-1866).
Ruddiman, Thomas, author of a well-known Latin grammar, a Banffshire man, and graduate of Aberdeen University; was school-mastering at Laurencekirk, where his scholarly attainments won him an assistantship in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh; spent a busy life in that; city in scholarly occupation, editing many learned works, the most notable being Buchanan's works and the “immaculate” edition of Livy; his famous Latin grammar was completed in 1732; in 1730 became principal keeper of the Advocates' Library (1674-1757).
Rudolf I., of the House of Hapsburg, founder of the Austrian dynasty; born, the son of a count, at Schloss Limburg (Breisgau); greatly increased his father's domain by marriage, inheritance, and conquest, becoming the most powerful prince in S. Germany; acquired a remarkable ascendency among the German princes, and was elevated to the imperial throne in 1273, and by friendly concessions to the Pope, Gregory IX., terminated the long struggle between the Church and the empire; shattered the opposition of Ottocar, king of Bohemia, and brought peace and order to Germany (1218-1291).
Rudolf II., German Emperor, son of Maximilian II., born at Vienna; became king of Hungary in 1573, and of Bohemia three years later; ascended the imperial throne in 1576; indolent and incapable, he left the empire to the care of worthless ministers; disorder and foreign invasion speedily followed; persecution inflamed the Protestants; by 1611 his brother Matthias, supported by other kinsmen, had wrested Hungary and Bohemia from him; had a taste for astrology and alchemy, and patronised Kepler and Tycho Brahé (1552-1612).
Rudolf Lake, in British East Africa, close to the highlands of S. Ethiopia, practically an inland sea, being 160 m. long and 20 broad, and brackish in taste; discovered in 1888.
Rudra, in the Hindu mythology the old deity of the storm, and father of the Marutz.
Rugby (11), a town in Warwickshire, at the junction of the Swift and the Avon, 83 m. NW. of London; an important railway centre and seat of a famous public school founded in 1567, of which Dr. Arnold (q. v.), and Archbishops Tait and Temple were famous head-masters, is one of the first public schools in England, and scholars number about 450.
Ruge, Arnold, a German philosophical and political writer, born at Bergen (Rügen); showed a philosophic bent at Jena; was implicated in the political schemes of the Burschenschaft (q. v.), and was imprisoned for six years; taught for some years in Halle University, but got into trouble through the radical tone of his writings in the Halle Review (founded by himself and another), and went to Paris; was prominent during the political agitation of 1848, and subsequently sought refuge in London, where for a short time he acted in consort with Mazzini and others; retired to Brighton, and ultimately received a pension from the Prussian Government; his numerous plays, novels, translations, &c., including a lengthy autobiography, reveal a mind scarcely gifted enough to grasp firmly and deeply the complicated problems of sociology and politics; is characterised by Dr. Stirling as the “bold and brilliant Ruge”; began, he says, as an expounder of Hegel, and “finished off as translator into German of that 'hollow make-believe of windy conceit,' he calls it, Buckle's 'Civilisation in England'” (1802-1880).
Rügen (45), a deeply-indented island of Germany, in the Baltic, separated from the Pomeranian coast by a channel (Strela Sund) about a mile broad; the soil is fertile, and fishing is actively engaged in. Bergen (4) is the capital.
Ruhr, an affluent of the Rhine, which joins it at Ruhrort after a course of 142 m.; navigable to craft conveying the product of the coal-mines to the Rhine.
Rule of Faith, the name given to the ultimate authority or standard in religious belief, such as the Bible alone, as among Protestants; the Bible and the Church, as among Romanists; reason alone, as among rationalists; the inner light of the spirit, as among mystics.
Rum, a mountainous, forest-clad island in one of the Inner Hebrides, lies 15 m. off Ardnamurchan Point; a handful of inhabitants cultivate a very small portion of it; the rest is mountain, wood, and moorland; forms a deer-forest.
