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of which are covered with vines and crowned with wood, and others rocky and barren, large plateaus, and a few pleasant valleys. In the north it is wild and sterile, and in the west is covered with forests of pine, but the splendid valley watered by the Dordogne is rich in vines, fruit trees, and cereals. The climate is generally agreeable and healthy, but rather humid, especially in the south. Dordogne is watered by 11 rivers and more than 600 streams, all tributaries of the Dordogne except the Bandiat and the Dropt. The Dordogne itself is formed by the union of two mountain streams, the Dor and the Dogne, which rise in Mont d'Or, Puy-de-Dôme, and unite after a short course. Sufficient corn is grown in the department for home consumption. The cultivation of the vine occupies about a tenth of its surface, and its red and white wines are in high repute. Its truffles are considered the best in France. In the forests the prevailing trees are the oak and chestnut. The fruit of the latter is much used both as food by the people and for fattening hogs. The walnut is extensively cultivated for making oil. Dordogne is rich in various kinds of minerals; iron is very abundant,, and there are found also copper, lead, manganese, coal, marble, alabaster, lithographic stones, lime of gypsum, &c. The chief branches of industry are the working in metals, particularly iron and steel, the manufacture of paper, and boat-building; but there are also produced coarse woollens, serges, leather, earthenware, hosiery, vinegar, brandy, and liqueurs. Dordogne is divided into the arrondissments Périgueux, Bergerac, Nontron, Riberac, and Sarlat, with 47 cantons and 582 communes. The chief town is Périgueux. The total area is 3545 square miles, and the population in 1872 numbered 480,142.

DORIA, ANDREA (1466-1560), the famous Genoese admiral, was born at Oneglia in 1466. He belonged to a noble family, several of whose members, both before and after his time, distinguished themselves in the 'history of Genoa. Having lost both his parents in his youth, he embraced the military profession, and served in the papal guards and under various princes of Italy. It was not until he was fifty years of age that he entered into the service of Francis I. of France, who gave him the command of his fleet in the Mediterranean. In this position he preserved that spirit of independence which is so natural to a sailor and a republican. When the French attempted to render Savona, long the object of jealousy to Genoa, its rival in trade, Doria remonstrated strongly against the measure; this irritated Francis to such a degree that early in 1528 he ordered his admiral Barbesieux to sail for Genoa, then in the hands of the French troops, to arrest Doria, and to seize his galleys. Doria, however, retired with all his galleys to a place of safety, and closing with the offers of the emperor Charles V., returned his commission to Francis, and hoisted the imperial colours. To deliver his country, now weary alike of the French and the imperial yoke, from the dominion of foreigners, was Doria's highest ambition; and the favourable moment had presented itself. Genoa was afflicted with the pestilence, the French garrison was ill paid and greatly reduced, and the inhabitants were sufficiently disposed to second his views. Before the close of the same year (1528) he sailed to the harbour with thirteen galleys, landed five hundred men, and made himself master of the gates and the palace with very little resistance. The French governor with his feeble garrison retired to the citadel, but was soon forced to capitulate; upon which the people speedily levelled the citadel with the ground. It was now in Doria's power to have declared himself the sovereign of his country; but, with a magnanimity of which there are few examples, he assembled the people in the court before the palace, disclaimed all pre-eminence, and recommended to them to settle what form

of government they chose to establish. The people, animated by his spirit, forgot their factions, and fixed, with his approval, that republican form of government which, with little variation, subsisted until 1815. His disinterested patriotism won for him the appointment of censor for life and the title "Father and Liberator of his Country." Doria afterwards engaged in an expedition against the Turks, from whom he took Coron and Patras. He also co-operated with Charles V. in the reduction of Tunis and Goulette. In 1547 two successive attempts were made against his life by Fieschi and a Genoese emigrant of the name of Giulio Cibo. He resigned his command in 1556, and died at Genoa in November 1560, being then ninety-four years of age.

