RASSAM-RATIOXALISM. 



SI 3 



is made up of shrubs and a few herbaceous, perennial 

 plants, mostly with compound leaves, the fruit being 

 one-seeded, pulpy drupes, which cohere in a head or 

 cluster above the open calyx. The species of Itubus 

 are very variable, there having been more than 500 

 described, though there are probably not over 100 good 

 species. 



The Eastern United States have two very common 

 species, R. striynsits, the red, and R. occidnttn/ix, 

 the black raspberry, which yield favorite fruit in the 

 wild state, and both of which are cultivated. These 

 species have biennial, woody, and prickly stems, the 

 leaves having 3 to 5 leaflets. The red raspberry ex- 

 tends from Newfoundland to Oregon, and southward 

 to the Middle States. It has upright, prickly stems, 

 and propagates itself by underground runners, which 

 send up suckers from which new plants rise. These 

 grow to a height of 5 or 6 feet in one season, bear 

 fruit the next, and then die. This species abounds in 

 the North, particularly on new clearings. Its fruit is 

 of a light red color, and is yielded in profusion all sum- 

 mer. It is nearly, or quite, identical with R. Ida-id, 

 the European garden raspberry. 



The black raspberry is more southerly in its range, 

 and extends as far as Georgia. Its fruit is black in 

 color, ripens in July, and is drier than the red berry. 

 Its mode of growth is different, as it makes no suckers, 

 the new shoots springing from the base of the old 

 plant. Late in summer the branches, which become 

 very long, bend over till their tips touch the ground, 

 when they take root and yield new plants. In cultiva- 

 tion the bending tips are covered lightly with earth. 

 This species, known as black-cap and thimbleberry, is 

 common around old stumps and in fence-corners. 

 When cultivated in deep, loamy soil the fruit increases 

 nearly one-quarter in size. 



There are several interesting American species be- 

 longing to another section of the raspberry group, in 

 which the plants are not prickly, have simple leaves 

 and large flowers, and the fruit is very broad and flat. 

 The most interesting of these is R. odoratux, the 

 rote-flowering, or the Virginia raspberry, as it is called 

 in England. The flower is of a rich, row- purpU color, 

 about 2 inches across : the fruit sometimes an inch 

 broad, dry, but of pleasing flavor. This species is 

 found in rocky places, from Canada to Georgia. Other 

 species are R. ffutkaiua^ the white-flowering rasp- 

 berry of the north east coast* ; R. ileliciosng, the 

 Rocky Mountain raspberry, a species with very large, 

 white flowers, and tVuit of indifferent flavor ; and R. 

 chama-marns, the cloud-berry, a creeping plant of the 

 Arctic regions of Europe and America. 



Of cultivated raspberries, one of the best varieties 

 is tin; Hudson River Antwerp, a red variety of sup- 

 posed European origin, which is grown abundantly 

 along that river, and supplies the New York market. 

 The Philadelphia raspberry is another prolific bearer, 

 not of best quality, yet a profitable variety. Other 

 favorite varieties of the red berry are the Cnthbert and 

 the Hanscll ; of the black, the Gregg, which yields 

 large fruit of excellent flavor and in great quantity. 

 < It' the yellow varieties, the Caroline and Brinckle's 

 Orange rank among the best. In some sections the 

 raspberry is less hardy than the blackberry, and it is 

 best to cover the cultivated varieties for the winter 

 with from 3 to 6 inches of corn-stalks, straw, etc. The 

 fruit of the raspberry is too well known to need re- 

 marks. It forms an excellent dessert fruit, of sub- 

 acid flavor, and is much used in making conserves, jel- 

 lies, and other delicacies for the table and sick-room, 

 and an agreeable summer beverage known as raspberry 

 vinegar. (c. M.) 



