Part 6

The Emperor Leopold I, son and successor of Ferdinand III, was victorious through the talents of Prince Eugene in two wars with Turkey; and Vienna was delivered by Sobieski and the Germans from the attacks of Kara Mustapha in 1683. In 1687 he united Hungary to Transylvania, and in 1699 restored to Hungary the country lying between the Danube and the Theiss. It was the chief aim of Leopold to secure to Charles, his second son, the inheritance of the Spanish monarchy, and in 1701, upon the victory of French diplomacy in the appointment of the grandson of Louis XIV, the War of the Spanish Succession commenced. Leopold died in 1705, but Joseph I, his eldest son, continued the war. As he died without children in 1711, his brother Charles was elected emperor, but was obliged to accede in 1714 to the Peace of Utrecht, by which Austria received the Netherlands, Milan, Mantua, Naples, and Sardinia. In 1720 Sicily was given to Austria in exchange for Sardinia. This monarchy now embraced over 190,000 sq. miles; but its power was weakened by new wars with Spain and France. In the peace concluded at Vienna (1735 and 1738) Charles VI was forced to cede Naples and Sicily to Spain and part of Milan to the King of Sardinia; and in 1739, by the Peace of Belgrade, he was obliged to transfer to the Porte Belgrade, Serbia, &c., partly in order to secure the succession to his daughter, Maria Theresa, by the Pragmatic Sanction. He died in 1740.

On Maria Theresa's marriage to Francis Stephen, Duke of Lorraine (the dynasty henceforth being that of Habsburg-Lorraine), and her accession to the Austrian throne, the Empire was threatened with dismemberment. Frederick II of Prussia subdued Silesia; the Elector of Bavaria was crowned in Lintz and Prague, and in 1742 chosen emperor under the name of Charles VII; Hungary alone supported the heroic and beautiful queen. Charles, however, died in 1745, and the husband of Theresa was crowned Emperor of Germany as Francis I; but a treaty concluded in 1745 confirmed to Frederick the possession of Silesia, and by the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1748, Austria was obliged to cede the duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla to Philip, Infant of Spain, and several districts of Milan and Sardinia. To recover Silesia, Maria Theresa formed an alliance with France, Russia, Saxony, and Sweden, and entered upon the Seven Years' War; but by the Peace of Hubertsberg, 1763, Silesia was recognized as Prussian territory. On the death of Francis I, in 1765, Joseph II, his eldest son, was appointed to assist his mother in the government and elected Emperor of Germany. The partition of Poland (1772) gave Galicia and Lodomeria to Austria, which also obtained Bukowina from the Porte in 1777. At the death of the Empress in 1780 Austria contained 235,000 sq. miles, with a pop. estimated at 24,000,000.

The liberal home administration of the Empress was continued and extended by her successor, Joseph II, who did much to further the spread of religious tolerance, education, and the industrial arts. The Low Countries, however, revolted, and he was unsuccessful in the war of 1788 against the Porte. His death took place in 1790. He was succeeded by his eldest brother, Leopold II, under whom peace was restored in the Netherlands, and in Hungary, and also with the Porte. On the death of his sister and her husband Louis XVI of France he formed an alliance with Prussia, but died in 1792, before the French revolutionary war broke out.

His son, Francis II, succeeded, and was elected German Emperor, by which time France had declared war against him as King of Hungary and Bohemia. In 1795, in the third partition of Poland, West Galicia fell to Austria, and by the Peace of Campo-Formio (1797) she received the largest part of the Venetian territory as compensation for her loss of Lombardy and the Netherlands. In 1799 Francis, in alliance with Russia, renewed the war with France until 1801, when the Peace of Luneville was concluded. In 1804 Francis declared himself hereditary Emperor of Austria as Francis I, and united all his States under the name of the Empire of Austria, immediately taking up arms once more with his allies Russia and Great Britain against France. The war of 1805 was terminated by the Peace of Pressburg (26th Dec.), by which Francis had to cede to France the remaining provinces of Italy, as well as to give up portions of territory to Bavaria, Wuertemberg, and Baden, receiving in return Salzburg and Berchtesgaden. After the formation of the Confederation of the Rhine (12th July, 1806) Francis was forced to resign his dignity as Emperor of Germany, which had been in his family more than 500 years. A new war with France in 1809 cost the monarchy 42,380 sq. miles of territory and 3,500,000 subjects. Napoleon married Maria Louisa, daughter of the Emperor, and in 1812 concluded an alliance with him against Russia. But in 1813 Francis again declared war against France, and formed an alliance with Britain, Prussia, and Sweden against his son-in-law. By the Congress of Vienna (1815) Austria gained Lombardy and Venetia, and recovered, together with Dalmatia, the hereditary territories which it had been obliged to cede.

