[1] These words were emended by some authors to read _luru mope can
ubre_, the letters of which can be arranged to give _pulvere
carbonum_.
[2] This represents the composition of English powder at present, and
no doubt it has remained the same for a longer time than the above
date indicates.
[3] Brown or coco-powder for large charges in guns. The charcoal is
not burnt black but roasted until brown, and is made from some
variety of straw, not wood.
GUNPOWDER PLOT, the name given to a conspiracy for blowing up King James
I. and the parliament on the 5th of November 1605.
To understand clearly the nature and origin of the famous conspiracy, it
is necessary to recall the political situation and the attitude of the
Roman Catholics towards the government at the accession of James I. The
Elizabethan administration had successfully defended its own existence
and the Protestant faith against able and powerful antagonists, but this
had not been accomplished without enforcing severe measures of
repression and punishment upon those of the opposite faith. The
beginning of a happier era, however, was expected with the opening of
the new reign. The right of James to the crown could be more readily
acknowledged by the Romanists than that of Elizabeth: Pope Clement VIII.
appeared willing to meet the king half-way. James himself was by nature
favourable to the Roman Catholics and had treated the Roman Catholic
lords in Scotland with great leniency, in spite of their constant plots
and rebellions. Writing to Cecil before his accession he maintained, "I
am so far from any intention of persecution as I protest to God I
reverence their church as our mother church, although clogged with many
infirmities and corruptions, besides that I did ever hold persecution as
one of the infallible notes of a false church." He declared to
Northumberland, the kinsman and master of Thomas Percy, the conspirator,
"as for the Catholics, I will neither persecute any that will be quiet
and give but an outward obedience to the law, neither will I spare to
advance any of them that will be of good service and worthily deserved."
It is probable that these small but practical concessions would have
satisfied the lay Roman Catholics and the secular priests, but they were
very far from contenting the Jesuits, by whom the results of such
leniency were especially feared: "What rigour of laws would not compass
in so many years," wrote Henry Tichborne, the Jesuit, in 1598, "this
liberty and lenity will effectuate in 20 days, to wit the disfurnishing
of the seminaries, the disanimating of men to come and others to return,
the expulsion of the society and confusion as in Germany, extinction of
zeal and favour, disanimation of princes from the hot pursuit of the
enterprise.... We shall be left as a prey to the wolves that will
besides drive our greatest patron [the king of Spain] to stoop to a
peace which will be the utter ruin of our edifice, this many years in
building." Unfortunately, about this time the Jesuits, who thus thrived
on political intrigue, and who were deeply implicated in treasonable
correspondence with Spain, had obtained a complete ascendancy over the
secular priests, who were for obeying the civil government as far as
possible and keeping free from politics. The time, therefore, as far as
the Roman Catholics themselves were concerned, was not a propitious one
for introducing the moderate concessions which alone James had promised:
James, too, on his side, found that religious toleration, though clearly
sound in principle, was difficult in practice. During the first few
months of the reign all went well. In July 1603 the fines for recusancy
were remitted. In January 1604 peaceable Roman Catholics could live
unmolested and "serve God according to their consciences without any
danger." But James's expectations that the pope would prevent dangerous
and seditious persons from entering the country were unfulfilled and the
numbers of the Jesuits and the Roman Catholics greatly increased.
Rumours of plots came to hand. Cecil, though like his master naturally
in favour of toleration, with his experience gained in the reign of
Elizabeth, was alarmed at the policy pursued and its results, and great
anxiety was aroused in the government and nation, which was in the end
shared by the king. It was determined finally to return to the earlier
policy of repression. On the 22nd of February 1604 a proclamation was
issued banishing priests; on the 28th of November 1604, recusancy fines
were demanded from 13 wealthy persons, and on the 10th of February 1605
the penal laws were ordered to be executed. The plot, however, could not
have been occasioned by these measures, for it had been already
conceived in the mind of Robert Catesby. It was aimed at the repeal of
the whole Elizabethan legislation against the Roman Catholics and
perhaps derived some impulse at first from the leniency lately shown by
the administration, afterwards gaining support from the opposite cause,
the return of the government to the policy of repression.
It was in May 1603 that Catesby told Percy, in reply to the latter's
declaration of his intention to kill the king, that he was "thinking of
a most sure way." Subsequently, about the 1st of November 1603, Catesby
sent a message to his cousin Robert Winter at Huddington, near
Worcester, to come to London, which the latter refused. On the arrival
of a second urgent summons shortly afterwards he obeyed, and was then at
a house at Lambeth, probably in January 1604, initiated by Catesby
together with John Wright into the plot to blow up the parliament house.
Before putting this plan into execution, however, it was decided to try
a "quiet way"; and Winter was sent over to Flanders to obtain the good
offices of Juan de Velasco, duke of Frias and constable of Castile, who
had arrived there to conduct the negotiations for a peace between
England and Spain, in order to obtain the repeal of the penal laws.
Winter, having secured nothing but vain promises from the constable,
returned to England about the end of April, bringing with him Guy
Fawkes, a man devoted to the Roman Catholic cause and recommended for
undertaking perilous adventures. Subsequently the three and Thomas
Percy, who joined the conspiracy in May, met in a house behind St
Clement's and, having taken an oath of secrecy together, heard Mass and
received the Sacrament in an adjoining apartment from a priest stated by
Fawkes to have been Father Gerard. Later several other persons were
included in the plot, viz. Winter's brother Thomas, John Grant, Ambrose
Rokewood, Robert Keyes, Sir Everard Digby, Francis Tresham, a cousin of
Catesby and Thomas Bates Catesby's servant, all, with the exception of
the last, being men of good family and all Roman Catholics. Father
Greenway and Father Garnet, the Jesuits, were both cognisant of the plot
(see GARNET, HENRY). On the 24th of May 1604 a house was hired in
Percy's name adjoining the House of Lords, from the cellar of which they
proposed to work a mine. They began on the 11th of December 1604, and by
about March had got half-way through the wall. They then discovered that
a vault immediately under the House of Lords was available. This was at
once hired by Percy, and 36 barrels of gunpowder, amounting to about 1
ton and 12 cwt., were brought in and concealed under coal and faggots.
The preparations being completed in May the conspirators separated.