DORIANS, the name by which one of the two foremost races of the Hellenic or Greek people was commonly known, the other being the Ionic. These two races, if the term may here be rightly used, stand out in marked contrast, as exhibiting different types of character, which have their issue in different modes of thought and forms of government. But when from a consideration of their political and intellectual development we endeavour to work our way backward to the origin and early history of these races, we find ourselves confronted by traditions which show little consistency, or which even exclude each other. The writer who speaks with the greatest confidence on this subject is the perfectly truthful man who well earned his title to be known as the father of history; but Herodotus, although thoroughly to be trusted as to all that he relates from his own experience, could not rise much above the standard of his age in dealing with alleged matters of fact, nor could he see that tho eking out of theory by conjecture is an illegitimate process. Herodotus then, in speaking of the Athenians and Spartans as standing at the head severally of the Dorian and Ionian races, states positively that the Ionian was a Pelasgic, the Dorian a Hellenic people; that the former had always been stationary, while the latter had many times changed its abode. In the time of Deucalion, he asserts, the Dorians, or rather the tribe or tribes which were afterwards to be called Dorians, inhabited Phthiotis, by which he probably understands the southern portion of the great Thessalian plain. Afterwards, under their eponymus Dorus, they occupied Histiæotis, which he describes as the region under Össa and Olympus. They had thus migrated from the most southerly to the most northerly parts of the great plain which is drained by the Peneius. The next migration was to the highlands of Pindus, the chain which runs down at right angles from the Cambunian range, or the westward extension of Olympus. Here, he says, they were known not as Dorians, but as Macedonians. A later southward migration brought them into Dryopis, whence they made their way into the Peloponnesus, and it would seem were then only first known as Dorians (Herod. i 56).

If we examine the statement thus boldly advanced, we shall find at each step that the ground becomes more uncertain. Wo may indeed, in order to explain it, assume that the Pelasgic race was closely akin to the Greek, and that their language stood midway between the Hellenic and the Latin; but if we do so we are reasoning strictly from the point of view of modern philology, and really abandoning that of Herodotus, who says that, if he may judge from the Pelasgian populations which he found at Placia, Scylace, and Creston, the Pelasgians generally must have spoken a barbarous dialect, i.e., a dialect unintelligible to a Greek. He is thus driven to assume, first, that the Attic tribes had been Pelasgic before they became Hellenic, and that the change was accompanied by a change of language (Herod. i. 57). Elsewhere (ii. 51) he speaks of the Athenians as being already Greek or Hellenic before

the Pelasgians became their neighbours, and adds that the latter came in time to be reckoned Hellenic also. We thus see, without going further, how vague and misty were the notions of Herodotus; but we have to note further that the account here given of the Dorians and Ionians is said to apply to the time of Croesus, and thus, down to his age, the Ionians had been stationary in their original abodes, these abodes in his day being assuredly not in the Peloponnesus. Yet he can assert elsewhere that the Peloponnese had been their original home, and that they had been expelled from it by the Achaians (i. 145). But, apart from the fact that the poets of the Iliad and the Odyssey know nothing of any expulsion of Ionians from Peloponnesus, the difficulties are increased if we betake ourselves to the tribal genealogies which the Greeks regarded as undoubtedly historical documents. We have then, on the one side, the assertion that the Ionians were originally non-Hellenic and Pelasgian; on the other, the Iapetid genealogy speaks of Dorians, Achaians, Ionians, and Æolians, as being all sprung from Hellen,—Xouthus, the son of Hellen, being the father of Ion and Achaius. If, therefore, we were to argue from these data, we should have to conclude that, as the tribes just mentioned were all Hellenic, and as the Ionians were Pelasgians, some Pelasgians at least were Hellenes. But the whole process would be deceptive, for as Ion and Achaius are here the sons of Xouthus, the Ionians would be expelled from the Peloponnesus by their nearest brethren. It is, however, more important to note that the opinion of Herodotus respecting the Pelasgi was distinctly contradicted by another, which had the countenance of Strabo, Plutarch, and other writers. Strabo speaks of them as virtually nomadic tribes; and the story even went that they received their name, Pelasgi Pelargoi, or Storks, from their wandering habits. It is difficult to resist the inference of Sir G. Cornewall Lewis that this radical inconsistency in the views respecting the Pelasgians is a proof that they rest on no historical basis (Credibility of Early Roman History, i. 282). Further, there is the extreme unlikelihood that the tribes afterwards known as Dorians should for a certain period have been called Macedonians, or rather, as Herodotus implies, that they should more than once change their name. The assertion that they were called Macedonians involves a fresh contradiction, for elsewhere Herodotus asserts that the Macedonians were not Hellenic at all, although they were governed by chiefs of genuine Greek descent. Nor is our position improved if we choose to prefer the statements of the genealogies in preference to those of Herodotus or other historians, on the ground that the national tradition by which these genealogies were handed down must be trustworthy, for the descent in one genealogy is often directly contradicted by that of another, and not unfrequently, and indeed even generally, the genealogy betrays the nature of the materials from which it has been made up. Thus, for instance, Dorus, the eponymus of the Dorians, has as his sister Protogeneia (the Early Dawn), who, being wedded to Zeus, the god of the gleaming heaven, becomes the mother of Aethlius, the toiling sun, who is the father of Endymion, that is, of the sun-god who sinks to sleep in Latmus, the land of forgetfulness. Finally, we have to note the fact that, in the Hellenic world as elsewhere, tribes bearing the same name were found separated by great distances; and in such cases traditions always sprang up, not merely asserting their connection, but accounting for it. Thus they found Achaians in Thessaly and Achaians in the Peloponnese; and it was said, not merely that the former passed southwards across the isthmus of Corinth, but that they were led by the barbarian Pelops from Phrygia. The same process connected the Peloponnesian Dorians with the

