PICTURE 



Uu 



U is the twenty-first letter of the English alphabet. There was 

 no such letter in the Phoenician alphabet, but when the Greeks took 

 up the system they added a letter which was called upsilon and was 

 pronounced like the English oo. It was written at first either like a 

 capital V or a capital Y, but gradually the latter came to be used 

 almost exclusively by the Greeks, while the Romans used the V. 



The sound in Greek also changed by degrees to one that resembled the French u, and is 

 more like a long e than like anything else in English; and the Romans took over the Y 

 form to represent this new sound. The V in Latin had usually the vowel sound, but at the 

 beginning of words it had a consonant force, like the English W, and in time the rounded 

 form V came to represent the vowel sound, while the angular form stood for the consonant. 

 In English, when the V sound was introduced, a new letter was necessary, and W was added. 

 In most modern languages long u has the oo sound, but in English this is preceded by a 

 distinct y sound yoo, as in use. This is much more pronounced after some consonants, as 

 k, p, b, m, j, than after others, and in the case of r the y sound practically disappears, rule 

 commonly being pronounced as rool. A short oo sound appears in such words as pull; the 

 regular short u sound in but, and the so-called circumflex sound in burn. Occasionally u has 

 the sound of short i, as in busy, or a short e sound, as in bury. It is always used after q, 

 where it has the force of a w, and in some words is silent, serving merely to give the hard 

 sound to the consonant which precedes it, as in plague. 



UDALL, u'dal, NICHOLAS (1506-1556), an 

 English schoolmaster and playwright, whom it 

 is essential to remember chiefly as the author 

 of the earliest English comedy, Ralph Roister 

 Doister. He was born in Hampshire, studied 

 at Corpus Christi College, Oxford, was head 

 master of Eton from 1534 until 1541, and head 

 master at Westminster School about 1554-1556. 

 For a time he maintained himself by making 

 translations into English chiefly from the 

 Latin such as the works qf Terence and the 

 Apophthegms of Erasmus. However, his fame 

 for posterity rests chiefly upon Ralph Roister 

 Doister. It was published in 1566, but must 

 have been written considerably earlier; the 

 exact date has not been determined. The chief 

 and title character of the comedy resembles 

 the Miles Gloriosus of Plautus the boasting 

 soldier finally shown up as a coward. The hu- 

 mor is original and spontaneous, and the play 

 is interesting in itself, aside from its historical 

 interest as the first English comedy. 



UFFIZI, oojeet'se, PALACE, a famous 

 building in Florence, noted for its wonderful 

 gallery of painting and sculpture. Originally it 

 was a government office of the grand dukes of 

 Tuscany, and in it was housed a part of the art 

 collection of the Medici family (see MEDICI). 

 In 1737 this collection was given to the state. 

 It is one of the most extensive and valuable in 

 the world, containing the famous statue of 

 Niobe, the Boy Drawing Out a Thorn, the 

 Venus de' Medici, and other pieces of ancient 

 statuary, as well as splendid examples of all the 

 great Italian r artists and many of other na- 

 tionalities. The Pitti Palace, which contains 

 another famous collection, is connected with 

 the Uffizi by a passageway. 



UGANDA, oogahn'dah, a British protector- 

 ate in the eastern part of Africa (see PROTECTOR- 

 ATE). It is a political division of British East 

 Africa, and consists of the native kingdom of 

 Uganda and several adjacent states, the total 

 area being 109,119 square miles, about equal to 



5934 