Fawkes was despatched to Flanders, where he imparted the plot to Hugh
Owen, a zealous Romanist intriguer. Sir Edmund Baynham was sent on a
mission to Rome to be at hand when the news came to gain over the pope
to the cause of the successful conspirators. An understanding was
arrived at with several officers levied for the service of the archduke,
that they should return at once to England when occasion arose of
defending the Roman Catholic cause. A great hunting match was organized
at Danchurch in Warwickshire by Digby, to which large numbers of the
Roman Catholic gentry were invited, who were to join the plot after the
successful accomplishment of the explosion of the 5th of November, the
day fixed for the opening of parliament, and get possession of the
princess Elizabeth, then residing in the neighbourhood; while Percy was
to seize the infant prince Charles and bring him on horseback to their
meeting-place. Guy Fawkes himself was to take ship immediately for
Flanders, spread the news on the continent and get supporters. The
conspirators imagined that a terrorized and helpless government would
readily agree to all their demands. Hitherto the secret had been well
kept and the preparations had been completed with extraordinary success
and without a single drawback; but a very serious difficulty now
confronted the conspirators as the time for action arrived, and
disturbed their consciences. The feelings of ordinary humanity shrunk
from the destruction of so many persons guiltless of any offence. But in
addition, among the peers to be assassinated were included many Roman
Catholics and some lords nearly connected in kinship or friendship with
the plotters themselves. Several appeals, however, made to Catesby to
allow warning to be given to certain individuals were firmly rejected.
On the 26th of October Lord Monteagle, a brother-in-law of Francis
Tresham, who had formerly been closely connected with some of the other
conspirators and had engaged in Romanist plots against the government,
but who had given his support to the new king, unexpectedly ordered
supper to be prepared at his house at Haxton, from which he had been
absent for more than a year. While at supper about 6 o'clock an
anonymous letter was brought by an unknown messenger which, having
glanced at, he handed to Ward, a gentleman of his service and an
intimate friend of Winter, the conspirator, to be read aloud. The
celebrated letter ran as follows:--
"My lord, out of the love I bear to some of your friends, I have a
care for your preservation. Therefore I would advise you, as you
tender your life, to devise some excuse to shift of your attendance
of this Parliament, for God and man hath concurred to punish the
wickedness of this time. And think not slightly of this advertisement,
but retire yourself into your country, where you may expect the event
in safety, for though there be no appearance of any stir, yet I say
they shall receive a terrible blow the Parliament, and yet they shall
not see who hurts them. This counsel is not to be contemned, because
it may do you good and can do you no harm, for the danger is past as
soon as you have burnt the letter: and I hope God will give you the
grace to make good use of it, to whose holy protection I commend you."
The authorship of the letter has never been disclosed or proved, but all
evidence seems to point to Tresham, and to the probability that he had
some days before warned Monteagle and agreed with him as to the best
means of making known the plot and preventing its execution, and at the
same time of giving the conspirators time to escape (see TRESHAM,
FRANCIS).
Monteagle at once started for Whitehall, found Salisbury and other
ministers about to sit down to supper, and showed the letter, whereupon
it was decided to search the cellar under the House of Lords before the
meeting of parliament, but not too soon, so that the plot might be ripe
and be fully disclosed. Meanwhile Ward, on the 27th of October, as had
evidently been intended, informed Winter that the plot was known, and on
the 28th Winter informed Catesby and begged him to give up the whole
project. Catesby, however, after some hesitation, finding from Fawkes
that nothing had been touched in the cellar, and prevailed upon by
Percy, determined to stand firm, hoping that the government had put no
credence in Monteagle's letter, and Fawkes returned to the cellar to
keep guard as before. On the 4th the king, having been shown the letter,
ordered the earl of Suffolk, as lord chamberlain, to examine the
buildings. He was accompanied by Monteagle. On arriving at the cellar,
the door was opened to him by Fawkes. Seeing the enormous piles of
faggots he asked the name of their owner, to which Fawkes replied that
they belonged to Percy. His name immediately aroused suspicions, and
accordingly it was ordered that a further search should be made by
Thomas Knyvett, a Westminster magistrate who, coming with his men at
night, discovered the gunpowder and arrested Fawkes on the threshold.
The opinion that the whole plot was the work of Salisbury, that he acted
as an _agent provocateur_ and lured on his victims to destruction,
repeated by some contemporary and later writers and recently formulated
and urged with great ability, has no solid foundation. Nor is it even
probable that he was aware of its existence till he received Monteagle's
letter. Even after its reception complete belief was not placed in the
warning. A search was made only to make sure that nothing was wrong and
guided only by Monteagle's letter, while no attempt was made to seize
the conspirators. The steps taken by Salisbury after the discovery of
the gunpowder do not show the possession of any information of the plot
or of the persons who were its chief agents outside Fawkes's first
statement, and his knowledge is seen to develop according to the
successive disclosures and confessions of the latter. Thus on the 7th of
November he had no knowledge of the _mine_, and it is only after
Fawkes's examination by torture on the 9th, when the names of the
conspirators were drawn from him, that the government was able to
classify them according to their guilt and extent of their
participation. The inquiry was not conducted by Salisbury alone, but by
several commissioners, some of whom were Roman Catholics, and many
rivals and secret enemies. To conceal his intrigue from all these would
have been impossible, and that he should have put himself in their power
to such an extent is highly improbable. Again, the plan agreed upon for
disclosing the plot was especially designed to allow the conspirators to
escape, and therefore scarcely a method which would have been arranged
with Salisbury. Not one of the conspirators, even when all hope of
saving life was gone, made any accusation against Salisbury or the
government and all died expressing contrition for their crime. Lastly
Salisbury had no conceivable motive in concocting a plot of this
description. His political power and position in the new reign had been
already secured and by very different methods. He was now at the height
of his influence, having been created Viscount Cranborne in August 1604
and earl of Salisbury in May 1605; and James had already, more than 16
months before the discovery of the plot, consented to return to the
repressive measures against the Romanists. The success with which the
conspirators concealed their plot from Salisbury's spies is indeed
astonishing, but is probably explained by its very audacity and by the
absence of incriminating correspondence, the medium through which the
minister chiefly obtained his knowledge of the plans of his enemies.
