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RA'DIANCE, n. s. All of Lat. radio. LusRA'DIANT, adj. tre; glitter of light: raRA'DIATE, v. n. diant is, shining; brilRA'DIATED, adj. liant with rays; emitRADIATION, n. s. ting rays: to radiate, to shine; emit rays; sparkle: radiated, adorned with rays, or emitting rays: radiation, emission of rays; emission from a centre; beamy lustre. By the sacred radiance of the sun, By all the operations of the orbs, Here I disclaim all my paternal care.

Shakspeare. There was a sun of gold radiant upon the top, and before, a small cherub of gold with wings displayed.

Bacon.

Sound paralleleth in many things with the light and radiation of things visible. Id. Natural History. Should I say I lived darker than were true, Your radiation can all clouds subdue,

But one; 'tis best light to contemplate you. Donne. The sun

Girt with omnipotence, with radiance crowned. Of majesty divine. Milton.

I see the warlike host of heaven,
Radiant in glittering arms and beamy pride,
Go forth to succour truth below.

Id.

Whether there be not too high an apprehension above its natural radiancy, is not without just doubt; however it be granted a very splendid gem, and whose sparkles may somewhat resemble the glances of fire.

Browne's Vulgar Errours. Though with wit and parts their possessors could never engage God to send forth his light and his truth; yet now that revelation hath disclosed them, and that he hath been pleased to make them radiate in his word, men may recollect those scattered divine beams, and, kindling with them the topics proper to warm our affections, enflame holy zeal. Boyle.

Light radiates from luminous bodies directly to our eyes, and thus we see the sun or a flame; or it is reflected from other bodies, and thus we see a man or a picture. Locke.

Burnet.

A glory surpassing the sun in its greatest radiancy. The radiated head of the phoenix gives us the meaning of a passage in Ausonius.

RADICAL, adj. RADICALITY, n.s. RADICALLY, adv. RAD'ICATE, V. a. RADICATION, n. s. RAD'ICLE.

Addison.

Fr. radical; Lat. radix. Original; primitive; implanted by nature; it has lately been used also in the sense of effectual; penetrating to the root: radicality is, origination: radically follows the senses of radical: to radicate is to plant or root firmly radication, the act of taking root: radicle, that part of the seed which becomes the

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There may be equivocal seeds and hermaphroditical principles, that contain the radicality and power of different forms; thus in the seeds of wheat there lieth obscurely the seminality of darnel.

Browne's Vulgar Errours. Nor have we let fall our pen upon discouragement of unbelief, from radicated beliefs, and points of high prescription.

Browne.

Prior.

These great orbs thus radically bright, Primitive founts, and origins of light, Enliven worlds denied to human sight. Radicle is that part of the seed of a plant which, upon its vegetation, becomes its root. Quincy. The sunbeams render the humours hot, and dry up the radical moisture. Arbuthnot.

Such a radical truth, that God is, springing up together with the essence of the soul, and previous to all other thoughts, is not pretended to by religion. Bentley.

RADICAL. That which is considered as constitituting the distinguishing part of an acid, by its union with the acidifying principle or oxygen, which is common to all acids. Thus, sulphur is the radical of the sulphuric and sulphurous acids. It is sometimes called the base of the acid, but base is a term of more extensive application.

RADISH, in botany. See RAPHANUS.
RADIUS, in anatomy. See ANATOMY.

RADNOR, NEW, or Maesyfed-newyold, a borough and market-town, the chief town of Radnorshire, situated on the river Sommergill, at the narrow entrance of a pass between two high pointed hills, is twenty-four miles north-west The town was formerly defended by a strong from Hereford, and 156 W. N. W. from London. castle, which has been destroyed. Owen Glyndower, in the reign of Henry IV., nearly burnt the place to the ground; and it now only consists of one irregularly built street. It was a borough by prescription, till the reign of queen Elizabeth, when a charter was granted it, with many privileges, together with a manor containing eleven townships, and a jurisdiction extending ten or twelve miles in circuit. The church stands on an eminence above the town, and is a very small edifice. The town-hall is a mean building. The corporation consists of a bailiff, twenty-five burgesses, &c., and, jointly with Rhaiader and Knighton, sends one member to parliament, elected by about 300 voters. The borough has a court of pleas for all actions without limitation, but the assizes are held at Presteigne. In the neighbourhood is a cataract, called Water-break-neck, which precipitously descends into a vast hollow, surrounded by craggy declivities. Market on Saturday. Fair October 18th. It is a rectory, value £13, Patron, the king.

