Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/542

Rh 500 N I J N I J being blocked up by the heavy winter snows. In August 1880 nearly half of the town was destroyed by fire; but in the following year most of the public buildings were restored. The college, founded in 1870, was handed over to the authorities in 1878 (with an English department, an engineering school, a geological museum, and various laboratories) ; and the large hospital was rebuilt on a more spacious scale and in European style in 1878. There are large public gardens in the city; many of the canals are bordered with trees ; and an air of tidiness and comfort prevails throughout the un-Europeanized quarters. Niigata has a greater junk traffic than any other town on the Avest coast of Japan, but it has been found quite unsuited in its present state for foreign commerce. The mouth of the river is obstructed by a bar with only 12 feet of water at high tide, and in autumn and winter the squalls are so violent that only very powerful steamers can safely anchor in the bay. Ebisuminato, on the island of Sado, has been opened as a supplementary harbour of refuge but not as a trading port. The shore of the Shinano has already been improved up to the town ; and when the Government has constructed the new harbour and breakwater planned in 1880 Niigata will doubtless become a very nourishing commercial centre, as it is the natural outlet of a large and populous province, producing rice, tea, coal, petroleum, copper, silver, and gold. Almost all the foreign trade of the place has passed into the hands of the Japanese since the Mitsubishi Company began to call at the port. In 1879 thirty-six of their vessels entered, with a total burden of 29,361 tons. In 1878 there were only twenty foreigners in the city, and these mostly in Government employment or agents of mission societies. The Edinburgh Medical Mission has maintained a valuable hospital and dispensary since 1875. During winter Niigata suffers from a terribly severe climate, and the people go &quot;about in wadded clothes with only their eyes exposed.&quot; See Bird, Unbeaten Trades in Japan, for many picturesque details. NIJAR, a town of Spain, in the province of Almeria, 14 miles to the east-north-east of that town, occupies an exposed site on the southern slope of the Sierra Alhamilla. It has dye-works, and manufactures woollen stuffs and pottery ; trade is carried on in the products of these industries, as well as in corn, cattle, barilla, and fine potter s clay procured in the neighbourhood. The popula tion of the ayuntamiento in 1877 was 13,661. NIJNE-TAGHILSK, currently known as TAGHIL, a town and iron-work of Russia, situated in the govern ment of Perm and district of Verkhoturie, 100 miles to the south-east of the district town. It occupies an advantageous position in a longitudinal valley on the eastern slope of the Ural Mountains, within a few miles of the place where the Taghil, cutting through the eastern wall of the valley, escapes to the lowlands to join the Tura, a tributary of the Tobol. The southern part of this valley is occupied by the upper Taghil, and its continuation towards the north by the upper Tura, from which it is separated by a low watershed ; it is dotted with numer ous iron-works, and is now connected by railway (the first in Siberia) with Perm and Ekaterinburg (88 miles distant). The town was founded in 1725 by the well- known Russian miner Demidoff, and is still the property of his family. The river, which above the iron-work ex pands into a small lake, supplies the iron-work with motive power, driving no less than twenty-seven water-wheels, while there are several steam-engines. Nijne-Taghilsk is a central foundry for a number of iron -mines and eleven other works scattered in the valley of the Taghil and its tributary, the Salda, the aggregate production of which in 1879 amounted to 749,000 cwts. of cast iron and 280,000 cwts. of wrought iron (547,500 cwts. of iron and iron-ware, worth 6,000,000 roubles, in 1881). About 360 Ib of gold, 2500 B&amp;gt; of platinum, and 11,600 cwts. of copper are also annually mined at Nijne-Taghilsk. The town has several educational institutions both primary and secondary, the latter including a technical school and a school for girls. It has a very animated appearance during its weekly fairs, and, being the chief corn-market for the supply of nearly all the iron-works of the district of Verkhoturie, carries on a brisk corn trade, which the railway has further developed. The inhabitants also make wooden boxes and trays which are sent to the fairs of Irbit and Nijni-Novgorod. The population, including that of the Vyiski iron-work, situ ated close at hand, exceeds 30,000, all Great-Russians, and chiefly Nonconformists. NIJNE-TCHIRSKAYA, a Cossack village, or stanitsa, of Russia, chief town of the Second Don district of the Don Cossack government, is situated on the right bank of the Don, at its junction with the Tchir, 25 miles below the Kalatch station of the Volga and Don Railway, and is the chief point for corn and linseed from the basin of the middle Don. Its 14,000 inhabitants (with the 11,000 of Verkne-Tchirskaya, 2 miles distant) are mostly engaged in agriculture and cattle-raising, favoured by the extensive landholdings (about 700,000 acres) belonging to the Cossacks of both stanitsas. The hills above the village are covered for several miles with rich gardens and vine yards. Besides the trade in grain and linseed, a consider able business is done in cattle, wool, and salt. Manufac tures, as among the Don Cossacks generally, are very limited, being confined to tanning, brick-making, and candle- making. The place is in regular steamboat communica tion with Novotcherkassk and Taganrog. NIJNI-LOMOFF, a district town of Russia, in the government of Penza, 69 miles west-north-west from the capital of the government, on the Lomoff; the railway from Penza to Tula passes within 17 miles. It was founded as a south-eastern frontier fort in 1636, in a country of moderate fertility, and has but slowly developed. It has now 19,000 inhabitants, who support themselves chiefly by agriculture and gardening. The merchants carry on trade in grain, wine-spirit, hempseed oil, leather, woollen goods, and a variety of wooden wares (cars, sledges, wheels, and so on), largely manufactured in the southern and wooded part of the district. The yearly fair is of some importance as regards corn and cattle. The town and the district have also a few distilleries, manufactures of woollen cloth and potash, oil-works, and potteries. NIJNI-NOVGOROD, or NIJNIY-NOVGOROD, a govern ment of Central Russia, bounded by Vladimir on the W., by Yaroslaff and Vyatka on the N. and N.E., by Kazan and Simbirsk on the E., and by Penza and Tamboff on the S., with an area of 19,800 square miles, two-thirds being on the right and the rest on the left bank of the Volga. The smaller portion, with the exception of the better- drained lands close to the river, is a low flat marshy district, covered with thick forests and sandy hills, and is but thinly peopled. The space between the Oka and Volga is also flat and covered with forests, but offers some what greater advantages to the settler. The best part of the* government is that to the east of the Oka ; it is hilly, traversed by deep ravines, and better drained, and has patches of fertile black earth in the south. Geologically, Nijni-Novgorod belongs chiefly to the Permian system ; the Carboniferous appears only in the lowest formations, and the Permian limestones are covered with a stratum 450 feet in thickness, of variegated marls, formerly con sidered as Permian, but now supposed to be Triassic. It is watered by the Volga with its tributaries, the Kcrjenetz and Vetluga on the left, and the Sura (with the Piana)