Chapter 17

Many points in Kossuth’s career and character will probably always remain the subject of controversy. His complete works were published in Hungarian at Budapest in 1880-1895. The fullest account of the Revolution is given in Helfert,Geschichte Oesterreichs(Leipzig, 1869, &c.), representing the Austrian view, which may be compared with that of C. Gracza,History of the Hungarian War of Independence, 1848-1849(in Hungarian) (Budapest, 1894). See also E. O. S.,Hungary and its Revolutions, with a Memoir of Louis Kossuth(Bohn, 1854); Horvath,25 Jahre aus der Geschichte Ungarns, 1823-1848(Leipzig, 1867); Maurice,Revolutions of 1848-1849; W. H. Stiles,Austria in 1848-1849(New York, 1852); Szemere,Politische Charakterskizzen: III. Kossuth(Hamburg, 1853); Louis Kossuth,Memoirs of my Exile(London, 1880); Pulszky,Meine Zeit, mein Leben(Pressburg, 1880); A. Somogyi,Ludwig Kossuth(Berlin, 1894).

(J. W. He.)

KOSTER(orCoster),LAURENS(c.1370-1440), Dutch printer, whose claims to be considered at least one of the inventors of the art (seeTypography) have been recognized by many investigators. His real name was Laurens Janssoen-Koster (i.e.sacristan) being merely the title which he bore as an official of the great parish church of Haarlem. We find him mentioned several times between 1417 and 1434 as a member of the great council, as an assessor (scabinus), and as the city treasurer. He probably perished in the plague that visited Haarlem in 1439-1440; his widow is mentioned in the latter year. His descendants, through his daughter Lucia, can be traced down to 1724.

See Peter Scriver,Beschryvinge der Stad Harlem(Haarlem, 1628); Scheltema,Levensschets van Laurens d. Koster(Haarlem, 1834); Van der Linde,De Haarlemsche Costerlegende(Hague, 1870).

KOSTROMA,a government of central Russia, surrounded by those of Vologda, Vyatka, Nizhniy-Novgorod, Vladimir and Yaroslav, lying mostly on the left bank of the upper Volga. It has an area of 32,480 sq. m. Its surface is generally undulating, with hilly tracts on the right bank of the Volga, and extensive flat and marshy districts in the east. Rocks of the Permian system predominate, though a small tract belongs to the Jurassic, and both are overlain by thick deposits of Quaternary clays. The soil in the east is for the most part sand or a sandy clay; a few patches, however, are fertile black earth. Forests, yielding excellent timber for ship-building, and in many cases still untouched, occupy 61% of the area of the government. The export of timber is greatly facilitated by the navigable tributaries of the Volga,e.g.the Kostroma, Unzha, Neya, Vioksa and Vetluga. The climate is severe; frosts of −22° F. are common in January, and the mean temperature of the year is only 3°.1 (summer, 64°.5; winter, −13°.3). The population, which numbered 1,176,000 in 1870 and 1,424,171 in 1897, is almost entirely Russian. The estimated population in 1906 was 1,596,700. Out of 20,000,000 acres, 7,861,500 acres belong to private owners, 6,379,500 to the peasant communities, 3,660,800 to the crown, and 1,243,000 to the imperial family. Agriculture is at a low ebb; only 4,000,000 acres are under crops (rye, oats, wheat and barley), and the yield of corn is insufficient for the wants of the population. Flax and hops are cultivated to an increasing extent. But market-gardening is of some importance. Bee-keeping was formerly an important industry. The chief articles of commerce are timber, fuel, pitch, tar, mushrooms, and wooden wares for building and household purposes, which are largely manufactured by the peasantry and exported to the steppe governments of the lower Volga and the Don. Boat-building is also carried on. Some other small industries, such as the manufacture of silver and copper wares, leather goods, bast mats and sacks, lace and felt boots, are carried on in the villages; but the trade in linen and towelling, formerly the staple, is declining. There are cotton, flax and linen mills, engineering and chemical works, distilleries, tanneries and paper mills. The government of Kostroma is divided into twelve districts, thechief towns of which, with populations in 1897, are Kostroma (q.v.), Bui (2626), Chukhloma (2200), Galich (6182), Kineshma (7564), Kologriv (2566), Makariev (6068), Nerekhta (3002), Soligalich (3420), Varnavin (1140), Vetluga (5200) and Yurievets (4778).