RADNOR, OLD, or MAESYFED-HFN, a parish two miles south-east from New Raduor, and sometimes called Pen-y-craig, from_its_situation on the summit of a rock. The church is a large stone building, consisting of a nave and chancel.

RADNORSHIRE, a county of the principality, derives its name from Radnor the county town, but is called by the Welsh Sir Vaes-ivid. It is an inland county of South Wales, bounded by Herefordshire and a part of Shropshire on the east; by Brecknockshire on the south; by the same county and part of Montgomeryshire and Shropshire on the north, and is twenty-four miles in length from east to west, twenty-two in breadth from north to south, and about ninety miles in circumference. Radnorshire is divided into six hundreds, and fifty-two parishes.

This county was in the time of the Romans part of the country of the Silures, and contains several barrows; most of the mountains have cairns or large heaps of stones, probably intended as memorials of the dead. One of the most celebrated remains of antiquity in this county is part of a work called by the Welsh Rlawdh Offa, or Offa's Dyke, from its having been cut by Offa king of Mercia, as a boundary between the English Saxons and the ancient Britons. This dyke may be traced from the mouth of the Wye to that of the Dee, through the whole extent of the county. We are told that king Harold made a law that whatever Welshman should be found armed on the east side of the dyke should have his right hand cut off. There are the ruins of several castles, particularly those of Kevn Lyks, and of Tinbod, which last stood on the summit of a hill, and was destroyed in the year 1260 by Llewelyn, prince of Wales. The only religious house in this county was at Combehire, where Cadwathelan ap Madoc in 1143 founded a Cistercian abbey, which was dedicated to St. Mary; and, at the suppression of religious houses by Henry VIII., had a revenue of £28 17s. 4d. per annum.

The principal river of this county is the Wye, which skirts it from north-west to south-east, constituting the boundary between Brecknockshire and Radnorshire. The first tributary flood of any consequence that attends on its stream is Clarwen, with Clargwy, receiving as they do the Elain into their united channels before they join the Wye. This latter river in its progress is increased by the Ithor, drawing along with it the Dulas, the Clywedoc, and Cymran, all of which rise in Radnorshire; as do Edwy and Machwy, the last contributions the Wye derives from this county. The train of rivers which attend it from the Brecknockshire side is not so productive of interesting scenery and speculations connected with the mythological antiquities of the principality. The north-eastern and central parts of the county likewise abound in forests, which were once consecrated by all the natural awe of religious institutions, and as some say, by all the fictitious terrors of craftily pretended enchantment, though time has left few if any remains of the machinery, by the mouldering fragments of which we are enabled in some other places to weigh the credulity of the disciples against the wit and ingenuity of the instructors. The eastern part of Radnorshire is upon the whole a fine and beautiful country. The Lug is on this side the principal river. It rises in the interior of the county, and quits it for Herefordshire at Prestain. Afterwards at Lemster it takes

in the Arro, the source of which is likewise in Radnorshire. But the Lug is rather to be considered as a Herefordshire river, from its longer course through the north of that county, the superior plenteousness of its streams, and the many brooks it brings with it. Radnorshire, in a picturesque point of view, is generally considered as the least interesting of the Welsh counties. If this is to be understood as applying to it on the whole, it is undoubtedly true; for both its grandeur and beauty are, with a few exceptions, confined to its western side, on a narrow edge of the Wye, opposite Brecknockshire, and to that north-western nook which touches upon the counties of Montgomery and Cardigan, and participates in the irrefragable majesty of their character. But Radnorshire, independently of the Wye, has insulated scenes which vie with any thing to be found in the whole compass of the district that surrounds it. We need only mention the dingle through which the Machwy runs, the vale of Edwy, and the beauties of Cwm Elain, or the vale of Does, to illustrate the truth of these assertions. In the two last especially are realised those apparent contrarieties of luxuriance and barrenness, sylvan decoration and leafless horror, the blended description of which, in works of fancy, we are apt to criticise as out of nature. They certainly are so for the most part; and our poets, to say nothing of our painters, cannot easily be acquitted of dealing in them too profusely and indiscriminately. But they do exist as exceptions to a general rule, and here seem almost to introduce the traveller into fairy land; particularly if his spirits have become languid, and the elasticity of his expectations has been slackened by toiling over the eastern division of the county, where his imagination is neither kept alive by what is grand, nor his speculation as a philosopher or economist excited by the improvements of science, working on the capabilities of nature.

