JOHANNESBURG 



3155 



JOHN 



ceived with great enthusiasm. The party vis- 

 ited the Lincoln tomb at Springfield, 111. 



General Joffre's parents were working people 

 at Rivesaltes, in the Eastern Pyrenees. In 

 military school he showed no brilliancy, but 

 was a hard worker. He took part in the de- 

 fense of Paris, in the Franco-German War of 

 1870, when not quite eighteen years old, after- 

 wards entering the corps of engineers as a 

 lieutenant. His rise was gradual, but steady, 

 and was the result of ceaseless labor. He was 

 decorated for service in Formosa in 1885, or- 

 ganized the defenses of Tongking, constructed 

 a railroad in the Sudan in 1892, and aided in 

 the capture of Timbuktu in 1894. In December, 

 1918, he was elected one of the "forty immor- 

 tals" in the French Academy. 



JOHANNESBURG, yo hahn' es burg, the 

 most advanced city of South Africa, situated 

 in the Transvaal province, where it is the cen- 

 tral point of the gold-field district, known as 

 Witwatersrand, and one of the richest in the 

 world. It was founded on a desolate plateau, 

 5,600 feet above sea level, by foreigners who 

 came in search of gold; they left, however, at 

 the outbreak of the Boer War in 1899. The 

 city has prospered and grown remarkably, un- 

 til at present it has a population of nearly 

 240,000, about one-half of which is European. 

 It is a thoroughly up-to-date city in every re- 

 spect, with broad streets lined with fine build- 

 ings, and with street cars and electric lights. 

 The city is connected by railway with Cape 

 Town, Port Elizabeth, Pretoria, Durban and 

 Delagoa Bay. It was the seat of the Uitlander 

 hostility which led to the war with Great Brit- 

 ain, but was captured by the British troops 

 under Lord Roberts in May, 1900. See SOUTH 

 AFRICAN WAR. 



JOHN (about 1167-1216), king of England 

 from 1199 to 1216, remembered principally as 

 the reluctant signer of the famous Magna 

 Charta, the first great document embodying 

 the principles of English liberty. He was the 

 youngest son of Henry II, who called his son 

 Lackland, probably because John was left 

 without a portion when his father divided his 

 dominions among his elder' sons. John was 

 appointed king of Ireland in April, 1185, but 

 ruled so badly that he was recalled six months 

 later. On the death of his brother Richard in 

 1199, John became king, although the French 

 provinces of Anjou, Touraine and Maine de- 

 clared that Arthur of Brittany was the rightful 

 heir to the throne. A war followed, in which 

 John recovered the rebellious provinces. 



A serious quarrel with the Pope began in 

 1205, regarding the election to the see of Can- 

 terbury, to which Stephen Langton had been 

 nominated by the Pope. Innocent III sus- 

 pended the religious privileges of the whole 

 kingdom and in 1211 issued a bull deposing 

 John. Before Philip of France delivered the 

 decree John made abject submission. John's 

 methods of arbitrary rule, constantly growing 

 more unendurable, led to a rising of the nobles 

 of his court, and he was forced to sign the 

 Magna Charta, or Great Charter, June 15, 

 1215. John obtained an edict from the Pope 

 annulling the charter, raised an army of mer- 

 cenaries and commenced war. The crown of 

 England was offered to the dauphin Louis by 

 the despairing barons, and he was received as 

 lawful sovereign in 1216. The outcome was 

 still doubtful when John was taken ill and died. 



Related Subjects. The reader is referred to 

 the following articles in these volumes : 

 England, subtitle Magna Charta 



History Philip II (France) 



Innocent III Richard I 



JOHN, the name of twenty-three Popes of 

 Rome, who ruled between A. D. 523 and 1419. 

 Among them the following are worthy of 

 special notice: 



John I', Pope from 523 to 526, succeeded 

 Hormisdas. He was compelled by Theodoric, 

 king of Italy, to visit the Emperor Justin II, 

 at Constantinople, in regard to an imperial 

 edict against the Arians, an heretical body in 

 the Church. His mission failing in the desired 

 result, he was imprisoned by Theodoric upon 

 his return, and soon died. 



John XII, Pope from 955 to 964, was elected 

 when only eighteen years of age. His name 

 was Octavian and he is credited with being 

 the first Pope to assume a new name at conse- 

 cration. In 962 he crowned Otho I, who, as 

 emperor of the Romans, revived the title borne 

 by Charlemagne (see HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE). 

 Otho deposed John in 963, but the latter re- 

 turned to Rome afterward and displaced Leo 

 VIII, his successor. 



John XIX, Pope from 1024 to 1033, was a 

 Roman of the family of the counts of Tus- 

 culum. He succeeded his brother Benedict 

 VIII. John crowned the Emperor Conrad II 

 in the presence of the English king, Canute. 



John XXII (JACQUES D'EUSE), Pope from 

 1316 to 1334, was a learned theologian, zealous 

 in spreading the faith, and was also skilled in 

 medicine. He excommunicated Louis of Bava- 

 ria, and favored Robert, king of Naples, who, 