KOSTROMA,a town of Russia, capital of the government of the same name, 230 m. N.N.E. of Moscow and 57 m. E.N.E. from Yaroslav, on the left bank of the Volga, at the mouth of the navigable Kostroma, with suburbs on the opposite side of the Volga. Pop. (1897), 41,268. Its glittering gilded cupolas make it a conspicuous feature in the landscape as it climbs up the terraced river bank. It is one of the oldest towns of Russia, having been founded in 1152. Its fort was often the refuge of the princes of Moscow during war, but the town was plundered more than once by the Tatars. The cathedral, built in 1239 and rebuilt in 1773, is situated in the kreml, or citadel, and is a fine monument of old Russian architecture. In the centre of the town is a monument to the peasant Ivan Susanin and the tsar Michael (1851). The former sacrificed his own life in 1669 by leading the Poles astray in the forests in order to save the life of his own tsar Michael Fedeorovich. On the opposite bank of the Volga, close to the water’s edge, stands the monastery of Ipatiyev, founded in 1330, with a cathedral built in 1586, both associated with the election of Tsar Michael (1669). Kostroma has been renowned since the 16th century for its linen, which was exported to Holland, and the manufacture of linen and linen-yarn is still kept up to some extent. The town has also cotton-mills, tanneries, saw-mills, an iron-foundry and a machine factory. It carries on an active trade—importing grain, and exporting linen, linen yarn, leather, and especially timber and wooden wares.

KÖSZEG(Ger.Güns), a town in the county of Vas, in Hungary, 173 m. W. of Budapest by rail. Pop. (1900), 7422. It is pleasantly situated in the valley of the Güns, and is dominated towards the west by the peaks of Altenhaus (2000 ft.) and of the Geschriebene Stein (2900 ft.). It possesses a castle of Count Esterhazy, a modern Roman Catholic Church in Gothic style and two convents. It has important cloth factories and a lively trade in fruit and wine. The town has a special historical interest for the heroic and successful defence of the fortress by Nicolas Jurisics against a large army of Sultan Soliman, in July-August 1532, which frustrated the advance of the Turks to Vienna for that year.

To the south-east of Köszeg, at the confluence of the Güns with the Raab, is situated the town of Sárvár (pop. 3158), formerly fortified, where in 1526 the first printing press in Hungary was established.

KOTAH,a native state of India, in the Rajputana agency, with an area of 5684 sq. m. The country slopes gently northwards from the high table-land of Malwa, and is drained by the Chambal with its tributaries, all flowing in a northerly or north-easterly direction. The Mokandarra range, from 1200 to 1600 ft. above sea-level, runs from south-east to north-west. The Mokandarra Pass through these hills, in the neighbourhood of the highest peak (1671 ft.), has been rendered memorable by the passage of Colonel Monson’s army on its disastrous retreat in 1804. There are extensive game preserves, chiefly covered with grass. In addition to the usual Indian grains, wheat, cotton, poppy, and a little tobacco of good quality are cultivated. The manufactures are very limited. Cotton fabrics are woven, but are being rapidly superseded by the cheap products of Bombay and Manchaster. Articles of wooden furniture are also constructed. The chief articles of export are opium and grain; salt, cotton and woollen cloth are imported.

Kotah is an offshoot from Bundi state, having been bestowed upon a younger son of the Bundi raja by the emperor Shah Jahan in return for services rendered him when the latter was in rebellion against his father Jahangir. In 1897 a considerable portion of the area taken to form Jhalawar (q.v.) in 1838 was restored to Kotah. In 1901 the population was 544,879, showing a decrease of 24% due to the results of famine. The estimated revenue is £206,000; tribute, £28,000. The maharao Umad Singh, was born in 1873, and succeeded in 1889. He was educated at the Mayo College, Ajmere, and became a major in the British army. A continuation of the branch line of the Indian Midland railway from Goona to Baran passes through Kotah, and it is also traversed by a new line, opened in 1909. The state suffered from drought in 1896-1897, and again more severely in 1899-1900.

The town of Kotah is on the right bank of the Chambal. Pop. (1901), 33,679. It is surrounded and also divided into three parts by massive walls, and contains an old and a new palace of the maharao and a number of fine temples. Muslins are the chief articles of manufacture, but the town has no great trade, and this and the unhealthiness of the site may account for the decrease in population.

KOTAS(Kotar, Koter, Kohatur, Gauhatar), an aboriginal tribe of the Nilgiri hills, India. They are a well-made people, of good features, tall, and of a dull copper colour, but some of them are among the fairest of the hill tribes. They recognize no caste among themselves, but are divided intokeris(streets), and a man must marry outside hiskeri. Their villages (of which there are seven) are large, averaging from thirty to sixty huts. They are agriculturists and herdsmen, and the only one of the hill tribes who practise industrial arts, being excellent as carpenters, smiths, tanners and basket-makers. They do menial work for the Todas, to whom they pay a tribute. They worship ideal gods, which are not represented by any images. Their language is an old and rude dialect of Kanarese. In 1901 they numbered 1267.

KOTKA,a seaport of Finland, in the province of Viborg, 35 m. by rail from Kuivola junction on the Helsingfors railway, on an island of the same name at the mouth of the Kymmene river. Pop. (1904), 7628. It is the chief port for exports from and imports to east Finland and a centre of the timber trade.

