Swiss
a semi-transparent muslin, light in weight and finished with considerable starch. It is usually woven plain, but is sometimes ornamented with embroidered dots or figures. The finer grades are used for women's and children's summer dresses; coarser qualities for curtains and draperies. The manufacture of this fabric originated in Switzerland but is by no means confined to that country at the present time. A fabric similar to Swiss, but somewhat coarser, is called tarlatan. See Embroidery
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Switchback
a term applied zigzagging, alternate back and forward to a mode of progression up a slope. "switchback" railway originally meant A one where the ascent is up a steep incline simplified by curving the track backwards and forward (and upward) on the face of the slope. Afterward the term came to be applied to a railway where (as at Mauch Chunk, Pa.) the movement of the cars is largely effected by their own weight alone, the descents by gravity and the ascents by a stationary engine. Hence the application to the well-known apparatus for amusing the public at watering places, fairs, and exhibitions: a short length of elevated railway with a series of rounded inclines, so that the car gains enough momentum descending the first steep incline to ascend one or more smaller inclines till it gradually and more slowly works its way to the original level at the far end of the course. Thence it returns in the same way. Sometimes these switchbacks are made circular, called "Russian Mountains. " They were introduced into Paris as a popular amusement about 1815. The latest forms of this kind of amusement in the United States the "toboggan," the "steeple-chase" and are known as "loop-the-loop."
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Swithin
or SWITHUN, St. of Winchester from 852 to 862. He was , Bishop tutor to Egbert's son, Ethelwulf, under whom he was made bishop. He was a devoted builder of churches and a man of unusual piety and humility. He built a bridge at the E. side of the city. He died in 862 and was buried in the churchyard of Winchester. A century later he was canonized, and the monks exhumed his body to deposit cathedral. Although the account canit in the not be found in contemporary ary chroniclers, the transference of the body is supposed to have taken place on July 15, and to have been delayed by violent rains. Hence the still current belief that if rain falls on July 15 it will continue to rain for 40 Below these falls its navigation properly days.
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Swivel
In foundry nomenclature swivels mean the trunnions of a flask. Properly speaking, a swivel consists of a link made to turn round on a headed pin. See FLASKS; CHAIN. Swivel-chain is a chain supplied with a swivel-link to permit an even disposal of the links, free from twisting or kinks. This may be accomplished in a superior manner by inserting a long flat link, which, besides working loose on a link-pin at one end, is also tapped at the other end to receive a long threaded link-pin, by which means several chains may be readily adjusted to any required variety of lengths, and thus effectually dispense with the dangerous method of twisting the chains, so prevalent in some foundries. A chain made in this manner is commonly termed a buckle chain by foundrymen. See CHAIN; SWIVEL.
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Swope
HERBERT BAYARD, an American journalist, born at St. Louis , Mo., in 1882. He was educated in the United States and in Europe. After serving as a reporter on the St. Louis "Post-Dispatch," the Chicago "Tribune," the New York "Herald " and the New corre- York "World," he spondent for the New York "World" with the German armies from 1914 to war was 1916, and from then on one of the editors of this newspaper. In July, 1918, he was appointed associate member and assistant chairman of the United War Industries Board. During the Paris peace conference he acted as chief correspondent for the "World " and associated papers, and was appointed by the Paris peace conference, chairman of the American Committee on Publicity . In 1917 he was awarded the Pulitzer prize for the most meritorious newspaper work by the College of Journalism , Columbia University. He was a member of the Authors' League of America and of the Academy of Political Science and wrote "Inside the German Empire" (1916).
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Swordbill
a popular name for any individual of the humming bird genus, Docimastes. The bill, which exceeds in length the body of the bird, is a character SWORDBILL by which this humming bird may be dÃstinguished at the first glance. One species is known, D. ensiferus, an inhabitant of Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.
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Swordfish
a fierce, active sea fish, ten to twenty feet long. Its upper jaw is prolonged into a long sword-like weapon which its owner employs in the destruction of larger fishes. A sword-fish does not hesitate to attack a whale. It has no difficulty in piercing the side of a rowboat and has been known to bury its sword in the timbers of a passing ship. The British museum has a piece of ship's timber containing the "sword" of one of these fishes. A section of a three-inch oak plank sheathed with copper, and having the sword of a swordfish sticking clear through it, is shown at Singapore. It is a bluish fish found in Atlantic waters. It is not without value as a food fish. The chase of the swordfish is a source of profit in the Mediterranean. New England fishermen take 1,500,000 pounds a year. The industry is worth $90,000 yearly.
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Swordfish
in astronomy, the constellation, Dorado. In ichthyology, a popular name for any individual of the Xiphinde. The They are pelagic agic fishes, widely distributed in tropical and sub- sub-tropical seas. Their popular name is derived from their formidable sword-like weapon, formed by the coalescence and prolongation of the maxillary and intermaxillary bones beyond the lower jaw; it is very hard and strong, and capable of inflicting terrible wounds. Swordfishes seem to have a mortal antipathy to whales and other large Cetacea, attacking them whenever occasion offers, and, so far as is known, always coming coming off victorious. In their fury swordfishes often attack boats and vessels, evi evidently mistaking them for cetaceans; and sometimes the sword has been driven through the bot- SWORDFISH tom of a ship, and broken off by the fish in vain struggles to withdraw it. Swordfishes are the largest of the Acanthopterygii; specimens of the genus Histiophorus (the sailorfish), from the Indian and Pacific oceans, reaching a length of from 12 to 15 feet, of which the sword than 3. The occupies rather more or Mediterranean swordfish common sometimes reaches a length of 10 feet, with a proportionately shorter sword; it is bluish-black above, merging into silver below. The flesh is of excellent flavor, and in recent years has become popular in the United States.
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