Images de page
PDF
ePub
[blocks in formation]

underground galleries owe their inception entirely to the chemical action of water seeking its way downwards from the surface, and following the lines of natural division-planes in the rocks, it is obvious that caves will be of most common occur rence in regions where the rocks yield most readily to such chemical action. Among the more soluble rocks are rock-salt and gypsum, but these are only locally developed in such quantities as to give rise on their removal to underground cavities of any extent. Calcareous rocks, more especially limestone, have not only an almost world-wide distribution, but they also occur in greater mass than either gypsum or rock-salt, and hence, although not so readily acted upon by water as the latter two, it is in limestones that nearly all the most renowned caves and subterranean galleries appear.

Many caverns have a calcareous incrustation lining their interior. Sometimes this deposit is pure white; it is, however, more generally coloured by the impurities which the water, percolating downwards from the surface, has taken up from the superincumbent rocks. To the incrustations which are suspended from the roof like icicles, the name stalactites is given, while those rising from the floor, are called stalagmites. The origin of these is as follows: Water which has percolated down from the surface always contains a certain proportion of¦ carbonic acid-it is acidulated water-the acid being derived from the atmosphere and the decaying organic matter of the soil, &c. Water thus charged with carbonic acid has the power of dissolving limestone-i.e. it takes up a certain proportion of carbonate of lime and converts it into the soluble bicarbonate. Arrived at the roof of a cave it oozes out and is there subject to evaporation, the excess of carbonic acid is parted with, and a thin pellicle of carbonate of lime is deposited as an incrustation. When the drops fall to the floor they are subject there in the same way to evaporation, and are thus compelled to give up the remainder of the calcareous matter held in solution. By this constant dropping and falling, icicle-like pendants grow downwards from the roof, while sheets, bosses, and domes gradually accumulate upon the floor-until, not infrequently, these stalagmites come at last to unite with the gradually lengthening stalactites, and so to form, as it were, pillars which look as if they had been placed to support the roof. See the articles on ADELSBERG, AGTELEK, KENT'S CAVE, MAMMOTH CAVE, &c.

BONE-CAVES.-Caves are of interest to geologists not only because they testify to the potency of the chemical and mechanical action of underground water, but on account of the remarkable evidence they have yielded as to the contemporaneity of man with many extinct and no longer indigenous mammals. This evidence is furnished by the accum ulations which so frequently cover the floors of caverns to a greater or less depth. The accumulations in question consist partly of clay, sand, gravel, and shingle, and partly of red earth and sheets of stalagmite. Some of these are doubtless the alluvial detritus carried forward by underground streams. This detritus often consists largely of angular, subangular, and water-worn fragments of limestone, which have doubtless been derived from the roof and walls of the underground galleries, but not infrequently the presence of other kinds of rock fragments shows that no inconsiderable amount of material has been introduced from the outside by the streams as they plunged into their subterranean courses, Much debris also may have been swept in by heavy rain or flooded torrents washing down through the sinks and swallow-holes that so frequently pierce the roofs of subterranean watercourses. These sinks often become pitfalls to unfortunate cattle in our own day, and in former

[ocr errors]