KOTRI,a town of British India, in Karachi district, Sind, situated on the right bank of the Indus. Pop. (1901), 7617. Kotri is the junction of branches of the North-Western railway, serving each bank of the Indus, which is here crossed by a railway bridge. It was formerly the station for Hyderabad, which lies across the Indus, and the headquarters of the Indus steam flotilla, now abolished in consequence of the development of railway facilities. Besides its importance as a railway centre, however, Kotri still has a considerable general transit trade by river.

KOTZEBUE, AUGUST FRIEDRICH FERDINAND VON(1761-1819), German dramatist, was born on the 3rd of May, 1761, at Weimar. After attending the gymnasium of his native town, he went in his sixteenth year to the university of Jena, and afterwards studied about a year in Duisburg. In 1780 he completed his legal course and was admitted an advocate. Through the influence of Graf Görtz, Prussian ambassador at the Russian court, he became secretary of the governor-general of St Petersburg. In 1783 he received the appointment of assessor to the high court of appeal in Reval, where he married the daughter of a Russian lieutenant-general. He was ennobled in 1785, and became president of the magistracy of the province of Esthonia. In Reval he acquired considerable reputation by his novels,Die Leiden der Ortenbergischen Familie(1785) andGeschichte meines Vaters(1788), and still more by the playsAdelheid von Wulfingen(1789),Menschenhass und Reue(1790) andDie Indianer in England(1790). The good impression produced by these works was, however, almost effaced by a cynical dramatic satire,Doktor Bahrdt mit der eisernen Stirn, which appeared in 1790 with the name of Knigge on the title-page. After the death of his first wife Kotzebue retired from the Russian service, and lived for a time in Paris and Mainz; he then settled in 1795 on an estate which he had acquired near Reval and gave himself up to literary work. Within a few years he published six volumes of miscellaneous sketches and stories (Die jüngsten Kinder meiner Laune, 1793-1796) and more than twenty plays, the majority of which were translated into several European languages. In 1798 he accepted the office of dramatist to the court theatre in Vienna, but owing to differences with the actors he was soon obliged to resign. He now returned tohis native town, but as he was not on good terms with Goethe, and had openly attacked the Romantic school, his position in Weimar was not a pleasant one. He had thoughts of returning to St Petersburg, and on his journey thither he was, for some unknown reason, arrested at the frontier and transported to Siberia. Fortunately he had written a comedy which flattered the vanity of the emperor Paul I.; he was consequently speedily brought back, presented with an estate from the crown lands of Livonia, and made director of the German theatre in St Petersburg. He returned to Germany when the emperor Paul died, and again settled in Weimar; he found it, however, as impossible as ever to gain a footing in literary society, and turned his steps to Berlin, where in association with Garlieb Merkel (1769-1850) he editedDer Freimütige(1803-1807) and began hisAlmanach dramatischer Spiele(1803-1820). Towards the end of 1806 he was once more in Russia, and in the security of his estate in Esthonia wrote many satirical articles against Napoleon in his journalsDie BieneandDie Grille. As councillor of state he was attached in 1816 to the department for foreign affairs in St Petersburg, and in 1817 went to Germany as a kind of spy in the service of Russia, with a salary of 15,000 roubles. In a weekly journal (Literarisches Wochenblatt) which he published in Weimar he scoffed at the pretensions of those Germans who demanded free institutions, and became an object of such general dislike that he was obliged to move to Mannheim. He was especially detested by the young enthusiasts for liberty, and one of them, Karl Ludwig Sand, a theological student, stabbed him, in Mannheim, on the 23rd of March 1819. Sand was executed, and the government made his crime an excuse for placing the universities under strict supervision.

Besides his plays, Kotzebue wrote several historical works, which, however, are too one-sided and prejudiced to have much value. Of more interest are his autobiographical writings,Meine Flucht nach Paris im Winter1790 (1791),Über meinen Aufenthalt in Wien(1799),Das merkwürdigste Jahr meines Lebens(1801),Erinnerungen aus Paris(1804), andErinnerungen von meiner Reise aus Liefland nach Rom und Neapel(1805). As a dramatist he was extraordinarily prolific, his plays numbering over 200; his popularity, not merely on the German, but on the European stage, was unprecedented. His success, however, was due less to any conspicuous literary or poetic ability than to an extraordinary facility in the invention of effective situations; he possessed, as few German playwrights before or since, the unerring instinct for the theatre; and his influence on thetechniqueof the modern drama from Scribe to Sardou and from Bauernfeld to Sudermann is unmistakable. Kotzebue is to be seen to best advantage in his comedies, such asDer Wildfang,Die beiden KlingsbergandDie deutschen Kleinstädter, which contain admirable genre pictures of German life. These plays held the stage in Germany long after the once famousMenschenhass und Reue(known in England asThe Stranger),Graf Benjowsky, or ambitious exotic tragedies likeDie SonnenjungfrauandDie Spanier in Peru(which Sheridan adapted asPizarro) were forgotten.

