DNIESTER 



1825 



DODDER 



through highly cultivated agricultural districts 

 and waters an area of 203,462 square miles. 



DNIESTER, nee'stur, a river rising in the 

 Austrian province of Galicia, flowing from the 

 slopes of the Carpathian Mountains and emp- 

 tying its waters into the Black Sea after a 

 southeasterly course of 850 miles. More than 

 500 miles of its length is in Russian territory, 

 and during recent years the imperial govern- 

 ment has done much to increase commerce by 

 dredging and blasting the river bed. It is now 

 navigable from the Black Sea to Khotin, on 

 the Russian frontier, and its boats carry great 

 quantities of fish, lumber and grain to the 

 sea. It flows through the western end of the 

 great Russian \vheat belt, one of the world's 

 most productive grain centers. 



DOCK, a large herblike plant of the buck- 

 wheat family, very troublesome as a weed 

 throughout the United States. The roots of 

 three species, however, the yellow, the broad- 

 leaved and the yellow-rooted water dock, are 

 used in tonics, as astringents, and especially for 

 skin diseases. About 125,000 pounds of dock 

 roots are imported into the United States each 

 year, the price ranging from two to eight cents 

 per pound. 



The docks grow from two to four feet high 

 and have long, large leaves, usually lance- 

 shaped or heart-shaped, sometimes with very 

 heavy margins. The flowers are small, greenish 

 and inconspicuous. 



DOCK. To say, "He fell off a dock" is no 

 more correct than to say, "He fell off a hole," 

 according to authorities on the usage of words. 

 Yet to most people in America a dock is a 



AT DETROIT, MICHIGAN 

 A type of the ordinary dry-dock. 



wharf, a structure alongside of which boats 

 may be fastened. This local perversion of the 

 word probably arose from the circumstance 

 that in America there are almost no true docks 

 115 



enclosures in which ships may be anchored 

 while in port, the dock being the basin contain- 

 ing the water which floats the ship. In Europe 

 such docks are well known. They are most 

 valuable at shipping points where the tide 

 rises and falls many feet. At Liverpool, for 

 instance, the River Mersey is lined for miles 

 with enclosures whose gates may be closed to 

 retain water for ships when the tide goes out. 



Dry-Docks. When a dock is built so that 

 the water in it can be pumped out, it is called 

 a dry-dock. Ships needing repairs beneath 

 their water-lines may be towed into it and 

 braced in position before the water is with- 

 drawn. Floating dry-docks are steel shells which 

 can be raised or lowered, like a submarine, by 

 pumping water out or in. One may be made 

 to sink until its floor is low enough to permit 

 a ship to enter, and then raised until the ship's 

 keel is out of water. Probably the most 

 famous floating dry-dock is the Dewey, which 

 was constructed in 1905 and successfully towed 

 from Maryland to the Philippine Islands. 



DOCKYARDS , government establishments 

 in which warships are built, repaired and fitted 

 out with all required stores. There are eight 

 of these establishments, officially called navy 

 yards, in the United States. Two are on the 

 Pacific coast, at Puget Sound, Wash., and 

 Mare Island near San Francisco, Cal. The 

 other six are on the Atlantic coast, at Ports- 

 mouth, N. H., Boston, Mass., Brooklyn, N. Y., 

 Washington, D. C., Norfolk, Va., and Phila- 

 delphia, Pa. The principal British dockyards 

 are at Portsmouth, Devonport, Sheerness, 

 Chatham, Queenstown and Pembroke. Canada 

 has well-equipped dockyards at Halifax, Nova 

 Scotia, and Esquimalt, B. C., for the conven- 

 ience of warships of Great Britain. 



DODDER, dod'er, a twinelike parasite plant, 

 native of Europe, but found in June and July 

 in the United States south and west from New 

 York as far .as the Rocky Mountains. It 

 starts from the ground, living on the starch 

 stored in the seed. Then its pale-yellow, fine, 

 leafless stems twine on other plants and hold 

 on by means of rootlets or suckers. It then 

 breaks loose from the soil and feeds on the 

 plant to which it is attached. These thread- 

 like stems form a tangled mass and later pro- 

 duce dense clusters of small white flowers. 



Dodder is very destructive, especially to 

 flax, clover and alfalfa. The best prevention 

 is careful examination of seed before planting. 

 Dodder seed is a little smaller than clover 

 seed and can be screened out if sufficient care 



