RAP

462

RAT

and was born at Urhino on Good Frida}', 1482. The popes JuliusII. and Leo . X. who employed him, loaded him with ueallli andhonours; and cardinal De St.Bibiana had such a value tor him, thathe offered him his niece m marriage. H is pictures are principallyto be found in Italy and Paris . That of the Transfiguration, pre-served at Rome in the church of St. Peter Monterio, passes forhis master-piece. He had a handsome person, was polite, affable,and modest. He lived in the utmostsplendor. He was not on I vthe best painter in the world, hut perhaps the best ar, hitect too";on which account Leo X. charged him with building St. Peter’schurch at Rome ; but he was too much addicted to pleasure, whichoccasioned his death at 37 years ot age. See Painting. His ce-lebrated cartoons, for which Lewis XV. offered 100,000/. arenow removed, from Windsor Castle , to the Queen’s (formerlyBuckingham) house. See Cartoons.

RAPtIAIM, or R FT HAIM, a name mentioned by Moses,signifying giants; a people situated in Basan or Batanea, beyondJordan, separated from tire Zamzummim by the river Jabbok .Also a valley near Jerusalem ; Joshua x.

RAPIIAX1DOSIS, [from faf-wuc, a radish,] a punishment in-dicted at Athens upon adulterers. See Adultery.

RAPHANUS, Radish; a genus of the siliquosa order, aud te-tradynainia class of plants ; natural order, Siliquos;e. Calvx close ;siliqua torose, or swelling out in knots, sub-articulated, and round,melliferous glandules two between the shorter stamina and thepistil, and two between the longer stamina and the calyx. Thereare six species.

RAPH ELENGIUS, Francis, a learned French Orientalist ,born at Laney, near Lisle, in 1539. He studied Greek and He-brew at Paris ; but the civil wars breaking out, he came to Eng-land, and taught Greek at Cambridge . lie afterwards went tothe Netherlands , and corrected the press for the celebrated Plan-tin. He was afterwards appointed professor of Hebrew andArabic , in the university of Leyden. He published a ChaldaicDictionary, an Arabic Lexicon, and a Hebrew Grammar; whichare much esteemed. He died in 1597, aged 58.

RAPH ID [A, in entomology; a genus of insects, of the neu-roptera order. Head, of a horny subbmcl, depressed or flattened :mouth armed with two teeth, and furnished with four palpi : stem-mata three ; wings deflected ; antenna; filiform, as long as thethorax ; anterior part lengthened out, cylindrical. There arethree species.

RAPHOE, a town of Ireland, in Donegal county , with acathedral ; 21 miles IS. E. ol Donegal, and 11 S. W. of Derry .

RAPIER, formerly signified a long old fashioned sword, suchas those worn by the common soldiers; but it now denotes a smallsword, as contradistinguished from a back sword.

RAPIN’ DETHOYRAS, Paul de, a celebrated historian,tlie son of James Rapin, lord of Thoyras, and w as horn atCastresin 1661. After being educated under a tutor in his lather’s house,he was sent to Puy Laurens, and thence to Sauimir. (u 1679 hereturned to his father, studied the law, and was admitted an advo-cate : but reflecting that his being a Protestant would prevent hisadvancement at the bar, he resolved to quit the law, and applyhimself to the sword ; but his father would not consent to it. Therevocation of the edict of Nantes in 1685. and the death of hisfather, which happened two months after, made him come toEngland ; but he soon after went to Holland , and listed himself inthe company of French volunteers at Utrecht , commanded by M.Rapin, his cousin-german. He attended the Prince of Orangeinto England in 1688 : and in 1689 Lord Kingston made him anensign in his regiment, with which he went into Ireland , where hegained the esteem of his officers at the siege of Carrickfergus, andhad soon a lieutenant’s commission, lie was present at the battleof the Boyne, and was shot through the shoulder at the siege ofLimerick. He was soon after captain of the company in whichhe had been ensign ; but, in 1693, resigned it to one of his bro-thers, in order to be tutor to the earl of Portland’s son. In 1699,he married Marianne Testard ; but this neither abated his care ofhis pupil, nor prevented his accompanying him in his travels.Having finished this employment, he returned to his family,which he had settled at the Plague ; and here he continued someyears. But as he found his family increase, lie resolved to retireto some cheap country : and accordingly removed, in 1707, toWesel , where he wrote his History of England, and some other

