m 



ORTZA. 



in 



arim roiled tbemnelvm of thui noUUon, when dealing with unwritten 

 languages, or with thoae whose alphabet* differ wholly or widely from 

 all that u familiar to European*. Further, it may be conoaded that 

 the acquisition of the English language itself by young children would 

 be greatly facilitated by the uae o? school-books on the " Konetik " 

 jnstem a* (topping-atone* to our ordinary form of printing. No doubt 

 it is some alight evil that the strict reduction of our written sign* to 

 harmony with (poken language would involve a sacrifice of much that 

 is valuable for etymological guidance. But any Ion on this side would 

 be more than compensated by the increased facilities for attaining the 

 language. The valid objection to the proposal is, the utter impossi- 

 bility of effecting ao extensive a revolution. It is most true, and it is 

 also a aerioua evil, that our mode of (veiling is ao anomalous and 

 ineonaiaient; yet the words are in reality very few of which the 

 orthography may not be said to be now ntablMed by the great Jiu el 

 Norma Loquauli custom. We take the following from a modern 

 grammar, as being those which, in the opinion of the writer, are most 

 frequently found with orthographical varieties : 



honour honor 



inquirer 



negotiate 



control 



expense 



allege 



complete 



connexion 



abridgment 



surprise 



enquirer 



nepociato 



controul 



expcnce 



alledge 



coin pi eat 



connection 



abridgement 



surprize 



Of course some of these represent classes. But what are these to 

 the great body of such a language as ours f And with respect to the 

 first and to the lost, each of which represents a large family of words, 

 we would submit that very few persons indeed who were entitled to a 

 voice in a question of this kind would be found writing honor; and 

 that there is a general rule respecting words in ur or i:e. The rule is 

 this : when the word is a derivative of the French prtndrt, as is the 

 case with lurpriK, enterprise, and one or two others, to write it with 

 the ite ; but when it comes to us from the Greek, as in agonize, and 

 other words, to keep the Greek termination i(a A nglict, ize. 



ORUS, or HORUS, an Egyptian deity, the son of Isis and Osiris, 

 corresponds, according to Herodotus, to the Apollo of the Greeks, and 

 was the last of the gods who reigned in Egypt. (Herod., ii. 144; 

 Diod., i. 44.) Typhon, after the murder of his brother Osiris, sought 

 to kill Orus ; but his mother Isis, according to Herodotus (ii. 156), 

 committed him to the care of Leto, who brought him up in the moving 

 island uf Chemmis, which was in the lake Buto. The Egyptian priests, 

 however, in this instance, as well as in many others, appear to have 

 been anxious to assimilate the history of their deities as much as 

 possible to that of the Greeks. Orus, from the death of Osiris stood 

 forth as the avenger of his father ; and when he had grown up, he 

 made war upon Typhon, whom he defeated in several battles, deprived 

 of the kingdom of Egypt, and, according to some accounts, put to 

 death. (Diod., i. 25 ; Herod., ii. 144 ; Plutarch, ' De Is. et Osir.,' p. 

 858, Francfort, 1620.) 



According to Diodorus (i. 25), Orus was killed by the Titans, and 

 restored to life by his mother Isis, who conferred upon him immortality, 

 and taught him divination and the healing art ; a fable which Wilkinson 

 thinks " explained by the historical fact of the priesthood of different 

 gods having ruled Egypt before the monarchical form of government 

 was established in the person of Menes and his successors." (Wilkin- 

 son, 'Ancient Egyptians,' iv. 397.) Little reliance, however, as he 

 odds, is to be placed on what the Greeks relate of the deities of 

 Egypt. 



Orus is frequently represented as sitting in the lap of Isis, but more 

 commonly standing in a boat along with other deities, and piercing the 

 evil being, Typhon, who is in the water, either in the form of a man, 

 or of a long serpent. Orus appears also to be represented in some 

 bronzes in the British Museum, which depict a man trampling on the 

 crocodile, since we know that the crocodile was one of the symbols of 

 Typhon. The symbol of Orus is a hawk, who, sometimes in later 

 works, is figured perched on an oryx : and the god himself is represented 

 with the head of a hawk crowned with the pshent, or double crown of 

 Upper and Lower Egypt. (Wilkinson, iv. c. 18 j ' Egyptian Anti- 

 quities,' vol. ii. p. 306.) 



ORYZA, the name by which rice was known to the Greeks and 

 Romans, and which bos been adopted by botanists as the generic 

 name of the plant yielding that valuable grain. [OBY/A, in NAT. 

 HIST. Drv.J 



The rice plant is undoubtedly a native of India, from which country 

 it has spread over a great part of the world, especially in Asia, where 

 it forms the princi|l portion of the food of the inhabitants, but it 

 has also from very early times been introduced into the southern parts 

 <>f Europe. Theophnutus describes it in book iv. c. 5, with otli.T 

 Indian plants, and mentions it as growing in water, and that its inflo- 

 rescence is like that of milium or panicum, and not in form of a spike. 

 Rice is now extensively cultivated in North and South Carolina, and 

 in Georgia; also in Italy and the south of Spain, and likewise a little in 

 Germany. The perfect system of irrigation and tillage which was 



introduced into Italy at so early a period no doubt rendered the 

 cultivation easy, as the climate is also sufficiently hot and regular. 



