STRAITS SETTLEMENTS (507, of which 150 are Chinese), British colony in the East Indies, embracing the British possessions in the Malay Peninsula (on the Strait of Malacca), Singapore, Malacca, Penang, and the Keeling Islands and Christmas Island; were under the jurisdiction of the Governor-General of India till 1867, in which year they passed under the control of the Colonial Office at home.
STRALSUND (28), a fortified seaport of North Prussia, on Strela Sound, opposite the island of Rugen, in the Baltic, and 66 m. NW. of Stettin, forms of itself an islet, and is connected with the mainland (Pomerania) by bridges; is a quaint old town, dating back to the 13th century; figures often in the wars of Prussia, and is now a place of considerable commercial importance.
STRANGFORD, PERCY C. S. SMYTHE, VISCOUNT, diplomatist; graduated at Trinity College, Dublin, in 1800; entered the diplomatic service, and in the following year succeeded to the title; was ambassador to Portugal, Sweden, Turkey, and Russia; translated the "Rimas" of Camoens, and was raised to the peerage (1825) as Baron Penshurst (1780-1855).
STRANGFORD, PERCY E. F. W. SMYTHE, son of preceding, diplomatist and noted philologist, born at St. Petersburg; passed through Harrow and Oxford; entered the diplomatic service; became attache at Constantinople, and during the Crimean War served as Oriental Secretary, acquiring the while a profound grip of the Eastern Question, and an unrivalled knowledge of European and Asiatic languages--Turkish, Persian, Arabic, Slavonic, Afghan, Basque, &c.; succeeded to the title in 1855, and henceforth resided chiefly in London; was President of the Asiatic Society, and was considered by Freeman "our greatest English philologist"; author of various articles on political, geographical, and philological subjects (1825-1869).
STRANRAER (6), a royal burgh and seaport of Wigtownshire, finely situated at the southern extremity of Loch Ryan, 73 m. W. of Dumfries; has an interesting 16th-century castle, and a handsome town-hall and court-house; there is some shipping in agricultural produce, and steamers ply daily between Stranraer and Larne, in Ireland.
STRAPAROLA, GIOVANNI FRANCESCO, author of a famous collection of stories after the style of Boccaccio's "Decameron," partly borrowed and partly genuine folk-stories, which ranks as an Italian classic, and has been translated into various European languages; flourished in the 16th century.
STRAP, HUGH, a simple-hearted friend and adherent of Roderick Random in Smollett's novel of that name.
STRAPPADO, an obsolete military punishment by drawing a culprit to the top of a beam and then letting him drop the length of the rope.
STRASBURG (124), capital, since 1871, of Alsace-Lorraine, on the Ill, a few miles above its confluence with the Rhine, 89 m. N. of Basel; a place of great strategical importance, and a fortress of the first class; is a city of Roman origin, and contains a magnificent Gothic cathedral (11th century) with a famous astronomical clock, an imperial palace, university, &c.; manufactures embrace beer, leather, cutlery, jewellery, &c.; there is also a busy transit trade; a free town of the German empire in the 13th century; fell into the hands of the French in 1681, and was captured by the Germans, after a seven weeks' siege, on 28th September 1870, after which it became finally German, as it was originally, by the peace of Frankfort, May 1871.
STRATFORD (40), manufacturing town in Essex, on the Lee, 4 m. NE. of London.
STRATFORD DE REDCLIFFE, SIR STAFFORD CANNING, FIRST VISCOUNT, a distinguished ambassador, born in London, son of a well-connected merchant, and cousin to Canning the statesman; passed from Cambridge to the Foreign Office in 1807 as a precis-writer to his cousin; in three years had risen to the post of minister-plenipotentiary at Constantinople, where he speedily gave evidence of his remarkable powers as a diplomatist by arranging unaided the treaty of Bucharest (1814) between Russia and Turkey, and so setting free the Russian army to fall upon Napoleon, then retreating from Moscow; as minister to Switzerland aided the Republic in drawing up its constitution, and in the same year (1815) acted as commissioner at the Congress of Vienna; was subsequently employed in the United States and various European capitals, but his unrivalled knowledge of the Turkish question brought him again, in 1842, to Constantinople as ambassador, where his remarkable power and influence over the Turks won him the title of "Great Elchi"; exerted in vain his diplomatic skill to prevent the rupture between Turkey and Russia, which precipitated the Crimean War; resigned his embassy in 1858; was raised to the peerage in 1852; sat in Parliament for several years previous to 1842, but failed to make his mark as a debater; ranks among the great ambassadors of England (1786-1880).
STRATFORD-ON-AVON (8), a pleasant old market-town of Warwickshire, on the right bank of the Avon, 8 m. SW. of Warwick and 110 m. NW. of London; forever famous as the birth and burial place of Shakespeare, with whom all that is of chief interest in the town is associated, the house he was born in, his old school, Anne Hathaway's cottage on the outskirts, the fine Early English church (14th century), where he lies buried, the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, museum, &c.; is Visited annually by some 20,000 pilgrims; a thriving agricultural centre.
STRATHCLYDE or NORTHERN CUMBRIA, an ancient kingdom of the Britons, which originated in the 8th century, and comprised the W. side of Scotland between the Solway and the Clyde; Alclyde or Dumbarton was the capital; was permanently annexed to Scotland in 1124 under David I.
STRATHFIELDSAYE, an estate in Hampshire with a fine Queen Anne mansion, 7 m. NE. of Basingstoke, purchased by Parliament for 263,000, and presented to the Duke of Wellington in 1817.
STRATHMORE ("Great Valley"), the great plain of Scotland stretching for 100 m. (5 to 10 m. broad), in a north-easterly direction from Dumbartonshire to Stonehaven, in Kincardineshire, between the great mountain barrier of the Highlands, the Grampians, and the Southern Lennox, Ochil, and Sidlaw Hills; in a more restricted sense denotes the plain between Perth and Brechin.
