OpenLLM-France/wikimedia huggingface dataset:
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skirret

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​SKIRRET, known botanically as Sium Sisarum (natural order Umbelliferae) , a fleshy-rooted perennial, the roots of which are boiled, and afterwards served up like salsify. It requires a free, deep and much enriched soil, and is generally raised from seeds, which should be sown in drills a foot apart about the end of March, the bed being well-watered in dry weather. The roots will be in use about November, and will continue fresh through the winter if carefully stored.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skittles

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​SKITTLES (from O. Eng. sceoten, to shoot), a game played on the green or an alley with a number of " pins " of wood, which are knocked down by an oval, flattened missile called the cheese, about 10 ℔ in weight, thrown by the player. The game has been in existence for centuries in many countries under different names, quilles in France, Kegelspiel in Germany, skayles, kails, closh, cloddynge, roly-poly, Dutch bowls, &c, in Great Britain. In early days in England " sheepe's joynts " were thrown at the pins, and in many varieties of the game, for instance in the German and Dutch, balls were used, which were rolled along the ground at the pins. As now played, nine large, oval-headed pins are set up in a square, three pins on each side, with a corner angle presented to the player, who stands about 21 ft. from the pins. One step in advance is allowed in delivery. The object is to knock down the greatest number of pins in the fewest throws. In the eastern counties of England four pins only, one on each corner, are generally used. In Dutch skittles the centre pin is called the " king-pin " and often has a crown on its head. The object of this game is to knock down the " king " without touching any of the other pins, or to knock down all the other pins and leave the king. In Germany and Holland balls have always been used, and the game in that form was introduced into America from the latter country early in the 18th century, but is not now played there, being replaced by bowling.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skinner, James

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​SKINNER, JAMES (1778-1841), British military adventurer in India, son of Lieut. -Colonel Hercules Skinner, was born in India in 1778, his mother being a Rajput lady. At the age of eighteen he entered the Mahratta army under de Boigne, where he soon showed military talents; and he remained in the same service under Perron until 1803, when, on the outbreak of the Mahratta War, he refused to serve against his countrymen. He joined Lord Lake, and raised a regiment of irregular horse called " Skinner's Horse " or the " Yellow Boys," which became the most famous regiment of light cavalry in the India of that day. He was present at the siege of Bharatpur, and in 1818 was granted a jagir yielding Rs. 20,000 a year, appointed lieutenant- colonel in the British service and made C.B. He had an intimate knowledge of the character of the natives of India, and his advice was highly valued by successive governor-generals and commanders-in-chief. He died at Hansi on the 4th of December 1 841 , and was buried in a church at Delhi which is called after his name.
See J. Baillie Fraser, Military Memoir of Lieut.-Colonel James Skinner (1851).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skinner, John

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​SKINNER, JOHN (1721–1807), Scottish author, son of John Skinner, a parish schoolmaster, was born at Balfour, Aberdeenshire, on the 3rd of October 1721. He had been intended for the Presbyterian ministry, but, after passing through Marischal College, Aberdeen, and teaching for a few years, he took orders in the Episcopal Church, and was appointed to the charge of Longside in 1742. Very soon after Skinner joined the Episcopalians they became, in consequence of the Jacobite rebellion in 1745, a much persecuted remnant. Skinner's church was burnt; his house was plundered ; for some years he had to minister to his congregation by stealth; and in 1753 he suffered six months' imprisonment for having officiated to more than four persons besides his own family. After 1760 the penal laws were less strictly en- forced, but throughout the century the lot of the Episcopalian ministers in Scotland was far from comfortable, and only the humblest provisions for church services were tolerated. He died at the house of his son, John Skinner, bishop of Aberdeen, on the 16th of June 1807. It is by his few songs that Skinner is generally known. A correspondence took place between him and Burns, who considered his " Tullochgorum " " the best Scotch song Scotland ever saw," and procured his collaboration for Johnson's Musical Museum. Other of his lyrics are: " The Monymusk Christmas Ba'ing," a football idyll; " The Ewie wi' the Crookit Horn " and " John o' Badenyon." His best songs had stolen into print; a collection was not published till 1809, under the title of Amusements of Leisure Hours. Throughout his life Skinner was a vigorous student, and published in 1788 an Ecclesiastical History of Scotland (2 vols.) in the form of letters.
A Life of Skinner, in connexion with the history of Episcopacy in the north of Scotland, was published by the Rev. W. Walker in 1883. His songs and poems were edited by H. G. Reid (1859).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skirving, Adam