Rumford, Count, Benjamin Thompson, soldier, philanthropist, and physicist, born at Woburn, Massachusetts; a fortunate marriage lifted him into affluence, relieving him from the necessity of teaching; fought on the British side during the American War; became a lieutenant-colonel, and for important services was knighted in 1782 on his return to England; entered the Bavarian service, and carried through a series of remarkable reforms, such as the suppression of mendicity, the amelioration of the poorer classes by the spread of useful knowledge, culinary, agricultural, &c.; was made a Count of the Holy Roman Empire, and placed in charge of the War Department of Bavaria; was a generous patron of science in England and elsewhere; retired from the Bavarian service in 1799, and five years later married the widow of Lavoisier the chemist; his later years were spent in retirement in a village near Paris, where he devoted himself to physical research, especially as regards heat (1753-1814).
Rump, The, name of contempt given to the remnant of the Long Parliament in 1659.
Runcorn (20), a flourishing river-port of Cheshire, on the Mersey, 12 m. SE. of Liverpool, at the terminus of the Bridgewater Canal; is an old place dating back to the 10th century; has excellent docks; industries embrace shipbuilding, iron-founding, &c.
Runeberg, Johan Ludwig, the national poet of Finland, born at Jacobstad; educated at, and afterwards lectured in, the university of Abo; published his first volume, “Lyric Poems,” in 1830; edited a bi-weekly paper; for forty years (till his death) was Reader of Roman Literature in the College of Borga; his epic idylls, “The Elk Hunters,” “Christmas Eve,” his epic “King Fjalar,” &c., are the finest poems in the Swedish language; are characterised by a repose, simplicity, and artistic finish, yet have withal the warmth of national life in them (1804-1877).
Runes, a name given to the letters of the alphabet by heathen Teutonic tribes prior to their coming under the influence of Roman civilisation; are formed almost invariably of straight lines, and scarcely exist except in inscriptions dating back to A.D. 1; found chiefly in Scandinavia, also in Britain. There are three runic alphabets (much alike), the oldest being the Gothic of 24 letters or runes. They are now believed to have first come into use among the Goths in the 6th century B.C., and to be a modified form of the old Greek alphabet introduced by traders.
Runnimede, a meadow on the right bank of the Thames, 36 m. SW. of London, where King John signed the Magna Charta, 15th June 1215.
Rupee, a silver coin, the monetary unit of India, whose face value is 2s., but which, owing to the depreciation of silver, is now valued in outside markets at about 1s. 2½d.; a lac of rupees equals 100,000.
Rupert, Prince, son of Frederick V., Elector Palatine, and grandson of James I. of England; received an excellent education; took part in the Thirty Years' War, and suffered three years' imprisonment at Linz; in England, at the outbreak of the Great Rebellion, he was entrusted with a command by Charles I., and by his dash and daring greatly heartened the Royalist cause, taking an active part in all the great battles; finally surrendered to Fairfax at Oxford in 1646; but two years later took command of the Royalist ships and kept up a gallant struggle till his defeat by Blake in 1651; escaped to the West Indies, where he kept up a privateering attack upon English merchantmen; came in for many honours after the Restoration, and distinguished himself in the Dutch War; the closing years of his life were quietly spent in scientific research (physical, chemical, mechanical), for which he had a distinct aptitude (1619-1682).
Rupert's Land, a name given by Prince Rupert to territory the drainage of which flows into Hudson Bay or Strait.
Rush, Benjamin, a noted American physician and professor, born at Byberry, near Philadelphia; studied medicine at Princeton and Edinburgh; became professor of chemistry at Philadelphia in 1769; sat in Congress, and signed the Declaration of Independence (1776); held important medical posts in the army; resigned, and assumed medical professorship in Philadelphia; won a European reputation as a lecturer, philanthropist, and medical investigator; published several treatises, and from 1799 acted as treasurer of the U.S. Mint (1745-1813).
