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414 IROQUOIS are Episcopalians; the villages near Montreal are Catholics ; Baptists, Congregationalists, and Methodists have also made converts. The lan- guage of the tribes was first reduced to gram- matical form by the Jesuit Bruyas, who also made a dictionary of the " Radical Words of the Mohawk Language" (New York, 1862); an Onondaga dictionary by an unknown French author was printed in New York in 1860; and a sketch of Iroquois grammar by the Rev. Mr. Cuoq in his Etudes philologiques sur quelques languet sauvages (Montreal, 1866). A very full grammar and dictionary by the Rev. Mr. Marcoux remains unpublished. " The Book of Common Prayer " has been several times print- ed in Mohawk, and prayer books and devotional treatises in the Caughnawaga dialect ; and some portions of the Bible in Mohawk and Seneca. The special works on the tribe are Cusick's " Sketches of Ancient History of the Six Na- tions " (Tnscarora, 1826) ; Colden's " History of the Five Nations" (New York, 1727; reprinted, 1866; London, 1747, 1755); Morgan's "League of the Iroquois" (Rochester, 1851); School- craft's " Notes on the Iroquois " (New York, 1846); "The Iroquois, or the Bright Side of Indian Character," by Minnie Myrtle (Anna C. Johnson) (New York, 1855); Stone's "Life of Brant" (2 vols. 8vo, 1838, 1864) and "Life of Red Jacket " (1841, 1866) ; and Williams, "Life of Tehoraguanegen, alias Thomas Williams" (1859). IROQUOIS, an E. county of Illinois, bordering on Indiana and drained by the Kankakee river ; area, 750 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 25,782. It has a level surface, much of which is prairie, and the soil is generally fertile. The county is traversed by the Chicago branch of the Illinois Central railroad, and by the Toledo, Peoria, and Warsaw, the Oilman, Clinton, and Spring- field, and the Chicago, Danville, and Vincennes lines. The chief productions in 1870 were 67,- 640 bushels of wheat, 23,250 of rye, 799,810 of Indian corn, 430,746 of oats, 27,293 of flax seed, 87,127 of potatoes, 54,495 Ibs. of wool, 30,194 of flax, 358,672 of butter, and 63,947 tons of hay. There were 12,716 horses, 10,- 345 milch cows, 21,135 other cattle, 14,986 sheep, and 21,764 swine; 7 manufactories of saddlery and harness, 1 of cooperage, 1 distil- lery, and 6 flour mills. Capital, Middleport. IRRAWADDY, Irawadl, or Airavatl (" great river," or "elephantine river"), the principal stream in India E. of the Brahmapootra. It rises on the confines of Thibet and Burmah, at the E. extremity of the Snowy range of the Himalaya, about lat. 28 N., Ion. 98 E., flows S. across the territory of Burmah, which it divides into two nearly equal parts, and traverses the state of Pegu in British Bur- mah, entering the bay of Bengal and the gulf of Martaban by several mouths which form an extensive delta. Its whole length is 1,060 m. It separates 140 m. below the S. frontier of Burmah into two branches, the eastern of which is named the Rangoon or Siriam from IRRIGATION the principal cities on its banks, and falls into the gulf of Martaban, while the western, called the Bassein, enters the bay of Bengal near Cape Negrais. The delta is formed by numer- ous offsets from both these branches. The Irrawaddy has two striking deviations from its general southerly course : one just below the mouth of the Tapan, about lat. 24 15', where it makes a bold curve in the shape of the letter S ; and the other at Amarapura, where it turns sharply W., and, after receiving the waters of its largest tributary, the Khyen- Dwen, flows successively S., S. W., and again S. The principal cities and towns on its banks are Bhamo (a trading town having a considerable traffic with China), Amara- pura and Ava, former capitals, Mandelay, the present capital of Burmah, Pagan, Maloon, Prome, Bassein, and Rangoon. From above the junction of the Khyen-Dwen to Maloon the Irrawaddy spreads itself over a channel reaching during the inundation from June to September to a width of 4 or 5 m. It is then restricted between steep and hilly banks, and does not expand again considerably until it has passed Prome. It is navigable to Ava at all seasons by boats drawing 3 ft. of water, and during the rains vessels of 200 tons can ascend to Bhamo, a distance of 800 m. from the sea. Two steam navigation companies run steamers on the Irrawaddy, making 60 trips a year. Klaproth and the Chinese geographers consider the Irrawaddy a continuation of the Sanpo of Thibet ; but the latter river is now generally admitted, though not positively ascertained, to be identical with the Brahmapootra. IRRIGATION, the watering of lands by cur- rents distributed over or near the surface, and also by temporarily flooding them. It is one of the oldest of arts, was practised by the an- cient Egyptians, Arabians, Assyrians, Babylo- nians, and Chinese, and has always formed a part of the agriculture of the countries border- ing on the Mediterranean. The valley of Mareb in Yemen, Arabia, was irrigated by waters distributed from a vast reservoir made by a dam 2 m. long and 120 ft. high, constructed by an Adite monarch of Saba, probably long before the times of Solomon. This dam was built of enormous blocks of hewn stone, and must have been a work of no mean engineer- ing skill, as it stood and restrained the current of a large stream of 70 tributaries for about 2,000 years, when it burst with desolating ef- fect. The canal of the Pharaohs, connecting ancient Pelusium with the Red sea, was con- structed for purposes of irrigation. The plains of Oman in Arabia are watered by subter- ranean canals supplied by reservoirs in the mountains, and a vegetation of rare luxuri- ance, consisting of most of the fruits and grains of Persia and India, is produced in con- sequence. The plains of Assyria and Baby- lonia were covered with an immense system of canals, some of them hundreds of miles in length, intended partly for irrigation and part-