Rivers. Climate. Ceology. Plants and Animals. Agriculture. Mar, with parts of the coast bold and rocky, and with the | interior bare, low, flat, undulating, and in parts peaty. On the coast, six miles south of Peterhead, are the Bullers of Buchan,―a basin in which the sea, entering by a natural arch, boils up violently in stormy weather. Buchan Ness is the eastmost point of Scotland. Fourth, Garioch, a beautiful, undulating, loamy, fertile valley, formerly called the granary of Aberdeen, with the prominent hill Benachie, 1676 feet, on the south. Fifth, Strathbogie, mostly consisting of hills (The Buck, 2211 feet; Noath, 1830 feet), moors, and mosses. The county as a whole, except the low grounds of Buchan, and the Highlands of Braemar, consists mainly of nearly level or undulating tracts, often naked and infertile, but interspersed with many rich and highly cultivated spots. The chief rivers are the Dee, 96 miles long; Don, 78; Ythan, 37, with mussel beds at its mouth; Ugie, 20; and Deveron, 58, partly on the boundary of Banffshire. The pearl mussel occurs in the Ythan and Don. A valuable pearl in the Scottish crown is said to be from the Ythan. Loch Muick, the largest of the few lakes in the county, 1310 feet above the sea, is only 2 miles long and to mile broad. The rivers have plenty of salmon and trout. There are noted chalybeate springs at Peterhead, Fraserburgh, and Pananich near Ballater. The climate of Aberdeenshire, except in the mountainous districts, is comparatively mild, from the sea being on two sides. The mean annual temperature at Braemar is 43°-6 Fahr., and at Aberdeen 45° S. The mean yearly rainfall | varies from about 30 to 37 inches. The summer climate of the Upper Dee and Don valleys is the driest and most bracing in the British Isles, and grain is cultivated up to 1600 feet above the sea, or 400 to 500 feet higher than elsewhere in North Britain. All the crops cultivated in Scotland ripen, and the people often live to a great age. The rocks are mostly granite, gneiss, with small tracts of syenite, mica slate, quartz rock, clay slate, grauwacke, primary limestone, old red sandstone, serpentine, and trap. Lias, greensand, and chalk flints occur. The rocks are much covered with boulder clay, gravel, sand, and alluvium. Brick clay occurs near the coast. The surface of the granite under the boulder clay often presents glacial smoothings, grooves, and roundings. Cairngorm stone, beryl, and amethyst are found in the granite of Braemar. The tops of the highest mountains have an arctic flora. At Her Majesty's Lodge, Loch Muick, 1350 feet above the sea, grow larches, vegetables, currants, laurels, roses, &c. Some ash trees, 4 or 5 feet in girth, are growing at 1300 feet above the sea. The mole occurs at 1800 feet above the sea, and the squirrel at 1400. Trees, especially Scotch fir and larch, grow well in the county, and Braemar abounds in natural timber, said to surpass any in the north of Europe. Stumps of Scotch fir and oak found in peat in the county are often far larger than any now growing. Grouse, partridges, and hares abound in the county, and rabbits are often too numerous. Red deer abound in Braemar, the deer forest being there valued at £5000 a year, and estimated at 500,000 acres, or one-fourth the area of deer forests in Scotland. Poor, gravelly, clayey, and peaty soils prevail much more. in Aberdeenshire than good rich loams, but tile draining, bones, and guano, and the best modes of modern tillage, | have greatly increased the produce. Farm-houses and steadings have greatly improved, and the best agricultural implements and machines are in general use. About twothirds of the population depend entirely on agriculture, and oatmeal in various forms, with milk, is the chief food of farm-servants. Farms are generally small, compared with those in the south-east counties. The fields are separated by dry-stone dykes, and also by wooden and wire fences. Leases of 19 or 21 years prevail, and the five, six, or seven shift rotation is in general use. In 1872 there were 11,642 occupiers of land, with an average of 50 acres each, and paying about £536,000 in rent. Of the 585,299 acres of the county in crop in 1872, 191,880 acres were in oats, 18,930 in barley and bere, 1633 in rye, 1357 in wheat, 95,091 in turnips (being one-fifth of the turnips