DE GROOT 



1742 



DELAGOA BAY 



In Education. One who has completed a 

 course of instruction in an institution of learn- 

 ing is usually granted a title called a degree. 

 In general, these academic degrees indicate 

 how long and what their holders have studied, 

 but the significance of each title varies widely 

 between countries and between schools in the 

 same country. Some degrees, like Doctor of 

 Laws, are often given by universities in honor 

 of success in other lines than learning. The 

 most common degrees will be found listed in 

 the article ABBREVIATIONS, in Volume I. 



DE GROOT, degrote', HUGO. See GROTIUS, 

 HUGO. 



DEKALB, ILL., a city in De Kalb County, 

 in the north-central part of the state, the seat 

 of the Northern Illinois State Normal and 

 Training School. It is fifty-eight miles west 

 of Chicago and seventy miles east of Clinton, 

 la., and is on the Chicago & North Western 

 and the Chicago & Great Western railroads 

 and an electric railway. The city has an area 

 of two sqqare miles. It was settled about 

 1838 and bore the name of Buena Vista until 

 1840. In 1861 it was incorporated and in 

 1877 was granted a city charter. The popula- 

 tion, largely American, but containing also 

 Swedish, Lithuanians, Finnish and English, in 

 1910 was 8,102; in 1916 it was 9,482. 



The building of the State Normal School was 

 completed in 1897 at a cost of $245,000. The 

 Training School building, added in 1907-1908, 

 cost $74,000, and the dormitory, built in 1914- 

 1915, cost $114,000. Besides two small parks, 

 the city maintains two public playgrounds. 

 DeKalb is called the Barb City, referring to 

 barbed wire, the chief manufactured product. 

 The important industrial plants include wire- 

 drawing and woven-wire mills, agricultural im- 

 plement works, and manufactories of pianos, 

 shoes, gloves, mittens, nails and creamery- 

 packages. An engagement of the Black Hawk 

 War took place at DeKalb, and after the 

 battle a conference was held there by Lincoln, 

 Jefferson Davis and Zachary Taylor. G.N.B. 



DEKALB, JOHANN, Baron (1721-1780), a 

 German-American soldier who won distinction 

 in the Revolutionary War. He was born at 

 Hiittendorf, in Bavaria. His name was simply 

 JOHANN KALB, the "Baron" being self-styled. 

 In 1743 he entered the French army and was 

 promoted rapidly, becoming brigadier-general 

 in 1761. In 1777 DeKalb came to America 

 with Lafayette and during the same year was 

 appointed a major-general by Congress. He 

 served with credit in the armies of Washing- 



BARON DE KALB 



ton in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, was sec- 

 ond in command 

 under General 

 Gates in the 

 Carolinas and led 

 the American 

 forces at Cam- 

 den. In the lat- 

 t e r engagement 

 he was wounded 

 eleven times, 

 which resulted in 

 his death a few 

 days later. In 

 1825 Lafayette 

 laid the corner- 

 stone of a monument to De Kalb at Camden, 

 and in Annapolis, in 1887, a statue of 'him was 

 dedicated. 



DEKO'VEN, REGINALD (1861- ), a lead- 

 ing American composer, whose melodious and 

 picturesque opera, Robin Hood, produced in 

 1890, was the first work by an American 

 composer to take rank among standard light 

 operas. He has also composed numerous at- 

 tractive songs, his Promise Me being a uni- 

 versal favorite. De Koven was born in Mid- 

 dletown, Conn., and was graduated at Saint 

 John's College, Oxford University, England. 

 He studied music in Stuttgart, Florence, Paris 

 and Vienna. His successful opera, The Begum, 

 produced in 1887, was the first of a notable list 

 that includes, besides Robin Hood, The Alger- 

 ian, Rob Roy, The Mandarin, Red Feather 

 and many others, all of which are characterized 

 by refinement of melody, richness of harmony 

 and skill in construction. Margery Daw, A 

 Winter Lullaby, Indian Love Song and Ask 

 What Thou Wilt are among his best songs. 

 De Koven has acted as music critic for several 

 New York publications, and was the founder 

 of the Washington Symphony Orchestra. His 

 wife, Anna Farwell De Koven, is the author 

 of an excellent biography of John Paul Jones. 



DELAGO'A BAY, an inlet of the Indian 

 Ocean indenting the coast of Portuguese East 

 Africa. The southern portion of the bay is 

 protected from the rolling waters of the ocean 

 by the Inyack peninsula and island. At the 

 head of the bay stands Lourengo Marques, an 

 important port with excellent harborage. The 

 bay has been well dredged and vessels of the 

 largest size can lie alongside the docks. Since 

 the opening of a railway in 1895 from Lour- 

 engo Marques to Pretoria, capital of the Trans- 

 vaal, the commercial importance of Delagoa 



