The Rubicon is a river of Italy, flowing into the Adriatic, which formed the boundary between Cisalpine Gaul and Italy proper. The passage of this river by Julius Cæsar was necessarily the signal for civil war, the issue of which could not be foreseen, as Roman generals were forbidden to cross this river at the head of an army.

The Smithsonian Institution is the name of a celebrated Institution in Washington, D. C., founded (1846) for the encouragement of scientific research and the diffusion of scientific knowledge, under the will of James Smithson (natural son of the third Duke of Northumberland), who bequeathed over $500,000 for this purpose.

The highest summit of the Harz mountains in Prussian Saxony is called the Brocken. It occupies an important place in the folklore of North Germany. Here annually assemble the witches on Walpurgis night to hold their revels on its summit. It is also interesting for the phenomenon known as the "Spectre of the Brocken."

Corso is an Italian word used to express not only the racing of riderless horses, but also the slow driving in procession of handsome equipages through the principal streets of a town, such as almost always takes place in Italy on festivals. Hence the name has been applied to many such Italian thoroughfares, notably the Corso in Rome.

The population of Chicago in 1830, was 70; 1840, 4,853; 1845, 12,088; 1850, 29,963; 1855, 60,227; 1860, 112,172; 1865, 178,900; 1870, 298,977; 1872, 364,377; 1880, 503,185; 1884 (estimated), 675,000; 1885 (estimated), 727,000; 1886 (estimated), 750,000; 1887 (estimated), 760,000; 1889 (estimated), 1,000,000; 1890, 1,099,133; 1892 (school census), 1,438,010.

The Ghetto is the Jews' quarter in Italian cities, to which they used to be strictly confined. The ghetto of Rome, instituted in 1556 by Pope Paul IV., was removed in 1885 and following years, its demolition having been rendered necessary by the new Tiber embankment. The term is also employed to indicate the Jews' quarters in any city.

Croesus, the last king of Lydia, succeeded his father, Alyattes, in 560 B.C. He made the Greeks of Asia Minor his tributaries, and extended his kingdom eastward from the Ægean to the Halys. From his conquests, his mines and the golden sand of the Pactolus he accumulated so much treasure that his wealth has become a proverb.

Temple Bar is the name of a London gateway which formerly stood at the junction of Fleet street and the Strand. It was rebuilt by Sir Christopher Wren in 1672-73; was removed, having become an obstruction in 1878-79, and was re-erected at Theobald's Park, near Chestnut, in 1888. The memorial which marks the site was erected in 1880.

The fair of Nijni-Novgorod is the greatest in the world, the value of goods sold being as follows: 1841, $35,000,000; 1857, $60,000,000; 1876, $140,000,000; the attendance in the last named year including 150,000 merchants from all parts of the world. In that of Leipsic the annual average of sales is $20,000,000, comprising 20,000 tons of merchandise, of which two-fifths is books.

Kara George Petrovitsch, known as Black George, of Servia, was a Servian peasant who, in 1804, revolted against the Porte. Having defeated several armies sent against him, in 1807 he took Belgrade, and formed a military government in Servia. In 1811, Turkey acknowledged him "hospodar of Servia," but, in 1814, the Turks recovered the country, Black George fled to Austria, was imprisoned, and died.

Caledonia is the name given by the Romans to that part of Scotland lying between the Forth and the Clyde; so called from the tribe of Caledonii. The name disappears in the fourth century, and the people of Scotland began to be called Picts (to the east) and Scots (to the west). In more modern times Caledonia is a poetical name for Scotland.

Delphi was an ancient northern Greek town, celebrated for the oracles pronounced by the Pythian priestess in the temple of Apollo. The oracle was known as early as 900 B. C., and the temple became the repository of immense treasures. It was plundered by the Phocians and Nero, the latter taking away three hundred costly ŝtatues in 67 a. D.