grown in Scotland), 8414 in potatoes, 232,178 in grasses and clover. In 1872 the county had 23,117. horses, 157,960 cattle (being above one-seventh of all the cattle in Scotland), 128,308 sheep, and 13,579 pigs. The county is unsurpassed in breeding, and unrivalled in feeding cattle, and this is more attended to than the cultivation of grain-crops. About 40,000 fat cattle are reared, and above £1,000,000 value of cattle and dead meat is sent from the county to London yearly. The capital invested in agriculture within the county is estimated at about £5,133,000. The great mineral wealth in Aberdeenshire is its long- Minerals. famed durable granite, which is largely quarried for building, paving, causewaying, and polishing. An acre of land on being reclaimed has yielded £40 to £50 worth of causewaying stones. Gneiss is also quarried, as also primary limestone, old red sandstone, conglomerate millstone, grauwacke, clay slate, syenite, and hornblende rock. Iron ore, manganese, and plumbago occur in the county. A large fishing population in villages along the coast Fisheries. engage in the white and herring fishery. Haddocks are salted and rock-dried (speldings), or smoked (finnans). The rivers and coasts yield many salmon. Peterhead was long the chief British port for the north whale and seal fishery, but Dundee now vies with it in this industry. The manufactures and arts of the county are mainly Manufac prosecuted in or near the town of Aberdeen, but throughout tures. the rural districts there are much milling of corn, brick and tile making, stone-quarrying, smith-work, brewing and distilling, cart and farm implement making, casting and drying of peat, timber felling, especially on Deeside and Donside, for pit-props, railway sleepers, lath, barrel staves, &c. The chief imports into the county are, coals, lime, Trade. timber, iron, slates, raw materials of textile manufactures, wheat, cattle-feeding stuffs, bones, guano, sugar, alcoholic liquors, fruits, &c. The chief exports are granite (rough, dressed, and polished), flax, woollen, and cotton goods, paper, combs, preserved provisions, oats, barley, live and dead cattle, &c. In the county there are about 520 fairs in the year for cattle, horses, sheep, hiring servants, &c. Aberdeenshire communicates with the south by the Railways. Caledonian Railway, and five macadamised roads across the east Grampians, the highest rising 2200 feet above the sea. About 188 miles of railway (the Great North of Scotland, Formartin and Buchan, and Deeside lines), and 2359 miles of public roads, ramify through the county. Tolls over the county were abolished in 1865, and the roads are kept up by assessment. The railway lines in the county have cost on the average about £13,500 a mile. Several macadamised roads and the Great North of Scotland Railway form the main exits from the county to the north-west. The chief antiquities in Aberdeenshire are Picts' houses Antior weems; stone foundations of circular dwellings; mono- quities. liths, some being sculptured; the so-called Druid circles; stone cists; stone and earthen enclosures; the vitrified forts of Dunnideer and Noath; cairns; crannoges; earthen mounds, as the Bass; flint arrow-heads; clay funeral urns; stone celts and hammers. Remains of Roman camps occur at Peterculter, Kintore, and Auchterless, respectively 107, 100, and 115 acres. Roman arms have been found. Ruins of ancient edifices occur. On the top of a conical hill called Dunnideer. in the Garioch district, are the remains of a Historical Lotes. Eminent men. Native features. Courts and Churches. castle, supposed to be 700 years old, and surrounded by a | Catholic, and 31 of other denominations. This includes In Roman times, Aberdeenshire formed part of Vespasiana in Caledonia, and was occupied by the Taixali, a warlike tribe. The local names are mostly Gaelic. St Columba and his pupil Drostan visited Buchan in the 6th century. In 1052 Macbeth fell near the Peel Bog in Lumphanan, and a cairn which marks the spot is still shown. In 1309 Bruce defeated Comyn, Earl of Buchan, near Inverurie, and annihilated a powerful Norman family. In 1411 the Earl of Marr defeated Donald of the Isles in the battle of Harlaw, near Inverurie, when Sir Robert Davidson, Provost of Aberdeen, was killed. In 1562 occurred the battle of Corrichie