The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 161

DESMOND, EARLDOM OF, an Irish t.i.tle long extinct by the death of the last earl in 1583; he had rebelled against Elizabeth's government, been proclaimed, and had taken refuge in a peasant's cabin, and been betrayed.

DES MOINES (62), the largest city in Iowa, U.S., and the capital, founded in 1846.

DESMOULINS, CAMILLE, one of the most striking figures in the French Revolution, born at Guise, in Picardy; studied for the bar in the same college with Robespierre, but never practised, owing to a stutter in his speech; was early seized with the revolutionary fever, and was the first to excite the same fever in the Parisian mob, by his famous call "To arms, and, for some rallying sign, c.o.c.kades--green ones--the colour of Hope, when," as we read in Carlyle, "as with the flight of locusts, the green tree-leaves, green ribbons from the neighbouring shops, all green things, were s.n.a.t.c.hed to make c.o.c.kades of"; was one of the ablest advocates of the levelling principles of the Revolution; a.s.sociated himself first with Mirabeau and then with Danton in carrying them out, and even supported Robespierre in the extreme course he took; but his heart was moved to relent when he thought of the misery the guillotine was working among the innocent families, the wives and the children, of its victims, would, along with Danton, fain have brought the Reign of Terror to a close; for this he was treated as a renegade, put under arrest at the instance of Robespierre, subjected to trial, sentenced to death, and led off to the place of execution; while his young wife, for interfering in his behalf, was arraigned and condemned, and sent to the guillotine a fortnight after him (1762-1794).

DE SOTO, a Spanish voyager, was sent to conquer Florida, penetrated as far as the Mississippi; worn out with fatigue in quest of gold, died of fever, and was buried in the river (1496-1542).

DES PERIERS, BONAVENTURE, a French humanist and story-teller, born at Autun, in Burgundy; valet-de-chamber of Margaret of Valois; wrote "Cymbalum Mundi," a satirical production, in which, as a disciple of Lucian, he holds up to ridicule the religious beliefs of his day; also "Novelles Recreations et Joyeux Devis," a collection of some 129 short stories admirably told; was one of the first prose-writers of the century, and is presumed to be the author of the "Heptameron," ascribed to Margaret of Valois; _d_. 1544.

DESPRE'AUX. See BOILEAU.

DESSALINES, JEAN JACQUES, emperor of Hayti, born in Guinea, W.

Africa, a negro imported into Hayti as a slave; on the emanc.i.p.ation of the slaves there he acquired great influence among the insurgents, and by his cruelties compelled the French to quit the island, upon which he was raised to the governors.h.i.+p, and by-and-by was able to declare himself emperor, but his tyranny provoked a revolt, in which he perished (1760-1806).

DESSAU (34), a North German town, the capital of the Duchy of Anhalt, on the Mulde, affluent of the Elbe, some 70 m. SW. of Berlin; it is at once manufacturing and trading.

DESSAUER, THE OLD. See LEOPOLD OF DESSAU.

DESTOUCHES, a French dramatist, born at Tours; his plays were comedies, and he wrote 17, all excellent (1680-1754); also a French painter (1790-1884).

DETMOLD (9), capital of Lippe, 47 m. SW. of Hanover, with a bronze colossal statue of ARMINIUS (q. v.) near by.

DETROIT (285), the largest city in Michigan, U.S., a great manufacturing and commercial centre, situated on a river of the same name, which connects Lake St. Clair with Lake Erie; is one of the oldest places in the States, and dates from 1670, at which time it came into the possession of the French; is a well-built city, with varied manufactures and a large trade, particularly in grain and other natural products.

DETTINGEN, a village in Bavaria, where an army of English, Hanoverians, and Austrians under George II., in 1743 defeated the French under Duc de Noailles.

DEUCALION, son of Prometheus, who, with his wife Pyrrha, by means of an ark which he built, was saved from a flood which for nine days overwhelmed the land of h.e.l.las. On the subsidence of the flood they consulted the oracle at Delphi as to re-peopling the land with inhabitants, when they were told by Themis, the Pythia at the time, to throw the bones of their mother over their heads behind them. For a time the meaning of the oracle was a puzzle, but the readier wit of the wife found it out; upon which they took stones and threw them over their heads, when the stones he threw were changed into men and those she threw were changed into women.

DEUS EX MACHINA, the introduction in high matters of a merely external, material, or mechanical explanation instead of an internal, rational, or spiritual one, which is all a theologian does when he simply names G.o.d, and all a scientist does when he simply says EVOLUTION (q. v.).

