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CROWN OFFICE-CRUSADES.

are filed by the king's coroner and attorney, usually called master of the crown office.

CROWN POINT; a post-town in Essex county, New York, on lake Champlain; 12 miles N. Ticonderoga, 96 N. Albany; population, in 1820, 1522; lat. 44° 3' N.; lon. 72° 29/ W. This town received its name from a noted fortress, much celebrated in the history of the American wars. The fortress, which is now in ruins, is situated in the north-east part of the township, on a point of land projecting some distance into the lake, elevated 47 feet above the surface, and 15 miles north of fort Ticonderoga. It was an expensive and regular fortification, about 1500 yards square, surrounded by a deep and broad ditch, cut in rock, with immense labor. The walls were of wood and earth, 22 feet thick and 16 high, and are only partially decayed.

CROZAT, Joseph Antony, marquis du Châtel, born in 1696, at Toulouse, a great lover and collector of works of art, inherited a large fortune from his father (who was a financier during the last years of the reign of Louis XIV), was counsellor of the parliament of Toulouse, and subsequently reader to the king. The whole of his life was dedicated to the works of art which he had collected, and to the artists who wished to profit by them. The sketches in his collection exceeded 19,000, and he had expended above 450,000 livres in this particular branch. During the 60 years which he employed in collecting, no cabinet was sold in any part of Europe, of which some part was not purchased by him. Crozat went to Italy, in 1714, for the purpose of increasing his collection. Corn. Vermeulen came yearly from Antwerp to Paris, to bring him the works of the artists of the Netherlands. He was also presented with several valuable collections. His cabinet of antiques and sculpture, particularly of gems, was equally valuable, and contained about 1400 pieces. This treasure became more famous from the description which Mariette gave of it, when in the possession of the duke of Orleans, in 1742. It is at present at St. Petersburg. On Crozat's death (1740), his collection came into the possession of his brother, the marquis du Châtel. Mariette's Description sommaire des Collections de M. Crozat, avec des Réflexions sur la Manière de Dessiner des principaux Maîtres (Paris, 1741), is the only account we now have of this great

museum.

CRUISERS, in naval affairs; vessels, as the name imports, employed on a cruise.

The name is commonly given to small men of war, made use of to secure merchant ships and vessels from the enemy's small frigates and privateers. They are generally formed for fast sailing, and well manned.

CRUSADES are the wars which were carried on by the Christian nations of the West, from the end of the 11th to the end of the 13th century, for the conquest of Palestine. They were called crusades because all the warriors who followed the holy banner (crusaders), wore the sign of the cross. The Christian and Mohammedan nations had been, during a long period, in a state of war, not only in Asia, but also in Europe, where the Moors, Mohammedans by religion, had taken possession of part of the Spanish peninsula. The nations of the West were grieved that the Holy Land, where Jesus had lived, taught, and died for mankind, where pious pilgrims resorted to pour out their sorrows, and ask for aid from above, at the tomb of their Savior, should be in the power of unbelievers. The pilgrims, on their return, related the dangers they had encountered. The caliph Hakem was particularly described as a second Nero, Being the son of a Christian woman, he shed the blood of Christians without mercy, to prevent the suspicion of his being secretly attached to that religion. These representations kindled the religious zeal of Christian Europe into a flame, and a general ardor was awakened to deliver the sepulchre of Christ from the hands of the infidels. In order to understand this general excitement, we must remember that, at this period, the confusion and desolation, which had followed the irruption of the barbarians into the south and west of Europe, had ceased, and the dawn of civilization and intellectual cultivation had commenced. In this mental twilight, men were just in a state to receive a strong religious excitement. The idea of the Virgin, too, harmonized well with the Teutonic reverence for the female sex; and to fight in her cause was gratifying to the spirit of chivalry. The undisciplined minds of men were bent upon adventure, and their imaginations were easily roused by the reports of the riches of the East. The joys of paradise were the sure reward of all who fell in the holy cause. Thus a crowd of the strongest feelings, chivalrous devotion to the female sex, the hope of adventure, of wealth, of honor and of heaven, stirred up the spirit of Europe, and impelled her sons into the East. (See Chiv