on the Hill of Fare, when the Earl of Murray defeated the Marquis of Huntly. In 1715 the Earl of Marr proclaimed the Pretender in Braemar. In 1746 the Duke of Cumberland with his army marched through Aberdeenshire to Culloden. In 1817 a base line of verification, 5 miles 100 feet long, was measured in connection with the Trigonometrical Survey of the British Isles, on the Belhelvie Links 5 to 10 miles north of Aberdeen. Among eminent men connected with Aberdeenshire are, Robert Gordon of Straloch, who in 1648 published the first atlas of Scotland from actual survey; the Earls Marischal, whose chief seat was Inverugie Castle; Field-Marshal Keith, born at Inverugie Castle, 1696; Dr Thomas Reid, the metaphysician, minister of New Machar 1737 to 1752; Lord Pitsligo, attainted 1745; Sir Archibald Grant of Monymusk, who introduced turnips into the county 1756, and was the first to plant wood on a great scale; Peter Garden, Auchterless, said to have died at the age of 132, about 1780; Rev. John Skinner, author of some popular Scottish songs; Morrison the hygeist; the Earl of Aberdeen, Prime Minister during the Crimean war. The native Scotch population of Aberdeenshire are longheaded, shrewd, careful, canny, active, persistent, but reserved and blunt, and without demonstrative enthusiasm. They have a physiognomy distinct from the rest of the Scottish people, and have a quick, sharp, rather angry accent. The local Scotch dialect is broad, and rich in diminutives, and is noted for the use of e for o or u, f for ch, d for th, &c. In 1830 Gaelic was the fireside language almost every family in Braemar, but now it is little used. Aberdeenshire has a Lord-Lieutenant and 3 Vice and 60 Deputy-Lieutenants. The Supreme Court of Justiciary sits in Aberdeen twice a-year to try cases from the counties of Aberdeen, Banff, and Kincardine. The counties of Aberdeen and Kincardine are under a Sheriff and two Sheriffs-Substitute. The Sheriff Courts are held in Aberdeen and Peterhead. Sheriff Small-Debt and Circuit Courts are held at seven places in the county. There are Burgh or Bailie Courts in Aberdeen and the other royal burghs in the county. Justice of the Peace and Police Courts are held in Aberdeen, &c. The Sheriff Courts take cognisance of Commissary business. During 1871, 994 persons were confined in the Aberdeenshire prisons. In the year 1870-71, 74 parishes in the county were assessed £53,703 for 7702 poor on the roll and 1847 casual poor. Aberdeenshire contains 105 Established churches, 99 Free, 31 Episcopal, 15 United Presbyterian, 9 Roman By the census of 1871, 84-83 per cent. of the children Education. in the county, of the ages 5 to 13, were receiving education. Those formerly called the parochial schoolmasters of Aberdeenshire participate in the Dick and Milne Bequests, which contributed more salary to the schoolmasters in some cases than did the heritors. Most of the schoolmasters are Masters of Arts, and many are preachers. Of 114 parochial schools in the county before the operation of the new Education Act, 89 received the Milne Bequest of £20 a year, and 91 the Dick Bequest, averaging £30 a year, and a schoolmaster with both bequests would have a yearly income of £145 to £150, and in a few cases £250. The higher branches of education have been more taught in the schools of the shires of Aberdeen and Banff than in the other Scotch counties, and pupils have been long in the habit of going direct from the schools of these two counties to the University. The value of property, or real rental of the lands and Property. heritages in the county (including the burghs, except that of Aberdeen), for the year 1872-73, was £769,191. The railway and the water works in the city and county were for the same year valued at £11,133. For general county purposes for the year ending 15th May 1872, there was assessed £14,803 to maintain police, prisons, militia, county and municipal buildings, &c., and £19,320 to maintain 2359 miles of public county roads. The chief seats on the proprietary estates are-Balmoral Proprietors. Castle, the Queen; Mar Lodge and Skene House, Earl of Fife; Aboyne Castle, Marquis of Huntly; Dunecht House, Earl of Crawford and Balcarres; Keith Hall, Earl of Kintore; Slains Castle, Earl of Errol; Haddo House, Earl of Aberdeen; Castle Forbes, Lord Forbes; Philorth