Part 18

was known regarding its origin, some referring it to Dionysus, some to Deukalion, and some to Semiramis (a name said to mean mountain dove) (chapter xxxiii). Aelian tells that the dove was the sacred companion of Astarte (_Hist. Nat._, iv, 2). Like the Egyptians, the Semites regarded the pigeon with veneration. The Hebrews sacrificed it on special occasions (_Num._ vi, 10; _Lev._ xiv, 4, 49). Noah sent out a dove from the ark (_Gen._ viii, 8). A prophet mourns as a dove (_Is._ xxxviii, 14). The dove is 'silly' (_Hos._ vii, 11). Doves were sold in the temple (_Mark_, xi, 15). The Spirit of God appears as a dove (_Matt._ iii, 16). According to Herodotus, the Persians drove away white pigeons, connecting them with leprosy (_Book I_, 139). At Dodona, the famous sanctuary in Epirus, auguries were taken from the moaning of doves in the tree-tops, and the priestesses of Zeus were called doves (_Peleiai_). Doves and pigeons were mystical birds in the British Isles. In England it was believed that one could not die on a bed of pigeon feathers, and the dying person had, therefore, to be removed from one so that the suffering might not be prolonged. The early Christian saints reverenced the dove. St. Gregory the Great is shown with a dove on his shoulder, and the emblem of St. Remigius is a dove with an oil-cruse in its beak. A snow-white dove with golden bill was wont to sit on the head of St. Mungo, the patron saint of Glasgow. Stories used to be told of sick persons recovering on seeing a white dove on an altar. In the folk lore attached to the memory of Michael Scott, the dove is connected with heaven, and the raven with hell. St. Columba's name signifies 'Dove'. Dove-cotes were connected with old churches, especially in England.

DO'VER, a municipal borough of England, county of Kent, 67 miles south-east of London. It lies on the coast of the Straits of Dover, and is 21 miles distant from Calais on the French coast. It is an important railway terminus, and as a port for mail and packet service with the Continent has a large passenger traffic. Ship-building, sail-making, and fisheries are carried on. There are two docks and a tidal harbour; an outer harbour of 70 acres, enclosed by a new pier and the extended Admiralty Pier, completed in 1871. Very extensive harbour improvements, begun in 1893, were carried out in subsequent years. The celebrated castle stands on a high chalk cliff. Dover is the chief of the Cinque Ports, and has extensive barracks. A parliamentary borough till 1918, Dover now gives its name to a parliamentary division of Kent. Dover was frequently raided by German aviators during the European War. Pop. 43,645.

DOVER, a city of the United States, in New Hampshire. It is situated on both sides of the Cochecho, which has here a fall of over 30 feet, affording abundant water-power for the large iron and cotton manufactories. Pop. 13,247.

DOVER, STRAITS OF, the narrow channel between Dover and Calais which separates Great Britain from the French coast. At the narrowest part it is only 21 miles wide. The depth of the channel at a medium in the highest spring-tides is about 25 fathoms. On both the French and English sides the chalky cliffs show a correspondency of strata which leaves no room for doubt that they were once united, a fact which is clearly shown by many other proofs.

DOVER'S POWDER, a preparation frequently used in medical practice to produce perspiration. It consists of 1 grain of opium, 1 of ipecacuanha, and 8 of sulphate of potash in every 10 grains, which constitute a full dose. It is named after Thomas Dover, an English physician of the eighteenth century.

DOVRE-FJELD (d[=o]-vre-fyel), an assemblage of mountain masses in Norway, forming the central part of the Scandinavian system, and extending as a plateau 2000 feet high E.N.E. from lat. 62deg N. to lat. 63deg. It is generally composed of gneiss and mica schist. One of the mountains belonging to it is Snehaetta, 7620 feet.

DOW, Gerard, an eminent painter of the Dutch school, was the son of a glazier, and born at Leyden in 1613. He studied under Rembrandt, and united his master's manner in chiaroscuro with the most minute finish and delicacy. Among his pictures, generally of small size and mostly scenes of family life, are: _The Evening School_, _Young Mother_, _Woman Sick with Dropsy_, and _The Bible Reader_. Dow died in 1675.