On the arrest of Fawkes the other conspirators, except Tresham, fled in
parties by different ways, rejoining each other in Warwickshire, as had
been agreed in case the plot had been successful. Catesby, who with some
others had covered the distance of 80 m. between London and his mother's
house at Ashby St Legers in eight hours, informed his friends in
Warwickshire, who had been awaiting the issue of the plot, of its
failure, but succeeded in persuading Sir Everard Digby, by an
unscrupulous falsehood, to further implicate himself in his hopeless
cause by assuring him that both James and Salisbury were dead; and,
according to Father Garnet, this was not the first time that Catesby had
been guilty of lies in order to draw men into the plot. He pushed on the
same day with his companions in the direction of Wales, where, it was
hoped, they would be joined by bands of insurgents. They arrived at
Huddington at 2 in the afternoon. On the morning of the 7th the band,
numbering about 36 persons, confessed and heard Mass, and then rode away
to Holbeche, 2 m. from Stourbridge, in Staffordshire, the house of
Stephen Littleton, who had been present at the hunting at Danchurch (see
DIGBY, EVERARD), where they arrived at 10 o'clock at night, having on
their way broken into Lord Windsor's house at Hewell Grange and taken
all the armour they found there. Their case was now desperate. None had
joined them: "Not one came to take our part," said Sir Everard Digby,
"though we had expected so many." They were being followed by the
sheriff and all the forces of the county. All spurned them from their
doors when they applied for succour. One by one their followers fled
from the house in which the last scene was to be played out. They now
began to feel themselves abandoned not only by man but by God; for an
explosion of some of their gunpowder, on the morning of the 8th, by
which Catesby and some others were scorched, struck terror into their
hearts as a judgment from heaven. The assurance of innocence and of a
just cause which till now had alone supported them was taken away. The
greatness of their crime, its true nature, now struck home to them, and
the few moments which remained to them of life were spent in prayer and
in repentance. The supreme hour had now arrived. About 11 o'clock the
sheriff and his men came up and immediately began firing into the house.
Catesby, Percy and the two Wrights were killed, Winter and Rokewood
wounded and taken prisoners with the men who still adhered to them. In
all eight of the conspirators, including the two Winters, Digby, Fawkes,
Rokewood, Keyes and Bates, were executed, while Tresham died in the
Tower. Of the priests involved, Garnet was tried and executed, while
Greenway and Gerard succeeded in escaping.
So ended the strange and famous Gunpowder Plot. However atrocious its
conception and its aims, it is impossible not to feel, together with
horror for the deed, some pity and admiration for the guilty persons who
took part in it. "Theirs was a crime which it would never have entered
into the heart of any man to commit who was not raised above the lowness
of the ordinary criminal." They sinned not against the light but in the
dark. They erred from ignorance, from a perverted moral sense rather
than from any mean or selfish motive, and exhibited extraordinary
courage and self-sacrifice in the pursuit of what seemed to them the
cause of God and of their country. Their punishment was terrible. Not
only had they risked and lost all in the attempt and drawn upon
themselves the frightful vengeance of the state, but they saw themselves
the means of injuring irretrievably the cause for which they felt such
devotion. Nothing could have been more disastrous to the cause of the
Roman Catholics than their crime. The laws against them were immediately
increased in severity, and the gradual advance towards religious
toleration was put back for centuries. In addition a new, increased and
long-enduring hostility was aroused in the country against the adherents
of the old faith, not unnatural in the circumstances, but unjust and
undiscriminating, because while some of the Jesuits were no doubt
implicated, the secular priests and Roman Catholic laity as a whole had
taken no part in the conspiracy.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.--The recent controversy concerning the nature and origin
of the plot can be followed in _What was the Gunpowder Plot?_ by John
Gerard, S.J. (1897); _What Gunpowder Plot was_, by S. R. Gardiner (a
rejoinder) (1897); _The Gunpowder Plot ... in reply to Professor
Gardiner_, by John Gerard, S.J. (1897); _Thomas Winter's Confession
and the Gunpowder Plot_, by John Gerard, S.J. (with facsimiles of his
writing) (1898); _Eng. Hist. Rev._ iii. 510 and xii. 791; _Edinburgh
Review_, clxxxv. 183; _Athenaeum_ 1897, ii. 149, 785, 855; 1898, i.
23, ii. 352, 420; _Academy_, vol. 52 p. 84; _The Nation_, vol. 65 p.
400. A considerable portion of the controversy centres round the
question of the authenticity of Thomas Winter's confession, the MS. of
which is at Hatfield, supported by Professor Gardiner, but denied by
Father Gerard principally on account of the document having been
signed "Winter" instead of "Wintour," the latter apparently being the
conspirator's usual style of signature. The document was deposited by
the 3rd Marquess of Salisbury for inspection at the Record Office, and
was pronounced by two experts, one from the British Museum and another
from the Record Office, to be undoubtedly genuine. The cause of the
variation in the signature still remains unexplained, but ceases to
have therefore any great historical importance. The bibliography of
the contemporary controversy is given in the article on Henry Garnet
in the _Dictionary of National Biography_ and in _The Gunpowder Plot_
by David Jardine (1857), the latter work still remaining the principal
authority on the subject; add to these Gardiner's _Hist. of England_,
i., where an excellent account is given; _History of the Jesuits in
England_, by Father Ethelred Taunton (1901); Father Gerard's
_Narrative in Condition of the Catholics under James I._ (1872), and
Father Greenway's Narrative in _Troubles of our Catholic Forefathers_,
1st series (1872), interesting as contemporary accounts, but not to be
taken as complete or infallible authorities, of the same nature being
_Historia Provinciae Anglicanae Societatis Jesu_, by Henry More, S.J.
(1660), pp. 309 et seq.; also History of Great Britain, by John Speed
(1611), pp. 839 et seq.; _Archaeologia_, xii. 200, xxviii. 422, xxix.
80; _Harleian Miscellany_ (1809), iii. 119-135, or _Somers Tracts_
(1809), ii. 97-117; M. A. Tierney's ed. of _Dodd's Church History_,
vol. iv. (1841); _Treason and Plot_, by Martin Hume (1901); _Notes and
Queries_, 7 ser. vi., 8 ser. iv. 408, 497, v. 55, xii. 505, 9 ser. xi.
115; _Add. MSS. Brit. Mus._ 6178; _State Trials_, ii.; _Calendar of
State Pap. Dom._ (1603-1610), and the official account, _A True and
Perfect Relation of the Whole Proceedings against the late most
Barbarous Traitors_ (1606), a neither true nor complete narrative
however, now superseded as an authority, reprinted as _The Gunpowder
Treason ..._ with additions in 1679 by Thomas Barlow, bishop of
Lincoln. A large number of letters and papers in the State Paper
Office relating to the plot were collected in one volume in 1819,
called the _Gunpowder Plot Book_; these are noted in their proper
place in the printed calendars of State Papers, Domestic Series; see
also articles on FAWKES, GUY; TRESHAM, FRANCIS; MONTEAGLE, WILLIAM
PARKER, 4TH BARON; PERCY, THOMAS; CATESBY, ROBERT; GARNET, HENRY;
DIGBY, SIR EVERARD. (P. C. Y.)