House, Lord Saltoun; Huntly Lodge, the Duke of Richmond. Other noted seats are-Drum, Irvine; Invercauld, Farquharson; Newe Castle, Forbes ; Castle Fraser, Fraser; Cluny Castle, Gordon; Meldrum House, Urquhart; Craigston Castle, Urquhart; Pitfour, Ferguson; Ellon Castle, Gordon; Fyvie Castle, Gordon. Ten baronets and knights have residences in the county. Of the proprietors many live permanently on their estates. Their prevailing names are Gordon, Forbes, Grant, Fraser, Duff, and Farquharson. Aberdeenshire has one city, Aberdeen, a royal parlia- Burghs. mentary burgh; three other royal parliamentary burghs, Inverurie, Kintore, and Peterhead; and seven burghs of barony, Old Aberdeen, Charleston of Aboyne, Fraserburgh, Huntly, Old Meldrum, Rosehearty, and Turriff. The county sends two members to Parliament-one for ParliamenEast Aberdeenshire, with 4341 electors, and the other for tary repreWest Aberdeenshire, with 3942 electors. The county has sentation. also four parliamentary burghs, which, with their respective populations in 1871, are-Aberdeen, 88,125; Peterhead, 8535; Inverurie, 2856; and Kintore, 659. The first sends one member to Parliament, and the other three unite with Elgin, Cullen, and Banff, in sending another. By the census 1801 the county had 121,065 inhabitants, Population. and by that of 1871, 244,603, with 53,576 families, 111 females to 100 males, 34,589 inhabited houses, 1052 uninhabited houses, and 256 building. In 1871 there were in eight towns (Aberdeen, Peterhead, Fraserburgh, Huntly, Inverurie, Old Meldrum, Turriff, and New Pitsligo), 111,978 inhabitants; in 32 villages, 19,561; and in rural districts, 113,064. (New Statistical Account of Scotland, vol. xii.; the charters of the burgh; extracts from the Council Register down to 1625, and selections from the letters, guildry, and treasurer's accounts, forming 3 volumes of the Spalding Club; Collections for a History of the Shires of A. and Banff, edited by Joseph Robertson, Esq., 4to, Spalding Club; admission of ministers to benefices in Scotland," and it necessitate a coalition government, of which Lord Aber- Registrum Episcopatus Aberdonensis, vols. i. and ii., by ABERDOUR, a village in the county of Fife, in Scot- ABERFELDY, a village in Perthshire, celebrated in ABERGAVENNY, a market town in Monmouthshire, ABERNETHY, a town in Perthshire, situated in the parish of the same name, on the right bank of the Tay, 7 miles below Perth. The earliest of the Culdee houses was founded there, and it is said to have been the capital of the Pictish kings. It was long the chief seat of the Episcopacy in the country, till, in the 9th century, the bishopric was transferred to St Andrews. There still remains at Abernethy a curious circular tower, 74 feet high and 48 feet in circumference, consisting of sixty-four courses of hewn stone. A number of similar towers, though not so well 1 built, are to be met with in Ireland, but there is only one other in Scotland, viz., that at Brechin. Petrie argues, in his Round Towers of Ireland, that these structures have been used as belfries, and also as keeps. monstrator;" he also attended Pott's surgical lectures at St Bartholomew's Hospital, as well as the lectures of the celebrated John Hunter. On Pott's resignation of the office of surgeon of St Bartholomew's, Sir Charles Blicke, who was assistant-surgeon, succeeded him, and Abernethy was elected assistant-surgeon in 1787. In this capacity he began to give lectures in Bartholomew Close, which were so well attended that the governors of the hospital built a regular theatre (1790-91), and Abernethy thus became the founder of the distinguished School of St Bartholomew's. Bartholomew's. He held the office of assistant-surgeon of the hospital for the long period of twenty-eight years, till, in 1815, he was elected principal surgeon. He had before that time been appointed surgeon of Christ's Hospital (1813), and Professor of Anatomy and Surgery to the Royal College of Surgeons (1814). Abernethy had great fame both as a practitioner and as a lecturer, his reputation in both respects resting on the efforts he made to promote the practical improvement of surgery. His Surgical Observations on the Constitutional Origin and Treatment of Local Diseases (1809)-known as "My Book," from the great frequency with which