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RAMTEAK, a town of Hindostaii in Berar: 15 miles N. E.ofNagpour, and 110 S. ol Gurrah.Lon. 79. 57. E.Lat. 21. 23. N.
KAMTRUT, a deity worshipped by the Ranazins of Hindoo-stan, where he has a celebrated temple at Onor. lie is repre-sented as more resembling a monkey than a man.
RAMUS, [Lat.] in general, denotes a branch cf any tiling, asof a tree, an artery, &c. (n the anatomy of plants it means thefirst or lateral branches which go oft from the peliolum, or middle-rib of a leaf. The subdivisions of these are called surculi ; andthe final divisions into the most minute of all, are by some calledcapillamenla ; but both kinds are generally denominated surculus.
RAMA, the Frog, in natural history, a genus of Amphibia,of the order Reptiles . Generic character: body four-footed, tail-less, and without any integument but the skin; hind-legs longer,than the fore. There are thirty-six species. The R. bufo, ortoad, is a species of this genus.
HANAI, or ORANAI, one of the Sandwich islands discoveredby Capt. Cook, is about 9 miles W. of Mowee and Morotoi, andis situated S. W. of the passage between those two isles. Lon.156. 52. VV. E. Lat. 20. 46. N.
RANCHER1A, RAMCI1IERA, or RANCHEiKA, a sea-port-town of S. America, in Terra Eirma, in the province of NewGranada. Lon. 72. 0. E. Lat. 11.34. N.
RANCID is used of a fatty substance that is become rank ormusty, or that has contracted an ill smell by being kept close.
RANCIDITY, in chemistry. Fixed oils are liable, by keeping,to undergo a change well known by the name of rancidify. Theybecome thick ; acquire a brown colour, an acrid taste, and a dis-agreeable smell. The oil thus altered converts vegetable bluesinto red, and of course contains an acid. It is believed that thischange is owing to the alteration of the foreign substances presentin oils, or to the action of those foreign bodies upon the oily mat-ter itself. Several of the fixed oils, when newly extracted, letfall, on standing, a quantity of mucilaginous matter; and fromthe experiments of Scheele, it appears probable that they alw aysretain less or more of a similar principle.
RANDERS, or RANDERSON, an ancient town of Den-mark, in N. Jutland , 18 miles N. N. W. of Aarlmus, and 20 E.of Viborg . Lon. 10. 35. E. Lat. 56. 20. N.
Random-Shot, in gunnery, is a shot made when the muzzleof a gun is raised above the horizontal line, and is not designed toshoot directly or point-blank. See Projectiles. °
RANGE,’ in gunnery, the path of a bullet, or the line it de-scribes from the mouth of the piece to the point where it lodges.If the piece He in a line parallel to the horizon, it is called 'theright or level range ; if it be mounted to 45°, it is said to have tiieutmost range; all others between 0 and 45° are called the inter-mediate ranges.,
... Ranger, a sworn officer of a forest, appointed by the king’sletters patent; wdiose business is to drive back the deer out of thepurlieus, &c. and to present all. trespasses within his jurisdictionat the next forest-court.
RANGNITZ, a town of East Prussia , on the borders of Sa-wogitia, 55 miles E. of Konigsburg , Lon. 22. 40. E. Lat.55. 6. N.
RANK, a straight line made by' the soldiers of a battalion orsquadron, drawn up side by side ; this order was established forthe marches, and for regulating the different bodies of troops andofficers which compose an army.
Ran k and Precedence, in the army and navy, areas follow:
. Rank in the N avy. The admiral, or commander-in-chief ofu:s majesty’s fleet, has the rank of a field-marshal ; admirals, withtheir flags on the main-top-mast-head, rank witli generals of horseu "d foot; vice-admirals, with lieutenant-generals; rear-admirals,as major-generals; commodores, with broad pendants, as briga-uier-generals ; captains of post-ships, after three years from tiie•'ate of their first commission, as colonels; other captains, as com-manding post-ships, as lieutenant-colonels; captains, not takingPost, as majors ; lieutenants, as captains.