In the troubled period following the French revolution of 1830 insurrections took place in Modena, Parma, and the Papal States (1831-2), but were suppressed without much difficulty; and though professedly neutral during the Polish insurrections Austria clearly showed herself on the side of Russia, with whom her relations became more intimate as those between Great Britain and France grew more cordial. The death of Francis I (1835) and accession of his son, Ferdinand I, made little change in the Austrian system of government, and much discontent was the consequence. In 1846 the failure of the Polish insurrection led to the incorporation of Cracow with Austria. In Italy the declarations of Pio Nono in favour of reform increased the difficulties of Austria, and in Hungary the opposition under Kossuth and others assumed the form of a great constitutional movement. In 1848, when the expulsion of Louis Philippe shook all Europe, Metternich found it impossible any longer to guide the helm of the State, and the Government was compelled to admit a free press and the right of citizens to arms. Apart from the popular attitude in Italy and in Hungary, where the Diet declared itself permanent under the presidency of Kossuth, the insurrection made equal progress in Vienna itself, and the royal family, no longer in safety, removed to Innsbruck. After various ministerial changes the Emperor abdicated in favour of his nephew, Francis Joseph; more vigorous measures were adopted; and Austria, aided by Russia, reduced Hungary to submission.

The year 1855 is memorable for the Concordat with the Pope, which put the educational and ecclesiastical affairs of the Empire entirely into the hands of the Papal see. In 1859 the hostile intentions of France and Sardinia against the possessions of Austria in Italy became so evident that she declared war by sending an army across the Ticino; but after disastrous defeats at Magenta and Solferino she was compelled to cede Milan and the north-west portion of Lombardy to Sardinia. In 1864 she joined with the German States in the war against Denmark, but a dispute about Schleswig-Holstein involved her in a war with her allies (1866), while at the same time Italy renewed her attempts for the recovery of Venice. The Italians were defeated at Custozza and driven back across the Mincio; but the Prussians, victorious at Koeniggraetz (or Sadowa), threatened Vienna. Peace was concluded with Prussia on 23rd Aug. and with Italy on 3rd Oct., the result of the war being the cession of Venetia through France to Italy and the withdrawal of Austria from all interference in the affairs of Germany.

For nearly half a century (from 1866 to 1914) the internal affairs of Austria-Hungary gave much occupation to statesmen of the dual monarchy. Hungarian demands for self-government were finally agreed to, and the Empire was divided into the two parts already mentioned--Austria and Hungary. This settlement was consummated by the coronation of the Emperor Francis Joseph I, at Budapest, as King of Hungary, on 8th June, 1867. In the same year the Concordat of 1855 came up for discussion, and measures were passed for the re-establishment of civil marriage, the emancipation of schools from the domination of the Church, and the placing of different creeds on a footing of equality. The fact of the Austro-Hungarian dominions comprising so many different nationalities gave the central Government much trouble, both in regard to internal and to external affairs. In regard to the 'Eastern Question', for instance, the action of Austria was hampered by the sympathies shown by the Magyars for their blood relations, the Turks, while the Slavs were naturally more favourable to Russia. During the war between Russia and Turkey in 1877-8 Austria remained neutral; but at its close it was decided at the Congress of Berlin that Bosnia and Herzegovina should in future be administered by Austria instead of Turkey. In 1908, taking advantage of the condition of Turkey, Austria formally annexed these provinces. By the middle of Oct., 1918, the Austro-Hungarian monarchy began to break up into independent national States. Four States of some size laid claim to independence, viz. German-Austria, Czecho-Slovakia (recognized by the Allies), Hungary, and Yugo-Slavia. On 13th Oct., 1921, German Austria signed with Hungary the Burgenland pact, agreeing to a plebiscite in several districts. For recent history of Austria, see _Francis Joseph; European War._--Cf. S. Whitman, _Austria_ (in Story of the Nations Series); H. W. Steed, _The Hapsburg Monarchy._

AUTEUIL ([=o]-t[.e]-y[.e]), formerly a suburban village of Paris, but now enclosed within the fortifications.

