Chapter XVII: Part 17

The state itself had its own Lares, called _praestites_, the protecting patrons and guardians of the city. They had a temple and altar on the Via Sacra, near the Palatine, and were represented on coins as young men wearing the chlamys, carrying lances, seated, with a dog, the emblem of watchfulness, at their feet. Mention may also be made of the _Lares grundules_, whose worship was connected with the white sow of Alba Longa and its thirty young (the epithet has been connected with _grunnire_, to grunt): the _viales_, who protected travellers; the _hostilii_, who kept off the enemies of the state; the _permarini_, connected with the sea, to whom L. Aemilius Regillus, after a naval victory over Antiochus (190 B.C.), vowed a temple in the Campus Martius, which was dedicated by M. Aemilius Lepidus the censor in 179.

The old view that the Lares were the deified ancestors of the family has been rejected lately by Wissowa, who holds that the Lar was originally the protecting spirit of a man's lot of arable land, with a shrine at the _compitum_, i.e. the spot where the path bounding his arable met that of another holding; and thence found his way into the house.

In addition to the manuals of Marquardt and Preller-Jordan, and
Roscher's _Lexikon der Mythologie_, see A. de Marchi, _Il Culto
privato di Roma antica_ (1896-1903), p. 28 foll.; G. Wissowa,
_Religion und Kultus der Römer_ (1902), p. 148 foll.; _Archiv für
Religionswissenschaft_ (1904, p. 42 foll.) and W. Warde Fowler in the
same periodical (1906; p. 529).

LA RÉVELLIÈRE-LÉPEAUX, LOUIS MARIE DE (1753-1824), French politician, member of the Directory, the son of J. B. de la Révellière, was born at Montaign (Vendée), on the 24th of August 1753. The name of Lépeaux he adopted from a small property belonging to his family, and he was known locally as M. de Lépeaux. He studied law at Angers and Paris, being called to the bar in 1775. A deputy to the states-general in 1789, he returned at the close of the session to Angers, where with his school-friends J. B. Leclerc and Urbain René Pilastre he sat on the council of Maine-et-Loire, and had to deal with the first Vendéen outbreaks. In 1792 he was returned by the department to the Convention, and on the 19th of November he proposed the famous decree by which France offered protection to foreign nations in their struggle for liberty. Although La Révellière-Lépeaux voted for the death of Louis XVI., he was not in general agreement with the extremists. Proscribed with the Girondins in 1793 he was in hiding until the revolution of 9.10 Thermidor (27th and 28th of July 1794). After serving on the commission to prepare the initiation of the new constitution he became in July 1795 president of the Assembly, and shortly afterwards a member of the Committee of Public Safety. His name stood first on the list of directors elected, and he became president of the Directory. Of his colleagues he was in alliance with Jean François Rewbell and to a less degree with Barras, but the greatest of his fellow-directors, Lazare Carnot, was the object of his undying hatred. His policy was marked by a bitter hostility to the Christian religion, which he proposed to supplant as a civilizing agent by theophilanthropy, a new religion invented by the English deist David Williams. The credit of the _coup d'état_ of 18 Fructidor (4th of September 1797), by which the allied directors made themselves supreme, La Révellière arrogated to himself in his _Mémoires_, which in this as in other matters must be read with caution. Compelled to resign by the revolution of 30 Prairial (18th of June 1799) he lived in retirement in the country, and even after his return to Paris ten years later took no part in public affairs. He died on the 27th of March 1824.

The _Mémoires_ of La Révellière-Lépeaux were edited by R. D. D'Angers
(Paris, 3 vols., 1895). See also E. Charavay, _La Révellière-Lépeaux
et ses mémoires_ (1895) and A. Meynier, _Un Représentant de la
bourgeoisie angevine_ (1905).

LARGENTIÈRE, a town of south-eastern France, capital of an arrondissement in the department of Ardèche, in the narrow valley of the Ligne, 29 m. S.W. of Privas by road. Pop. (1906) 1690. A church of the 12th, 13th and 15th centuries and the old castle of the bishops of Viviers, lords of Largentière, now used as a hospital, are the chief buildings. The town is the seat of a sub-prefect and of a tribunal of first instance; and has silk-mills, and carries on silk-spinning, wine-growing and trade in fruit and silk. It owes its name to silver-mines worked in the vicinity in the middle ages.

LARGILLIÈRE, NICOLAS (1656-1746), French painter, was born at Paris on the 20th of October 1656. His father, a merchant, took him to Antwerp at the age of three, and while a lad he spent nearly two years in London. The attempt to turn his attention to business having failed, he entered, some time after his return to Antwerp, the studio of Goubeau, quitting this at the age of eighteen to seek his fortune in England, where he was befriended by Lely, who employed him for four years at Windsor. His skill attracted the notice of Charles II., who wished to retain him in his service, but the fury aroused against Roman Catholics by the Rye House Plot alarmed Largillière, and he went to Paris, where he was well received by Le Brun and Van der Meulen. In spite of his Flemish training, his reputation, especially as a portrait-painter, was soon established; his brilliant colour and lively touch attracted all the celebrities of the day--actresses, public men and popular preachers flocking to his studio. Huet, bishop of Avranches, Cardinal de Noailles, the Duclos and President Lambert, with his beautiful wife and daughter, are amongst his most noted subjects. It is said that James II. recalled Largillière to England on his accession to the throne in 1685, that he declined the office of keeper of the royal collections, but that, during a short stay in London, he painted portraits of the king, the queen and the prince of Wales. This last is impossible, as the birth of the prince did not take place till 1688; the three portraits, therefore, painted by Largillière of the prince in his youth must all have been executed in Paris, to which city he returned some time before March 1686, when he was received by the Academy as a member, and presented as his diploma picture the fine portrait of Le Brun, now in the Louvre. He was received as an historical painter; but, although he occasionally produced works of that class ("Crucifixion," engraved by Roettiers), and also treated subjects of still life, it was in historical portraits that he excelled. Horace Walpole states that he left in London those of Pierre van der Meulen and of Sybrecht. Several of his works are at Versailles. The church of St Étienne du Mont at Paris contains the finest example of Largillière's work when dealing with large groups of figures; it is an _ex voto_ offered by the city to St Geneviève, painted in 1694, and containing portraits of all the leading officers of the municipality. Largillière passed through every post of honour in the Academy, until in 1743 he was made chancellor. He died on the 20th of March 1746. Jean Baptiste Oudry was the most distinguished of his pupils. Largillière's work found skilful interpreters in Van Schuppen, Edelinck, Desplaces, Drevet, Pitou and other engravers.

