Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 17.djvu/306

BONSARD. 278 ROOF. Jean Antoine de Bait', son of the ambassador. This was the kernel of the future Pl^iade (q.v. ). Du UcUay (q.v.) soon became a fellow-student, and with him Konsard sliared in the Difense et il- lustration de la langue fransaise, which inaugu- ralc<l the classic reform in diction with which the Pleiade is associated. In 1550 Konsard pub- lished his first poems, the Odes, and in 1552 the first of the Atnours. These brought him lionors and pensions from the Court circle, and won him the friendship of distinguished literary men. Eonsard followed up the Odes and Aniovrs with Hymncs (l.')55 and 1556), and collected his works in four volumes (1500). In the religious wars he was a partisan of Catholicism, became recognized as the Court poet, and won new favors from Charles IX. for his Franciade (1572), an unfinished epic, and for many occasional poems. His last years were spent in lettered ease at two of liis priories, Val-Crois and Saint-Cosme, in his native VendOmois. Here he received costly gifts from Queen Elizabeth of England, and from her prisoner, Mary of Scotland ; here he made a final collection of his works (1584). Konsard was a master in poetic imagination, and in tlie technique of language and metre. His vigor anil brilliancy, whether in verse or prose, had not been equaled in France. He was first to popularize the sonnet. He restored the Alex- andrine line to due honor, and introduced many original lyric stanzas with which anthologies and imitation have made all familiar. His lyrics have the naivetfi of the Kenaissance, a free healthy naturalism, in w'hich there is hardly ever a morbid strain. Ronsard's ^yorks were printed seventeen times tefore 1030, and were w-ell edited by Blanchemain (8 vols., Paris, 1857-67), and by Marty-Laveaux (6 vols., ib., 1887-93). There is a selection, (Euvres ohoisies, in one volume by Sainte-Beuve (Paris, 1828, and since often reprinted, with ad- ditions by Louis Moland) ; other selections are by Voizard. Noel, and Becq de Fouquiferes. For criti- cism and biography, consult: Pellissier's essay in Petit de .Julleville's Histoire de la langue et de la littirature fran<;aise (vol. iii., Paris, 1898, with a good bibliography) ; Gandar, Ronsard imitateur d'Bomcre et de Pindare (Metz, 1854) ; Eochani- beau, La famille de Eonsard (Paris, 1869) : Cha- landon, Essai sur Ronsard (ib., 1875) ; Mellerio, Lcxiqiie de la lanr/tie de Ronsard (ib., 1895) ; Fieri, Petrarque et Ronsard (ib., 1895) ; Faguet, XVI. Steele (ib., 1894) ; and Sainte-Beuve, C'auseries du lundi, vol. xii. (which is used also by way of introduction to later editions of the Selections by Sainte-Beuve, mentioned above). Among those who have translated poems by Ron- sard are Henry Francis Cary, Longfellow, Lord Lytton (in Orval) , and Andrew Lang. In his Sonr/s and Sonnets of Pierre de Ronsard (Bos- ton, 1903), C. H. Page has put into English verse seventy-six poems, most of which had not pre- viously been translated. EONSDORF, rSns'dorf. A to^vn and railway station in the Rhine Province of Prussia, 3 mile's southeast of Elberfeld. It is largely engaged in manufacturing, having iron works, foundries, machine shops, copper works, ribbon mills, dyeing establishments, etc. Population, in 1900, 13,297. RONTGEN, rent'gen, Wilhelm Konbad. See Roentgen, Wilhelii Konead. RONTGEN RAYS. See X-Rats. ROOD. The cross on which Christ suffered ; in modern usage, the name is most commonly applied to the large and striking crucifix, gen- erally with standing figures of jNIary and John on either side of it, which was placed at the entrance of the choir or chancel in most mediaeval churches. Often it stood on a gallery or screen, loiown as the rood-loft or rood-screen. ROOD (AS. rod, pole, crucifix, OHG. ruota, Ger. Rute, rod; possibly connected with Lat. radius, utaS, Skt. rudh, to grow ) . A measure of surface. It is the fourth part of an acre and contains 40 square poles or perches. ROOD, Ogden Nicholas (1831-1902). An American physicist, born at Danbury, Conn. After graduating at Princeton in 1852 he studied at the universities of Munich and Berlin, and was made professor of physics and chemistry at the LIniversity of Troy (1858), and professor of physics in Columbia College (1863). He was elected a member of the National Academy of Sciences in 1864, and served as vice-president <if the American Association for the Advancement of Science (1868). His investigations have em- braced problems in mechanics, electricity, optics, and acoustics. He was the first to construct fluid prisms of great dispersive power for use in spectroscopic studies, and was also one of the first to apply photography to the miscroscope. His investigations on the nature of the electric spark and duration of lightning flashes are val- uable, as they determined most accurately mi- nute intervals of time. He constructed an air- pump (q.v.) which for many years held a rec- ord for high vacua, and devised a method of photometry which was independent of color. Professor Rood was able to demonstrate the regular or specular reflection of X-rays and also investigated materials of high electrical re- sistance. He wrote Modern Chromaties (New York, 1874), a standard work on color, and many scientific papers published for the most I)art in the American Journal of Science. ROOF (AS., leel. hrof; probably connected with Gk. Kprnrreiii, kn/plrin, to hide). The top- most covering of a building, including its sup- porting framework. The commoner forms of roof are the gambrel, having two slopes meeting in a horizontal ridge and terminated at the end walls by triangular gables or pedimeijts; the hipped roof, which has four sloped surfaces ris- ing from the four walls to the short central ridge ; the gabled, with a double slope on either side, the lower part steep, the upper part flatter; the mansard, which is a hipped gambrel roof with a nearly flat upper slope. Other roofs form P3'ramids or cones, which are called spires wdicn very lofty and relatively slender. A roof of convex form on a round or polygonal plan is called a dome or cupola; if formed with a double curve it is sometimes called a hell-roof. A roof of a single slope from a higher to a lower side wall is called a lean-to, pent, or shed roof; such are the roofs of most side-aisles of churches. The construction of roofs varies w-ith material and span. The simplest are the primitive flat roofs of the Orient, made with cross-beams, thatch, and a heavy layer of stamped clay. In Central Syria and in Egypt important buildings were roofed with enormous beams and slabs of stone. The Greeks employed a low-pitched gable roof, carried by simple trusses of wood and eov-