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succeeded in regaining Jerusalem, although he could not secure the permanent possession of the country. The list of heroes who conducted the crusades is honorably closed with St. Louis, king of France (who conducted the sixth crusade, commencing in 1248), although fate frustrated his plan, which was ably conceived and bravely executed. While Louis was still in Egypt (for he proposed conquering the Holy Land by an invasion of Egypt, the seat, at that time, of the rulers of Palestine), a revolution broke out in that country, which`proved decisive with regard to the possession of the Holy Land. The house of Saladin was dethroned, and the dominion of the Mamelukes and sultans established. These directed their efforts against the possessions of the Christians in Palestine. Tripoli, Tyre, Berytus, fell into their hands successively, and, on the fall of Acre, or Ptolemais, the last bulwark and the last remains of the Christian empire on the continent of Asia, were overthrown. By means of these joint enterprises, the European nations became more connected with each other, the class of citizens increased in influence, partly because the nobility suffered by extravagant contributions to the crusades, and partly because a commercial intercourse took place throughout Europe, and greatly augmented the wealth of the cities; the human mind expanded, and a number of arts and sciences, till then unknown in Europe, were introduced there. The present civilization of the European world is, in a great degree, the result of these crusades. It belongs to a history of poetry to describe how much contemporary poetry was affected by the crusades, and the extent to which they have given currency to a certain class of ideas that has prevailed ever since. Some of the best works on the crusades are Frederic Wilken's Geschichte der Kreuzzüge nach morgenländischen und abendländishen Berichten, Leipsic (the three first volumes appeared in 1807-19: volune 4, which treats of the period from 1188 to 1195, appeared in 1826); Histoire des Croisades, by De Michaud, a member of the French academy, fourth edition, Paris, 1825; Charles Mills's History of the Crusades, London, 1820; Heeren's Versuch einer Entwickelung der Folgen der Kreuzzüge für Europa, Göttingen, 1808.

CRUSADE, and CRUSADA. (See cruzada, old and new, in the article Coins, under the division Portugal.

CRUSCA, ACADEMIA DELLA. (Scc Academies.)

CRUSTACEOUS ANIMALS, in natural history; those covered with shells, consisting of several pieces or scales, as crabs, lobsters, &c. Their shells are generally softer than the shells of the testaceous kind, which consist of but few pieces or valves, such as those of the oyster, scallop, cockle.

Cruz, Santa (Spanish; Holy Cross). Among the various places of this name, the most important are, 1. An island in the West Indies, belonging to Denmark, the most southerly of the Virgin isles; lat. 17° 45′ N.; lon. 64° 35′ W. It is about 24 miles in length, with an area of 84 square miles, and contains 33,000 inhabitants, of which 30,000 are slaves. The country is mostly level, the climate unhealthy at certain seasons, the water scarce and bad. The soil is fertile, producing cotton, sugar-cane, some coffee and indigo, and tropical fruits. About 9,000,000 gallons of rum are annually exported. The best ports are Christianstadt and Frederickstadt. The former, situated on the northern coast of the island, is the capital of all the Danish West Indies. After having been successively in the hands of the Dutch, English, French, and Spaniards, Santa Cruz was ceded to Denmark in 1733. In 1807, it was taken by the English, but was restored to the Danes by the peace of Paris, in 1814. 2. A city on the island of Teneriffe; lat. 28° 28 N.; lon. 16° 30′ W. The road is much visited by European vessels, on their way to the Indies and to America, for water and provisions. The population is 8400. The principal article of export is Teneriffe wine.` (See Teneriffe.)

CRUZADA (Spanish). A bull called the bull of the crusade, is a source of considerable revenue to the Spanish crown. Pope Calixtus III first issued this bull, during the reign of king Henry of Castile, in 1457, granting an absolution for past offences to all who would fight against infidels, or pay a certain sum (200 maravedis), to aid the crown in carrying on war against them; and, as this bull is granted only for five years, the king has the power It confers also certain of renewing it. immunities, such as the right to eat some kinds of prohibited food in Lent. It has not been customary to renew the grant since 1753. These bulls were formerly sold, in a printed form, by priests and monks, who very often abused their authority, and would not confess people, or give them extreme unction, unless they would buy the bulls. The revenue thus received by the crown was estimated, for Spain and

CRUZADA-CRYPTOGRAPHY.

CRYPT, in architecture; a hollow place or vault constructed under ground. The tombs of the Christian martyrs also were so called, where the early Christians met to perform their devotions, for fear of persecution. Hence crypt came to signify a church under ground, or the lower story, like that of St. Paul's, London, Lastingham priory, and many of the ancient ecclesiastical edifices of England, Germany and France. When crypts are on a large scale, like those of Rome, Naples and Paris, they are then called catacombs. (See Catacombs.) Bartoli and Bellori have published engravings of paintings found in the crypts of Rome, of which there are several editions. The one of 1738 is in Latin.

