DALGETTY, DUGALD, a swaggering soldier of fortune in the "Legend of
Montrose," who let out his services to the highest bidder.
DALHOUSIE, JAMES ANDREW BROUN-RAMSAY, MARQUIS OF, Governor-General
of India, third son of the ninth Earl; as Lord Ramsay served in
Parliament as member for Haddingtonshire; on his father's death in 1838
entered the House of Lords; held office under Sir Robert Peel and Lord
Russell; went to India as Governor-General in 1848; ruled vigorously,
annexed territory, developed the resources of the country, projected and
carried out important measures for its welfare; his health, however, gave
way at the end of eight years, and he came home to receive the thanks of
the Parliament, elevation in the peerage, and other honours, but really
to end his days in pain and prostration; dying without male issue, he was
succeeded in the earldom by Fox Maule, Lord Panmure (1812-1860).
DALKEITH (7), a grain-market town in Midlothian, 6 m. SE. of
Edinburgh, with a palace adjoining, a seat of the Duke of Buccleuch.
DALLAS, GEORGE MIFFLIN, an American diplomatist, born in
Philadelphia; represented the United States as ambassador at St.
Petersburg and at London, and was from 1844 to 1849 Vice-President
(1792-1864).
DALMATIA (527), a crownland of Austria, lying along the NE. coast of
the Adriatic, and bounded on the land side by Croatia, Bosnia, and
Herzegovina; half the land is pasture, only one-ninth of it arable, which
yields cereals, wine, oil, honey, and fruit.
DALRI`ADS, a Celtic race who came over from Ireland to Argyllshire,
and established a kingdom in the SW. of Scotland, till King Kenneth
Macalpin succeeded in 843, who obtained rule both over it and the
northern kingdom of the Picts, and became the first king of Scotland.
DALRYMPLE, ALEXANDER, hydrographer to the Admiralty and the East
India Company, born at New Hailes, and brother of Lord Hailes; produced
many good maps (1737-1808).
DALTON, JOHN, chemist and physicist, born near Cockermouth, of a
Quaker family; took early an interest in meteorology, and kept through
life a record of meteorological observations; taught mathematics and
physics in Manchester; made his first appearance as an author in 1793 in
a volume of his observations and essays, and in 1808 published "A New
System of Chemical Philosophy," which he finished in 1810; famous for his
experiments on the elastic force of steam, for his researches on the
proportional weights of simple bodies, for his discovery of the atomic
theory, as also for his investigations on colour-blindness by
experimenting on himself and his brother, who along with himself was
colour-blind (1766-1844).
DALTONISM, COLOUR-BLINDNESS (q. v.). See DALTON, JOHN.
DALZIEL, THOMAS, general, born in Linlithgowshire; being hand-idle
at home, entered the Russian service against the Turks; returning at the
request of Charles II., was appointed commander-in-chief in Scotland;
suppressed a rising of the Covenanters at Pentland in 1666; never once
shaved his beard after the execution of Charles I. (1599-1685).
DAMAN, a Portuguese settlement with a port of the same name in
Gujarat, India, 100 m. N. of Bombay.
DAM`ARALAND, a territory on the W. coast of South Africa, N. of
Namaqualand; the chief industry is pastoral; the mountain districts,
which are rich in minerals, particularly copper, are inhabited by
Damaras, who are nomads and cattle-rearers; it is a German protectorate
since 1890.
DAMAS, COLONEL COMTE DE, a devoted adherent of Louis XVI., and one
of his convoys on his attempt at flight.
DAMASCUS (220), the capital of Syria, one of the oldest cities in
the world; stands 2260 ft. above the sea-level; is a great centre of the
caravan trade; is embosomed in the midst of gardens and orchards, hence
its appearance as the traveller approaches it is most striking; its
history goes as far back as the days of Abraham; it was the scene of two
great events in human destiny--the conversion of St. Paul, and, according
to Moslem tradition, a great decisive moment in the life of Mahomet, when
he resolutely turned his back once for all on the pleasures of the world.
DAMASUS, ST., Pope from 366 to 384, a Spaniard; a zealous opponent
of the Arians and a friend of St. Jerome, who, under his sanction,
executed his translation of the Bible into the Vulgate; there was a
Damasus II., Pope in 1048.
DAME AUX CAMÉLIAS, LA, a romance and a drama by Alexander Dumas
_fils_, one of his best creations.
DAMIEN, FATHER, a French priest, born at Louvain; devoted his life
to nurse and instruct the lepers in an island of the Hawaian group, and,
though after 12 years infected with the disease himself, continued to
minister to them till his death (1841-1889).
DAMIENS, ROBERT FRANÇOIS, the would-be assassin of Louis XV., born
near Arras; aimed at the king as he was entering his carriage at Trianon,
but failed to wound him mortally; was mercilessly tortured to death; was
known before as _Robert le Diable_; his motive for the act was never
known (1715-1757).
