RIVERS RIZZIO. 



881 



the existence of capacious inland lakes, which are 

 the final receptacles of the streams that fall into 

 them, are the causes why the waters are more 

 equally drained off in different directions than in the 

 New World. 



When water, by following a descent, has once 

 received an impulse, the pressure of the particles 

 behind upon those before will be sufficient to keep 

 the stream in motion, even when there is no longer 

 a declivity in the ground. The only effect is, that 

 in passing along a level, the course of the stream 

 becomes gradually slower an effect which may be 

 perceived, more or less, in all running waters that 

 originate in mountainous or hilly tracts, and after- 

 wards traverse the plains. The declivity of many 

 great rivers is much less than might at first be sup- 

 posed. The Maranon, or Amazons, has a descent 

 of only ten and a half feet in 200 leagues of its 

 course ; that is, one twenty-seventh part of an inch 

 for every thousand feet of that distance. The 

 Loire, in France, between Pouilly and Briare, falls 

 one foot in 7500, but between Briare and Orleans, 

 only one foot in 13,596. Even the rapid Rhine has 

 not a descent of more than four feet in a mile, be- 

 tween Schaffhausen and Strasburg, and of two feet 

 between the latter place and Schenckenschantz. 

 When rivers flow through a mountainous and rug- 

 ged country, they frequently fall over precipices, 

 and form cataracts, in some cases, several hundred 

 feet in depth. The most celebrated falls in the 

 world are those of the Niagara, in North America. 



In the tropical regions, most of the rivers are 

 subject to periodical overflowings of their banks, 

 in consequence of the rains which annually fall in 

 such abundance, in those countries, during the wet 

 season. The overflow of the Nile was considered 

 by the ancients, who were ignorant of its cause, as 

 one of the greatest mysteries of nature ; because, 

 in Egypt, where the overflow takes place, no rain 

 ever falls. The apparent mystery is easily explain- 

 ed, by the circumstance of the rains descending 

 upon the mountains in the interior of Africa, where 

 the Nile rises. The consequent accumulation of 

 the waters among the high grounds, gradually 

 swells the river along its whole extent, and, in 

 about two months from the commencement of the 

 rains, occasions those yearly inundations, without 

 which Egypt would be no better than a desert. 



The disappearance of some rivers, for a certain 

 distance, under ground, is accounted for with equal 

 facility. When a river is impeded in its course by 

 a bank of solid rock, and finds beneath it a bed of 

 a softer soil, the waters wear away the latter, and 

 thus make for themselves a subterraneous passage. 

 In this way are explained the sinking of the Rhone, 

 between Seyssel and L'Ecluse, and the formation, 

 in Virginia, of the magnificent rock bridge which 

 overhangs the course of the Cedar creek. In 

 Spain, the phenomenon exhibited by the Guadiana, 

 which has its waters dispersed in sandy and marshy 

 grounds, whence they afterwards emerge in greater 

 abundance, is to be referred to the absorbing power 

 of the soil. 



Rivers, in their junction with the sea, present 

 several appearances worthy of notice. The oppo- 

 sition which takes place between the tide and their 

 own currents, occasions, in many instances, the col- 

 lection at their mouths of banks of sand or mud, 

 called bars, on account of the obstruction which 

 they offer to navigation. Some streams rush with 

 such force into the sea, that it is possible, for some 

 distance, to distinguish their waters from those of 

 the sea. The shock arising from the collision of 

 the current of the majestic Amazons with the tide 

 of the Atlantic is of the most tremendous descrip- 



tion. (See Mascaret.) Many of the largest rivers 

 mingle with the sea by means of a single outlet, 

 while others (for instance, the Nile, the Ganges, 

 the Volga, the Rhine, and the Orinoco), before their 

 termination, divide into several branches.* This 

 circumstance will depend upon the nature of the 

 soil of the country through which a river runs ; but 

 it also frequently results from the velocity of the 

 stream being so much diminished in its latter stage, 

 that even a slight obstacle in the ground has power 

 to change its course, and a number of channels are 

 thus produced. Another cause may be assigned for 

 the division into branches of those rivers which, in 

 tropical countries, periodically inundate the plains; 

 the superfluous waters which, at those periods . 

 spread over the country, find various outlets, which 

 are afterwards rendered permanent by the deepen- 

 ing of the channels by each successive flood. In 

 some of the sandy plains of the torrid zone, the 

 rivers divide into branches, and, from the nature of 

 the soil and the heat of the climate, they are ab- 

 sorbed and evaporated, and thus never reach the 

 sea. See the articles Amazons, Plata, Mississippi, 

 Missouri, Lawrence, St., Danube, Rhine, Rile, 

 Niger, Ganges, &c. 



RIVOL1 ; a village in the Lombardo- Venetian 

 kingdom, five leagues north-west of Verona, be- 

 tween lake Garda and the right bank of the Adige, 

 near the imperial road leading from Trent to Ve- 

 rona, with 535 inhabitants, famous for a bloody 

 battle between Bonaparate and the Austrians, on 

 January 14 and 15, 1797, which decided the fate 

 of Italy. After the Austrian general Alvinzi had 

 been forced back to Verona, Napoleon turned and 

 followed general Provera, beat him on the 15th at 

 La Favorite, and made 6000 prisoners. On these 

 two days, the French took above 20,000 prisoners 

 and forty-six cannons. Thus the fourth Austrian 

 army in Italy was almost entirely destroyed. The 

 fall of Mantua was a consequence. Massena distin- 

 guished himself greatly on this occasion, and Napo- 

 leon subsequently made him duke of Rivoli. Na- 

 poleon gives a description of the battle in his 

 Metnoires (t. iv., p. 331 et seq.) 



RIVOLI, DUKE OF. See Massena. 



RIX DOLLAR ; a silver coin in different coun- 

 tries on the continent, and of different values. See 

 Coins. 



RIZZIO, OR RICCI, DAVID ; the son of a pro- 

 fessor of music and dancing at Turin, where the 

 subject of this article was born, in the earlier part 

 of the sixteenth century. His musical abilities pro- 

 cured him notice at the court of Savoy, while his 

 talents as a linguist caused him to be selected by 

 the ambassador from the grand-duke to Mary queen 

 of Scots, as a part of his suite. In 1564, he first 

 made his appearance at Holyrood house, where 

 he soon became so great a favourite with the queen, 

 that he was appointed her secretary for foreign 

 languages. (See Mary Stuart.) The distinction 

 with which he was treated by his mistress, soon 

 excited the envy of the nobles, and the jealousy of 

 Darnley ; the hatred of the former being increased 

 as much by the religion as by the arrogant deport- 

 ment of the new favourite, while the suspicions of 

 the latter were excited by his address and accom- 

 plishments. A conspiracy, with the king at its head, 

 was formed for his destruction, and before he had 

 enjoyed two years of court favour, the lord Ruthven, 

 and others of his party, were introduced by Darnley 

 into the queen's apartment, where they despatched 



* The triangular space formed by a river pouring itself into 

 the sea by various mouths, is called a Delta, from its resein- 

 blanre to the shape of the fourth letter (A) of the Greek 

 alphabet. 



3 K 



