torus, which, however, is dry and inconspicuous, and the number of carpels is much reduced, sometimes to one (figs. 2, 5, 6). Petals are often wanting, as in Alchemilla (lady's mantle) and Poterium, and the flowers are often unisexual and frequently windpollinated, as in salad burnet (Poterium Sanguisorba), where the small flowers are crowded in heads, the upper pistillate, with protruding feathery stigmas, and the lower staminate (or bisexual), with exserted stamens. Agrimonia (agrimony) has a long spike of small honeyless flowers with yellow petals; in the fruit the torus becomes hard and crowned by hooked bristles which ensure the distribution of the enclosed achenes. Suborder IV. Neuradoideae contains only two genera of desert - inhabiting herbs with yellow flowers; and the five to ten carpels are united together and with the base of the cup-shaped torus, which enlarges to form a dry covering round the one-seeded fruits. After Duchartre, from Strasburger's Lehrbuch der Botanik, by permission of Gustav Fischer. FIG. 4.-Fruit of Rose, consisting of the fleshy hollowed axis, s', the persistent sepals S, and the carpels fr. The stamens have withered. e Suborder V. Prunoideae (fig. 7) is characterized by a free solitary carpel with a terminal style and two pendulous ovules, and the fruit a one-seeded drupe. The torus forms a cup from the edge of which spring the five sepals, five alternating petals and the ten to indefinite stamens. The plants are deciduous or evergreen trees or shrubs with simple leaves, often After Wossidlo, from Strasburger's Lehrbuch der Botanik, by permission FIG. 2.-Pyrus communis (pear). 1, flowering branch; 2, a flower cut through longitudinally; 3, longitudinal section of fruit; 4, floral diagram. fruit, forming a feathery appendage (Dryas) or a barbed awn (avens), either of which is of service in distributing the fruit. The Potentilleae are chiefly north temperate, arctic and alpine plants. 2 with small caducous stipules, and racemes or umbels of generally showy, white or pink flowers. There are five genera, the chief of which is Prunus, to which belong the plum (Prunus communis), with several well-marked subspecies-P. spinosa (sloe or blackthorn), P. insititia (bullace), P. domestica (wild plum), the almond (P. Amygdalus), with the nearly allied peach (P. persica), cherry (P. Cerasus), birdcherry (P. Padus) and cherry After Wossidlo, from Strasburger's Lehrbuch der Botanik, by permission of Gustav Fischer. FIG. 3.-Rubus fruticosus (blackberry). I, flowering branch; 2, longitudinal section of a flower; 3, fruit; 4, floral diagram. The Roseae comprise the large genus Rosa, characterized by a more or less urn-shaped torus (fig. 4) enclosing the numerous carpels which form dry one-seeded fruits enveloped in the brightcoloured fleshy torus. The numerous stamens surround the mouth of the torus. The plants are shrubs bearing prickles on the stems and leaves; many species have a scrambling habit resembling the brambles. The species of Rosa, like those of Rubus, are extremely variable, and a great number of subspecies, varieties and forms have been described. The Sanguisorbeae are a reduced form of Rosoideae. The dry one-seeded fruit is enclosed in the urn-shaped After Wossidlo from Strasburger's Lehrbuch der Botanik, by permission of Gustav Fischer. FIG. 7.-Prunus Cerasus. 1, flowering branch; 2, a flower cut through longitudinally; 3, fruit in longitudinal section. laurel (P. Laurocerasus). The tribe is distributed through the north temperate zone, passing into the tropics. Suborder VI. Chrysobalanoideae resembles the last in having a single free carpel and the fruit a drupe, but differs in having the style basal, not terminal, and the ovules ascending, not pendulous; the flowers are also frequently zygomorphic. The 12 genera are tropical evergreen trees or shrubs, the great majority being South American. The zygomorphic flowers indicate an affinity with the closely allied order Leguminosae. ROSAMOND, known as The Fair (d. c. 1176), mistress of Henry II., king of England, is believed to have been the daughter of Walter de Clifford of the family of Fitz-Ponce. The evidence for the paternity is, however, only an entry of a statement made by the jurors of the manor of Corfham in a Hundred Roll of the second year of the reign of Edward I. (1274), great grandson of Henry II. Rosamond is said to have been Henry's mistress secretly for several years, but was openly acknowledged by him only when he imprisoned his wife Eleanor of Acquitaine as a punishment for her encouragement of her sons in the rebellion of 1173-74. She died in or about 1176, and was buried in the nunnery church of Godstow