DAMIETTA (36), a town, the third largest, in Egypt, on an eastern
branch of the Nile, 8 m. from its mouth; has a trade in grain, rice,
hides, fish, &c.; was taken by St. Louis in 1249, and restored on payment
of his ransom from captivity.
DAMOCLES, a flatterer at the court of the elder Dionysius, tyrant of
Syracuse, whom, after one day extravagantly extolling the happiness of
kings, Dionysius set down to a magnificent banquet, but who, when seated
at it, looked up and saw a sword hanging over his head suspended by a
single hair; a lesson this which admonished him, and led him to change
his views of the happiness of kings.
DAMON AND PYTHIAS, two Pythagoreans of Syracuse of the days of
Dionysius I., celebrated for their friendship; upon the latter having
been condemned to death, and having got leave to go home to arrange his
affairs beforehand, the former pledged his life for his return, when just
as, according to his promise, he presented himself at the place of
execution, Pythias turned up and prepared to put his head on the block;
this behaviour struck the tyrant with such admiration, that he not only
extended pardon to the offender, but took them both into his friendship.
DAMPIER, WILLIAM, an English navigator and buccaneer; led a roving
and adventurous life, and parting company with his comrades, set off on a
cruise in the South Seas; came home and published a "Voyage Round the
World"; this led to his employment in further adventures, in one of which
Alexander Selkirk accompanied him, but was wrecked on Juan Fernandez; in
his last adventure, it is said, he rescued Selkirk and brought him home
(1652-1715).
DANA, CHARLES ANDERSON, American journalist, member of BROOK
FARM (q. v.), and became editor of the _New York Tribune_, the
_Sun_, and a cyclopædia: _b_. 1829.
DANA, JAMES DWIGHT, American mineralogist and geologist, born at
Utica, New York State; was associated as scientific observer with
Commodore Wilkes on his Arctic and Antarctic exploring expeditions, on
the results of which he reported; became geological professor in Yale
College; author of works on mineralogy and geology, as also on South Sea
volcanoes (1813-1895).
DANA, RICHARD HENRY, an American poet and critic; editor of the
_North American Review_, author of the "Dying Raven," the "Buccaneer,"
and other poems (1787-1879).
DANA, RICHARD HENRY, a son of the preceding, lawyer; author of "Two
Years before the Mast" (1815-1882).
DANAË, daughter of Acrisius, king of Argos, confined by her father
in an inaccessible tower of brass to prevent the fulfilment of an oracle
that she should be the mother of a son who would kill him, but Zeus found
access to her in the form of a shower of gold, and she became the mother
of Perseus, by whose hand Acrisius met his fate. See PERSEUS.
DANA`IDES, daughters of Danaüs, who, for murdering their husbands on
the night after marriage, were doomed in the nether world to the
impossible task of filling with water a vessel pierced with holes. See
DANAÜS.
DANAÜS, son of Belus, and twin-brother of Ægyptus, whom fearing, he
fled from with his fifty daughters to Argos, where he was chosen king;
by-and-by the fifty sons of Ægyptus, his brother, came to Argos to woo,
and were wedded to, their cousins, whom their father provided each with a
dagger to murder her husband, which they did, all except Hypermnestra,
whose husband, Lynceus, escaping, succeeded her father as king, to the
defeat of the old man's purpose in the crime.
DANBY, FRANCIS, painter, born near Wexford; settled for a time in
Bristol, then in Switzerland, and finally at Exmouth; his works are
mostly landscape, instinct with feeling, but some of them are historical,
the subjects being taken from Scripture, as the "Passage of the Red Sea,"
or from pagan sources, as "Marius among the Ruins of Carthage"
(1793-1861).
DANCE, GEORGE, English architect; was architect to the City of
London, and designed the Mansion House, his chief work (1700-1768).
GEORGE, his son, built Newgate Prison (1740-1825).
DANCE OF DEATH, an allegorical representation in a dramatic or
pictorial form of Death, figuring, originally as a skeleton, and
performing his part as a chief actor all through the drama of life, and
often amid the gayest scenes of it; a succession of woodcuts by Holbein
in representation of this dance is well known.
DANCING MANIA, an epidemic of frequent occurrence, especially in
German towns, during the Middle Ages, of the nature of hysteria, showing
itself in convulsive movements beyond the control of the will, and in
delirious acts, sometimes violently suicidal; the most signal occurrence
of the mania was at Aix-la-Chapelle in July 1374.
DANCOURT, FLORENT CARTON, French dramatist, a prolific author; a
favourite of Louis XIV.; wrote comedies, chiefly on the follies of the
middle classes of the time (1661-1725).