The proportion of mountain to vale is probably less here than in any county of Wales, except Pembrokeshire; and the quantity of land in cultivation, compared with that which is unbroken, is certainly greater than in most, on a fair estimate of their respective dimensions. The mountains of Radnorshire are for the most part low and broad crowned, so that they might be convertible to purposes of husbandry, if there was not already a larger proportion of ground in tillage than the confined knowledge and deficient activity of the natives can turn to a lucrative account. The appearance of the farms, therefore, is in too many places impoverished and hungry; but this is injuriously attributed to nature; for the most intelligent and experienced inhabitants aver the quality of the soil to be generally good, though its tendency to fertility is kept down by slovenly management, local prejudice, and indolent habits. The inhabitants can live as their fathers have lived before them, and they have no desire to live better. The consequence of an agricultural system so imperfect is, that they depend principally on their sheep, for the wool of which they find a ready market at Lemster; and this, rather than any intrinsic difference, is the reason why the price of good land in the heart

of Radnorshire bears so very disproportionate a elation to the current price in the adjoining counties of Herefordshire and Shropshire. Cattle and sheep are such staple articles that the rate at which farms let is very much governed by their possessing or not possessing right of mountain: and, as the best land for tillage in general is not that which lies contiguous to these black and barren mountains, this circumstance occasions the apparent absurdity, that some of the best land in the county is let at a lower rent than some of the worst. Such discouragement to the occupation of the more even and fertile districts, arising from the difficulty of consulting the general interests of agriculture, without sacrificing local objects, to which long cherished opinions, confirmed by the experience of partial benefit, have attached importance, must continue to depress the improvement and consequent value of land below the average standard of the times, and of the country at large. But more extensive and unprejudiced views, a broader calculation of advantages and disadvantages, a less servile adherence to established maxims, and a less timid investigation of their merits, are making way, though slowly, in these regions.

The language of Radnorshire is almost universally English. In learning to converse with their Saxon neighbours, they have forgotten the use of their vernacular tongue. It is uncommon to meet with a peasant who understands Welsh, though it seems to have been generally spoken, even in the eastern parts of this county, so lately as the middle of the seventeenth century. The angle of the county beyond Rhayader, to the north-west, is however to be excepted, where the few scattered people speak nothing else. But the features and the character of this corner participate entirely in those of Cardiganshire; and, when we recollect how near Offa's Dyke approaches to this spot, we should perhaps rather wonder that the Welsh language has lost so little ground, and not been obliged to recede still farther. Nay, in the south-east part of the county, about Clyrow, Paine's Castle, and other places in that neighbourhood, even beyond Offa's Dyke, the Welsh language is still understood, and all are able to speak it, though they decidedly affect the English. About Presteign no native understands Welsh, but it is partially known to all or most in the places five or six miles to the westward. It may indeed be suspected that the people in the east of Radnorshire are not Welshmen, who by vicinity and intermarriages have gradually changed their speech for one more fashionable, but that they are the direct descendants of the English Marches, who, with their rapacious followers, occupied the limits between England and Wales, and were pouring in upon the natives of the Welsh shires from Hereford, Shropshire, and the English part, on every slight pretence of licentiousness, disaffection, or danger. By these means they might have driven the aboriginal Britons still further into the mountainous districts, and have established themselves in their seats. Radnorshire sends two members to the imperial parliament, viz. one for the shire, and one for the town of Radnor, which gives the title of earl to the family of Pleydell-Bouverie, and the village VOL. XVIII

of Llandrindod the title of earl of March (derived from the Marches in South Wales) to that of Lennox.

Its

RAE, an ancient and immense city of Persia, was formerly the capital of that country. ruins cover a vast extent of ground. They do not, however, present any remarkable objects; for having, like other Persian cities, been composed merely of bricks dried in the sun, it has crumbled into dust, and presents now only the appearance of mounds or hillocks of sand, covered with lacquered tile. In the centre stands a'village, called Sheikh Abdul Azzeem, from a son of the seventh Imam, to whose memory a noble mosque and mausoleum have been erected. Rae was destroyed by the Tartars under Zinges Khan. Sax. peapian; Isl. RAFFLE, v. n. & n. s. ) rifa; Swed. rifeva; barb. Lat. reffare; Fr. rafle. To rob; sweep; huddle up, or huddle away. Spenser uses the participle passive raff for torn; rent: to raffle is to cast dice for a prize: as a noun substantive, a species of lottery of this description.

RAFF, v. a.