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​SKIRVING, ADAM (1719-1803), Scottish song-writer, was born in Haddington in 1719. He became a farmer at Garleton, near Haddington, and died in April 1803. He was buried at Athelstaneford. His reputation rests on two Jacobite ballads on the battle of Prestonpans, one of which, "Hey, Johnnie Cope, are Ye Waking Yet?" has a well-deserved place in most collections of Scottish songs.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skinner's Case

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​SKINNER'S CASE, the name usually given to the celebrated dispute between the House of Lords and the House of Commons over the question of the original jurisdiction of the former house in civil suits. In 1668 a London merchant named Thomas Skinner presented a petition to Charles II. asserting that he could not obtain any redress against the East India Company, which, he asserted, had injured his property. The case was referred to the House of Lords, and Skinner obtained a verdict for £5000. The company complained to the House of Commons which declared that the proceedings in the other House were illegal. The Lords defended their action, and after two conferences between the Houses had produced no result the Commons ordered Skinner to be put in prison on a charge of breach of privilege; to this the Lords replied by fining and imprisoning Sir Samuel Barnardiston, the chairman of the company. Then for about a year the dispute slumbered, but it was renewed in 1669, when Charles II. advised the two Houses to stop all proceedings and to erase all mention of the case from their records. This was done and since this time the House of Lords has tacitly abandoned all claim to original jurisdiction in civil suits.
See Lord Holles, The Grand Question concerning the Judicature of the House of Peers (1689) ; T. P. Taswell-Langmead, English Constitutional History (1905) ; L. O. Pike, Constitutional History of the House of Lords (1894); and H. Hallam, Constitutional History, vol. iii. (1885).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skipton

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​SKIPTON, a market town in the Skipton parliamentary division of the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, 26 m. N.W. of Leeds by the Midland railway, served also by the Lancashire and Yorkshire railway. Pop. of urban district (1901) 11,986. It is picturesquely situated in the hilly district of the upper valley of the river Aire, the course of which is followed by the Leeds and Liverpool canal. The strong castle built by Robert de Romille in the time of the Conqueror was partly demolished in 1648, but was restored by the countess of Pembroke. Of the ancient building of de Romille all that remains is the western doorway of the inner castle. In the castle grounds are the remains of the ancient chapel of St John. The church of the Holy Trinity, mainly Perpendicular, was also partly demolished during the Civil War, but was restored by the countess of Pembroke. The free grammar-school was founded in 1548 by William Ermysted, a canon of St Paul's, London. There are also science and art schools. There are extensive woollen and cotton factories, and, in the neighbourhood, a large limestone quarry.
Skipton was the capital of the ancient district of Craven. At the Norman accession it became part of the possessions of Earl Edwin, and was granted to Robert de Romille. Subsequently it went to the Albemarle family, but was, again vested in the Crown, and Edward II. bestowed it on, Piers de Gaveston. In 1311 it came into the possession of the Cliffords. The castle was taken by the parliamentary forces in 1645 after a desultory siege of three years.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Skobelev, Mikhail Dimitriévich