Two collections of Kotzebue’s dramas were published during his lifetime:Schauspiele(5 vols., 1797);Neue Schauspiele(23 vols., 1798-1820). HisSämtliche dramatische Werkeappeared in 44 vols., in 1827-1829, and again, under the titleTheater, in 40 vols., in 1840-1841. A selection of his plays in 10 vols, appeared at Leipzig in 1867-1868. Cp. H. Döring,A. von Kotzebues Leben(1830); W. von Kotzebue,A. von Kotzebue(1881); Ch. Rabany,Kotzebue, sa vie et son temps(1893); W. Sellier,Kotzebue in England(1901).

KOTZEBUE, OTTO VON(1787-1846), Russian navigator, second son of the foregoing, was born at Reval on the 30th of December 1787. After being educated at the St Petersburg school of cadets, he accompanied Krusenstern on his voyage of 1803-1806. After his promotion to lieutenant Kotzebue was placed in command of an expedition, fitted out at the expense of the imperial chancellor, Count Rumantsoff, in the brig “Rurick.” In this vessel, with only twenty-seven men, Kotzebue set out on the 30th of July 1815 to find a passage across the Arctic Ocean and explore the less-known parts of Oceania. Proceeding by Cape Horn, he discovered the Romanzov, Rurik and Krusenstern Islands, then made for Kamchatka, and in the middle of July proceeded northward, coasting along the north-west coast of America, and discovering and naming Kotzebue Gulf or Sound and Krusenstern Cape. Returning by the coast of Asia, he again sailed to the south, sojourned for three weeks at the Sandwich Islands, and on the 1st of January 1817 discovered New Year Island. After some further cruising in the Pacific he again proceeded north, but a severe attack of illness compelling him to return to Europe, he reached the Neva on the 3rd of August 1818, bringing home a large collection of previously unknown plants and much new ethnological information. In 1823 Kotzebue, now a captain, was entrusted with the command of an expedition in two ships of war, the main object of which was to take reinforcements to Kamchatka. There was, however, a staff of scientists on board, who collected much valuable information and material in geography, ethnography and natural history. The expedition, proceeding by Cape Horn, visited the Radak and Society Islands, and reached Petropavlovsk in July 1824. Many positions along the coast were rectified, the Navigator islands visited, and several discoveries made. The expedition returned by the Marianna, Philippine, New Caledonia and Hawaiian Islands, reaching Kronstadt on the 10th of July 1826. There are English translations of both Kotzebue’s narratives:A Voyage of Discovery into the South Sea and Beering’s Straits for the Purpose of exploring a North-East Passage, undertaken in the Years 1815-1818(3 vols. 1821), andA New Voyage Round the World in the Years 1823-1826(1830). Three years after his return from his second voyage, Kotzebue died at Reval on the 15th of February 1846.

KOUMISS,milk-wine, or milk brandy, a fermented alcoholic beverage prepared from milk. It is of very ancient origin, and according to Herodotus was known to the Scythians. The name is said to be derived from an ancient Asiatic tribe, the Kumanes or Komans. It is one of the staple articles of diet of the Siberian and Caucasian races, but of late years it has also been manufactured on a considerable scale in western Europe, on account of its valuable medicinal properties. It is generally made from mares’ or camels’ milk by a process of fermentation set up by the addition to the fresh milk of a small quantity of the finished article. This fermentation, which appears to be of a symbiotic nature, being dependent on the action of two distinct types of organisms, the one a fission fungus, the other a true yeast, eventuates in the conversion of a part of the milk sugar into lactic acid and alcohol. Koumiss generally contains 1 to 2% of alcohol, 0.5 to 1.5% of lactic acid, 2 to 4% of milk sugar and 1 to 2% of fat.Kefiris similar to koumiss, but is usually prepared from cows’ milk, and the fermentation is brought about by the so-called Kefir Grains (derived from a plant).

