Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 08.djvu/398

SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK 342 SERBIA length of over 400 feet. These great trees are in the Calaveras grove. The Mariposa grove has about 500 trees of various sizes, of which about 100 are of the tall variety. A hunter named Dowd discovered the big trees in 1850. Some of the trees are supposed to be nearly 2,000 years old. SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK, a re- gion made public property in 1890 in order to safeguard the splendid groves of sequoia trees which are there found. The number of groves in this park are twelve, and the number of large trees exceed 12,000, having a minimum diam- eter of 10 feet. The park was estab- lished by the acts of Sept. 25 and Oct. 1, 1890. The area includes 161,597 acres. The valleys, rivers, and forested slopes in this park combine to make up a pic- ture of great beauty. Tourists in great number visit it each year, coming by way of Visalia, on the Southern Pacific and Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe rail- roads, and then to Lemon Cove, going 40 miles by stage coach to the park. The trees belong to the Sequoia genus that showed themselves first in the cretaceous beds of Greenland and in the American Potomac group, as well as later in the Tertiary of Europe and America, re- sembling those still extant in California. They are collaterally related to the Swedenborgia of the Jurassic, which grew to great heights in earlier ages. SERAJEVO, a city in Jugo-Slavia, formerly the capital of the Austrian province of Bosnia, situated on both banks of the Miljaka, 122 miles S. W. of Belgrade. The principal industries of the town consist of textile mills and metal ware factories. Iron mines and mineral springs are found in the vicin- ity. The name of the city, however, is generally associated with the assassina- tion of the heir apparent to the throne of Austria-Hungary, the Archduke Fran- cis Ferdinand, which took place there on June 28, 1914. Pop. (1919) 50,000. SERAPIS, or SARAPIS (also found as Osarapis), the Greek name of an Egyptian deity, introduced into Egypt in the time of Ptolemy I. or Soter, and really a combination of the Greek Hades and Egyptian Osiris. He was not an Egyptian, but the Greek deity, with some Egyptian characters superadded; and his temple was not admitted into the pre- cincts of Egyptian cities, finding favor only in the Greek cities founded in Egypt. It is said that 42 temples were erected under the Ptolemies and Romans to this god in Egypt. His resemblance to Osiris consisted in his chthonic or infernal character, as judge of the dead and ruler of Hades. The god had a magnificent temple, the famed Serapeum at Alexandria, to which was attached the celebrated library; another at Memphis, in the vicinity of the cemetery of the mummies of the Apis, which was exca- vated by Mariette in 1850; and another temple at Canopus. It appears that he represented or was identified with the Hesiri Api, or Osorapis, the "Osirified" or "dead Apis," who was also invested with many of the attributes of Osiris. The worship of Serapis, introduced into Egypt by the Ptolemies, subsequently became greatly extended in Asia Minor; and his image, in alliance with that of Isis and other deities, appears on many of the coins of the imperial days of Rome. In A. D. 146 the worship of the god was introduced into the city of Rome by Antoninus Pius; but it was not long after abolished by the senate, on account of its licentious character. A celebrated temple of Serapis also existed at Puteoli, near Naples, and the remains of it are still seen. In Egypt itself the worship of the deity subsisted till the fall of paganism, the image at Alexandria con- tinuing to be worshiped till destroyed, A. D. 398, by Theophilus, archbishop of that city. SERBIA (Jugoslavia), formerly an independent kingdom of eastern Europe; bounded N. by Austria-Hungary, from which it is separated by the Save and the Danube; E. by Bulgaria; W. by Albania and Montenegro; S. by Greece; area, 42,098 square miles; pop. about 5,000,000. Capital, Belgrade; pop. (1919) 120,000. The surface of Serbia is ele- vated and is traversed by ramifications of the Carpathians in the N. E., of the Balkans in the S. E., and of the Dinaric Alps in the W. The summits seldom exceed 3,000 feet, though the highest reaches 6,325. The whole surface be- longs to the basin of the Danube, which receives the drainage partly directly, and partly by the frontier rivers Save, augmented by the Drin and the Timok, but chiefly by the Morava, which flows through the center of the kingdom. The climate is somewhat rigorous in the ele- vated districts, but mild in the valleys and plains. There are extensive forests and uncultivated wastes, the forest area being 42 per cent, of the total area. Serbia is essentially an agricultural country, and each peasant cultivates his own freehold. These holdings range in size from 10 to 30 acres. Of the entire area of land, about 21 per cent, is un- der cultivation. The chief agricultural products are wheat, barley, oats, maize, rye and beetroot. Tobacco is also grown and the product in 1919 was 15.000 tons.