AUTOBIOG'RAPHY, a department of literature of which, as a definite branch or form at least, we have no very ancient examples, though many autobiographical details are contained, for instance, in Cicero's and Pliny's letters, while St. Augustine has left a fragmentary autobiography in his _Confessions_. Various writers of note, without claiming or perhaps intending to write a formal autobiography, have left similar materials in the form of their own memoirs or reminiscences, or, for a portion of their lives, in diaries. The chief English diarists are Pepys and Evelyn, while Crabb Robinson is an admirable modern example. Brief autobiographies were written by Gibbon, Hume, and Sir Walter Scott (of his early life only), and among other writers who have given us autobiographies or kindred works are Fanny Burney, Cobbett, Haydon, Miss Mitford, Harriet Martineau, Leigh Hunt, Hugh Miller (in _My Schools and Schoolmasters_), John Stuart Mill, Anthony Trollope, Sir Henry Taylor, Miss F. P. Cobbe, Carlyle, Ruskin, Herbert Spencer, Alexander Bain, and Alfred Russel Wallace. Lord Roberts's _Forty-one Years in India_ and General Grant's _Personal Memoirs_ are most interesting autobiographical works by men of action. One of the most famous of autobiographies is that of the Italian Benvenuto Cellini. See _Biography_.

AUTOCHROME. See _Photography_.

AUTOCHTHONES ([a:]-tok'tho-n[=e]z), the Greek name for the aboriginal inhabitants of a country. See _Aborigines_.

AU'TOCLAVE (derived from the Gr. _autos_, self, and Lat. _clavis_, key) is a strong steam-tight vessel in which hydrolysis of liquids can be carried out, under pressure, at temperatures considerably higher than their normal boiling-points. The vessels may be of copper, iron, or other suitable material, are sometimes enamelled within, or may have renewable refractory linings when used for corrosive liquids. Some types have mechanical agitators. Used in the manufacture of candles, coal-tar colours, &c. May be heated by high-pressure steam or in baths of oil or molten lead. See _Papin_.

AU'TOCRAT (Gr. _autos_, self, _kratos_, rule), an absolute or uncontrolled ruler; the head of a State who is not controlled by any constitutional limitations, such as the Tsars of Russia till 1917.

AUTO-DE-FE (Sp.); AUTO-DA-FE (Pg.), literally, 'act of faith'. See _Inquisition_.

AU'TOGRAPH, a person's own handwriting; an original manuscript or signature, as opposed to a copy. The practice of collecting autographs or signatures originated in Germany and the Low Countries, chiefly among members of the universities, and dates at least from the sixteenth century. Among the earliest collections known are those of John Cotton and Hans Sloane in the British Museum, and of Philippe de Bethune, brother of Sully, and Lomenie de Brienne at the Bibliotheque Nationale. The most celebrated collection formed in England in recent years is that of Alfred Morrison.

AUTOMATIC WRITING. See _Psychical Research_; _Spiritualism_.

AUTOM'ATISM, the confinement of activity in men or animals within a purely mechanical limit, resulting from injury to or partial removal of the brain.

AUTOM'ATON (Gr. _automatos_, spontaneous), a self-moving machine performing actions like those of a living being, and often shaped like one. The walking statues of Daedalus, the flying dove of Archytas, the brazen head of Friar Bacon, the iron fly of Regiomontanus, the door-opening figure of Albertus Magnus, the parading knights of the clock presented to Charlemagne by Harun al Rashid, the toy carriage and attendants constructed by Camus for Louis XIV, the flute-player, tambour-player, and duck of Vaucanson, and the writing child of the brothers Droz are among the more noteworthy of traditional automata. See _Conjuring_.

AUTOMOBILE. See _Motor Vehicles_.

AUTON'OMY, the power of a State, institution, &c., to legislate for itself.

AUTOPH'AGI (-j[=i]), birds which feed themselves as soon as hatched.

AU'TOPLASTY, the operation by which wounds and diseased parts are repaired with healthy tissues taken from other parts of the same person's body.

AUTOPLATE. See _Printing_.

AUTOP'SY, literally, personal observation or inspection, commonly restricted to post-mortem examination. See _Coroner_.