KOUMOUNDOUROS, ALEXANDROS(1814-1883), Greek statesman, whose name is commonly spelt Coumoundouros, was born in 1814. His studies at the university of Athens were repeatedly interrupted for lack of means, and he began to earn his living as a clerk. He took part in the Cretan insurrection of 1841, and in the demonstration of 1843, by which the Greek constitution was obtained from King Otto, he was secretary to General Theodoraki Grivas. He then settled down to the bar at Kalamata in Messenia, where he married a lady belonging to the Mavromichalis family. He was elected to the chamber in 1851, and four years later his eloquence and ability had secured the president’s chair for him. He became minister of finance in 1856, and again in 1857 and 1859. He adhered to the moderate wing of the Liberal party until the revolution of 1862 and the dethronement of King Otto, when he was minister of justice in the provincial government. He was twice minister of the interior under Kanaris, in 1864 and in 1865. In March 1865 he became prime minister, and he formed several subsequent administrations in the intervals of the ascendancy of Tricoupi. During the Cretan insurrection of 1866-68 he made active warlike preparations against Turkey, but was dismissed by King George, who recognized that Greece could not act without the support of the Powers. He was again premier at the time of the outbreakof the insurrection in Thessaly in January 1878, and supported by Delyanni as minister of foreign affairs he sent an army of 10,000 men to help the insurgents against Turkey. The troops were recalled on the understanding that Greece should be represented at the Congress of Berlin. In October 1880 the fall of the Tricoupi ministry restored him to power, when he resumed his warlike policy, but repeated appeals to the courts of Europe yielded little practical result, and Koumoundouros was obliged to reduce his territorial demands and to accept the limited cessions in Thessaly and Epirus, which were carried out in July 1881. His ministry was overturned in 1882 by the votes of the new Thessalian deputies, who were dissatisfied with the administrative arrangements of the new province, and he died at Athens on the 9th of March 1883.

KOUSSO(KossoorCusso), a drug which consists of the panicles of the pistillate flowers ofBrayera anthelmintica, a handsome rosaceous tree 60 ft. high, growing throughout the table-land of Abyssinia, at an elevation of 3000 to 8000 ft. above the sea-level. The drug as imported is in the form of cylindrical rolls, about 18 in. in length and 2 in. in diameter, and comprises the entire inflorescence or panicle kept in form by a band wound transversely round it. The active principle is koussin or kosin, C31H38O10, which is soluble in alcohol and alkalis, and may be given in doses of thirty grains. Kousso is also used in the form of an unstrained infusion of ¼ to ½ oz. of the coarsely powdered flowers, which are swallowed with the liquid. It is considered to be an effectual vermifuge forTaenia solium. In its anthelmintic action it is nearly allied to male fern, but it is much inferior to that drug and is very rarely used in Great Britain.

KOVALEVSKY, SOPHIE(1850-1891), Russian mathematician, daughter of General Corvin-Krukovsky, was born at Moscow on the 15th of January 1850. As a young girl she was fired by the aspiration after intellectual liberty that animated so many young Russian women at that period, and drove them to study at foreign universities, since their own were closed to them. This led her, in 1868, to contract one of those conventional marriages in vogue at the time, with a young student, Waldemar Kovalevsky, and the two went together to Germany to continue their studies. In 1869 she went to Heidelberg, where she studied under H. von Helmholtz, G. R. Kirchhoff, L. Königsberger and P. du Bois-Reymond, and from 1871-1874 read privately with Karl Weierstrass at Berlin, as the public lectures were not then open to women. In 1874 the university of Göttingen granted her a degreein absentia, excusing her from the oral examination on account of the remarkable excellence of the three dissertations sent in, one of which, on the theory of partial differential equations, is one of her most remarkable works. Another was an elucidation of P. S. Laplace’s mathematical theory of the form of Saturn’s rings. Soon after this she returned to Russia with her husband, who was appointed professor of palaeontology at Moscow, where he died in 1883. At this time Madame Kovalevsky was at Stockholm, where Gustaf Mittag Leffler, also a pupil of Weierstrass, who had been recently appointed to the chair of mathematics at the newly founded university, had procured for her a post as lecturer. She discharged her duties so successfully that in 1884 she was appointed full professor. This post she held till her death on the 10th of February 1891. In 1888 she achieved the greatest of her successes, gaining the Prix Bordin offered by the Paris Academy. The problem set was “to perfect in one important point the theory of the movement of a solid body round an immovable point,” and her solution added a result of the highest interest to those transmitted to us by Leonhard Euler and J. L. Lagrange. So remarkable was this work that the value of the prize was doubled as a recognition of unusual merit. Unfortunately Madame Kovalevsky did not live to reap the full reward of her labours, for she died just as she had attained the height of her fame and had won recognition even in her own country by election to membership of the St Petersburg Academy of Science.

See E. de Kerbedz, “Sophie de Kowalevski,”Benidiconti del circolo mathematico di Palermo(1891); the obituary notice by G. Mittag Leffler in theActa mathematica, vol. xvi.; and J. C. Poggendorff,Biographisch-literarisches Handwörterbuch.

