Nonsuch Palace. A royal mansion erected by Henry VIII. in a little place called Codintone. The palace was so named in consequence of its then unequalled beauty. It was taken down in the seventeenth century.

Norfolk House. A noble house in

St. James's Square, London, so called from the seventh Duke of Norfolk, who died here in 1701. George III. was born here in 1738.

Norfolk Street. A London street associated with Sir Roger de Coverley, and in which William Penn formerly lived.

It was the schooner Hesperus

That sailed the wintry sea.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear,

The

Through the whistling sleet and snow, Like a sheeted ghost the vessel swept Towards the reef of Norman's Woe. Longfellow. North Star. An Arctic exploring ship employed in the expedition of Capt. Saunders in 1849, and in that of Capt. Pullen in 1852-54. Northumberland House. city residence of the Duke of Northumberland, Strand, London. It was built by Henry Howard, the Earl of Northampton, who left it in 1614 to his nephew, Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk, when it received the name of Suffolk House. It was afterwards bought by Algernon Percy, Earl of Northumberland, from whom it received its present name. This mansion, called the finest great historical house in London," commenced by a Howard, continued by a Percy, and completed by a Seymour," has been recently destroyed.

"One only of the great Strand palaces has survived entire to our own time. We have all of us seen and mourned over Northumberland House,

one of the noblest Jacobean buildings in England, and the most picturesque feature of London. . . . Of all the barbarous and ridiculous injuries by which London has been wantonly mutilated within the last few years, the destruction of Northumberland House has been the greatest." Hare.

Notch, The. [Known also as the Crawford Notch in distinction from the Pinkham and Franconia Notches.] A grand and impressive valley between Willey Mountain and Mount Webster in the White Mountains, New Hampshire. It contains the famous Willey House. Bayard Taylor, speaking of the view looking down upon the tremendous gulf of the Notch from the top of Mount Willard (at the head of the Notch), says, "As a simple mountain pass, seen from above, it cannot be surpassed in Switzerland. Something like it I have seen in the Taurus, otherwise I can recall no view with which to compare it." See WILLEY HOUSE.

"I know nothing on the Rhine equal to the view from Mount Willard down the mountain pass called the Notch." Anthony Trollope.

He hears the echoes of a horn in a hill country, in the Notch mountains, for example, which converts the mountains into an Æolian harp, and this supernatural tiralira restores to him the Dorian mythology, Apollo, Diana, and all divine hunters and huntresses. R. W. Emerson.

Notre Dame. [Our Lady.] A name commonly applied in France to churches dedicated to the Virgin Mary. When the name is used in literature, unaccompanied by any designation of place, reference is usually intended to the metropolitan cathedral of Paris. See infra.

Notre Dame. [Our Lady.] The most celebrated church in Paris. It was begun by Pope Alexander the Third, but was not completed for nearly 300 years (not until 1420). It is built in the form of a Latin cross. The exterior is more imposing than the interior. The principal entrance is ornamented by bas-reliefs illustrative of the resurrection, and the seven

cardinal virtues with their opposite vices. The interior is richly adorned with bas-reliefs, paintings, and sculptures, and magnificent rose-windows of stained glass, illustrating sacred history. The church is surrounded by 24 chapels. In one of the towers is a famous bell, weighing 32,000 pounds, which is rung only on very great occasions. This church has been often referred to of late years in connection with Père Hyacinthe, the distinguished monk and preacher, whose eloquence drew crowds within its walls until his independence and freedom of speech brought upon him the interdict of his superiors.

The

church has suffered from various alterations, and, in the time of the Revolution, from wanton desecration. It has, however, since 1845, been restored as nearly as possible in accordance with the old design.

"We had been much disappointed at first by the apparently narrow limits of the interior of this famous church; but now, as we made our way round the choir, gazing into chapel after chapel, each with its painted window, its crucifix, its pictures, its confessional, and afterwards came back into the nave, where arch rises above arch to the lofty roof, we came to the conclusion that it was very sumptuous." Hawthorne.

"The cathedral of Paris was designed at a time when the architects had not obtained that confidence in their own skill which made them afterwards complete masters of the constructive difficulties of the design.

The cathedral has not internally the same grandeur as the other three [those at Amiens, Chartres, and Rheims], though externally there is a very noble simplicity of outline and appearance of solidity in the whole design."

Fergusson.

On Christmas day I went to see the Cathedrall of Notre Dame.. This is the prime church of France for dignity, having Archdeacons, Vicars, Canons, Priests, and Chaplaines in good store to the number of 127. It is also the palace of the Archbishop. The young king (Louis XIV.) was there with a great and martial guard, who entered the Nave of the Church with drums and fifes, at the ceasing of which I was entertained with the church musiq. John Evelyn, Diary.