Alsatia is a cant name applied to the precinct of Whitefriars, which, until 1697, enjoyed the privilege of a debtors' sanctuary, and hence was crowded with swindlers and bullies. The name is first met with in 1623, and we have Shadwell's comedy, "The Squire of Alsatia" (1688), Scott's authority for some of the finest scenes in the "Fortunes of Nigel."

Jack Cade was the ringleader of the insurrection that broke out in Kent, 1450. He was an Irishman, and called himself Mortimer, claiming to be a natural son of the Duke of York. He marched to London at the head of twenty thousand armed men, who encamped at Blackheath, June 1, 1450. Being slain by Alexander Iden, July 11, his head was stuck on London Bridge.

The name "Ironsides," was popularly applied to the regiment of a thousand horse, which Cromwell raised mainly in the eastern counties for service against King Charles I. early in the great Civil War. The name, already given for his bravery to an English king, Edmund, was first attached to Cromwell himself, but passed easily to the men at whose head he first appeared at Edgehill.

Karl Friedrich Hieronymus, Baron von Münchhausen, was a member of an ancient, noble family of Hanover, whose name has become proverbial as the narrator of false and ridiculously exaggerated exploits and adventures. He was born May 11, 1720, at Bodenwerder, in Hanover, served as a cavalry officer in Russian campaigns against the Turks, and died at his birthplace, February 22, 1797.

Dismal Swamp, measuring thirty miles from north to south by ten in breadth, lies chiefly in Virginia, but partly in North Carolina. In the center is Lake Drummond, about six miles broad; elsewhere its dense growth of cypress and cedar has been greatly thinned, and part of the region has been reclaimed. The tract is intersected by a canal connecting Chesapeake Bay and Albemarle Sound.

Alloway, Burns' birthplace, and the scene of his "Tam o' Shanter," lies on the right bank of the "bonny Doon," two miles south of the town of Ayr. The "auld clay biggin," in which the poet was born on 23d January, 1759, was in 1880 converted into a Burns Museum. The "haunted kirk" still stands, a roofless ruin, near the "Auld Brig;" and hard by is the Burns Monument erected in 1820.

The subject of the famous song "Annie Laurie" was the eldest of the three daughters of Sir Robert Laurie, of Maxwelton. In 1709 she married James Fergusson, of Craigdarroch, and was the mother of Alexander Fergusson, the hero of Burn's song, "The Whistle." The song of "Annie Laurie" was written by William Douglas, of Finland, in the stewardry of Kirkcudbright, hero of the song Willie was a Wanton Wag."

In Java the "Valley of the Upas Tree" is sometimes called the "Valley of Death," and its deadly influence was formerly ascribed to the malignant properties of a peculiar vegetable production of the island, called the "upas tree, which especially flourishes in this locality. Recent travelers, however, declare that accounts of the fatality attending a passage of this famous valley have been greatly exaggerated.

Crispinos and Crispianus were two brothers, born at Rome, from which place they traveled to Soissons, in France (about A.D. 303), to propagate the gospel, and worked as shoemakers, that they might not be chargeable to any one. The governor of the town ordered them to be beheaded the very year of their arrival, and they were made the tutelary saints of the "gentle craft." St. Crispin's Day is October 25.

The nine worthies is the title given to the following eminent men: Jews: Joshua (1426 B.C.), David (1015 B.C.), Judas Maccabæus (161 B.C.); Heathens: Hector of Troy (1184 B.C.), Alexander the Great (323 B.C.), Julius Cæsar (44 B.C.); Christians: King Arthur of Britain (542 A.D.), Charlemagne of France (814 A.D.), Godfrey of Bouillon (1100 A.D.). In some lists Gideon and Samson are introduced, and in others Hercules and Pompey.

San Marino, in Italy, on the coast of the Adriatic Sea, is the oldest Republic in the world. It is, next to Monaco, the smallest State in Europe. The exact date of the establishment of this Republic is not known, but according to tradition it was in the fourth century, by Marinus, a Dalmatian hermit, and has ever since remained independent. It is mountainous and contains four or five villages. The word "liberty" is inscribed on its capitol.