GUN-ROOM, a ship cabin occupied by the officers below the rank of
lieutenant, but who are not warrant officers of the class of the
boatswain, gunner or carpenter. In the wooden sailing ships it was on
the lower deck, and was originally the quarters of the gunner.
GUNTER, EDMUND (1581-1626), English mathematician, of Welsh extraction,
was born in Hertfordshire in 1581. He was educated at Westminster
school, and in 1599 was elected a student of Christ Church, Oxford. He
took orders, became a preacher in 1614, and in 1615 proceeded to the
degree of bachelor in divinity. Mathematics, however, which had been his
favourite study in youth, continued to engross his attention, and on the
6th of March 1619 he was appointed professor of astronomy in Gresham
College, London. This post he held till his death on the 10th of
December 1626. With Gunter's name are associated several useful
inventions, descriptions of which are given in his treatises on the
_Sector, Cross-staff, Bow, Quadrant and other Instruments_. He contrived
his sector about the year 1606, and wrote a description of it in Latin,
but it was more than sixteen years afterwards before he allowed the book
to appear in English. In 1620 he published his _Canon triangulorum_ (see
LOGARITHMS). There is reason to believe that Gunter was the first to
discover (in 1622 or 1625) that the magnetic needle does not retain the
same declination in the same place at all times. By desire of James I.
he published in 1624 _The Description and Use of His Majestie's Dials in
Whitehall Garden_, the only one of his works which has not been
reprinted. He introduced the words cosine and cotangent, and he
suggested to Henry Briggs, his friend and colleague, the use of the
arithmetical complement (see Brigg's _Arithmetica Logarithmica_, cap.
xv.). His practical inventions are briefly noticed below:
_Gunter's Chain_, the chain in common use for surveying, is 22 yds.
long and is divided into 100 links. Its usefulness arises from its
decimal or centesimal division, and the fact that 10 square chains
make an acre.
_Gunter's Line_, a logarithmic line, usually laid down upon scales,
sectors, &c. It is also called _the line of lines_ and _the line of
numbers_, being only the logarithms graduated upon a ruler, which
therefore serves to solve problems instrumentally in the same manner
as logarithms do arithmetically.
_Gunter's Quadrant_, an instrument made of wood, brass or other
substance, containing a kind of stereographic projection of the sphere
on the plane of the equinoctial, the eye being supposed to be placed
in one of the poles, so that the tropic, ecliptic, and horizon form
the arcs of circles, but the hour circles are other curves, drawn by
means of several altitudes of the sun for some particular latitude
every year. This instrument is used to find the hour of the day, the
sun's azimuth, &c., and other common problems of the sphere or globe,
and also to take the altitude of an object in degrees.
_Gunter's Scale_ (generally called by seamen the _Gunter_) is a large
plane scale, usually 2 ft. long by about 1-1/2 in. broad, and engraved
with various lines of numbers. On one side are placed the natural
lines (as the line of chords, the line of sines, tangents, rhumbs,
&c.), and on the other side the corresponding artificial or
logarithmic ones. By means of this instrument questions in navigation,
trigonometry, &c., are solved with the aid of a pair of compasses.
GUNTHER, JOHANN CHRISTIAN (1695-1723), German poet, was born at Striegau
in Lower Silesia on the 8th of April 1695. After attending the gymnasium
at Schweidnitz, he was sent in 1715 by his father, a country doctor, to
study medicine at Wittenberg; but he was idle and dissipated, had no
taste for the profession chosen for him, and came to a complete rupture
with his family. In 1717 he went to Leipzig, where he was befriended by
J. B. Mencke (1674-1732), who recognized his genius; and there he
published a poem on the peace of Passarowitz (concluded between the
German emperor and the Porte in 1718) which acquired him reputation. A
recommendation from Mencke to Frederick Augustus II. of Saxony, king of
Poland, proved worse than useless, as Gunther appeared at the audience
drunk. From that time he led an unsettled and dissipated life, sinking
ever deeper into the slough of misery, until he died at Jena on the 15th
of March 1723, when only in his 28th year. Goethe pronounces Gunther to
have been a poet in the fullest sense of the term. His lyric poems as a
whole give evidence of deep and lively sensibility, fine imagination,
clever wit, and a true ear for melody and rhythm; but an air of cynicism
is more or less present in most of them, and dull or vulgar witticisms
are not infrequently found side by side with the purest inspirations of
his genius.
Gunther's collected poems were published in four volumes (Breslau,
1723-1735). They are also included in vol. vi. of Tittmann's _Deutsche
Dichter des 17ten Jahrh._ (Leipzig, 1874), and vol. xxxviii. of
Kurschner's _Deutsche Nationalliteratur_ (1883). A pretended
autobiography of Gunther appeared at Schweidnitz in 1732, and a life
of him by Siebrand at Leipzig in 1738. See Hoffmann von Fallersleben,
_J. Ch. Gunther_ (Breslau, 1833); O. Roquette, _Leben und Dichten J.
Ch. Gunthers_ (Stuttgart, 1860); M. Kalbeck, _Neue Beitrage zur
Biographie des Dichters C. Gunther_ (Breslau, 1879).
GUNTHER OF SCHWARZBURG (1304-1349), German king, was a descendant of the
counts of Schwarzburg and the younger son of Henry VII., count of
Blankenburg. He distinguished himself as a soldier, and rendered good
service to the emperor Louis IV., on whose death in 1347 he was offered
the German throne, after it had been refused by Edward III., king of
England. He was elected German king at Frankfort on the 30th of January
1349 by four of the electors, who were partisans of the house of
Wittelsbach and opponents of Charles of Luxemburg, afterwards the
emperor Charles IV. Charles, however, won over many of Gunther's
adherents, defeated him at Eltville, and Gunther, who was now seriously
ill, renounced his claims for the sum of 20,000 marks of silver. He died
three weeks afterwards at Frankfort, and was buried in the cathedral of
that city, where a statue was erected to his memory in 1352.
