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NORTHERN DRIFT 486 NORTH PLAINFIELD NORTHERN DRIFT, in geology, a name formerly given to boulder-clay of the Pleistocene period, when its mate- rials were supposed to have been brought by polar currents from the N. NORTHERN GIANT, a figurative designation sometimes applied to Russia. NORTHERN PROVINCE, one of the five provinces into which Uganda in east Africa is divided, the others being Ru- dolf, Eastern, Western, and Buganda. There is gold and iron, and soil is fertile. Province comprises districts of Bunyoro, Gulu, Chua, West Nile. NORTHERN TERRITORY, a terri- tory of the Commonwealth of Australia, situated between Western Australia and Queensland on the west and east, and reaching from South Australia north to the Timor and Arafura seas. It has a total area of about 525,000 square miles. There are mountain ranges and the coun- try is for the most part exceedingly dry, although portions are well adapted to cultivation of tropical products. Cattle and sheep raising are the chief indus- tries. The total population in 1912 was estimated at about 3,000. NORTHFIELD CONFERENCES and SUMMER SCHOOLS, an annual series of meetings for Christian workers in the Evangelical Protestant Churches, estab- lished in 1882 by the famous evangelist Dwight L. Moody. The Student Confer- ence met at East Northfield in 1886 and has held its sessions there ever since. It is a meeting designed primarily to in- terest students in Christian work. The Mount Hermon School for Bible study also has its sessions during the summer at Northfield. Other summer confer- ences are: the Home Mission School, the Young Women's Conference, the Sunday School Workers' Conference, and the Foreign Missionary School. Since Moody's death the work has been in charge of his sons. NORTH LITTLE ROCK. See Ar- GENTA. NORTHMEN, a name applied to the ancient inhabitants of Scandinavia, or Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, but more generally restricted to those sea- rovers called Danes by the Saxons, who sailed on piratical expeditions to all parts of the European seas, made their first ap- pearance on the coast of England in 787, and from the year 832 repeated their invasions, till they became masters of all the country under their King Canute, and reigned in England during the next 50 years, down to 1042, when the Saxo~ dynasty was restored in the person of Edward the Confessor. A Danish inva- sion penetrated to the Meuse in 515, but was repelled. The victories of Charle- magne over the Saxons led to a league being formed between that people and the Danes; and Gottfried, King of Jut- land, with his piratical bands, ravaged the French and Spanish coasts, even as far as the Straits of Gibraltar. Their great invasion of France took place in 841, after which the whole coast of W. Europe, from the Elbe to the Guadal- quivir fell a prey to the Northmen. In 837 they had sacked Utrecht and Ant- werp, and fortified themselves on the island of Walcheren. Flanders was obstinately defended; but Friesland, Lower Lorraine, and Neustria fell with- out resistance, Roland devastated Hol- land, and appeared on the Seine, while Gottfried ravaged the valleys of the Meuse and Scheldt. Hastings, at the head of a band of Northmen, sacked Bor- deaux, Lisbon, and Seville, defeated the Moorish conquerors of Spain at Cordova, overran Italy and Sicily, and crossed the straits into Morocco. In 885 they laid siege to Paris, but were bought off by Charles the Fat. RoUo, after ravaging Friesland and the countries watered by the Scheldt, ac- cepted the hand of a daughter of Charles the Simple, and received with her pos- session of all the land in the valley of the Seine, from the Epte and Eure to the sea, which then went by the na.ae of Normandy. Their conquest of Eng- land, in 1066, gave that country an ener- getic race of kings and nobles. Though the Normans had acquired comparatively settled habits in France in the course of the 11th century many nobles, with their followers, betook themselves to S. Italy and engaged in strife with native princes, Greeks and Arabs. In 1059, Robert Guiscard, one of the 10 sons of the Norman count, Tancred de Haute- ville, was recognized by Pope Nicholas II. as Duke of Apulia and Calabria, and in 1071 as lord of all lower Italy. His brother Roger conquered Sicily, 1060- 1089. Roger II. of Sicily united the two dominions in 1127; but in the person of his grandson, William II., the Norman dynasty became extinct, and the kingdom passed to the Hohenstauffen family. NORTH PLAINFIELD, a borough of New Jersey, in Somerset co. It is on the Central Railroad of New Jersey. Its in- dustries include fruit canneries, a wood- working factory, a telescope factory, etc. In the neighborhood are important stone quarries. It is the seat of Mount St. Marv's College and Herbert's Hall for