The Tuileries is the name of a garden and palace in Paris, built on the site of an ancient fabrique de tuiles. It was composed of three great pavilions, called Le pavillon de Marsan (north), the pavillon de Flore (south), and the pavillon de l'Horloge (center). It was joined to the Louvre by Napoleon III. (1851-6). The land was bought by Francois I. in 1564, and the original palace was made for Catherine de Medicis after the design of Philibert Delorme.

Since 1811 Ajaccio has been the capital of Corsica. It has a fine cathedral, completed in 1585, and a spacious harbor, protected by a citadel; but its special interest is as the birthplace of Napoleon. There is a statue of him as First Consul (1850), and a monument of the emperor on horseback, surrounded by his four brothers (1865). The house of the Bonapartes, the "Casa Bonaparte" is now national property. The chief employments are the anchovy and pearl fisheries, and the trade in wine and olive-oil, which the neighborhood produces in abundance, and of good quality. Of late years Ajaccio has become a winter resort for consumptive patients.

The familiar name Bedlam is a corruption of Bethlehem, formerly a hospital founded by Simon Fitz-Mary in Bishopsgate Street Without, London, in 1246, as "a privy of canons, with brethren and sisters." When the religious houses were suppressed by Henry VIII. the corporation converted it into a lunatic asylum for six lunatics, but in 1641, the funds being insufficient, partly convalescent patients were turned out to beg, and wore a badge. These were the "Bedlam Beggars," generally called "Tom-o'-Bedlams." In 1675 the old building was taken down and a new one was erected in Moorfields. In 1814 this building was also pulled down, and a new hospital built in St. George's Fields.

Bramah (Joseph), a peasant's son, occupied his spare time when a mere boy in making musical instruments, aided by the village blacksmith. At the age of sixteen he hurt his ankle while plowing, and employed his time while confined to the house in carving and making woodwares. In another forced leisure from a severe fall he employed his time in contriving and making useful inventions, which ultimately led him to fame and fortune (1749–1814).

Among the noted club-rooms of the eighteenth century was Almack's. It was a suite of assembly rooms, built in 1765 in King street, St. James', London, by a tavern-keeper named M'Call, who inverted the two syllables of his name, Mac-call, into Allmack, or Almack. The rooms became famous for fashionable balls under the management of a commitee of ladies of the highest rank. The rooms are now called Willis' Rooms from a proprietor named Willis.

Saint Veronica was, according to the legend, one of the women who met our Lord on His way to Calvary. She offered Him her veil to wipe the sweat from His brow, when, wondrous to tell, the Divine features were miraculously imprinted upon the cloth and remained as a permanent picture of the face of our Lord. This miraculous picture is reported to have been preserved in Rome from about the year 700, and was exhibited in St. Peter's on December 8, 1854.

Half legendary, half historic is the name of Vortigern, the British prince who is reported by Bede, Nennius, and Geoffrey of Monmouth to have invited the Saxons into Britain to help him against the Picts, and to have married Rowena, daughter of Hengist. His allies soon became, according to the legend, enemies even more dangerous than the Picts, and soon destroyed the British princes. Samuel Ireland fathered his historical play of "Vortigern" on Shakspeare.

Among odd titles for towns is that of Westward Ho, on the coast of North Devon, 21⁄2 miles west of Biddeford, which owes not merely its name but its existence to Charles Kingsley's Elizabethan romance (1855), which attracted swarms of visitors to North Devon. For their accommodation this pretty cluster of villas and lodging houses, with its church, hotel, club-house, and college, has sprung up since 1867. The bathing facilities are excellent, and it is a great resort of golfers.