Rushworth, John, historian and politician, born at Warkworth, Northumberland; although a barrister he never practised, but set himself to compile elaborate notes of proceedings at the Star Chamber and other courts, which grew into an invaluable work of 7 vols., entitled “Historical Collections”; acted as assistant-clerk to the Long Parliament; sat as a member in several Parliaments, and was for some years secretary to Fairfax and the Lord-Keeper; fell into disfavour after the Restoration, and in 1684 was arrested for debt and died in prison; is an authority whom Carlyle abuses as a Dry-as-dust (1607-1690).
Ruskin, John, art-critic and social reformer, born in London, son of an honourable and a successful wine-merchant; educated with some severity at home under the eye of his parents, and particularly his mother, who trained him well into familiarity with the Bible, and did not object to his study of “Robinson Crusoe” along with the “Pilgrim's Progress” on Sundays, while, left to his own choice he read Homer, Scott, and Byron on week days; entered Christ's Church, Oxford, as a gentleman Commoner in 1837, gained the Newdigate Prize in 1839, produced in 1843, under the name of “A Graduate of Oxford,” the first volume of “Modern Painters,” mainly in defence of the painter Turner and his art, which soon extended to five considerable volumes, and in 1849 “The Seven Lamps of Architecture,” in definition of the qualities of good art in that line, under the heads of the Lamps of Sacrifice, of Truth, of Power, of Beauty, of Life, of Memory, and Obedience, pleading in particular for the Gothic style; these were followed in 1851 by “Pre-Raphaelitism” (q. v.), and 1851-53 by the “Stones of Venice,” in further exposition of his views in the “Seven Lamps,” and others on the same and kindred arts. Not till 1862 did he appear in the rôle of social reformer, and that was by the publication of “Unto this Last,” in the Cornhill Magazine, on the first principles of political economy, the doctrines in which were further expounded in “Munera Pulveris,” “Time and Tide,” and “Fors Clavigera” (q. v.), the principles in which he endeavoured to give practical effect to by the Institution of St. George's Guild, with the view of commending “the rational organisation of country life independent of that of cities.” His writings are numerous, several of them originally lectures, and nearly all on matters of vital account, besides many others on subjects equally so which he began, but has had, to the grief of his admirers, to leave unfinished from failing health, among these his “Præterita,” or memories from his past life. The most popular of his recent writings is “Sesame and Lilies,” with perhaps the “Crown of Wild Olive,” and the most useful that of the series beginning with “Unto this Last,” and culminating in “Time and Tide.” He began his career as an admirer of Turner, and finished as a disciple of Thomas Carlyle, but neither slavishly nor with the surrender of his own sense of justice and truth; Justice is the goddess he worships, and except in her return to the earth as sovereign he bodes nothing but disaster to the fortunes of the race; his despair of seeing this seems to have unhinged him, and he is now in a state of fatal collapse; his contemporaries praised his style of writing, but to his disgust they did not believe a word he said; he sits sadly in these days at Brantwood, in utter apathy to everything of passing interest, and if he thinks or speaks at all it would seem his sense of the injustice in things, and the doom it is under, is not yet utterly dead—his sun has not even yet gone down upon his wrath; the keynote of his wrath was, Men do the work of this world and rogues take the pay, selling for money what God has given for nothing, or what others have purchased by their life's blood; b. 1819. He died 20th January 1900.
Russell, John, Earl, known best as Lord John Russell, statesman, youngest son of the Earl of Bedford; travelled in Spain, studied at Edinburgh, entered Parliament in 1813, took up vigorously the cause of parliamentary reform and Catholic Emancipation, joined Earl Grey's ministry in 1830 as Paymaster of the Forces, framed and zealously advocated the Reform Bill (1832), drove Peel from office in 1835, and became, under Lord Melbourne, Home Secretary and leader of the Commons; four years later he was appointed Colonial Secretary, warmly espoused the cause of repeal of the Corn Laws, formed a Ministry on the downfall of Peel in 1846, and dealt with Irish difficulties and Chartism; resigned in 1852, and in the same year became Foreign Secretary under Aberdeen, became unpopular on account of his management of the Crimean War (1855) and conduct at the Vienna Conference; again Foreign Secretary in Palmerston's ministry of 1859, an earl in 1861, and premier a second time in 1865-66; author of various pamphlets, biographies, memoirs, &c.; was twice married; was nicknamed “Finality John” from his regarding his Reform Bill of 1832 as a final measure (1792-1878).
