Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 14.djvu/409

* NEPAI,. 359 NEPHOSCOPE. Khatmandu, they obtained favorable conditions of peace and the establislinient of a British Kesi- dency at the capital. ]5y the assassination of his uncle in 1845, and by the Kot massacre of his opponents in the foUowinj^ year, Jiinj; IJahadur, a colonel in the army, became J'rinie Minister and nominal ruler. Having (irmly established him- self in power, he visited England in 1850, and after his return the fruits of his journey were exhibited in the wise reforms that he introduced. During the Indian ilutiny of ISo" lie rendered valuable assistance to the British and was hand- somely rewarded. He died in 187" and was .succeeded by his brother, who also resorted to wliolesale executions to maintain his ascendency, and ruled until 1885, when he was murdered at the instigation of Bir Shamsher Jang, now Prime ilinister and father-in-law, by two daughters, of the reigning Jlaharaja, Pirthivi Bir Bikram, who was born in 1875 and ascended the throne in 1881. BiBLioGR^vr-HY'. Hodgson, Colonization of Xepaul (Calcutta, 1857); id.. Essays on the Language, Literature, and Rcliqion of Xepaul and Tihet (London, 1874); Wright (ed.), Jlistori/ of .Yc- paul (Cambridge, 1877) ; Oldfield, Sketches from TCepauI, Historical and Descriptive (ib., 1880); Hunter, Imperial (lazetteer of India, vol. x, (ib., 1886) ; Bendall, Journal of Literary and Archte- ologieal Research in Sepal (ib., 188G) ; Vansit- tart, yotcs on Sepal (Calcutta, 1895) ; Ballan- tine, On India's Frontier, or Xepal (Xew York, 1896) ; Waddell, Among the Himalayas (London, 1898) : Boeck, Dureh Indien ins verschlussene Land Sepal (Leipzig, 1903). NEPENTHE, ne-pen'the (Gk. v-qireveii^. ne- penthes, from v-q-, ne-, negative prefi.x + irivBos, penthos, grief). In the Odyssey, an epithet of a drug given to Helen in Egypt, possessing the power to bring forgetfulness of every pain or grief. Later writers identified the drug with opium, or some preparation of hemp. NEPENTHES, ne-pen'thez. A genus of herbs or half-shrubby plants of the natural order Ne- penthacoa?. The species are natives of swampy ground in India, China, llalaysia, Madagascar, etc., and are chiefly remarkalile for the leaves of some species which consist of a dilated foliaceous petiole, prolonged beyond its foliaceous part, as if it were the prolongation of the midrib of a leaf, and terminating in a pitcher ( ascidium ), from which the name pitcher-plant hasbeen derived. The pitcher is ter- minated by a lid. which is regarded as the true blade of the leaf. The fluid found in these pitchers is a se- cretion of the plant itself. Insects often enter the pitcher, and according to investigations of Vines, are dissolved by a fennent se- creted by the leaves and absorbed ; so that the nepenthes rank among insectivorous plants. Many of the species are epiphytes, being attached to trees and other plants, and are rather commonly grown in hothouses for their strange leaves. The name pitcher-plant is applied to many other CULTIVATKl) V.VHIETY OF NEPENTHES. plants, as Sarraceuia spp., Arisa-ma triphyllum, etc. NEPHELENE SYENITE (nephelene, from Gk. v«pirj, nrpliiU', cloud -+- syenite), Laurvig- ite. An igneous ruck of granitic texture, of which the essential mineral constituents are nephelene and alkali feldspar. Nephelene syen- ites usually contain also an alkaline variety of pyroxene (acmite or icgerine), and frequently also nosean or haiiyne, sodalite, sphene, and peculiar varieties of mica (lepidomelane) and garnet (melanite). These minerals are so gen- erally found together, and so rarely occur except when in association with nephelene or the allied mineral leucite. that the nephelene syenites and a few rare families of rocks (leucite syenites, Iheralitcs) are quite marked in their peculiari- ties. Xephelcne .syenites are very rich in the alkalies and alumina. They are quite subject to alteration by weathering processes. NEPH'ELITE (from Gk. jt^Aij, nephele, cloud). A mineral sodium-aluminum silicate that crystallizes in the hexagonal system, has a vitreous or greasy lustre, and is generally color- less or light yellow, though sometimes when found massive it is green or red. It occurs in both ancient and modern volcanic rocks, and in such as syenite. It is found in the lavas of the volcanoes' of Italy; also in Bohemia, in France, in Brazil, and in Canada: in the United States the massive and crystallized varieties are found in Maine, New Jersey, in the Ozark Mountains (Arkansas), and in Montana. NEPHE'LIUM. A genus of plants. See Ll- TCHI. NEPHI, ne'fi. A city and the county-seat of Juab Countv, Utah, 87 iniles south of Salt Lake City; at th"e Junction of the Oregon Short Line and" the Sanpete Valley railroads (Map: Utah, B 2). It is the distributing point for a district interested chiefly in farming, lumbering, and cattle-raising, and in the mining of salt and gypsum. Population, in 1890, 2034; in 1900, 2208. NEPHOSCOPE (from Gk. vio(, nephos, cloud + mo-civ, skopein, to view). An instru- ment used by meteorologists for observing the clouds, and ' especially for determining the amount and direction of the horizontal com- ponent of the apparent motion of a cloud. The modern nephoscope is the development of an idea embodied by Aimf- in 1846, in his so-called 'reflecting anemometer,' and in its best form it has a wide range of usefulness. The simplest form is merely a horizontal mirror, having a cir- cular graduated edge. The observer brings one eye to such a position that the reflected image of the cloud is seen to pass from the centre of the mirror to the ciromiference, and he merely re- cords the direction in which the image appears to pass off. The Marvin nejihoscope, an instru- ment of high i)recision,is used by the United States Weather Bureau observers, and has been exten- sively employed in cloud observations. A form of nephoscojic for use on vessels at sea was de- vised by Professor Finemann and used by him about 1888. About the same time Professor Abbe devised his marine nephoscope and a method of using it for determining absolute altitudes and movements of clouds at sea. It consists essen- tially of a light bronze circle fitting rather loosely