Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/240

Rh 222 R, A H R A I RAHEL. See VARNHAGEN VON ENSE. RAHWAY, a city of the United States in Union county, New Jersey, 1 9 miles by rail south-west of New York, lies on Rah way river at the head of schooner navigation, about 4 miles above its mouth in Staten Island Sound. It is best known for its carriage-factories, but has also a wool- mill, a printing-press manufactory, a printing-house, a shirt -factory, a hunting -goods factory, &c. The popula- tion was 6258 in 1870 and 6455 in 1880. First settled in 1720 and named after Rahwack, the Indian owner of the site, Rah way was incorporated as a city in 1858. RAI BARELI or ROY BAREILLY, a district of British India, in the Rai Bareli division l of Oudh, under the jurisdiction of the lieutenant-governor of the North- Western Provinces, has an area of 1738 square miles. It lies between 25 49' and 26 35' N. lat. and between 80 45' and 81 40' E. long., and is bounded on the N. by the districts of Lucknow and Bara Banki, on the E. by Sultanpur, on the S. by Partabgarh and the Ganges, and on the W. by Unao. The general aspect of the district is slightly undulating, and the country is beauti- fully wooded ; in fact, the beauty of the country is not to be surpassed by any part of the real plain of Hindustan. The soil is remarkably fertile, and the cultivation of a high class. The principal rivers of the district are the Ganges and the Sai : the former skirts it for 54 miles and is everywhere navigable for boats of 40 tons; the latter traverses it from north-west to south-east, a dis- tance of 55 miles. Other rivers are the Basha, the Loni, and the Naiya. The indigenous products of Rai Bareli consist of several magnificent and useful timber trees, numerous kinds of grazing and thatching grasses, and a variety of rice known as "pasahi," which grows wild in many tanks and marshes ; its jungle products are lac and silk cocoons. Herds of wild cattle are to be found in the south of the district, near the Sai river, and do much harm to the crops ; nylghau are common near the Ganges, and wolves are occasionally met with in the jungles. According to the census of 1881 Rai Bareli district contains a population of 951,905 (males 466,906, females 484,999). By religion 874,180 are Hindus, 77,424 Mohammedans, and 123 Christians. The most numerous castes are the Ahirs (114,869), the Brahmans(113,212), and the Rajputs (70,757). Compared with other Oudh districts, the proportion of high castes is large, which is accounted for by the fact that Rai Bareli was for centuries the seat of Hindu authority and but little controlled by the Mohammedan kings. The population is almost entirely rural, there being only three towns with a population exceeding 5000, viz., Rai Bareli (see below), Jais (11,044), and Dalmau (5367). The principal occupa- tion of the people is agriculture. Of the total area 892 square miles were in 1882 returned as cultivated, 432 as cultivable, and 414 square miles as uncultivable. The greater portion of the cultivated area is two-crop land. The principal crops are rice, wheat, gram, arhar, and pease. In years of scarcity Rai Bareli is worse off than other districts, having no railway and only some 56 miles of water communication along its border. On the other hand, its masonry wells afford it a greater assurance against famine ; its drainage is superior to that of other districts ; it suffers comparatively less from floods ; and its area of artificial irrigation is so large that absolute famine ought to be almost unknown. The average rainfall of the district is 37 inches ; the rainfall is, however, very capricious and often deficient in the very months when it is most needed for agricultural purposes. Although possessing no railway communication, the district is well opened up by roads. Its gross revenue in 1882 was 153,072, of which 129,841 was derived from the land-tax. There are little trade and few manufactures, except cloth-weaving for local use, the making of brass and copper utensils, and glass ware. RAI BARELI or ROY BARBELL Y, town and administra- tive headquarters of the above district, is situated on the t l Rai Bareli division comprises the three districts of Rai Bareli, Sultanpur, and Partabgarh, and contains an area of 4882 square miles, with a population (1881) of 2,756,864 (males 1,362,761, females 1,394,103). The great majority of the people are Hindus, of whom there are 2,493,536; the Mohammedans number 262,892 and the Christians 226. banks of the Sai in 26 14' N. lat. and 81 17' E. long. It was founded by the Bhars, who called it Bharauli, but it was subsequently corrupted into Bareli. The prefix "Rai" is either derived from Rahi, a village near the town, or from the fact of its having been long in the possession of a Kayasth family bearing the name of Rai. The population of the town (1881) is 11,781 (males 5970, females 5811). It possesses many architectural features, chief of which is a spacious and strong fort erected in 1403, and constructed of bricks 2 feet long by 1 foot thick and 1| wide. Among its ancient buildings are the magnificent palace and tomb of Nawab Jahan Khan, the governor in the time of Aurangzeb, and four fine mosques. RAIKES, ROBERT (1735-1811), the founder of Sunday schools, was the son of Robert Raikes, a printer in Gloucester and proprietor of the Gloucester Journal, and was born on 14th September 1735. On the death of his father in 1757 he succeeded him in the business, which he continued to conduct till 1802. Along with some others he started a Sunday school at Gloucester in 1780, and on his giving publicity to the enterprise in the columns of his journal the notice was copied into the London papers and awakened considerable attention. For nearly thirty years he continued actively engaged in the promotion of his undertaking, and he lived to witness its wide extension throughout England. He died on 5th April 1811. Among various accounts of the life and work of Raikes mention may be made of that by P. M. Eastman, 1880. RAIL (German fialle, French JRdle, Low Latin Itallus), originally the English name of two birds, distinguished from one another by a prefix as Land-Rail and Water-Rail, but latterly applied in a much wider sense to all the species which are included in the Family Rallidse, of Ornithology. The LAKD-RAIL, also very commonly known as the Corn-Crake, and sometimes as the Daker-Hen, is the Rallus crex of Linnaeus and Crex pratensis of recent authors. Its monotonous grating cry, which has given it its common name in several languages, is a familiar sound throughout the summer nights in many parts of the British Islands ; but the bird at that season very seldom shews itself, except when the mower lays bare its nest, the owner of which, if it escape beheading by the scythe, may be seen for an instant before it disappears into the friendly covert of the still standing grass. In early autumn the partridge-shooter not unfrequently flushes it from a clover- field or tangled hedgerow ; and, as it rises with apparent labour and slowly flies away to drop into the next place of concealment, if it fall not to his gun, he wonders how so weak-winged a creature can ever make its way to the shores if not to the interior of Africa, whither it is almost certainly bound; for, with comparatively few individual exceptions, the Land-Rail is essentially migratory nay more than that, it is the Ortygometra of classical authors supposed by them to lead the QUAIL (supra, p. 146) on its voyages and in the course of its wanderings has now been known to reach the coast of Greenland, and several times that of North America, to say nothing of Bermuda, in every instance we may believe as a straggler from Europe or Barbary. The Land-Rail needs but a brief description. It looks about as big as a Partridge, but on examination its appearance is found to be very deceptive, and it will hardly ever weigh more than half as much. The plum- age above is of a tawny brown, the feathers being longi- tudinally streaked with blackish brown ; beneath it is of a yellowish white ; but the flanks are of a light chestnut. The species is very locally distributed, and in a way for which there is at present no accounting. In some dry upland and corn-growing districts it is plentiful ; in others, of apparently the same character, it but rarely occurs ; and