Page:EB1911 - Volume 17.djvu/189

 See A. Woodward, Memoir of General Nathaniel Lyon (Hartford, 1862); James Peckham, Life of Lyon (New York, 1866); and T. L. Snead, The Fight for Missouri (New York, 1886). Also Last Political Writings of General Nathaniel Lyon (New York, 1862).

LYONNESSE, or, a legendary country off the south coast of Cornwall, England. Lyonnesse is the scene of many incidents in the Arthurian romances, and especially in the romances of Tristram and Iseult. It also plays an important part in purely Cornish tradition and folklore. Early English chronicles, such as the Chronicon e chronicis of Florence of Worcester, who died in 1118, described minutely and without a suggestion of disbelief the flourishing state of Lyonnesse, and its sudden disappearance beneath the sea. The legend may be a greatly exaggerated version of some actual subsidence of inhabited land. There is also a very ancient local tradition, apparently independent of the story of Lyonnesse, that the Scilly Islands formed part of the Cornish mainland within historical times.

LYONS, EDMUND LYONS, (1790–1858), British admiral, was born at Burton, near Christchurch, Hampshire, on the 21st of November 1790. He entered the navy, and served in the Mediterranean, and afterwards in the East Indies, where in 1810 he won promotion by distinguished bravery. He became post-captain in 1814, and in 1826 commanded the “Blonde” frigate at the blockade of Navarino, and took part with the French in the capture of Kasteo Morea. Shortly before his ship was paid off in 1835 he was knighted. From 1840 till 1853 Lyons was employed on the diplomatic service, being successively minister to Greece, Switzerland and Sweden. On the outbreak of the war with Russia he was appointed second in command of the British fleet in the Black Sea under Admiral Dundas, whom he succeeded in the chief command in 1854. As admiral of the inshore squadron he had the direction of the landing of the troops in the Crimea, which he conducted with marvellous energy and despatch. According to Kinglake, Lyons shared the “intimate counsels” of Lord Raglan in regard to the most momentous questions of the war, and toiled, with a “painful consuming passion,” to achieve the object of the campaign. His principal actual achievements in battle were two—the support he rendered with his guns to the French at the Alma in attacking the left flank of the Russians, and the bold and brilliant part he took with his ship the “Agamemnon” in the first bombardment of the forts of Sebastopol; but his constant vigilance, his multifarious activity, and his suggestions and counsels were much more advantageous to the allied cause than his specific exploits. In 1855 he was created vice-admiral; in June 1856 he was raised to the peerage with the title of Baron Lyons of Christchurch. He died on the 23rd of November 1858.

See Adam S. Eardley-Wilmot, R.N., Life of Lord Lyons (1898).

LYONS, RICHARD BICKERTON PEMELL LYONS, (1817–1887), British diplomatist, son of the preceding, was born at Lymington on the 26th of April 1817. He entered the diplomatic service, and in 1859–1864 was British minister at Washington, where, after the outbreak of the Civil War, the extremely important negotiations connected with the arrest of the Confederate envoys on board the British mail-steamer “Trent” devolved upon him. After a brief service at Constantinople, he succeeded Lord Cowley at the Paris embassy in 1867. In the war of 1870 he used his best efforts as a mediator, and accompanied the provisional government to Tours. He continued to hold his post with universal acceptance until November 1887. He died on the 5th of December 1887, when the title became extinct.