See Graf L. Utterodt zu Scharffenberg, _Gunther, Graf von Schwarzburg,
erwahlter deutscher Konig_ (Leipzig, 1862); and K. Janson, _Das
Konigtum Gunthers von Schwarzburg_ (Leipzig, 1880).
GUNTRAM, or GONTRAN (561-592), king of Burgundy, was one of the sons of
Clotaire I. On the death of his father (561) he and his three brothers
divided the Frankish realm between them, Guntram receiving as his share
the valleys of the Saone and Rhone, together with Berry and the town of
Orleans, which he made his capital. On the death of Charibert (567), he
further obtained the _civitates_ of Saintes, Angouleme and Perigueux.
During the civil war which broke out between the kings of Neustria and
Austrasia, his policy was to try to maintain a state of equilibrium.
After the assassination of Sigebert (575), he took the youthful
Childebert II. under his protection, and, thanks to his assistance
against the intrigues of the great lords, the latter was able to
maintain his position in Austrasia. After the death of Chilperic (584)
he protected the young Clotaire II. in the same way, and prevented
Childebert from seizing his dominions. His course was rendered easier by
the fact that his own sons had died; consequently, having an inheritance
at his disposal, he was able to offer it to whichever of his nephews he
wished. The danger to the Frankish realm caused by the expedition of
Gundobald (585), and the anxiety which was caused him by the revolts of
the great lords in Austrasia finally decided him in favour of
Childebert. He adopted him as his son, and recognized him as his heir at
the treaty of Andelot (587); he also helped him to crush the great
lords, especially Ursion and Berthefried, who were conquered in la
Woevre. From this time on he ceased to play a prominent part in the
affairs of Austrasia. He died in 592, and Childebert received his
inheritance without opposition. Gregory of Tours is very indulgent to
Guntram, who showed himself on occasions generous towards the church; he
almost always calls him "good king Guntram," and in his writings are to
be found such phrases as "good king Guntram took as his servant a
concubine Veneranda" (iv. 25); but Guntram was really no better than the
other kings of his age; he was cruel and licentious, putting his
_cubicularius_ Condo to death, for instance, because he was suspected of
having killed a buffalo in the Vosges. He was moreover a coward, and
went in such constant terror of assassination that he always surrounded
himself with a regular bodyguard.
See Krusch, "Zur Chronologie der merowingischen Konige," in the
_Forschungen zur deutschen Geschichte_, xxii. 451-490; Ulysse
Chevalier, _Bio-bibliographie_ (2nd ed.), s.v. "Guntram." (C. Pf.)
GUNTUR, a town and district of British India, in the Madras presidency.
The town (pop. in 1901, 30,833) has a station on the Bellary-Bezwada
branch of the Southern Mahratta railway. It is situated east of the
Kondavid hills, and is very healthy. It appears to have been founded in
the 18th century by the French. At the time of the cession of the
Circars to the English in 1765, Guntur was specially exempted during the
life of Basalat Jang, whose personal _jagir_ it was. In 1788 it came
into British possession, the cession being finally confirmed in 1823. It
has an important trade in cotton, with presses and ginning factories.
There is a second-grade college supported by the American Lutheran
Mission. Until 1859, Guntur was the headquarters of a district of the
same name, and in 1904 a new DISTRICT OF GUNTUR was constituted,
covering territory which till then had been divided between Kistna and
Nellore. Area, 5733 sq. m. The population on this area in 1901 was
1,490,635. The district is bounded on the E. and N. by the river Kistna;
in the W. a considerable part of the boundary is formed by the
Gundlakamma river. The greater part consists of a fertile plain
irrigated by canals from the Kistna, and producing cotton, rice and
other crops.
GUPTA, an empire and dynasty of northern India, which lasted from about
A.D. 320 to 480. The dynasty was founded by Chandragupta I., who must
not be confounded with his famous predecessor Chandragupta Maurya. He
gave his name to the Gupta era, which continued in use for several
centuries, dating from the 26th of February, A.D. 320. Chandragupta was
succeeded by Samudragupta (c. A.D. 326-375), one of the greatest of
Indian kings, who conquered nearly the whole of India, and whose
alliances extended from the Oxus to Ceylon; but his name was at one time
entirely lost to history, and has only been recovered of recent years
from coins and inscriptions. His empire rivalled that of Asoka,
extending from the Hugli on the east to the Jumna and Chambal on the
west, and from the foot of the Himalayas on the north to the Nerbudda on
the south. His son Chandragupta II. (c. A.D. 375-413) was also known as
Vikra-Maditya (q.v.), and seems to have been the original of the
mythical Hindu king of that name. About 388 he conquered the Saka satrap
of Surashtra (Kathiawar) and penetrated to the Arabian Sea. His
administration is described in the work of Fa-hien, the earliest Chinese
pilgrim, who visited India in A.D. 405-411. Pataliputra was the capital
of the dynasty, but Ajodhya seems to have been sometimes used by both
Samudragupta and Chandragupta II. as the headquarters of government. The
Gupta dynasty appears to have fostered a revival of Brahmanism at the
expense of Buddhism, and to have given an impulse to art and literature.
The golden age of the empire lasted from A.D. 330 to 455, beginning to
decline after the latter date. When Skandagupta came to the throne in
455, India was threatened with an irruption of the White Huns, on whom
he inflicted a severe defeat, thus saving his kingdom for a time; but
about 470 the White Huns (see EPHTHALITES) returned to the attack, and
the empire was gradually destroyed by their repeated inroads. When
Skandagupta died about 480, the Gupta empire came to an end, but the
dynasty continued to rule in the eastern provinces for several
generations. The last known prince of the imperial line of Guptas was
Kamaragupta II. (c. 535), after whom it passed "by an obscure
transition" into a dynasty of eleven Gupta princes, known as "the later
Guptas of Magadha," who seem for the most part to have been merely local
rulers of Magadha. One of them, however, Adityasena, after the death of
the paramount sovereign in 648, asserted his independence. The last
known Gupta king was Jivitagupta II., who reigned early in the 8th
century. About the middle of the century Magadha passed under the sway
of the Pal kings of Bengal.
See J. F. Fleet, _Gupta Inscriptions_ (1888); and Vincent A. Smith,
_The Early History of India_ (2nd ed., Oxford, 1908), pp. 264-295.