DEUTERONOMY (i. e. the Second Law), the fifth book of the Pentateuch, and so called as the re-statement and re-enforcement, as it were, by Moses of the Divine law proclaimed in the wilderness. The Mosaic authors.h.i.+p of this book is now called in question, though it is allowed to be instinct with the spirit of the religion inst.i.tuted by Moses, and it is considered to have been conceived at a time when that religion with its ritual was established in Jerusalem, in order to confirm faith in the Divine origin and sanction of observances there.

DEUTSCH, EMANUEL, a distinguished Hebrew scholar, born at Neisse, in Silesia, of Jewish descent; was trained from his boyhood to familiarity with the Hebrew and Chaldea languages; studied under Boeckh at the university of Berlin; came to England, and in 1855 obtained a post in the library of the British Museum; had made a special study of the "Talmud,"

on which he wrote a brilliant article for the _Quarterly Review_, to the great interest of many; his ambition was to write an exhaustive treatise on the subject, but he did not live to accomplish it; died at Alexandria, whither he had gone in the hope of prolonging his days (1829-1873).

DEUTZ (17), a Prussian town on the right bank of the Rhine, opposite Cologne.

DEUX PONTS, French name for ZWEIBRuCKEN (q. v.).

DEVA, the original Hindu name for the deity, meaning the s.h.i.+ning one, whence _deus_, G.o.d, in Latin.

DEVANAG'ARI, the character in which Sanskrit works are printed.

DEVELOPMENT, the biological doctrine which ascribes an innate expansive power to the organised universe, and affirms the deviation of the most complex forms through intermediate links from the simplest, without the intervention of special acts of creation. See EVOLUTION.

DEV'ENTER (25), a town in Holland, in the province of Overyssel, 55 m. SE. of Amsterdam; has carpet manufactures; is celebrated for its gingerbread; was the locality of the Brotherhood of Common Life, with which the life and work of Thomas a Kempis are a.s.sociated.

DE VERE, THOMAS AUBREY, poet and prose writer, born in co. Limerick, Ireland; educated at Trinity College, Dublin; wrote poetical dramas of "Alexander the Great" and "St. Thomas of Canterbury"; his first poem "The Waldenses"; also critical essays; _b_. 1814.

DEVIL, THE, a being regarded in Scripture as having a personal existence, and, so far as this world is concerned, a universal spiritual presence, as everywhere thwarting the purposes of G.o.d and marring the destiny of man; only since the introduction of Christianity, which derives all evil as well as good from within, he has come to be regarded less as an external than an internal reality, and is identified with the ascendency in the human heart of pa.s.sions native to it, which when subject enn.o.ble it, but when supreme debase it. He is properly the spirit that deceives man, and decoys him to his eternal ruin from truth and righteousness.

DEVIL, THE, IS AN a.s.s, a farce by Ben Jonson, full of vigour, but very coa.r.s.e.

DEVIL-WORs.h.i.+P, a homage paid by primitive tribes to the devil or spirit of evil in the simple-hearted belief that he could be bribed from doing them evil.

DEVONPORT (70), a town in Devons.h.i.+re, adjoining Plymouth to the W., and the seat of the military and naval government of the three towns, originally called Plymouth Dock, and established as a naval a.r.s.enal by William III.

DEVONs.h.i.+RE, a county in the S. of England, with Exmoor in the N. and Dartmoor in the S.; is fertile in the low country, and enjoys a climate favourable to vegetation; it has rich pasture-grounds, and abounds in orchards.

DEVONs.h.i.+RE, DUKE OF. See CAVENDISH.

DEVRIENT, LUDWIG, a popular German actor, born in Berlin, of exceptional dramatic ability, the ablest of a family with similar gifts (1784-1832).

D'EWES, SIR SIMONDS, antiquary, born in Dorsets.h.i.+re; bred for the bar; was a member of the Long Parliament; left notes on its transactions; took the Puritan side in the Civil War; his "Journal of all the Parliaments of Elizabeth" is of value; left an "Autobiography and Correspondence" (1602-1656).

DE WETTE, WILHELM MARTIN LEBERECHT, a German theologian, born near Weimar; studied at Jena, professor of Theology ultimately at Basel; was held in high repute as a biblical critic and exegete; contributed largely to theological literature; counted a rationalist by the orthodox, and a mystic by the rationalists; his chief works "A Critical Introduction to the Bible" and a "Manual to the New Testament" (1780-1849).