The root is in pieces from two to six inches long, and about the thickness of a straw, much bent or twisted, either simple or branched, with a remarkably knotty character, owing to numerous circular depressions or clefts, which give the whole an appearance of a number of rings; and hence the term annulated. It consists of a central axis called meditullium, and an external portion, called the cortical part. Each contains emeta; but by far the greater portion exists in the cortical. Of the three varieties of annulated ipecacuan the brown contains 16 per cent. of emeta, while the red contains only 14 per cent.: the grey has not been analyzed. Another sort of ipecacuan is obtained from the Psychotria emetica: this kind contains only 9 per cent of emeta, and the undulated or amylaceous ipecacuan, the produce of the Richardsonia scabra, holds only 6 per cent. of emeta, with 92 per cent. of starch. Besides these, the roots of numerous other plants are used in tropical countries as emetics, and often termed ipecacuan. The dust or powder of ipecacuan applied to any mucous surface causes irritation and increased secretion from the part. It is chiefly employed to excite the stomach either to augmented secretion, or to invert its action, and effect vomiting. It is also capable, by being combined with other substances, of being directed to the skin, and producing increased perspiration. When given in very small doses, it improves the appetite and digestive powers; in a somewhat larger dose, it acts on the intestines; but in a still larger, it inverts the action of the stomach, and occasions vomiting. It may therefore be used in a great many diseases, such as indigestion, dysentery, rheumatism, common colds, croup, &c. [EMETA; EMETICS; DIAPHORETICS; ANTIDOTES.] IPHI'CRATES, an Athenian general, most remarkable for a happy innovation upon the antient routine of Greek tactics, which he introduced in the course of that general war which was ended B.C. 387 by the peace of Antalcidas. This, like most improvements upon the earlier methods of warfare, consisted in looking, for each individual soldier, rather to the means of offence than of protection. Iphicrates laid aside the weighty panoply, which the regular infantry, composed of Greek citizens, had always worn, and substituted a light target for the large buckler, and a quilted jacket for the coat of mail; at the same time he doubled the length of the sword, usually worn thick and short, and increased in the same, or, by some accounts, in a greater proportion, the length of the spear. It appears that the troops whom he thus armed and disciplined (not Athenian citizens, who would hardly have submitted to the necessary discipline, but mercenaries following his standard, like the Free Companions of the middle ages), also carried missile javelins; and that their favourite mode of attack was to venture within throw of the heavy column, the weight of whose charge they could not have resisted, trusting in their individual agility to baffle pursuit. When once the close order of the column was broken, its individual soldiers were overmatched by the longer weapons and unencumbered movements of the lighter infantry. In this way Iphicrates and his targetiers (peltastæ), as they were called, gained so many successes that the Peloponnesian infantry dared not encounter them, except the Lacedæmonians, who said in scoff that their allies feared the targetiers as children fear hobgoblins. They were themselves taught the value of this new force, B.C. 392, when Iphicrates waylaid and cut off nearly the whole of a Lacedæmonian battalion. The loss in men was of no great amount, but that heavy-armed Lacedæmonians should be defeated by lightarmed mercenaries was a marvel to Greece, and a severe blow to the national reputation and vanity of Sparta. Accordingly this action raised the credit of Iphicrates extremely high. He commanded afterwards in the Hellespont, B.C. 389; in Egypt, at the request of the Persians, B.C. 374; relieved Corcyra in 373, and served with credit on other less important occasions. (Xen., Hell.; Diod.; Corn. Nep.) IPHIS. [LEUCOSIANS.] IPOMEA, a genus of plants of the natural family of Convolvulacea, which is very closely allied to Convolvulus, or Bindweed, whence has been derived its name. From the more minute investigations of modern botanists considerable changes have taken place in the nomenclature of the species sometimes referred to this genus and sometimes to other nearly allied genera. M.Choisy, who has most recently examined the Oriental Convolvulaceae, excludes many species usually referred here, and forms the genus of the species of Ipomea and Convolvulus of authors. Ipomea has a P. C., No. 790. 5-sepaled calyx, a campanulate corol, with five stamens included within it. Style single; stigma bilobed; lobes capitate; ovary 2-celled; cells 2-seeded; capsule 2-celled. The species are very numerous, and found in the tropical parts of Asia, Africa, and America. A few ascend the mountains in such latitudes. Most of the species are ornamental; others have been removed to Quamoclit, Argyreia, Pharbitis, &c., and one of the most useful as an article of diet in tropical countries, to Batatas. B. edulis produces the tubers so well known by the name of Sweet Potatoes. Like the kindred genus Convolvulus, which affords us scammony, many of the species of Ipomea are useful for their purgative properties: thus the Jalap plant is of this genus; and in India, I. Turpethum and cærulea are useful for similar purposes. Of the last the seeds only are employed, and form the hub-al-nil of Arabian authors, which has been usually translated granum Indicum. 