Rank op Engineers. Chief, as colonel; director, as lien-enant-coloncl; subdirector, as major ; engineer in ordinary, ascaptain ; engineer extraordinary, as captain-lieutenant; sub-en-gineer, -as lieutenant; practitioner-engineer, as ensign.
Rank of , or between the Army, Navy , and Gover-nors.
yol. IV.—no. 188.
General in chief—Admiral in chief—Commander-in-chief of theforces in America .
Generals of horse—Admiral, with aflag at the main-top-mast—Cap-tain-general of provinces.
Lieutenant-generals—Vice-admirals—Lieutenant-generals of pro-vinces.
Major-generals—Rear-admirals—Lieutenant-governors and presi-dents.
Colonels—Post-captains of three years—Lieutenant-governors notcommanding.
Lieutenant-colonels—Post-captains— Governors of charter co-lonies.
Majors—Captains—Deputy governors.
Captains—Lieutenants—Established by the king, 17f>0.
Ranks and Files, are the horizontal and vertical lines of sol-diers when drawn up for service.
Ranks, Doubling of the, is the placing two ranks in one,frequently used in tiie manoeuvres of a regiment.
RANSOM, a sum of money paid for tiie redemption of a slave,
• or for the liberty of a prisoner ot war. In our law-books, ransomis also used for a sum paid for the pardon of some great offence,and to obtain the offender’s liberty.
KANT , in the drama, an extravagant, unnatural, and impro-bable, flight of passion.
RANSTADT, a town of Upper Saxony, in Leipsic ; 6 milesIV. of Leipsic, and 11 E. of Mersburg .
RANTAMl’OUK, a town and fort of Ilindostan, in Agimere :S6 miles E. of Agimere, and 9° S. E. of Agra . Lon. 70. 58. E.Lat. 20. 35. N.
RANULA, [Lat.] a soft swelling, possessing the salivalsunder the tongue ; it is made by congestion, and its pro-gress fills up the space between the jaws, and makes a tumourexternally under the chin.
Ranula, a tumour under a child’s tongue, which, like a liga-ture* hinders it from speaking or sucking.
RANUNCULUS, Crowfoot ; a genus of the polygamia or-der, and polyandria class of plants ; natural order, Multi sili-quai. Calyx five-leaved; petals five to eight, with a honiedpore at the claw ; seeds naked. There are fifty-nine species, someof which claim general esteem as flowery plants for ornamentingthe gardens, and a great number are common weeds in the fields,waters, and pasture-ground, not having merit for garden-culture.Of the garden-kinds, the principal sort is the Asiatic or Turkeyand Persian ranunculus, which comprises many hundred varietiesof large, double, most beautiful flowers of various colours: butseveral other species having varieties with fine double flowers,make a good appearance in a collection, though as those of eachspecies consist only of one colour, some white, others yellow, theyare inferior to the Asiatic ranunculus, which is large, and diversi-fied a thousand ways in rich colours, in different varieties. How-ever, all the garden-kinds in general effect a very agreealfle diver-sity in assemblage in the flower-compartments,&c. and they beingall very hardy; succeed in any open beds and borders, &c.
RAPE of "Women, is where a man lias carnal knowledge of awoman by force, and against her will, which is by our law a capi-tal felony, and subjects the offender to the punishment of death,which is never remitted. By 18 Elizabeth, c. 7, if any personshall, unlawfully and carnally, know and abuse any woman-childunder the age often years, whether with her consent or against it,he shall be punished as for a rape. And it is not a sufficient ex-cuse in the ravisher to prove that she is a common strumpet; forshe is still under tiie protection of the law, and may not be forced.Nor is the offence of a rape mitigated, by shewing that the womanat last yielded to the violence, if such her consent were forced byfear of death or duress; nor is it any excuse that she consented
after tiie fact.
Rare is also a name given to a division of a county, and some-times means the same as a hundred, and at other times signifies adivision consisting of several hundreds; thus Sussex is divided intosix rapes, every one of which, besides its hundreds, has a castle, ariver, and a forest, belonging to it. The like parts in other coun-ties are called tithings, lathes, or wapentakes.
RAPHAEL, Sanzio, of Urbino , the greatest, most sublime,and most excellent painter that has appeared, since the revival ofthe line arts, was the son of an indifferent painter named Sanzio,
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