Notre Dame [d'Amiens]. A magnificent Gothic church in Amiens, France, one of the finest church edifices in Europe. It was founded in 1220. It is larger than any cathedral in Europe except St. Peter's and Cologne. Its length is 469 feet, and the height of its spire 422 feet. It is dedicated to the Virgin.

"The interior is one of the most magnificent spectacles that architectur al skill can ever have produced. The mind is filled and elevated by its enormous height, its lofty and many-colored clerestory, its grand proportions, its noble simplicity. Such terms will not be considered extravagant when it is recollected that the vault is half as high again as Westminster Abbey." Whewell.

Notre Dame [de Rouen]. A fine Gothic church of the thirteenth century, in Rouen, France, dedicated to the Virgin. It abounds in profuse and elaborate ornamentation.

Notre Dame. An immense church in Montreal, Can., the largest in America. It was built in 1824. It is 255 feet long and 145 feet wide, with a seating capacity of 10,000. It has two towers, in one of which hangs the largest bell on the continent. See GROS BOURDON.

Notre Dame de Lorette. A gorgeously decorated modern church in Paris, begun in 1823, and built in imitation of the smaller Roman basilicas.

Notte, La. [The Night] A celebrated picture of the Nativity by Antonio Allegri, surnamed Correggio (1494-1534), remarkable for the striking effect produced by the light proceeding from the infant Saviour. This picture is in the Dresden Gallery.

"Correggio has been much admired for representing in his famous Nativity the whole picture as lighted by the glory which proceeds from the divine Infant, as if the idea had been new and original. It occurs frequently before and since his time, and is founded upon the legendary story which describes the cave or stable filled with dazzling and supernatural light." Mrs. Jameson.

"All the powers of art are here united to make a perfect work. Here the simplicity of the drawing of the Virgin and Child is shown in contrast with the foreshortening of the group of angels. The emitting the light from the body of the child, though a supernatural illusion, is eminently successful. The matchless beauty of the Virgin and Child, the group of angels overhead, the daybreak in the

sky, and the whole arrangement of light and shade, give it a right to be considered, in conception at least, the greatest of his [Correggio's] works.

I consider it one of the first works the art of painting has to boast of." Wilkie.

Nozze Aldobrandini. See ALDOBRANDINI MARRIAGE.

Nozze di Cana. See MARRIAGE AT CANA.

Nuova Gerusalemme. See MONTE SACRO.

The name by

Nuremberg Eggs. which are known two curious old watches in the Green Vault (Grüne Gewölbe) in Dresden. They are so called from their form and from the place in which they were made, in 1500.

Nursery, The. A building in Golding Lane, London, erected during the reign of Charles II. as a school for the training of children for the stage. It was standing till the present century. Near these a Nursery erects its head, Where queens are formed, and future heroes bred,

Where unfledged actors learn to laugh and cry,

Where infant punks their tender voices try,

And little Maximins the gods defy.

Dryden. Nymphenburg. A royal palace in the immediate neighborhood of Munich, Bavaria.

Oak Hill. A beautiful cemetery in Georgetown, D.C. It contains the tombs of many eminent men. Oak of Guernica. A venerable tree of Guernica, Spain, cut down by the French in 1808. According to Laborde, it was a very ancient natural monument. Under

this oak Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1476, swore to maintain the municipal laws (fueros) of the Biscayans.

Oak of Guernica! Tree of holier power Than that which in Dodona did enshrine (So faith too fondly deemed) a voice divine,

Heard from the depths of its aërial bower, How canst thou flourish at this blighting Wordsworth.

hour?

monument at Axum in Nubia, Africa. It is the only one now standing of a group said to have consisted of 55.

"The most exceptional monu. ments in the world, -the obelisks at Axum. . . . Its height [that of the one now standing] is 60 feet, its width at base nearly 10, and it is of one stone. The idea is evidently Egyptian, but the details are Indian. It is, in fact, an Indian nine-storied pagoda, translated in Egyptian in the first century of the Christian era!" Fergusson.

Obelisk of Heliopolis. This obelisk-the oldest in Egypt-which with some mounds is about all that remains of Heliopolis (that

great seat of learning where Plato and Eudoxus lived and studied), is between 60 and 70 feet in height. Tradition speaks of another similar obelisk which stood opposite this, according to the Egyptian custom of placing them in pairs at the entrances of their temples.

