SGRAFFITO 



SHADOWS 



357 



obtained his investiture as duke, and becoming 

 alarmed at the rapid progress of the French in 

 Italy he joined the league against them, and was 

 rewarded for his perfidy by being driven from his 

 duchy, which was seized by the troops of Louis 

 XII. (1499). The following year he made an 

 ineffectual attempt to regain possession, was made 

 prisoner, and carried to France, where he died in 

 1510. Of great talents, but low morality, he 

 valued astuteness more than everything else ; yet 

 hi- encouragement of letters and of the line arts 

 has preserved his name to posterity. His eldest 

 son, MASSIMILIANO SFORZA (1512-15), regained 

 the duchy of Milan after the reverses suffered by 

 Louis XII., and with the aid of the Swiss steadily 

 repulsed the various energetic attempts of the 

 French to recover it ; but after the battle of 

 Marignano ( 1515) he abandoned his rights to the 

 French for a pension of 30,000 ducats, glad to be 

 free from the insolence and exactions of his allies 

 and the attacks of his enemies. His brother 

 FRANCESCO-MARIA SFORZA succeeded nominally 

 to the Milanese after the battle of Pavia, but he 

 was a mere puppet in the hands of Charles V., and 

 on his death, '21th October 1535, and the extinction 

 of the main line of the House of Sforza, the duchy 

 was quietly swallowed up by Austria. The Dukes 

 of Sforza-Cesarini descend from collateral branches 

 of the family. See Haiti, Delia Fainialia Sforza 

 (1794). 



Sgraffito, or SCRATCHED WORK, is the name 

 given to a mode of external wall-decoration prac- 

 tised in Italy, and of which examples have been 

 found in Pozzuoli near Naples, of the date of about 

 200 B.C. The process is accomplished by means of 

 superimposed layers of plaster applied and operated 

 upon in the following manner. First, the wall 

 having been thoroughly moistened to ensure adhe- 

 sion, a J-inch coat of plaster is floated on, and 

 before it is perfectly dry a |-inch skin of black, 

 red, or any other coloured plaster that will not 

 fade is applied ; when this is set and while it is still 

 wet, a finishing coat of white plaster is added. A 

 full-sized drawing of the design that is to lie realised 

 is then transferred to this outer coating, and the 

 outline cut through to the second coat with a sharp 

 instrument, and made broad or narrow according to 

 the effect desired, and where necessary these in- 

 cisions are enforced by additional lines as shading. 

 The process is an economical mode of obtaining 

 effect, but like ' fresco ' requires to be executed while 

 the material is moist, and therefore no more should 

 be prepared than can ! immediately operated 

 upon. Examples of the system are to be found in 

 the choir boys' school of St Paul's Cathedral, the 

 inner court of the Science Schools at South 

 Kensington, some private residences, and the 

 'interiors of some churches in England. The 

 application of this principle of decoration is not 

 confined to plaster, but extends also to super- 

 imposed metals and to pottery. There are 15th- 

 i-<-ntury specimens of sgraffito pottery in the South 

 Kensington Museum. The examples of house- 

 decoration in Italy are of the 15th, 16th, and 17th 

 centuries. 



Shad (Alauta or Alpta), a genus of fishes of 

 the family Clnpeidir, differing from Clupea (the 

 Herring, &c.) in having the upper jaw deeply 

 notched. The teeth are very small, on the jaws 

 only, and often wanting, at least in the adult fish. 

 The species are numerous, inhabiting the sea, but 

 ascending rivers to spawn. The eggs are small, 

 heavy, and non-adhesive ; but they are not buried, 

 like those of the salmon, in the gravel of the river 

 bottom. Shad are very like herrings in form and 

 appearance, and on this account and their large 

 size the British species receive from Scottish 



fishermen the name of King of the Herrings. The 

 herrings of extraordinary size of which the cap- 

 ture is sometimes reported are probably always 

 shad. The Common Shad or Allice Shad (A. 

 communis) is rather thicker and deeper in propor- 

 tion to its length than the herring. It is found on 

 the British coasts and in the lower part of some of 



Common Shad (Alauta communis). 



the large rivers, more abundantly in the Severn 

 than in any other British river. It attains a 

 length of two or even three feet and a weight of 

 from four to eight pounds. It has no teeth. There 

 is a single black spot In-hind the gills. Its flesh is 

 of good flavour. The Twaite Slim I (A. finta) is 

 more plentiful on the British coasts, and is the 

 common shad of the Thames, but the foul state of 

 the river has now made it of very rare occurrence 

 above London. It is smaller than the Allice shad, 

 seldom exceeding 16 inches in length ; there are 

 small teeth in both jaws, and a row of dusky 

 spots alon" each side of the body. The flesh is 

 coarser and less esteemed than that of the Allice 

 shad, but much used for food wherever the fish is 

 plentiful. This species spawns later in the year 

 than the last, and in order to permit it to deposit 

 its spawn its capture in the Thames is prohibited 

 after the end of June. It abounds in many of the 

 rivers of Fram-e and other parts of Europe. A 

 species of shad (Alosa sapidisxima), generally 

 weighing about four or live pounds, but sometimes 

 twelve pounds, is very abundant during some 

 months of the year in some of the North American 

 rivers, as the Hudson, Delaware, Susquehanna, and 

 St Lawrence, and is now bred successfully and in 

 immense numbers in the United States piscicul- 

 tural establishments. 



Shaddock (Citrus decumanus ; see CITRUS), 

 a tree, which, like the other species of the same 

 genus, is a native of the East Indies, and which 

 has long been cultivated in the south of Europe. 

 It is said to derive its English name from a Captain 

 Shaddock, by whom it was introduced from China 

 into the West Indies about 1810. It is readily 

 distinguished from most of its congeners by its 

 large leaves and broad-winged leaf-stalk ; it has 

 very large white flowers, and the fruit is also 

 very large, sometimes weighing ten or even four- 

 teen pounds, roundish, pale yellow; the rind thick, 

 white and spongy within, bitter; the pulp greenish 

 and watery, siibacid, and subaromatic. It is a 

 pleasant, cooling fruit, and much used for pre- 

 serves. The tree is rather more tender than the 

 orange, but with proper care is often made to 

 produce fine fruit in orangeries in Britain. Finer 

 and smaller than the Shaddock proper is the 

 Pomelo (also called Pummelo, Pomi>elmoo8e, and 

 Grape-fruit), a variety rather larger than an orange 

 which bears its fruit in clusters. Both varieties 

 are grown in Florida, and the pomelo is exported 

 thence to the northern states. 



Shadows, as ordinarily understood, are the 

 result of the interception of rays of light by opaque 

 or semi-opaque substances. Close inspection of 



