Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume XV.djvu/39

 SIEGERT berg; pop. in 1871, 11,070. It is the chief seat of the tanning and leather industry of Westphalia, and has large manufactories of iron and steel ware, and of linen, cotton, and woollen goods. It is rapidly increasing in population. Rubens was born here. SIEGERT, Karl August, a German painter, born in Neuwied in 1820. He studied at Diissel- orf under Hildebrandt from 1837 to 1841, d subsequently at the academy till 1846, avelled in various countries, and in 1851 be- e a professor of painting at Diisseldorf. e excels in genre pictures. His recent works elude "Dinner Hour," "A Welcome Pause," Sunday Morning," and " A Lay Brother dis- tributing Alms." SIEMENS. I. Ernst Werner, a German inven- r, born at Lenthe, near Hanover, Dec. 13, 816. He entered the Prussian army in 1834, came an artillery officer in 1838, busied him- If with researches in electro-metallurgy, and k out in 1841 a patent for electro-plating d gilding. From 1844 he had charge of the vernment artillery works at Berlin, and also evoted himself to perfecting the electric tele- In 1848 he laid at Kiel the first sub- arine mines exploded by electricity. In 1849 left the army and founded in Berlin the legraph-building establishment of Siemens Halske. Among the more important of iemens's inventions are: the method of de- rmining the position of injuries in subter- .ean and submarine lines ; of examining in- ated wires ; of charging subterraneous and bmarine conductors, in order to lessen the urbing influences of induced currents in e cables. II. Karl Wilhelm, brother of the receding, born at Lenthe, April 4, 1823. He .udied at Gottingen, entered the Stolberg ma- ine works, and in 1843 settled in London a civil engineer. In 1858 he undertook management of a London branch of the rm of Siemens and Halske of which he had 'me a partner. With his brother Werner e carried on investigations in electro-magnet- and several important improvements in e manufacture of submarine cables and the ode of insulating with caoutchouc were made y them jointly. Assisted by his younger ther Friedrich (born Dec. 8, 1826), he insti- ted in 1846 experiments looking to the dis- very of a more perfect combustion of fuel, e result was the regenerating gas furnace. FURNACE, vol. vii., p. 543.) In perfecting is invention all the brothers took part, al- ough the chief merit belongs to Wilhelm. n 1869 the Siemens steel works were erected Landore in Wales, in which nearly 1,000 -ns of cast steel are produced weekly, partly y the Siemens method directly from the ore, d partly from cast and wrought iron. Oth- inventions of Wilhelm Siemens are : the ihometer, a hydrostatic instrument for mea- suring depths at sea; the hydraulic brake to prevent the recoil of artillery on ships of war; a pyrometer (see PYROMETER), &c. Pie has 743 VOL. xv. 3 SIERRA 31 published dissertations " On a Regenerative Condenser" (1850); "On the Conversion of Heat into Mechanical Effects" (1853); U 0n a Regenerative Steam Engine" (1856); and " On the Increase of Electrical Resistance in Conductors with Rise of Temperature, and its Application to the Measure of ordinary and Furnace Temperatures" (1871). SIENA, or Sienna. I. A central province of Italy, in Tuscany, bordering on Florence, Arez- zo, Perugia, Rome, Grosseto, and Pisa; area, 1,465 sq. m. ; pop. in 1872, 206,446. It is watered by the Ombrone, Orcia, and other rivers. The N. E. portion is very mountain- ous. There are several lakes. A portion of the soil is fertile, producing wheat, olive oil, and wine ; a larger portion comprises forests, prairies, and pasture grounds; much of it is uncultivated. Cattle raising is a chief occu- pation. It comprises the districts of Siena and Montepulciano. II. A city, capital of the province, on two hills in a dreary plain, 31 m. S. by E. of Florence; pop. in 1872, 22,- 965. The streets are narrow, and many of them too steep for vehicles. The cathedral, built in the 13th century, is a fine specimen of Italian Gothic, and there are several other churches which are rich in works of art. The university, which was flourishing in the mid- dle ages, has a library of 50,000 volumes and 5,000 manuscripts. Siena is an archbishop's see, and has numerous academies of litera- ture, science, and the fine arts. The hos- pital of Santa Maria della Scala is one of the oldest in Europe. The piazza, del Campo, celebrated in Dante's Purgatorio, contains the loggia di San Paolo, the seat of a commercial tribunal in the middle ages. Siena is a very ancient place, as the remains of Etruscan walls still visible testify. It was a bishop's see in the 6th century. In the middle ages it was a powerful republic, and rivalled Florence, with which it was often at war. In the struggle between the popes and emperors it sided with the Ghibelline party, and its soldiers defeated the Guelphs at Monte Ap.erto or Montaperti in 1260. The council of Pavia, transferred to Siena, lasted from June 22, 1423, to Feb. 26, 1424. A long period of civil war ended in its capture by the troops of Charles V. in 1555, and it was united with Tuscany in 1557. SIERRA, a N. E. county of California, bound- ed E. by Nevada, and drained by the North and Middle forks of the Yuba river ; area, 830 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 5,619, of whom 810 were Chinese. It is situated among the Sierra Nevada mountains, and but little of it is less than 3,000 ft. above the sea. There are several isolated peaks, the most conspicuous of which are Table mountain, more than 6,500 ft. high ; Saddle mountain, a little lower ; and the Sierra buttes, 8,300 ft. high. Nearly the whole county is underlaid by auriferous slates, generally cov- ered by volcanic accumulations. It is one of the chief gold-producing counties in the state. The surface is covered with a heavy growth