STRATHPEFFER, a watering-place in Ross and Cromarty, 5 m. W. of Dingwall, a great health-resort, and much frequented on account of its mineral waters and bracing air and other attractions.
STRAUSS, DAVID FRIEDRICH, German theological and biblical critic, born at Ludwigsburg, in Wurtemberg; studied in the Theological Institute of Tubingen under Baur, was ordained in 1830, and went in 1834 to Berlin to attend the lectures of Hegel and Schleiermacher, and returning to Tubingen gave lectures on Hegel in 1832, he the while maturing his famous theory which, published in 1835, made his name known over the whole theological world; this was his "Leben Jesu," the first volume of which appeared that year, in which he maintained that, while the life of Christ had a historical basis, all the supernatural element in it and the accounts of it were simply and purely mythical, and the fruit of the idea of His person as Divine which at the foundation of the Christian religion took possession of the mind of the Church; the book proved epoch-making, and the influence of it, whether as accepted or as rejected, affected, as it still does, the whole theology of the Church; the effect of it was a shock to the whole Christian world, for it seemed as if with the denial of the supernatural the whole Christian system fell to pieces; and its author found the entire Christian world opposed to him, and he was cast out of the service of the Church; this, however, did not daunt his ardour, for he never abandoned the ground he had taken up; his last work was entitled "Der Alte und der Neue Glaube," in which he openly repudiates the Christian religion, and assigns the sovereign authority in spiritual matters to science and its handmaid art. In a spiritual reference the whole contention of Strauss against Christianity is a tissue of irrelevancies, for the spirit of it, which is its life and essence, is true whatever conclusion critics in their seraphic wisdom may come to regarding the facts (1808-1874).
STRAUSS, JOHANN, musical composer, born at Vienna; was a musical conductor and composer, chiefly of waltz music.
STREATHAM (48), a Surrey suburb of London, 6 m. SW. of St. Paul's.
STREET, GEORGE EDMUND, architect, born in Essex; was the architect of the New Law Courts in London; had been trained under Gilbert Scott (1824-1881).
STRELITZES, the name given to the life-guards of the czar, which at one time numbered 40,000; became so unruly and dangerous to the State that they were dissolved by Peter the Great, and dispersed in 1705.
STRETTON, HESBA, the _nom de plume_ of Sarah Smith, daughter of a Shropshire bookseller, whose semi-religious stories, chiefly for the young, have won wide acceptance in English homes since the publication of "Jessica's First Prayer" in 1867; was a regular contributor to _Household Words_ and _All the Year Round_ during Dickens's editorship; has written upwards of 40 volumes.
STRICKLAND, AGNES, biographer of the queens of England, born at Roydon Hall, near Southwold, Suffolk; had already published poems and some minor works before she conceived the plan of writing a series of biographies of the queens of England; these appeared in 12 vols. during 1840-1848, and such was their popularity that a similar work dealing with the queens of Scotland was immediately undertaken; was aided in these by her sister Elizabeth (1794-1875); was the author of various other works, "Lives of the Seven Bishops," "Bachelor Kings of England," &c.; her writings are of no value as history, but are full of entertaining details (1806-1874).
STRINDBERG, AUGUST, the most noted of modern Swedish writers, born at Stockholm; accumulated stores of valuable experience during various early employments, which he utilised in his first successful work, "The Red Room" (1879), a satire on social life in Sweden, "The New Kingdom"
(1882), equally bitter in its attack on social conventions, got him into trouble, and since then his life has been spent abroad; "Married Life," a collection of short stories, brought upon him a charge of "outraging Christianity," but after trial at Stockholm, in which he eloquently defended himself, he was acquitted; a prolific writer in all kinds of literature, and imbued with modern scientific and socialistic ideas, his writings lack the repose necessary to the highest literary achievement; _b_. 1849.
STROMBOLI, one of the Lipari Islands; has an active volcano, the cone 3022 ft., which erupts every five minutes what happens to be little else than steam; it is 12 m. in circuit, and contains about 1000 inhabitants.
STROMKARL, a Norwegian spirit who has 11 different music strains, to 10 of which people may dance, the 11th being his night strain, to the tune of which every one and everything begins to dance.
STROMNESS, a seaport on the Orkney island of Pomona.
STROUD (10), a busy manufacturing town of Gloucestershire; stands on rising ground overlooking the confluence of the Frome and Slade, which unite to form the Frome or Stroud Water, 10 m. SE. of Gloucester; numerous cloth and dye works are built along the banks of the river; in the town are several woollen factories.
STRUCK JURY, a jury of men who possess special qualifications to judge of the facts of a case.
STRUENSEE, Danish statesman, bred to medicine; became minister of Charles VII., took advantage of his imbecility and directed the affairs of government, roused the jealousy of the nobles, and he was arrested, tried on false charges, and was beheaded (1737-1776).
STRUTT, JOSEPH, antiquary, born in Essex; wrote the "Regal and Ecclesiastical Antiquities of England," followed by other works on the manners and customs of the English people, that on their "Sports and Pastimes" the chief (1742-1802).
STRYPE, JOHN, historian and biographer, born in London; was a voluminous writer, wrote Lives of eminent English Churchmen and upon the English Reformation (1643-1737).
STUART, ARABELLA, daughter of the Earl of Lennox, and, as descended from Margaret Tudor, heiress to the English throne in default of James VI. of Scotland and his family, and towards whom James all along cherished a jealous feeling, and who was subjected to persecution at his hands; when she chose to marry contrary to his wish he confined her in the Tower, where she went mad and died.