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​SKOBELEV, MIKHAIL DIMITRIBVICH (1843-1882), Russian general, was born near Moscow on the 29th of September 1843. After graduating as a staff officer at St Petersburg he was sent to Turkestan in 1868 and, with the exception of an interval of two years, during which he was on the staff of the grand duke Michael in the Caucasus, remained in Central Asia until 1877. He commanded the advanced guard of General Lomakine's column from Kinderly Bay, in the Caspian, to join General Verefkin, from Orenburg, in the expedition to Khiva in 1874, and, after great suffering on the desert march, took a prominent part in the capture of the Khivan capital. Dressed as a Turkoman, he intrepidly explored in a hostile country the route from Khiva to Igdy, and also the old bed of the Oxus. In 1875 he was given an important command in the expedition against Khokahd under General Kaufmann, showing great capacity in the action of Makram, where he out-man ceuvred a greatly superior force and captured 58 guns, and in a brilliant night attack in the retreat from Andijan, when he routed a large force with a handful of cavalry. He was promoted to be major-general, decorated with the order of St George, and appointed the first governor of Fergana. In the Turkish War of 1877 he seized the bridge over the Sereth at Barborchi in April, and in June crossed the Danube with the 8th corps. He commanded the Caucasian Cossack Brigade in the attack of the Green Hills at the second battle of Plevna. He captured Lovtcha on the 3rd of September, and distinguished himself again in the desperate fighting on the Green Hills in the third battle of Plevna. Promoted to be a lieutenant-general, and given the command of the 16th Division, he took part in the investment of Plevna and also in the fight of the 9th of December, when Osman Pasha surrendered, with his army. In January 1878 he crossed the Balkans in a severe snowstorm, ​defeating the Turks at Senova, near Schipka, and capturing 36,000 men and 90 guns. Dressed with care in white uniform and mounted on a white horse, and always in the thickest of the fray, he was known and adored by his soldiers as the “White General.” He returned to Turkestan after the war, and in 1880 and 1881 further distinguished himself in retrieving the disasters inflicted by the Tekke Turkomans, captured Geok-Tepe, and, after much slaughter, reduced the Akhal-Teke country to submission. He was advancing on Askabad and Kalat i-Nadiri when he was disavowed and recalled. He was given the command at Minsk. In the last years of his short life he engaged actively in politics, and made speeches in Paris and in Moscow in the beginning of 1882 in favour of a militant Panslavism, predicting a desperate strife between Teuton and Slav. He was at once recalled to St Petersburg. He was staying at a Moscow hotel, on his way from Minsk to his estate close by, when he died suddenly of heart disease on the 7th of July 1882.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monnikendam

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​MONNIKENDAM, a fishing village of Holland, in the province of North Holland, on an inlet of the Zuider Zee known as the Gouw Zee, 12 m. N.N.E. of Amsterdam, with which it is connected by steam tramway. It was once a flourishing town, but its quietness now is only disturbed by the advent of the numerous tourists who visit it in the summer, crossing hence to the island of Marken. Among the notable buildings are the weigh-house (17th century), the bell-tower (1591), formerly attached to the town-hall before this was destroyed in the 18th century, and the church of St. Nicholas, with its beautiful massive tower. Mention is made of this church in a document of 1356, but it was not completed until the beginning of the 15th century. It contains some fine carvings, many interesting old tombs, and a monument of Jan Nieuwenhuizen, the founder of the Society for Public Welfare (Tot Nut van het Algemeen) in 1785.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monod, Adolphe

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​MONOD, ADOLPHE (1802–1856), French Protestant divine, was born on the 21st of January 1802, in Copenhagen, where his father was pastor of the French church. He was educated at Paris and Geneva, and began his life-work in 1825 as founder and pastor of a Protestant church in Naples, whence he removed in 1827 to Lyons. Here his evangelical preaching, and especially a sermon on the duties of communicants (“Qui doit communier”?), led to his deposition by the Catholic Minister of education and religion. Instead of leaving Lyons he began to preach in a hall and then in a chapel. In 1836 he took a professorship in the theological college of Montauban, removing in 1847 to Paris as preacher at the Oratoire. He died on the 6th of April, 1856. Monod was undoubtedly the foremost Protestant preacher of 19th-century France. He published three volumes of sermons in 1830, another, La Crédulité de l’incrédule in 1844, and two more in 1855. Two further volumes appeared after his death. His elder brother Frédéric (1794–1863), who was influenced by Robert Haldane, was also a distinguished French pastor, who with Count Gasparin founded the Union of the Evangelical Churches of France; and Frédéric’s son Théodore (b. 1836) followed in his footsteps.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monmouth (Illinois)

