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KICOCHET. 140 KIDDLE. fleeted upon striking ater and they frequently rise from the water surface at an angle very mueli greater than the striking angle ; conse- quently ricochet is avoided in modern gun fire. See Gunnery. RICORD, rfe-kor', or RICARD, John. An American lawyer, said to have been a native of New York State, who went to Hawaii in October, 1843, and the next year was appointed Attorney- General of the island kingdom. In 1845 the Ha- waiian Legislature authorized him to draft a series of acts organizing the five executive de- partments of the Government: Interior, Foreign Affairs, Finance, Public Instruction, and Attor- ney-General. It also adopted changes in the Con- stitution of 1840 aftecting the Privy Council and the judiciary, w-liich he proposed. In 1846 and 1847 it accepted the statute laws that he drew up, and these continued until the revolu- tion to be the basis of Hawaii's civil code. His services in shaping Hawaiian institutions during their formative period were very valuable. He left the islands in 1847. RICORD, Philippe (1800-89). A French sur- geon, born at Baltimore. He went in 1820 to Paris, where he was attached in succession to the Hotel-Dieu under Dupu^-tren, and to the Pitie under Lisfranc. He graduated in medicine in 1826, and after practicing in the provinces, in 1828 he returned to Paris, where he delivered two annual courses of lectures at the Piti^ on surgi- cal operations, and was appointed surgeon-in- chief to the hospital for venereal diseases. This post he held with brilliant success till his retire- ment in October, 1860. He won a world-wide reputation in his specialty. In 1831 he became surgeon-in-chief of the Hospital du Midi in Paris. For his suggestions on the cure of varicocele and on the operation of urethro-plasty he received in 1842 one of the Montyon prizes. In 1862 he was appointed physician in ordinary to Napeoleon III., and in 1869 consulting surgeon to the Emperor, having already on August 12, 1860, been raised to the distinction of commander of the Legion of Honor. In 1871 he was made, for his services in the ambulance corps during the siege of Paris, grand officer of the Legion of Honor. His works are numerous, the more important of them being: De I'ernploi du sjiecuhim (1833); Traill des maladies vdtje'rienncs (1838); Lettres sur la syphilis (1851). RIDDLE (AS. ra-dels, rwdelse, from rmdan, to council, interpret, read, Goth, ga-redan, OHG. rfilan, Ger. raten, to council; perhaps connected with Lat. rcri. to think, or with OChurch Slav. raditi, to be anxious, Skt. rddh, to be successful) . The definition in obscure terms of a well-known object, which the person addressed is required to name. In modern times the enigma usually makes a witticism or pun; but anciently it had a character more serious. The themes of riddles were often natural objects, like the sun, moon, wind, or rainbow, and the presentation had some- thing of a mythologie character. Knowledge of this sort was considered to imply a measure of wisdom which was in accordance with the early inclination to express truth in a mystical man- ner, rather than in straightforward and simple speech. Thus Samson, in order to show his in- telligence, propounded a riddle to the Philistines. Riddle-guessing was often made to form a game, in which one side asked questions, and the other side responded; and such contest might be the subject of wagers. According to mythology the stake was often life or honor. Such was the case in the riddle proposed by the Sphinx to Oidipus: "What is that which has four feet in the morning, two at noon, and three at night?" to which the answer was: "Man." So Old Norse poetry makes Odin enter into a riddling contest with the giant Vafthrudnir, in which the latter perishes. In the Alvls-infil, the prize of the con- test is the daughter of the god Thor. Of these contests we have a survival in the English ballad of the Elfin-knight, where a maid saves herself from qn evil spirit by guessing his riddles. So in modern nursery lore, a nurse will put to a child riddles to be guessed on penalty of a forfeit. RID'DLE, Albert Gallatin ( 1816-1902) . An American lawyer and author, born in Monson, , Mass. He w'as admitted to the bar in 1840, and in 1848-49 served in the State Legislature. In 1859 he defended the Oberlin slave-rescuers, and in 1861-63 was in Congress as a Republican. He was engaged by the State Department to assist in prosecuting John H. Surratt for his part in the assassination of President Lincoln. In 1877 he was appointed law-officer of the District of Columbia, and subsequently practiced at Wash- ington. For a time he was head of the law de- partment at Howard University. He wrote sev- eral stories of early Ohio life, such as Bart Ridgely (1873) and The Sugar-Makers of the West Woods (1885); a Life of Benjamin F. Wade; and Recollections of War Times, 1860-65. RIDDLE, Joseph Esmond (1804-59). An Englisli divine and lexicographer. He was born at Bristol, educated at Saint Edmund Hall, Ox- ford, where he graduated in 1828, after which he resided at Ramsgate. Here he taught private pupils, prepared for his master's degree, and be- gan the first of his important works in lexi- cography. After his ordination in 1830 he held many curacies, his last incumbency being Saint Peter and Saint James's, Leckhampton, Gloucester, which he held from 1840 until his death. He was select preacher at Oxford in 1834 and in 1854; and in 1852 he delivered the Bamp- ton lectures, his theme being, Natural History of Infidelity and Superstition in Contrast icith Christian Faith. He translated Scheller's Lexi- con Totius Latinitatis (1835), published a Com- plete English-Latin Dictionary (1838), and A Copious and Critical Latin-English Lexicon, founded on the Dictionaries of Dr. W. Freund (1849). He was the author of a History of the Papacy to the Period of the Reformation (1854). RIDDLE, ]yLrrHEW Brown (1836—). An American clergvman, educator, and author, born in Pittsburg, Pa. After his graduation at Jef- ferson College, Pa., in 1852, he studied theology at the New Brunswick Seminary and elsewhere until 1859, and then went to Heidelberg. He was adjunct professor of Greek in Jefferson College in 1857-58, had pastoral charges successively in two Dutch Reformed churches of New Jersey in 1861-69. and afterwards was appointed professor in the Hartford Theological Seminary, which he left in 1887 to take the chair of New Testament exegesis in the Western Theological Seminary, Allegheny, Pa. He was a member of the Ameri- can committee for New Testament revision, was also a reviser of the Westminster Confession of Faith, and from 1877 to 1881 prepared Notes on,