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 rivers, with 28 ft. and upwards of water at low water of ordinary spring tides, and over 15,000 lineal feet of accommodation; the Empress dock, 18 acres, with a depth of 26 ft. at low water spring tide; the outer dock, 16 acres, with 18 ft. at low water spring tide; and the inner dock, 10 acres. In 1907 the construction of a new dock was undertaken, to cover 16 acres, with a depth of 40 ft. below low water. There are also two coal barge docks capable of floating 10,000 tons of coal at one time. There are five dry docks, having from 29 ft. to 12 ft. depth of water over blocks at neaps. The Prince of Wales, or No. 5 dry dock, opened in 1895, was at that time the largest single dock in the world; it is 750 ft. long by 87 ft. wide at sill, and 112 ft. at cope level. In 1905 a sixth graving dock was opened, having a length of 875 ft., and a width of 90 ft. at sill and 125 ft. at cope level. The principal passenger steamers sailing from the port are those of the Royal Mail Steam Packet Company for the West Indies and the Pacific (via Panama) and for Brazil and the River Plate, &c, and the Union-Castle line for the Cape of Good Hope, Natal, East Africa, &c, both of which companies have their headquarters here. New York is served by the American line, the North German Lloyd line, &c. Regular steamers serve the Channel Islands, Cherbourg and Havre, the principal English ports, Dublin, Belfast and Glasgow; and local steamers serve Cowes (Isle of Wight) and other neighbouring ports. The South-Western Company owns the local railway stations (Town and Dock and Southampton West, besides suburban stations), but through connexions are made with the north by way of the Great Western and Great Central and the Midland and South-Western Junction railways. Among the principal imports are cocoa, coffee, grain (including Indian corn), fruit, provisions (including butter, eggs and potatoes from France and the Channel Islands), wines and spirits, sugar, wool, and other foreign and colonial produce. Exports are all kinds of manufactured goods, such as cotton, linen, woollen, worsted and leather goods, machinery and hardware.

Southampton gives name to a suffragan bishopric in the diocese of Winchester. The parliamentary borough returns two members. The county borough was created in 1888. The town is governed by a mayor, sheriff, senior and junior bailiffs, 13 aldermen, and 39 councillors. The area, which includes the suburbs of Shirley, Freemantle and others, is 4501 acres.

History.—There was a Roman settlement of some importance on the site of the suburb of Bitterne on the E. bank of the Itchen. It was walled, and inscribed stones, coins, pottery, &c, have been found. It is probable that after the Danish invasions of the 11th century the modern Southampton (Hantune, Suhampton) gradually superseded the Saxon Hantune as the latter did the Roman settlement, the site being chosen for its stronger position and greater facilities for trade. It was a royal borough before 1086, and a charter of Henry II. (1154–5) declares that the men of Southampton shall hold their gild liberties and customs as in the time of Henry I. Richard I. in 1189 freed the burgesses from tolls and all secular customs. In 1199 John repeated the grant and gave them the farm of the customs of their own port and those of Portsmouth at a yearly rent of £200. Henry III. in 1256 granted all the liberties and customs enjoyed by Winchester. Grants and confirmations were made from the reign of Henry III. to Henry VI., that of 1401 (2 Henry IV.) granting further to the mayor and bailiffs cognisance of all pleas to be held in the Guildhall (guyhalda). The charter of incorporation was given by Henry VI. in 1445, under which the town was governed by a mayor, 2 bailiffs and burgesses, while by charter of 1447 the neighbouring district was amalgamated with the new borough as a distinct county under the title of " the town and county of the town of Southampton." Further privileges were granted by successive kings, and a charter was finally given by Charles I. in 1640. Southampton has returned two members to parliament since 1295. The inhabitants appear to have had a prescriptive right to hold a cattle-market, which was confirmed by Henry IV. in 1400, and later by Elizabeth. Markets on Wednesday for cattle and Friday for corn are now held. Trinity fair, dating from the year 1443, is now a pleasure fair. In medieval times Southampton owed its importance to the fact that it was the chief port of Winchester. It had a large import and export trade, and in the 13th century was the second wine port in England. Wool was very largely exported, and the fact that it was brought to this port to be shipped probably led to the first establishment of the woollen trade in the W. of England. The rise of London as a port, the prohibition of the export of wool, the loss of the Winchester market after the suppression of the monastic institutions, and the withdrawal of the court led to the gradual decline of trade from the 16th century onwards until railway facilities and the opening of new dockyards gave Southampton the position it holds to-day.