before the high altar. The body was removed by order of St Hugh, bishop of Lincoln, in 1191, and was, seemingly, reinterred in the chapter house. The story that she was poisoned by Queen Eleanor first appears in the French Chronicle of London in the 14th century. The romantic details of the labyrinth at Woodstock, and the clue which guided King Henry II. to her bower, were the inventions of story-writers of later times. There is no evidence for the belief that she was the mother of Henry's natural son William Longsword, earl of Salisbury. a start, and its trade and population have grown since then with great rapidity. ROSARY (Lat. rosarium), a popular devotion of the Roman Catholic Church, consisting of 15 Paternosters and Glorias and 150 Aves, recited on beads. It is divided into three parts, each containing five decades, a decade comprising 1 Pater, 10 Aves and a Gloria, in addition to a subject for meditation selected from the " mysteries" of the life of Christ and of the Blessed Virgin. The Christian practice of repeating prayers is traceable to early times: Sozomen mentions (H.E. v. 29) the hermit Paul of the 4th century who threw away a pebble as he recited each of his 300 daily prayers; and a canon of the English synod of Cealcythe in 816 (Mansi xiv. 360) directed septem beltidum Paternoster to be said for a deceased bishop. In many orders the lay brothers daily said a large number of Paternosters instead of reading the breviary; it was natural that the Paternoster should be the prayer most often repeated. The Ave Maria is first mentioned as a form of prayer in the second half of the 11th century, but it was not until the 16th century that it became general in its present form. It is not known precisely when the mechanical device of the rosary was first used. William ROSARIO, a city and river port of Argentina, in the province of Malmesbury (De gest. pont. Angl. iv. 4) says that Godiva, who of Santa Fé, on the W. bank of the Paraná, 186 m. by rail N.W, founded a religious house at Coventry in 1040, left a string of of Buenos Aires. Pop. (1904, estimate) 120,000. It is acces- jewels, on which she had told her prayers, that it might be hung sible to ocean-going steamers of medium draught. The city on the statue of the Blessed Virgin. Thomas of Chantimpré, stands on the eastern margin of the great pampean plain, who wrote about the middle of the 13th century, first men65 to 75 ft. above the wide river-bed washed out by the Paraná. tions the word "rosary" (De apibus, ii. 13), using it apparently It extends back a considerable distance from the river, and in a mystical sense as Mary's rose-garden. There is no conthere are country residences and gardens of the better class temporary confirmation of the story that the rosary was given along the line of the Central Argentine railway and northward to St Dominic through revelation of the Blessed Virgin and toward San Lorenzo. The city is laid out with chessboard was employed during the crusade against the Albigenses, regularity, and the streets are paved (in great part with cobble- although the story was later accepted by Leo X., Pius V., stones), lighted with gas and electricity, traversed by tramway Gregory XIII., Sixtus V., Alexander VII., Innocent XI. and lines, and provided with sewers and water mains. The Boule- Clement XI. According to Benedict XIV. (De Fest. 160), the vard El Santafecino is an attractive residence street with belief rests on the tradition of the Dominican order. Whatever double driveways separated by a strip of garden and bordered may have been the origin of the rosary, the Dominicans did by fine shade trees. The chief edifices of an official character much to propagate the devotion. The practice of meditating are the custom house, post office, municipal hall and law courts. on the mysteries doubtless began with a Dominican, Alanus There is a large charity hospital, and the English and German de Rupe (born 1428), and another Dominican, Jacob Sprenger colonies maintain a well-equipped infirmary. The largest (d. 1495), grand-inquisitor in Germany, founded the first consugar refinery in Argentina is here, and there are flour-mills, fraternity of the rosary at Cologne in 1475. This society spread breweries and some smaller manufactures. The city is chiefly rapidly, and was specially privileged by Sixtus IV., Innocent commercial, being the shipping port for a large part of northern VIII. and Leo. X. After the battle of Lepanto (1st Sunday in Argentina, among its exports being wheat, flour, baled hay, October 1571), which was won while the members of the linseed, Indian corn, sugar, rum, cattle, hides, meats, wool, confraternity at Rome