CRYPTO; a prefix from the Greek KOURTоs (secret), used in several compounds; for instance, cryptography (q. v.), cryptogamy (q. v.), Crypto-Calvinists (q. v.) When the Jesuits were dissolved by a papal bull, much was said of Crypto-Jesuits. In France, we hear sometimes of crypto-republicans, &c.

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Spanish America, at $1,500,000. Portugal by the ancients. They took a small stick, also received such a bull in 1591, for the and wound around it bark, or papyrus, The bark was support of her fortifications in Africa. upon which they wrote. Mendoza, in one chapter of his Vida de then unrolled, and sent to the correspondLazarillo de Tormes, describes the abuses ent, who was furnished with a stick of the by which the bullarios, or sellers of bulls, same size. He wound the bark again extorted money from the people. round this, and thus was enabled to read what had been written. This mode of concealment is evidently very imperfect. Cryptography properly consists in writing with signs, which are legible only to him for whom the writing is intended, or who has a key, or explanation of the signs. The most simple method is to choose for every letter of the alphabet some sign, or only another letter. But this sort of сгурtography (chiffre) is also easy to be deciphered without a key. Hence many illusions are used. No separation is made between the words, or signs of no meaning are inserted among those of real meaning. Various keys likewise are used, according to rules before agreed upon. By this means, the deciphering of the writing becomes difficult for a third person, not initiated; but it is likewise extremely troublesome for the correspondents themselves; and a slight mistake often makes it illegible, even by them. Another mode of communicating intelligence secretly, viz., to agree upon some printed book, and mark the words out, is also troublesome, and not at all safe. The method of concealing the words which are to convey the information intended in matter of a very different character, in a long letter, which the correspondent is enabled to read, by applying a paper to it, with holes corresponding to the places of the significant words, is attended with many disadvantages: the paper may be lost; the repetition of certain words may lead to discovery; and the difficulty of connecting the important with the unimportant matter, so as to give the whole the appearance of an ordinary letter, is considerable. If this is effected, however, this mode has the advantage of concealing the fact that any secrecy is intended. Writing with sympathetic ink, or milk, lemon-juice, &c., is unsafe, because the agents to make the letters visible are too generally known. Hence the chiffre quarré, or chiffre indéchiffrable, so called, has come very much into use, because it is easily applied, difficult to be deciphered, and the key may be preserved in the memory merely, and easily changed. It consists of a table, in which the letters of the alphabet, or any other signs agreed upon, are arranged under one another, thus:

CRYPTO-CALVINISTS (crypto from the Greek KOUNTOS, Secret); a name given to the favorers of Calvinism in Saxony, on account of their secret attachment to the Genevan doctrine and discipline. (See Concord, Form of.)

CRYPTOGAMIA, in botany; the 24th and last class of the sexual system of Linnæus, including several very numerous families of plants, in which the parts essential to their fructification have not been sufficiently ascertained, or are too small to admit of their being accurately described and referred to any of the other classes.

κρυπτος,

CRYPTOGRAPHY (from the Greek κpunтos, secret, and yoape, to write); the art of transmitting secret information by means of writing, which is intended to be illegible, except by the person for whom it is destined. The ancients sometimes shaved the head of a slave, and wrote upon the skin with some indelible coloring matter, and then sent him, after his hair had grown again, to the place of his destination. This is not, however, properly secret writing, but only a concealment of writing. Another sort, which corresponds better with the name, is the following, used

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Any word is now taken for a key; Paris, for example. This is a short word, and, for the sake of secrecy, it would be well to choose for the key some one or more words less striking. Suppose we wish to write in this cipher, with this key, the phrase "We lost a battle;" we must write Paris over the phrase, repeating it as often as is necessary, thus:

Paris Pa Tie Par We lost a battle. We now take, as a cipher for u, the letter which we find in the square opposite w in the left marginal column, and under p on the top, which is m. Instead of e, we take the letter opposite e and under a, which is f; for 7, the letter opposite and under r, and so on. Proceeding thus, we should obtain the following series of let

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meets m, opposite to which, in the left marginal column, he finds w. Next, going in the line of a down to f, he finds on the left e. In the same way, r gives l, i gives o, and so on. Or you may reverse the process; begin with p, in the left marginal column, and look along horizontally till you find m, over which, in the top line, you will find w. It is easily seen, that the same letter is not always designated by the same cipher; thus, e and a occur twice in the phrase selected, and they are designated respectively by the ciphers f and i, band . Thus the possibility of finding out the secret writing is almost excluded. The key may be changed from time to time, and a different key may be used with each correspondent. The utmost accuracy is necessary, because our character, accidentally omitted, changes the whole cipher. The correspondent, however, may ascertain this with considerable trouble. (See Deciphering.)