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​MONMOUTH, a city and the county-seat of Warren county, Illinois, in the W. part of the state, about 40 m. S. of Rock Island. Pop. (1890), 5936; (1900), 7460, (594 foreign-born); (1910), 9128. It is served by the Chicago, Burlington & Quincy and the Iowa Central railways, and by electric railways to Galesburg and to Rock Island. The city is the seat of Monmouth College (1856; United Presbyterian), which in 1908 had 28 instructors and 454 students. Among the public buildings and institutions are the county court-house, the federal building, a hospital and the Warren county library (1836). Monmouth is situated in a good farming region, and cattle, swine and ponies are raised in the vicinity. The city has various manufactures. Monmouth was settled about 1824, first incorporated as a village in 1836, chartered as a city in 1852 and in 1882 reorganized under a general state law.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monnier, Marc

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​MONNIER, MARC (1827–1885), French writer, was born at Florence on the 7th of December 1827. His father was French, and his mother a Genevese; he received his early education in Naples, he then studied in Paris and Geneva, and he completed his education at Heidelberg and Berlin. He became professor of comparative literature at Geneva, and eventually vice-rector of the university. He died at Geneva on the 18th of April 1885. He wrote a series of short, satirical, dramatic sketches collected as Théâtre de marionettes (1871), and stories, notably Nouvelles napolitaines (1879), numerous works on Italian history, a translation of Goethe’s Faust, Genève et ses poètes (1873), &c. The first volume of his Histoire de la littérature moderne, La Renaissance, de Dante à Luther (1884), was crowned by the French Academy.
See E. Rambert, Écrivains nationaux suisses, vol. i. (Geneva, 1874).
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monodelphia

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​MONODELPHIA (i.e. “single uterus,”—in allusion to the fusion of at least the basal portions of this organ, and in contradistinction to their duality in the Didelphia, or Marsupialia), Cuvier’s name for the group which includes all the orders of mammals (See Mammalia) except the Marsupialia and Monotremata; other titles for this group being Placentalia and Eutheria. With the Monotremata (q.v.) this group has no near affinity; and while more nearly related to the Marsupialia (q.v.), in which an imperfect allantoic placenta is sometimes developed, it is broadly distinguished therefrom by the invariable presence of a functional placenta by the aid of which the foetus is nourished throughout the greater portion of intra-uterine life. Other distinctive features by which marsupials are separated from monodelphians or placentals will be found in the article last mentioned. (R. L.*)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monmouth, Robert Carey, 1st Earl of

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​MONMOUTH, ROBERT CAREY, 1st Earl of (c. 1560–1639), youngest son of Henry Carey, 1st Baron Hunsdon, Chamberlain and first cousin of Queen Elizabeth, by Anne, daughter of Sir Thomas Morgan, of Arkestone in Herefordshire, was born about the year 1560. As a young man he accompanied several diplomatic missions abroad and took part in military expeditions. In 1587 he joined in the attempt to relieve Sluys, in 1588 served as a volunteer against the Spanish expedition, and commanded a regiment in Essex’s expedition to Normandy in 1591, taking part in the siege of Rouen. He was knighted by Essex the same year for having by his intercession with the queen procured his recall. In the parliaments of 1586 and 1588 he represented Morpeth; in that of 1593, Callington; and in those of 1596 and 1601, Northumberland. From 1593 till the end of Elizabeth’s reign he occupied various posts in the government of the Scottish borders, succeeding to his father’s appointment of lord warden of the marches in 1596, which he held till February 1598. In March 1603 he visited the court, and witnessed the queen’s last illness, which he described in his Memoirs. Anxious to recommend himself to her successor, and disobeying the orders of the council, he started on horseback immediately after the queen’s death on the morning of the 24th of March, in order to be the first to communicate the tidings to James, arrived at Holyrood late on the 26th, and was appointed by the king a gentleman of the bedchamber. But his conduct met with general and merited censure as “contrary to all decency, good manners and respect,” and on James’s arrival in England he was dismissed from his new post. On the 23rd of February 1605, however, he was made governor of Prince Charles, in 1611 his master of the robes, in 1617 his chamberlain, and on the 6th of February 1622, he was created Baron Carey of Leppington. In 1623 he followed Charles to Spain, and after the latter’s succession to the throne he was created earl of Monmouth in 1626. He died on the 12th of April 1639. His eldest son Henry (1596–1661), succeeded him as 2nd earl of Monmouth, and on his death without surviving male issue the peerage became extinct.
His Memoirs were published first by the earl of Cork and Orrery in 1759, a new edition, annotated by Sir Walter Scott, being printed in 1808.
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monochord