LARGS, a police burgh and watering place of Ayrshire, Scotland. Pop. (1901) 3246. It is situated 43 m. W. by S. of Glasgow by the Glasgow & South-Western railway. Its fine beach and dry, bracing climate have attracted many wealthy residents, and the number of summer visitors is also large. The public buildings include the Clark hospital, the Victoria infirmary convalescent home and the Stevenson institute and mechanics' library. Skelmorlie Aisle, the sole relic of the old parish church of St Columba, was converted into a mausoleum in 1636. Near it a mound covers remains, possibly those of the Norwegians who fell in the battle (1263) between Alexander III. and Haco, king of Norway. The harbour is used mainly by Clyde passenger steamers and yachtsmen. From the quay a broad esplanade has been constructed northwards round the bay, and there is an excellent golf course. Kelburne Castle, 2 m. S., a seat of the earl of Glasgow, stands in romantic scenery. FAIRLIE, 3 m. S., another seaside resort, with a station on the Glasgow & South-Western railway, is the connecting-point for Millport on Great Cumbrae. Once a fishing village, it has acquired a great reputation for its yachts.

LARGUS, SCRIBONIUS, court physician to the emperor Claudius. About A.D. 47, at the request of Gaius Julius Callistus, the emperor's freedman, he drew up a list of 271 prescriptions (_Compositiones_), most of them his own, although he acknowledged his indebtedness to his tutors, to friends and to the writings of eminent physicians. Certain old wives' remedies are also included. The work has no pretensions to style, and contains many colloquialisms. The greater part of it was transferred without acknowledgment to the work of Marcellus Empiricus (c. 410), _De Medicamentis Empiricis, Physicis, et Rationabilibus_, which is of great value for the correction of the text of Largus.

See the edition of the _Compositiones_ by G. Helmreich (Teubner
series, 1887).

LARINO (anc. _Larinum_) a town and episcopal see of the Molise (province of Campobasso), Italy, 32 m. N.E. of Campobasso by rail (20 m. direct), 984 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1901) 7044. The cathedral, completed in 1319, has a good Gothic façade; the interior has to some extent been spoilt by later restoration. The campanile rests upon a Gothic arch erected in 1451. The Palazzo Comunale has a courtyard of the 16th century. That the ancient town (which is close to the modern) existed before the Roman supremacy had extended so far is proved by the coins. It lay in the 2nd Augustan region (Apulia), but the people belonged to the Frentani by race. Its strong position gave it importance in the military history of Italy from the Hannibalic wars onwards. The town was a _municipium_, situated on the main road to the S.E., which left the coast at Histonium (Vasto) and ran from Larinum E. to Sipontum. From Larinum a branch road ran to Bovianum Vetus. Remains of its city walls, of its amphitheatre and also of baths, &c., exist, and it did not cease to be inhabited until after the earthquake of 1300, when the modern city was established. Cluentius, the client of Cicero, who delivered a speech in his favour, was a native of Larinum, his father having been praetor of the allied forces in the Social War. (T. As.)

LARISSA (Turk. _Yeni Shehr_, "new town"), the most important town of Thessaly, situated in a rich agricultural district on the right bank of the Salambria (Peneios, Peneus, Peneius), about 35 m. N.W. of Volo, with which it is connected by rail. Pop. (1889) 13,610, (1907) 18,001. Till 1881 it was the seat of a pasha in the vilayet of Jannina; it is now the capital of the Greek province and the seat of a nomarch. Its long subjection to Turkey has left little trace of antiquity, and the most striking features in the general view are the minarets of the disused mosques (only four are now in use) and the Mahommedan burying-grounds. It was formerly a Turkish military centre and most of the people were of Turkish blood. In the outskirts is a village of Africans from the Sudan--a curious remnant of the forces collected by Ali Pasha. The manufactures include Turkish leather, cotton, silk and tobacco; trade and industry, however, are far from prosperous, though improving owing to the immigration of the Greek commercial element. Fevers and agues are prevalent owing to bad drainage and the overflowing of the river; and the death-rate is higher than the birth-rate. A considerable portion of the Turkish population emigrated in 1881; a further exodus took place in 1898. The department of Larissa had in 1907 a population of 95,066.