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Dorian clans who dwelt between Œta and Parnassus, and spoke of the latter as the stock from which the Spartans sprang, to the great benefit of the insignificant clans, who thus acquired a foremost rank in the Hellenic world. All that we can do, then, is to bring together the genealogies which refer in any way to Dorus and his supposed descendants the Dorians, and then gather from historians and geographers the various regions in which Dorians were found during ages which may reasonably be regarded as historical. The result of the former process will scarcely appear satisfactory. We have noticed one genealogy which represents Dorus as the son of Hellen; but in the Etolian genealogy he is the son of Apollo and Phthia, and is slain by Etolus in the land which from him was called Etolia (Grote, Hist. Gr., i. 140). The great tradition which connects the Derians of the Peloponnesus with their more noteworthy namesakes is the legend which relates the return of the Heraclids, or descendants of Hercules, who, after the death of that hero, had been compelled to take refuge in Athens. Hyllus, in his exile, is adopted by the Dorian king Ægimius, the father of Pamphylus and Dymas, who with Hyllus become the eponymi or name-givers of the three tribes found in Dorian communities generally, and known as Hylleans, Pamphylians, and Dymanes, Hyllus being more particularly illustrious as the forefather of Eurysthenes and Procles, the progenitors of the two houses from which the Spartan kings were always elected. But this legend, like the rest, was variously related, and, according to the version of Plato, the return of the Heraclids would be rather a return of the Achaians to the Peloponnesus.

We cannot, however, question the fact that the Dorian race was widely extended, that it was found, like the Ionians, in various portions of the Hellenic world, separated by considerable distances of land or sea, and that the people who bore this name were singularly active in the work of colonization. They are found not only in all parts of the Peloponnese but in the islands of the Ægean, and on the coasts of Asia Minor; and from the foremost Dorian cities went forth, it is said, the colonists who were to carry the Hellenic name and Hellenic culture far to the east and the west. Thus Corinth became the mother city of Corcyra and Syracuse, and from these sprang Epidamnus, Camarina, Ambracia, Potidea. The Dorians of Crete and Rhodes sent forth the settlers of the Sicilian Gela, and Gela in turn became the parent of the mightier Acragas, or Agrigentum, while to Megara is assigned the origin of Byzantium, the future home of Roman Cæsars and of Ottoman Sultans. These several communities exhibit a general likeness in their dialect, their art, and their polity. Their civilization assumed a magnificent phase in the splendour of Corinth and the great Dorian cities of Italy and Sicily. Their powers of resistance were attested by the success with which their colonies were planted in regions occupied by powerful and hostile tribes, who failed to overthrow them simply because they lacked the Dorian power of cohesion. Yet with the Dorians this power was subjected to strictly defined bounds of action. All Dorian cities might feel a pride in belonging to the great Dorian stock, and the parent city might claim certain prerogatives in its colonies; but each city was for them nevertheless an absolute unit, with whose independence no other city had any right to interfere, even though this interference might have for its object the establishment of a pan-Hellenic union. Any movements in this direction were sure to rouse the keenest and most persistent opposition of the Dorian Greeks; and thus we can understand the nature of the quarrel which was fought out between Sparta and Athens, and which ended in the ruin of the great Ionian city, whose imperial rule must otherwise have checked, and may perhaps have rooted out.