GURA, EUGEN (1842-1906), German singer, was born near Saatz in Bohemia,
and educated at first for the career of a painter at Vienna and Munich;
but later, developing a fine baritone voice, he took up singing and
studied it at the Munich Conservatorium. In 1865 he made his debut at
the Munich opera, and in the following years he gained the highest
reputation in Germany, being engaged principally at Leipzig till 1876
and then at Hamburg till 1883. He sang in 1876 in the _Ring_ at
Bayreuth, and was famous for his Wagnerian roles; and his Hans Sachs in
_Meistersinger_, as performed in London in 1882, was magnificent. In
later years he showed the perfection of art in his singing of German
_Lieder_. He died in Bavaria on the 26th of August 1906.
GURDASPUR, a town and district of British India, in the Lahore division
of the Punjab. The town had a population in 1901 of 5764. It has a fort
(now containing a Brahman monastery) which was famous for the siege it
sustained in 1712 from the Moguls. The Sikh leader, Banda, was only
reduced by starvation, when he and his men were tortured to death after
capitulating.
The DISTRICT comprises an area of 1889 sq. m. It is bounded on the N. by
the native states of Kashmir and Chamba, on the E. by Kangra district
and the river Beas, on the S.W. by Amritsar district, and on the W. by
Sialkot, and occupies the submontane portion of the Bari Doab, or tract
between the Beas and the Ravi. An intrusive spur of the British
dominions runs northward into the lower Himalayan ranges, to include the
mountain sanatorium of Dalhousie, 7687 ft. above sea-level. This
station, which has a large fluctuating population during the warmer
months, crowns the most westerly shoulder of a magnificent snowy range,
the Dhaoladhar, between which and the plain two minor ranges intervene.
Below the hills stretches a picturesque and undulating plateau covered
with abundant timber, made green by a copious rainfall, and watered by
the streams of the Bari Doab, which, diverted by dams and embankments,
now empty their waters into the Beas directly, in order that their
channels may not interfere with the Bari Doab canal. The district
contains several large _jhils_ or swampy lakes, and is famous for its
snipe-shooting. It is historically important in connexion with the rise
of the Sikh confederacy. The whole of the Punjab was then distributed
among the Sikh chiefs who triumphed over the imperial governors. In the
course of a few years, however, the maharaja Ranjit Singh acquired all
the territory which those chiefs had held. Pathankot and the
neighbouring villages in the plain, together with the whole hill portion
of the district, formed part of the area ceded by the Sikhs to the
British after the first Sikh war in 1846. In 1862, after receiving one
or two additions, the district was brought into its present shape. In
1901 the population was 940,334, showing a slight decrease, compared
with an increase of 15% in the previous decade. A branch of the
North-Western railway runs through the district. The largest town and
chief commercial centre is Batala. There are important woollen mills at
Dhariwal, and besides their products the district exports cotton, sugar,
grain and oil-seeds.
GURGAON, a town and district of British India, in the Delhi division of
the Punjab. The town (pop. in 1901, 4765) is the headquarters of the
district, but is otherwise unimportant. The district has an area of 1984
sq. m. It is bounded on the N. by Rohtak, on the W. and S.W. by portions
of the Alwar, Nabha and Jind native states, on the S. by the Muttra
district of the United Provinces, on the E. by the river Jumna and on
the N.E. by Delhi. It comprises the southernmost corner of the Punjab
province, stretching away from the level plain towards the hills of
Rajputana. Two low rocky ranges enter its borders from the south and run
northward in a bare and unshaded mass toward the plain country. East of
the western ridge the valley is wide and open, extending to the banks of
the Jumna. To the west lies the subdivision of Rewari, consisting of a
sandy plain dotted with isolated hills. Numerous torrents carry off the
drainage from the upland ranges, and the most important among them empty
themselves at last into the Najafgarh _jhil_. This swampy lake lies to
the east of the civil station of Gurgaon, and stretches long arms into
the neighbouring districts of Delhi and Rohtak. Salt is manufactured in
wells at several villages. The mineral products are iron ore, copper
ore, plumbago and ochre.
In 1803 Gurgaon district passed into the hands of the British after Lord
Lake's conquests. On the outbreak of the Mutiny in May 1857, the nawab
of Farukhnagar, the principal feudatory of the district, rose in
rebellion. The Meos and many Rajput families followed his example. A
faithful native officer preserved the public buildings and records at
Rewari from destruction; but with this exception, British authority
became extinguished for a time throughout Gurgaon. After the fall of the
rebel capital, a force marched into the district and either captured or
dispersed the leaders of rebellion. The territory of the nawab was
confiscated on account of his participation in the Mutiny. Civil
administration was resumed under orders from the Punjab government, to
which province the district was formally annexed on the final
pacification of the country. The population in 1901 was 746,208, showing
an increase of 11% in the decade. The largest town and chief trade
centre is Rewari. The district is now traversed by several lines of
railway, and irrigation is provided by the Agra canal. The chief trade
is in cereals, but hardware is also exported.
GURKHA (pronounced _goorka_; from Sans. _gau_, a cow, and _raks_, to
protect), the ruling Hindu race in Nepal (q.v.). The Gurkhas, or
Gurkhalis, claim descent from the rajas of Chitor in Rajputana. When
driven out of their own country by the Mahommedan invasion, they took
refuge in the hilly districts about Kumaon, whence they gradually
invaded the country to the eastward as far as Gurkha, Noakote and
ultimately to the valley of Nepal and even Sikkim. They were stopped by
the English in an attempt to push south, and the treaty of Segauli,
which ended the Gurkha War of 1814, definitely limited their
territorial growth. The Gurkhas of the present day remain Hindus by
religion, but show in their appearance a strong admixture of Mongolian
blood. They make splendid infantry soldiers, and by agreement with their
government about 20,000 have been recruited for the Gurkha regiments of
the Indian army. As a rule they are bold, enduring, faithful, frank,
independent and self-reliant. They despise other Orientals, but admire
and fraternize with Europeans, whose tastes in sport and war they share.
They strongly resemble the Japanese, but are of a sturdier build. Their
national weapon is the _kukri_, a heavy curved knife, which they use for
every possible purpose.
See Capt. Eden Vansittart, _Notes on the Gurkhas_ (1898); and P. D.
Bonarjee, _The Fighting Races of India_ (1899).