Larissa, written Larisa on ancient coins and inscriptions, is near the
site of the Homeric Argissa. It appears in early times, when Thessaly
was mainly governed by a few aristocratic families, as an important
city under the rule of the Aleuadae, whose authority extended over the
whole district of Pelasgiotis. This powerful family possessed for many
generations before 369 B.C. the privilege of furnishing the Tagus, or
generalissimo, of the combined Thessalian forces. The principal rivals
of the Aleuadae were the Scopadae of Crannon, the remains of which
(called by the Turks _Old Larissa_) are about 14 m. to the S.W. The
inhabitants sided with Athens during the Peloponnesian War, and during
the Roman invasion their city was of considerable importance. Since
the 5th century it has been the seat of an archbishop, who has now
fifteen suffragans. Larissa was the headquarters of Ali Pasha during
the Greek War of Independence, and of the crown prince Constantine
during the Greco-Turkish War; the flight of the Greek army from this
place to Pharsala took place on the 23rd of April 1897. Notices of
some ancient inscriptions found at Larissa are given by Miller in
_Mélanges philologiques_ (Paris, 1880); several sepulchral reliefs
were found in the neighbourhood in 1882. A few traces of the ancient
acropolis and theatre are still visible.

The name Larissa was common to many "Pelasgian" towns, and apparently
signified a fortified city or _burg_, such as the citadel of Argos.
Another town of the name in Thessaly was Larissa Cremaste, surnamed
Pelasgia (Strabo ix. p. 440), situated on the slope of Mt. Othrys.
(J. D. B.)

LARISTAN, a sub-province of the province of Fars in Persia, bounded E. and N.E. by Kerman and S. by the Persian Gulf. It lies between 26° 30´ and 28° 25´ N. and between 52° 30´ and 55° 30´ E. and has an extreme breadth and length of 120 and 210 m. respectively, with an area of about 20,000 sq. m. Pop. about 90,000. Laristan consists mainly of mountain ranges in the north and east, and of arid plains varied with rocky hills and sandy valleys stretching thence to the coast. In the highlands, where some fertile upland tracts produce corn, dates and other fruits, the climate is genial, but elsewhere it is extremely sultry, and on the low-lying coast lands malarious. Good water is everywhere so scarce that but for the rain preserved in cisterns the country would be mostly uninhabitable. Many cisterns are infested with Guinea worm (_filaria medinensis_, Gm.). The coast is chiefly occupied by Arab tribes who were virtually independent, paying merely a nominal tribute to the shah's government until 1898. They reside in small towns and mud forts scattered along the coast. The people of the interior are mostly of the old Iranian stock, and there are also a few nomads of the Turkish Baharlu tribe which came to Persia in the 11th century when the province was subdued by a Turkish chief. Laristan remained an independent state under a Turkish ruler until 1602, when Shah Ibrahim Khan was deposed and put to death by Shah 'Abbas the Great. The province is subdivided into eight districts: (1) Lar, the capital and environs, with 34 villages; (2) Bikhah Ihsham with 11; (3) Bikhah Fal with 10; (4) Jehangiriyeh with 30; (5) Shibkuh with 36; (6) Fumistan with 13; (7) Kauristan with 4; (8) Mazayijan with 6 villages. Lingah, with its principal place Bander Lingah and 11 villages, formerly a part of Laristan, is now included in the "Persian Gulf Ports," a separate administrative division. Laristan is famous for the condiment called _mahiabeh_ (fish-jelly), a compound of pounded small sprat-like fish, salt, mustard, nutmeg, cloves and other spices, used as a relish with nearly all foods.

LARIVEY, PIERRE (c. 1550-1612), French dramatist, of Italian origin, was the son of one of the Giunta, the famous printers of Florence and Venice. The family was established at Troyes and had taken the name of Larivey or L'Arrivey, by way of translation from _giunto_. Pierre Larivey appears to have cast horoscopes, and to have acted as clerk to the chapter of the church of St Étienne, of which he eventually became a canon. He has no claim to be the originator of French comedy. The _Corrivaux_ of Jean de la Taille dates from 1562, but Larivey naturalized the Italian comedy of intrigue in France. He adapted, rather than translated, twelve Italian comedies into French prose. The first volume of the _Comédies facétieuses_ appeared in 1579, and the second in 1611. Only nine in all were printed.[1] The licence of the manners depicted in these plays is matched by the coarseness of the expression. Larivey's merit lies in the use of popular language in dialogue, which often rises to real excellence, and was not without influence on Molière and Regnard. Molière's _L'Avare_ owes something to the scene in Larivey's masterpiece, _Les Esprits_, where Séverin laments the loss of his purse, and the opening scene of the piece seems to have suggested Regnard's _Retour imprévu_. It is uncertain whether Larivey's plays were represented, though they were evidently written for the stage. In any case prose comedy gained very little ground in popular favour before the time of Molière. Larivey was the author of many translations, varying in subject from the _Facétieuses nuits_ (1573) of Straparola to the _Humanité de Jésus-Christ_ (1604) from Pietro Aretino.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] _Le Laquais_, from the _Ragazzo_ of Ludovico Dolce; _La Veuve_,
from the _Vedova_ of Nicolo Buonaparte; _Les Esprits_, from the
_Aridosio_ of Lorenzino de Medicis; _Le Morfondu_, from the _Gelosia_
of Antonio Grazzini; _Les Jaloux_, from the _Gelosi_ of Vincent
Gabbiani; and _Les Escolliers_, from the _Cecca_ of Girolamo Razzi,
in the first volume; and in the second, _Constance_, from the
_Costanza_ of Razzi; _Le Fidèle_, from the _Fedele_ of Luigi
Pasqualigo; and _Les Tromperies_, from the _Inganni_ of N. Secchi.