1. Turpethum, probably so called from the Arabic toorbud, which is itself no doubt derived from the Sanscrit tripoota (from tri, three, and poota, the coat of a seed), or from trivrit, another name, as the plant is an Indian one, and its root has been long employed in India as a common purgative. The bark of the roots is the part employed by the natives, as it contains all the active properties, which they use fresh, rubbed up with milk. About six inches in length of a root as thick as the little finger they reckon a common dose. (Roxb.) It is reckoned an excellent substitute for Jalap, and is free from the nauseous taste and smell of that drug. The plant is a native of all parts of Continental and probably of Insular India also, as it is said to be found in the Society and Friendly Isles and the New Hebrides. (Fl. Ind., ed. Wall. 2, p. 59.) Ipomea Jalapa. The I. Jalapa is a species which has only recently been accurately determined, though its root has so long and so extensively been employed as a powerful medicinal agent. drug being exported from Vera Cruz was supposed to be produced in the hot country in its immediate neighbourhood, or in that of Xalapa, and I. macrorhiza of Michaux was supposed to be the plant, though this grows also in Georgia and Florida, where no jalap has ever been produced, and its root weighs from 50 to 60 lbs. This was sufficient to prove that it could not be the source of the officinal drug, which is seldom larger than the fist. HumVOL. XIII.-D motions which convulsed so many parts of the kingdom about the middle of the seventeenth century. There are many good buildings, and many extremely old, decorated with a profusion of curiously carved images. Most of the houses, even in the heart of the city, have convenient gardens adjoining them, which render it at once agreeable, airy, and salubrious. The water for the supply of the town rises from springs in certain lands which the corporation hold under long leases, and it is conveyed into the town by pipes laid down at their expense. The water rental, which forms a considerable part of the revenue of the corporation, has been the source of much discontent among the inhabitants, as the former claim a monopoly of the supply, and the latter complain that they are ill supplied. In the Report of the Commissioners on Municipal Corporations, 1835, the police of the town is described as being particularly inefficient. boldt was however well aware that the true Purga de Xalapa delights only in a temperate climate, or rather an almost cold one, in shaded valleys, and on the slope of mountains' (New Spain, vol. iii.); and the fact is important as showing that a temperate and not a hot climate is required for its cultivation elsewhere. Dr. Coxe, of Pennsylvania, received in 1827 directly from Xalapa several small Jalap plants, one of which he succeeded in growing to maturity, and which was ascertained by Dr. Nuttal to be an Ipomea, and named by him I. Jalapa. Specimens and seeds, of which the latter have produced plants, were subsequently procured by Dr. Schiede from Chiconquiera, on the eastern declivity of the Mexican Andes, at an elevation of 6000 feet. This plant, it is now ascertained, was also known to Miller from seeds sent by Dr. Houston from Mexico, as in the 'Gardener's Dictionary' a plant agreeing in description with the true Jalap plant, and with smooth leaves, is described. The root of this plant is a roundish The manufactures of the town consist chiefly in the somewhat pear-shaped tuber, externally blackish, internally spinning of woollen yarn, ship-building, sail-making, &c. white, with long fibres proceeding from its lower parts. The Its commerce arises from the exportation of corn, malt, and stem is much disposed to twist, and rises to a considerable other produce of the surrounding country. There is a harheight upon surrounding objects. The leaves are heart-bour for light vessels formed by the æstuary of the Orwell, shaped and pointed, deeply sinuated at the base, entire, which is navigable at high water up to the bridge, except smooth, prominently veined upon their under surface, and for vessels of large burthen, which lie at Downham Reach. supported upon long footstalks. The flowers are of a lively purple colour, and stand upon peduncles as long as the petioles. [CONVOLVULUS JALAPA.] IPSAMBUL. [ABOUSAMBUL.] The principal public buildings are the churches of Saints Clement, Helen, Laurence, Margaret, Mary at Elms, Mary at Kay, Mary at Stoke, Mary at Tower, Matthew, Nicholas, Peter, and Stephen. To the northward of the church of IPSUS, BATTLE OF. [ANTIGONUS, p. 103.] St. Mary at Kay was formerly a house of Black Friars, IPSWICH, a parliamentary borough and corporate town, called the Priory of St. Peter's. The extensive site of this capital of the county of Suffolk, and distant 69 miles north-convent was purchased by the corporation, and confirmed east from London, is agreeably situated on the side of a hill to them in 1572 by the appellation of Christ's Hospital. near the junction of the rivers Orwell and Gipping. Ac- Part of this edifice is now occupied as an hospital for poor cording