were making supplication for Christian quebracho extract, &c. The railway connexions are good, success, Pius V. ordered an annual commemoration of St including the Buenos Aires and Rosario and the Central Argen- Mary of Victory," and Gregory XIII., by bull of the 1st of April tine lines to the national capital, the Buenos Aires and Rosario 1583, set aside the 1st Sunday in October as the feast of the line northward to Tucuman, where it connects with the govern- Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, to be observed in such ment line to Salta, Jujuy and the Bolivian frontier, the Central churches as maintained an altar in honour of the rosary. Clement Argentine line westward to Cordoba, with connexions at Villa XI., by bull of the 3rd of October 1716, directed the observance Maria for Mendoza and the Chilean frontier, and two narrow- of the feast by all Christendom. The devotion has been gauge lines, one running to Santa Fé and the other to Cordoba. particularly fostered by the Jesuits, St Ignatius Loyola having The port of Rosario has hitherto consisted of a deep river expressly ordered its use. It has been repeatedly indulgenced anchorage and wooden wharves on the lower bank for the by various popes. Leo XIII. issued eight encyclicals on the accommodation of steamers. Since 1902 work has been in devotion; he urged its recitation throughout October, and progress under a contract with a French company for the directed (1883) the insertion of the title regina sacratissimi construction of 12,697 ft. of quays, 23 m. of railway tracks rosarii in the Litany. There are several varieties of the rosary along the quays to connect with the several railways entering more or less in use by Roman Catholics: the Passionists, or the city, drawbridges, roadways, sheds, depots, elevator, offices, rosary of the five wounds, approved by Leo XII. in 1823; electric plant, fixed and movable cranes, and other appliances, the Crown of Our Lord, attributed to Michael of Florence, a &c., for the handling of produce and merchandise. The Camaldolese monk (c. 1516), and consisting of 33 Paters, trade of the port was officially valued at 21,276,672 Arg. 5 Aves and a Credo; St Bridget's, 7 Paters and 63 Aves, in gold dollars imports, and 68,503,231 gold dollars exports in honour of the joys and sorrows of the Blessed Virgin and the 1905. 63 years of her life. The Living Rosary, in which 15 persons unite to say the rosary every month, was approved by Gregory XVI. (1832) and placed in charge of the Dominican order by Pius IX. (1877). Rosario was founded in 1730 by Francisco Godoy, but it grew so slowly that it was still a small village up to the middle of the 19th century. In 1854 General Justo José de Urquiza, then at the head of the Argentine Confederation, made it the port of the ten inland provinces then at war with Buenos Aires, and in 1857 imposed differential duties on the cargoes of vessels first breaking bulk at the southern port. This gave Rosario Similar expedients to assist the memory in repetitions of prayers occur among Buddhists and Mahommedans: in the former case the prayers are said on a string of some hundred beads, called the tibet-pren-ba or the ten-wa; in the latter case, the so-called tasbih has 33, 66 or 99 beads, and is used for the ROSAS, JUAN MANUEL (1793–1877), tyrant of Buenos Aires, was born on the 30th of March 1793, in the city of that name. His father, Leon Ortiz de Rosas, was an owner of cattle runs (estancias) and a trader in hides, who took an active part in defeating the English attack on the city in 1807. Juan Rosas received so little education that he had to learn to read and write when he was already a married man and a successful cattle breeder. From a very early age he was left in charge of one of his father's establishments. When he was eighteen he married Maria de la Encarnacion Escurra. His mother having suspected him of appropriating money, he left his parents, and for some time subsisted by working as a vaquero or cowboy, and then as overseer on the estates of other owners; but he accumulated money, and by the help of a loan from a friend he became possessed of a cattle run of his own, Los Cerrillos. The anarchical state of the country since its independence of Spain had favoured the Indians, who had taken the offensive and raided up to within forty miles of Buenos Aires. Rosas obtained leave to arm his cowboys. Under his management Los Cerrillos became a refuge for adventurers, whom he paid and fed well, but from whom he exacted implicit obedience. His followers became a fighting force of acknowledged efficiency, and Rosas took practically the position of an independent ruler