LARK (O. Eng. _láwerce_, Ger. _Lerche_, Dan. _Laerke_, Dutch _Leeuwerik_), a bird's name used in a rather general sense, the specific meaning being signified by a prefix, as skylark, titlark, woodlark. It seems to be nearly conterminous with the Latin _Alauda_ as used by older authors; and, though this was to some extent limited by Linnaeus, several of the species included by him under the genus he so designated have long since been referred elsewhere. By Englishmen the word lark, used without qualification, almost invariably means the skylark, _Alauda arvensis_, which, as the best-known and most widely spread species throughout Europe, has been invariably considered the type of the genus. Of all birds it holds unquestionably the foremost place in English literature. It is one of the most favourite cage birds, as it will live for many years in captivity, and, except in the season of moult, will pour forth its thrilling song many times in an hour for weeks or months together. The skylark is probably the most plentiful of the class in western Europe. Not only does it frequent almost all unwooded districts in that quarter of the globe, but, unlike most birds, its numbers increase with the spread of agricultural improvement. Nesting chiefly in the growing corn, its eggs and young are protected in a great measure from molestation; and, as each pair of birds will rear several broods in the season, their produce on the average may be set down as at least quadrupling the original stock--the eggs in each nest varying from five to three. Young larks leave their birthplace as soon as they can shift for themselves. When the stubbles are cleared, old and young congregate in flocks.

In Great Britain in the autumn they give place to others coming from more northerly districts, and then as winter succeeds in great part vanish, leaving but a tithe of the numbers previously present. On the approach of severe weather great flocks arrive from the continent of Europe. On the east coast of both Scotland and England this immigration has been noticed as occurring in a constant stream for as many as three days in succession. Farther inland the birds are observed "in numbers simply incalculable," and "in countless hundreds." In these migrations enormous numbers are netted for the markets, but the rate of reproduction is so rapid, and the conditions of life so favourable in Europe that there is no reason to fear any serious diminution in the numbers of the species.

The skylark's range extends across the Old World from the Faeroe to the Kurile Islands. In winter it occurs in North China, Nepal, the Punjab, Persia, Palestine, Lower Egypt and Barbary. It sometimes strays to Madeira, and has been killed in Bermuda, though its unassisted appearance there is doubtful. It has been successfully introduced on Long Island, in the state of New York, into Hawaii and into New Zealand--in which latter it has become as troublesome a denizen as are some other subjects upon which acclimatization societies have exercised their activity.

Allied to the skylark a considerable number of species have been described, of which perhaps a dozen may be deemed valid, besides a supposed local race, _Alauda agrestis_, the difference between which and the normal bird is shown in the annexed woodcut (fig. 1), kindly lent to this work by H. E. Dresser, in whose _Birds of Europe_ it is described at length. These are found in various parts of Africa and Asia.

The woodlark, _Lullula arborea_, is a much more local and, therefore, a far less numerous bird than the skylark, from which it may be easily distinguished by its finer bill, shorter tail, more spotted breast and light superciliary stripe. Though not actually inhabiting woods, as its common name might imply, it is seldom found far from trees. Its song wants the variety and power of the skylark's, but has a resonant sweetness peculiarly its own. The bird, however, requires much care in captivity. It has by no means so wide a range as the skylark, and perhaps the most eastern locality recorded for it is Erzerum, while its appearance in Egypt and even in Algeria must be accounted rare.

Not far removed from the foregoing is a group of larks characterized by a larger crest, a stronger and more curved bill, a rufous lining to the wings, and some other minor features. This group has been generally termed _Galerita_, and has for its type the crested lark, the _Alauda cristata_ of Linnaeus, a bird common enough in parts of France and some other countries of the European continent, and one which has been obtained several times in the British Islands. Many of the birds of this group frequent the borders if not the interior of deserts, and such as do so exhibit a more or less pale coloration, whereby they are assimilated in hue to that of their haunts. The same characteristic may be observed in several other groups--especially those known as belonging to the genera _Calandrella_, _Ammomanes_ and _Certhilauda_, some species of which are of a light sandy or cream colour. The genus last named is of very peculiar appearance, presenting in some respects an extraordinary resemblance to the hoopoes, so much so that the first specimen described was referred to the genus _Upupa_, and named _U. alaudipes_. The resemblance, however, is merely one of analogy.

There is, however, abundant evidence of the susceptibility of the Alaudine structure to modification from external circumstances--in other words, of its plasticity; and perhaps no homogeneous group of _Passeres_ could be found which better displays the working of natural selection. Almost every character that among Passerine birds is accounted most sure is in the larks found subject to modification. The form of the bill varies in an extraordinary degree. In the woodlark (fig. 2, A), already noticed, it is almost as slender as a warbler's; in _Ammomanes_ it is short; in _Certhilauda_ (fig. 2, B) it is elongated and curved; in _Pyrrhulauda_ and _Melanocorypha_ (fig. 3, A) it is stout and finchlike; while in _Rhamphocorys_ (fig. 3, B) it is exaggerated to an extent that surpasses almost any Fringilline form, exceeding in its development that found in some members of the perplexing genus _Paradoxornis_, and even presenting a resemblance to the same feature in the far-distant _Anastomus_--the tomia of the maxilla not meeting those of the mandibula along their whole length, but leaving an open space between them. The hind claw, generally greatly elongated in larks, is in _Calandrella_ (fig. 4) and some other genera reduced to a very moderate size. The wings exhibit almost every modification, from the almost entire abortion of the first primary in the skylark to its considerable development (fig. 5), and from tertials and scapulars of ordinary length to the extreme elongation found in the _Motacillidae_ and almost in certain _Limicolae_. The most constant character indeed of the _Alaudidae_ would seem to be that afforded by the _podotheca_ or covering of the tarsus, which is scutellate behind as well as in front, but a character easily overlooked.[1]