times many animals may have been entrapped in the same way-for broken and rubbed bones often occur, sometimes very abundantly, in the old torrential accumulations of deserted subterranean watercourses. When the galleries ceased to be traversed by streams, stalagmitic accretions would then begin to accumulate over the shingle and debris beds, In course of time many of these subterranean hollows, becoming more or less accessible from the outside, were occupied by carnivorous animals, who carried thither their prey, and thus by and by accumulations of bones were formed, which the drip of water from above gradually inclosed in calcareous matter, and eventually covered up under a sheet of stalagmite. Now and again the caves were occupied for shorter or longer periods by man-his presence being still evidenced by his implements and weapons, by charred and split bones, &c., and occasionally by portions of his own skeleton-and these relics, in like manner, subsequently became sealed up in a more or less thick accumulation of stalagmite. Some of these bone-caves contain the record of many physical changes. Thus, we have evidence to show that after having been the haunt of wild beasts or the abode of man for some indefinite but often prolonged period, the cave again gave passage to a flow of water, and deposits of loam, clay, or gravel, &c. were laid down upon the stalagmitic pavement and bone-breccia. Or, as in some cases, the stalag. mite, together with bones covered by and inclosed within it, was broken up and partially or wholly removed. Then, at a subsequent date the stream once more deserted its channel, while carnivores or man again returned, and newer heaps of bones and stalagmite accumulated. Commingled with these stalagmites of the bone-caves there is almost always more or less of a reddish earth or clay, which is the insoluble residue of the limestone from the dissolution of which the stalactites and stalag. mites are formed. Some of the more remarkable bone-caves which have yielded testimony as to the contemporaneity of man with extinct mammalia, are Kent's Cave (q.v.) and Brixham Cave in England, the caves in the valley of the Lesse in Belgium, the caves of Perigord and the Pyrenees in France, and the Kesserloch near Thaingen in Switzerland. Bone-caves containing the remains of post-tertiary mammals are rare in North America; those of Brazil have many bones of large rodents and edentate. For caves at Wick, in Scotland, still occupied by tinkers, see Sir Arthur Mitchell, The Past in the Present (1880). For accounts of special caves, see the British Association Reports (for Kent's Cave) and the Philosophical Transactions (1822-73). For general descriptions, see Buckland's Reliquiæ Diluviance, Dupont's L'Homme pendant les Ages de la Pierre, Lartet's and Christy's Reliquia Aquitanica, Lubbock's Prehistoric Times, Dawkins' Cave-hunting, J. Geikie's Prehistoric Europe. For further information as to the European cave, dwellers of prehistoric times, see MAN, FLINT IMPLEMENTS, PLEISTOCENE.

ARTIFICIAL CAVES.-The primitive inhabitants of most civilised countries and many primitive tribes at the present day have been troglodytes or cave dwellers, In many countries where natural caves are either of rare occurrence or do not occur at all, certain rock-exposures have been artificially excavated, and occupied either permanently as dwelling places or occasionally as retreats in times of danger, while others have been used as cells, hermitages, or burial-places. Such caves are not uncommon in the cliffs of Scottish river ravines, as at Hawthornden near Edinburgh, and in the valley of the Jed, Roxburghshire. Caves of this kind occur usually in rocks that are readily dug into, such as soft sandstone. Now and again,

[ocr errors]

CAVE

they have been excavated in conglomerate, as in tam case of Hobbie Noble's Cave, Roxburghshire. | In volcanic regions it is the softer tuffs or ashes that are usually holed, as in the caves of the Canary Islands, There the Guanches have also excavated caves under the lavas, by simply raking out the more or less loose scoriæ and cinders which emmonly occur in that position. Vast areas in Central (hína are covered with a coherent loam of the same character as the Loess (q.v.) of the Taeys of the Rhine and Danube), in which dug out dwelling places are of common Occurrence. And a similar deposit, exposed along the bluffs of rivers in the far west of North America, has been utilised by some of the early inhabitants in the same way. In Arizona, parts of Colorado, Nevada, Utah, and south-east California, the rocky privatons walls of deep cañons are in places led with human habitations, so as to look like honeycombs. The strata forming the walls of the ealous have been eroded in different degrees, and trizontal caves larger and smaller have been formed. The cliff dwellings are often adobe or stone structures built on the ledges overhung by projecting rock masses; smaller caves have served as duelings, and been partially completed by adobe walls. Some of these houses are at a height ot 700 feet above the level of the valley, and are with difficulty accessible. They seem to have been, made as places of refuge and defence by the same ancient races as left the pueblos or stone ruins in the valleys, like those occupied by the Pueblos and Mui Indians now. Some assume them to have been the ancestors of the present Pueblos; others that they were akin to the Aztecs. See Hayden in Stanford's North America; Nadaillac's Prehistoric Aworien › Eng. trans. 1885); and the U.S. Survey Exports since 1874.