As the summer temperature of many countries is high, it is easy 

 to cultivate an annual like rice where water is abundant and irrigation 

 easy ; but as the summer temperature of most European countries is 

 too low, and not long enough continued, and far from regular, it is 

 hopeless to attempt the culture of a grain which requires so much 

 heat, and which lias the disadvantage, from the moisture arising from 

 irrigation, of making a country unhealthy ; but this is not the case 

 in the rainy season of tropical countries, where the rice-field is not 

 much more moist than the rest of the country. Its culture has been 

 attempted in England, and a small crop was raised near Windsor, on 

 the banks of the Thames. It has been hoped that the mountain 

 rice, which is known to grow at considerable elevations in the Hima- 

 layan Mountains, might be suited to an English climate. This variety 

 certainly requires a less degree of heat, but it seems to be forgotten 

 that temperature is only one of the elements of climate, and that 

 moisture may be supplied to a plant either by the soil or the atmos- 

 phere, and the latter may be moist when the former is comparatively 

 dry. Rice is sown in the Himalayas only in places within the influence 

 of the periodical rains, that is, from about the middle of June to the 

 end of September. In some places it is irrigated, and in others it is 

 not, but rain falls very frequently, and the air is almost always in a 

 moist state, from being charged with moisture from the heated volleys, 

 which is deposited on the mountains, when it reaches an elevation 

 where it becomes cooled beyond the point of saturation. The tempe- 

 rature also is so uniform as not to vary 10 of Fahr. from 70* for three 

 months. So in the Isle of France the mountain rice is cultivated only 

 in the rainy season. 



The rice so extensively cultivated throughout India (and the cultiva- 

 tion in China, as described by Sir G. Staunton, is very similar) depends 

 upon rain or irrigation either from rivers or tanks. These Captain B. 

 Hall (' Frag, of Voyages,' vol. iii. p. 83) describes in one situation, near 

 Nundydroog, as spread over a valley, which was from six to eight miles 

 across, and that they were used for irrigating myriads of rice-fields. 

 The embankments are sometimes miles in length, and then of a waving 

 snake-like shape. One valley was pointed out to Captain Hall, about a 

 mile broad and forty miles long from end to end, which included 

 between thirty and forty tanks, every intermediate square yard of the 

 intermediate spaces being richly cultivated, while the surrounding 

 country appeared to be condemned to perennial sterility. 



Dr. Roxburgh states that he never saw or heard of an Indian farmer 

 manuring in the smallest degree a rice-field ; yet these fields have pro- 

 bably for thousands of years continued to yield annually a large crop 

 of rice, on an average from thirty to sixty fold ; even eighty or a 

 hundred has been known. The best rice-fields are extensive open 

 plains through which large rivers pass. The soil U generally of good 

 depth ; the best are those annually overflowed by the inundations, 

 from which they necessarily receive some fertilising matter ; but the 

 greatest part of the rice lands depend on the rains only, and receive no 

 help except from it and the air. The varieties of rice are innumerable ; 

 forty or fifty at least are described. They are divided by Dr. Rox- 

 burgh into two kinds : one, called in Telinga, Patinas, Sans., Aioo, is 

 sown thick in June or July, and transplanted in about forty days, when 

 the plants are about nine to eighteen inches high ; the fields are then 

 kept constantly wet ; more or less flooded, as some sorts require \ vry 

 little water, while others require a great deal. When the grain is ripe, 

 the water is drained off, and the crop cut down with the sickle ; it is 

 either stacked or trod out by cattle. The grain is preserved in pits 

 dug in high ground and lined with the rice straw. The straw is 

 stacked by the careful farmer for feeding his cattle during the hot 

 weather. 



The second division of cultivated rice is called Pokier Worloo by the 

 Telingas. The grains are awnless, and both the unhusked and husked 

 rice, in most varieties, is white and of excellent quality, though 

 some require much water. In other parts of the country rice is 

 divided, according to the seasons in which it is reaped, into that 

 which ripens in the hot weather of spring, in the summer, or in the 

 winter. 



Buchanan states that two crops in the year from the same laud do 

 not yield much more than a single good crop would. But the seasons 

 are so uncertain, and the latter crop so liable to fail, that they 

 cultivate as much as possible for the first crop. This is reaped 

 in the rainy season, when the straw cannot be preserved, and as 

 rice-straw is almost the only food which the cattle have in many 

 districts, there is an absolute necessity for sowing the second crop 

 for fodder. 



Rice is no doubt the grain which yields food for the largest portion 

 of the human race, but even in India great numbers do not eat rice; 

 in fact, in all the north-western provinces wheat is the principal IT<>|>, 

 .mil tin' natives eat wheaten cakes, and have rather a contempt for 

 rice-eating districts. It abounds, however, in nourishment, being com- 

 posed almost entirely of fecula, that is, U(J per cent., and therefore 

 cannot be baked into bread ; but it is more easily cooked. It is light 

 and wholesome, and easily digested, and might form a much larger 

 portion of the diet ill Europe than it does. Europeans in India cat 

 it at breakfast as well as at other meals, and with iinh an frequently as 

 with their curries. 