to Camden, this town was antiently called Gippes- boys, in which they are maintained, clothed, and educated, wich, which name was derived from that of the neighbour- but the number during the five years preceding 1835 had ing river Gippen, or Gipping, and thence gradually became never exceeded sixteen. The revenue of the hospital is changed into Yppyswyche and Ipswich. The town does estimated at 4007. a year. In another part of the monastery not appear to be mentioned before the invasion of the Danes is a spacious room wherein is deposited the town library, in 991, by whom it was pillaged, and the fortifications de- the keys of which are kept by the master of the grammarstroyed. In the Confessor's time, according to Domesday school, and out of which every freeman is privileged to take Book, 'Queen Ediva had two parts here, and earl Gwert a away any book upon giving a proper receipt. In the spathird, and there were 800 burgesses paying custom to the cious refectory of the same building, and on the south side, king.' The earliest charter conferred upon the town was is now held the Free Grammar-school, the date of the first granted by king John in the first year of his reign, and by establishment of which is not known, though it was cerit numerous privileges were acquired by the burgesses, of tainly prior to the year 1477. But in 1524 Cardinal Wolsey which privileges the chief were, that they should have having intimated to the university of Oxford his design of a merchant's guild, with their own hanse; that no person founding a college (now Christ Church), the priory of St. should be lodged within the borough without the consent Peter's was surrendered to him in 1527, whereon he founded of the burgesses; that they should hold their lands and a school as a nursery for his intended college at Oxford, tenures according to the customs of free boroughs, &c. and this school is said for a time to have rivalled those of Henry III. increased the privileges of the burgesses, but in Eton and Winchester. Queen Elizabeth, in the second the reign of Edward I. the borough was seized by that and third years of her reign, granted two charters for the monarch, on account of certain offences committed by the regulation of the Grammar-school and of Christ's Hospital, inhabitants, though it was afterwards restored to them with At the present time the master has a salary of 150l. a year; all its liberties. In the reign of Edward III. the municipal he is provided with a dwelling-house, and the appointment government appears to have been again taken away from is for life. Since the Report of the Commissioners on the corporation, and committed to the sheriff of the county, Charities a committee has been appointed to investigate by whom a keeper of the town was appointed, but the cor- the endowments of the Grammar-school. They state that the porate government was soon restored, and the burghal original endowment under the charter of Queen Elizabeth privileges confirmed and extended by the subsequent char-was 387. 13s. 4d. per annum, which with some subsequent ters of Richard II., Henry VI., Edward IV., Richard III., bequests makes an aggregate annual income of 661. 68. 8d.; Henry VII. and VIII., Edward VI., Elizabeth, James I., but it does not appear from what source the additional and Charles I. In the reign of Charles II. this corporation, funds are derived in order to liquidate the master's salary like many others, surrendered its charters and franchises of 150%. and to defray the other expenses of the establishto the king, but in the 36th year of his reign the borough ment. Ipswich is in the diocese of Norwich. The livings was re-incorporated, with a new constitution, and by a are three rectories, of the respective annual net values o. charter of James II. the corporate officers were released 3267., 3377., and 821., and seven paid curacies of the net from the oaths. The charters of John, Edward IV., Henry value of 175l., 1157., 807., 1037., 150%., 1387., and 103. The VIII., and 17 Charles II., as restored by the proclamation borough is divided into fourteen parishes, the aggregate of James, are all considered as governing charters. By the population of which in 1831 was 20,201 persons. (Gough's 5 and 6 William IV., cap. 76, the council of the borough Camden's Britannia; Carlisle's Endowed Schools; Beauties consists of a mayor, 10 aldermen, and 30 councillors. of England and Wales; Parliamentary Papers, &c.) Ipswich has returned two members to parliament since IRĀK AJEMI. [PERSIA.] the 25th year of Henry VI. IRAK ARABI. [BAGDAD.] IRAPUATO. [MEXICO.] The revenue of the corporation, consisting of water rental, rents of lands, houses, mills, and other tenements, exceeds 20007. per annum. The expenditure in 1828 amounted to 15297. 