Hermitages, belonging to all ages, some of very simple, others of a more elaborate construction, have in like manner been excavated in rocks of very different kinds; so that we are presented with every variety of artificial rock-excavation, from sample hollows scraped out of some soft yielding material to the richly ornamented grottoes and temples of Ellora, near Daulatabad, which are cut oat in red granite. And so again in the matter of rock tombs we meet with artificial grottoes of all kin is-from mere holes picked out without much trouble in loess, tuff, sandstone, or other yielding #stance, to the great rock-cut sepulchres of Egypt, and the no less famous catacombs of Rome. Many caves have been doubtless partly natural, party artificial-the cells of the monks of the Teld in Egypt, St Serf's cave at Dysart, St Ninian at Whithorn. For the cave-dwellers known to fue ancients, see TROGLODYTES, PETRA. For the Indian cave-temples, see ELEPHANTA, ELLORA. CAVE-ANIMALS-Various caverns, both of the Old and New World, are tenanted by animals which are usually more or less blind. From one point of 1ew the eyes have degenerated from disuse and fren the absence of the necessary light stimulus; fm another point of view they have degenerated because no longer of use, and no longer maintained by that natural selection which through the struggle für existence is supposed by many to be necessary not only for the establishment, but for the main terate of organs. The fauna of the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky has been most studied, and is entagued with figures in Putnam and Packard's des ription of that famous cavern. Leydig has de a special study of the highly developed tacans borne by some fishes frequenting German Among the cave-animals may be noticed the amphilsan Proteus (q.v.) with eyes in an emby state: various Blind Fish (q.v.), such as Arany qmin (9.9.), Typhlichthys, &c.; hundreds of

[blocks in formation]

blind insects, of which in some cases (Machærites) only the females are blind; blind spiders and myriapods; many Crustaceans (Niphargus puteanus, Titanethes albus, Crangonyx, Asellus sieboldii, &c.); a few univalves and other forms.

It is noteworthy that the blindness may exist in various degrees, some being totally blind and others possessing rudimentary eyes. It is also to be remembered that not all cave-animals are blind, but forms with well-developed organs of vision also occur. Fish, insects, spiders, myriapods, and crustaceans with well-developed eyes have been recorded from various caves, and the explanation of this persistence of organs in such environment is still to find. See DEGENERATION, ENVIRONMENT, and Semper's Natural Conditions of Existence as they affect Animal Life (International Science Series, 1881).

CAVE BEAR, HYENA, LION, &c.--(1) Ursus spelaus, a fossil bear, like those now living, found very abundantly in the Pleistocene caves of Europe. (2) Hyæna spelwa, once abundant in Britain and other parts of Europe, and very closely allied to the H. crocuta now found in Africa. (3) Felis spelaa, a fossil lion, very like the modern form, abundant in caves of England and Europe generally. The prefix cave obviously refers to the fact that in caves the fossil remains of recent animals are well preserved and abundantly found.

Cave, EDWARD, the founder of the Gentleman's Magazine, was born at Newton, Warwickshire, in 1691; received some schooling at Rugby; and after many vicissitudes, became apprentice to a printer. Obtaining money enough to set up a small printingoffice, in 1731 he started the Gentleman's Magazine, the earliest literary journal of the kind. Samuel Johnson became its parliamentary reporter in 1740; and with his hand in Johnson's, Cave died on 10th January 1754.

Leicestershire, in 1637, from Oakham school passed Cave, WILLIAM, divine, born at Pickwell, to St John's College, Cambridge (1653), and was appointed to the vicarage of Islington (1662), to the rectory of Allhallows the Great, London (1679), and to the vicarage of Isleworth, Middlesex (1690). He died at Windsor, 4th July 1713. Among his twelve works on church history are Lives of the Apostles, Lives of the Fathers, and Primitive Christianity, which once were standard authorities.

books of a court or a public office, that no step shall Caveat is a formal warning, entered in the be taken in a particular matter without notice to the person lodging the caveat, so that he may appear and object. Thus, caveats are frequently entered at the Patent Office to prevent the unopposed granting of letters-patent; or at the Probate Court to prevent the unopposed making up a title to the property of deceased persons; or at the Admiralty Court to prevent the unopposed arrestment of a ship. The term is also used in ecclesiastical practice in England; although a caveate.g. against an institution to a particular benefice has not now the high effect attributed to it by the Canon Law. In Scotland the term is confined to such notices as are placed in the Bill Chamber (the summary department of the Supreme Civil Court) or in the Sheriff Courts to prevent any interdict being granted without notice to the person interested. Such caveats require to be renewed every month.