Russell, William, Lord, prominent politician in Charles II.'s reign, younger son of the Earl of Bedford; entered the first Restoration Parliament, became a prominent leader in the Country Party in opposition to the Cabal (q. v.) and the Popish schemes of the king; vigorously supported the Exclusion Bill to keep James, Duke of York from the throne in 1683; was charged with complicity in the Rye-house Plot, was found guilty on trumped-up evidence, and beheaded (1639-1683).
Russell, William Clark, a popular writer of nautical novels, born in New York; gained his experience of sea life during eight years' service as a sailor; was a journalist on the staff of the Daily Chronicle before, in 1887, he took to writing novels, which include “John Holdsworth,” “The Wreck of the 'Grosvenor,'” &c.; b. 1844.
Russell, Sir William Howard, a celebrated war correspondent, born near Dublin; was educated at Trinity College, called to the English bar in 1850, had already acted for some years as war correspondent for the Times before his famous letters descriptive of the Crimean War won him a wide celebrity; subsequently acted as correspondent during the Indian Mutiny, American Civil War, Franco-German War, &c.; accompanied the Prince of Wales to India in 1875; knighted in 1895; b. 1821.
Russell of Killowen, Charles Russell, Lord, a distinguished lawyer, born at Newry; educated at Trinity College, Dublin, called to the English bar in 1859, entered Parliament in 1880, became Attorney-General in 1886, receiving also a knighthood; in 1894 was elevated to the Lord Chief-Justiceship and created a life-peer; b. 1832.
Russia (117,562), next to the British empire the most extensive empire in the world, embracing one-sixth of the land-surface of the globe, including one-half of Europe, all Northern and a part of Central Asia; on the N. it fronts the Arctic Ocean from Sweden to the NE. extremity of Asia; its southern limit forms an irregular line from the NW. corner of the Black Sea to the Sea of Japan, skirting Turkey, Persia, Afghanistan, East Turkestan, and the Chinese empire; Behring Sea, Sea of Okhotsk, and the Sea of Japan wash its eastern shores; Sweden, the Baltic, Germany, and Austria lie contiguous to it in West Europe. This solid, compact mass is thinly peopled (13 to the sq. m. over all) by some 40 different-speaking races, including, besides the dominant Russians (themselves split into three branches), Poles, Finns, Esthonians, Servians, Bulgarians, Lithuanians, Kurds, Persians, Turco-Tartars, Mongols, &c. Three-fourths of the land-surface, with one-fourth of the population, lies in Asia, and is treated under Siberia, Turkestan, Caucasia, &c. Russia in Europe, embracing Finland and Poland (q. v.), is divided from Asia by the Ural Mountains and River and Caspian Sea; forms an irregular, somewhat elongated, square plain sloping down to the low and dreary coast-lands of the Baltic (W.), White Sea (N.), and Black Sea (S.); is seamed by river valleys and diversified by marshes, vast lakes (e. g. Ladoga, Onega, Peipus, and Ilmen), enormous forests, and in the N. and centre by tablelands, the highest of which being the Valdai Hills (1100 ft.); the SE. plain is called the Steppes (q. v.). The cold and warm winds which sweep uninterrupted from N. and S. produce extremes of temperature; the rainfall is small. Agriculture is the prevailing industry, engaging 90 per cent. of the people, although in all not more than 21 per cent. of the soil is cultivated; rye is the chief article of food for the peasantry, who comprise four-fifths of the population. The rich plains, known as the “black lands” from their deep, loamy soil, which stretch from the Carpathians to the Urals, are the most productive corn-lands in Europe, and rival in fertility the “yellow lands” of China, and like them need no manure. Timber is an important industry in the NW., and maize and the vine are cultivated in the extreme S.; minerals abound, and include gold, iron (widely distributed), copper (chiefly in middle Urals), and platinum; there are several large coal-fields and rich petroleum wells at Baku. The fisheries, particularly those of the Caspian, are the most productive in Europe. Immense numbers of horses and cattle are reared, e. g. on the