an ardent advocate of the policy of forcing Louis XVI. into harmony with the Revolution; moved (May 3) for the dismissal of the king’s non-juring confessor, for the banishment of all non-juring priests (May 16), for the disbandment of the royal guard (May 30), and the formation in Paris of a camp of fédérés (June 4). He remained a royalist, however, and with Gensonné and Vergniaud even addressed a letter to the king soliciting a private interview. Whatever negotiations may have resulted, however, were cut short by the insurrection of the 10th of August. Guadet, who presided over the Assembly during part of this fateful day, put himself into vigorous opposition to the insurrectionary Commune of Paris, and it was on his motion that on the 30th of August the Assembly voted its dissolution—a decision reversed on the following day. In September Guadet was returned by a large majority as deputy to the Convention. At the trial of Louis XVI. he voted for an appeal to the people and for the death sentence, but with a respite pending appeal. In March 1793 he had several conferences with Danton, who was anxious to bring about a rapprochement between the Girondists and the Mountain during the war in La Vendée, but he unconditionally refused to join hands with the man whom he held responsible for the massacres of September. Involved in the fall of the Girondists, and his arrest being decreed on the 2nd of June 1793, he fled to Caen, and afterwards hid in his father’s house at St Émilion. He was discovered and taken to Bordeaux, where, after his identity had been established, he was guillotined on the 17th of June 1794.
See J. Guadet, Les Girondins (Paris, 1889); and F. A. Aulard, Les Orateurs de la législative et de la convention (Paris, 2nd ed., 1906).
GUADIANA (anc. Anas, Moorish Wadi Ana), a river of Spain
and Portugal. The Guadiana was long believed to rise in the
lowland known as the Campo de Montiel, where a chain of small
lakes, the Lagunas de Ruidera (partly in Ciudad Real, partly
in Albacete), are linked together by the Guadiana Alto or Upper
Guadiana. This stream flows north-westward from the last
lake and vanishes underground within 3 m. of the river Zancara
or Giguela. About 22 m. S.W. of the point of disappearance,
the Guadiana Alto was believed to re-emerge in the form of
several large springs, which form numerous lakes near the
Zancara and are known as the “eyes of the Guadiana” (los
ojos de Guadiana). The stream which connects them with the
Zancara is called the Guadiana Bajo or Lower Guadiana. It is
now known that the Guadiana Alto has no such course, but
flows underground to the Zancara itself, which is the true
“Upper Guadiana.” The Zancara rises near the source of the
Júcar, in the east of the tableland of La Mancha; thence it
flows westward, assuming the name of Guadiana near Ciudad
Real, and reaching the Portuguese frontier 6 m. S.W. of Badajoz.
In piercing the Sierra Morena it forms a series of foaming rapids,
and only begins to be navigable at Mertola, 42 m. from its mouth.
From the neighbourhood of Badajoz it forms the boundary
between Spain and Portugal as far as a point near Monsaraz,
where it receives the small river Priega Muñoz on the left, and
passes into Portuguese territory, with a southerly direction.
At Pomarão it again becomes a frontier stream and forms a
broad estuary 25 m. long. It enters the Gulf of Cadiz between
the Portuguese town of Villa Real de Santo Antonio and the
Spanish Ayamonte, after a total course of 510 m. Its mouth
is divided by sandbanks into many channels. The Guadiana
drains an area of 31,940 sq. m. Its principal tributaries are
the Zujar, Jabalón, Matachel and Ardila from the left; the
Bullaque, Ruecas, Botoa, Degebe and Cobres from the right.
The Guadiana Menor (or Guadianamenor, i.e. “Lesser Guadiana”) rises in the Sierra Nevada, receives two large tributaries, the Fardes from the right and Barbata from the left, and enters the Guadalquivir near Ubeda, after a course of 95 m.
GUADIX, a city of southern Spain, in the province of Granada;
on the left bank of the river Guadix, a subtributary of the
Guadiana Menor, and on the Madrid-Valdepeñas-Almería railway.