Cavedoné, GIACOMO, an Italian artist of the Caracci school, born in 1577 at Sassuola, assisted Guido Reni at Rome, and finally settled in Bologna, where many of his religious pictures are preserved, He died in poverty in 1660,

Cavendish, the surname of the ducal House of Devonshire, a family directly descended from the

[blocks in formation]

chief-justice Sir John Cavendish, who in 1381 was beheaded at Bury St Edmunds by Jack Straw's followers; and from Sir William Cavendish of Cavendish, Suffolk (circa 1505-57), a brother of Wolsey's biographer. His third wife, the celebrated Bess of Hardwick,' afterwards Countess of Shrewsbury, brought Chatsworth (q.v.) into the family; and William, their second son, was in 1618 made Earl of Devonshire. His great-grandson, William (1640-1707), was, under the last two Stuarts, a steadfast member of the Whig opposi tion, Russell's friend to the death, and an active promoter of the Habeas Corpus Act. He succeeded as fourth earl in 1684, and, for his services at the Revolution, was in 1694 raised to be Duke of Devonshire and Marquis of Hartington. His great-grandson, Williain (1720-64) succeeded as fourth duke in 1755, and was prime-minister from November 1756 to the following May. William, fifth duke (1748-1811), was a bit of a poet; but is less remembered than his beautiful duchess, whom Gainsborough and Reynolds painted. Wil liam, sixth duke (1790-1858), was chiefly distinguished by his sumptuous embassy to St Petersburg (1826); and William, seventh duke (born 1808), had inherited the earldom of Burlington in 1834, twenty-four years before he succeeded his cousin in the Devonshire title.

His eldest son, the Right Hon. SPENCER COMPTON CAVENDISH, Marquis of Hartington, was born 23d July 1833, and was educated at Trinity College, Cambridge, graduating B. A. in 1854. He entered parliament in 1857, being first returned for North Lancashire, then in 1869 for the Radnor boroughs, in 1880 for North-east Lancashire, and in 1885 for the Rossendale division of that county. The representative of a great Whig house, he was chosen as early as 1859 to move the vote of want of confidence that overthrew the Derby government, and between 1863 and 1874 held office as a Lord of the Admiralty, Under-secretary for War, War Secretary, Postmaster-general, and, from 1871, Chiefsecretary for Ireland. Neither a born statesman nor great orator, he had yet shown an infinite capacity for taking pains,' when, in February 1875, on Mr Gladstone's temporary abdication, he was chosen leader of the Liberal opposition. He led it admirably, and in the spring of 1880, on the downfall of the Beaconsfield administration, was invited by the Queen to form a ministry. He rejected the offer, and served under Mr Gladstone, first as Secretary of State for India, and then as War Secretary from 1883 to 1885. But he wholly dissented from Mr Gladstone's scheme of Irish Home Rule; and since 1886, as head of the Liberal Unionists, he has firmly supported Lord Salisbury's Conservative

government.

His younger brother, Lord FREDERICK CAVENDISH, was born 30th November 1836, and was also educated at Trinity, taking his B.A. in 1858. He sat in parliament as Liberal member for the northern division of the West Riding of Yorkshire from 1865 till the spring of 1882, when he succeeded Mr. Forster as Chief-secretary for Ireland. Between seven and eight o'clock, on the evening of 6th May, having only that morning reached Dublin, he and Mr Burke, an unpopular subordinate, were stabbed to death in the Phonix Park. Eight months later, twenty Irish Invincibles were tried for the murder, and, Carey and two others having turned Queen's evidence, five of the rest were hanged, three sentenced to penal servitude for life, and the remaining nine to various terms of imprisonment. Carey himself disappeared; but in July news came from the Cape that he had been shot dead by an Irishman named O'Donnell on board an emigrant ship O'Donnell was brought back to London, and hanged.

