Page:EB1911 - Volume 23.djvu/898

Rh of the Maas in 1023. Ruodlieb was left unfinished, and furthermore the MS. was cut up and used for binding books, so that the fragments were only gradually discovered (from 1807 onwards) and pieced together. The framework of the story is borrowed from a popular märchen of the youth who takes service away from home, and is paid in wise saws instead of current coin. He receives at the same time a loaf, with instructions not to cut it until he is once more at home. This contains the coins. The proverbs, usually three in number, were increased in Ruodlieb to twelve, each of which was the starting-point of an episode by which the hero was made to appreciate its value.

 RUPAR, a town of British India, in Umballa district of the Punjab, on the left bank of the river Sutlej, 43 m. N. of Umballa, 1120 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) 8888. It was the scene of Ranjit Singh's visit to Lord William Bentinck when governor-general in 1831. Here are the head works of the Sirhind canal. Rupar has manufactures of cotton twill and hardware. Hindu and Mahommedan fairs are held.

 RUPEE (Hindustani rupiya, from Sanskrit rupya), the standard coin of the monetary system in India. A silver coin of 175 grains Troy, called tanka, approximating to the rupee, was struck by the Mahommedan rulers of Delhi in the 13th century; but the rupee itself, of 179 grains, was introduced by Sher Shah in 1542. The English at first followed various indigenous standards; but since 1835 the rupee has uniformly weighed 180 grains, containing 165 grains of pure silver. The weight of the rupee (one tola) is also the unit upon which the Indian standard of weights is based. Down to about 1873 the gold value of the rupee was 2s., and ten rupees were thus equal to £1; but after 1873, owing to the depreciation of silver, the rupee at one time sank as low in value as 1s. In order to provide a remedy the government of India decided in 1893 to close the mints, and in 1899 to make the rupee legal tender at fifteen to £1. This policy proved successful, and since 1899 the exchange value of the rupee has practically remained at 1s. 4d. Therefore a lakh of rupees, which before 1873 was worth £10,000, is now only worth £6666, and a crore of rupees, which was formerly a million sterling, now only amounts to, £666,666. The rupee is divided into sixteen annas, now worth 1d. each, and the anna is subdivided into 12 pies. (See, and .)

 RUPERT, ST, according to the Gesta Sancti Hrodberti, which dates from the 9th century, was a kinsman of the Merovingian house, and bishop of Worms under Childebert III. (695–711). At the invitation of the duke of Bavaria, Theodo II., Rupert went to Regensburg (Ratisbon), where he began his apostolate. He founded the church of St Peter near the Wallersee, and subsequently, at Salzburg, the church of St Peter, together with a monastery and a dwelling for the clerks, as well as a convent for women “in superiori castro Iuvavensium.” He died and was buried at Salzburg. He is regarded as the apostle of the Bavarians, not that the land was up to that time altogether heathen, but because of his services in the promotion and consolidation of its Christianity.

 RUPERT, PRINCE, (1619–1682), third son of the elector palatine and “winter king” of Bohemia, Frederick V., and of Elizabeth, daughter of James I. of England, was born at Prague on the 17th of December 1619. A year later his father was defeated at the battle of the Weisser-Berg, near Prague, and driven from Bohemia. After many wanderings the family took refuge in Holland, where Rupert's boyhood was spent. In 1633 the boy was present at the siege of Rheinberg in the suite of the Prince of Orange, and in 1635 he served in this prince's bodyguard. In 1636 he paid his first visit to England, was entered as an undergraduate, though only nominally, at St John's College, Oxford, and was named as the governor of a proposed English colony in Madagascar. But this scheme did not mature, and Charles sent his nephew back to Holland, having, however, formed a high opinion of his energy, talent and resolution. In 1637 he was again serving in the wars, and in 1638, after displaying conspicuous bravery, he was taken prisoner by the imperialists at the action of Vlotho (17th October) and held in a not very strict captivity for three years. In 1641 he was released, and, rejoining his mother in Holland, was summoned to England to the assistance of his uncle, for the Great Rebellion was about to break out.

In July 1642 he landed at Tynemouth. Charles at once made him general of the horse and independent of Lord Lindsey, the nominal commander of the whole army. From this point until the close of the first Civil War in 1646 Prince Rupert is the dominant figure of the war. His battles and campaigns are described in the article. He was distinctively a cavalry leader, and it was not until the battle of Marston Moor in 1644 that the Royalist cavalry was beaten. The prince's strategy was bold as well as skilful, as was shown both in the Royalist movements of 1644 which he proposed, and in the two far-ranging expeditions which he carried out for the relief of Newark and of York. In November 1644, in spite of the defeat at Marston Moor, he was appointed general of the king's army. But this appointment, though welcome to the army, was obnoxious to the king's counsellors, who resented the prince's independence of their control, to some of the nobility over whose titles to consideration he had ridden roughshod, and to some of the officers whose indiscipline and rapacity were likely to be repressed with a heavy hand. These dissensions culminated, after the prince's surrender of Bristol to Fairfax, in a complete break with Charles, who dismissed him from all his offices and bade Rupert and his younger brother Maurice seek their fortunes beyond the seas.

Rupert's character had been tempered by these years of responsible command. By 1645, although the parliamentary party accused him not merely of barbarity but of ingratitude for the kindnesses which his family had received from English people in the days of the Palatinate War, Rupert had in fact become a good Englishman. He was convinced, after Marston Moor, that the king's cause was lost, in a military sense, and moreover that the king's cause was bad. When he surrendered Bristol without fighting to the uttermost, it was because Fairfax placed the political issue in the foreground, and after the capitulation the prince rode to Oxford with his enemies, frankly discussing the prospect of peace. Already he had deliberately advised Charles to make peace, and had come to be suspected, in consequence, by Charles's optimistic adviser Digby. But to Charles himself the news of the fall of Bristol was a thunderbolt. “It is the greatest trial to my constancy that has yet befallen me,” he wrote to the prince, “that one that is so near to me in blood and friendship submits himself to so mean an action.” Rupert was deeply wounded by the implied stain on his honour; he forced his way to the king and demanded a court-martial. The verdict of this court smoothed over matters for a time, but Rupert was now too far estranged from the prevailing party at court to be of any assistance, and after further misfortunes and quarrels they separated, Charles to take refuge in the camp of the Scots, Rupert to stay, as a spectator without command, with the Oxford garrison. He received at the capitulation a pass from the parliament to leave England, as did also his faithful comrade Maurice.

For some time after this Rupert commanded the troops 