GURNALL, WILLIAM (1617-1679), English author, was born in 1617 at King's
Lynn, Norfolk. He was educated at the free grammar school of his native
town, and in 1631 was nominated to the Lynn scholarship in Emmanuel
College, Cambridge, where he graduated B.A. in 1635 and M.A. in 1639. He
was made rector of Lavenham in Suffolk in 1644; and before he received
that appointment he seems to have officiated, perhaps as curate, at
Sudbury. At the Restoration he signed the declaration required by the
Act of Uniformity, and on this account he was the subject of a libellous
attack, published in 1665, entitled _Covenant-Renouncers Desperate
Apostates_. He died on the 12th of October 1679. Gurnall is known by his
_Christian in Complete Armour_, published in three volumes, dated 1655,
1658 and 1662. It consists of a series of sermons on the latter portion
of the 6th chapter of Ephesians, and is described as a "magazine from
whence the Christian is furnished with spiritual arms for the battle,
helped on with his armour, and taught the use of his weapon; together
with the happy issue of the whole war." The work is more practical than
theological; and its quaint fancy, graphic and pointed style, and its
fervent religious tone render it still popular with some readers.
See also _An Inquiry into the Life of the Rev. W. Gurnall_, by H.
M'Keon (1830), and a biographical introduction by Bishop Ryle to the
_Christian in Complete Armour_ (1865).
GURNARD (_Trigla_), a genus of fishes forming a group of the family of
"mailed cheeks" (_Triglidae_), and easily recognized by three detached
finger-like appendages in front of the pectoral fins, and by their
large, angular, bony head, the sides of which are protected by strong,
hard and rough bones. The pectoral appendages are provided with strong
nerves, and serve not only as organs of locomotion when the fish moves
on the bottom, but also as organs of touch, by which it detects small
animals on which it feeds. Gurnards are coast-fishes, generally
distributed over the tropical and temperate areas; of the forty species
known six occur on the coast of Great Britain, viz. the red gurnard (_T.
pini_), the streaked gurnard (_T. lineata_), the sapphirine gurnard (_T.
hirundo_), the grey gurnard (_T. gurnardus_), the piper (_T. lyra_) and
the long-finned gurnard (_T. obscura_ or _T. lucerna_). Although never
found very far from the coast, gurnards descend to depths of several
hundred fathoms; and as they are bottom-fish they are caught chiefly by
means of the trawl. Not rarely, however, they may be seen floating on
the surface of the water, with their broad, finely coloured pectoral
fins spread out like fans. In very young fishes, which abound in certain
localities on the coast in the months of August and September, the
pectorals are comparatively much longer than in the adult, extending to
the end of the body; they are beautifully coloured and kept expanded,
the little fishes looking like butterflies. When caught and taken out of
the water, gurnards emit a grunting noise, which is produced by the
vibrations of a diaphragm situated transversely across the cavity of the
bladder and perforated in the centre. This grunting noise gave rise to
the name "gurnard," which is probably an adaptation or variation of the
Fr. _grognard_, grumbler, cf. the Fr. _grondin_, gurnard, from
_gronder_, and Ger. _Knurrfisch_. Their flesh is very white, firm and
wholesome.
[Illustration: _Trigla pleuracanthica_.]
GURNEY, the name of a philanthropic English family of bankers and
merchants, direct descendants of Hugh de Gournay, lord of Gournay, one
of the Norman noblemen who accompanied William the Conqueror to England.
Large grants of land were made to Hugh de Gournay in Norfolk and
Suffolk, and Norwich has since that time been the headquarters of the
family, the majority of whom were Quakers. Here in 1770 the brothers
John and Henry Gurney founded a banking-house, the business passing in
1779 to Henry's son, Bartlett Gurney. On the death of Bartlett Gurney in
1802 the bank became the property of his three cousins, of whom JOHN
GURNEY (1750-1809) was the most remarkable. One of his daughters was
Elizabeth Fry; another married Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton. Of his sons one
was Joseph JOHN GURNEY (1788-1847), a well-known philanthropist of the
day; another, SAMUEL GURNEY (1786-1856) assumed on his father's death
the control of the Norwich bank. Samuel Gurney also took over about the
same time the control of the London bill-broking business of Richardson,
Overend & Company, in which he was already a partner. This business had
been founded in 1800 by Thomas Richardson, clerk to a London
bill-discounter, and John Overend, chief clerk in the bank of Smith,
Payne & Company at Nottingham, the Gurneys supplying the capital. At
that time bill-discounting was carried on in a spasmodic fashion by the
ordinary merchant in addition to his regular business, but Richardson
considered that there was room for a London house which should devote
itself entirely to the trade in bills. This, at that time, novel idea
proved an instant success. The title of the firm was subsequently
changed to Overend, Gurney & Company, and for forty years it was the
greatest discounting-house in the world. During the financial crisis of
1825 Overend, Gurney & Company were able to make short loans to many
other bankers. The house indeed became known as "the bankers' banker,"
and secured many of the previous clients of the Bank of England. Samuel
Gurney died in 1856. He was a man of very charitable disposition, and
during the latter years of his life charitable and philanthropic
undertakings almost monopolized his attention. In 1865 the business of
Overend, Gurney & Company, which had come under less competent control,
was converted into a joint stock company, but in 1866 the firm suspended
payment with liabilities amounting to eleven millions sterling.
