works and for making steam shovels, dredges and steam engines; there also are woolen factories, one of the Diamond Match Co.'s factories, a Standard-Oil box-factory and breweries. The factory for corn-starch is one of the largest in the country, covering more than four acres. Oswego is one of the largest shipping-points on the Great Lakes for anthracite. The state normal school is located here. Oswego was a trading post of the English in 1720, and in 1727 a fort was built. It was taken by the French in 1756 and by the British in 1812. It became a city in 1848. Population 23,368.
Othel′lo, one of Shakespeare's four supreme masterpieces in tragedy, was perhaps written in 1604. Published in 1622 in quarto, in 1623 it appeared in the famous first folio. The alternative title of the drama is The Moor of Venice. The basis of the plot was adopted by Shakspeare from an Italian novel entitled Un Capitano Moro. The tragedy deals with the love and jealousy of Othello, a so-called Moor, who wins the love of the fair Venetian maiden Desdemona by his qualities of heart and head and his strange tales of adventure by flood and field. The villain, Iago, plays upon the jealousy of the otherwise great-hearted man, until, believing his wife to be false, Othello slays her and dies by his own hand.
O′tho I or Ot′to the Great was born in 912. He was the son of Henry I, emperor of Germany, and succeeded his father in 936. His reign was very successful; many tribes were brought by him into subjection; he held almost supreme power in Italy, both over the kings of Lombardy and the popes of Rome; he consolidated the German empire; and he established Christianity in Scandinavian and in Slavonic lands. He died in Prussian Saxony in 973.
O′tis, Elwell Stephen, an American soldier,
was born at Frederick, Md., March 25, 1838.
GENERAL OTIS
He studied law at
Harvard and graduated in
1861. On Sept. 13, 1862,
he entered the volunteer
army as a captain (140th
N. Y.), and was mustered
out in June, 1865, as brevet
brigadier-general “for
distinguished services.” He
was appointed lieutenant-colonel
in the regular army, July 28, 1866, and
rose to be brigadier, Nov. 28, 1893. He
was appointed major-general of volunteers
and assigned to the Philippine Islands, May
4, 1898, where he took chief command on
the departure of General Merritt. He
became military governor of the islands in
1899, and was appointed on the Philippine
commission in the same year. He was
promoted major-general in the regular army,
January, 1900. General Otis was a famous
Indian fighter during 1867-81, and published
The Indian Question in 1878.
Otis, Harrison Gray, an American statesman, was born at Boston, Mass., Oct. 8, 1765. He studied at Harvard College, and was admitted to the bar in 1786. Sent to the legislature in 1796, he soon became leader of the Federal party. He was one of three commissioners sent in 1814 by Massachusetts to Washington to present to the government the subject of the damages inflicted on New England by the war with Great Britain. As United States senator in 1820, in the debate on the Missouri question, he strongly favored the restriction of slavery. He was a popular orator, and opposed the antislavery movement in his later years. He died at Boston, Oct. 28, 1848.
Otis, James, an American statesman and
orator, was born at West Barnstable, Mass.,
Feb. 5, 1725. He studied at Harvard and
at Boston, was admitted to the bar at
Plymouth in 1748, and moved to Boston
in 1750. In 1760, when advocate-general,
the revenue officers asked his aid in obtaining
search warrants from the superior
courts by which they could enter any man's
house in search of smuggled goods. Otis
considered this illegal and refused, resigning
his position and appearing on hbehalf of
the people. His speech on the subject
lasted five hours, and made a great impression,
John Adams saying of it afterwards:
“The child Independence was then and
there born.” He was elected to the assembly,
and was a delegate to the Stamp Act
congress, which met in New York the
same year; and a member of a committee of
that body to prepare an address to the
English house of commons. While in the
Massachusetts legislature, the governor
requested that a letter on relief from
taxation, sent to the other colonies, be taken
back by the legislature. Otis opposed the
governor's requisition in a speech called
by his opponents “the most treasonable
declaration ever uttered,” and carried the
house 92 to 17. He was severely beaten
by some revenue officers in Boston in 1769,
and lost his reason as a consequence of a
sword cut on his head. He published
several political pamphlets, The Rights of the
Colonies Asserted being the best known.
He was killed by lightning on May 23,
1783, while standing at the door of his
home at Andover, Mass. See Life by Tudor.
Ot′tawa, Ont., capital of the Dominion of Canada, is on Ottawa River, 87 miles west of its junction with the St. Lawrence. Population, by census of 1910, 86,106. The New York Central has a terminus in Ottawa with a direct line to New York. The Grand Trunk and Canadian Pacific furnish excellent connections in all directions. There are four direct lines of road to Montreal. The city is well-known as the center and distributing point of an immense