19s. 1d., and the corporation property is charged with a debt of 14,3007. The streets of Ipswich, though well paved, and lighted with gas, are narrow and irregular, which is attributable to the remarkable circumstance that the town is not known ever to have suffered from fire, or even from the civil com IRELAND, the second in size of the British islands, and the second largest island of Europe, lies west of Great Britain, in the Atlantic Ocean. The general maps of Ireland at present published are too imperfect to give the means of stating its position more accurately than that it lies between 51° 25′ and 55° 22′ N. lat. and 5° 27' and 10° 35′ W. long. The arm of the Atlantic which separates Ireland from Great Britain, and bounds it on the north-east, east, and According to the Map published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, the greatest length of Ireland, in a line nearly from north to south, is from Bloody Farland Point in the county of Donegal to the Old Head of Kinsale in Cork, 245 miles; and the greatest breadth, from Achill Head in the county of Mayo, on the west, to the mouth of Loch Strangford in the county of Down, a little to the north of east, 200 miles. In an oblique direction the greatest length is, from Fairhead in the county of Antrim to Mizen Head in the county of Cork, 306 miles, in a line bearing north-north-east by south-south-west. Pending the completion of the Ordnance Survey of Ireland, nothing can be stated with certainty regarding the area of Ireland. It is however estimated in the Map published by the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, at 18,484,343 statute acres, or 28,881 statute square miles, of which 215,252 statute acres are under water. Another estimate made in 1831 is as follows: Dry land Unprofitable, mountain and bog Statute Acres. 14,603,473 5,340,736 south-east, is narrowest at its northern extremity, where it | sive mountain district of Ireland. Cominencing from the is called the North Channel, and the opposite coasts ap-east the Slievenaman, Knockmildown, and Gaultee ranges proach within 14 miles, between the Mull of Cantyre in extend in successive elevations of from 2000 to 3000 feet Scotland and Fair Head in the county of Antrim. South- across the south of Kilkenny, Tipperary, and Limerick; ward from this, that part of the channel which contains the after subsiding under the coal district which spreads from Isle of Man expands to a breadth of 120 miles, between Limerick over the north-east of Kerry, they rise again tothe coasts of Louth and Lancashire, and bears the name of wards the Atlantic, where Mount Brandon terminates the the Irish Sea. Being again contracted by the projecting series in a lofty promontory which separates the bay of coast of Wales to a breadth of about 65 miles, it assumes Dingle from the mouth of the Shannon. Southward from the name of St. George's Channel, which it bears until it these groups the same formation occupies the entire counexpands into the Atlantic at its southern extremity. The ties of Cork and Kerry; the elevations here towards the remainder of the coast-line on the north-west, west, and east are moderate and the country fertile, but they spread south-west is formed by the Atlantic Ocean. The chief over a wider surface and attain a greater altitude as they lines of communication between Ireland and Great Britain trend towards the sea, occupying the whole western part of are from Londonderry to Glasgow, 138 miles; from Belfast Cork and the southern portion of Kerry with precipitous to Glasgow, 107 miles, and to Liverpool, 156 miles; from and sterile ridges, among which MacGillicuddy's Reeks in Donaghadee to Portpatrick, 21 miles; from Dublin to Liver- Kerry rise to the height of 3404 feet, being the highest pool, 130 miles, to Holyhead, 63 miles, to Port-Dinnlleyn, ground in Ireland. Northward from Dingle Bay the lime70 miles; from Waterford to Bristol, 222 miles; from Cork stone district again touches the sea, but throughout the to Bristol, 268 miles-sailing distances. western parts of Limerick and Clare it is overlaid by the great Munster coal-tract, from under which it again emerges on the south side of the bay of Galway. North and west of Galway the space between the limestone plain and the sea is again occupied by mountains. An extensive tract of granite with peaks of quartz and greenstone rising to the height of 2400 feet forms the northern boundary of the bay of Galway, and from this point northward to Killalla Bay a series of primitive rocks consisting chiefly of micaslate and protruded masses of quartz is interposed between the Atlantic and the inland plain, except in one instance where the limestone reaches to the sea through the low country connecting the plains of Mayo with the head of Clew Bay. A primitive ridge of mica-slate and granite, nearly surrounded by the limestone which intervenes be tween it and the coast, prolongs this district northward and westward through Sligo to within a short distance of the borders of Donegal, where it subsides to rise again in that extended primitive formation which occupies almost all the county of Donegal and a great part of the counties of Derry and Tyrone. The north-western portion of this district consists of granite and quartz with numerous veins of primitive limestone, which is also of frequent occurrence throughout the great field of mica-slate that constitutes the remainder and rises in mountains from 1500 to 2500 feet high. district is succeeded on the east by the great trap-field of Antrim, which overlies it through an extent of nearly 800 square miles: the cap of trap is supported throughout by a bed of chalky white limestone reposing on lias, the denuded edges of which give an extraordinary variety of colouring and structure to the cliffs of that coast: the substratum of mica-slate protrudes from below the superincumbent masses at the north-eastern extremity of the field, and crossing the Channel re-appears in Scotland. The clay-slate tract which succeeds the