this fatal instinct of isolation. The Spartans, who stood | at the head of the Dorian portion of the Greek world, are regarded by K. O. Müller, in his History of the Dorians, as exhibiting in their institutions and government the true type of the race. This theory is strenuously combated by Grote, History of Greece, pt. ii. ch. 6; and at the least it must be said that if they displayed the true Dorian type, that type must have been completely lost among all the other Dorian tribes. The Spartans occupied Laconia strictly as an army of occupation, and carrying out inflexibly their rigid system, they opposed an uncompromising resistance, not only to luxury, but generally to art, refinement, and speculation (Cox, History of Greece, i. 72). No such condition of things is found even in Crete, from which Sparta was supposed to have derived her special institutions. Not only is their reputation as models of Dorism altogether undeserved, but it probably would have been exceedingly distasteful to the countrymen of Leonidas, Archidamus, and Agesilaus. (G. W. C.)

DORIS, the name which, in the time of Herodotus and later writers, designated the little territory which lay to the south-west of the Malian Gulf, and between the ranges of Eta and Parnassus, bounded by the lands of the Phocians on the east, of the Etolians on the west, of the Malians and Epicnemidian Locrians on the north, and of the Ozolian Locrians on the south, the whole being barely thirty miles in length by ten at its greatest width. The inhabitants were divided into the four townships of Boion, Cytinion, Erineus, and Pindus. Of their history down to the time of the invasion of Xerxes we know nothing, and probably they had none; nor is there more to be said than that they then consulted their interests by submitting to the Persian king. This confederacy of four little townships was honoured by the Spartans as their metropolis, or the home from which the Dorians had come who achieved the conquest of the Peloponnesus-a tradition which has been noticed in the article DORIANS. The political insignificance of Doris is to be ascribed to the fact that it had no seaboard. The only other Greek communities in like plight were those of Arcadia or the Peloponnesian highlands, and both Doris and Arcadia remained far in the rear of Hellenic development generally.

DORKING, a market town of West Surrey, England, situated on a small brook, a tributary of the Mole, 29 miles S. of London by rail. The town is well built and clean, and occupies a picturesque position in a sheltered vale near the base of Box Hill. The parish church of St Martin's is a handsome edifice rebuilt in 1873; and St Paul's district church, erected in 1857, is a building of some pretension. Lime of exceptionally good quality is burnt to a large extent in the neighbourhood, and forms an important article of trade; it is derived from the Lower Chalk formation. Dorking has long been famous for a finely-flavoured breed of fowl, distinguished by their having five claws. Several elegant mansions are in the vicinity of the town, notably that of Deepdene, containing a gallery of sculpture collected here by the late Thomas Hope, the author of Anastasius. The Roman road which crossed from the Sussex coast to the Thames, passed close to Dorking. The population of town is about 4800; that of parish in 1871 was 8567.