"A class of monuments almost exclusively Egyptian, are the obelisks, which form such striking objects in front of almost all the old temples of the country. The two finest known

to exist are, that now in the piazza of the Lateran, originally set up by Thotmes III., 105 feet in height, and that still existing at Karnac, erected by Thotmes I., 93 feet. Those of Luxor, erected by Rhamses the Great, one of which is now in Paris, are above 77 feet in height; and there are two others in Rome, each above 80 feet. Rome, indeed, has 12 of these monuments within her walls,-a greater number than exist, erect at least, in the country whence they came. Their use seems to have been wholly that of monumental pillars recording the style and title of the king who erected them, his piety, and the proof he gave of it in dedicating these monoliths to the deity whom he especially wished to honor. scarcely an exception all the pyramids are on the west side of the Nile, all the obelisks on the east. With regard to the former, this probably arose from a law of their existence, the western side of the Nile being in all ages preferred for sepulture; but with regard to the latter it seems to be accidental."

With

Fergusson. Obelisk of Luxor. A magnificent monolith of red Egyptian granite in the Place de la Concorde, Paris. It was one of two obelisks of the same shape and size, erected in 1350 B.C., by Rameses the Great, at the entrance of the temple of Thebes (now Luxor). It was a gift to the French Government from Mohammed Ali, Pasha of Egypt; was removed with much difficulty, at a great cost; and was raised in its present position in 1836, by a very skilful

feat of engineering, in the presence of Louis Philippe and 150,000 persons. The removal of this obelisk, which is 74 feet high and weighs 500,000 pounds, employed 800 men, and cost, including its elevation, £80,000. It was brought to France in a vessel especially built for the purpose.

Obelisk of Orsotasen. One of the earliest and finest of the Egyptian obelisks, still standing at Heliopolis. It is inscribed with the name of Orsotasen, one of the greatest rulers of the twelfth dynasty.

"It is 67 feet 4 inches in height, without the pyramidion which crowns it, and is a splendid block of granite, weighing 217 tons. It must have required immense skill to quarry it, to transport it from Syene, and finally, after finishing it, to erect it where it now stands and has stood for 4,500 years." Fergusson.

Obelisk of St. Peter's, or of the Vatican. A celebrated Egyptian column of red granite, brought from Heliopolis to Rome by the Emperor Caligula, and now standing in front of St. Peter's Church. It is 132 feet in height, and its weight is 360 tons. Pliny says that the ship which brought the obelisk from Heliopolis was almost as long as "the left side of the port of Ostia." It was successfully set up in its present position by Domenico Fontana, and it is about the raising of this obelisk that the following familiar story is told. The ceremony having been preceded by high mass in St. Peter's, and solemn benediction having been pronounced upon Fontana and the workmen, the Pope ordered that no one should speak, under penalty of death, while the obelisk was being raised. But, owing to the stretching of the ropes, the immense mass did not quite reach the required position, and the operation would have failed, had not a man in the crowd broken over the order of the Pope, and called to the workmen to wet the ropes." This suggestion was immediately acted upon, and the

66

huge column slowly rose to its destined place. This story is not found in any writer of that period; and it is, according to Platner, one of those inventions which spring from a wish to disparage the triumphs of genius, and to lower its claims.

Obelisk of the Lateran. An Egyptian monument of red granite, nearly 150 feet in height, originally belonging to the Temple of the Sun at Heliopolis, removed thence to Alexandria by Constantine, and subsequently brought to Rome, where it now stands in the centre of the Piazza di San Giovanni. It is the oldest object in Rome, being referred by antiquaries to the year 1740 B.C., when it was erected to the memory of Thotmes IV.

Obelisk of the Monte Cavallo. A famous Egyptian monument of red granite, being a plain shaft without hieroglyphics, which formerly stood in front of the Mausoleum of Augustus, and is now in the Piazza di Monte Cavallo, Rome. It was brought from Egypt by the Emperor Claudius, A.D. 57.

Obelisk of the Piazza del Popolo. An ancient Egyptian column, brought from Heliopolis to Rome by the Emperor Augustus, and set up in the Piazza of the People in 1589. It is of the age of Moses.

"This red granite obelisk, oldest of things even in Rome, with hardly a trace of decay upon it, is the first thing the traveller sees after enterHawthorne. ing the Flaminian Gate." Obelisk of the Vatican. See OBELISK OF ST. PETER'S. Ocean, The. An armor-plated ship of the British navy, launched March 19, 1863.

Ocean Monarch. An American emigrant ship, burned off Liverpool, Aug. 24, 1848, with a loss of nearly 200 lives.

October Club. A Parliamentary club in London, first formed about 1690, in the reign of Wil