DOWDEN, Edward, English critic, historian, and educator, was born at Cork in 1843, died in 1913. He studied at Queen's College, Cork, and Trinity College, Dublin, where he gained great distinction, especially in English and Philosophy; and in 1867 he was elected to the professorship of English literature in the university. He was the first Taylorian lecturer at Oxford University in 1889, and held the Clark lecturership in English literature at Trinity College, Cambridge, from 1893 to 1896. Besides contributing to periodicals, Professor Dowden published various works on literary subjects, in particular: _Shakspere: his Mind and Art_ (1875); _Shakspere Primer_; _Studies in Literature_; _Southey_; _Southey's Correspondence with Caroline Bowles_; _Life of Shelley_ (2 vols., 1886), the chief authority on the poet's life, being founded on papers in the possession of the Shelley family; _Wordsworth's Poetical Works_ (1892-3); _Introduction to Shakspere_ (1893); _New Studies in Literature_ (1895); _The French Revolution and English Literature_ (lectures delivered at Princeton College, New Jersey, in 1896); _History of French Literature_ (1897); _Robert Browning_ (1904); _Michel de Montaigne_ (1905); _Essays, Modern and Elizabethan_ (1910). A volume of poems by him appeared in 1876, and his collected _Poetical Works and Letters_ appeared in 1914.

DOWER (Fr. _douaire_, Lat. _dos_, dower), in English law, is the right which a wife (not being an alien) has in the freehold lands and tenements of which her husband dies possessed and undisposed of by will. By common law this right amounts to one-third of his estate during her life; by local custom it is frequently greater. Where the custom of _gavelkind_ prevails, the widow's share is a half, and that of _free-bench_ gives her the whole or a portion of a copyhold, according to the custom of the manor. The term is also applied to the property which a woman brings to her husband in marriage, but this is more correctly _dowry_.

DOWIE, John Alexander, religious impostor, born at Edinburgh in 1847, died in 1907. Educated at the university of his native town, he joined his family in Sydney, Australia, and entered the ministry as clergyman of the Congregational denomination. In 1878 he started evangelistic work, maintaining that it was wrong to take a minister's salary. In 1882 he established a tabernacle at Melbourne, and began to practise faith-healing. He then came to the United States, where he organized his own Church, establishing it in 1901 at Zion City, 42 miles from Chicago, on the shore of Lake Michigan. He styled himself 'Elijah II', and 'the First Apostle of the Lord Jesus Christ, and General Overseer of the Catholic Apostolic Church'. Suspended in 1906 by his congregation of Zion City, who accused him of tyranny, polygamy, and misuse of funds, he died shortly afterwards.

DOWLAIS, a town of South Wales, Glamorganshire, included in the parliamentary borough of Merthyr Tydfil, from which it is distant 1 1/2 miles north-east, with important iron- and steelworks. Pop. 18,112.

DOWLAS, a kind of coarse linen formerly much used by working people for shirts; this use of it is now generally superseded by calico.--Cf. Shakespeare, _1st Henry IV_, iii, 3.

DOWLETABAD. See _Daulatabad_.

DOWN, a county of Ireland, in Ulster, bounded on the north by Belfast Lough and on the east by the Irish Sea; area, 610,730 acres, of which over five-sixths are productive. Down is copiously watered by the Rivers Bann, Lagan, and Newry, and has numerous small lakes. The surface is very irregular, and in parts mountainous, Slieve Donard, in the Mourne Mountains, being 2796 feet high. Agriculture is in a flourishing condition, oats, wheat, flax, turnips, and potatoes being the principal crops. The native breed of sheep is small, but valued for the delicacy of its mutton and the fine texture of its wool. The principal manufactures are linen and muslin. The fisheries on the coast, principally cod, haddock, and herring, are considerable. The county has five parliamentary divisions, each returning a member. The county town is Downpatrick; others are Newry, Newtownards, Bangor, and Banbridge. Pop. 204,303.

DOWNING COLLEGE, one of the colleges of the University of Cambridge, chartered in 1800 and opened in 1821. Its founder was Sir George Downing, a Cambridgeshire gentleman.

DOWNING STREET, a street in London, leading from Whitehall. The name is used as a synonym for the British Government, the Foreign Office and Colonial Office being located in it. No. 10 is the official residence of the Prime Minister, and No. 11 that of the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

DOWNPAT'RICK, a market town of Ireland, county town of Down, 21 miles S.E. of Belfast. It is the seat of the diocese of Down, Connor, and Dromore, has a cathedral, and is celebrated as the supposed burial-place of St. Patrick. Pop. 3200.

DOWNS, a term given to undulating grassy hills or uplands, specially applied to two ranges of undulating chalk hills in England, extending through Surrey, Kent, and Hampshire, known as the North and South Downs. The word is sometimes used as equivalent to _dunes_ or sand-hills.