whose help was sought by contending political parties. By attending to his own interest only, and by astute intrigue, or savage fighting when necessary, grew in power from 1820 onwards, and from 1835 to 1852 ruled as dictator (see ARGENTINA). It is probable that he would have continued to govern in Buenos Aires till his death if his ambition had not led him into wars with all his neighbours. He wished to extend the authority of the Republic over all the territory which had belonged to the Spanish viceroyalty of Buenos. This led him directly into wars with Uruguay, Paraguay and Chile, and into "warlike operations" with England and France, with whom he had other causes of quarrel arising out of the complaints of traders and bondholders. His government was overthrown in 1852 by a coalition of his neighbours and the defection of several of his generals, and even members of his own family who lived in fear of his suspicions and violence. He took refuge in England, and lived at Swaythling, near Southampton, till his death on the 14th of March 1877. A portrait taken in 1834 and reproduced by Sir Woodbine Parish in his Buenos Ayres and Provinces of the Rio de la Plata (London, 1852) represents Rosas as a fine-looking man of the handsome Spanish type. See O. Martens, Ein Caligula unseres Jahrhunderts (Berlin, 1896), which contains a full bibliography. ROSCELLINUS (RUCELINUS, or ROUSSELIN) (c. 1050-c. 1122), often called the founder of Nominalism (see SCHOLASTICISM), was born at Compiègne (Compendium). Little is known of his life, and our knowledge of his doctrines is mainly derived from Anselm, Abelard and John of Salisbury. He studied at Soissons and Reims, was afterwards attached to the cathedral of Chartres, and became canon of Compiègne. It seems most probable that Roscellinus was not strictly the first to promulgate nominalistic doctrines; but in his exposition they received more definite expression, and, being applied to the dogma of the Trinity, attracted universal attention. Roscellinus maintained that it | is merely a habit of speech which prevents our speaking of the three persons as three substances or three Gods. If it were otherwise, and the three persons were really one substance or thing (una res), we should be forced to admit that the Father and the Holy Spirit became incarnate along with the Son. Roscellinus seems to have put forward this doctrine in perfect good faith, and to have claimed for it at first the authority of Lanfranc and Anselm. In 1092, however, a council convoked by the archbishop of Reims condemned his interpretation, and Roscellinus, who was in danger of being stoned to death by the orthodox populace, recanted his error. He fled to England, but having made himself unpopular by an attack on the doctrines of Anselm, he left the country and repaired to Rome, where he was well received and became reconciled to the Church. He then returned to France, taught at Tours and Loc-menach (Loches) in Brittany (where he had Abelard as a pupil), and finally became canon of Besançon. He is heard of as late as 1121, when he came forward to oppose Abelard's views on the Trinity. Of the writings of Roscellinus, nothing is preserved except a letter to Abelard, mainly concerned with the doctrine of the Trinity (ed. J. A. Schmeller, Munich, 1850). See F. Picaret, Rosselin, philosophe et théologien (1896), and authorities quoted under SCHOLASTICISM. ROSCHER, WILHELM GEORG FRIEDRICH (1817-1894), German economist, was born at Hanover on the 21st of October 1817. He studied at Göttingen and Berlin, and obtained a professorship at Göttingen in 1844 and subsequently at Leipzig in 1848. Omitting preparatory indications and undeveloped germs of doctrine, the origin of the "historical" school of political economy may be traced to Roscher. Its fundamental principles are dated, though with some hesitation, and with an unfortunate contrast of the historical with the philosophical method, in his Grundriss zu Vorlesungen über die Staatswirthschaft nach geschichtlicher Methode (1843). This short study was afterwards expanded into his great System der Volkswirthschaft, published in five volumes between 1854 and 1894, and arranged as follows: vol. i., Die Grundlagen der Nationalökonomie, 1854 (trans. by J. J. Lalor, Principles of Political Economy, Chicago, 1878); vol. ii., Die Nationalökonomie des Ackerbaues und der verwandten Urproduktionszweige, 1859; vol. iii., Die Nationalökonomie des Handels und Gewerbfleisses, 1881; vol. iv., System der Finanzwissenschaft, 1886; vol. v., System der Armenpflege und Armen politik, 1894. His Geschichte der Nationalökonomie in Deutschland (1874) is a monumental work. He also