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TARTARY....TAURUS....TEAS.

lower jaw, forming a kind of proboscis. It has an arched back, short legs, four hoofs on each foot, a small tail, short hair, and is of a dusky brown colour. It is an inoffensive timid animal. The Indians make bucklers of its skin, which is very thick and hard.... Winterbotham.

TARTARY, a vast country of Asia; lying between the Frozen Ocean, Persia, Hindostan, and China. From Tartary have issued the Turks and other hordes of semisavages, which have made Asia and Europe tremble. In the early part of the thirteenth century, GenghisKan, at the head of the Moguls, or western Tartars, extended his dominions, in a few years, from a small territory to more than eighteen hundred leagues, from east to west, and above a thousand from north to south. He conquered Persia, and pushed his conquests as far as the Euphrates; subdued Hindostan, and a great part of China, and the frontier provinces of Russia.... Russell.

TAURUS, a vast chain of mountains, running through Africa and Asia. The chain of mountains known by the names of Taurus and Imaus, commences in Africa, at Mount Atlas, toward the thirtieth degree of northern latitude. It runs across all Africa and all Asia, between the thirty-eight and fortieth degree of north latitude; having its summit covered, for the most part, through that immense extent, with snows that never melt. Mount Ararat, which makes part of this chain, is, perhaps, more elevated than any mountain of the New World, if we form a judgment from the time which Tournefort, and other travellers, took to perform the distance from the basis of that mountain, up to the commencement of the snow which covers its summit ; and which is more conclusive, from the distance at which it may be seen, and that is, at least, six days journey of a caravan....St. Pierre.

TEAS. The teas of China are of the following kinds : The Song-lo tea, being the same which we call Green tea, takes its name from the mountain Song-lo, which is entirely covered with the shrubs that produce this kind of tea. It is cultivated almost like vines, and is cropped at a certain height, to prevent it from growing. The

TEMPERATE ZONES....TENERIFF.

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flower which it bears is white, and shaped like a small rose composed of five leaves. The Vou-y tea, being the the same that is known in Europe and America by the names of Bohea and Souchong, takes its name from a mountain in China, called Vou-y. This is the tea the most esteemed throughout the Chinese empire; as agreeing better with the stomach, being in their estimation lighter, sweeter, and more delicate to the taste than the Song-lo, or Green tea. The Imperial tea, which is called by the Chinese Mao tcha, contains only the tender leaves of the shrubs. This is the most delicate of all the teas, and is that which is transported to court for the use of the emperor. It is seldom ever distributed but in presents; but it may sometimes be bought on the spot where it grows for twenty pence or two shillings the pound.... Winterbotham.

TEMPERATE ZONES, the spaces contained between the tropics and polar circles; or all those parts of the terraqueous globe which lie between the latitudes 23° 32′ and 66° 32', both in the northern and southern hemisphere. The southern temperate zone is mostly ocean: it contains no known country except the south part of New-Holland, and the southernmost parts of Africa and of South America. The northern temperate zone comprehends almost all Europe, the greatest part of Asia, part of Africa, particularly Egypt and Barbary, the United States of America, the British colonies, the Floridas, Louisiana, California, and a large part of Mexico. History informs us of no nation south of the equator, that had ever risen to great eminence in the arts and sciences. The Peruvians who were the most distinguished in the whole southern hemisphere for civilization and improvements, had no knowledge of the manufacture and use of iron; consequently their improvements in arts must have been comparatively small. The tropical climates, as well as the polar regions, are unfavorable to the full growth either of the human body or mind. It is in the northern temperate zone that the arts have chiefly flourished, and the greatest men and most powerful nations been produced.

TENERIFF, one of the Canary Islands

The moun

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TENNESSEE...THIBET...THORN PLANT.

tain in this island, called the Peak, is fifteen thousand three hundred and ninety-six feet above the level of the sea, and may be seen one hundred and twenty miles, in a clear day. Smoke continually issues from near the top of the Peak, which is a volcano; but they have had no eruption since 1704, when the port of Garrachia was destroyed, being filled up by the rivers of burning lava that flowed into it; and houses are now built where ships formerly lay at anchor. This vast mountain, cov ́ered with ice, is situated directly opposite to the great sandy desert, in Africa, called Sahara, and contributes, undoubtedly, to refresh the shores and atmosphere of it, by the effusion of its snows, which takes place even in the midst of summer. Mount Atlas is also placed as a cooler of that burning desert; as also Mount Ida, in the island of Crete, is aptly situated for cooling the atmosphere of the desert of Barca, which coasts along Egypt from north to south.... Cooke's Voyages, St. Pierre.