Steppes. Wolves, bears, and valuable fur-bearing animals are plentiful in the N. and other parts; the reindeer is still found, also the elk. Want of ports on the Mediterranean and Atlantic hamper commerce, while the great ports in the Baltic are frozen up four or five months in the year; the southern ports are growing in importance, and wheat, timber, flax, and wool are largely exported. There is a vast inland trade, facilitated by the great rivers (Volga, Don, Dnieper, Dniester, Vistula, &c.) and by excellent railway and telegraphic communication. Among its varied races there exists a wide variety of religions—Christianity, Mohammedanism, Buddhism, Shamanism, &c.; but although some 130 sects exist, the bulk of the Russians proper belong to the Greek Church. Education is backward, more than 85 per cent. of the people being illiterate; there are eight universities. Conscription is enforced; the army is the largest in the world. Government is an absolute monarchy, save in Finland (q. v.); the ultimate legislative and executive power is in the hands of the czar, but there is a State Council of 60 members nominated by the czar. In the 50 departments a good deal of local self-government is enjoyed through the village communes and their public assemblies, but the imperial power as represented by the police and military is felt in all parts, while governors of departments have wide and ill-defined powers which admit of abuse. The great builders of the empire, the beginnings of which are to be sought in the 9th century, have been Ivan the Great, who in the 15th century drove out the Mongols and established his capital as Moscow; Ivan the Terrible, the first of the czars, who in the 16th century pushed into Asia and down to the Black Sea; and Peter the Great (q. v.). Its restless energies are still unabated, and inspire a persistently aggressive policy in the Far East. Within recent years its literature has become popular in Europe through the powerful writings of Pushkin, Turgenief, and Tolstoi.
Rustchuk (27), a town in Bulgaria, on the Danube, 40 m. S. by W. of Bucharest; manufactures gold and silver ware, shoes, cloth, &c.; has a number of interesting mosques; its once important fortifications were reduced in 1877.
Rutebeuf or Rustebeuf, a celebrated trouvère of the 13th century, of whom little is known save that he led a Bohemian life in Paris and was unfortunate in his marriage; his songs, satires, &c., are vigorous and full of colour, and touch a note of seriousness at times which one hardly anticipates.
Ruthenians, a hardy Slavonic people, a branch of the Little Russian stock, numbering close upon 3½ millions, dwelling in Galicia and Northern Hungary.
Rutherford, Samuel, a Scottish divine, born at Nisbet, near Jedburgh; studied at Edinburgh University, became professor of Humanity, but had to resign; studied divinity, and became minister of Anworth in 1627, and was a zealous pastor and a fervid preacher; corresponded far and wide with pious friends by letters afterwards published under his name, and much esteemed by pious people; became at length professor of Divinity at St. Andrews, and represented the Scottish Church in the Westminster Assembly in 1643; wrote several works, for one of which he was called to account, but had to answer a summons on his deathbed before a higher bar (1600-1661).
Rutherglen (13), a town of Lanarkshire, on the Clyde, 3 m. SE. of Glasgow, of which it is practically a suburb; a handsome bridge spans the river; has been a royal burgh since 1126, and has interesting historical associations.
Ruthin (3), an interesting old town of Denbighshire, on the Clwyd, 8 m. SE. of Denbigh.
Ruthven, Raid of, a conspiracy entered into by certain Scottish nobles, headed by William, first Earl of Gowrie, to seize the young king James VI., and break down the influence of his worthless favourites, Lennox and Arran; at Ruthven Castle, or Huntingtower, in Perthshire, on 23rd August 1582, the king was captured and held for 10 months; Arran was imprisoned, and Lennox fled, to die in France; the conduct of the conspirators was applauded by the country, but after the escape of the king from St. Andrews Castle the conspirators were proclaimed guilty of treason, and Gowrie was ultimately executed.