In the Old World larks are found in most parts of the Palaearctic, Ethiopian and Indian regions; but only one genus, _Mirafra_, inhabits Australia, where it is represented by, so far as is ascertained, a single species, _M. horsfieldi_; and there is no true lark indigenous to New Zealand. In the New World there is also only one genus, _Otocorys_, where it is represented by many races, some of which closely approach the Old World shore-lark, _O. alpestris_. The shore-lark is in Europe a native of only the extreme north, but is very common near the shores of the Varanger Fjord, and likewise breeds on mountain-tops farther south-west, though still well within the Arctic circle. The mellow tone of its call-note has obtained for it in Lapland a name signifying "bell-bird," and the song of the cock is lively, though not very loud. The bird trustfully resorts to the neighbourhood of houses, and even enters the villages of East Finmark in search of its food. It produces at least two broods in the season, and towards autumn migrates to lower latitudes in large flocks. These have been observed in winter on the east coast of Great Britain, and the species instead of being regarded, as it once was, in the light of an accidental visitor to the United Kingdom, must now be deemed an almost regular visitor, though in very varying numbers. The observations on its habits made by Audubon in Labrador have long been known, and often reprinted. Other congeners of this bird are the _O. penicillata_ of south-eastern Europe, Palestine and central Asia--to which are referred by H. E. Dresser (_B. Europe_, iv. 401) several other forms originally described as distinct. All these birds, which have been termed horned larks, from the tuft of elongated black feathers growing on each side of the head, form a little group easily recognized by their peculiar coloration, which calls to mind some of the ringed plovers, _Aegialitis_.

The name of lark is also frequently applied to many birds which do not belong to the _Alaudidae_ as now understood. The mud-lark, rock-lark, tit-lark and tree-lark are pipits (q.v.). The grasshopper-lark is one of the aquatic warblers (q.v.), while the so-called meadow-lark of America is an Icterus (q.v.). Sand-lark and sea-lark are likewise names often given to some of the smaller members of the _Limicolae_. Of the true larks, _Alaudidae_, there may be perhaps about one hundred species, and it is believed to be a physiological character of the family that they moult but once in the year, while the pipits, which in general appearance much resemble them, undergo a double moult, as do others of the _Motacillidae_, to which they are most nearly allied. (A. N.)

FOOTNOTE:

[1] By assigning far too great an importance to this superficial
character (in comparison with others), C. J. Sundevall (_Tentamen_,
pp. 53-63) was induced to array the larks, hoopoes and several other
heterogeneous groups in one "series," to which he applied the name of
_Scutelliplantares_.

LARKHALL, a mining and manufacturing town of Lanarkshire, Scotland, near the left bank of the Clyde, 1 m. S.E. of Glasgow by the Caledonian railway. Pop. (1901) 11,879. The highest bridge in Scotland has been thrown across the river Avon, which flows close by. Brick-making is carried on at several of the adjoining collieries. Other industries include bleaching, silk-weaving, fire-clay and enamelling works, and a sanitary appliances factory. The town has a public hall and baths.

LARKHANA, a town and district of British India, in Sind, Bombay. The town is on a canal not far from the Indus, and has a station on the North-Western railway, 281 m. N. by E. of Karachi. It is pleasantly situated in a fertile locality, and is well laid out with wide streets and spacious gardens. It is a centre of trade, with manufactures of cotton, silk, leather, metal-ware and paper. Pop. (1901) 14,543.

The DISTRICT OF LARKHANA, lying along the right bank of the Indus, was formed out of portions of Sukkur and Karachi districts in 1901, and has an area of 5091 sq. m.; pop. (1901) 656,083, showing an increase of 10% in the decade. Its western part is mountainous, but the remainder is a plain of alluvium watered by canals and well cultivated, being the most fertile part of Sind. The staple grain-crops are rice, wheat and millets, which are exported, together with wool, cotton and other agricultural produce. Cotton cloth, carpets, salt and leather goods are manufactured, and dyeing is an important industry. The district is served by the North-Western railway.

LARKSPUR, in botany, the popular name for species of _Delphinium_, a genus of hardy herbaceous plants belonging to the natural order Ranunculaceae (q.v.). They are of erect branching habit, with the flowers in terminal racemes, often of considerable length. Blue is the predominating colour, but purple, pink, yellow (_D. Zalil_ or _sulphureum_), scarlet (_D. cardinale_) and white also occur; the "spur" is produced by the elongation of the upper sepal. The field or rocket larkspur (_D. Ajacis_), the branching larkspur (_D. consolida_), _D. cardiopetalum_ and their varieties, are charming annuals; height about 18 in. The spotted larkspur _(D. requienii_) and a few others are biennials. The perennial larkspurs, however, are the most gorgeous of the family. There are numerous species of this group, natives of the old and new worlds, and a great number of varieties, raised chiefly from _D. exaltatum_, _D. formosum_ and _D. grandiflorum_. Members of this group vary from 2 ft. to 6 ft. in height.

The larkspurs are of easy cultivation, either in beds or herbaceous borders; the soil should be deeply dug and manured. The annual varieties are best sown early in April, where they are intended to flower, and suitably thinned out as growth is made. The perennial kinds are increased by the division of existing plants in spring, or by cuttings taken in spring or autumn and rooted in pots in cold frames. The varieties cannot be perpetuated with certainty by seed. Seed is the most popular means, however, of raising larkspurs in the majority of gardens, and is suitable for all ordinary purposes; it should be sown as soon as gathered, preferably in rows in nursery beds, and the young plants transplanted when ready. They should be fit for the borders in the spring of the following year, and if strong, should be planted in groups about 3 ft. apart. Delphiniums require exposure to light and air. Given plenty of space in a rich soil, the plants rarely require to be staked except in windy localities.