Cavendish, GEORGE, the biographer of Wolsey, was born about 1500, and became Wolsey's gentleman-usher at least as early as 1527. He remained in close attendance upon his great master till the end (November 28, 1530), after which he retired to his house at Glemsford, in Suffolk, where he lived quietly with his wife, a niece of Sir Thomas More, till the close of his own life in 1561 or 1562. His affection for the great cardinal was most devotedhe had attached himself to his household, in Wolsey's own words, abandoning his own country, wife, and children, his own house and family, his rest and quietness, only to serve me.' He never laid aside his loyalty to his memory, but in the quiet meditation of after-years brooded over his fall, and from it learned for himself the blessedness of being little.' Thirty years after he wrote his Life of Cardinal Wolsey, one of the most interesting short biographies in the English language. Its pensive wisdom and simple sincerity reflect a pleasing picture of the gentle and refined nature of its author, and enable us to see intimately with our own eyes, but with singular clearness, the outlines of one of the grandest figures in our history. The book, written by a devout Catholic, full of regrets for the past, could not well be printed in Elizabeth's reign, but circulated pretty freely in manuscript copies, as many as twelve of which are still extant. It is almost certain that Shakespeare had read it before writing or collaborating in Henry VIII., as all the redeeming features in the picture of the great cardinal, and the lesson of his fall as a solemn homily upon human ambition, are directly due to the tender and loyal touch of Cavendish. book was first printed imperfect, for party purposes, in 1641. The best edition is that of S. W. Singer (2 vols. 1815), the text of which was reprinted with a good introduction in Professor Henry Morley's Universal Library' (1886).

The

Cavendish, HENRY, natural philosopher, eldest son of Lord Charles Cavendish, and a grandson of the second Duke of Devonshire, was born at Nice, October 10, 1731. From a school at Hackney he passed in 1749 to Peterhouse, Cambridge, but quitted it three years later without a degree; thereafter he devoted the whole of his long life to scientific investigations, a large fortune bequeathed him by an uncle enabling him to follow uninterruptedly his favourite pursuits. A silent, solitary man, he hated so to meet strangers, that he had his library-a magnificent one-in London, four miles from his residence on Clap ham Common, so that he might not encounter persons coming to consult it; whilst his female domestics had orders to keep out of his sight, on pain of dismissal. His dinner he ordered daily by a note placed on the hall-table. He died, unmarried, at Clapham, 10th March 1810, leaving more than a million sterling to his relatives. As a philosopher, Cavendish is entitled to the highest rank. To him it may almost be said we owe the foundation of pneumatic chemistry, for prior to his time it had hardly an existence. In 1760 he discovered the extreme levity of inflammable air, now known as hydrogen gas-a discovery which led to balloon experiments and projects for aerial navigation: and later, he ascertained that water resulted from the union of two gases-a discovery which has erroneously been claimed for Watt (q.v.; see also WATER). The famous Cavendish Experiment was an ingenious device for estimating the density of the Earth (q.v.). The accuracy and completeness of Cavendish's processes are remarkable. So high an authority as Sir Humphry Davy declared that they

were all of a finished nature, and though many of them were performed in the very infancy of chemical science, yet their accuracy and their beauty I have remained u red. Cavendish also wrote

CAVENDISH

an astronomical instruments; and his Electrical Researches (1771-81) were edited by Professor Clerk Maxwell (1879). See his Life by G. Wilson, forming vol. i. of the Cavendish Society's Works (1846). Cavendish, THOMAS, circumnavigator, was born about 1555 at Trimley St Martin, near Ipswich, and, after squandering his patrimony at court, shared in Grenville's expedition to Virginia (155) On 21st July of the following year he alled from Plymouth with 122 men and three ships of 40, 60, and 140 tons, and, by Sierra Leone and Brazil, reached the Strait of Magellan, whose passage took seven weeks. During the nine months that he cruised in the Pacific, he burned three Spanish towns and thirteen ships; then, with a na booty, but only the largest of his three Vessels, he returned by way of the Indian Archipea and the Cape of Good Hope to England, In September 1588. Elizabeth knighted him, and be took to his old mode of life, till in August 1591 he sailed on a second expedition, intended to rival to first. It ended in utter disaster, and in 1592 Cavendish died broken-hearted off Ascension.