published in 1842 an excellent commentary on the life and works of Thucydides. He died at Leipzig on the 4th of June 1894. See T. Roscher, Zur Geschichte der Familie Roscher in Niedersachsen (Hanover, 1892); Brasch, Wilhelm Roscher und die sozialwissenschaftlichen Strömungen der Gegenwart (Leipzig, 1895). ROSCIUS GALLUS, QUINTUS (c. 126-62 B.C.), Roman actor, was born, a slave, at Solonium, near Lanuvium. Endowed with a handsome face and manly figure, he studied the delivery and gestures of the most distinguished advocates in the Forum, especially Q. Hortensius, and won universal praise for his grace and elegance on the stage. He especially excelled in comedy. Cicero took lessons from him. The two often engaged in friendly rivalry to try whether the orator or the actor could express a thought or emotion with the greater effect, and Roscius wrote a treatise in which he compared acting and oratory. Q. Lutatius Catulus composed a quatrain in his honour, and the dictator Sulla presented him with a gold ring, the badge of the equestrian order, a remarkable distinction for an actor in Rome, where the profession was held in contempt. Like his contemporary Aesopus, Roscius amassed a large fortune, and he appears to have retired from the stage some time before his death. In 76 B.C. he was sued by C. Fannius Chaerea for 50,000 sesterces (about £400), and was defended by Cicero in a famous speech. See H. H. Pflüger, Cicero's Rede pro Q. Roscio Comoedo (1904). ROSCOE, SIR HENRY ENFIELD (1833- ), English chemist, was born in London on the 7th of January 1833. After studying at Liverpool High School and University College, London, he went to Heidelberg to work under R. W. Bunsen, of whom he became a lifelong friend. In 1857 he was appointed to the chair of chemistry at Owens College, Manchester, where he remained for thirty years, and from 1885 to 1895 he was M.P. for the south division of Manchester. He served on several royal commissions appointed to consider educational questions, in which he was keenly interested, and from 1896 to 1902 was vice-chancellor of London University. He was knighted in 1884. His scientific work includes a memorable series of researches carried out with Bunsen between 1855 and 1862, in which they laid the foundations of comparative photochemistry. In 1867 he began an elaborate investigation of vanadium and its compounds, and devised a process for preparing it pure in the metallic state, at the same time showing that the substance which had previously passed for the metal was contaminated with oxygen and nitrogen. He was also the author of researches on niobium, tungsten, uranium, perchloric acid, the solubility of ammonia, &c. His publications include, besides several elementary books on chemistry which have had a wide circulation and been translated into many foreign languages, Lectures on Spectrum Analysis (1869); a Treatise on Chemistry (the first edition of which appeared in 1877-1892); A New View of Dalton's Atomic Theory, with Dr A. Harden (1896); and an Autobiography (1906). The Treatise on Chemistry, written in collaboration with Carl Schorlemmer (1834-1892), who was appointed his private assistant at Manchester in 1859, official assistant in the laboratory in 1861, and professor of organic chemistry in 1874, is a standard work. ROSCOE, WILLIAM (1753-1831), English historian and miscellaneous writer, was born on the 8th of March 1753 at Liverpool, where his father, who was a market gardener, kept a publichouse known as the Bowling Green at Mount Pleasant. Roscoe was eager in the acquisition of knowledge, and at twelve he left school, having learned all that his schoolmaster could teach. He now assisted his father in the work of the garden, and gave his leisure hours to reading and study. This mode of life," he says, gave health and vigour to my body, and amusement and instruction to my mind; and to this day I well remember the delicious sleep which succeeded my labours, from which I was again called at an early hour. If I were now asked whom I consider to be the happiest of the human race, I should answer, those who cultivate the earth by their own hands." At fifteen it was necessary to decide upon a path in life. A month's trial of bookselling sufficed to disgust him, and in 1769 he was articled to a solicitor. Although a diligent student of law, he did not bid farewell to the Muses, but continued to read the classics, and made that acquaintance with the language and literature of Italy which became the instrument of his distinction in after life. He wrote many verses his Mount Pleasant was composed when he was sixteen, and this and other verses, though now forgotten, won the