French families, emigrated to the Low Countries after the revocation of the edict of Nantes, but some of the former appear to have settled in Holland as early as 1647. Dozy studied at the university of Leiden, obtained the degree of doctor in 1844, was appointed an extraordinary professor of history in 1850, and professor in 1857. The first results of his extensive studies in Oriental literature, Arabic language and history, manifested themselves in 1847, when he published Al-Marrakushi’s History of the Almohades (Leiden, 2nd ed., 1881), which, together with his Scriptorum Arabum loci de Abbaditis (Leiden, 1846–1863, 3 vols.), his editions of Ibn-Adhari’s History of Africa and Spain (Leiden, 1848–1852, 3 vols.), of Ibn-Badrun’s Historical Commentary on the Poem of Ibn-Abdun (Leiden, 1848), and his Dictionnaire détaillé des noms des vêtements chez les Arabes (Amsterdam, 1845)—a work crowned by the Dutch Institute—stamped Dozy as one of the most learned and critical Arabic scholars of his day. But his real fame as a historian mainly rests on his great work, Histoire des Mussulmans d’Espagne, jusqu’à la conquête de l’Andalousie par les Almoravides, 711–1110 (Leiden, 1861; 2nd ed., ibid., 1881); a graphically written account of Moorish dominion in Spain, which shed new light on many obscure points, and has remained the standard work on the subject. Dozy’s Recherches sur l’histoire et la littérature de l’Espagne pendant le moyen âge (Leiden, 2 vols., 1849; 2nd and 3rd ed., completely recast, 1860 and 1881) form a needful and wonderfully trenchant supplement to his Histoire des Mussulmans, in which he mercilessly exposes the many tricks and falsehoods of the monks in their chronicles, and effectively demolishes a good part of the Cid legends. As an Arabic scholar Dozy stands well-nigh unsurpassed in his Supplément aux dictionnaires arabes (Leiden, 1877–1881, 2 vols.), a work full of research and learning, a storehouse of Arabic lore. To the same class belongs his Glossaire des mots espagnols et portugais, dérivés de l’Arabe, edited with Dr W. H. Engelmann of Leipzig (Leiden, 1866; 2nd ed., 1868), and a similar list of Dutch words derived from the Arabic. Dozy also edited Al Makkari’s Analectes sur l’histoire et la littérature des Arabes d’Espagne (Leiden, 1855–1861, 2 vols.), and, in conjunction with his friend and worthy successor, Professor De Goeje, at Leiden, Idrisi’s Description de l’Afrique et de l’Espagne (1866), also the Calendrier de Cordoue de l’année 961; texte arabe et ancienne traduction latine (Leiden, 1874). Het Islamisme (Islamism; Haarlem, 1863, 2nd ed., 1880; French translation) is a popular exposition of Mahommedanism, of a more controversial character; and De Israelieten te Mekka (“The Israelites at Mecca,” Haarlem, 1864) became the subject of a rather heated discussion in Jewish circles. Dozy died at Leiden in May 1883. (H. Ti.)
DRACAENA, in botany, a genus of the natural order Liliaceae, containing about fifty species in the warmer parts of the Old World. They are trees or shrubs with long, generally narrow leaves, panicles of small whitish flowers, and berried fruit. The most remarkable species is Dracaena Draco, the dragon-tree of the Canary Isles, which reaches a great size and age. The famous specimen in Teneriffe, which was blown down by a hurricane in 1868, when measured by Alexander von Humboldt, was 70 ft. high, with a circumference of 45 ft. several feet above the ground. A resin exuding from the trunk is known as dragon’s blood (q.v.).
Many of the cultivated so-called Dracaenas belong to the closely-allied genus Cordyline. They are grown for the beauty of form, colour and variegation of their foliage and are extremely useful as decorative stove plants or summer greenhouse plants, or for room and table decoration. They are easy to grow and may be increased by cuttings planted in sandy soil in a temperature of from 65° to 70° by night, the spring being the best time for propagation. The old stems laid flat in a propagating frame will push young shoots, which may be taken off with a heel when 2 or 3 in. long, and planted in sandy peat in 3-in. pots; the tops can also be taken off and struck. The established plants do best in fibry peat made porous by sand. In summer they should have a day temperature of 75°, and in winter one of 65°. Shift as required, using coarser soil as the pots become larger. By the end of the summer the small cuttings will have made nice plants, and in the spring following they can be kept growing by the use of manure water twice a week. Those intended for the conservatory should be gradually inured to more air by midsummer, but kept out of cold draughts. When the plants get too large they can be headed down and the tops used for cuttings.
