RIPARIAN RIGHTS 



5024 



RIVER 



in a riot. If rioting results in loss of life the 

 penalty is more severe than when it results in 

 destruction of property alone. If the riot is 

 against the government those engaged in it 

 may be convicted of treason. 



Riot Act. The Riot Act was an act passed 

 by the British Parliament during the reign of 

 George I. It was commanded to be read aloud 

 by a justice of the peace or any other author- 

 ized officer of the law, whenever people assem- 

 bled themselves for the purpose of creating a 

 disturbance or committing any other unlawful 

 act. It commanded the people to disperse in 

 the name of the sovereign. In America "to 

 read the riot act" has come to be a slang ex- 

 pression for uttering a severe reprimand. 



RIPARIAN , ri pa ' ri an, RIGHTS . The owner 

 of land bordering on a stream that is not navi- 

 gable owns that portion of the bed of the stream 

 which adjoins his land, as far as the central line 

 or middle of the stream. He is also entitled to 

 his share of the water for such uses as will not 

 impair its availability for any purpose farther 

 down the stream. He is not entitled to all the 

 water, neither can he make such use of the 

 stream as will pollute the water, nor turn it 

 into another channel, if by so doing he will pre- 

 vent those farther down the stream from the 

 natural benefits they would receive from it. 

 These rights are known in law as riparian 

 rights, and the owner is known as a riparian 

 proprietor. The term is derived from the Latin 

 ripa, meaning river bank. The remedy for vio- 

 lation of riparian rights is usually through in- 

 junction (which see). 



RIP VAN WINKLE, wink"l, a famous story 

 by Washington Irving, published in 1819, in the 

 Sketch Book. Rip, the title character, is a 

 lazy, good-natured, intemperate ne'er-do-well, 

 who on one of his hunting trips meets with 

 Henry Hudson and his crew in the forests of 

 the Catskills. He drinks of the liquor with 

 which he is made to serve his companions, and 

 as a result falls into a sleep from which he does 

 not waken for twenty years. Returning then 

 to his home he finds that his scolding wife has 

 died, as have most of his old friends, his daugh- 

 ter has married, and his country, which when 

 he fell asleep was a colony of England, has be- 

 come a republic. The story was dramatized 

 several times before Boueicault, in 1866, pro- 

 duced the more effective version which Joseph 

 Jefferson made famous. 



RISTORI, reestoh're, ADELAIDE (1822-1906), 

 an Italian actress, was born at Cividale. Her 

 parents were strolling players, and she herself 



began while a child to take part in their crude 

 plays. At the age of fourteen she gained a 

 position with a reputable company and w r on 

 fame as Francesca da Rimini in the tragedy of 

 that name. Her next great success came when 

 she was eighteen years old in her acting of 

 Schiller's Mary Stuart. Her beauty and talent 

 had by this time attracted many ardent ad- 

 mirers, and one of these, the Marquis del Grillo, 

 she married in 1847. 



Each year she added to her stage triumphs 

 until, in 1855, she was called to Paris, where she 

 surpassed all her former efforts. Seldom if 

 ever had there been a similar sensation in the 

 theatrical w r orld. The great Rachel, whose 

 equal as an actress many French critics had de- 

 clared could never exist, was playing in the 

 city at the same time, and crowds argued over 

 their respective merits with such anger that 

 many persons came to blows. In 1857 Ristori 

 played in Spanish at Madrid and audiences 

 shouted their admiration. She visited America 

 four times between 1866 and 1885, and retired 

 from the stage in 1888 with the declaration of 

 Italian critics that she was the greatest actress 

 Italy had ever produced. 



RIVER. All the facts associated with the 

 formation of a river and the uniting of streams 

 into a river system may be observed in a road- 

 way after a shower. The drops of water collect 

 into little rills which unite with others to form 

 larger rills, and a number of these unite and 

 form a main stream which carries the water 

 down the embankment. Each tiny stream 

 wears its channel in the soft earth, and the 

 raindrops that flow in one are separated from 

 those flowing in another by a little ridge or a 

 gentle slope whose crest forms a watershed in 

 the miniature landscape. However large a 

 river may be, it has been formed in a manner 

 similar to that of the little stream flowing down 

 the embankment. The only difference is that 

 in case of the river we deal with larger facts. 



A river unsually has its beginning far up in 

 the mountains or hills, with a little spring or a 

 melting glacier for its source. As it flows on, 

 other streams join it and it continues to in- 

 crease in volume. The river wears for itself a 

 channel which is lower than the surrounding 

 country. The bottom of the channel is known 

 as the bed of the stream, and the sides are the 

 banks. The right bank of a river is that on the 

 right hand of the observer when he is facing 

 downstream. A river and all its tributaries 

 constitute a river system. The area drained by 

 a river system is known as the river basin. 