Prester John is the name applied by mediæval credulity for two hundred years to the supposed Christian sovereign of a vast but illdefined empire in central Asia. The idea of a powerful Christian potentate in the far East, at once priest and king, was universal in Europe from about the middle of the twelfth to the beginning of the fourteenth century, when it was transferred to Ethiopia and finally found a fancied historical justification in identification with the Christian king of Abyssinia.

Windermere, or Winandermere, the largest lake in England, called from its beauty "Queen of the Lakes," is partly in the county of Lancaster, and partly divides that county from Westmoreland. It is nearly eleven miles long and about one mile in extreme breadth. About a mile from Waterhead, at the north extremity of the lake, is the town of Ambleside, a mile and a half north-west of which is Rydal, the residence of the poet Wordsworth; in the vicinity of Waterhead is Dove's Nest, the cottage at one time occupied by Mrs. Hemans; farther down the East shore is Elleray, famous as the residence of "Christopher North;" and half-way down the lake, on the eastern shore, is Bowness.

Before the Reformation the clergy used to walk in procession every year on Corpus Christi day to St. Paul's Cathedral. They mustered at the upper end of Cheapside, and there commenced chanting the Paternoster, which continued through "Pater-noster Row"; at the end of the Row they said Amen, and the spot was called "Amen Corner." They then began the Ave Maria, turning down "Ave Maria Lane." After crossing Ludgate, they chanted the Credo in “Creed Lane" (which no longer exists).

The Tarpeian rock was so called from Tarpeia, daughter of Spurius Tarpeius governor of the citadel on the Saturnian Hill of Rome. The story is that the Sabines bargained with the Roman maid to open the gates to them, for the ‘ornaments on their arms." As they passed through the gates, they threw on her their shields, saying, "These are the ornaments we bear on our arms." She was crushed to death, and buried on the Tarpeian Hill. Ever after, traitors were put to death by being hurled headlong from the hill-top.

An ancient and popular English gathering was the Bartholomew fair held 24 August (old style). Henry I., in 1133, granted the charter of this fair to Rayer or Rahere, a monk. Like all other fairs, it was connected with the church, and miracle plays, mysteries and moralities were performed. In 1445 four persons were appointed by the Court of Aldermen as keepers of the fair. In 1661 the fair lasted fourteen days. In 1691 the fair was limited to three days. In 1840 the fair was removed to Islington; and in 1855 it was discontinued.

La Belle Alliance is the name of a farm some thirteen miles from Brussels; ever memorable for being the position occupied by the centre of the French infantry in the battle of Waterloo (June 18, 1815). Napoleon himself was in the vicinity of this farm, but Wellington was at Mont St. Jean, two miles further north. Between these two spots was La Haye Sainte, where were posted the French tirailleurs. The Prussians call the battle of Waterloo the "Battle of la Belle Alliance" and the French call it the "Battle of Mont Saint-Jean.

Will's Coffee House was a noted resort in the reign of Charles II. near Covent Garden at the western corner of Bow street. It was the great emporium of libels and scandals, but was one of the best in London, and had acquired the sobriquet of "the Wit's Coffee-house." Here the frequenters heard the talk of the town about the poets, authors, and other celebrities, and here was the "Observator" and all the Tory and Whig journals of the day; and here would be found Matthew Prior, John Dryden, Betterton the tragedian and other celebrities.

Thirty miles from the City of Kumamoto, Japan, is the volcano Aso San, which has the largest crater in the world. It is more than thirty miles in circumference, and peopled by twenty thousand inhabitants. Think of walking for miles among fertile farms and prosperous villages, peering into schoolhouse windows and sacred shrines well within the shell of an old-time crater, whose walls rise eight hundred feet all about you. It gives one a queer feeling. Hot springs abound everywhere. In one place brick-red hot water is utilized to turn a rice mill. The inner crater is nearly half a mile in diameter, and a steady column of roaring steam pours out of it. The last serious eruption was in 1884, when immense quantities of black ashes and dust were ejected and carried by the wind as far as Kumamoto, where for three days it was so dark that artificial light had to be used.