The Nuttall Encyclopaedia Part 388

ST. OMER (20), a fortified town of France, on the Aa, 26 m. SE. of Calais; has a fine old Gothic cathedral, a ruined Benedictine abbey church, a Catholic college, a.r.s.enal, &c.; manufactures embrace light textiles, tobacco pipes, &c.

ST. PAUL (168), capital of Minnesota State, finely situated on the Mississippi, a little below the mouth of the Minnesota River; in 1849 a village of 500 inhabitants; is now a beautiful and s.p.a.cious city, equipped with colleges, libraries, government buildings, electric street-railways, &c.; is a centre for 10 railways, and carries on a large trade in distributing groceries and dry goods throughout the State.

ST. PAUL'S SCHOOL, at West Kensington, London, a famous charity school founded by JOHN COLET (q. v.), dean of St. Paul's, for children of "every nation, country, and cla.s.s"; originally stood in St.

Paul's Churchyard, but was burned out by the Great Fire of 1666; the present building was opened in 1884. The endowment amounts to 10,000 a year, and 1000 boys and 400 girls are provided with education and board.

There are a number of Oxford and Cambridge exhibitions.

ST. PETERSBURG (1,036), capital of Russia, an imposing city, occupying a dreary, isolated site at the head of the Gulf of Finland, on the banks and delta islands (100) of the Neva, founded in 1702 by Peter the Great; a large number of bridges span the main stream and its numerous divisions; ma.s.sive stone quays hold back the waters, but a rise of 12 ft. floods the city (a yearly occurrence in the poorer parts); the river is ice-bound nearly half the year, and is given over to sleighing, &c.; the short summer is hot; covers nearly 48 sq. m.; its palaces and government buildings for number and grandeur are unsurpa.s.sed; Neva View is the finest street in Europe; is the centre of Russian political, literary, scientific, and artistic life; has a university, numerous academies, cathedral, technical and training colleges, and libraries (the Imperial Public Library contains 1,200,000 vols.); connected with the Volga basin by a ca.n.a.l, and the centre of four railways, it is the commercial metropolis and chief port of Russia, and carries on half the foreign trade; exports one-fifth of the corn of Russia, besides flax, linseed, leather, petroleum, &c.; imports coal, machinery, &c.; princ.i.p.al manufactures are cotton goods and other textiles, leather, sugar, porcelain goods, &c.

ST. PIERRE, HENRI BERNARDIN DE, French novelist, born at Havre; an engineer by profession, was a disciple of Rousseau both sentimentally and speculatively; his chief work, "PAUL AND VIRGINIA" (q. v.), shows here as in his other writings, says Professor Saintsbury, "a remarkable faculty of word-painting, and also of influencing the feelings" (1737-1814).

ST. QUENTIN (48), a manufacturing town of France, on the Somme, 95 m. NE. of Paris; manufactures all kinds of cotton and woollen goods, machinery, paper, &c.; has a fine old Gothic church and town-hall; here the French were routed by the Spaniards in 1557, and by the Germans in 1871.

ST. ReAL, ABBe DE, historian, born at Chambery, where he settled in 1679, and where he died; was historiographer to the Duke of Savoy, and wrote the "History of the Conspiracy of Spain against Venice," a masterpiece of its kind, and modelled on Sall.u.s.t (1639-1692).

SAINT SAeNS, CHARLES CAMILLE, a French musician, born in Paris; for 19 years organist of the Madeleine; composer of a number of operas (e. g.

"Henri VIII.") indifferently successful, and of much orchestral and chamber music of a masterly kind; is held to be one of the greatest of living pianists and organists; also noted for his musical critiques; _b_.

1835.

ST. SIMON, CLAUDE HENRI, COMTE DE, founder of French Socialism, and of a sect called after him St. Simonians, born in Paris, of an old n.o.ble family; grand-nephew of the succeeding, but renounced his t.i.tle and devoted his life and all his means of living to the promotion of his Socialist scheme, reducing himself in the end to utter penury; he made few disciples, though some of them were men of distinction; he is credited by Carlyle with having discovered, "not without amazement, that man is still man, of which forgotten truth," he bids us remark, "he had made a false application"; that is, we presume, by reorganisation from without instead of regeneration from within; his scheme was a reconstruction of society by the abolition of the hereditary principle, and the vesting of the instruments of production in the State and the administration of these for the welfare of all its members (1760-1825).