[blocks in formation]

Cavour, COUNT CAMILLO BENSO DI, the restorer of Italian unity and nationality, was born at Turin, August 10, 1810. He was descended from one of the ancient noble families of Piedmont, and being the younger son was destined for a military career. At the military school he distinguished himself by his mathematical talent, and at an early age was appointed to a post in the engineers. But as his liberal opinions proved unfavourable to his stay in the army, he left it in 1831. His good sense, however, taught him that the deliverance of Italy could not be accomplished by secret conspiracy and spasmodic revolutionary outbreaks. There was nothing for him therefore but to retire into private life. Here he devoted himself to agriculture, introducing great improvements in the cultivation of the family estates; and his efforts generally to raise the economic condition of Piedmont were end in view; he saw that economic improvement thorough and enlightened. But he had a further must be the basis for a better social and political order. And he widened his knowledge of economie and political questions by foreign travel, especially in France and England. Constitutionalism as established and practised in England was on the whole the form of government he most admired. During a residence in England he made himself intimately acquainted with the political organisa tion of the country, and also with its industrial institutions; knowledge of which he made good use on his return to his own country.

Cavendish, WILLIAM, Duke of Newcastle, son of Sir Charles Cavendish, and nephew of the first Earl of Devonshire, was born in 1592, and educated at St John's College, Cambridge. His learning and winning address made him a favourite at the eoart of James I., who in 1610 created him Knight of the Bath, and in 1620 Viscount Mansfield. Charles I., who was splendidly entertained by him at Welbeck and Bolsover, in 1628 created him Earl of Newcastle, and in 1638 appointed him governor to his son, afterwards Charles II. His support of the king during the contest with the parliament Was munificent. He contributed £10,000 to the treasury, and raised a troop of 200 knights and In this way for sixteen years Cavour energetically gentlemen, who served at their own cost. As laboured as a private gentleman. No opportunity general of all the forces north of the Trent, he presented itself for any effective influence in had power to issue declarations, confer knight politics, and he wisely abstained. It was very bood, con money, and raise men; and the last part different when the spirit of freedom and innova of his commission he executed with great zeal. tion once more awoke towards the revolutionary After the battle of Marston Moor (1644), Cavendish period of 1848. In conjunction with Count Cesare retired to the Continent, where he resided, at times Balbo, he in 1847 established a newspaper, Il Risorin great poverty, till the Restoration. In 1665 hegimento, in which he advocated a representative was created. Duke of Newcastle; and he died 25th Deen,ber 1676. He was author of two works on berseruanship, and of several plays, not of a character to increase any man's reputation for intelliRefice. See his Life by his second wife (1667; new esi. by C. H. Firth, 1886).-She, MARGARET LUCAS (1624-74), the daughter of an Essex house, where all the brothers were valiant, and all the asters virtuous,' had married him in 1645, and was herwelf the author of a dozen folio volumes of poems, plays, letters, &c.

Caviare, the salted roes (immature ovaries) of the common sturgeon (Acipenser sturio) and other bshes of the same genus (see STURGEON). It is chetly prepared in Russia, where, as in various her countries, it is a favourite delicacy, and is ly made in the United States; though the Parase (aviare to the general,' shows that taste is an acquired one. The species of #geon from the roe of which it is chiefly prepared inhabit the Caspian and Black seas and their tributary rivers. Among them are the Bie, or Great Sturgeon (A. huso), the Osseter A guidenstadti), the Scherg or Sevruga ( A. stelvata, and the Sterlet (A. ruthenus). The caviare male from the roe of the last-named species is esteemed particularly delicious. Astrakhan is a principal seat of the preparation of caviare. The are more or less roughly separated from the neeting tissue, and, after salting, are packed in harrels, or the roes may be salted in long trghs, and the eggs passed through a sieve into