he referred his patients to it, and to page 72 of it in particular, under that name—was one of the earliest popular works on medical science. The views he expounds in it are based on physiological considerations, and are the more important that the connection of surgery with physiology had scarcely been recognised before the time he wrote. The leading principles on which he insists in "My Book" are chiefly these two:-1st, That topical diseases are often mere symptoms of constitutional maladies, and then can only be removed by general remedies; and 2d, That the disordered state of the constitution very often originates in, or is closely allied to deranged states of the stomach and bowels, and can only be remedied by means that beneficially affect the functions of those organs. His profession owed him much for his able advocacy of the extension in this way of the province of surgery. He had great success as a teacher from the thorough knowledge he had of his science, and the persuasiveness with which he enunciated his views. It has been said, however, that the influence he exerted on those who attended his lectures was not beneficial in this respect, that his opinions were delivered so dogmatically, and all who differed from him were disparaged and denounced so contemptuously, as to repress instead of stimulating inquiry. It ought to be mentioned, that he was the first to suggest and to perform the daring operation of securing by ligature the carotid and the external iliac arteries. The celebrity Abernethy attained in his practice was due not only to his great professional skill, but also in part to the singularity of his manners. He used great plainness of speech in his intercourse with his patients, treating them often brusquely, and sometimes And so even rudely. In the circle of his family and friends he was courteous and affectionate; and in all his dealings he was strictly just and honourable. He resigned his surgery at St Bartholomew's Hospital in 1827, and his professorship at the College of Surgeons two years later, on account of failing health, and died at his residence at Enfield on the 20th of April 1831. A collected edition of his works in five volumes was published in 1830. A biography, Memoirs of John Abernethy, by George Macilwain, F.R.C.S., appeared in 1853, and though anything but satisfactory, passed through several editions. ABERNETHY, JOHN,-a Protestant dissenting divine of Ireland, was born at Coleraine, county Londonderry, Ulster, where his father was minister (Nonconformist), on the 19th October 1680. In his thirteenth year he entered a student at the University of Glasgow. On concluding his course at Glasgow he went to Edinburgh University, where his many brilliant gifts and quick and ready wit thought-born, not verbal merely-struck the most eminent of his contemporaries and even his professors. Returning home, he received licence to preach from his Presbytery before he was twenty-one. In 1701 he was urgently invited to accept the ministerial charge of an important congregation in Antrim; and after an interval of two years, he was ordained there on 8th August 1703. His admiring biographer tells of an amount and kind of work done there, such as only a man of fecund brain, of large heart, of healthful frame, and of resolute will, could have achieved. In 1717 he was invited to the congregation of Usher's Quay, Dublin, as colleague with Rev. Mr Arbuckle, and contemporaneously, to what was called the Old Congregation of Belfast. The Synod assigned him to Dublin. He refused to accede, and remained at Antrim. This refusal was regarded then as ecclesiastical hightreason; and a controversy of the most intense and disproportionate character followed. The controversy and quarrel bears the name of the two camps in the conflict, the "Subscribers" and the "Non-subscribers." Outand-out evangelical as John Abernethy was, there can be no question that he and his associates sowed the seeds of that after-struggle in which, under the leadership of Dr Henry Cooke, the Arian and Socinian elements of the Irish Presbyterian Church were thrown out. Much of what he contended for, and which the "Subscribers" opposed bitterly, has been silently granted in the lapse of time. In 1726 the "Non-subscribers," spite of an almost wofully pathetic pleading against