trap-field on the south and west, extending over Down and Armagh into MonaThe most remarkable feature in the distribution of high ghan, Louth, and parts of Cavan, Meath, Longford, and and low land over the surface is the great limestone plain Roscommon, also re-appears on the opposite side of the which occupies, with little interruption, almost the whole of Channel, forming the grauwacke district which extends the central district extending from the sea at Dublin on the from Portpatrick to St. Abb's Head on the Frith of Forth. east to the bay of Galway on the west, and from the coun- The granite group of the Mourne Mountains and the granite ties of Sligo and Fermanagh on the north to the confines of and greenstone group of Slieve Gallion occupy a considerCork and Waterford on the south. The chief mountain-able portion of this clay-slate tract, protruding in conspicuous groups are either external to this plain, or rise in insulated ridges near its borders. Commencing from Dublin, where touches the sea, the first interval between the limestone country and the Channel is occupied by the granite range of the Wicklow and Mount Leinster Mountains, which extends southward from the confines of Dublin and Wicklow into Carlow, and terminates near the confluence of the Barrow and Nore. From the flanks of this chain a clayslate formation extends on the one hand into the eastern portion of Kildare, and on the other to the sea, forming the more cultivable portions of Wicklow, and almost the entire of Wexford; this latter district is interspersed with protruded masses of quartz and greenstone. Abutting on the southern extremity of this granite range commences a series of mountain-groups skirting the limestone plain on the south. The main constituent of these elevations is clayslate and old conglomerate supporting flanks of yellow sandstone. One group, that of the Gaultees in Tipperary, is entirely insulated by the limestone, which also occupies several longitudinal valleys of the external district and in some places penetrates to the sea. This is the most exten 455,399 Total 20,399,608; but this is probably above the true amount. GENERAL FEATURES.-The general form of the island is that of an oblique parallelogram, the longer diagonal lying between Mizen Head on the south-west and Fair Head on the north-east, and the shorter between Erris Head on the north-west and Carnsore Point on the south-east. The south-westerly portion of the island, which is most exposed to the Atlantic, is deeply indented with arms of the sea penetrating between rocky and mountainous promontories: the western shore in general is lofty and precipitous, and the eastern flat and little indented. This masses in the southern parts of Down and Armagh to a height of 2500 feet and upwards. This completes the circuit of the interior plain which extends between the last-mentioned district and Dublin to the sea. The principal detached groups which occur within the limestone plain are the Slieve Bloom and Slieve Baughia ranges, consisting of nuclei of clay-slate supporting flanks of red and yellow sandstone, which extend to a considerable distance on each side of the valley of the Shannon in the counties of Tipperary and Queen's County, and Clare and Galway respectively. A tract of old red sandstone rises into a chain of moderate elevation on the borders of Roscommon and Sligo in the north-west part of the plain, and several greenstone elevations diversify its surface in the centre and south-west. The limestone-plain likewise contains six coal-districts. the Leinster, or Castlecomer district, on the south-east; the Slieve Arda, or Tipperary district, on the south; the Munster district, extending through parts of the counties of Cork, Kerry, Limerick, and Clare, on the south-west; the Loch Allen district, round the source of the Shannon, on the north west; and the Monaghan and Tyrone districts, on the north there is also a coal district of small extent in the northeastern extremity of the county of Antrim. The coal raised in the southern districts is anthracite, or blind-coal; that raised in the districts north of Dublin is bituminous. In addition to these the central district of Ireland contains upwards of one million of acres of bog, comprehended for the most part within that portion which would be embraced by lines drawn from Wicklow to Galway, and from Howthhead to Sligo. The greater portion of these bogs lies west of the Shannon in the counties of Galway, Roscommon, and Mayo; the remainder, extending in various tracts through King's County, Longford, Westmeath, and Kildare, is known collectively as the Bog of Allen. Numerous ridges of limestone-gravel, called Eskers, surrounding these several divisions, offer an unlimited supply of the material best adapted for their improvement. It is calculated that an expense of 17. 