DOWNS, THE, a celebrated roadstead for ships, extending 6 miles along the east coast of Kent in England, protected on the seaward side by the Goodwin Sands.

DOWNTON, a town of England, in Wilts., on the Avon, 6-1/2 miles S.S.E. of Salisbury; an ancient place, with a large cruciform church in the Norman and later styles, an old earthwork mound called 'the Moat', and an agricultural college. Pop. 1933.

DOXOL'OGY (from Gr. _doxa_, praise, glory, and _logos_), a set form of words giving glory to God, and especially a name given to two short hymns distinguished by the title of _greater_ (Glory be to God on high, &c.) and _lesser_ (Glory be to the Father, &c.). Both the doxologies have a place in the Church of England liturgy, the latter being repeated after every psalm, and the former used in the communion service.

DOYEN, Eug[`e]ne Louis, famous French surgeon, born at Rheims in 1859, died at Paris in 1916. He made numerous discoveries in gynaecological surgery, and in 1895 established a private clinic, where many French and foreign surgeons came to study under him. His surgical methods were adopted, although his claim to have discovered the germ of cancer has been disputed. In 1898 he received the degree of LL.D. from the University of Edinburgh, where he introduced the method of teaching surgery by means of the cinematograph. His works include: _La maladie et le m['e]decin_ and _Le Cancer_.

DOYLE, Sir Arthur Conan, English novelist, a nephew of Richard Doyle, born at Edinburgh, 1859, studied medicine, and for some years practised, but gave up the profession for that of literature. In 1887 he produced _A Study in Scarlet_, in which he created the detective Sherlock Holmes. Among his other books are: _Micah Clarke_, _The Sign of Four_, _The White Company_, _The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes_, _Brigadier Gerard_, _The Great Boer War_, _The Crime of the Congo_, _The Lost World_, _The Poison Belt_, _The British Campaign in France and Flanders_, _The New Revelation_, and _The Vital Message_.

DOYLE, Sir Francis Hastings Charles, English poet, born 21st Aug., 1810, died 8th June, 1888, was the son of Major-General Sir Francis Hastings Doyle, first baronet, succeeding his father in the title in 1839. Educated at Eton and Oxford, he graduated with first-class honours in classics in 1832, and held a fellowship at All Souls' from 1835 to 1844. After some years' work as a barrister, he became Receiver-General, and in 1869 Commissioner of Customs, having two years previously been elected professor of poetry at Oxford in succession to Matthew Arnold, a position to which he was re-elected for a second term five years later. He had already published _Miscellaneous Verses_ (1840); _The Two Destinies_ (1844); _The Return of the Guards and other Poems_ (1866); and subsequently printed his _Oxford Lectures_ (1869 and 1877) and _Reminiscences and Opinions, 1813-85_ (1886).

DOYLE, Richard, an artist, born in London in 1824, died in 1883. He was long well known as a constant contributor of satirical designs to _Punch_, and also showed much talent in illustrations to Leigh Hunt's _Jar of Honey_, Thackeray's _Newcomes_ and his _Rebecca and Rowena_, and Ruskin's _King of the Golden River_. Afterwards he devoted himself to water-colour painting.

DOZY (d[=o]'zi), Reinhart, Dutch Orientalist and historian, born 1820, died 1883. He was thoroughly versed in most of the Semitic tongues, and spoke and wrote almost all the European languages with facility. Among his works (sometimes in Dutch, sometimes in French) are: _Histoire des Musulmans d'Espagne de 711-1110_, _G['e]ographie d'Edrisi_, _De Israelieten te Mekka_, _Het Islamisme_], _Supplements aux Dictionnaires Arabes_.

DRAA, or WADY DRAA, a river, or rather water-course, of Morocco, rising in the Atlas Mountains and flowing generally south-east, until, after penetrating the Anti-Atlas range and passing several oases, it suddenly turns westwards, and forms the shallow lagoon El Debaia. From this point until it enters the ocean it is a wady, and forms the southern boundary of Morocco.

DRACAE'NA, a genus of endogenous evergreen plants, nat. ord. Liliaceae. It includes the dragon tree of Teneriffe (_D. Draco_), celebrated for producing the resin called dragon's blood. Several species of Dracaena are cultivated in greenhouses for the beauty of their foliage, but many of the fine plants known by this name belong strictly to other genera.