ST. SIMON, LOUIS DE ROUVROY, DUC DE, French courtier and diplomatist in the reign of Louis XIV.; left "Memoirs" in record of the times he lived in, depicting with remarkable sagacity the manners of the Court and the characters of the courtiers (1676-1755).

ST. SIMONIANS. See ST. SIMON, COMTE DE.

ST. TAMMANY, an American-Indian chief, popularly canonised as a saint, and adopted as the tutelary genius by a section of the democratic party in the States; his motto was "Unite in peace for happiness; in war for defence."

ST. THOMAS, 1, an unhealthy volcanic island (20) in the Gulf of Guinea, belonging to Portugal; produces coffee, cocoa, and some spices; chief town, St. Thomas (3), a port on the NE. 2, One of the Virgin Islands (14), 37 m. E. of Porto Rico; belongs to Denmark; since the abolition of slavery its prosperous sugar trade has entirely departed; capital, St. Thomas (12), is now a coaling-station for steamers.

ST. THOMAS'S, a handsome hospital on the S. side of the Thames, opposite Westminster, founded in 1553, and with an annual revenue of 40,000.

SAINT-VICTOR, PAUL DE, an ornate French writer, born in Paris; from 1851 was engaged in dramatic and other criticism, and established his reputation as a stylist of unusual brilliance. "When I read Saint-Victor I put on blue spectacles," said Lamartine; author of several works on historical and aesthetic subjects (e. g. "Anciens et Modernes," "Hommes et Dieux") was for a number of years General Inspector of Fine Arts (1827-1881).

ST. VINCENT (41), one of the Windward Islands, in the West Indies, 105 m. W. of Barbadoes, belongs to Britain; a coaling and cable station; mountainous and volcanic; warm, but healthy climate; exports sugar, rum, spices, &c.; chief town is Kingston (6), a port on the SW. coast.

ST. VINCENT, CAPE, a lofty and rugged headland in the extreme SW. of Portugal, off which have been fought several naval battles, the most memorable being the great victory on February 14, 1797, when Jervis and Nelson annihilated the Franco-Spanish fleet.

ST. VINCENT, JOHN JERVIS, EARL, a noted English admiral, born at Meaford Hill, Staffords.h.i.+re; ran away to sea when a boy, and by gallantry at Quebec in 1759 and otherwise rose rapidly in the service; commanded the naval attack upon the French West Indies (1793), and four years later, as admiral of the Mediterranean fleet, shared with Nelson the honours of a brilliant victory over the combined fleets of France and Spain off Cape St. Vincent; was created an earl in reward; during 1801-1804 was a successful First Lord of the Admiralty (1734-1823).

SAINTE-BEUVE, CHARLES AUGUSTIN, the greatest of French literary critics, born at Boulogne-sur-Mer; adopted medicine as a profession in deference to the wishes of his widowed mother, and for some years studied at Paris, but even as a student had begun his career as a literary critic by contributions to the _Globe_ newspaper; in 1827 became acquainted with Victor Hugo, whose commanding influence drew him into the Romantic movement, and determined for him a literary career; a critical work on French poetry in the 16th century (1828), two volumes of mediocre poetry (1829-1830), and a psychological novel, "Volupte" (1834), the fruit of spiritual and mental unrest, preceded his lectures at Lausanne on Port-Royal (1837), which, afterwards elaborated and published, contain some of his finest writings; an appointment in the Mazarin Library, Paris (1840), brought him a modest competence, and allowed him during the next 8 years to contribute without strain or stress to the _Revue des Deux Mondes_; was elected in 1845 to the Academy; three years later lectured for a session at Liege University; during 1849-1869 he contributed a weekly literary article to the _Const.i.tutionnel_; these form his famous "Causeries du Lundi" and "Nouveaux Lundis," which, for variety of human interest, critical insight, and breadth of sympathy, remain unsurpa.s.sed; was appointed professor of Latin in the College de France (1854), but his unpopularity with the students, owing to his support of Napoleon III., led to his resignation; as a senator in 1865 his popularity revived by his eloquent advocacy of freedom of thought, and on his decease some 10,000 people attended his funeral (1804-1869).