58. per acre would be sufficient for the drainage of these bogs, which are at present inaccessible and useless for the purposes of turbary. Besides these encumbrances the lower carboniferous limestone, which constitutes the central plain, is overlaid in many tracts towards the borders of the district by the upper or splintery limestone, and this is generally accompanied by a craggy and rough surface: such is the case in the vicinity of each of the coal districts and throughout the counties of Sligo, Fermanagh, Cavan, and Leitrim. These districts contain numerous caverns, and streams sinking into subterranean channels are here of frequent occurrence. By much the greater part of the central plain however is unincumbered, and has the pure carboniferous limestone for its substratum. Throughout these districts the soil is rich and sweet, and the surface gently undulating. The mountain groups and waste lands on the whole occupy a comparatively small portion of the entire island, and many of the districts lying without the central plain rival the richest limestone lands in easiness of access and fertility. On an average of five years ending with 1829 the annual quantity of rain which fell at Cork in the southern extremity of the island was 35 inches, and in a like calculation for Derry, at its northern extremity, the average annual quantity was 31 inches; being in both cases considerably above the average quantity for most parts of Great Britain, though much below the average at Kendal, Keswick, and a few other places. Frosts are rarely severe in Ireland, and snow does not lie so long as in England; neither are thunder-storms of so frequent occurrence or of so formidable a character. The extension of tillage has contributed in a considerable degree to lessen the extreme moisture complained of by early historians; and to the quantity of darkcoloured earth now annually turned up intelligent writers attribute a fact often remarked by old persons, that the winters have latterly become much milder. The prevalent winds are from the west and south, and these are usually accompanied by a mild state of the atmosphere. Easterly winds are keen, and much dreaded by invalids. Instances of longevity are numerous, and the population generally healthy. The chief characteristics of the scenery of Ireland are freshness and verdure the surface is less rugged than that of Scotland, and more varied and undulating than that of England; it is however generally deficient in timber. works of various tourists have latterly attracted much attention to the natural beauties of the southern and western districts. The HISTORY AND ANTIQUITIES.-In the various names of Ireland, as known to the classic writers, Iris, lernis, Iuvernis, Hibernia, &c., the radical Ir or Eri, by which it is still known to its own natives, is plainly traceable. It is customary among the Irish to indicate a country by the affix Hy or Hua, sometimes written O, as in the case of proper names, signifying literally the (dwelling of the) sons or family of,' such as Hy-Mania, Hy-Tuirtre, Hy-Brazil, &c. In adding this affix to names beginning with a vowel it is optional to insert a consonant to prevent the concurrence of open sounds, thus Hy-v-Each, meaning the country of the descendants of Each or acus. Again, this affix requires the genitive, which in Eri is Erin, and thus all variations of the name, from the Iris of Diodorus Siculus, and the Ir-land and Ireland of modern times, to the lernis (Hy-Ernis) of the Orphic poems, and the Hibernia (Hyb-Ernia) of Latin writers, would seem to be accounted for. The name Scotia does not appear to have been applied to Ireland till about the end of the third century, from which time to the beginning of the eleventh it continued to indicate that country exclusively. Rivers and Lakes.-From the arrangement of the mountain groups round the borders of the central plain the courses of the greater number of the rivers of Ireland are necessarily short. Of those which drain the external districts the chief are the Blackwater and Lee in Cork, the Foyle in Donegal and Derry, the Bann and Lagan in Antrim and Down, and the Slaney in Wexford. The rivers of the central district have longer courses and a much greater body of water. The chain of Slieve Bloom and the low range of the Eskers divide the central plain longitudinally into two unequal portions, of which the western division is by much the greater. The eastern or smaller division is again subdivided by the summit-level of the bog The Scoti, who were in possession of the island at the time of Allen into a northern district, the waters of which dis- of the introduction of Christianity, appear to have been to charge themselves into the Irish Sea by the Boyne, and a a great extent the successors of a people whose name and southern district, which sends its drainage in an opposite monuments indicate a close affinity with the Belge of direction into the Atlantic by the united streams of the Southern Britain. A people also called Cruithne by the Irish Barrow, Nore, and Suir, all navigable rivers. The western aunalists, who are identifiable with the Picts of Northern division, which much exceeds the united basins of these Britain, continued to inhabit a portion of the island distinct several rivers, is drained solely by the Shannon, which, from the Scoti until after the Christian mission; and it is from its great body of water and course through a flat observable that the names of mountains and remarkable country, possesses the extraordinary advantage of being places in that district still strikingly resemble the topogranavigable from its source to its mouth, a distance of nearly phical nomenclature of those parts of North Britain which 240 miles. Those portions of the central plain which lie have not been affected by the Scotic conquest. The monubeyond the basins of the Shannon and Boyne dischargements and relics which attest the presence of a people their chief