esteem of good critics. In 1774 he commenced business as an attorney, and as soon as his professional gains warranted he married (1781) Jane, second daughter of William Griffies, a Liverpool tradesman, and had seven sons and three daughters. He had the courage to denounce the African slave trade in his native town, where not a little of the wealth came from this source. He wrote the Wrongs of Africa (1787–1788), and entered into a controversy with an ex-Roman Catholic priest, who undertook to prove the licitness of the slave trade" from the Bible. Roscoe was also a political pamphleteer, and like many other Liberals of the day hailed the promise of liberty in the French Revolution. Meanwhile he had steadily pursued his Italian studies, and had made extensive collections relating to the great ruler of Florence. The result was his Life of Lorenzo de' Medici, which appeared in 1796, and at once placed him in the front rank of contemporary historians. The work has often been reprinted, and translations in French, German and other languages show that its popularity was not confined to its author's native land. Perhaps the most gratifying testimony was that of Fabroni, who had intended to translate his own Latin life of Lorenzo, but abandoned the design and induced Gaetano Mecherini to undertake an Italian version of Roscoe. In 1796 Roscoe gave up practice as an attorney, and had some thought of going to the bar, but relinquished the idea after keeping a single term. Between 1793 and 1800 he paid much attention to agriculture, and helped to reclaim Chat Moss, near Manchester. He also succeeded in restoring to good order the affairs of a banking house in which his friend William Clark, then resident in Italy, was a partner. This task led to his introduction to the business, which eventually proved disastrous. His translation of Tansillo's Nurse appeared in 1798, and went through several editions. It is dedicated in a sonnet to his wife, who had practised the precepts of the Italian poet. The Life and Pontificate of Leo the Tenth appeared in 1805, and was a natural sequel to that by which he had made his reputation. The work, whilst it maintained its author's fame, did not, on the whole, meet with so favourable a reception as the Life of Lorenzo. the Life of Lorenzo. It has been frequently reprinted, and the insertion of the Italian translation in the Index did not prevent its circulation even in the papal states. Roscoe was elected member of parliament for Liverpool in 1806, but the House of Commons was not a congenial place, and at the dissolution in the following year he declined to be again a candidate. The commercial troubles of 1816 brought into difficulties the banking house with which he was connected, and forced the sale of his collection of books and pictures. It was on this occasion that he wrote the fine "Sonnet on Parting with his Books." Dr S. H. Spiker, the king of Prussia's librarian, gives an interesting account of a visit to Roscoe at this period of trouble. Roscoe said he still desired to write a biography of Erasmus but "wanted both leisure and youth." This project was not executed (Spiker's Travels through England, &c., 1816). After a five years' struggle to discharge the liabilities of the bank, the action of a small number of creditors forced the partners into bankruptcy in 1820. For a time Roscoe was in danger of arrest, but ultimately he received honourable discharge. On the dispersal of his library, the volumes most useful to him were secured by friends and placed in the Liverpool Athenaeum. The sum of £2500 was also invested for his benefit. The independent and sensitive nature of Roscoe made both these operations difficult. Having now resigned commercial pursuits entirely, he found a pleasant task in the arrangement of the great library at Holkham, the property of his friend Coke. In 1822 he issued an appendix of illustrations to his Lorenzo and also a Memoir of Richard Robert Jones of Aberdaron, a remarkable self-taught linguist. The year 1824 was memorable for the death of his wife and the publication of his edition of the works of Pope, which involved him in a controversy with Bowles. His versatility was shown by the appearance of a folio monograph on the Monandrian Plants, which was published in 1828. It appeared first in numbers, and the last part came out after his recovery from a paralytic attack. He died on the 30th of June 1831. Roscoe's character was a fine one. Under circumstances uncongenial and discouraging he steadfastly maintained the ideal of the intellectual life. Sensitive and conscientious, he sacrificed his possessions to a punctilious sense of duty. He had the