Pop. (1900) 12,652. Guadix occupies part of an elevated plateau
among the northern foothills of the Sierra Nevada. It is surrounded
by ancient walls, and was formerly dominated by a
Moorish castle, now in ruins. It is an episcopal see of great
antiquity, but its cathedral, built in the 18th century on the site
of a mosque, possesses little architectural merit. The city was
once famous for its cutlery; but its modern manufactures
(chiefly earthenware, hempen goods, and hats) are inconsiderable.
It has some trade in wool, cotton, flax, corn and liqueurs. The
warm mineral springs of Graena, much frequented during the
summer, are 6 m. W. Guadix el Viejo, 5 m. N.W., was the
Roman Acci, and, according to tradition, the seat of the first
Iberian bishopric, in the 2nd century. After 711 it rose to some
importance as a Moorish fortress and trading station, and was
renamed Wad Ash, “Water of Life.” It was surrendered without
a siege to the Spaniards, under Ferdinand and Isabella, in 1489.
GUADUAS, a town of the department of Cundinamarca,
Colombia, 53 m. N.W. of Bogotá on the old road between that
city and the Magdalena river port of Honda. Pop. (1900,
estimate) 9000, chiefly Indians or of mixed blood. It stands
in a narrow and picturesque valley formed by spurs of the
Eastern Cordillera, and on a small stream bearing the same name,
which is that of the South American bamboo (guaduas), found
in great abundance along its banks. Sugar-cane and coffee are
cultivated in the vicinity, and fruits of various kinds are produced
in great abundance. The elevation of the town is 3353 ft. above
the sea, and it has a remarkably uniform temperature throughout
the whole year. Guaduas has a pretty church facing upon its
plaza, and an old monastery now used for secular purposes.
The importance of the town sprang from its position on the old
camino real between Bogotá and Honda, an importance that has
passed away with the completion of the railway from Girardot
to the Bogotá plateau. Guaduas was founded in 1614.
GUAIACUM, a genus of trees of the natural order Zygophyllaceae.
The guaiacum or lignum-vitae tree (Ger. Guajakbaum,
Franzosenbaum, Pockenholzbaum; Fr. Gayac, Gaïac),
G. officinale, is a native of the West Indies and the north coast
of South America, where it attains a height of 20 to 30 ft. Its
branches are numerous, flexuous and knotted; the leaves
opposite and pinnate, with caducous (falling early) stipules,
and entire, glabrous, obovate or oval leaflets, arranged in 2 or,
more rarely, 3 pairs; the flowers are in axillary clusters (cymes),
and have 5 oval pubescent sepals, 5 distinct pale-blue petals
three times the length of the sepals, 10 stamens, and a 2-celled
superior ovary. The fruit is about 34 in. long, with a leathery
pericarp, and contains in each of its two cells a single seed
(see fig.). G. sanctum grows in the Bahamas and Cuba, and at
Key West in Florida. It is distinguished from G. officinale by
its smaller and narrow leaflets, which are in 4 to 5 pairs, by its
shorter and glabrous sepals, and 5-celled and 5-winged fruit.
G. arboreum, the guaiacum tree of Colombia, is found in the valley
of the Magdalena up to altitudes 800 metres (2625 ft.) above
sea-level, and reaches considerable dimensions. Its wood is of a
yellow colour merging into green, and has an almost pulverulent
fracture; the flowers are yellow and conspicuous; and the fruit
is dry and 4-winged.
The lignum vitae of commerce, so named on account of its high repute as a medicinal agent in past times, when also it was known as lignum sanctum and lignum Indicum, lignum guaycanum, or simply guayacan, is procured from G. officinale, and in smaller amount from G. sanctum. It is exported in large logs or blocks, generally divested of bark, and presents in transverse section very slightly marked concentric rings of growth, and scarcely any traces of pith; with the aid of a magnifying glass the medullary rays are seen to be equidistant and very numerous. The outer wood, the sapwood or alburnum, is of a pale yellow hue, and devoid of resin; the inner, the heartwood or duramen, which is by far the larger proportion, is of a dark greenish-brown, contains in its pores 26% of resin, and has a specific gravity of 1.333, and therefore sinks in water on which the alburnum floats. Owing to the diagonal and oblique arrangement of the successive layers of its fibres, the wood cannot be split; and on account of its hardness, density and durability it is much valued for the manufacture of ships’ pulleys, rulers, skittle-balls, mallets and other articles.