See Victoria County History: Hampshire, iii. 490 seq. ; B. B. Woodward, History of Hampshire (London, 1861–9); Rev. Silvester Davies, History of Southampton (London, 1883).

SOUTHAMPTON, a township of Suffolk county, New York, occupying the western part (W. of Easthampton) of the south-eastern peninsula of Long Island, S. of the Peconic Bay and N. of the Atlantic Ocean. Pop. (1900), 10,371; (1910), 11,240. Separated from the ocean by a narrow beach only, in the south-western part of the township are the nearly landlocked East Bay and Shinnecock Bay, and farther east are Mecox Bay (landlocked) and other ponds near the ocean. At Canoe Place, an old portage, Shinnecock Bay and Peconic Bay are less than 3 m. apart. On the northern shore of the township are the small settlements called Flanders, Southport, Sebonac, North Haven and North Sea. Nearer the south shore and served by the Long Island railway are Speonk, Westhampton, Quogue, Good Ground, Shinnecock Hills, Southampton (pop. in 1910, 2509), Water Mill and Bridgehampton, from which there is a branch line of the Long Island railway to Sag Harbor. Good sailing and sea-bathing are obtained at several places; and the golf links of the Shinnecock Golf Club, at Shinnecock Hills, is one of the best in the country. The first " summer cottages " were built near the village of Southampton in the latter part of the decade 1870–1880, and the summer colony was long called the "New York Annex" or the "Annex." The village of Southampton has been called the Newport of Long Island; in it is the Rogers Memorial Library (1893). The whale fishery was formerly important; it began here about 1660. The Shinnecock Indians long took part in it and many of the men of the tribe were lost in the wreck of the " Circassian " here on the 31st of December 1876. The Indians now on the reservation are mostly mixed bloods with a large proportion of negro blood. Southampton was settled in 1640, probably before Southold, by a " company of undertakers " formed in March 1639 at Lynn, Massachusetts, who received from James Forrett, agent of the proprietor, William Alexander, Lord Stirling, a patent dated the 17th of April 1640 for 8 m. square of land and whose deed from the Indians is dated the 13th of December 1640. Their first attempt to settle was broken up by the Dutch. The name may have been taken in honour of Henry Wriothesley, earl of Southampton. The settlement was a commercial scheme, and in spite of the rigid Puritanism of Abraham Pierson, their first pastor and a sympathizer with New Haven, the people voted to attach themselves to Connecticut (1645). The Mosaic law was adopted for the government of the township. In 1678 Governor Edmund Andros, in a note to the home government, said: " Our principall places of trade are New York and Southampton, except Albany for the Indyans." The village of Southampton was incorporated in 1894.

See Geo. R. Howell, Early History of Southampton, L.I. (2nd ed., Albany, 1887), and the Town Records (4 vols., Sag Harbor, 1874–1879), with notes by W. S. Pelletreau.

 SOUTH AUSTRALIA, a British colonial state, forming part of the Commonwealth of Australia. (For map, see ). It lies between 129° and 141° E. long., has Queensland, New South Wales and Victoria on the E., Western Australia on the W., and the Southern Ocean on the S. Originally its northern line was 26° S. lat.; by the addition of the Northern Territory the area was extended from 380,070 sq. m. to 903,690, and the northern border carried to the Indian Ocean;