LARNACA, LARNICA or LARNECA (anc. _Citium_, Turk. _Tuzla_), a town of the island of Cyprus, at the head of a bay on the south coast, 23 m. S.S.E. from Nicosia. Pop. (1901) 7964. It is the principal port of the island, exporting barley, wheat, cotton, raisins, oranges, lemons and gypsum. There is an iron pier 450 ft. long, but vessels anchor in the bay in from 16 to 70 ft. of water. Larnaca occupies the site of the ancient _Citium_, but the citadel of the ancient city was used to fill up the ancient harbour in 1879. The modern and principal residential part of the town is called Scala. Mycenaean tombs and other antiquities have been found (see CYPRUS).

LA ROCHE, a small town in the Belgian Ardennes, noticeable for its antiquity and its picturesque situation. Pop. (1904) 2065. Its name is derived from its position on a rock commanding the river Ourthe, which meanders round the little place, and skirts the rock on which are the interesting ruins of the old castle of the 11th century. This is supposed to have been the site of a hunting box of Pippin, and certainly the counts of La Roche held it in fief from his descendants, the Carolingian rulers. In the 12th century they sold it to the counts of Luxemburg. In the 16th and 17th centuries the French and Imperialists frequently fought in its neighbourhood, and at Tenneville, not far distant, is shown the tomb of an English officer named Barnewall killed in one of these encounters in 1692. La Roche is famous as a tourist centre on account of its fine sylvan scenery. Among the local curiosities is the Diable-Château, a freak of nature, being the apparent replica of a medieval castle. La Roche is connected by steam tramway with Melreux, a station on the main line from Marloie to Liége.

LA ROCHEFOUCAULD, the name of an old French family which is derived from a castle[1] in the province of Angoumois (department of Charente), which was in its possession in the 11th century. François de La Rochefoucauld (1494-1517), godson of King Francis I., was made count in 1515. At the time of the wars of religion the family fought for the Protestant cause. François (1588-1650) was created duke and peer of France by Louis XIII. in 1622. His son François was the author of the _Maxims_, and the son of the latter acquired for his house the estates of La Roche-Guyon and Liancourt by his marriage with Jeanne Charlotte du Plessis-Liancourt. Alexandre, duc de La Rochefoucauld (d. 1762), left two daughters, who married into the Roye branch of the family. Of the numerous branches of the family the most famous are those of Roucy, Roye, Bayers, Doudeauville, Randan and Estissac, which all furnished distinguished statesmen and soldiers.

FOOTNOTE:

[1] The castle was largely rebuilt in the reign of Francis I., and is
one of the finest specimens of the Renaissance architecture in
France.

LA ROCHEFOUCAULD, FRANÇOIS DE (1613-1680), the greatest maxim writer of France, one of her best memoir writers, and perhaps the most complete and accomplished representative of her ancient nobility, was born at Paris in the Rue des Petits Champs on the 15th of September 1613. The author of the _Maxims_, who during the lifetime of his father (see above) and part of his own most stirring years bore the title of prince de Marcillac, was somewhat neglected in the matter of education, at least of the scholastic kind; but he joined the army before he was sixteen, and almost immediately began to make a figure in public life. He had been nominally married a year before to Andrée de Vivonne, who seems to have been an affectionate wife, while not a breath of scandal touches her--two points in which La Rochefoucauld was perhaps more fortunate than he deserved. For some years Marcillac continued to take part in the annual campaigns, where he displayed the utmost bravery, though he never obtained credit for much military skill. Then he passed under the spell of Madame de Chevreuse, the first of three celebrated women who successively influenced his life. Through Madame de Chevreuse he became attached to the queen, Anne of Austria, and in one of her quarrels with Richelieu and her husband a wild scheme seems to have been formed, according to which Marcillac was to carry her off to Brussels on a pillion. These caballings against Richelieu, however, had no more serious results (an eight days' experience of the Bastille excepted) than occasional exiles, that is to say, orders to retire to his father's estates. After the death of the great minister (1642), opportunity seemed to be favourable to the vague ambition which then animated half the nobility of France. Marcillac became one of the so-called _importants_, and took an active part in reconciling the queen and Condé in a league against Gaston of Orleans. But the growing credit of Mazarin came in his way, and the _liaison_ in which about this time (1645) he became entangled with the beautiful duchess of Longueville made him irrevocably a Frondeur. He was a conspicuous figure in the siege of Paris, fought desperately in the desultory engagements which were constantly taking place, and was severely wounded at the siege of Mardyke. In the second Fronde Marcillac followed the fortunes of Condé, and the death of his father, which happened at the time (1650), gave rise to a characteristic incident. The nobility of the province gathered to the funeral, and the new duke de La Rochefoucauld took the opportunity of persuading them to follow him in an attempt on the royalist garrison of Saumur, which, however, was not successful. We have no space to follow La Rochefoucauld through the tortuous cabals and negotiations of the later Fronde; it is sufficient to say that he was always brave and generally unlucky. His run of bad fortune reached its climax in the battle of the Faubourg Saint Antoine (1652), where he was shot through the head, and it was thought that he would lose the sight of both eyes. It was nearly a year before he recovered, and then he found himself at his country seat of Verteuil, with no result of twenty years' fighting and intriguing except impaired health, a seriously embarrassed fortune, and some cause for bearing a grudge against almost every party and man of importance in the state. He spent some years in this retirement, and he was fortunate enough (thanks chiefly to the fidelity of Gourville, who had been in his service, and who, passing into the service of Mazarin and of Condé, had acquired both wealth and influence) to be able to repair in some measure the breaches in his fortune. He did not, however, return to court life much before Mazarin's death, when Louis XIV. was on the eve of assuming absolute power, and the turbulent aristocratic anarchy of the Fronde was a thing utterly of the past.