DORLEANS, LOUIS, (1542-1629), a minor French poet and political pamphleteer, and a prominent partisan of the Catholic League, was born in 1542, probably at Paris, though one of his biographers states that Orleans was his birthplace. He studied under Jean Daurat, and after taking his degree in law began to practise at the bar with but slight success. He added little to his reputation by writing indifferent verses, and it was not until the League had taken the daring step of arresting the royalist members of varliament, that he was brought into prominence by being

appointed its advocate-general. He maintained the position and claims of the League in language that was always strong and often insolent, going so far as to express regret that the king of Navarre and the prince of Condé had not been assassinated. He was, however, courageous enough to intercede with the duke of Mayenne for the inhabitants of Paris, but without effect. After this failure he continued the publication of violently-worded pamphlets intended to render the accession of Henry impossible. One of these, Le Banquet et Après-dînée du Comte d'Arète, in which he accused Henry of insincerity in his return to the Roman Catholic faith, was so scurrilous as to be disapproved of by many members of the League. When Henry at length entered Paris, Dorléans was among the number of the proscribed. He took refuge in Antwerp, where he remained for nine years. At the expiration of that period he received a pardon, and returned to Paris, where he had not been long before he was imprisoned for sedition. The king, however, ordered him to be set free after he had been three months in the Conciergerie, and this generous conduct had the effect of attaching him ever afterwards to the cause of Henry. His last years were passed in obscurity, and he died in 1629 at the age of eighty. seven. Dorléans's political pamphlets are now exceedingly scarce. His chief poem, Renaud (Paris, 1572), ia a poor imitation or translation of part of the Orlando Furioso.

DORMOUSE, the common name of a family of small rodents (Myoxida), generally regarded as intermediate between mice and squirrels. It contains 12 species, distributed over the temperate parts of the great Palearctic region from Britain to Japan, and throughout the greater portion of Africa. The Common Dormouse (Myoxus avellanarius) occurs in most parts of Europe, and is the only species found in Britain. It is an active little creature, measuring about three inches long, with a thick bushy tail of nearly similar length. Its posterior legs are slightly longer than those in front, and both fore and hind feet form prehensile organs, whereby the dormouse climbs along the twigs of the low bushes among which it lives, and in which it builds a neat round nest formed of leaves. It is a shy and timid animal, choosing the recesses of woods for its habitation, and seldom showing itself by day; in confinement, however, it is readily tamed and becomes very familiar. It feeds, as its specific name implies, on hazels, and is also partial to berries, haws, and grain. These it eats, either sitting on its haunches or suspended by its hind feet, and holding them between its forepaws like a squirrel. In autumn it grows very fat, and lays up a store of food for winter use,-retiring at the commencement of the cold season to its nest, and curling itself up into a ball, when it becomes dormant. A warmer day than usual restores it to temporary activity, and then it supplies itself with food from its autumn hoard, again becoming torpid till the advent of spring finally rouses it. Owing to this hybernat ing habit it is known as the Sleeper, while the name dormouse has reference to the same peculiarity. The young of the dormouse are generally four in number, and these, according to Bell, are produced twice a year. They are born blind, but in a marvellously short period are able to cater for themselves, and their hibernation begins later in the season than with the adult form. The fur of the dormouse is of a tawny colour above, and paler_beneath, with a white patch on the throat. The Fat Dormous? (Myoxus glis) is larger than the British species, and is the one most commonly found in Southern Europe.

DORNBIRN, or DORNBÜHREN, a straggling but wellbuilt township of Austria, in Tyrol, about six miles S. of Bregenz, situated on the right bank of a stream known as the Dornbirn Ach, which flows into the Lake of Con

stance. It has upwards of 8000 inhabitants, ranks as the principal market-place in the Vorarlberg, and carries on iron and copper smelting and the manufacture of cotton cloth and worked muslin.

DOROGOBUSH, a town of Russia in Europe, in the government of Smolensk, about 55 miles E. of the city of that name, on the banks of the Dnieper, in 54° 55′ N. lat. and 33° 17′ E. long. It has twelve churches, and still preserves its ancient earthen fortress, with its ramparts and ditch, within the precincts of which are situated the cathedral, the courthouse, and two victualling stores. Its manufactures are of no importance, but it maintains an extensive trade with various parts of Russia, and even with foreign countries, in tallow, leather, and hemp. First mentioned in 1300 as the object of a contest between Alexander of Smolensk and Andrew of Viasma, Dorogobush continued through the 13th century to share in the vicissitudes of the neighbouring principalities, passed in the 15th successively into the power of the Lithuanians and the Poles, and was finally united with Russia in 1667. It was partially burned by the French on their retreat from Moscow. Population in 1873, 7905. of whom only a very few are Catholics and Jews.