drainage into a series of lakes which skirt the considerably advanced in civilization at some period in limits of the limestone country on the west and north. The Ireland, such as Cyclopean buildings, sepulchral mounds lakes of Galway and Mayo form such a series, separating containing stone chambers, mines, bronze instruments and the primitive district of Connaught from the plain on the weapons of classic form and elegant workmanship, would west; the extended line of Loch Erne in like manner appear to be referrible to some of the predecessors of the drains that portion of the central plain which stretches Scoti, and indicate a close affinity between the earliest inhatowards the primitive district of Donegal and the high bitants of Ireland and that antient people, by some referred lands of Tyrone on the north; and Loch Neagh collects to a Phoenician origin, whose vestiges of a similar kind the waters of the remainder by the Blackwater River on abound throughout the south and south-west of Europe. the north-east. The other principal lakes of Ireland lie within the basin of the Shannon, those of most consequence being merely expansions of that river. The water-power afforded by the different rivers and natural dams of Ireland is greater than in any equal extent of accessible country in Europe. The surface of all the lakes in Ireland is estimated at 215,252 statute acres, or 336 square miles. Climate. There is but a small portion of Ireland which is more than fifty miles distant from the sea-coast, and on three sides of the island the Atlantic Ocean extends uninterrupted: hence the climate is more moist and less liable to severe cold than in any of the neighbouring countries. The Scoti were not builders in stone, at least in their civil edifices, nor did they use bronze implements. Their own tradition is that they came originally from Scythia, by which is meant the north-eastern part of central Europe, which appears to be confirmed by the fact that the antient topography of the country, in districts where the Scotic invasion has not wholly obliterated it, points at the Welsh language as the nearest representative of that spokon by the predecessors of the Scoti, and that the chief distinctions which at present exist between the Irish and Welsh languages are referrible to a Gothic or Northern European source, al S The general conversion of the Irish Scots to Christianity | of rebellions and confiscations, succeeded at length, in the took place in the earlier and middle portion of the fifth beginning of the seventeenth century, in making the entire century. The principal instrument in effecting the change island shire-ground, and planting a numerous Protestant was Patrick, who landed in Ireland on this mission in the proprietary in Ulster. The Reformed church had already year 432. Before this time Christianity had made some been established in A.D. 1535; but the great body of the progress, but the mass of the people were heathens. The native Irish still continued attached to the Roman Catholic form of church government introduced by Patrick was epis- faith. copal in his doctrine and that of his successors for many centuries it is affirmed that there are no traces of those peculiar tenets which the Reformed churches rejected in the sixteenth century. A considerable advance in civilization followed the introduction of the new religion. Greek and Roman literature got some footing among the clergy, and an improved system of architecture became requisite for religious edifices. The Irish round towers are now generally ascribed to an ecclesiastical origin, and are supposed to have been erected during the sixth, seventh, and eight centuries, which form perhaps the most prosperous epoch in the history of the country. From the end of the eighth century till the coming of the English, in A.D. 1170, the disputes of the petty princes of the country, and the frequent depredations of the Danes and other northern pirates, render the annals of Ireland a melancholy series of feuds and disasters. Up to this time the government of the island had usually been vested in one monarch, who was entitled to certain subsidies and services from the petty kings of the provinces, and they in like manner levied contributions from the minor chiefs of territories. Dermod Mac Murrough, king of Leinster, having seduced the wife of one of these petty princes, and otherwise grown oppressive to his subjects, was expelled from his dominions in 1168, and fled for succour to Henry II. king of England, who, having already obtained a grant of Ireland from pope Adrian IV., readily gave his countenance to the restoration of Mac Murrough on receiving his oath of allegiance; but, being at that time engaged in a war with the French, he was unable personally to undertake the expedition. Several Welsh adventurers however, having obtained his licence to embark in the undertaking, fitted out a small armament, with which they landed in the county of Wexford, in the month of May, A.D. 1170. The conquest of the entire island was soon effected. In 1174, the king, coming over in person, received the submission of the Irish monarch, and of almost all the provincial and petty kings, and in the same year had his title confirmed, and the discipline of the Irish and English churches assimilated at a general synod of the Irish clergy held at Cashel. In October, 1641, a rebellion, having