DRACHENFELS (dr[:a]'_h_en-fels; 'dragon rock'), "the castled crag of Drachenfels", as Byron calls it, a hill in Rhenish Prussia, about 8 miles south-east of Bonn, rising 900 feet above the Rhine, and crowned by the old castle of Drachenfels.

DRACHMA (drak'ma), the unit of weight and of money among the ancient Greeks. It was the principal Greek coin, was made of silver, and was worth (the Attic drachma) about 9-3/4d. As a weight amongst the Greeks it was about 2 dwt. 7 grains troy. The monetary unit of modern Greece is also called a drachma. Since 1867 its value has been equivalent to that of the franc of the Latin Monetary Union. It is divided into 100 _lepta_.

DRACO, a legislator of Athens, about 620 B.C., whose name has become proverbial as an inexorable and bloodthirsty lawgiver, and whose laws were said to have been written in blood, not ink. Suidas says that he met his death at Aegina, being unintentionally suffocated by the caps and cloaks thrown at him by some of his enthusiastic supporters.

DRACO, the Dragon, a constellation of the northern hemisphere, consisting of a long and straggling line of stars, coiled about Ursa Minor, the Lesser Bear. The Pole of the Ecliptic, or earth's orbital plane, is in this constellation, and round that point the Pole of the Equator, at present close to [alpha] Ursae Minoris (the 'Pole Star'), travels in a circle in about 26,000 years. Some 4000 years ago [alpha] Draconis was pole-star.

DRAG, (1) a long coach or carriage, generally uncovered and seated round the sides; (2) an apparatus for retarding or stopping the rotation of one wheel or of several wheels, in carriages especially; (3) an apparatus, consisting of a frame of iron with a bag-net attached, used to recover articles lost in the water.

DRAG-NET, a net drawn along the bottom of a river or pond to catch fish. The use of drag-nets is usually prohibited in rivers where fish breed, as it takes all indiscriminately.

DRAGO DOCTRINE, a doctrine formulated by L. M. Drago, an Argentinian jurist and Minister for Foreign Affairs, and asserting the principle that no power had a right to impose itself by force of arms upon any of the Spanish American nationalities. Drago first advanced his doctrine in 1902, when the British, German, and Italian fleets were blockading the Venezuelan coast to compel President Castro to pay certain claims made upon his government.

DRAGOMIROV, Mikhail Ivanovitch, Russian general, born in 1830, died in 1905. He became known as lecturer on military tactics, and was appointed chief of the Russian general staff at Kiev. During the Russo-Turkish War he distinguished himself at the crossing of the Danube at Sistova, and was wounded at the Shipka Pass. Retired from active service, he was director of the War Academy at St. Petersburg, Governor-General of Kiev from 1898 to 1902, and member of the Council of the Empire. His works include: _The Austro-Prussian War_, _A Study on the Novel 'War and Peace'_, _The French Soldier_, _War is an Inevitable Evil_, and _Duels_.

DRAGOMIROV, Vladimir, son of the former, was prominent as a commander during the European War, and took part in the offensive in Galicia in 1916. In 1919 he was president of General Denikin's Political Council, and Governor of Kiev.