courage of unpopular opinions, and, whilst promoting every good object in his native town, did not hesitate to speak out where plain dealing, as in the matter of slavery, was required. He was a sincere friend and exemplary in his domestic relations. Posterity is not likely to endorse the verdict of Horace Walpole, who thought Roscoe by far the best of our historians," but in spite of newer lights and of some changes of fashion in the world of letters, his books on Lorenzo de' Medici and Leo X. remain important contributions to historical literature. In addition to the writings already named, Roscoe wrote tracts on penal jurisprudence, and contributed to the Transactions of the Royal Society of Literature and of the Linnean Society. The first collected edition of his Poetical Works was published in 1857, and is sadly incomplete, omitting, with other verses known to be from his pen, the Butterfly's Ball, a fantasy, which has charmed thousands of children since it appeared in 1807. Other verses are in Poems for Youth, by a Family Circle (1820). The Life by his son Henry Roscoe (2 vols., London, 1833) contains full details of Roscoe's career, and there are references to him in the Autobiographical Sketches of De Quincey, and in Washington Irving's Sketch Book. (W. E. A. A.) ROSCOFF, a maritime town and watering-place of northwestern France, in the department of Finistère, on the English Channel, 171 m. N.N.W. of Morlaix by rail. Pop. (1906) town, 1984; commune, 5054. Roscoff, separated from the Ile de Batz by a narrow channel, has a tidal port used by fishing and coasting vessels. Many of the inhabitants are engaged in the cultivation of early vegetables, to the growth of which the mild climate and fertile soil is eminently favourable. The church of Roscoff (16th century) has a fine Renaissance tower and contains interesting alabaster bas-reliefs. The ruined chapel of St Ninian commemorates the landing at Roscoff in 1548 of Mary Stuart, previous to her betrothal with the dauphin, son of Henry II. In 1746 Charles Edward, the young Pretender, landed at the port after his defeat at Culloden. ROSCOMMON, WENTWORTH DILLON, 4TH EARL OF (c. 1630-1685), English poet, was born in Ireland about 1630. He was a nephew of Thomas Wentworth, earl of Strafford, and was educated partly under a tutor at his uncle's seat in Yorkshire, partly at Caen in Normandy and partly at Rome. After the Restoration he returned to England, and was well received at court. In 1649 he had succeeded to the earldom of Roscommon, which had been created in 1622 for his great-grandfather, James Dillon; and he was now put in possession by act of parliament of all the lands possessed by his family before the Civil War. As captain of the Gentleman Pensioners he found abundant opportunity to indulge the love of gambling, which appears to have been his only vice. Disputes with the Lord Privy Seal about his Irish estates necessitated his presence in Ireland, where he gave proof of some business capacity. On his return to London he was made master of the horse to the duchess of York. He was twice married, in 1662 to Lady Frances Boyle, widow of Colonel Francis Courtenay, and in 1674 to Isabella Boynton. In His reputation as a didactic writer and critic rests on his blank verse translation of the Ars Poetica (1680) and his Essay on Translated Verse (1684). The essay contained the first definite enunciation of the principles of poetic diction," which were to be fully developed in the reign of Queen Anne. Roscommon, who was fastidious in his notions of "dignified writing," was himself a very correct writer, and quite free from the indecencies of his contemporaries. Alexander Pope, who seems to have learnt something from his carefully balanced phrases and the regular cadence of his verse, says that all Charles's days, Roscommon only boasts unspotted bays." He saw clearly that a low code of morals was necessarily followed by a corresponding degradation in literature, and he insists that sincerity and sympathy with the subject in hand are essential qualities in the poet. This elevated conception of his art is in itself no small merit. He has, moreover, the distinction of having been the first critic to avow his admiration for Paradise Lost. Roscommon formed a small literary society which he hoped to develop into an academy with authority to formulate rules on language and style, but its influence only extended to a limited circle, and the scheme fell through after its promoter's death. He was buried in Westminster Abbey on the 21st of January 1685. The title passed to his uncle, Carey Dillon (1627-1689). In 1746, on the death of James, the 8th earl, it passed to