108 R I 0 • 
To wash the soap out of clothes. 
They cannot boil, nor wash, nor rinse, they say, 
With water sometimes ink, and sometimes whey, 
According as you meet with mud or clay. King. 
RI'NSER, s. One that washes or rinses; a washer. 
RINTELN, a town of Germany, and the capital of that 
part of the county of Schaumberg which belongs to Hesse- 
Cassel. It is situated on the Weser, over which there is a 
bridge of boats. It had formerly a small university, the 
place of which is now supplied by a gymnasium or high 
school, erected in 1816. The population is 2700, all Pro¬ 
testants; 30 miles west-south-west of Hanover, and 10 south¬ 
east of Minden. 
RIN1IMFORE See Rantampore. 
RINUCCIN1 (Ottavio), an Italian poet, and native of 
Florence, is entitled to commemoration as the inventor of the 
musical drama termed opera. Some attempts had been 
made before his time to introduce music into dramatic action, 
but Rinuceini was the first who gave a proper form to com¬ 
positions of this kind. His “ Dafne,” set to music by 
Jacopo Peri, was represented in the house of Jacopo or 
Giacomo Corsi, a gentleman of Florence skilled in music and 
polite literature, and who had been consulted in the plan of 
this new species of composition. According to Pc-ri, this 
representation took place in 1594; and it was so well received 
that it was followed by our author's “Euridice,” exhibited at 
Florence in 1600 at the nuptials of Henry IV. with Mary de 
Medicis, and his “ Arianna,” performed in 1608, at Florence 
and Mantua, on occasion of the marriages of Francesco 
Gonzaga, son of Duke Vincenzo, and Cosmo de’ Medici, son 
of the Grand Duke Ferdinand. Rinuceini, who was a hand¬ 
some, polite, and eloquent man, was a great admirer, 
and even presumed to be a lover, of Queen Maryde Medicis, 
whom he accompanied to France, where he was appointed 
gentleman of the bed-chamber to King Henry. On return¬ 
ing to Italy, he became serious, and passed his latter years in 
pious exercises. He died at Florence in 1621, and in the 
following year his Poems, dedicated by himself to Louis 
XIII., were published by his son Pier-Francesco. He was 
one of the most elegant writers of poems for music; and 
especially in his Anacreontic songs, he was one of the first 
who approached the grace and amenity of the Greek bard. 
Tirabpschi. 
R1NVILL POINT, a cape of Ireland, on the west coast 
of the county of Galway. Lat. 53. 36. N. long. 9. 58. E. 
RIO, a town of Tuscany, in the island of Elba, near Porto 
Longone. It contains 1800 inhabitants. 
RIO DE LOS ANZUELOS, a river of Mexico, which 
runs into the Spanish Main, north lat. 11° 10'.—Rio dos 
Apostolos, a river of North America, which runs into the 
northern part of the gulf of California. 
RIO DE BOGOTA, a river of New Granada, which 
collects all the waters of the vaBey of Bogota, the bottom of 
which valley, according to Humboldt, is no less than 7460 
feet above the level of the sea, and finds its way through the 
mountains to the south-west of the town of Santa Fe. The 
perfect level of the plain, its geological structure, and the 
form of the rocks, which resemble small islands in the 
middle of the Savannahs, appeared to M. Humboldt to indi¬ 
cate the existence of an ancient lake. If the single outlet 
of the river were to be stopt, the valley would again be con¬ 
verted into a lake. The river, where it leaves the valley, is 
about 144 feet wide, half the breadth nearly of the Seine at 
Paris, between the Louvre and the Palace of the Arts. It 
then enters into a narrow rocky channel, not more than 40 
test wide, which appears, says the same intelligent and in¬ 
structive traveller, to have been formed by an earthquake. 
After running for a little way in this crevice, the river preci¬ 
pitates itself, at two bounds, to the depth of 574 feet. After 
this tremendous fall, it pursues its way to the Magdalena, 
about 50 miles, still descending with great rapidity, and at 
the rate of 150 feet to a mile. Although this is not the 
greatest fall in the globe, there is not probably any which 
R 1 O 
from so great a height, precipitates so large a body of wafer. 