separation by Abernethy, were cut off, with due ban and solemnity, from the Irish Presbyterian Church. In 1730, spite of being a "Non-subscriber," he was called by his early friends of Wood Street, Dublin, whither he removed. In 1731 came on the greatest controversy in which Abernethy engaged, viz., in relation to the Test Act nominally, but practically on the entire question of tests and disabilities. His stand was "against all laws that, upon account of mere differences of religious opinions and forms of worship, excluded men of integrity and ability from serving their country." He was nearly a century in advance of his century. He had to reason with those who denied that a Roman Catholic or Dissenter could be a "man of integrity and ability." His Tracts-afterwards collected did fresh service, generations later. John Abernethy through life was ever foremost where unpopular truth and right were to be maintained; nor did he, for sake of an ignoble expediency, spare to smite the highestseated wrongdoers any more than the hoariest errors (as he believed). He died in 1740, having been twice married. (Kippis' Biog. Brit., s. v.; Dr Duchal's Life, prefixed to Sermons; Diary in MS., 6 vols. 4to; History of Irish Presbyterian Church). (A. B. G.) ABERNETHY, JOHN, grandson of the preceding, an eminent surgeon, was born in London on the 3d of April 1764. His father was a London merchant. Educated at Wolverhampton Grammar School, he was apprenticed in 1779 to Sir Charles Blicke, a surgeon in extensive practice in the metropolis. He attended Sir William Blizzard's anatomical lectures at the London Hospital, and was early employed to assist Sir William as "de ABERRATION, or (more correctly) THE ABERRATION or LIGHT, is a remarkable phenomenon, by which stars appear to deviate a little, in the course of a year, from their true places in the heavens. It results from the eye of the observer being carried onwards by the motion of the earth on its orbit, during the time that light takes to light proceeding from a star is not seen in its true direction, but strikes the eye obliquely, for a precisely similar reason. If lines be taken to represent the motions, so that the eye is carried from A to C during the time that light moves from D to C, the light will appear to the eye at C to come, not from D, but from F. The angle DCF, contained by the true and apparent directions of the star, is the aberration. It is greatest when the two motions are at right angles to each other, i.e., when the star's longitude is 90° in advance of, or behind, the heliocentric longitude of the earth, or (which amounts to the same thing) 90° behind, or in advance of, the geocentric longitude of the sun. (See ASTRONOMY.) Now, in the right-angled triangle ACD, tan ADC (i.e., DCF)=C; whence it appears that the tangent of the angle of aberration (or, since the angle is very small, the aberration itself) is equal to the ratio, velocity of earth in orbit The rate of the earth's motion velocity of light being to the velocity of light in the proportion of 1 to 10,000 nearly, the maximum aberration is small, amounting to about 20-4 seconds of arc,-a quantity, however, which is very appreciable in astronomical observations. AC Aberration always takes place in the direction of the earth's motion; that is, it causes the stars to appear nearer than they really are to the point towards which the earth is at the moment moving. That point is necessarily on the ecliptic, and 90° in advance of the earth in longitude. The effect is to make a star at the pole of the ecliptic appear to move in a plane parallel to the ecliptic, so as to form a small ellipse, similar to the earth's orbit, but having its major axis parallel to the minor axis of that orbit, and vice versa. As we proceed from the pole, the apparent orbits the stars describe become more and more elliptical, till in the plane of the ecliptic the apparent motion is in a straight line. The length of this line, as well as of the major axes of the different ellipses, amounts, in angular measure, to about 40"-8. The stars thus appear to oscillate, in the course of the year, 20"-4 on each side of their true position, in a direction parallel to the plane of the ecliptic, and the quantity 20"-4 is therefore called the constant of aberration. For the discovery of the aberration