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RAFFAELLE. See RAPHAEL. RAFFLES (Sir Thomas Stamford), LL. D., was the son of Benjamin Raffles, a captain in the West India trade, and born at sea in the ship Anne, off Port Morant in Jamaica, July 6th, 1781. His father placed him for education with Dr. Anderson, of Hammersmith, whence he removed to a clerkship in the India house. In 1805 the interest of Mr. secretary Ramsay procured him the situation of assistant secretary to the government of Pulo Penang, in the straits of Malacca, whither he accompanied governor Dundas. He here applied himself to the study of the Malay language; was soon after appointed Malay translator to the government; and, in 1807, became secretary to the council and registrar of the recorder's court; the following year he was compelled, by indisposition, to retire to Malacca. In 1810 his reputation procured him the appointment of agent of the governor-general with the Malay states; and the following year, on the reduction of Batavia and Java, he was nominated lieutenant-governor of the latter. Here he continued till 1816, having, in the interval, brought the hostilities commenced against the native chiefs to a successful termination. In 1816 he returned to England, bringing with him a Javanese prince and a most extensive collection of specimens of the productions, &c., of the Eastern archipelago. The year following appeared his History of Java, in two thick quartos, with plates. He again sailed from Falmouth in the winter of 1817, having been nominated to the residency of Bencoolen in Sumatra, with the honor of knighthood and the lieutenant-governorship of Fort

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Marlborough. On reaching his government, in March 1818, he set himself forthwith to remedy many abuses, and did much towards carrying into effect the abolition of slavery. He also distinguished himself by his arrangements with the Dutch commissioners in the interest of the sultan of Palembang, and by the occupation of the island of Singapore. On his last visit to the island, in 1823, he laid the foundation of the Anglo-Chinese college, but in the following year the impaired state of his constitution induced him to return to Europe. With this view he embarked on board the Fame, on the 2d of February 1824; but a fire breaking out in the ship, on the evening of the same day, the vessel and property of his own to the amount of nearly £30,000 with many valuable papers, were destroyed at sea; the crew and passengers saving their lives with difficulty, and landing in a state of utter destitution, about fifteen miles from Bencoolen. Of this calamity an account remains, in a letter written by Sir Thomas to a friend in England, dated the day after the accident. In April his family embarked again on board the Mariner, which landed them in London, in August. Sir Thomas, however, survived his return not quite two years, dying of an apoplectic attack in July 1826. In addition to the work alluded to, he left behind him a memoir of Singapore, in MS.; besides editing Finlayson's Mission to Siam, 8vo., and Dr. Leyden's Malay Annals.

RAFT, n. s. Dan. rafte; Swed. rafft; Lat.

ratis. A float of timber.

Where is that son

That floated with thee on the fatal raft?

Shakspeare.

Fell the timber of yon lofty grove, And form a raft, and build the rising ship. Pope. RAFTS are formed by various planks of timber, fastened together side by side, so as to be conveyed more commodiously to any short distance in a harbour or road than if they were separate. The timber and planks with which merchantships are laden, in the different parts of the Baltic Sea, are attached together in this manner, in order to float them down the rivers and off to the shipping.

RAFTER, n. s. Sax. nærten; Belg. rafRAF'TERED, adj. Š ter; Goth. raftræ, or roof tree. The cross or secondary timber of a house: furnished with rafters.

The rafters of my body, bone,

Being still with you, the muscle, sinew, and vein, Which tile this house, will come again. Donne.

By Danaus, king of Egypt, when he fled from his brother Rameses, the use of shipping was first brought among the Grecians, who before that time knew no other way of crossing their narrow seas, but on beams or rafters tied to one another.

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Heylin.

Denham.

Which oft is sooner found in lowly sheds,

With smoky rafters, than in tap'stry halls.

From the east, a Belgian wind

Milton.

His hostile breath through the dry rafters sent; The flames impelled.

Dryden

No raftered roofs with dance and tabor sound, No noontide bell invites the country round. Pope. The roof began to mount aloft, Aloft rose every beam and rafter, The heavy wall climbed slowly after.

Swift's Miscellanies. RAFTERS, in building, are pieces of timber which, standing by pairs on the reason or railing piece, meet in an angle at the top, and form the roof of a building. See ARCHITECTURE. RAG, n. s. RAGGED, adj. RAG'GEDNESS, n. s.

Sax. prac, phacode, torn; Swed. raca; Gr. ρακος. A piece of cloth torn from the rest; any thing torn or tattered; stantive corresponding: ragged is also used for mean dress the adjective and other noun subuneven; broken; rugged.

Worn like a cloth,

Gnawn into rags by the devouring moth. Sandys.
Fathers that wear rags,

Do make their children blind;
But fathers that bear bags,
Shall see their children kind.

Shakspeare. King Lear.
That some whirlwind bear
Unto a ragged, fearful, hanging rock,
And throw it thence into the raging sea.
Shakspeare.

That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm!
Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your looped and windowed raggedness defend you?

They tooke from me

Id. Both coate and cloake, and all things that might be Grace in my habit; and, in place, put on These tattered rugs.