Somewhat earlier, La Rochefoucauld had taken his place in the salon of Madame de Sablé, a member of the old Rambouillet coterie, and the founder of a kind of successor to it. It was known that he, like almost all his more prominent contemporaries, had spent his solitude in writing memoirs, while the special literary employment of the Sablé salon was the fabrication of _Sentences_ and _Maxims_. In 1662, however, more trouble than reputation, and not a little of both, was given to him by a surreptitious publication of his memoirs, or what purported to be his memoirs, by the Elzevirs. Many of his old friends were deeply wounded, and he hastened to deny flatly the authenticity of the publication, a denial which (as it seems, without any reason) was not very generally accepted. Three years later (1665) he published, though without his name, the still more famous _Maxims_, which at once established him high among the men of letters of the time. About the same date began the friendship with Madame de la Fayette, which lasted till the end of his life. The glimpses which we have of him henceforward are chiefly derived from the letters of Madame de Sévigné, and, though they show him suffering agonies from gout, are on the whole pleasant. He had a circle of devoted friends; he was recognized as a moralist and man of letters of the first rank; he might have entered the Academy for the asking; and in the altered measure of the times his son, the prince de Marcillac, to whom some time before his death he resigned his titles and honours, enjoyed a considerable position at court. Above all, La Rochefoucauld was generally recognized by his contemporaries from the king downward as a type of the older noblesse as it was before the sun of the great monarch dimmed its brilliant qualities. This position he has retained until the present day. He died at Paris on the 17th of March 1680, of the disease which had so long tormented him.

La Rochefoucauld's character, if considered without the prejudice which a dislike to his ethical views has sometimes occasioned, is thoroughly respectable and even amiable. Like almost all his contemporaries, he saw in politics little more than a chessboard where the people at large were but pawns. The weight of testimony, however, inclines to the conclusion that he was unusually scrupulous in his conduct, and that his comparative ill-success in the struggle arose more from this scrupulousness than from anything else. He has been charged with irresolution, and there is some ground for admitting the charge so far as to pronounce him one of those the keenness of whose intellect, together with their apprehension of both sides of a question, interferes with their capacity as men of action. But there is no ground whatever for the view which represents the Maxims as the mere outcome of the spite of a disappointed intriguer, disappointed through his own want of skill rather than of fortune.

His importance as a social and historical figure is, however, far inferior to his importance in literature. His work in this respect consists of three parts--letters, _Memoirs_ and the _Maxims_. His letters exceed one hundred in number, and are biographically valuable, besides displaying not a few of his literary characteristics; but they need not further detain us. The _Memoirs_, when they are read in their proper form, yield in literary merit, in interest, and in value to no memoirs of the time, not even to those of Retz, between whom and La Rochefoucauld there was a strange mixture of enmity and esteem which resulted in a couple of most characteristic "portraits." But their history is unique in its strangeness. It has been said that a pirated edition appeared in Holland, and this, despite the author's protest, continued to be reprinted for some thirty years. It has been now proved to be a mere cento of the work of half a dozen different men, scarcely a third of which is La Rochefoucauld's, and which could only have been possible at a time when it was the habit of persons who frequented literary society to copy pell-mell in commonplace books the MS. compositions of their friends and others. Some years after La Rochefoucauld's death a new recension appeared, somewhat less incorrect than the former, but still largely adulterated, and this held its ground for more than a century. Only in 1817 did anything like a genuine edition (even then by no means perfect) appear. The _Maxims_, however, had no such fate. The author re-edited them frequently during his life, with alterations and additions; a few were added after his death, and it is usual now to print the whole of them, at whatever time they appeared, together. Thus taken, they amount to about seven hundred in number, in hardly any case exceeding half a page in length, and more frequently confined to two or three lines. The view of conduct which they illustrate is usually and not quite incorrectly summed up in the words "everything is reducible to the motive of self-interest." But though not absolutely incorrect, the phrase is misleading. The _Maxims_ are in no respect mere deductions from or applications of any such general theory. They are on the contrary independent judgments on different relations of life, different affections of the human mind, and so forth, from which, taken together, the general view may be deduced or rather composed. Sentimental moralists have protested loudly against this view, yet it is easier to declaim against it in general than to find a flaw in the several parts of which it is made up. With a few exceptions La Rochefoucauld's maxims represent the matured result of the reflection of a man deeply versed in the business and pleasures of the world, and possessed of an extraordinarily fine and acute intellect, on the conduct and motives which have guided himself and his fellows. There is as little trace in them of personal spite as of _forfanterie de vice_. But the astonishing excellence of the literary medium in which they are conveyed is even more remarkable than the general soundness of their ethical import. In uniting the four qualities of brevity, clearness, fulness of meaning and point, La Rochefoucauld has no rival. His _Maxims_ are never mere epigrams; they are never platitudes; they are never dark sayings. He has packed them so full of meaning that it would be impossible to pack them closer, yet there is no undue compression; he has sharpened their point to the utmost, yet there is no loss of substance. The comparison which occurs most frequently, and which is perhaps on the whole the justest, is that of a bronze medallion, and it applies to the matter no less than to the form. Nothing is left unfinished, yet none of the workmanship is finical. The sentiment, far from being merely hard, as the sentimentalists pretend, has a vein of melancholy poetry running through it which calls to mind the traditions of La Rochefoucauld's devotion to the romances of chivalry. The maxims are never shallow; each is the text for a whole sermon of application and corollary which any one of thought and experience can write. Add to all this that the language in which they are written is French, still at almost its greatest strength, and chastened but as yet not emasculated by the reforming influence of the 17th century, and it is not necessary to say more. To the literary critic no less than to the man of the world La Rochefoucauld ranks among the scanty number of pocket-books to be read and re-read with ever new admiration, instruction and delight.