DOROGOI, or DOROHOI, a town of Roumania, in the northern part of Moldavia, about 80 miles north-west of Jassy, on the Shiska, a tributary of the Pruth. It has about 10,000 inhabitants, a large transit trade with the products of Northern Europe, and several important annual fairs; but its buildings are of a poor description.

DOROTHEUS, a professor of jurisprudence in the law school of Berytus in Syria, and one of the three commissioners appointed by the emperor Justinian to draw up a book of Institutes, after the model of the Institutes of Gaius, which should serve as an introduction to the Digest already completed. His colleagues were Tribonian and Theophilus, and their work was accomplished in 533. Dorotheus was subsequently the author of a commentary on the Digest, which is called the Index, and was published by him in 542. Fragments of this commentary, which was in the Greek language, have been preserved in the Scholia appended to the body of law compiled by order of the emperor Basilius the Macedonian and his son Leo the Wise, in the 9th century, known as the Basilica, from which it seems probable that the commentary of Dorotheus contained the substance of a course of lectures on the Digest delivered by him in the law school of Berytus, although it is not cast in a form so precisely didactic as the Index of Theophilus.

DORP, a town of Prussia, in the government of Düsseldorf, 17 miles north-east of Cologne, which, like Barmen and many other towns in the valley of the Wupper, has since 1849 rapidly grown into importance as a centre of manufacturing industry. Tobacco, paper, steel, and iron wares are the principal objects of its activity. In 1872 the population amounted to 10,689.

DORPAT, in German frequently Dörpt, in Russian Derpt or Yurieff, in Esthonian Tartoma, a city of Russia in Europe, in the government of Livonia, situated on both banks of the Embach, 157 miles north-east of Riga, in 58° 23' N. lat. and 26° 23' E. long. The principal part of the town lies to the south of the river, and the more important buildings are clustered round the two eminences known as the Domberg and the Schlossberg, which, in the Middle Ages, were occupied by the citadel, the cathedral, the episcopal palace, the monastery, and the houses of the wealthier inhabitants. Owing to the great conflagration of 1777, the actual town is almost entirely of modern erection; and its fortifications have been transformed into promenades. Besides one Roman Catholic, three Lutheran, and two Russian churches, a hospital, and an orphanage, a

veterinary institute founded in 1846, the economical society of Livonia, an Esthonian learned society, and a medicophysical society, it possesses a famous university, with an observatory, an anatomical theatre, a botanical garden, and a library of about 250,000 volumes, which are housed in a restored portion of the cathedral, burned down in 1596,

This university, which renders the town the great intel lectual centre of Livonia, preserves the Teutonic traditions of its earlier days, and is much more German than Russian in its culture. It was founded by Gustavus Adolphus in 1632; but in 1699 teachers and students removed to Pernau on the advance of the Russians, and on the occupation of the country by Peter the Great again took flight to Sweden. In spite of the stipulation of the treaty of 1710 and the efforts of the Livonian nobles, it was not till 1802 that its restoration was effected under the patronage of Alexander I.; but since that date its history has been one of considerable prosperity. It possesses 42 ordinary professors, a total teaching staff of 73 members, and upwards of 800 students. The astronomical department is especially famous, owing partly to the labours of Otto Struve, and partly to its possession of Frauenhofer's great refracting telescope, presented by the emperor Alexander I. The manufacturing industry of the town is very slight, but it carries on a good trade, and has six great markets in the year. Population in 1873, 20,780.

The foundation of Dorpat is ascribed to the grand duke Yaroslaff I., and is dated 1030. In 1223 the town was seized by the Teutonic Knights, and in the following year Bishop Hermann erected a greatest prosperity was achieved under the patronage of the inde cathedral on the Domberg. From that date till about 1559, the pendent episcopal see, and the population reached as high as 50,000. In 1559, the town was captured by the Russians under Peter Ivan Shiuski, but in 1582 it was yielded by treaty to Stephen Bathori of Poland. In 1600, it fell into the hands of the Swede3, in 1603 reverted to the Poles, and in 1625 was seized by Gustavus Adolphus. The Russians again obtained possession in 1666, but once more yielded before the Swedes, and did not effect a permanent occupation till 1703. In 1708 the bulk of the population was removed to the interior of Russia; but before long the town began to receive better treatment from the victors, and when in 1777 it suffered so severely from the conflagration already mentioned, it obtained valuable assistance in the work of restoration from Catherine II.

