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DAMMAR 



DAMPIER 



Branch of Dammar Pine. 



the same name ( more anciently Tamiathis ) stood 

 more to the south. It was strongly fortified by the 

 Saracens, and formed on that side the bulwark of 

 Egypt against the early crusaders, who, however, 

 succeeded in capturing it more than once. It was 

 razed, and rebuilt farther inland on the site it now 

 occupies, by the Mamluk sultan Beybars. 



Dammar, or DAMMAR PINE (Agathis, Dam- 

 mar a i, a genus of Conifer*, of the family Arau- 

 cariinae, distinguished from Araucaria by its later- 

 ally winged seeds not being adherent to the 

 carpellary leaf. There are four species, all oriental 



or Australasian, of 

 which the most 

 familiar is A. (Dam- 

 mara ) orientalis or 

 alba of the lower 

 mountain-regions of 

 the Malay Archi- 

 pelago, Borneo, and 

 the Philippines, a 

 lofty tree with stout, 

 leathery, lanceolate 

 leaves. The timber 

 is light, but the tree 

 is chiefly valuable 

 for its extraordinary 

 abundance of resin, 

 which is not only 

 obtained in quantity 

 from incisions which 

 are best made in 

 the large knot-like 

 prominences of the 

 lower part of the 

 stem and the root, 

 but which naturally 

 exudes so freely as 

 to form large lumps 

 underground, and 



foot-long icicles or stalactite-like masses hanging 

 from the branches. According to Miguel it even 

 drips from the branches in Sumatra in such quantity 

 as often to form incrustations and rock-like masses 

 on the banks of streams. At first semifluid and of 

 pleasant balsamic odour, it soon hardens into an 

 inodorous transparent mass, of no great hardness, 

 but of glossy appearance and conchoidal fracture. 

 It is soluble in cold ether, and at all temperatures 

 in ethereal and fatty oils ; but not entirely in 

 boiling alcohol. It is of great value in the* pre- 

 paration of transparent and rapidly drying var- 

 nishes. The name signifies in Malay, 'light.' 

 The Kauri Pine (q.v.) of New Zealand is A. aus- 

 tralis. D. ovata of New Caledonia has also similar 

 properties. 



The same name is applied in commerce to the 

 resin of other and unrelated trees. Thus the 

 dammar of shipyards is derived from a species of 

 Canarium, an Amyridaceous tree, while Black 

 Dammar is a kind of pitch derived from the allied 

 Marignia. Shorea robusta, a dipteraceous tree, 

 yields pitch and resin used in Indian dockyards, 

 and sometimes also called dammar. Dammar is 

 also occasionally confused with kinds of copal ; thus 

 the resin of Vateria indica ( Dipteracere ) is some- 

 times known as Dammar or Piny Dammar. It is 

 the source of the Piny Varnish of India. See 

 COPAL. 



Damnatory Clauses* See ATHANASIAN 

 CREED. 



Damocles, one of the courtiers and flatterers 

 of the elder Dionysius, tyrant of Syracuse. Cicero 

 tells how Damocles, having extolled in the highest 

 terms the grandeur and happiness of royalty, was 

 reproved by Dionysius in a singular manner. The 

 sycophant was seated at a table, richly spread and 



surrounded by all the furniture of royalty, but in 

 the midst of his luxurious banquet, on looking 

 upwards, he saw a keen-edged sword suspended 

 over his head by a single horse-hair a sight that 

 at once altered his views of the felicity of kings. 



Damodar, a river of Bengal, rises in the Chutia 

 Nagpur watershed, and after a south-easterly course 

 of 350 miles, enters the Hoogly from the right. 

 The valley of the Damodar abounds in coal and 

 iron ; and some 40,000 tons of coal are brought 

 down yearly in native boats, strengthened to resist 

 the strain caused by frequent grounding on sand- 

 banks. 



Dailioh, a town of India, in the Jabalpur 

 division of the Central Provinces, 50 miles E. of 

 Sagar, with 8800 inhabitants. The district of 

 Damoh lias an area of 2831 sq. in., and a pop. 

 of 325,613. 



Damon and Pythias (more correctly Phin- 

 tias), two noble Pythagoreans of Syracuse, remem- 

 bered as the models of faithful friendship. Pythias 

 having been condemned to death by the elder 

 Dionysius, the tyrant of Syracuse, begged to be 

 allowed to go home, for the purpose of arranging 

 his domestic affairs, Damon pledging his own life 

 for the reappearance of his friend at the time 

 appointed for his doom. Dionysius consented, and 

 Pythias returned just in time to save Damon from 

 death. Struck by so noble an example of mutual 

 affection, the tyrant pardoned Pythias, and desired 

 to be admitted into their sacred fellowship. 



Damper, a door or valve which, by sliding, 

 rising and falling, turning on a hinge, or other- 

 wise, diminishes the aperture of a chimney or air- 

 flue ; this lessens the quantity of air that can pass 

 through a furnace or other fire, and thus ' damps ' 

 or checks the combustion. The damper of a piano- 

 forte is that part of the mechanism which, after a 

 key is struck, and the finger is lifted up from the 

 key, immediately checks or stops the vibration of 

 the string (see PIANO). Damper is also the name 

 given in Australia to a simple kind of unleavened 

 bread formed of wheat-flour. It is made while 

 travelling in the bush, and baked among the ashes 

 of a fire often kindled for the purpose. 



Dampier, the name of several places in Aus- 

 tralasia : ( 1 ) Dampier Archipelago, a cluster of about 

 twenty small rocKy islands off the NW. coast of 

 Australia, in 21 S. lat., and 117 E. long., divided 

 by the Mermaid Strait in two groups ; in the 

 eastern is Rosemary, the largest island. (2) Dam- 

 pier Island, off the NE. coast of New Guinea, with 

 a volcano about 5250 feet high. (3) Dam pier's 

 Land, a peninsula of Western Australia, fertile and 

 well watered, lying between King Sound and the 

 Indian Ocean. (4) Dampier Strait, between New 

 Guinea and the archipelago of New Britain, form- 

 ing, with Goschen Strait to the SE., the shortest 

 route from Eastern Australia to China by some 300 

 miles. (5) Dampier Strait, separating the island of 

 Waygiou from the NW. extremity of New Guinea, 

 the "safest and easiest passage between the Indian 

 and Pacific oceans. 



Dampier, WILLIAM, a celebrated English 

 navigator and hydrographer, Avas born near Yeovil 

 in Somersetshire in 1652. He went early to sea, 

 saw much hard service, and gained a great know- 

 ledge of hydrography in voyages to Newfound- 

 land, Bantam, Jamaica, and tfie Bay of Campeachy. 

 After spending a few years among the lawless log- 

 wood-cutters on the coast of Yucatan, where honest 

 trade was pleasantly varied with private piracy, he 

 joined in 1679 a regular party of buccaneers who 

 crossed the Isthmus of Darien, sacked Santa Marta, 

 and ravaged the coast as far south as the island of 

 Juan Fernandez. In 1683 he engaged in another 



