Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XIV.djvu/811

 SERVITES and splits badly ; it is much used for screws to wine presses, cogs to wheels, rollers, pulleys, and rules ; and for the coarser kinds of en- graving it is one of the best substitutes for box wood. The fruit is sometimes eaten, but only when it is ready to decay ; when recent it is very acid and austere ; its use to make a fermented drink is mentioned by both Virgil and Pliny ; in Brittany a cider or perry is made from it which is said to be good, though having a very unpleasant smell. The wild ser- vice tree of England is P. torminalis ; and the name is sometimes given to the European and the American mountain ash, P. aucuparia and P. Americana. (See ASH.) SERVITES, or Servants of the Virgin Mary, an order of monks in the Roman Catholic church, founded in Florence in 1233 by seven patri- cian Florentines. Their main object was to propagate devotion to the Virgin Mary. They lived at first as hermits, but soon became a monastic community under the Augustinian rule. They were approved in 1255 by Pope Alexander IV., founded establishments in ev- ery state of western Europe, and were ranked as a mendicant order by Pope Martin V. In 1593 a branch of the order, under Bernardino di Ricciolini, adopted the original eremetical mode of life. The Servites have produced a large number of distinguished men, among whom may be mentioned St. Philip Benizi (died 1285), one of the apostles of western Europe in the 13th century, and Fra Paolo Sarpi. There were also female Servites, who were never very numerous, and a large body of Tertiarians. (See TERTIARIANS.) The or- der in 1870 was divided into 27 provinces, the central house being the monastery of the An- nunziazione in Florence. They were subse- quently involved in the decrees suppressing religious orders in Italy and Germany. They were introduced into the United States in 1870 by Bishop Melcher of Green Bay. SERVIUS TILLItS, the sixth king of Rome, reigned from about 578 to about 534 B. C. According to the legendary accounts of his life, he was brought up in the palace of Tar- quinius Priscus. One day, while he was asleep, flames appeared about his head, and Queen Tanaquil prophesied that he would do great things. He grew up in high favor with the king, and received in marriage one of his daughters. The sons of Ancus Marcius, fear- ing that he would be made heir to the throne, put the king to death ; but Tanaquil declared that Tarquinius was not mortally wounded, and caused Servius Tullius to rule in his name. Servius not long after assumed the sovereign power. He added to the city the Viminal, Esquiline, and Quirinal hills, divided the peo- ple into tribes, classes, and centuries, and made a new constitution which was designed to give political independence to the commons. ^His regard for their interests awakened the jeal- ousy of the nobles, and a horrible tragedy was the consequence. His two daughters were SETON 785 'married to the two sons of Tarquinius, and both wives and husbands being of unlike na- tures, Lucius Tarquinius secretly killed his wife, and married his sister-in-law Tullia, who had murdered her husband. Lucius then plot- ted with the nobles against the king, and in the summer, when the commons were gath- ering their harvests, entered the forum with a band of armed men, and seated himself on the throne before the doors of the senate house. Some of his followers slew the king on the way toward the Esquiline hill, and left his body in the road, where the chariot of his daughter Tullia was driven over it. Many of the incidents of this reign are unquestionably fabulous. The constitution, which is histori- cal, was swept away entirely during the suc- ceeding reign. What are called the walls of Servius Tullius were the walls of Rome down to the time of the emperor Aurelian. SESOSTRIS. See EGYPT, vol. vi., p. 462. SESTERCE (Lat. sestertius), an ancient Ro- man brass or silver coin, worth a quarter of a denarius, or originally 2-fr asses, whence its name (semis tertius, the third a half, the Ro- man expression for two and a half); but the denarius being early divided into 16 instead of 10 asses, the sesterce became equal to 4 asses. Its value down to the time of Augustus was 4*1 cents, and afterward 3-6. The sestertium was 1,000 sesterces, and large sums were often counted in sestertia. There was a common for- mula for the expression of that value in thou- sands, as: 88, 1,000 sestertia; Mna 88, 2,000; dena 88, 10,000 ; and centena SS, 100,000. SESTOS, or Sestns, in antiquity, the principal city of the Thracian Chersonesus (now penin- sula of Gallipoli), on the Hellespont, opposite Abydos, from which it is distant about 1 m. Though never large, it was important from its position. Its chief celebrity is from its con- nection with the romantic story of Hero and Leander, the former of whom was a priestess in the temple of Venus at Sestos. The west- ern end of the bridge by which Xerxes crossed the Hellespont was a little S. of Sestos ; and from its port the army of Alexander sailed over into Asia. Its site is now called Yalova. SET, or Typhon. See DEMONOLOGY, vol. v., p. 794. SETI I. and II. See EGYPT, vol. vi., pp. 461-9. SETON, Elizabeth Ann, founder of the sisters of charity in the United States, born in New York, Aug. 28, 1774, died at Emmettsburp, Md., Jan. 4, 1821. She was the daughter of Dr. Richard Bayley, and in her 20th year be- came the wife of William Seton, whom she accompanied to Italy in 1803. After his death in Pisa she returned to New York, and en- tered the Roman Catholic chureh March 14, 1805. The ruin of her husband's fortune hav- ing left her dependent on her own exertions, she opened a school in Baltimore ; but having received $8,000 from the Rev. Samuel Cooper, and being joined by her two sisters-in-law, Harriet and Cecilia Seton, with two other la-