The editions of La Rochefoucauld's _Maxims_ (as the full title runs,
_Réflexions ou sentences et maximes morales_) published in his
lifetime bear the dates 1665 (_editio princeps_), 1666, 1671, 1675,
1678. An important edition which appeared after his death in 1693 may
rank almost with these. As long as the _Memoirs_ remained in the state
above described, no edition of them need be mentioned, and none of the
complete works was possible. The previous more or less complete
editions are all superseded by that of MM Gilbert and Gourdault
(1868-1883), in the series of "Grands Écrivains de la France," 3 vols.
There are still some puzzles as to the text; but this edition supplies
all available material in regard to them. The handsomest separate
edition of the _Maxims_ is the so-called _Édition des bibliophiles_
(1870); but cheap and handy issues are plentiful. See the English
version by G. H. Powell (1903). Nearly all the great French critics of
the 19th century have dealt more or less with La Rochefoucauld: the
chief recent monograph on him is that of J. Bourdeau in the _Grands
écrivains français_ (1893). (G. Sa.)

LA ROCHEFOUCAULD-LIANCOURT, FRANÇOIS ALEXANDRE FRÉDÉRIC, DUC DE (1747-1827), French social reformer, was born at La Roche Guyon on the 11th of January 1747, the son of François Armand de La Rochefoucauld, duc d'Estissac, grand master of the royal wardrobe. The duc de Liancourt became an officer of carbineers, and married at seventeen. A visit to England seems to have suggested the establishment of a model farm at Liancourt, where he reared cattle imported from England and Switzerland. He also set up spinning machines on his estate, and founded a school of arts and crafts for the sons of soldiers, which became in 1788 the École des Enfants de la Patrie under royal protection. Elected to the states-general of 1789 he sought in vain to support the cause of royalty while furthering the social reforms he had at heart. On the 12th of July, two days before the fall of the Bastille, he warned Louis XVI. of the state of affairs in Paris, and met his exclamation that there was a revolt with the answer, "_Non, sire, c'est une révolution._" On the 18th of July he became president of the Assembly. Established in command of a military division in Normandy, he offered Louis a refuge in Rouen, and, failing in this effort, assisted him with a large sum of money. After the events of the 10th of August 1792 he fled to England, where he was the guest of Arthur Young, and thence passed to America. After the assassination of his cousin, Louis-Alexandre, duc de La Rochefoucauld d'Enville, at Gisors on the 14th of September 1792 he assumed the title of duc de La Rochefoucauld. He returned to Paris in 1799, but received small favour from Napoleon. At the Restoration he entered the House of Peers, but Louis XVIII. refused to reinstate him as master of the wardrobe, although his father had paid 400,000 francs for the honour. Successive governments, revolutionary and otherwise, recognized the value of his institutions at Liancourt, and he was for twenty-three years government inspector of his school of arts and crafts, which had been removed to Châlons. He was one of the first promoters of vaccination in France; he established a dispensary in Paris, and he was an active member of the central boards of administration for hospitals, prisons and agriculture. His opposition to the government in the House of Peers led to his removal in 1823 from the honorary positions he held, while the vaccination committee, of which he was president, was suppressed. The academies of science and of medicine admitted him to their membership by way of protest. Official hostility pursued him even after his death (27th of March 1827), for the old pupils of his school were charged by the military at his funeral. His works, chiefly on economic questions, include books on the English system of taxation, poor-relief and education.

His eldest son, François, duc de La Rochefoucauld (1765-1848),
succeeded his father in the House of Peers. The second, Alexandre,
comte de La Rochefoucauld (1767-1841), married a San Domingo heiress
allied to the Beauharnais family. Mme de La Rochefoucauld became dame
d'honneur to the empress Josephine, and their eldest daughter married
a brother-in-law of Pauline Bonaparte, Princess Borghese. La
Rochefoucauld became ambassador successively to Vienna (1805) and to
the Hague (1808-1810), where he negotiated the union of Holland with
France. During the "Hundred Days" he was made a peer of France. He
subsequently devoted himself to philanthropic work, and in 1822 became
deputy to the Chamber and sat with the constitutional royalists. He
was again raised to the peerage in 1831.

The third son, Frédéric Gaétan, marquis de La Rochefoucauld-Liancourt
(1779-1863), was a zealous philanthropist and a partisan of
constitutional monarchy. He took no part in politics after 1848. The
marquis wrote on social questions, notably on prison administration;
he edited the works of La Rochefoucauld, and the memoirs of Condorcet;
and he was the author of some vaudevilles, tragedies and poems.

LA ROCHEJACQUELEIN, DE, the name of an ancient French family of La Vendée, celebrated for its devotion to the throne during and after the Revolution. Its original name was Duverger, derived from a fief near Bressuire in Poitou, and its pedigree is traceable to the 13th century. In 1505 Gui Duverger married Renée, heiress of Jacques Lemartin, seigneur de La Rochejacquelein, whose name he assumed. His grandson, Louis Duverger, seigneur de La Rochejacquelein, was a devoted adherent of Henry II., and was badly wounded at the battle of Arques; other members of the family were also distinguished soldiers, and the seigniory was raised to a countship and marquisate in reward for their services.

At the outbreak of the Revolution the chief of the family was HENRI LOUIS AUGUSTE, marquis de La Rochejacquelein, _maréchal de camp_ in the royal army, who had three sons named after himself--Henri, Louis and Auguste. The marquis fled abroad with his second son Louis at the time of the emigration of the nobles. He entered the service of Great Britain, and died in San Domingo in 1802.