CCEA; the largest and most westerly of the Antilles. Its configuration, extent, geographical position, great number of ports, fertility and climate, contribute to

CUBA.

render it one of the most interesting
countries of America. Its length, from
cape St. Antonio to point Maisi, in a direc-
tion from W. S. W. to E. N. E., and then
from W. N. W. to E. S. E., is 257 leagues,
and its greatest width, in the direction
north to south, is 38 leagues. The learned
geographer don Felipe Bausá calculated,
in June, 1825, that the surface of Cuba
contained 3615 square marine leagues (20
to a degree). Cuba is situated between
lon. 73° 56 and 85° W. and between lat.
19° 48′ 30 and 23° 12′ 45′′ N. It lies 14
leagues west from cape Nicolas, in the
island of St. Domingo, 34 south from
point Morant, in Jamaica, 27 east from
cape Catoche, and 37 south from cape
Florida. The gulf of Mexico, which is
very nearly of a circular form, of more
than 250 leagues in circumference, is closed
by the island of Cuba, with the exception
of two narrow passages, the one to the
south, between cape Catoche and cape
St. Antonio, and the other to the north,
between Bahia Honda and the Florida
shoals. Along the coast of Cuba are
many keys and small islands, which are
included in the same government with
the large island. The navigation of the
coast is very unsafe on account of the
rocks and shoals which encompass it al-
most without interruption, and often ex-
tend from 2 to 3 miles into the sea. The
broken outline of this vast extent of coast,
however, affords more than 50 ports and an-
choring places, which are equally safe and
casy of access. The most remarkable, in
a commercial point of view, are those of
Havanna, Matanzas, Nuevitas, Jibara and
Baracoa, on the north; St. Jago, Manza-
nillo, Trinidad, Jagua and Batabano, on
the south side of the island. There is
another port between Manzanillo and
Trinidad, called Santa Cruz, which, in
February, 1829, was declared a free port,
and which, undoubtedly, will be much
frequented, furnishing great facilities for
trading with Puerto Principe (the second
city in Cuba in point of population), being
the only good harbor in its vicinity on the
south side of the island, and distant from
it but 20 leagues. The harbors of Bahia
Honda, Nipe, Naranjo and Guantanamo
also deserve to be mentioned, as they are
very spacious, and have plenty of water
for such large vessels as may be in want
of a safe port.
A ridge of mountains
traverses the whole of the island, from the
cast to the west, dividing it into two
parts. At the foot of these, the country
opens into extensive savannas. A consid-
erable number of small streams from

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these heights water the island on both sides. These streams abound in fish of different kinds, and are said to bring down considerable quantities of gold. There are likewise many salt ponds, which furnish abundance of fish and garne; also several springs of mineral water, which have proved very useful for the cure of many diseases. The most remarkable are those of St. Diego, 40 leagues west of Havanna; those of Madruga, 14 leagues S. W. of the said city; those of the town of Guanabacoa; and those of Carugiro, 14 league from Puerto Principe. Those of St. Diego are the only ones which have been analysed. They consist of two wells (Tigre and Templado), and, according to the analysis of señor Esteves, a pound of the water contains 0.46 grains of sulphureted hydrogen gas, 10.5 of sulphate of lime, 10 of hydrochlorate of magnesia, and one grain of carbonate of magnesia. They are particularly useful in cases of scrofula, cutaneous diseases, &c. The island is very rich in minerals, particularly in copper, iron and loadstone. In 1813, some persons endeavored to work a mine which they found near the city of Trinidad, and from which they obtained good gold and silver. They were, however, "obliged, from want of funds, to desist, though it was highly probable that, with a sufficient capital, it could have been made profitable. For the same reason, together with the want of protection from the government, a very rich mine of coal, which was opened in 1816, near Bacurando, was abandoned. In 1827, a silver mine was discovered, yielding 7.5 of pure silver to a quintal of ore. Iron secins to be abundant, as it shows itself in parts of the great cordillera of Sierra Maestra. Loadstone is found in the mountains of Paragua and on the northern coast. Marbles of various kinds, serpentine, chalcedony of excellent quality, quartz, mineral bitummen, &c., are likewise found in the island. Our knowledge of the geological and mineralogical structure of Cuba, however, is comparatively small, on account of the thickness of the forests and the asperity of the mountains, particularly on the eastern part. Most that we know on this subject is derived from the researches of Alexander von Humboldt. The soil of Cuba is so productive that it yields two, and even three crops of corn in a year. The fields, during the whole year, are covered with aromatic plants and trees in blossoin. The climate is dry and warın. In the months of July and August, the thermometer

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