PARSEES 



4515 



PARSLEY 



Canadian Pacific, which servo it. Population 

 in 1911, 3,429; in 1916, about 6,500. 



One of the chief reasons for the striking in- 

 crease in population is the establishment of a 

 great munitions factory in the town soon after 

 the beginning of the War of the Nations. This 

 plant has about 3,000 employees. In peace 



s Parry Sound is known for its sawmills and 

 planing mills, tannery, smelter and chemical 

 works. The chief varieties of lumber are hem- 

 lock and pine, although several hard woods are 

 used. Wood alcohol is one of the chief arti- 

 cles made. The town owns its electric power 

 and lighting plant and its waterworks and sew- 

 erage system. 



PARSEES, or P ARSIS, pahr'seez, a reli- 

 gious sect of India which takes its name from 

 Pars or Fars, a province in Persia, where it 

 was founded. The parsees are the modern fol- 

 lowers of Zoroaster (which see). They have 

 great veneration for fire, regarding it as the 



lem of purity and good. The invasion of 

 tin Mohammedans in the seventh century 

 drove tin- greater number to the western coast 

 of India, whore they have advanced and pros- 

 pered, but their worship has accommodated 

 itself to Hindu ideas and practices. Bombay 



heir headquarters, and at present they 

 number about 90,000. The small number that 

 remained in Persia were subjected to perse- 

 cution and sank into poverty. They preserved 

 their religion intact, however, and to-day they 

 are respected by Europeans for their honesty 

 and integrity. The Parsees do not marry per- 

 sons not of their caste or creed, nor do they eat 



hing prepared by one of another religion. 

 Among their curious customs is the disposal of 

 their dead in towers of silence (which see), now 

 happily being abandoned through British in- 

 fluence. 



PARSIFAL, pahr'rifahl, a noble and r< h- 

 :;i by Richard Wagner, the 



.'.hied I- founded Upon the legend Of 



In- :l (tee HOI.Y GRAIL). Wagner 



adopted, with M>me changes, tin- VITMOII of the 



poem < ntitled l'< 



en about 1205 by Wolfram von Esch- 

 eh, one of the greatest poets of medieval 

 Germany. Parsifal was presented for the first 

 my, in 1882, its produc- 

 tion elsewhere being forbidden until th, 



ion of the cop < 



1903, it was produced at the Metropolitan Opera 

 -e of New York, for the first time outside 

 of Bayreuth. and now is gi\ 



1 opera organisations in all the 



great cities. Its presentation requires several 

 hours, and it is customary to divide the per- 

 formance into two sections, with an intermis- 

 sion of from one to two hours. This master- 

 piece contains some of the most inspiring music 

 and most beautiful scenic pictures of any of 

 the great composer's works. 



The scene of the drama is in or near the 

 Castle of Monsalvat, Spain, also known as the 

 Castle of the Holy Grail. Parsifal is a young 

 and inexperienced knight who is brought 10 

 the castle by another knight to witness the 

 adoration of the Holy Grail. Unable to un- 

 derstand its sacred character, he is cast out by 

 the other knights. Another important char- 

 acter is Amfortas, formerly a knight of tin- 

 Holy Grail and keeper of the Holy Spear. 

 Amfortas has fallen into the power of a magi- 

 cian, Klingsor, who has wiv.-ted the Spear 

 from him and wounded him with it in the 

 st niggle. The magician uses a beautiful woman, 

 Kundry, to tempt the knights to break their 

 holy vows, but neither she nor Klingsor su 

 in their efforts to lead Parsifal astray. 



This young knight not only inpta- 



tion, but recovers the Holy Spear from Klingsor. 

 He then begins a search for the Castle of tin- 

 Holy Grail. When many years have passed 

 he meets another knight in company with 

 Kundry, who has repented. After baptizing 

 her, Parsifal is led to the ra>tl by the knight. 

 where he heals the wound of Amfortas by 

 touching it with the Spear, and where he is 

 proclaimed king of the knight* of the Holy 

 Grail. 



PARSING, pahr'siny. In the days when 

 every schoolboy studied Latin grammar, school- 

 masters would call for the part of speech of 

 any word by asking "Pars?" this being tin- 

 Latin equivalent of part. Thus it has come 

 that we are said to pam a word in Knglish 

 grammar when we tell the pait of spi di to 

 which it belongs and explain how it is used in 

 the sentence. 



In parsing the noun, for in.-taiice. it is neces- 

 sary to state its classification, win th. r common 

 or proper; its person, number, gender and case; 

 and its construction, or syntax. For examples 

 of parsing, see the articles in these volumes 

 on the parts of speech 



PARSLEY, pahrx'li, a garden herb ailli- 

 d chiefly for its leaves, which have a pleas- 

 :!a\or that makes them popular as a gar- 

 nish or as a seasoning. If porn. pow 

 to maturity the plant will reach a height of 

 three feet and bear small, greenish-yellow fio\\- 