TENNESSEE, one of the United States of America; 360 miles in length, and 100 miles in breadth; lying between 35 and 36 degrees north latitude; bounded east by North Carolina; north by Virginia and Kentucky; west by the Missisippi, and south by the Missisippi territory, Georgia, and South Carolina. Knoxville is its capital. Tennessee was erected into an independent state, and received into the union, in 1796.

THIBET, a large country of Asia, bordering upon China and Hindostan. It is one of the most elevated countries in Asia; and gives rise to some of the rivers not only in China and Hindostan, but also of Siberia and Tartary. The Thibetians have a profound veneration for the cow, and also for the waters of the Ganges, believing the source of that river to be from heaven. They pay religious homage to their Grand Lama, as to a divinity. See LAMAS.

THORN PLANT, a plant used for hedges The European method of raising quicks from thorn is as follows. Gather the haws when full ripe, perhaps in the month of November; dig a hole in a dry hill, from two to three feet deep; put in the bottom a layer of dry

straw; throw your haws upon the straw and cover them with the same; then fill in the earth, and do it up neatly, so as to prevent the water soaking to them. Take them up in March or April, and sow them in beds of well prepared ground, nearly in the same manner as parsnips are sowed, leaving a sufficient space between for a person to pass to weed them. They will come up as soon as any garden seeds; and, if kept clean and weeded, may be transplanted into hedges in two years. ....American Museum.

TIDE, the periodical rising and falling of the water of the sea. The water of the sea flows about six hours from south to north; during which period it gradually swells, so that it enters the mouths of rivers, and counteracts the natural current from their sources. It then remains stationary for about a quarter of an hour; after which it ebbs for six hours, and then again remains, for a quarter of an hour stationary. If the moon be in the first and third quarters, or when it is new and full, the tides are high and swift, being then called spring-tides ; on the contrary, when that luminary is in the second and last quarter, they neither rise so high, nor flow with such rapidity; and are termed neap-tides. In open seas the tides rise to a very small height in proportion to what they do in wide-mouthed rivers, opening in the direction of the stream of the tide. For in channels growing narrower gradually, the water is accumulated by the opposition of the converging banks. Some rivers, creeks, and bays, are so situated as to raise the tide-waters into mountains: thus, in the Bay of Fundy, the tide rises from forty to sixty feet. The ancient Grecians were ignorant of the phenomena of tides; inasmuch as their navigation did not extend beyond the Mediterranean, which has no tide. Therefore, when Alexander, after his conquest of Persia, sailed down the river Indus in order to see the ocean, its ebbing and flowing terrified his pilots. The principal cause of the tides is believed to be the attraction of the moon. The honor of discovering this cause has been attributed to Kepler; yet Cicero, more than seventeen hundred years before, imputed the ebbing and flowing of the tide to the moon's influence. Some moderns,

among whom is Bernardine St. Pierre, attribute the tides to the liquefication of the snow and ice in the polar regions; but this is generally thought to be a visionary theory. Why there is no tide in the Mediterranean, Lake Superior, and some other vast bodies of water, is hard to explain on the commonly received principles of gravitation or attraction.

and

TIGER, a most ferocious and terrible animal of the cat-kind. Goldsmith remarks that a cat, magnified in imagination to the size of several hundred pounds weight, would give a perfect idea of the form and appearance of a tiger. The skin is of a darkish yellow colour, striped with long black streaks; the hair is short, excepting on the sides of the head, where it is about four inches long; the point of the tail is black, and the rest of it is interspersed with black rings. The woods of Sondry in the East-Indies, are famous for the enormous size of the tigers which are found there, with which they are filled. This species is called the Royal Tiger. These animals are extremely formidable by their strength and activity: some of them are as large as oxen. They are so eager and ferocious in pursuit of their prey, that they have been known to throw themselves into the water, and swim to attack boats on the river Ganges. About the year 1790, twelve men landed on the shore of the Ganges from the vessel of M. Grandpre, in order to take in some dry wood. They were at the distance of about three hundred yards from the vessel, and had scarcely begun their work, when we saw them (says Grandpre) running to the water side with the strongest marks of terror. They were pursued by a small tiger of the size of a common calf; which rushed out of the woods, seized the hindmost of these men, and carried him off in an instant. The following instance of escape from the fangs of this dreadful animal, is very remarkable. " I was informed (says Mr. Pennant) by very good authority, that in the beginning of the eighteenth century, some gentlemen and ladies being on a party of pleasure, under a shade of trees, on the banks of a river in Bengal, observed a tiger preparing for its fatal spring; when one of the ladies, with amazing presence of mind,