GURNEY, EDMUND (1847-1888), English psychologist, was born at Hersham,
near Walton-on-Thames, on the 23rd of March 1847. He was educated at
Blackheath and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he took a high place
in the classical tripos and obtained a fellowship. His work for the
schools was done, says his friend F. W. H. Myers, "in the intervals of
his practice on the piano." Dissatisfied with his own executive skill as
a musician, he wrote _The Power of Sound_ (1880), an essay on the
philosophy of music. He then studied medicine with no intention of
practising, devoting himself to physics, chemistry and physiology. In
1880 he passed the second M.B. Cambridge examination in the science of
the healing profession. These studies, and his great logical powers and
patience in the investigation of evidence, he devoted to that outlying
field of psychology which is called "Psychical Research." He asked
whether, as universal tradition declares, there is an unexplored region
of human faculty transcending the normal limitations of sensible
knowledge. That there is such a region it was part of the system of
Hegel to declare, and the subject had been metaphysically treated by
Hartmann, Schopenhauer, Du Prel, Hamilton and others, as the philosophy
of the Unconscious or Subconscious. But Gurney's purpose was to
approach the subject by observation and experiment, especially in the
hypnotic field, whereas vague and ill-attested anecdotes had hitherto
been the staple of the evidence of metaphysicians. The tendency of his
mind was to investigate whatever facts may give a colour of truth to the
ancient belief in the persistence of the conscious human personality
after the death of the body. Like Joseph Glanvill's, the natural bent of
Gurney's mind was sceptical. Both thought the current and traditional
reports of supernormal occurrences suggestive and worth investigating by
the ordinary methods of scientific observation, and inquisition into
evidence at first hand. But the method of Gurney was, of course, much
more strict than that of the author of _Sadducismus Triumphatus_, and it
included hypnotic and other experiments unknown to Glanvill. Gurney
began at what he later saw was the wrong end by studying, with Myers,
the "seances" of professed spiritualistic "mediums" (1874-1878). Little
but detection of imposture came of this, but an impression was left that
the subject ought not to be abandoned. In 1882 the Society for Psychical
Research was founded. (See PSYCHICAL RESEARCH.) Paid mediums were
discarded, at least for the time, and experiments were made in
"thought-transference" and hypnotism. Personal evidence as to uninduced
hallucinations was also collected. The first results are embodied in the
volumes of _Phantasms of the Living_, a vast collection (Podmore, Myers
and Gurney), and in Gurney's remarkable essay, _Hallucinations_. The
chief consequence was to furnish evidence for the process called
"telepathy," involving the provisional hypothesis that one human mind
can affect another through no recognized channel of sense. The fact was
supposed to be established by the experiments chronicled in the
_Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research_, and it was argued
that similar experiences occurred spontaneously, as, for example, in the
many recorded instances of "deathbed wraiths" among civilized and savage
races. (Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, i. chapter xi., especially pp.
449-450, 1873. Lang, _Making of Religion_, pp. 120-124, 1898.) The dying
man is supposed to convey the hallucination of his presence as one
living person experimentally conveys his thought to another, by
"thought-transference." Gurney's hypnotic experiments, marked by great
exactness, patience and ingenuity, were undertaken in 1885-1888. Their
tendency was, in Myers's words, "to prove--so far as any one operator's
experience in this protean subject can be held to prove anything--that
there is sometimes, in the induction of hypnotic phenomena, some agency
at work which is neither ordinary nervous stimulation (monotonous or
sudden) nor suggestion conveyed by any ordinary channel to the subject's
mind." These results, if accepted, of course corroborate the idea of
telepathy. (See Gurney, "Hypnotism and Telepathy," _Proceedings S. P.
R._ vol. iv.) Experiments by MM. Gibert, Janet, Richet, Hericourt and
others are cited as tending in the same direction. Other experiments
dealt with "the relation of the memory in the hypnotic state to the
memory in another hypnotic state, and of both to the normal or waking
memory." The result of Gurney's labours, cut short by his early death,
was to raise and strengthen the presumption that there exists an
unexplored region of human faculty which ought not to be neglected by
science as if the belief in it were a mere survival of savage
superstition. Rather, it appears to have furnished the experiences
which, misinterpreted, are expressed in traditional beliefs. That Gurney
was credulous and easily imposed upon those who knew him, and knew his
penetrating humour, cannot admit; nor is the theory likely to be
maintained by those whom bias does not prevent from studying with care
his writings. In controversy "he delighted in replying with easy
courtesy to attacks envenomed with that _odium plus quam theologicum_
which the very allusion to a ghost or the human soul seems in some
philosophers to inspire." In discussion of themes unpopular and obscure
Gurney displayed the highest tact, patience, good temper, humour and
acuteness. There never was a more disinterested student. In addition to
his work on music and his psychological writings, he was the author of
_Tertium Quid_ (1887), a collection of essays, on the whole a protest
against one-sided ideas and methods of discussion. He died at Brighton
on 23rd June 1888, from the effects of an overdose of narcotic medicine.
(A. L.)
GURWOOD, JOHN (1790-1845), British soldier, began his career in a
merchant's office, but soon obtained an ensigncy in the 52nd (1808).
With his regiment he served in the "Light Division" of Wellington's army
throughout the earlier Peninsular campaigns, and at Ciudad Rodrigo (19th
Jan. 1812) he led one of the forlorn hopes and was severely wounded. For
his gallant conduct on this occasion Wellington presented Gurwood with
the sword of the French governor of Ciudad Rodrigo. A little later,
transferring to the 9th Light Dragoons, he was made brigade-major to the
Guards' cavalry which had just arrived in the Peninsula. In the latter
part of the war he served as brigade-major to Lambert's brigade of the
sixth infantry division, and was present at the various actions in which
that division played a conspicuous part--the Nivelle, the Nive, Orthes
and Toulouse. At Waterloo Captain Gurwood was for the third time
severely wounded. In the first twelve years of the peace he was promoted
up to the grade of lieut.-colonel, and in 1841 became brevet-colonel. He
was for many years the duke of Wellington's private secretary, and was
entrusted by him with the collection and editing of the _Wellington
Despatches_, which occupied Gurwood from 1837 to the end of his life.
This work is a monument of industrious skill, and earned its author a
Civil List Pension of L200. But overwork and the effects of his wounds
had broken his health, and he committed suicide on Christmas day 1845.
He was a C.B. and deputy-lieutenant of the Tower.
GUSLA, or GUSLI, an ancient stringed instrument still in use among the
Slavonic races. The modern Servian gusla is a kind of tanbur (see
Pandura), consisting of a round, concave body covered with a parchment
soundboard; there is but one horse-hair string, and the peg for tuning
it is inserted in oriental fashion in the back of the head. The gusla is
played with a primitive bow called _goudalo_. The _gouslars_ or blind
bards of Servia and Croatia use it to accompany their chants. C. G.
Anton[1] mentions an instrument of that name in the shape of a half-moon
strung with eighteen strings in use among the Tatars. Prosper Merimee[2]
has taken the _gusla_ as the title for a book of Servian poems, which
are supposed to have been collected by him among the peasants, but which
are thought to have been inspired by the _Viaggio in Dalmazia_ of
Albarto Fortis.
Among the Russians, the gusli is an instrument of a different type, a
kind of psaltery having five or more strings stretched across a flat,
shallow sound-chest in the shape of a wing. In the gusli the strings, of
graduated length, are attached to little nails or pins at one end, and
at the other they are wound over a rod having screw attachments for
increasing and slackening the tension. There is no bridge to determine
the vibrating length of the strings. The body of the instrument is
shaped roughly like the tail of the grand piano, following the line of
the strings; the longest being at the left of the instrument. Matthew
Guthrie gives an illustration of the gusli.[3] (K. S.)