for its object the overthrow of the new establishment and the restoration of the old proprietors to their estates, broke out among the native Irish, and was afterwards joined by the chief Roman Catholic nobility and gentry: the result of the civil wars which ensued was the suppression of the Irish and Roman Catholic party, and a general confiscation of their lands. On the accession of James II., and the prospect of a reestablishment of the Roman Catholic church, the same party again rose to considerable power, and on king James retiring to Ireland after the revolution of 1688, they supported his cause through an arduous war of three years' continuance, until after the defeats of the Boyne and Aughrim, when they finally capitulated at Limerick, on the 3rd October, 1692. Extensive confiscations followed this civil war also. The military men and other more active members of the Roman Catholic party left the country, and entered into the service of different states on the Continent, where they very generally distinguished themselves by their fidelity and bravery. Those who remained, still constituting the bulk of the population of the island, were henceforth treated with extreme severity; yet, notwithstanding the harshness of the penal laws from time to time enacted against Roman Catholics, the country generally prospered during the century of uninterrupted tranquillity that ensued. The example of the American and French revolutions however having created a democratic spirit among many of the northern Protestants, and some of them having taken up arms in the year 1798, led to another rising among the Roman Catholic peasantry of much the same character with those insurrections in which their ancestors had unfortunately been so often engaged. This rebellion, being likewise suppressed, led the way to the Act of Union, by which the parliament of Ireland, which had of late years enjoyed an absolute independence of all power but the crown, was merged in that of the United Kingdom, A.D. 1800. The Irish Roman Catholics, who had greatly increased in wealth and numbers since the time of the Union, were in the year 1829 admitted generally to the political privileges enjoyed by Protestant dissenters. The Reform Act The country was now portioned out among the Anglo- considerably added to their political influence, and various Norman conquerors, and with the introduction of English changes are now in progress and operation, the general tenmodes of tenure the erection of courts of law and appoint-dency of which is to give them a large share of political ment of executive authorities had their commencement. power in the state. The twelfth year of the reign of king John, who succeeded his father as lord of Ireland, is the epoch to which the final division into counties is generally referred. This division appears to have embraced almost the entire of Ireland, although through subsequent reverses most of the counties in Ulster and Connaught ceased to be considered shire ground. These disasters were chiefly owing to the exorbitant powers enjoyed within their several territories by the great lords of the country, who finding the Irish customs more congenial to arbitrary authority, by degrees fell away from the exercise of the English law, and assumed the characters of despotic chieftains. In particular, the family of the De Burgho's in Ulster and Connaught, being released, by the murder of William earl of Ulster, in A.D. 1333, from the restraint which he had for some time exercised over them, seized the better part of the latter province and assumed Irish names; while the northern native Irish recrossing the river Bann, beyond which they had hitherto been confined, drove the English out of the north-eastern parts of Ulster, and narrowed the pale in that direction to the county of Louth. In like manner the families of Desmond and Kildare, having possessed themselves of a great part of Munster and Leinster, introduced the Irish customs on that side, so that on the accession of king Henry VIII. there was but an inconsiderable tract along the eastern coast in which the English law was fully recognised. POPULATION. Notwithstanding the numerous colonies of British who have from time to time settled in Ireland, the great bulk of the population is still of the native Irish race. The native Irish are of a warm and imaginative disposition, with much natural eloquence and a strong perception of humour; they are very hospitable, and individually brave; the prevailing vices of the national character are improvidence and a disposition to riotous excitement. During the wars in the reign of Elizabeth they were reduced to considerably less than a million in number, but in the subsequent progress of the population they have increased in a much more rapid ratio than either their English or Scottish fellow-countrymen. The following table exhibits the numbers of the entire population at the several dates below: In this and the succeeding reigns of Elizabeth and James I., the English government having now the double motive of effecting a religious as well as a civil reformation in Ireland, applied themselves with great energy to the recovery of their authority, and, after a tedious series Date. 1672 1695 1712 1718 1725 1726 1731 How ascertained. 1,320,000 By Sir William Petty of the House of Lords of Ireland. (2,010,221 money 1767 1777 On an average of 6 per house |