SAINTE-CLAIRE DEVILLE, HENRI eTIENNE, a noted French chemist, born in St. Thomas, West Indies; occupied for many years the chair of Chemistry in the Sorbonne, Paris; his important contributions to chemical knowledge include a process for simplifying the extraction of aluminium and platinum (1818-1881).

SAINTES (15), an interesting old town in West France, dep.

Charente-Inferieure, on the Charente, 28 m. SE. of Rochefort; known in ancient times as Mediolanum; has some splendid Roman remains, a cathedral, &c.; manufactures copper and iron goods, leather, &c.

SAINTSBURY, GEORGE, literary critic, born at Southampton; graduated at Merton College, Oxford; was engaged in scholastic work for a number of years at Manchester, Guernsey, and Elgin; in 1876 settled in London, and made a reputation for vigorous and scholarly criticism, devoting much of his time to French literature; elected to the Chair of English Literature in Edinburgh University, 1895; is the author of a "Short History of French Literature," a "Short History of English Literature," besides several volumes of essays, &c.; _b_. 1845.

SAS, a city of ancient Egypt, on the delta, on the right bank of the W. branch of the Nile; gave name to two Egyptian dynasties founded by natives of it, was a religious centre, and eventually for a time capital, the temple of which was said to contain a veiled statue which became a subject of legend.

SAIVAS, in the Hindu religion the wors.h.i.+ppers of Siva, one of the two great sections of the Hindus, the wors.h.i.+ppers of Vishnu being the other.

SAKI, a beer of alcoholic quality made in j.a.pan from rice by fermentation. It is drunk hot at meals, and is in a small way intoxicating.

SAKUNTALA, in Hindu mythology a benignant female character, made the subject of a famous drama of KaLIDaSA (q. v.), translated in 1789 by Sir William Jones.

SAKYAMUNI (i. e. the solitary of the Sakyas), the name given to Buddha, one of the tribe of the Sakyas in Northern India.

SALA, GEORGE AUGUSTUS, a well-known journalist, born in London, of Italian and English parentage; had some training in art before he began writing for d.i.c.kens's _Household Words_, &c.; lived a busy, rambling life; founded and edited _Temple Bar;_ acted as war-correspondent for the _Daily Telegraph_; author of several popular novels, "Captain Dangerous"

and "Quite Alone" among them, and books of travel, "A Trip to Barbary"

and "America Revisited" (1828-1895).

SALAAM, an Oriental term of salutation meaning "Peace," especially among the Mohammedans.

SALADIN, sultan of Egypt and Syria, the hero of the third crusade on the Saracen side; a man of n.o.ble and chivalrous character; served first as a soldier under Nureddin; rose to be vizier of Egypt, and ultimately sovereign in 1174; distinguished himself by the capture of Damascus, Aleppo, &c., and entering the Holy Land defeated the Christians at Tiberias, thereafter taking Jerusalem and laying siege to Tyre; found in Richard Coeur de Lion a foeman worthy of his steel, concluded a truce in 1192, and died the year after (1137-1193).

SALAMANCA (22), an interesting old city of Spain, capital of a province of the same name, occupies a hilly site on the Tormes, here spanned by a Roman bridge, 110 m. NW. of Madrid, long famous for its university, which in its heyday (16th century) numbered 8000 students, now fallen to 400; holds within its surrounding walls many fine old cathedrals, colleges, and other buildings; its industries are greatly fallen off, and consist mainly of cloth, linen, leather, and pottery manufacturing; in this neighbourhood Wellington won a great victory over the French on July 22, 1812.