AU'TOTYPE, a species of photographic print. A thin sheet of gelatine on paper is rendered sensitive to light by treatment with bichromate of potash, and then exposed under an ordinary photographic negative. The portions of gelatine affected by the light become insoluble, the remainder of the gelatine is then washed away, and the picture remains reproduced in the gelatine, there being slight elevations and depressions corresponding with the distribution of light and shade. This may be printed from, but it is more often made use of to obtain electrotypes or other reverses, from which impressions can more easily be taken.

AUTUMN, the season between summer and winter, in the northern hemisphere often regarded as embracing August, September, and October, or three months about that time. The beginning of the astronomical autumn is 22nd Sept., the autumnal equinox; and the end is 21st Dec., the shortest day. The autumn of the southern hemisphere takes place at the time of the northern spring.

AUTUN ([=o]-t[.u]n; ancient, BIBRACTE, later, AUGUSTODUNUM), a town, South-Eastern France, department of Saone-et-Loire. It has two Roman gates of exquisite workmanship, the ruins of an amphitheatre and of several temples, the cathedral of St. Lazare, a fine Gothic structure of the twelfth century with chapels added in the fifteenth; manufactures of carpets, woollens, cotton, velvet, hosiery, &c. Pop. 15,498.

AUTUNITE, a hydrous phosphate of uranium and calcium, crystallizing in the rhombic system in yellow plates. Like other minerals of the uranium series it shows radio-activity.

AUVERGNE ([=o]-v[=a]r-ny[.e]), a province, Central France, now merged into departments Cantal and Puy-de-Dome, and an arrondissement of Haute-Loire. The Auvergne Mountains, separating the basins of the Allier, Cher, and Creuse from those of the Lot and Dordogne, contain the highest points of Central France: Mount Dor, 6188 feet; Cantal, 6093 feet, and Puy-de-Dome, 4806 feet. The number of extinct volcanoes and general geologic formation make the district one of great scientific interest. The minerals include iron, copper, and lead, and there are warm and cold mineral springs. Auvergne contributes a large supply to the labour markets of Paris and Belgium, there being in Paris alone some 50,000 Auvergnats.

AUXERRE ([=o]-s[=a]r), a town, France, department of Yonne, 110 miles S.E. of Paris. Principal edifices: a fine Gothic cathedral, unfinished; the abbey of St. Germain, with curious crypts; and an old episcopal palace, now the Hotel de Prefecture; it manufactures woollens, hats, casks, leather, earthenware, violin strings, &c.; trade, chiefly in wood and wines, of which the best known is white Chablis. Pop. 21,930.

AUXOM'ETER, an instrument to measure the magnifying powers of an optical apparatus.

AUXONNE ([=o]-son; ancient, AUSSONA), a town, France, department of Cote-d'Or (Burgundy), on the Saone; a fortified place, with some manufactures. Pop. 6300.

A'VA, a town in Asia, formerly the capital of Burma, on the Irawadi, now almost wholly in ruins.

AVA-AVA, ARVA, KAVA, or YAVA (_Macropiper methysticum_), a plant of the nat. ord. Piperaceae (pepper family), so called by the inhabitants of Polynesia, who make an intoxicating drink out of it. Its leaves are chewed with betel, in South-Eastern Asia.

AVAD'AVAT. See _Amadavat_.

AV'ALANCHES, large masses of snow or ice precipitated from the mountains, and distinguished as _wind_ or _dust avalanches_ when they consist of fresh-fallen snow whirled like a dust-storm into the valleys; as _sliding avalanches_ when they consist of great masses of snow sliding down a slope by their own weight; and as _glacier_ or _summer avalanches_ when ice-masses are detached by heat from the high glaciers.

AVAL ISLANDS. Same as _Bahrein Islands_.

AVALLON ([.a]-v[.a]-l[=o]n), a town of Central France, department Yonne. Pop. 5900.

AV'ALON, a sort of fairyland or elysium mentioned in connection with the legends of King Arthur, being his abode after disappearing from the haunts of men: called also _Avilion_. The name is also identified with Glastonbury; and has been given to a peninsula of Newfoundland.

AVAN'TURINE, or AVEN'TURINE, a variety of quartz containing glittering spangles of mica through it; also a sort of artificial gem of similar appearance.