A large number of the garden species of Dracaena are varieties of Cordyline terminalis. D. Goldieana is a grandly variegated species from west tropical Africa, and requires more heat.
DRACHMANN, HOLGER HENRIK HERBOLDT (1846–1908), Danish poet and dramatist, son of Dr A. G. Drachmann, a physician of Copenhagen, whose family was of German extraction, was born in Copenhagen on the 9th of October 1846. Owing to the early death of his mother, who was a Dane, the child was left much to his own devices. He soon developed a fondness for semi-poetical performances, and loved to organize among his companions heroic games, in which he himself took such parts as those of Tordenskjold and Niels Juul. His studies were belated, and he did not enter the university until 1865, leaving it in 1866 to become a student in the Academy of Fine Arts. From 1866 to 1870 he was learning, under Professor Sörensen, to become a marine painter, and not without success. But about the latter date he came under the influence of Georg Brandes, and, without abandoning art, he began to give himself more and more to literature. At various periods he travelled very extensively in England, Scotland, France, Spain and Italy, and his literary career began by his sending letters about his journeys to the Danish newspapers. After returning home, he settled for some time in the island of Bornholm, painting seascapes. He now issued his earliest volume of poems, Digte (1872), and joined the group of young Radical writers who gathered under the banner of Brandes. Drachmann was unsettled, and still doubted whether his real strength lay in the pencil or in the pen. By this time he had enjoyed a surprising experience of life, especially among sailors, fishermen, students and artists, and the issues of the Franco-German War and the French Commune had persuaded him that a new and glorious era was at hand. His volume of lyrics, Daempede Melodier (“Muffled Melodies,” 1875), proved that Drachmann was a poet with a real vocation, and he began to produce books in prose and verse with great rapidity. Ungt Blod (“Young Blood,” 1876) contained three realistic stories of contemporary life. But he returned to his true field in his magnificent Sange ved Havet; Venezia (“Songs of the Sea; Venice,” 1877), and won the passionate admiration of his countrymen by his prose work, with interludes in verse, called Derovre fra Graensen (“Over the Frontier there,” 1877), a series of impressions made on Drachmann by a visit to the scenes of the war with Germany. During the succeeding years he was a great traveller, visiting most of the principal countries of the world, but particularly familiarizing himself, by protracted voyages, with the sea and with the life of man in maritime places. In 1879 he published Ranker og Roser (“Tendrils and Roses”), amatory lyrics of a very high order of melody, in which he showed a great advance in technical art. To the same period belongs Paa Sömands Tro og Love (“On the Faith and Honour of a Sailor,” 1878), a volume of short stories in prose. It was about this time that Drachmann broke with Brandes and the Radicals, and set himself at the head of a sort of “nationalist” or popular-Conservative party in Denmark. He continued to celebrate the life of the fishermen and sailors in books, whether in prose or verse, which were the most popular of their day. Paul og Virginie and Lars Kruse (both 1879); Östen for Sol og vesten for Maone (“East of the Sun and Moon,” 1880); Puppe og Sommerfugl (“Chrysalis and Butterfly,” 1882); and Strandby Folk (1883) were among these. In 1882 Drachmann published his fine translation, or paraphrase, of Byron’s Don Juan. In 1885 his romantic play called Der var en Gang (“Once upon a Time”) had a great success on the boards of the Royal theatre, Copenhagen; and his tragedies of Völund Smed (“Wayland the Smith”) and Brav-Karl (1897) made him the most popular playwright of Denmark. He published in 1894 a volume of exquisitely fantastic Melodramas in rhymed verse, a collection which contains some of Drachmann’s most perfect work. His