D'ORSAY, ALFRED GUILLAUME GABRIEL, COUNT (1798-1852), a celebrated leader of society in Paris and London, who added to the attractions of dandyism those of high intellectual and artistic gifts, was born at Paris in 1798. He was the son of General D'Orsay, from whom he inherited the exceptionally handsome person which contributed so much to his social success. Through his mother he was grandson by a morganatic marriage of the king of Würtemberg. In his youth he entered the French army, and served as a garde du corps of Louis XVIII. In 1822, while stationed at Valence on the Rhone, he formed that acquaintance with the earl of Blessington and his family which affected the whole course of his future life. The acquaintance quickly ripened into intimacy, and at the invitation of the earl he accompanied the party on their tour through Italy. In the spring of 1823 he met Lord Byron at Genoa, and the published correspondence of the poet at this period contains numerous references to the count's gifts and accomplishments, and to his peculiar relationship to the Blessington family. A diary which D'Orsay had kept during a visit to London in 1821-2 was submitted to Byron's inspection, and was much praised by him for the knowledge of men and manners and the keen faculty of observation it displayed. On the 4th December 1827, Count D'Orsay married Lady Harriet Gardiner, a girl of fifteen, the daughter of Lord Blessington by his first wife. The union, if it rendered his connection with the Blessington family less ostensibly equivocal than before, VII.

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was in other respects an unhappy one, and a separation took place soon after the death of Lord Blessington, which occurred in 1829. When the widowed countess returned to England she was accompanied by Count D'Orsay, and the two lived under the same roof, first at Seamore Place and then at Kensington Gore. Their house soon became a resort of the fashionable literary and artistic society of London, which found an equal attraction in host and in hostess. The 'count's charming manner, brilliant wit, and artistic faculty were accompanied by benevolent moral qualities, which endeared him to all his associates. His skill as a painter and sculptor was shown in numerous portraits and statuettes representing his friends, which were marked by great vigour and truthfulness, if wanting the finish that can only be reached by persistent discipline. Count D'Orsay had been from his youth a zealous Bonapartist, and one of the most frequent guests at Gore House was Prince Louis Napoleon. It was to Paris, therefore, that he naturally resorted in 1849, after the breaking up of the establishment at Gore House in consequence of his bankruptcy. The countess of Blessington, who had accompanied him, died a few weeks after their arrival, and he endeavoured to provide support for himself by adopting the profession of a portrait painter. He was deep in the counsels of the prince president, but the relation between them was less cordial after the coup d'état, of which the count had by anticipation expressed his strong disapproval. His appointment to the post of director of fine arts was announced only a few days before his death, which occurred on the 4th August 1852.

Much information as to the life and character of Count D'Orsay is to be found in Madden's Literary Life and Correspondence of the Countess of Blessington (1855).

DORSET, an English county, situated on the western coast. In British times, previous to the landing of Cæsar, it was inhabited by a tribe which Ptolemy calls the Durotriges, and which, upon no good authority, but not without probability, has been identified with the Morini, the occupants of a part of the opposite coast (extremi hominum Morini, En. viii. 727), the two appellations being apparently of similar import, and referring to their location on the sea-shore. Under the Romans this county constituted a portion of Britannia Prima; and the Saxons called it Dornsæta, or Dorsæta (a word involving the same root, Dwr, water), and included it in the kingdom of Wessex.

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Melcombe-Regis aud Weymouth two between them. Dorsetshire .forms a part of the see of Salisbury. It originally fell under the wide jurisdiction of the ancient sees of Dorchester in Oxfordshire and of Winchester, till the foundation of the bishopric of Sherborne, 705 A.D., and when that see was transferred to Salisbury it still remained a part of it, till in 31st Henry VIII. it was annexed to the newly-erected bishopric of Bristol, and so continued till 1836, when its ancient connection with Salisbury was revived, and still continues.

