G56 



TRAJAN'S COLUMNTRANSCENDENT. 



the reduction of Armenia to a Roman province was 

 the result. The succeeding Eastern campaigns of 

 Trajan, and the renewal of the war with Parthia, 

 i-.iimot be detailed in summaries of this nature. 

 The year 114 is said to be that in which he dedi- 

 cated the magnificent forum which he built in Rome, 

 and erected the column sculptured with his ex- 

 ploits, which still remains under his name. In a 

 final campaign in the East, after giving a king to 

 the Parthians, he laid siege to Atra, the capital of 

 an Arabian tribe, but was obliged to withdraw to 

 Syria. In the following year, 117, he proposed re- 

 turning into Mesopotamia, but was attacked by a 

 paralytic disorder, attended by a dropsy, which in- 

 duced him to repair to Italy, leaving the army under 

 the command of Adrian. He had proceeded no 

 farther than Selinus, in Cilicia, when he died. The 

 empress Plotina took ad vantage of his last moments 

 to secure the adoption of Adrian for his successor, 

 not without some suspicion of a gross deception. 

 Trajan died in his sixty-fourth year, after a reign 

 of nearly twenty years. As a sovereign, the only 

 blemish in his character was his great passion for 

 war, the extension of empire produced by which 

 the greatest that ever acknowledged Roman sway 

 scarcely lasted longer than his own lifetime. In 

 his private character he was said to be addicted to 

 sensual indulgences, of which a passion for wine 

 was by far the least disgraceful. His good qualities 

 as a ruler, however, were such that, at the distance 

 of two hundred and fifty years from his death, the 

 senators, in their acclamations on the accession of 

 a new emperor, were accustomed to wish that he 

 might be more fortunate than Augustus and better 

 than Trajan. 



TRAJAN'S COLUMN. See Column. 



TRALEE; a market town in the county of 

 Kerry, Munster, Ireland, situated on the river Lee, 

 distant from Dublin, 187 miles. This was the 

 capital and residence of the old earls of Desmond. 

 The town was totally destroyed during the civil 

 wars of 1641, and suffered seriously during the re- 

 volution. A monastery for Dominican friars was 

 founded here, under the invocation of the holy 

 cross, A. D. 1260, by the Lord John Fitz-Thomas, 

 who, with his son, was slain at Callen, by Mac- 

 earthy More, and both were interred on the north 

 side of this friary. It is supposed that there was 

 also a commandery here, belonging to the Knights 

 of St John of Jerusalem. Of the four strong castles 

 of Tralee, which belonged to the Desmonds, only 

 one survives, which is the property of Sir Edward 

 Denny, to whose ancestors it was granted by queen 

 Elizabeth. The name, Tralee, signifies the strand, 

 or estuary of the Lee. The country trade of this 

 place is considerable, and an import and export is 

 conducted at the quay of Blennerville, one mile and 

 a half distant, upon the margin of Tralee Bay. 

 Butter, corn, and agricultural produce, are shipped 

 there for the English market. Coals and manufac- 

 tured goods brought as a return ; and the harbour 

 affords a valuable herring-fishery. An act was 

 passed in the 9th George IV. for the improvement 

 of the harbour and river of Tralee, under which 

 commissioners were appointed with sufficient power 

 to construct a ship-canal from the town to the sen. 

 The population of Tralee is not given in the tables 

 for 1831, but it may be about 8000. 



TR AMONT AN A. The Italians give this name ' 

 to the north wind, because it comes to them over 

 the Alps, and for a similar reason, they call the north 

 or polar star Stella tramontane!. This gave rise to 



the s*y\ng perder la tramontanu applied to one who 

 loses his way a metaphor taken from mariners, 

 who are guided in their course by the pole-star. 

 The phrase has even passed from the Italians to the 

 French (perdre la tramontane), and the Germans 

 (die Tramontane verlieren), though, in its original 

 signification, it has no application to France ;m<l 

 Germany. 



TRANCE ; an ecstasy, a state in which the 

 voluntary functions of the body are suspended, and 

 the soul seems to be rapt into visions. For tlie 

 state of apparent death, which sometimes takes 

 place to such a degree as to have led to the inter- 

 ment of people under the supposition that death 

 had actually taken place, see Asphyxia and Dtmth ; 

 and for the means of restoring suspended animation, 

 see Drowning. 



TRANENT ; the name of a small town and 

 parish in Haddingtonshire, Scotland, the former 

 situated ten miles east from Edinburgh. The 

 parish is five miles in length and 2 in breadth ; 

 the soil is good, and highly cultivated. Besides 

 Tranent, the parish includes the villages of Elphin- 

 stone, Seaton, St Clement's Wells, and Wester 

 Falside, besides the small fishing-towns of Coeken- 

 zie and Port Seaton, situated on the coast of the 

 Frith of Forth, each long the seat of a considerable 

 manufacture of salt, and noted for the numerous 

 oyster-beds in the vicinity. A great abundance of 

 coal is wrought in this parish. At St Clement's 

 Wells there is a large distillery, and a school, sup- 

 ported by voluntary contributions. The battle of 

 Preston Pans, in 1743, was fought half a mile north 

 of the church, in which the remains of Colonel 

 Gardiner, who there received his death-wound, lie 

 buried. Population of parish in 1831, 3620. 



TRANQUEBAR; a seaport of the Carnatic, 

 in Tanjore, fifty-six miles south of Pondicherrv ; 

 Ion. 79* 54' E. ; lat. 1 1 1' N. ; population, 15,000. 

 It belongs to the Danes, having been purchased by 

 them in 1616, and is the seat of a governor, and 

 the capital of the Danish possessions in India. 

 (See East India Companies.} It is situated on the 

 coast of Coromandel, with a harbour at the mouth 

 of one of the branches of the Cauvery, defended 

 by a fortress. The town is between two and three 

 miles in circumference, and surrounded with a wall 

 and several bastions, well provided with artillery. 

 Within the walls are three Christian churches, one 

 Lutheran, one missionary, and one for Roman Catho- 

 lics (descendants of Portuguese who were in pos- 

 session of the town before it was possessed by the 

 Danes), a large mosque for the Mohammedans, and 

 five pagodas for the Hindoos. The fort called 

 Daneborg is kept in neat order. The territory be- 

 longing to the town is considerable (425 square 

 miles, population, 50,000), and is full of populous 

 villages. 



TRANSCENDENT AND TRANSCENDEN- 

 TAL are technical terms in philosophy. According 

 to their etymology (from transcendere~), they signi- 

 fy that which goes beyond a certain limit ; in philo- 

 sophy, that which goes beyond, or transcends, the 

 circle of experience, or of what is perceptible by the 

 senses. Properly speaking, all philosophy is in this 

 sense transcendental, because all philosophical inves- 

 tigations rise above the sensual, even if they start 

 from that which is perceptible by the senses. But 

 philosophical inquiries are to be distinguished accord- 

 ing as they proceed from experience, or from princi- 

 ples and ideas not derived from that source. The lat- 

 ter sort are called, in a narrower sense, pure, or tt on 