KOVNO(in LithuanianKauna), a government of north-western Russia, bounded N. by the governments of Courland and Vitebsk, S.E. by that of Vilna, and S. and S.W. by Suwalki and the province of East Prussia, a narrow strip touching the Baltic near Memel. It has an area of 15,687 sq. m. The level uniformity of its surface is broken only by two low ridges which nowhere rise above 800 ft. The geological character is varied, the Silurian, Devonian, Jurassic and Tertiary systems being all represented; the Devonian is that which occurs most frequently, and all are covered with Quaternary boulder-clays. The soil is either a sandy clay or a more fertile kind of black earth. The government is drained by the Niemen, Windau, Courland Aa and Dvina, which have navigable tributaries. In the flat depressions covered with boulder-clays there are many lakes and marshes, while forests occupy about 25½% of the surface. The climate is comparatively mild, the mean temperature at the city of Kovno being 44°F. The population was 1,156,040 in 1870, and 1,553,244 in 1897. The estimated population in 1906 was 1,683,600. It is varied, consisting of Lithuanians proper and Zhmuds (together 74%), Jews (14%), Germans (2½%), Poles (9%), with Letts and Russians; 76.6% are Roman Catholics, 13.7% Jews, 4.5% Protestants, and 5% belong to the Greek Church. Of the total 788,102 were women in 1897 and 147,878 were classed as urban. The principal occupation of the inhabitants is agriculture, 63% of the surface being under crops; both grain (wheat, rye, oats and barley) and potatoes are exported. Flax is cultivated and the linseed exported. Dairying flourishes, and horse and cattle breeding are attracting attention. Fishing is important, and the navigation on the rivers is brisk. A variety of petty domestic industries are carried on by the Jews, but only to a slight extent in the villages. As many as 18,000 to 24,000 men are compelled every year to migrate in search of work. The factories consist principally of distilleries, tobacco and steam flour-mills, and hardware manufactories. Trade, especially the transit trade, is brisk, from the situation of the government on the Prussian frontier, the custom-houses of Yerburg and Tauroggen being amongst the most important in Russia. The chief towns of the seven districts into which the government is divided, with their populations in 1897, are Kovno (q.v.), Novo-Alexandrovsk (6370), Ponevyezh (13,044), Rosieny (7455), Shavli (15,914), Telshi (6215) and Vilkemir (13,509).

The territory which now constitutes the government of Kovno was formerly known as Samogitia and formed part of Lithuania. During the 13th, 14th and 15th centuries the Livonian and Teutonic Knights continually invaded and plundered it, especially the western part, which was peopled with Zhmuds. In 1569 it was annexed, along with the rest of the principality of Lithuania, to Poland; and it suffered very much from the wars of Russia with Sweden and Poland, and from the invasion of Charles XII. in 1701. In 1795 the principality of Lithuania was annexed to Russia, and until 1872, when the government of Kovno was constituted, the territory now forming it was a part of the government of Vilna.

KOVNO,a town and fortress of Russia, capital of the government of the same name, stands at the confluence of the Niemen with the Viliya, 550 m. S.W. of St Petersburg by rail, and 55 m. from the Prussian frontier. Pop. (1863), 23,937; (1903), 73,743, nearly one-half being Jews. It consists of a cramped Old Town and a New Town stretching up the side of the Niemen. It is a first-class fortress, being surrounded at a mean distance of 2½ m. by a girdle of forts, eleven in number. The town lies for the most part in the fork and is guarded by three forts in the direction of Vilna, one covers the Vilna bridge, while the southern approaches are protected by seven. Kovno commands and bars the railway Vilna-Eydtkuhnen. Its factories produce nails, wire-work and other metal goods, mead and bone-meal. It is an important entrepôt for timber, cereals, flax, flour, spirits, bone-meal, fish, coal and building-stone passing from and to Prussia. The city possesses some 15th-century churches. It was founded in the 11th century; and from 1384 to 1398 belongedto the Teutonic Knights. Tsar Alexis of Russia plundered and burnt it in 1655. Here the Russians defeated the Poles on the 26th of June 1831.

KOVROV,a town of Russia, in the government of Vladimir, 40 m. N.E. of the city of Vladimir by the railway from Moscow to Nizhniy-Novgorod, and on the Klyazma River. It has railway-carriage works, cotton mills, steam flour mills, tallow works and quarries of limestone, and carries on an active trade in the export of wooden wares and in the import of grain, salt and fish, brought from the Volga governments. Pop. (1890), 6600; (1900), 16,806.

KOWTOW,orKotou, the Chinese ceremonial act of prostration as a sign of homage, submission, or worship. The word is formed fromko, knock, andtou, head. To the emperor, the “kowtow” is performed by kneeling three times, each act accompanied by touching the ground with the forehead.

KOZLOV,a town of Russia, in the government of Tambov, on the Lyesnoi Voronezh River, 45 m. W.N.W. of the city of Tambov by rail. Pop. (1900), 41,555. Kozlov had its origin in a small monastery, founded in the forest in 1627; nine years later, an earthwork was raised close by, for the protection of the Russian frontier against the Tatars. Situated in a very fertile country, on the highway to Astrakhan and at the head of water communication with the Don, the town soon became a centre of trade; as the junction of the railways leading to the Sea of Azov, to Tsaritsyn on the lower Volga, to Saratov and to Orel, its importance has recently been still further increased. Its export of cattle, grain, meat, eggs (22,000,000), tallow, hides, &c., is steadily growing, and it possesses factories, flour mills, tallow works, distilleries, tanneries and glue works.