LYONS (Fr. Lyon), a city of eastern France, capital of the department of Rhône, 315 m. S.S.E. of Paris and 218 m. N. by W. of Marseilles on the Paris-Lyon railway. Pop. (1906) town, 430,186; commune, 472,114. Lyons, which in France is second only to Paris in commercial and military importance, is situated at the confluence of the Rhone and the Saône at an altitude of 540 to 1000 ft. above sea-level. The rivers, both flowing south, are separated on the north by the hill on which lies the populous working quarter of Croix-Rousse, then by the narrow tongue of land ending in the Perrache Quarter. The peninsula thus formed is over 3 m. long and from 650 to 1000 yds. broad. It is traversed lengthwise by the finest streets of the city, the rue de la République, the rue de l’Hôtel de Ville, and the rue Victor Hugo. Where it enters Lyons the Saône has on its right the faubourg of Vaise and on its left that of Serin, whence the ascent is made to the top of the hill of Croix-Rousse. Farther on, its right bank is bordered by the scarped heights of Fourvière, St Irénée, Ste Foy, and St Just, leaving room only for the quays and one or two narrow streets; this is the oldest part of the city. The river sweeps in a semicircle around this eminence (410 ft. above it), which is occupied by convents, hospitals and seminaries, and has at its summit the famous church of Notre-Dame de Fourvière, the resort of many thousands of pilgrims annually.

On the peninsula between the rivers, at the foot of the hill of Croix-Rousse, are the principal quarters of the town: the Terreaux, containing the hôtel de ville, and the chief commercial establishments; the wealthy residential quarter, centring round the Place Bellecour, one of the finest squares in France; and the Perrache. The Rhone and Saône formerly met on the site of this quarter, till, in the 18th century, the sculptor Perrache reclaimed it; on the peninsula thus formed stands the principal railway station, the Gare de Perrache with the Cours du Midi, the most extensive promenade in Lyons, stretching in front of it. Here, too, are the docks of the Saône, factories, the arsenal, gas-works and prisons. The Rhone, less confined than the Saône, flows swiftly in a wide channel, broken when the water is low in spring by pebbly islets. On the right hand it skirts first St Clair, sloping upwards to Croix-Rousse, and then the districts of Terreaux, Bellecour and Perrache; on the left it has a low-lying plain, occupied by the Parc de la Tête d’Or and the quarters of Brotteaux and Guillotière. The park, together with its lake, comprises some 285 acres, and contains a zoological collection, botanical and pharmaceutical gardens, and the finest greenhouses in France, with unique collections of orchids, palm-trees and Cycadaceae. It is defended from the Rhone by the Quai de la Tête d’Or, while on the east the railway line to Geneva separates it from the race-course. Brotteaux is a modern residential quarter. Guillotière to the south consists largely of workmen’s dwellings, bordering wide, airy thoroughfares. To the east extend the manufacturing suburbs of Villeurbanne and Montchat. The population, displaced by the demolition of the lofty old houses and the widening of the streets on the peninsula, migrates to the left bank of the Rhone, the extension of the city into the plain of Dauphiné being unhindered.

The Rhone and the Saône are bordered by fine quays and crossed by 24 bridges—11 over the Rhone, 12 over the Saône, and 1 at the confluence. Of these the Pont du Change over the Saône and the Pont de la Guillotière over the Rhone have replaced medieval bridges, the latter of the two preserving a portion of the old structure.

Of the ancient buildings Notre-Dame de Fourvière is the most celebrated. The name originally applied to a small chapel built in the 9th century on the site of the old forum (forum vetus) from which it takes its name. It has been often rebuilt, the chief feature being a modern Romanesque tower surmounted by a cupola and statue of the Virgin. In 1872 a basilica was begun at its side in token of the gratitude of the city for having escaped occupation by the German troops. The building, finished in 1894, consists of a nave without aisles flanked at each exterior corner by a turret and terminating in an apse. The façade, the lower half of which is a lofty portico supported on four granite columns, is richly decorated on its upper half with statuary and sculpture. Marble and mosaic have been lavishly used in the ornamentation of the interior and of the crypt. Round the apse runs a gallery from which, according to an old custom, a benediction is pronounced upon the town annually on the 8th of September. From this gallery a magnificent view of the city and the surrounding country can be obtained. At the foot of the hill of Fourvière rises the cathedral of St Jean, one of the finest examples of early Gothic architecture in France. Begun in the 12th century, to the end of which the