|

system, somewhat after the pattern of the English constitution, as opposed alike to absolutism on the one hand, and mob rule on the other. On his suggestion, the king was petitioned for a constitution, which was granted in February 1848. In the Chamber of Deputies, during the stormy period which succeeded Charles Albert's declaration of war against Austria in March, Cavour strenuously opposed the ultra-democrats, and counselled an alliance with England as the surest guarantee for the success of the Italian arms. In the Marquis d'Azeglio's ministry, formed soon after the fatal battle of Novara, Cavour was suecessively Minister of Agriculture and Commerce, Minister of Marine, and Minister of Finance. In 1852 he was appointed to succeed D'Azeglio as premier. From this time until his resignation in 1859, in consequence of the conclusion of the peace of Villafranca, Cavour was the originator as well as the director of the Sardinian policy. Taking upon himself at different times, in addition to the premiership, the duties of the Ministers of Finance, Commerce, and Agriculture, and latterly of Home and Foreign Affairs, he greatly improved the financial condition of the country, introduced measures of free trade, consolidated constitutionalism, weakened clerical influence, and made Sardinia a power of some account in Europe.

Hitherto the work of Cavour had been to reform Piedmont, and place its affairs on a sound basis. The Crimean war afforded him an opportunity to begin the task of restoring the unity and national

[blocks in formation]

independence of Italy. It was through his advice and influence that Sardinia took part in the war, and as a result of this he managed to bring the Italian question before the Congress of Paris in 1856. In 1858 Cavour had with the Emperor Napoleon a secret meeting, at which the programme for driving Austria out of Italy was drawn up, and during the early part of 1859 there followed a diplomatic contest with Austria, which Cavour conducted with masterly tact and astuteness. The peace of Villafranca, coming after the successful war of 1859, and leaving Austria in possession of Venetia, was a bitter disappointment to Cavour. He resigned his office; yet he had no reason for despair, as the power of Austria in the Italian peninsula was now really broken. On returning to office in 1860 he resumed his great undertaking, but by new methods. Popular feeling in central Italy declared itself in favour of union with the north, and thus Parma, Modena, and Tuscany came under the sway of Victor Emmanuel. It was the part of Cavour to guide opinion towards this end, gaining time for it while he negotiated with the great powers; but he had to purchase the acquiescence of France by the surrender of Nice and Savoy. He secretly encouraged the expedition of Garibaldi, which in 1860 achieved the deliverance of Sicily and southern Italy. When a Sardinian army marched southwards and on the plains of Campania met the volunteers of Garibaldi, the unity of Italy was already an accomplished fact. In 1861 an Italian parliament was summoned, and Victor Emmanuel was declared king of Italy. For the completion of Italian unity only Rome and Venetia were wanting; with a little patience they too could be won.

Thus had Cavour achieved the task of his life. But it had not been accomplished without a fearful strain on his health. He had to manage the Sardinian parliament, to meet the artifices, protests, and reproaches of many of the great powers, to prevent revolutionary parties from upsetting the practical mission on which he was engaged, and to direct a great popular and national movement towards a reasonable and attainable goal by methods involving the minimum of delay and violence. For the real power of Sardinia was com paratively limited, and a false step might have been serious. The constant strain was too much for him, and he died June 6, 1861, only a few months after the unity of Italy had been proclaimed. The last words he was heard to utter were those so familiar as expressing an important feature of his policy: 'Brothers, brothers, the free church in the free state.' Cavour is admitted to be the beau ideal of a practical and constructive statesman, who, aiming at just and reasonable ends, seeks to achieve them by effectual and legitimate methods. He made a reformed Piedmont the basis for attaining the unity and regeneration of Italy. The ambition of Napoleon, the military gallantry of the king, the enthusiasm of Garibaldi, were all made to cooperate towards his plan for satisfying the national aspirations of Italy under a lasting constitutional rule. Through his early death much of the work necessary for a sound and healthy national life was left unfinished, yet the subsequent history of Italy proves that Cavour had built on a solid foundation. He deserves a place among the greatest statesmen

of modern times.