DRAGON (Gr. _drakon_, 'the seeing one', a serpent). This 'composite wonder beast' is prominent not only in fairy lore and mediaeval romances, but in ancient religious systems. In the mythical history of the East the dragon is the symbol of anarchy and destruction, and the idea was taken over by Christianity, which looked upon the dragon as an emblem of the devil. In Ancient Egypt certain of the deities had serpentine forms, as have still some of the dragons of India, China, and Japan. The Egyptian 'fiery flying serpent' is a dragon, as is also the Apep serpent of night and death, through which the sun-barque of Ra was supposed to pass each night. Biblical references to it as the 'worm' include: "Their worm shall not die" (_Is._ lxvi, 24); "The worm shall eat them like wool" (_Is._ li, 8); "In that day the Lord, with his sore, and great, and strong sword, shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent," &c. (_Is._ xxvii, 1); "The great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, he that is called the Devil and Satan" (_Rev._ xii, 9). See also _Ps._ lxxxvii, 4, and lxxxix, 10; _Amos_, ix, 3; and _Is._ li, 9. Osiris, as the Nile, was a dragon on which were human heads. In the Pyramid Texts he is addressed as "the Great Green" (the Mediterranean Sea), and the one who is "round as the Great Circle (Okeanos)." On the sarcophagus of Seti I he is "Osiris encircling the Nether World." Set, who slew him, had a 'roaring serpent' form and hid in a hole; he resembled Typhon. The Babylonian dragon Tiamat was the Great Mother of all the deities, and was slain by her descendant Marduk (Merodach), who formed the earth and sky from her body; her blood ran as the flooded rivers to the sea. In India the drought-demon is a water confiner. When slain by Indra with the thunderbolt, the rainy season ensues. The Naga serpent-gods are dragons who may assume human or half-human, half-reptile forms. They guard treasure and chiefly pearls. Early pearl-fishers believed that the shark was the owner and guardian of pearls. Among the Chinese dragons is the lion-headed shark. All the Chinese dragons have pearls in their mouths, and are supposed to spit out pearls. Dragon deities are connected with the moon, which is 'the night-shining pearl,' and in Mexico 'the pearl of heaven'. The Mexican dragon resembles the Chinese, Indian, and Babylonian dragons. The Indian wonder-beast, the _Makara_, the vehicle of the sea-god Varuna, is similar to the dragon of the Babylonian mother-goddess Ishtar seen on the famous Ishtar gate of Babylon. _Makara_ forms include the lion-headed dolphin, the crocodile-headed fish, and the ram-headed fish so like the 'goat fish' or 'antelope fish' of the Babylonian sea-god Ea, and resembling the Greek horse-headed, dog-headed, and man-headed fish (Tritons). Japanese dragons are serpentine 'water fathers', which are prayed to in time of drought. The Chinese dragons are rain-bringers which sleep during the winter (the season of drought) in pools and rise to fight and thunder in spring. They are hatched from stones as snakes, or from sea-plants, or are transformed fish, or are born from aged pine trees. They are coloured according to their attributes, and may assume human forms or be horse-headed with a snake's tail. That the composite dragon-god is a mixture of several ancient animal-gods is evident by the following description of one class of dragon by a Chinese writer: "His horns resemble those of a stag, his head that of a camel, his eyes those of a demon, his neck that of a snake, his belly that of a clam, his scales those of a carp, his claws those of an eagle, his soles those of a tiger, his ears those of a cow." Dragons may transform themselves into fishes, snakes, crows, dogs, rats, cows, sharks, whales, crocodiles, &c., as well as human beings. The 'will o' wisp' is the 'dragon lantern', and the dragon pearl is the 'jewel that grants all desires' in India, China, and Japan. Dragon herbs cure diseases and prolong life. Dragons carry souls to the Celestial regions, or draw vehicles in which souls stand. This Far Eastern belief existed in Ancient Crete too. On a Cretan sarcophagus is a chariot drawn by two griffins (forms of the dragon) in which stands a woman, probably a goddess, and a swathed pale figure, the deceased. Shakespeare has interesting dragon references, including:

The dragon wing of night o'erspreads the earth,...

(_Troilus and Cressida_, V, 8, 17.)

Swift, swift, you dragons of the night, that dawning May bare the raven's eye.

(_Cymbeline_, ii, 2, 49.)

It is believed that the treasure-guarding dragon of the romances had origin in mixed memories regarding the pearl-guarding shark, the fiery flying serpent, and the ancient serpent and crocodile demons of destruction, flood, darkness, and death. The whole idea of dragons may have originated from traditions about the pterodactyls which lived in the Mesozoic period.

The dragon being a symbol of destruction and a power of evil, the slaying of a dragon was considered a great achievement of mediaeval heroes, such as King Arthur, Beowulf, Siegmund, and Tristram.--Cf. G. Elliot Smith, _The Evolution of the Dragon_; M. W. de Visser, _The Dragon in China and Japan_.

[Illustration: Dragon-fly

A, Larva of dragon-fly. B, Dragon-fly escaping from chrysalis. C, The perfect insect.]

DRAGON, or DRAGON-LIZARD, a name for several species of lizards inhabiting South-East Asia. The common flying lizard (_Draco volans_), the best type of the genus, is about 10 or 12 inches in length, the tail being extremely long in proportion to the body. The sides are furnished with peculiar extensions of the skin, resembling wings, which help to support it in the air as it springs from branch to branch. These wing-like processes are borne by prolongations of five or six of the hindermost ribs, and can be folded up. Its food consists almost exclusively of insects.

DRAG'ONET, the common name of small marine fishes constituting a special family (Callionymidae). The gemmeous dragonet (_Callionymus lyra_) is found in the British seas. The female is dull brown and much smaller than the male, which is brilliantly coloured with spots and bars of blue on a yellow ground. His first dorsal fin is large and drawn out into a long filament.