Branches of the London and South-Western Railway, or in connection with it, enter the county from Southampton, Salisbury, and Bath, meet near Wimborne, and continue to Poole, Wareham, Dorchester, and Weymouth, which last two places are also reached by a branch of the GreatWestern from Yeovil, with a drop-line to Bridport at Maiden-Newton. The main line of the London and SouthWestern likewise touches the north of the county near Shaftesbury, Gillingham, and Sherborne.

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The surface of Dorsetshire is hilly and uneven. ing out for the present the consideration of the coast-line in Purbeck, Portland, and to the westward, and proceeding in the direction of from S.E., to N.W., we find a descending series of formations, commencing from the Tertiaries, which occupy an almost equilateral triangle, and include the towns of Wareham, Poole, Wimborne, and Cranborne; passing through a band of Chalk some ten or twelve miles in breadth, in which the chief town Dorchester and Blandford are situated, and which is fringed by a thin belt of Greensand; and thence to the Oolitic beds in the north-east, and the Lias at Bridport and the south-west. The three systems

thus roughly indicated have been popularly divided into the Sands, the Chalks, and the Clays. It is, of course, the last south-which has won for this county the somewhat exaggerated, and not uncontested, designation of "the garden of England;" though the rich wide vale of Blackmore, and the luxuriant pastures and orchards of the extreme west may fairly support the claim. The Downs of the Chalk district, formerly so celebrated as sheep-walks, have been rapidly disappearing of late years under the influence of a more scientific system of agriculture, though still the stock of sheep pastured in the county amounts to between 500,000 and 600,000. Even in the sandy region, cultivation is advancing, and detached portions are improved, though there is still much waste land, dreary and barren, hardly supporting, even in the summer months, a few sheep and cattle, and supplying the scattered cottars with heath and turf for fuel.

On the north Dorsetshire is bounded by Somersetshire and Wiltshire, on the east by Hampshire, on the west by Devonshire and a part of Somersetshire, whilst the British Channel washes the whole of its southern coast. Its form is very irregular; the northern boundary has a considerable angular projection in the middle; its southern coast runs out into various points and headlands; and the western inclines towards Devonshire with an uneven line. Its greatest breadth from north to south is about 35 miles, and its length from east to west 55. Its circumference, including 627,265 a.res, is nearly 160 miles. In 1871 the population was found to be 195,537,-having increased from 114,452 in 1801 and 175,054 in 1841. 111,731 acres were under corn-crops, and 60,633 under green-crops. The males numbered 95,616, the females 99,921

Dorset is divided into 35 hundreds, containing more than 300 parishes, 8 boroughs, 22 liberties, and 12 market towns, the principal of which are Dorchester, Bridport, Sherborne, Lyme-Regis, Shaftesbury, Weymouth and Melcombe-Regis, Poole, and Blandford. Only 10 members are returned to parliament, instead of 20 as before the first Reform Act. The county itself sends three; Dorchester, Bridport, Poole, Shaftesbury, and Wareham one each, and

Dorsetshire is not generally speaking a well-wooded county, though much fine timber may be seen, not only in the richer and deeper soils, but likewise in the sheltered valleys of the Chalk district, and more especially upon the Greensand. The views from some of the higher hills, which constitute, as it were, the back-bone of the county, are often vastly extensive, ranging on many points from the Needles to the very utmost limit of the Mendip and Quantock Hills, where they sink into the Bristol Channel.

The Dorsetshire air is remarkably mild and salubrious, and in some sunnier spots of the coast, such as Abbotsbury, even tropical plants are found to flourish. Weymouth has long been celebrated as a watering-place, and owing to the general calmness of the sea there, its pleasant situation, and commodiousness for bathing, it still maintains considerable consequence. The sea-side villages of Swanage, Lulworth, and Charmouth also, though more difficult of access, and affording less accommodation for visitors, abound with many quiet and enjoyable charms.

The chief port of the county is Poole, situated on an estuary formed by the mouth of the Frome. Its entrance is defended by Brownsea Castle,-not, however, a military

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