Robert Dillon (d. 1770), a descendant of the first earl. His family became extinct in 1816, and in 1828 Michael James Robert Dillon, another descendant of the 1st earl, established his title to the earldom before the House of Lords. When he died in May 1850 it became extinct. Roscommon's poems were collected in 1701, and are included in Anderson's and other collections of the British poets. He also translated into French from the English of Dr W. Sherlock, Traitté touchant l'obéissance passive (1686). ROSCOMMON, a county of Ireland in the province of Connaught, bounded N.E. by Leitrim, N.W. by Sligo, W. by Mayo, W. and S. by Galway, E. by Longford and E. and S. by Westmeath and King's County. The area is 629,633 acres, or about 985 sq. m. The greater part of the county belongs to the great limestone plain of central Ireland, and is either flat or very slightly undulating. In the north-east, on the Leitrim border, the Braulieve Mountains, consisting of rugged and precipitous ridges with flattened summits, attain an elevation in Cashel Mountain of 1377 ft.; and in the north-west the Curlew Mountains, of similar formation, between Roscommon and Sligo, rise abruptly to a height over 800 ft. In the east the Slievebawn range, formed of sandstone, have a similar elevation. The Shannon with its expansions forms nearly the whole eastern boundary of the county, and on the west the Suck from Mayo forms for over 50 m. the boundary with Galway till it unites with the Shannon at Shannon Bridge. The other tributaries of the Shannon within the county are the Arigna, the Feorish and the Boyle. The lakes formed by expansions of the Shannon on the borders of Co. Roscommon are Loughs Allen, Boderg, Boffin, Forbes and Ree. Of the numerous other lakes within the county the most important are Lough Key in the north, very picturesquely situated with finely wooded banks, and Lough Gara (mostly in Co. Sligo) in the north-west. In this long county one may travel fifty miles across the Carboniferous Limestone plain, with the grey rock cropping out here and there, and long grass-covered esker-ridges forming the only obstacle to the roads. Lough Ree is a typical lake of the plain. Two inliers of Silurian rocks have been thrust up, forming hills between Lough Ree and Lough Boffin. At Boyle, however, higher Old Red Sandstone country is encountered, and farther north the Millstone Grit and Coal-Measure series cap the mountains almost horizontally at Arigna near Lough Allen. The nodules of clay-ironstone here were formerly smelted, and the seams of bituminous coal, mostly on Millstone Grit horizons, are worked successfully on a high level of the mountains. The subsoil is principally limestone, but there is some light, sandy soil in the south. In the level parts the land when drained and properly cultivated is very fertile, especially in the district known as the plains of Boyle, which includes some of the richest grazing land in Ireland. Along the banks of the Suck and Shannon there is, however, a large extent of bog and marsh. The proportion of tillage to pasture is roughly as one to three. Oats and potatoes are the principal crops, but the acreage devoted to them decreases; the numbers of cattle, sheep, pigs, goats and poultry, on the other hand, are proportionately large and increasing. Communications are afforded by the Midland Great Western railway, the Sligo line of that system crossing the northern part of the county by Boyle, the Athlone and and Castlerea, and the Athlone and Galway line crossing the Mayo line passing from S.E. to N.W. by the towns of Roscommon southern part. The population was 116,552 in 1891, and 101,791 in 1901; 97% are Roman Catholics, and nearly the whole population is rural. The chief towns are Boyle, Roscommon, Elphin and Castlerea; and a small portion of Carrick-on-Shannon, including the railway station, is in this county, the major portion being in Co. Leitrim. The county is divided into ten baronies. Ecclesiastically it belongs to the Protestant dioceses of Elphin and Ardagh (united with Kilmore and Tuam), and to the Roman Catholic dioceses of Tuam, Clonfert, Achonry, Elphin and Ardagh. Assizes are held at Roscommon and quarter sessions at Boyle, Strokestown and Roscommon. The county returns two members to parliament. To the Irish parliament before the Union of 1800 two members were returned for the county, and two each for the boroughs of Boyle, Roscommon and Tulsk. The district was granted by Henry III. to Richard de Burgo, but remained almost wholly in the possession of the native septs. Until the time of Elizabeth Connaught was included in the two districts of Roscommon and Clare, but in 1579 it |