Chapman.

The earl of Warwick's ragged staff is yet to be seen pourtrayed in their church steeple. Carew. Cowls, hoods, and habits, with their wearers tost, And fluttered into rags. Milton.

He had first matter seen undrest; He took her naked all alone, Before one rag of form was on. Hudibras Content with poverty, my soul I arm; And virtue, though in rags, will keep me warm.

Dryden.

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RAGAMUFFIN, n. s. From rag and 'I know not what else,' says Dr. Johnson. Query muffle, which pervades all the northern lan guages; from Goth. hufa, to conceal. A petty mean fellow.

I have led my ragamuffins where they were peppered; there's not three of my hundred and fifty left alive; and they are for the town's end to beg during life. Shakspeare. Henry IV. Shall we brook that paltry ass

And feeble scoundrel, Hudibras,

With that more paltry ragamuffin,

Ralpho, vapouring and huffing? Hudibras

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Cowper.

The rose soon reddened into rage, And, swelling with disdain, Appealed to many a poet's page, Το prove her right to reign. RAGGSTONE, in mineralogy, is a genus of stones belonging to the class of siliceous earths. It is of a gray color; the texture obscurely laminar, or rather fibrous; but the laminae or fibres consist of a congeries of grains of a quartzy appearance, coarse and rough. The specific gravity is 2-729; it effervesces with acids, and strikes fire with steel. Kirwan found it to contain a portion of mild calcareous earth, and a small proportion of iron. It is used as a whetstone for coarse cutting tools. It is found about Newcastle, and many other parts of England.

RAGMAN'S ROLL, Rectius Ragimund's roll, so called from one Ragimund a legate in Scotland, who, calling before him all the beneficed clergyman in that kingdom, caused them on oath to give in the true value of their benefices; according to which they were afterwards taxed by the court of Rome; and this roll, among other records, being taken from the Scots by Edward I., was redelivered to them in the beginning of the reign of Edward III.

RAĞOUT, n. s. Fr. ragout. Meat stewed and highly seasoned.

When art and nature join, th' effect will be Some nice ragout, or charming fricasy.

King.

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RAGULED, or RAGGED, in heraldry, jagged or knotted. This term is applied to a cross formed of the trunks of two trees without their

branches, of which they show only the stumps. Raguled differs from indented, in that the latter is regular, the former not.

RAGUSA, a town and district of Austrian Dalmatia, containing the territory of the republic, with the islands of Curzola, Lagosta or Agosta, Mileda, Guipana, Mezzo, Calamata, &c. It is bounded by the Turkish frontier east, and by the Adriatic on the west. Its area is about 700 square miles; population about 60,000. It contains no town of consequence, except the capital. Tracts along the banks of the Narenta are marshy and unhealthy; but in general the climate is good, and the soil fertile. The rivers are the Narenta, Drino, Gliuta, and Ombla.

RAGUSA, the chief town of the above district, and an archbishop's see, is situated on a peninsula on the Adriatic. The peninsula on which it stands forms two commodious harbours, sheltered by a hill from the north winds, which are so pernicious in the Adriatic; and the attacks of an enemy by land are rendered difficult by almost inaccessible rocks. The town itself is surrounded by a wall flanked with old towers; but the harbours are protected by strong modern works. The streets are narrow, with the exception of the principal one which extends from north to south. The mansion of the chief magistrate, the cathedral, and some of the churches, are worth notice. The inhabitants exhibit a heterogeneous mixture of northern and oriental dress and language, and their religious and other ceremonies are a combination of Catholic, Greek, and even Pagan rites. They weave silk and woollen stuffs, and build some shipping, and still carry on a traffic with the Levant and Italy.

This city was founded in the seventh century by fugitives from Epidaurus. Subject for some time to the Roman, afterwards to the Greek empire, it became independent; and, pursuing a pacific policy, paid a slight tribute to Venice and other maritime powers. It suffered severely from the great earthquake of 1767; but its commerce continued nearly as before, though it has been long eclipsed by that of the larger states of the south of Europe. The republic did not lose its independence until the successes of Buonaparte, who gave to marshal Marmont the title of duke of Ragusa. Of the men of note born here the most remarkable was Boscovich. It is 278 miles east by north of Rome, and ninety-four south-east of Spalatro.

RAGUSA, a populous town in the south part of the island of Sicily, in the Val di Noto, on the small river Ragusa. This town is said to contain 20,000 inhabitants, and the environs are very beautiful and fertile

RAJA, or RAJAH, the title of the Indian black princes, the remains of those who ruled there before the Moguls.

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