Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/351

Rh 

1em 1em 1em

1em  GÜNTHER, (1695–1723), German poet, was born at Striegau in Lower Silesia, on the 8th April 1695. After attending the academy at Schweidnitz, where he composed a number of verses of more than usual promise, he entered in 1715 the university of Wittenberg with the view of studying medicine ; but he became idle and dissipated, contracted heavy debts, and came to a com plete rupture with his father. In 1717 he went to Leipsic, where he obtained the friendship of Menck, and published a poem on the peace of Passarowitz, which acquired him an immediate reputation. Menck recommended him to the king of Poland, but unhappily the first time he appeared at court he was in a state of intoxication. From that time he led an unsettled and dissipated life, depending for an un certain subsistence partly on money obtained for occasional poems and partly on the charity of his friends. He died at Jena, 15th March 1723, when only in his 28th year. Goethe pronounces Giinther to have been a poet in the fullest sense of the term. As a lyrical poet he stands alone among his contemporaries for freedom, spontaneity, and sincerity of utterance ; and his works as a whole give evidence of deep and lively sensibility, fine imagination, clever wit, and a true ear tor melody and rhythm. An air of cynicism, how ever, which was the necessary consequence of his aimless life, is more or less present in most of his poems, and dull, vulgar, or impure witticisms are not unfrequently found side by side with the purest inspirations of his genius.

1em  GUNTOOR, a town in Kistna district, Madras, situated on the Grand Trunk road, about 46 miles from Masulipatam, 17 42 N. lat., 80 29 E. long. ; population 18,033. It is the headquarters of the sub-collector and the district judge of Kistna ; and there is a considerable trade in grain and cotton. Guntoor was formerly the capital of a Circar (SarkAr) under the Mahometans ; it was ceded to the French by the nizfim in 1753. At the time of the cession of the Circars to the English in 1766, Guntoor was specially exempted during the life of Basalat Jang, whose personal jdgir it was. In 1788 it came into British possession, and was finally confirmed in 1803.  GURDÁSPUR, a British district in the lieutenant- governorship of the Punjab, lying between 32 30 and 31 36 N. lat., and between 74 56 and 75 45 E. long. Bounded on the N&quot;. by the native Himalayan states of Kashmir and Chamba, on the E. by Kdngra district and the river Bias, on the S.W. by Amritsar district, and on the W. by Sialkot, the district of Gurdaspur occupies the submontane portion of the Bari Doab or tract between the Bias and the Ravi. An intrusive spur of the British dominions runs northward into the lower Himalayan ranges, to include the mountain sanatarium of Dalhousie. This station crowns the most westerly shoulder of a magnificent snowy range, the Dhdola Dhdr, between which and the plain two minor ranges intervene. Below the hills stretches a picturesque and undulating plateau covered with abundant timber and made green by a copious rainfall, arid watered by the streams of the Bari Dodb, which, diverted by dams and embankments, now empty their waters into the Bias directly, in order that their channels may not interfere with the Bari Doab canal. The district contains several large and important jliils or swampy lakes. Few facts can now be recovered with regard to the early annals of Gurdaspur. Our first distinct historical knowledge begins with the rise of the Sikh confederacy. The whole of the Punjab then was distributed to the chiefs who triumphed over the imperial governors. In the course of a few years, how ever, the famous Ranjit Sinh acquired all the territory which those chiefs had held. Pathankot and the neighbour ing villages in the plain, together with the whole hill portion of the district, formed part of the area ceded by the Sikhs to the East India Company after the first Sikh war in 1846. In 1861-62, after receiving one or two additions, the district was brought into it-j present shape, having its headquarters at Gurdaspur.

1em  GURGÁON, or, a British district in tha lieutenant-governorship of the Punjab, between 27 39 and 28 30 45&quot; N. lat., and 76 20 45&quot; and 77 35 E. long. Bounded on the N. by Rohtak, on the W. and S.W. by portions of the Ulwar, Ndbha, and Jind native states, on the 