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​MONOCHORD (Gr. μονόχορδον, κανών μουσικός): med. Lat. monochordum), an instrument having a single string, used ​by the ancient Greeks for tuning purposes and for measuring the scale arithmetically. The monochord, as it travelled westwards during the middle ages, consisted of a long board, or narrow rectangular box, over which was stretched the single string; along the edge of the sound-board was drawn a line divided according to simple mathematical ratios to show all the intervals of the scale. A movable bridge was so contrived as to slide along over the string and stop it at will at any of the points marked. The vibrating length of string, being thus determined as on the guitar, lute, violin, &c., yielded a note of absolutely correct pitch on being twanged by fingers or plectrum. In order the better to seize the relation of various intervals, a second string tuned to the same note, but out of reach of the bridge, was sometimes added to give the fundamental.  (K. S.)
# 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Monod, Gabriel

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​MONOD, GABRIEL (1844–), French historian, was born at Havre on the 7th of March, 1844. Adolphe Monod (q.v.) was his uncle. Having studied at Havre, he went to Paris to complete his education, and whilst there lived with the family of De Pressensé. The influence of Edmond de Pressensé, a pastor and large-minded theologian, and of Madame de Pressensé, a woman of superior intellect and refined feeling, who devoted her life to educational works and charity, made a great impression on him. In 1865 he left the école normale supérieure, and went to Germany, where he studied at Göttingen and Berlin. The teaching of George Waitz definitely directed his studies towards the history of the middle ages. Returning to France in 1868 he was nominated by V. Duruy to give lectures on history, following the method used in German seminaries, at the école des hautes études. When the Franco-Prussian War broke out, Gabriel Monod, with his cousins, Alfred and Sarah Monod, organized an ambulance with which he followed the whole campaign, from Sedan to Mans. He wrote a small book of memoirs of this campaign, Allemands et français (1871), in which he spoke of the conquerors without bitterness; this attitude was all the more praiseworthy as his mother was an Alsatian, and he was unable to resign himself to the loss of Alsace and Lorraine. The war being over he returned to teaching. At this period of his life he wrote Grégoire de Tours et Marius d’Avenche (1872); Frédégaire, whose history, taken from original MSS., he published in 1885; a translation of a book of W. Junghans, Histoire critique des règnes de Childerich et de Chlodovech, with introduction and notes (1879); Études critiques sur les sources de l’histoire carolingienne (1898, 1st part only published); and Bibliographie de l’histoire de France (1888). He himself said that his pupils were his best books; he intended to teach them not so much new facts as the way to study, endeavouring to develop in them an idea of criticism and truth. They showed their gratitude by dedicating a book to him in 1896, Études d’histoire du moyen âge, and after his retirement in 1905 by having his features engraved on a slab (see À Gabriel Monod, en souvenir de son enseignement: école pratique des hautes études, 1868–1905, école normale supérieure, 1880–1904. May 26, 1907). In 1875 he founded the Revue Historique, which rapidly became a great authority on scientific education. Some of his articles in this and other periodicals have been put together in book form, Les Maîtres de l’histoire: Renan, Taine, Michelet (1894); Portraits et souvenirs (1897: on Hugo, Fustel de Coulanges, V. Duruy, &c.).