Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 17.djvu/546

Rh N I K N I L The remains of the well-known Greek colony Olbia have been discovered close to the confluence of the Ingul with the Bug at the Sto-Moghily (Hundred Graves). In mediaeval times the country was under the Lithuanians, and subsequently under the Zaporogian Cossacks. Russian colonists settled in the locality about the end of the last century, and after the fall of Otchakoff Prince Potem- kin established a wharf on the Ingul which received the name of Nikolaieff. The further development of the town is due almost entirely to the efforts of the Russian Government to make it an important naval station. NIKOLAIEVSK, a district town of Russia, in the government of Samara, on the right bank of the Irghiz, lies 48 miles from the Volga and 109 miles to the south-west of Samara. Its 10,000 inhabitants are mostly Raskolniks, or of the &quot;United Church,&quot; and about 2000 Tartars occupy a separate part of the town. The chief occupation of the Russian and Tartar inhabitants is agriculture and cattle-breeding, in the products of which the merchants carry on a lively trade. The industries (tallow-melting and tanning) are unimportant. The fertility of the soil in the district favours commerce, as well as the development of large villages, many of which Poganovka (6000 inhabitants), Ekaterinstadt (5000), Porubejka (5000), and several others are more important and wealthier than many district towns of Russia. The famous Irghiz monasteries of the Raskolniks occur along the Irghiz in the same district, whilst the left bank of the Volga is studded with rich German colonies. Under the name of Metchetnoye, Nikolaievsk was founded in 1762, by Raskolniks who had fled to Poland and returned when Catherine II. undertook to grant them religious freedom. The monasteries which were founded at the same time became the refuge of numerous runaway serfs, and so the focus of the dis turbances which broke out in 1773. In 1828 serious prosecu tions began, with the result that the monasteries were closed with the exception of three, which were handed over in 1829 and 1836 to the United Church by order of Government. In 1835 the name of Metchetnoye was changed to Nikolaievsk. For Nikolaievsk-on-the-Amur, a town of Eastern Siberia, on the left bank of the estuary of the Amur, 23 miles from the Gulf of Amur, see MARITIME PROVINCE, vol. xv. p. 548. NIKOLAIEVSKAYA SLOBODA, a village of Russia, in the government of Astrakhan and district of Tsareff, 3 miles from the Volga, on its left bank, opposite Kamuishin. It dates from about the end of the last century, when a number of Little-Russians settled here for the transport of salt from Lake Elton. Although still but a village, it has about 30,000 inhabitants, and is one of the chief centres on the lower Volga for the trade in corn and salt. NIKOPOL, a town of Russia, in the government and district of Ekaterinoslaff, on the right bank of the Dnieper, 76 miles to the south-south-west of Ekaterinoslaff. The town, formerly called Nikitin Rog, occupies an elongated peninsula between two branches of the Dnieper, at a point where its banks are covered on both sides and to a con siderable distance with marshes, and has been for many centuries one of the places where the middle Dnieper could most conveniently be crossed. The old &quot; setcha,&quot; or fortified camp, of the Zaporogian Cossacks had its seat a little above. Numbers of graves around it recall the battles which were fought for the possession of this im portant strategic point. One of them, close to the town, &quot; the Great Grave &quot; (Tolstaya Moghila), contained, along with other Scythian antiquities, the well-known precious vase representing the capture of wild horses. Even now Nikopol, which is situated on the highway from Ekaterinoslaff to Kherson, is also the point where the _ &quot; salt-highway &quot; of the Chumaks (Little-Russian carriers of salt) to the Crimea crosses the Dnieper. A wharf for the building of trading ships navigating the estuary of the Dnieper has been established at Nikopol, and it is still one of the chief places on the lower Dnieper for the export of corn, linseed, tallow, and wool. Its 10,000 inhabitants are Little -Russians, Jews, and Mennonites, who prosecute agriculture extensively. The trade in wheat, hemp, tallow, and wool is important in connexion with the export trade of Nikolaieff and Odessa. NIKOPOLI, or NICOPOLI (Turkish, Nighebolu or Nebul a city of Bulgaria, the chief town of a circle in the district of Plevna (Plyeven), is picturesquely situated on the south bank of the Danube, at the confluence of the Osma. According to the census of 1881 it had only 4652 inhabitants, but previous to its destruction by the Russians in 1877 they numbered about 10,000, and as a military post the town has for centuries been of con siderable importance. A ruined castle still dominates the place, and fortifications stretch down to the river. Nikopoli occupies the site of the ancient Asamus, but by some mediaeval confusion bears the name of Nicopolis ad Istrum, which was founded by Trajan several miles down the river, at the inflow of the latrus or Yantra, at the spot still called Nikup. The? following are the chief points in the modern history of the place : capture of the fortress by Sigismund of Hungary in 1392 and 1395 ; defeat of Sigismund and his hosts in 1396 by Bajazet; siege of the town by Uladislaus of Hungary in 1444 ; defeat of the Turks by Bathori in 1595 and by Michael of AVallachia in 1598 ; occupation of the fortress by the Russians in 1810 ; destruction of the Turkish flotilla and storming of the Turkish camp by Govaroff in 1829 ; and the capture and burning of the town by the Russians under Kriidener on 15th June 1877. NILE. This mighty river, which after a course of Plate- 3370 miles pours into the Mediterranean a low- water XV - T current of 61,500 cubic feet per second, has its cradle in the Victoria Nyanza, an enormous lake in Central Africa victoria where the line of the equator is crossed by 32, 33, Nyanza.: and 34 of E. long., somewhere about 4000 feet above the sea. The Victoria Nyanza 2 measures 230 miles from north to south and 220 from east to west. Its coast-line, which is very irregular, cannot be less than 2000 miles ; its water area is estimated at 27,000 miles, and its very islands have an aggregate area of 1400 square miles. The physical features of the shores vary greatly from district to district. 3 At the south-east corner is Speke Gulf, about 60 miles long, formed partly by a deep indentation of the mainland and partly by the peninsular island of Ukerewe, which is separated from the mainland by Rugisi or Rugeshi Strait, a narrow and shallow channel about f mile long, overgrown with rushes, papyrus, and a fine network of grass which undulates beneath the foot. Bukindo is the chief village on the island, which forms the territory of a separate, ruler. Its inhabitants murdered Lieutenant G. Shergold Smith, R.N., and Mr O Neill, members of the 1876-77 expedition of the Church Missionary Society. To the north of Ukerewe lies Ukara, for the most part barren, and with two rugged hills rising 200 or 300 feet. The natives- average less than 5 feet in height (Wilson and Felkin, L pp. 99-101). Along the south and south-west coasts is a whole series of islands notably Komeh, Mysomeh,, Bumbireh, and Bukerebe or Alice Island ; but of much more importance is the great Sesse Archipelago off the. coasts of western Uganda. At first entered on our maps as a single great island, it has turned out to be (according, to King Mtesa s possibly somewhat exaggerated statement) a cluster of four hundred mostly inhabited islands, some of the largest being 10 to 15 miles in length and 3 to 4 miles in breadth. Clothed as they generally are with forest,, and fringed along the shore with papyrus or low jungle,, they often present scenes of the richest tropical luxuriance. Along the east half of the northern coast are a number of 1 Plate XV. shows the river system south of the Tropic of Cancer. For the Egyptian portion see Plate VI. , vol. vii. 2 Nyanza means water or lake. Other names are Nyanza Kerewe- (Linant), Neraa Bali (Baker), Luero lo Luta Nzige, i.e., &quot;white with dead locusts&quot; (Speke), Bahari ya Pila or &quot;Second Lake&quot; and Baliari ya Ukara (of the Sawahili), and Sea of Ukerewe (of the Arabs). 3 A description will be found in Wilson and Felkin, Uganda and the Egyptian Soudan, vol. i. p. 250-54.