KRAAL,also speltcraal,kraul, &c. (South African Dutch, derived possibly from a native African word, but probably from the Spanishcorral, Portuguesecurral, an enclosure for horses, cattle and the like), in South and Central Africa, a native village surrounded by a palisade, mud wall or other fencing roughly circular in form; by transference, the community living within the enclosure. Folds for animals and enclosures made specially for defensive purposes are also called kraals.

KRAFFT(orKraft),ADAM(c.1455-1507), German sculptor, of the Nuremberg school, was born, probably at Nuremberg, about the middle of the 15th century, and died, some say in the hospital, at Schwabach, about 1507. He seems to have emerged as sculptor about 1490, the date of the seven reliefs of scenes from the life of Christ, which, like almost every other specimen of his work, are at Nuremberg. The date of his last work, an Entombment, with fifteen life-size figures, in the Holzschuher chapel of the St John’s cemetery, is 1507. Besides these, Krafft’s chief works are several monumental reliefs in the various churches of Nuremberg; he produced the great Schreyer monument (1492) for St Sebald’s at Nuremberg, a skilful though mannered piece of sculpture opposite the Rathaus, with realistic figures in the costume of the time, carved in a way more suited to wood than stone, and too pictorial in effect; Christ bearing the Cross, above the altar of the same church; and various works made for public and private buildings, as the relief over the door of the Wagehaus, a St George and the Dragon, several Madonnas, and some purely decorative pieces, as coats of arms. His masterpiece is perhaps the magnificent tabernacle, 62 ft. high, in the church of St Laurence (1493-1500). He also made the great tabernacle for the Host, 80 ft. high, covered with statuettes, in Ulm Cathedral, and the very spirited “Stations of the Cross” on the road to the Nuremberg cemetery.

SeeAdam Krafft und seine Schule, by Friedrich Wanderer (1869);Adam Krafft und die Künstler seiner Zeit, by Berthold Daun (1897); Albert Gümbel inRepertorium für Kunstwissenschaft, Bd. xxv. Heft 5, 1902.

KRAGUYEVATS(also writtenKraguievatzandKragujevac), the capital of the Kraguyevats department of Servia; situated 59 m. S.S.W. of Belgrade, in a valley of the Shumadia, or “forest-land,” and on the Lepenitsa, a small stream flowing north-east to join the Morava. On the opposite bank stands the picturesque hamlet of Obilichevo, with a large powder factory. Kraguyevats itself is the main arsenal of Servia, and possesses an iron-foundry and a steam flour-mill. It is the seat of the district prefecture, of a tribunal, of a fine library, and of a large garrison. It boasts the finest college building and the finest modern cathedral (in Byzantine style) in Servia. In the first years of Servia’s autonomy under Prince Milosh, it was the residence of the prince and the seat of government (1818-1839). Even later, between 1868 and 1880, the national assembly (Narodna Skupshtina) usually met there. In 1885 it was connected by a branch line (Kraguyevats-Lapovo) with the principal railway (Belgrade-Nish), and thenceforward the prosperity of the town steadily increased. Pop. (1900), 14,160.

KRAKATOA(Krakatao,Krakatau), a small volcanic island in Sunda Strait, between the islands of Java and Sumatra, celebrated for its eruption in 1883, one of the most stupendous ever recorded. At some early period a large volcano rose in the centre of the tract where the Sunda Strait now runs. Long before any European had visited these waters an explosion took place by which the mountain was so completely blown away that only the outer portions of its base were left as a broken ring of islands. Subsequent eruptions gradually built up a new series of small cones within the great crater ring. Of these the most important rose to a height of 2623 ft. above the sea and formed the peak of the volcanic island of Krakatoa. But compared with the great neighbouring volcanoes of Java and Sumatra, the islets of the Sunda Strait were comparatively unknown. Krakatoa was uninhabited, and no satisfactory map or chart of it had been made. In 1680 it appears to have been in eruption, when great earthquakes took place and large quantities of pumice were ejected. But the effects of this disturbance had been so concealed by the subsequent spread of tropical vegetation that the very occurrence of the eruption had sometimes been called in question. At last, about 1877, earthquakes began to occur frequently in the Sunda Strait and continued for the next few years. In 1883 the manifestations of subterranean commotion became more decided, for in May Krakatoa broke out in eruption. For some time the efforts of the volcano appear to have consisted mainly in the discharge of pumice and dust, with the usual accompaniment of detonations and earthquakes. But on the 26th of August a succession of paroxysmal explosions began which lasted till the morning of the 28th. The four most violent took place on the morning of the 27th. The whole of the northern and lower portion of the island of Krakatoa, lying within the original crater ring of prehistoric times, was blown away; the northern part of the cone of Rakata almost entirely disappeared, leaving a vertical cliff which laid bare the inner structure of that volcano. Instead of the volcanic island which had previously existed, and rose from 300 to 1400 ft. above the sea, there was now left a submarine cavity, the bottom of which was here and there more than 1000 ft. below the sea-level. This prodigious evisceration was the result of successive violent explosions of the superheated vapour absorbed in the molten magma within the crust of the earth. The vigour and repetition of these explosions, it has been suggested, may have been caused by sudden inrushes of the water of the ocean as the throat of the volcano was cleared and the crater ring was lowered and ruptured. The access of large bodies of cold water to the top of the column of molten lava would probably give rise at once to some minor explosions, and then to a chilling of the surface of the lava and a consequent temporary diminution or even cessation of the volcanic eructations. But until the pent-up water-vapour in the lava below had found relief it would only gather strength until it was able to burst through the chilled crust and overlying water, and to hurl a vast mass of cooled lava, pumice and dust into the air.

