ZEPHANIAH 



6411 



ZINC 



descendants were prominent figures in the so- 

 ciety of the capital for two hundred y< 

 Palmyra, having revolted a second time against 

 Aurelian, was destroyed by fire, and was never 

 restored. See PALMYRA. 



ZEPHANIAH, zefani'ah, a Hebrew prophet 

 whose name has been given to the ninth book 

 of the Minor Prophets. Presumably he lived 

 :iiul wrote during the reign of Josiah in Judah, 

 but not even that much can be told of him 

 with certainty. His little book, containing only 

 three chapters in all, pronounces a doom on the 

 world, and especiallj' on Judah, for its idolatry. 

 but closes with a more cheerful strain as the 

 author sees beyond the punishment the happy 

 state of those who have been purified and re- 

 united with God. 



ZEPPELIN, tsepeleen', FERDINAND, Count 

 von (183&-1917), a German inventor, one of the 

 foremost aeronauts of the world at the 'begin- 

 ning of the twentieth century, w r as born at 

 Constance, Baden. After serving as an officer 

 of cavalry in the Franco-German war, he was 

 promoted to the rank of lieutenant-general and 

 was joined to the suite of the king of Wiirt- 

 tt| II- early experiments with a diri- 

 gible balloon were successful, and in 1892 ho 

 made his first safe flight from Bern to Lu- 

 cerne. The Zeppelin airship, in several models 

 differing but slightly, has been used extensively 

 for passenger service since 1910. Repeated 

 riments further perfected Zeppelin's skill, 

 .mil in 1913 the seventeenth airship he had con- 

 alled the Saxon, made a trip from 

 n-Baden to Vienna in about half the time 

 ! quired for the journey by train. The Saxon, 

 carrying twenty-four passengers, covered a di>- 

 tance of 435 miles in eight hours. The Zeppe- 

 lin L-ll was constructed with the purpose of . 

 making an attempt to cross the ocean from 

 I.urope to America. On October 17, 1913, it 

 was destroyed by an explosion in mid-air, en- 

 tailing the loss of the ship's entire company, 

 y-eight men. 



Upon the Zeppelin airship the Germain. 

 powers expected to accomplish great n< 



: prise* in the War of the Nations, in long- 

 distance trips to enemy countries on bombing 

 expeditions and as naval scouts and com 

 While many of these expectations were real- 

 ized, it was apparent late in 1916 that small* r. 

 fleeter aircraft of the monoplane and biplane 

 were better adapted to almost all kinds of 

 i Rod inventor died in th.- 

 knowledge that successful conquest with his 

 m:ir\ el<>u invention was impoesil 



For extended description of Count Zeppelin's 

 invention, see FLYING MACHINE, pages 2239-2240. 

 Consult Hearne's Zeppelins and Super-Zeppelins. 



ZE'RO, as used by the mathematician, 

 represents nothing considered as a quantity. It 

 denotes, in other words, the entire absence of 

 a given quantity and is indicated by the sym- 

 bol 0. In measurements, the zero of a scale is 

 the starting point from which measurements 

 are made. The zero found on the scale of the 

 thermometer, it should be noted, is a little mis- 

 leading. One might suppose that a body hav- 

 ing temperature had no heat; but such is not 

 the case. Zero on the centigrade thermometer 

 marks the freezing point of water, but scientists 

 believe, from experiments conducted with gases, 

 that a body absolutely without heat would 1. 

 a temperature of about 273 below on the 

 centigrade scale. 



ZEUS, zuse. See JUPITER. 



ZEUXIS, zuke'sis, a celebrated Greek painter 

 who flourished from about 420 B.C. to near tin- 

 end of the century. He was born at Heraclea, 

 and but little is known of his life. He e\e lied 

 in the management of light and shade, and hi> 

 art brought him great wealth as well as fame. 

 So conscious was he of the value of his pic- 

 tures that he preferred to present them t. 

 cities expressing a desire for them, as he be- 

 lieved that no money could adequately pay for 

 them. Among the most famous of his \v 

 are Zeus Enthroned; Helen, painted for tin 

 city of Crotona; The Infant //irrn/.< Stran- 

 gling the Serpents, and Pan. Zeuxis lived at tin- 

 same time as a rival artist, Parrhasius (which 

 see). 



ZINC, zink, or SPELTER, a white metal 

 with a bluish-gray tint. In appearance zinc 

 resembles lead, but it is much harder. It is 

 seven times heavier than water, and is so hard 

 that a file acts upon it with difficulty. How- 

 ever, if heated to 250 or 300 it softens and 

 can be rolled into thin sheets or drawn into 

 wire. It melts at 773. When slowly cooled it 

 crystallizes in four- or six-sided prisms. When 

 ed to a high temperature in air it burns 

 with a white linhi. forming a white j>< 

 zinc 



Xinc always occurs in ore- The most impor- 

 tant ores include the sulphide, or */ 

 the carbonate, or tmiihtonitc ; the hydrate sili- 

 cate, or calamine; the oxide, or zincilc. Sphal- 

 . or zinc blend, is the ore from v 

 <r part of the zinc of commerce is ob- 

 1 Xinc ores are found in most of th. 

 count n. of Europe, in Missouri, Kansas, N 