RASSAM, HOKHCZD, an Assyrian explorer, was 

 bom in 1820, at Mosul, on the Tigris, opposite the 



and accompanied him to England, where Rassam pur- 

 sued a regular course of study at Oxford. In 1849 he 

 returned to Mesopotamia to prosecute further the ex- 

 cavations at Nineveh, and when Mr. Layard withdrew 

 from the work Mr. Rassam became the superintendent 

 in behalf of the British Museum. After his return to 

 England, in 1854, he was employed by the British 

 government at Aden, and in 1864 he was despatched 

 to Abyssinia to procure the release of Consul Cam- 

 eron. He was, however, himself seized by King Theo- 

 dore, and kept prisoner for nearly two years, until the 

 close of Lord Napier's campaign, in April, 1868. Ras- 

 sam published a Narrative of the British Mission to 

 Theodore, King of Abyssinia (2 vols., 1869). After 

 the death of George Smith, the Chaldsean explorer, 

 Rassam was chosen, in 1876, to succeed him in his 

 work under a liberal finnan obtained from the Turkish 

 government. Among his discoveries were the bronze 

 gates of Balawat, 22 feet high, bearing memorials of 

 the wars of Shalmanezer II., which, with other treas- 

 ures, were safely deposited in the British Museum. 

 Again, in 1878, Rassam was sent to make new explora- 

 tions in other parts of the Turkish dominions in Asia. 

 He was engaged in these archaeological researches until 

 July, 1882, having explored the ruins of Sipar, the 

 Sepharvaiiu of the Bible, and of the Babylonian 

 Certha. 



RAT. The two species of rat most common in the 

 . United States are the brown rat and 

 OOQ , 9fiA black rat described in the ENCYCLOPJE- 

 Am Rep. 1 )'. ' BIA BRITANNICA. The general char- 

 acters of the rats, and the relationship 

 of their genera and specie to each other and to the 

 other rodents, are stated in the same work in the article 

 MOUSE. There are, however, native American species 

 of rat, all of which are sigmodont, rather than strictly 

 murine. in their dentition. The old-world species, and 

 especially the brown rat (miscalled Norway rat), are 

 rapidly displacing the native species. The cotton-rat 

 of the Southern States (Stffnodon }iispidu) is the 

 best known of our native rats. It is smaller than the 

 common brown rat, and much less fierce and aggres- 

 sive. (See COTTON RAT.) The Florida wood-rat 

 (Neotoma jlrridana) is a large and handsome creature, 

 with soft and delicate fur, which ought to have a com- 

 mercial value. The squirrel-tailed wood-rat of the 

 Rocky Mountains is very remarkable for its habit of 

 building a great nest or house of sticks and brush, 

 often in some tree or clump of large shrubs. This 

 creature is a great thief, and is one of the pests of the 

 frontiersman's life, carrying away to its secret stores 

 towels, spoons, knives, soap, or any portable article 

 not too large for it to handle. Its flesh is said to be 

 verv palatable, more so than that of any squirrel or 

 rabbit. Not unfreqnently various species of the mouse 

 kind quarter themselves as guests in the commodious 

 house of this curious wood-rat, where they appear to 

 be well received. South America has quite a number 

 of large rat-like rodents, for the most part little 

 known to science. (c. W. O.) 



RATIONALISM. As intimated in the ENCYCLO- 

 pjEDiA BRITANNICA, this term is capa- 

 I'lc of a Much wider application than is 

 tllere discussed. Lccky, whose Jlis- 

 toi-y of Rationalism in Europe is one 



-. _._ 



O<M / MI' 



Am Rep). 



of the most widely read books of modern times, thui 

 states his own conception of a proper use of the 

 term : '' It [rationalism] leads men on all occasions to 

 subordinate dogmatic theology to the dictates of reason 

 and of conscience, and, as a necessary consequence, 

 greatly to restrict its influence upon life. It predis- 

 poses men in history to attribute all kinds of phenomena 

 to natural rather than miraculous causes ; in theology, 

 to esteem succeeding systems the expression of the 



HUM of Nineveh. He was of native Chaldaean de- , wants and aspirations of that religious sentiment which 

 scent, but his family became connected by marriage i is planted in all men ; and in ethics to regard as duties 

 with that of Rev. George 1'ercy Badger (q. v.). He only those which conscience reveals to be such. " 

 assisted Layard in his explorations of Nineveh in 1845, This will be recognized as a marked departure from 