The amount of material discharged during the two days of paroxysmal energy was enormous, though there are no satisfactory data for even approximately estimating it. A large cavity was formed where the island had previously stood, and the sea-bottom around this crater was covered with a wide and thick sheet of fragmentary materials. Some of the surrounding islands received such a thick accumulation of ejected stones anddust as to bury their forests and greatly to increase the area of the land. So much was the sea filled up that a number of new islands rose above its level. But a vast body of the fine dust was carried far and wide by aerial currents, while the floating pumice was transported for many hundreds of miles on the surface of the ocean. At Batavia, 100 m. from the centre of eruption, the sky was darkened by the quantity of ashes borne across it, and lamps had to be used in the houses at midday. The darkness even reached as far as Bandong, a distance of nearly 150 miles. It was computed that the column of stones, dust and ashes projected from the volcano shot up into the air for a height of 17 m. or more. The finer particles coming into the higher layers of the atmosphere were diffused over a large part of the surface of the earth, and showed their presence by the brilliant sunset glows to which they gave rise. Within the tropics they were at first borne along by air-currents at an estimated rate of about 73 m. an hour from east to west, until within a period of six weeks they were diffused over nearly the whole space between the latitudes 30° N. and 45° S. Eventually they spread northwards and southwards and were carried over North and South America, Europe, Asia, South Africa and Australasia. In the Old World they spread from the north of Scandinavia to the Cape of Good Hope.

Another remarkable result of this eruption was the world-wide disturbance of the atmosphere. The culminating paroxysm on the morning of the 27th of August gave rise to an atmospheric wave or oscillation, which, travelling outwards from the volcano as a centre, became a great circle at 180° from its point of origin, whence it continued travelling onwards and contracting till it reached a node at the antipodes to Krakatoa. It was then reflected or reproduced, travelling backwards again to the volcano, whence it once more returned in its original direction. “In this manner its repetition was observed not fewer than seven times at many of the stations, four passages having been those of the wave travelling from Krakatoa, and three those of the wave travelling from its antipodes, subsequently to which its traces were lost” (Sir R. Strachey).

The actual sounds of the volcanic explosions were heard over a vast area, especially towards the west. Thus they were noticed at Rodriguez, nearly 3000 English miles away, at Bangkok (1413 m.), in the Philippine Islands (about 1450 m.), in Ceylon (2058 m.) and in West and South Australia (from 1300 to 2250 m.). On no other occasion have sound-waves ever been perceived at anything like the extreme distances to which the detonations of Krakatoa reached.

Not less manifest and far more serious were the effects of the successive explosions of the volcano upon the waters of the ocean. A succession of waves was generated which appear to have been of two kinds, long waves with periods of more than an hour, and shorter but higher waves, with irregular and much briefer intervals. The greatest disturbance, probably resulting from a combination of both kinds of waves, reached a height of about 50 ft. The destruction caused by the rush of such a body of sea-water along the coasts and low islands was enormous. All vessels lying in harbour or near the shore were stranded, the towns, villages and settlements close to the sea were either at once, or by successive inundations, entirely destroyed, and more than 36,000 human beings perished. The sea-waves travelled to vast distances from the centre of propagation. The long wave reached Cape Horn (7818 geographical miles) and possibly the English Channel (11,040 m.). The shorter waves reached Ceylon and perhaps Mauritius (2900 m.).

See R. D. M. Verbeek,Krakatau(Batavia, 1886); “The Eruption of Krakatoa and Subsequent Phenomena,”Report of the Krakatoa Committee of the Royal Society(London, 1888).

KRAKEN,in Norwegian folk-lore, a sea-monster, believed to haunt the coasts of Norway. It was described in 1752 by the Norwegian bishop Pontoppidan as having a back about a mile and a half round and a body which showed above the sea like an island, and its arms were long enough to enclose the largest ship. The further assertion that the kraken darkened the water around it by an excretion suggests that the myth was based on the appearance of some gigantic cuttle-fish.

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