Rhea

3981

Rhett

cies, ib only about 36 inches long. It was for-
merly abundant but has been captured so
extensively for its fluffy wing feathers that it
is in danger of being exterminated.

Rhea, or American Ostrich.

Rhea, in ancient Greek mythology, the
daughter of Uranus and Gasa, and the wife
of Cronus, her brother, by whom she was
the mother of Hestia, Demcter, Hera, Hades,
Poseidon, and Zeus. The worship of Rhea
appears to have originated in Crete, where
she seems to have been one of the various
forms of the earth-goddess.

Rhea Sylvia, in ancient Roman legend, the
daughter of Numitor, a descendant of ^Eneas,
and by Mars the mother of Romulus and
Remus.

Rheims, town, department of Marne,
France, which suffered serious havoc during
the Great War (1914-19).Formerly a flour-
ishing town, renowned throughout France
and the world for the beauty of its great
Cathedral, it was reduced practically to a
mass of ruins by the German bombardment.
The Cathedral of Notre Dame at Rheims, be-
gun hi 1212 and completed in the fourteenth
century, was one of the finest specimens of
Gothic architecture in Europe, Industrially
Rheims was an important center for the
manufacture of woollens (especially merino)
and mixed silk and wool fabrics, and as an
entrepot for the wines of Champagne. In
the early days of the Great War (1914-19)
Rheims was in German possession from Sept.
4 to Sept. 12, 1914. During the rest of the
war German efforts to enter it were fruitless,
but it was almost continually under bom-
bardment from Sept. 17-28, 1914, when the
shelling of its great cathedral scandalized
the civilized world. After four years of war
all that remained of that magnificent edifice
were the walls and the series of statues with-
in the west wall. After the cessation of hos-

tilities the Knights of Columbus in the Uni-
ted States raised a large sum for general re-
storation work, and in 1924 John D. Rocke-
feller, Jr. gave 18,500,000 francs for recon-
iiructing the Cathedral roof. The work of
restoring the Cathedral was finally completed
in 1938.

Rheinberger, Joseph Gabriel (18,39-
1901), German musical composer, was a na-
tive of Vaduz, Lichtenstein, Among his
compositions are the operas Die sieben Raben
(1869), Winner's Tockterlein (1873), the
Wallenslein and Florentine Symphonies, and
the oratorio Christ oforus.

Rheostat, a control device consisting of
resistances and contacts, for changing the
value of resistance between given limits. In
use there are two types, the series type and
the parallel type.

Rhesus, a small brown monkey distributed
throughout Northern India. It is partly mi-
gratory and is found in troops at Simla. In
the natural condition the monkeys quickly
learn to come at a call for food, and are fre-
quently attached to temples in Kashmir in a
semi-domestic state.

Rhetoric, the art of public speaking. Its
origin was due to the Sicilian Greeks, Corax
and Tisias, who lived at Syracuse c. 460 BC.
Isocrates had a school attended by most of
the leading men of Greece from 400-350 B'.C.
His own style is the model of nearly all the
best European prose. About 300 B.C. the At-
tic school of rhetoric was superseded by the
Asiatic, marked by its artificiality; in the 2d
century B.C. Rhodes was famous for a rhetor-
ical school which aimed at greater natural-
ness. By the ist century B.C. the importance
of rhetoric as a living study passed to Rome.
From the time of Cicero onward rhetoric sig-
nified the more advanced study of language,
such as would now form part of a university
education. In the middle ages and in more
recent times the study of rhetoric has usually
meant that of literature in general; as a prac-
tical aid to oratory, rhetoric has been disused.

Rhett, Robert Barnweli (1800-76), Am-
erican politician, was born in Beaufort, S. C.
He was a member of Congress during 1837-
49, and succeeded John C. Calhoun in the
Senate in January, 1851. He advocated the
secession of S. C. because of dissatisfaction
over the Compromise of 1850, but, as his
party was defeated, resigned from the Sen-
ate in disgust. For several years he was the
editor of the Charleston Mercury, the most"
heated of the 'fire-eater* organs,