pieces. Though he was of a strong constitution, yet 1.7 years ap-plication (in composing that history) entirely ruined his health.He died in 1725. He wrote in French , 1. A Dissertation on theWhigs and Tories. 2. His History of England, printed at theHague in 1726 and 1727, in 9 vols. 4to. and reprinted at Tre-voux in 1728, in 10 vols. 4to. 'Phis last edition is more completethan that of the Hague. It has been translated into English , andimproved with notes, by the ltev. Mr. Tindnl, in 2 vols. folio.'Phis performance, though the work of a foreigner, is deservedlyesteemed as the fullest and most impartial collection of English political transactions extant.

RAPOLLA, orRAPOLLO, a town of Naples, in Basilicata ,5-j miles W. of Venosa , 56 W. of Bari, and 70 L. of Naples. Lon.15. 51. E. Lat. 40. 56. N.

RAPPERSCI1W YL, or RAPPERSWI L, a town of the Hel-vetic republic, on the coniines o! the canton ot Zurich . Lon. 8.57. E. Lat. 47. 20. N.

RAPPOLSTE1N, a town of France , in the department of theUpper Rhine, and late province of Alsace, 8 miles N. of Colmar .Lon. 7. 28. E. Lat. 48. 15. N.

RARE, in physics, stands opposed to dense; and denotes abody that is very porous, whose parts are at a great di-lance fromone another, and which is supposed to contain hut little matterunder a large bulk. See Rarefaction.

RAREFACTION, in physics, the act whereby a body is ren-dered rare ; that is brought to appear under a large hulk, withoutaccession of any matter. This is very frequently the effect of fireas has long been universally allowed. In many cases, however,philosophers have attributed it to (he action of a repulsive prin-ciple. However, from the many discoveries concerning the na-ture and properties of the electric fluid and lire, there is the greatestreason to believe, that this repulsive principle is no other than ele-mentary fire. See Repulsion.

RAS, the name of several towns and capes ;

Has Are h a/., a cape on the coast of Nubia, on the Red Sea .Lon. 38. 0. E. Lat. 18. 19. N.

Ras al Enf, a cape on the coast of Egypt , on the Red SeaLon. 35. 20. E. Lat. 23. 57. N.

Ras el Cansir, a town of Asiatic Turkey, in the pachalic ofAleppo , on a cape on the coast of the Mediterranean, 16 milesW. of Alexandrttta.

Ras el Feel, one of the frontier provinces of Abyssinia, ofwhich the late celebrated traveller Mr. Bruce was made governorwhile in that country.

Ras el Sem, acity of Tripoli in Barbary.

Ras Mahommed, a cape on the S. coast of Arabia Petraa, onthe Red Sea . Lon. 34.37. E. Lat. 27. 51. N.

RASANT, or RAZANT, in fortification. Rasant-fiank, orline, is that part of the curtin or flank whence the shot explodedrase, or glance, along the surface of the opposite bastion.

RAS1ENBURG, a city of Prussia in the province of Natan-gen, 46 miles S. E. of Konigsberg .

RASTICO, a harbour and bay in the Gulf of St. Lawrence ;on the N. coast of the island of St. Laurence. Lon. 62. 50. W.Lat. 46. 25. N.

RAF, in zoology. See Mus. G. W. Muller, an ingeniousapothecary of Wernigerode, in Germany , proposed the followingcomplete remedy for destroying rats, which lie candidly acknow-ledges to have derived the first hint for such purpose, many yearssince, from a book written by a celebrated (economist; in short,it will be found the most expeditious and effectual mode that canbe pursued. A capacious cask of moderate height must previouslybe procured, and put in the vicinity of places infested with rats.During the first week, this vessel is employed only to allure therats to visit the solid top of the cask, by means of boards or planksarranged in a slopingdirection to the floor, which are every daystrewed with oatmeal, or any other food equally grateful to theirpalate ; and the principal part of which is exposed on the surface.After having thus been lulled into security, and accu-totned tofind a regular supply lor their meals, a skin of parchment is sub-stituted for the wooden lop of the cask, and the former is cut, forseveral inches, with transverse incisions through tin; centre, so asto yield on the smallest pressure. At the same time, a few gal-lons of water, to the depth of five or six inches, are poured intothe empty cask. In the middle of this clement, a brick or stone