Spontini (GASPARO an Italian composer)
GASPARO, an Italian composer; born in Majolatti, near Jesi, in the Roman States, Nov. 14, 1774. He was educated at the Conservatorio de la Pietà of Naples, and began his career when 17 years of age as the composer of an opera, "The Punctilio of Women." This was followed by some 16 operas, produced within six years, for the theaters of Italy and Sicily, but not a note of which has survived. In 1803 Spontini went to Paris; in 1807 he was_appointed music director to the Empress Josephine; and in 1808 he produced his most famous work, "The Vestal," with brilliant and decisive success. His "Fernando Cortez" appeared in 1809; and the next year witnessed his appointment to the directorship of the Italian Opera in Paris, which he held for 10 years. In 1820 the magnificent appointments offered by the court of Prussia tempted him to leave Paris for Berlin, in which capital his three grand operas, "Nourmahal"
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Spontini (GASPARO founded on Lalla Rookh)
GASPARO (founded on "Lalla Rookh"), "Alcidor," schools. From 1889 to 1891 he was and "Agnes of Hohenstauffen," were principal of schools in Fitchburg, Mass., produced with great splendor. Spontini continued to reside as first chapel master in Berlin till the death of the king in 1840. The latter period of his sojourn at Berlin was embittered by professional disputes; and in 1842 he repaired to Paris, where in 1839 he had been elected one of the five members of the Académie des Beaux Arts. He died in Majolatti, Jan. 14, 1851.
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Spoonbill
in ichthyology, the genus Polyodon. In ornithology, any individual of the genus Platalea; specifically P. leucorodia, the white spoonbill, found over the greater part of Europe and Asia and the N. of Africa. The adult male is about 32 inches long; plumage white with pale pink tinge; at the junction of the neck with the breast there is a band of buffy yellow; the naked skin on the SPOONBILL throat is yellow; eggs and feet black; bill about eight inches long, very much flattened and grooved at the base, the expanded portion yellow, the rest black. There is a white occipital crest in both sexes. The spoonbill possesses no power of modulating its voice. The windpipe is bent on itself, like the figure 8, the coils applied to each other and held in place by a thin membrane. This peculiarity does not exist in young birds. The roseate spoonbill (P. ajaja), a native of the United States, has rose-colored plumage.
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Spooner
CHARLES HORACE, an American educator, born in Charleston, N. H., in 1858. He was educated at Norwich University. From 1879 to 1889 he was instructor in various preparatory and from 1891 to 1904, instructor of mathematics at the Manual Training School of Washington University. In 1904 he became president of Norwich University, Northfield, Vt., retiring in 1915, being made president emeritus in the following year.
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Spooner (JOHN COIT a United States)
JOHN COIT, a United States Senator from Wisconsin, born in Lawrenceburg, Ind., in 1843. He graduated from the University of Wisconsin in 1864. He fought in the Civil War, and rose to the rank of major. In 1867 he was admitted to the bar and for many years practiced in Wisconsin. He served as a member of the State Assembly in 1872, and in 1885 was elected to the United States Senate, serving until 1891. He was re-elected in 1897 and retained his seat until 1907, when he resigned to take up the practice of law in New York City. He was greatly distinguished as a lawyer and as an authority on international law. During his service in the Senate, he was recognized as one of its strongest members. In 1898 he was a member of the British-American Joint High Commission. He died in 1919.
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Spotted Fever
the name given to a form of malignant typhus fever, which is accompanied by a rash _or eruption of red spots. See TYPHUS FEVER.
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Spottiswoode
WILLIAM, an English mathematician; born in London, Jan. 11, 1825; was educated at Harrow and Balliol College, Oxford. For some time he lectured at Balliol, and in 1846 he succeeded his father as the head of the great printing house of Eyre & Spottiswoode. Though throughout life an energetic man of business, he found time for much original work as well as for travels in Eastern Russia, Croatia, and Hungary. His contributions to the "Proceedings" of the Royal Society and of the London Mathematical Society and his admirable lectures on the "Polarization of Light" (1874), are known to all students. Spottiswoode was treasurer of the British Association (1861- 1874), of the Royal Institution (1865- 1873), and of the Royal Society (1871- 1878); president of Section A (1865) and of the British Association itself (1878), of the London Mathematical Society (1870-1872), and of the Royal Society from 1879 till his death in London, June 27, 1883.
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Spottsylvania Court-House
a small village in Virginia, 55 miles N. by W. of Richmond, the scene of one of the most desperate battles of the American Civil War. On May 10, 1864, during the Wilderness campaign, Grant attacked Lee in his earthworks, and was repulsed with dreadful slaughter; yet on the next day he wrote to the Secretary of War, "I propose to fight it out on this line if it takes all summer," ammer," and on the 12th repeated the assault, when Hancock's corps carried and held the "bloody angle." The next morning Lee, unable to bear his share of the heavy losses, withdrew within an inner line of intrenchments, and on the 20th Grant, having failed to dislodge him, moved round his flank toward Richmond.
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Sprague
LEVI L. they are still further reduced; the ovule is the macrosporangium.
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Sprague
LEVI L. as a delegate to three General conferences, in 1892, 1896 and 1904. He wrote Prac- "Practical Bookkeeping" (1873); " tical Grammar" (1894).
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Sprague
FRANK JULIAN, an engineer and inventor, born in Milford, Conn., from the United States Naval Academy, in 1878, and served as engineer in the navy until 1883, when he resigned to attention to electrical work. devote his He founded, in 1884, the Sprague Electric Railway & Motor Co., which, using his constant speed electric motor, was the first to engage in general manufacindustrial ture and the introduction of electric motors. He was a pioneer in the electrification of railways, and in 1887 equipped the first modern trolley railway in the United States, in Richmond, many Va. He invented and perfected applications used in the electrical tems of railways. During the War he was engaged in the development of fuses in air and depth bombs. was a member and official of many scientific societies and was awarded many for his inventions. prizes and medals many scientific He was the author of papers on electricity.
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