The title is taken from the small Piedmontese town of Cavour, 28 miles SW. of Turin. See De la Rive, Le Comte de Cavour, Récits et Souvenirs (Paris, 1863; Eng. trans. of same date); Bianchi, La Politique de Cavour (Turin, 1885); his Lettere, edited by Chiala (6 vols. 1883-87); also the biographies of him by Massari (Turin, 1873) and Mazade (Paris, 1877; Eng. trans. of same date).

CAXIAS

Cavy (Cavia), a genus of Rodents, best known by the domesticated species (Cavia cobaya), the common Guinea-pig (q.v.).

Cawdor, a village in Nairnshire, 5 miles SW. of Nairn. Cawdor Castle, near by, the seat of the Earl of Cawdor, was founded in 1454, but is one of the three places which tradition has assigned as | the scene of King Duncan's murder by Macbeth in 1040. A series of papers from the charter-room at Cawdor was edited by Cosmo Innes under the title of The Book of the Thanes of Cawdor (1859). See CAMPBELL.

Cawk, a popular name for a massive variety of the mineral called Heavy Spar or Sulphate of Baryta. See BARYTA.

Cawnpore' (Kanhpur), a city of the Northwestern Provinces, on the right bank of the Ganges, 42 miles SW. of Lucknow, 266 SE. of Delhi, and 628 NW. of Calcutta. The river in front, varying, according to the season, from 500 yards in width to more than a mile, presents a large and motley assemblage of steam-vessels and native craft; the principal landing-place is the beautiful Sarsiya ghát. Cawnpore, at least as a place of note, is of recent origin, being indebted for its growth, besides its commercial facilities, partly to military and political considerations. In 1777, being then an appendage of Oudh, it was assigned by the nawab it became, in name as well as in fact, British as the station of a subsidiary force; and in 1801 property. In 1881 its cantonments, having accommodation for 7000 troops, contained a population of 31,283, and the city of 120,161, giving a total of 151,444, of whom 113,354 were Hindus, and 3194 Christians. At the outbreak of the mutiny in May 1857, Cawnpore contained about 1000 Europeans, 560 of whom were women and children. The hasty, ill-chosen entrenchments into which they had thrown themselves, were speedily invested by overwhelming numbers of the mutineers, led on by the infamous Nana Sahib. For three weeks the few defenders held gallantly out; but at last they surrendered on promise of a safe-conduct to Allahabad. The sepoys accompanied them to the banks of the Ganges, and scarcely were they embarked on the boats, when a murderous fire was opened upon them, and only four men escaped. The women and children, 125 in number, were reserved for a crueller fate, and were carried back to Cawnpore. Hearing that Havelock was within two days' march of the place, Nana Sahib advanced to meet him. He was driven back, and, smarting under defeat, returned to Cawnpore, and gave orders for the instant massacre of his helpless prisoners, who, dead and dying, were cast into a well. Havelock and his small army arrived on 16th July, only to find to their unutterable horror that they came too late to rescue the women and children." A memorial church, a Romanesque redbrick building, now marks the site of General Wheeler's entrenchment; whilst the scene of the massacre is occupied by the memorial gardens. Over the well itself a mound has been raised, its summit crowned by an octagonal Gothic inclosure, with Marochetti's white marble angel in the centre. But Sir George Trevelyan's Cawnpore (1865) is the best memorial of the tragedy.-The district of Cawnpore has an area of 2370 sq. m., and a population (1881) of 1,181,396. It is an alluvial plain of great fertility. The vine is cultivated, and indigo grows wild. Besides its two mighty rivers, the Ganges and Jumna, and their navigable tributaries, the Ganges Canal traverses the country for 60 miles, and there is ample communication by rail.

Caxias, (1) a town of Brazil, in the province of Maranhão, on the navigable Itapicuru, 190 miles from its mouth, with an active trade in cotton.

« PrécédentContinuer »