Ruthwell Cross, a remarkable sandstone cross, 17¾ ft. high, found in Ruthwell parish, 9 m. SE. of Dumfries; dates back to the 7th century; bears runic and Latin inscriptions, notably some verses of the Saxon poem, “The Dream of the Holy Rood”; was broken down in 1642 by the Covenanters as savouring of idolatry; found and re-erected in 1802.
Rutland (21), the smallest county of England, bounded by Lincoln, Northampton, and Leicester; has a pleasant undulating surface, with valleys in the E., and extensive woods; is watered by the Welland; is largely pastoral, and raises fine sheep; dairy produce (especially cheese) and wheat are noted; Oakham is the capital.
Ruysdael, Jacob, a famous Dutch landscape-painter, born and died at Haarlem; few particulars of his life are known; his best pictures, to be seen in the galleries of Dresden, Berlin, Paris, &c., display a fine poetic spirit (1628-1682).
Ruyter, Michael de, a famous Dutch admiral, born of poor parents at Flushing; from a boy of 11 served in the merchant and naval service; commanded a ship under Van Tromp in the war with England 1652-1654; was ennobled in 1660 by the king of Denmark for services rendered in the Dano-Swedish war; for two years fought against Turkish pirates in the Mediterranean; commanded the Dutch fleet in the second war against England, and in 1667 struck terror into London by appearing and burning the shipping in the Thames; held his own against England and France in the war of 1672; co-operated with Spain against France; was routed and mortally wounded off the coast of Sicily; a man of sterling worth (1607-1675).
Ryan, Loch, an arm of the sea penetrating Wigtownshire in a south-easterly direction, 8 m. long and from 1½ to 3 broad; at its landward end is Stranraer (q. v.); forms an excellent anchorage.
Rybinsk (20, 100 in the summer), a busy commercial town in Russia, on the Volga, 48 m. NW. of Yaroslav; connected by canal with St. Petersburg; industries embrace boat-building, brewing, distilling, &c.
Ryde (11), a popular old watering-place on the NE. coast of the Isle of Wight, 4½ m. SW. of Portsmouth; rises in pretty wooded terraces from the sea; has a fine promenade, park, pier, &c.
Rye (4), an interesting old port in the SE. corner of Sussex, situated on rising ground flanked by two streams, 63 m. SE. from London, one of the Cinque Ports (q. v.); the retiral of the sea has left it now 2 m. inland; has a fine Norman and Early English church.
Rye House Plot, an abortive conspiracy in 1683 to assassinate Charles II. of England and his brother James, Duke of York, planned by Colonel Rumsey, Lieutenant-Colonel Walcot, the “plotter” Ferguson, and other reckless adherents of the Whig party. The conspirators were to conceal themselves at a farmhouse called Rye House, near Hertford, and to waylay the royal party returning from Newmarket; the plot miscarried owing to the king leaving Newmarket sooner than was expected; the chief conspirators were executed.
Rymer, Thomas, the learned editor of the “Foedera,” an invaluable collection of historical documents dealing with England's relations with foreign powers, born at Northallerton; was a Cambridge man and a barrister; turned to literature and wrote much both in prose and poetry, but to no great purpose; was Historiographer-royal; Macaulay in characteristic fashion calls him “the worst critic that ever lived”; but his “Foedera” is an enduring monument to his unwearied industry (1639-1714).
Rysbrach, Michael, a well-known sculptor in the 18th century, born at Antwerp; established himself in London and executed busts and statues of the most prominent men of his day, including the monument to Sir Isaac Newton in Westminster Abbey, statue of Marlborough, busts of Walpole, Bolingbroke, Pope, &c. (1694-1770).
Ryswick, Peace of, signed on October 30, 1697, at the village of Ryswick, 2 m. S. of The Hague, by England, Holland, Germany, and Spain on the one hand and France on the other, terminating the sanguinary struggle which had begun In 1688; it lasted till 1702.