Bouguermakes the height between 1500 and 2000 feet; 
but he speaks only from the information of others who had 
seen the fall, and pointed out to him such heights as they 
thought might be nearly equal to it. The accompaniments 
of this waterfall, upon which the effect so much depends, 
are an assemblage of every thing that is sublime, beautiful, 
and picturesque. Independent, says M. Humboldt, of 
the height and the size of the column of water, the figure of 
the landscape, and the aspect of the rocks; the peculiar 
character stamped on these great scenes of nature is owing' 
to the luxuriant form of the trees and herbaceous plants, 
their distribution into groups, or into scattered thickets, the 
extent of the craggy precipice, and the freshness of vegeta¬ 
tion. Another feature in the character of this extraordi¬ 
nary cataract is probably quite peculiar to it:—the water 
descends from a cold region to a warm one. The plain of 
Bogota, especially near the fall, is extremely fertile, and is 
supposed to owe some of its fruitfulness to the irrigation oc¬ 
casioned by the great quantity of water from the tall, which 
is dissolved in the air, and afterwards precipitated. The 
fine crops of wheat, the oak, the elm, and other plants, 
recall to mind the vegetation of Europe. Looking down 
from this terrace, one sees, with surprise, at the bottom, a 
country producing the palm, the banana, and the sugar¬ 
cane. This cannot arise from the difference of height; as 
it is known, that no very great change of temperature can 
be produced by a difference of level of 570 feet. Mr. Hum¬ 
boldt suggests, that-it is probably owing to the shelter 
which the high country affords to the low. It is one of 
the circumstances that has added much to the marvellous 
height of the cataract; as the height is naturally supposed 
to be great, that carries one at once from the temperature 
of Europe, and one where the theremometer is sometimes at 
the freezing point, to that of the torrid zone. Although 
the river loses a great part of its water in falling, which is 
reduced into vapour, the rapidity of the lower current 
forces the observer to keep at the distance of 150 yards from 
the basin dug out by the fall. The solitude of the place,’ 
the richness of the vegetation, and the dreadful roar that 
strikes the ear, contribute to render the foot of the cataract 
of Tequendama one of the wildest scenes that can be found 
in the Cordilleras. (Humboldt’s Researches, &c. translated 
by Helen Williams, Load. 1814.) 
RIO DE JANEIRO, a jurisdiction or independent go¬ 
vernment of Brasil, so called by the Portuguese when they 
became masters of the country, from the river Janeiro, which 
runs through the middle of it; and the river probably derived 
its name from its having been discovered on the day of the 
feast of St. Januarius, or on the 1st day of January, in 1516, 
by Solis. At the mouth of the river, on the east side, is the. 
fort of Santa Cruz, and on the west, that of St. Jago, toge¬ 
ther with the capital. The rivers in this government are 
few and none of them large, except the Janeiro, which is 
rather a salt bay or gulf than a river, and two rivers that dis¬ 
charge themselves into this bay. At the mouth of it are 
several small islands, that render its entrance somewhat diffi¬ 
cult and dangerous. Although the soil of this province is 
for the greatest part rich and fertile, the inhabitants manifest 
little industry either in the cultivation of the soil or the im¬ 
provement of the country. It is used chiefly, at least near 
the capita), in raising garden vegetables for the whites, and 
rice and manioc for the blacks. Wheat is found to grow in 
other parts of the Brasils, beyond what is known in Europe. 
A corn-mill, distinguished by the simplicity of its structure, 
attracted the notice of Sir George Staunton; and he has 
thought it worthy of being described. A wheel, a few feet 
only in diameter, was placed horizontally, much below the 
current of a stream, as it fell from a steep bank, and was 
received in hollows, ten or twelve in number, so obliquely 
scolloped into the upper rim of the wheel, as to impel it to a 
quick rotatory motion, while its upright shaft, passing 
through an opening in the centre of an immovable mill-stone 
above the wheel, but of a narrower diameter, was fixed to a 
smaller 