AV'ARS, a nation, probably of Turanian origin, who at an early period may have migrated from the region east of the Tobol in Siberia to that about the Don, the Caspian Sea, and the Volga. A part advanced to the Danube in A.D. 555, and settled in Dacia. They served in Justinian's army, aided the Lombards in destroying the kingdom of the Gepidae, and in the sixth century conquered under their Khan Bajan the region of Pannonia. They then won Dalmatia, pressed into Thuringia and Italy against the Franks and Lombards, and subdued the Slavs dwelling on the Danube, as well as the Bulgarians on the Black Sea. But they were ultimately limited to Pannonia, where they were overcome by Charlemagne, and nearly extirpated by the Slavs of Moravia. After 827 they disappear from history. Traces of their fortified settlements are found, and known as Avarian rings. See _Lesghians_.

AVATAR', more properly AVATARA, in Hindu mythology, an incarnation of the Deity. Of the innumerable avatars the chief are the ten incarnations of Vishnu, who appeared successively as a fish, a tortoise, a boar, a man-lion, a dwarf, &c.

AVATCH'A, a volcano and bay in Kamchatka. The volcano, which is 9000 feet high, was last active in 1855. The town of Petropavlovsk lies in the bay.

AVEBURY ([=a]v'be-ri), a village of England, in Wiltshire, occupying the site of a so-called Druidical temple, which originally consisted of a large outer circle of 100 stones, from 15 to 17 feet in height, and about 40 feet in circumference, surrounded by a broad ditch and lofty rampart, and enclosing two smaller circles. Few traces now remain of the structure. On the neighbouring downs are numerous barrows or tumuli, one of which, called Silbury Hill, rises to the height of 130 feet, with a circumference of 2027 feet at the base, covering fully 5 acres.

AVEBURY, John Lubbock, first Baron. See _Lubbock_.

AVEIRO ([.a]-v[=a]'i-r[u:]), a coast town in Portugal, province of Douro, with a cathedral, an active fishery, and a thriving trade. Pop. 11,523.

AVELLINO ([.a]-vel-l[=e]'n[=o]), a town in Southern Italy, capital of the province of Avellino, 29 miles east of Naples, the seat of a bishop. Avellino nuts were celebrated under the Romans. Pop. 24,620. Area of the province, 1165 sq. miles; pop. 411,813.

A'VE MARI'A ('Hail, Mary'), the first two words of the angel Gabriel's salutation (_Luke_, i, 28), and the beginning of the very common Latin prayer to the Virgin in the Roman Catholic Church. Its lay use was sanctioned at the end of the twelfth century, and a papal edict of 1326 ordains the repetition of the prayer thrice each morning, noon, and evening, the hour being indicated by sound of bells called the Ave Maria or Angelus Domini. The prayers are counted upon the small beads of the rosary, as the pater-nosters are upon the large ones.

AVE'NA. See _Oat_.

AV'ENS, the English name of two rosaceous plants of the genus Geum. Common avens, or herb-bennet, _G. urb[=a]num_, possesses astringent properties, and was formerly used in medicine. The mountain avens, _Dryas octopetala_, belongs to the same nat. ord.

AV'ENTAILE, the movable face-guard of the helmet, through which the wearer breathed.

AV'ENTINE, one of the seven hills of Rome, east of the Tiber. It was included in the city by Servius Tullius.

AVEN'TURINE. See _Avanturine_.

AV'ERAGE, in maritime law, any charge or expense over and above the freight of goods, and payable by their owner.--_General average_ is the sum falling to be paid by the owners of ship, cargo, and freight, in proportion to their several interests, to make good any loss or expense intentionally incurred for the general safety of ship and cargo, e.g. throwing goods overboard, cutting away masts, port dues in cases of distress, &c.--_Particular average_ is the sum falling to be paid for unavoidable loss when the general safety is not in question, and therefore chargeable on the individual owner of the property lost. A policy of insurance generally covers both general and particular average, unless specially excepted.--_Averaging_, in Stock Exchange language, denotes the operation of a speculator in increasing transactions at a higher or lower price when the price is moving against him, so that the average price of the whole will be higher or lower than his original purchase or sale.

AVER'NUS, a lake, now called LAGO D'AVERNO, in Campania, Italy, between the ancient Cumae and Puteoli, about 8 miles from Naples. It is the crater of an old volcano, and is in some places 180 feet deep. Formerly the gloom of its forest surroundings and its mephitic exhalations caused it to be regarded as the entrance to the infernal regions. It was the fabled abode of the Cimmerians, and especially dedicated to Proserpine.