of light, one of the finest in modern astronomy, we are indebted to the distinguished astronomer Dr Bradley. He was led to it, in 1727, by the result of observations he made with the view of determining the annual parallax of some of the stars; that is, the angle subtended at these stars by the diameter of the earth's orbit. He observed certain changes in the positions of the stars that he could not account for. The deviations were not in the direction of the apparent motion that parallax would give rise to; and he had no better success in attempting to explain the phenomenon by the nutation of the earth's axis, radiation, errors of observation, &c. tion, &c. At last the true solution of the difficulty occurred thim, suggested, it is said, by the movements of a vane on the top of a boat's mast. Roemer had discovered, a quarter of a century before, that light has a velocity which admits of measurement; and Bradley perceived that the earth's motion, having a perceptible relation to that of light, must affect the direction of the visual rays, and with this the apparent positions of the stars. He calculated the aberration from the known relative velocities of the earth and of light, and the results agreed entirely with his observations. The observed effects of aberration are of importance as supplying an independent method of measuring the velocity of light, but more particularly as presenting one of the few direct proofs that can be given of the earth's motion round the sun. It is indeed the most satisfactory proof of this that astronomy furnishes, the phenomenon being quite inexplicable on any other hypothesis. ABERYSTWITH, a municipal and parliamentary borough, market town, and seaport of Wales, in the county of Cardigan, is situated at the western end of the Vale of Rheidol, near the confluence of the rivers Ystwith and Rheidol, and about the centre of Cardigan Bay. It is the terminal station of the Cambrian Railway, and a line to the south affords direct communication with South Wales, Bristol, &c. Wales, Bristol, &c. The borough unites with Cardigan, Lampeter, &c., in electing a member of Parliament. Coal, timber, and lime are imported, and the exports are lead, oak bark, flannel, and corn. The harbour has of late been much improved; and the pier, completed in 1865, forms an excellent promenade. There are many elegant buildings, and it has been proposed to establish here a University College of Wales. On a promontory to the S.W. of the town are the ruins of its ancient castle, erected in 1277, by Edward I., on the site of a fortress of great strength, built by Gilbert de Strongbow, and destroyed by Owen Gwynedd. From its picturesque situation and healthy climate, and the suitableness of the beach for bathing, Aberystwith has risen into great repute as a watering-place, and attracts many visitors. Much of the finest scenery in Wales, such as the Devil's Bridge, &c., lies within easy reach. Population (1871), 6898. ABETTOR, a law term implying one who instigates, encourages, or assists another to perform some criminal action. See ACCESSORY. ABEYANCE, a law term denoting the expectancy of an estate. Thus, if lands be leased to one person for life, with reversion to another for years, the remainder for years is in abeyance till the death of the lessee. ABGAR, the name or title of a line of kings of Edessa in Mesopotamia. One of them is known from a correspondence he is said to have had with Jesus Christ. The letter of Abgar, entreating Jesus to visit him and heal him of a disease, and offering Him an asylum from the wrath of the Jews, and the answer of Jesus promising to send a disciple to heal Abgar after His ascension, are given by Eusebius, who believed the documents to be genuine. The same belief has been held by a few moderns, but there can be no doubt whatever that the letter of Jesus at least is apocryphal. It has also been alleged that Abgar possessed a picture of Jesus, which the credulous may see either at Rome or at Genoa. Some make him the possessor of the handkerchief a woman gave Jesus, as He bore the cross, to wipe the sweat from His face with, on which, it is fabled, His features remained miraculously imprinted. ABIAD, BAHR-EL-, a name given to the western branch of the Nile, above Khartoum. It is better known as the White Nile. See NILE. |