DRACO, a constellation in the northern hemisphere. The star Draconis is celebrated as the one used in determining the co-efficient of aberration of the fixed stars.

DRACONTIUM, a tropical genus of plants of the family Araceæ. Like others of the family, it has strong medicinal properties; D. polyphyllum of Asia being used in asthma. Dracontium of medicine is obtained from another arum, the Symplocarpus fœtidus, or "skunk-cabbage, of the United States. Most arums emit an offensive odor from their inflorescences, which are composed of numerous flowers closely packed together on a fleshy axis, and enveloped by a hood-like spathe.

DRAFT, a tentative copy of a legal document or other formal writing, made for the purpose of adjusting the matter afterward to be admitted into the fair copy, or engrossed, as it is called. Manuscripts and proof-sheets are the drafts of printed works. A bill of exchange is called a draft. See Vol. III, p. 673.

DRAFT RIOTS, the outbreak which occurred in the summer of 1863 in the city of New York, upon the attempt to make the first draft under the Enrollment Act of March 3d of that year, which declared that all able-bodied male citizens of the United States, and all persons of foreign birth who had declared on oath their intention to become citizens, between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, should be liable to perform military duty, with some exceptions. In New York City, Provost-Marshal Jenkins and his deputies, who had received from the President requisitions calling for specified numbers of men, were instructed to commence operations, July 11th. There had been rumors of dissatisfaction, and as trouble was anticipated, the police were held in readiness. The day, Saturday, arrived, and, unexpectedly, the day's proceedings passed off pleasantly. Next morning the names of the conscripts appeared in the papers. In the neighborhood in which the initial working of the law was undertaken there resided a rather unruly element. Among them were many very poor men, heads of families, whose sole support they were, and who were, by the mere turn of a wheel, forced to leave home and family to the care of Providence. Such men began to reflect upon this phase of the conscription. Another cause for disapproval was the clause allowing the purchase, for three hundred dollars, of substitutes, which sum was far above what such poor men could raise. On the Monday following, committees of discontents went around the various places where laboring-men were engaged, enjoining them to fall into line with the various processions which were on their way to the place of conscription. Proceedings had barely commenced there, when a huge boulder crashed into the room, discomposing the serenity of the presiding officers. Immediately the mob was aroused, and the place was attacked and set on fire, which extended to the whole block, the fire brigade being prevented, by the force of the mob, from its attempts to reduce the flames.

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The city was in the power of the rioters, there being no troops at hand. The incendiaries, now increased tenfold, commenced plundering and fire-raising. Citizens were maltreated, and many were cruelly tortured to death. Private residences were looted and destroyed. A detachment of marines, about fifty in number, was sent on the street-cars to quell the mob, but could get no farther than Forty-third Street, the mob at Forty-sixth Street having torn up the rails at that point. The marines formed in line, and after an ineffectual appeal to the mob to disperse, they were fired upon by the marines, with blank cartridges. The mob was roused to fury, and before the marines could take any more effective means of dispersing the rioters, they were attacked and desperately maltreated. police were also dealt with in the same way. The colored people in particular, and their sympathizers, were marked out for especially brutal treatment. The Colored Orphan Asylum was burned. Trade was paralyzed. A quorum of aldermen could not be collected to consider the situation. On Tuesday, Governor Seymour arrived and issued a proclamation, but it produced little effect, and the second day was even worse than the first. Not a store was opened. The murder of Colonel O'Brien, who had heroically attempted, single-handed, to pacify the mobs, was treacherous, inhuman and implacable. The arrival of the militia, that had been on duty in Pennsylvania, however, had the desired effect, and on Wednesday Mayor Opdyke was able to announce the quelling of the riot and the establishment of quietude. The mortality statistics for the week showed an increase of 450 over the figures for the corresponding week of the previous year, 90 deaths were reported as having been caused by gunshot-wounds, and about $1,300,000 were paid to claimants for damages.

In the following month the draft was resumed and completed without further trouble, President Lincoln, considering the draft urgent, refusing at that time to consider the petition of Governor Seymour to have the provisions of the act relaxed, or suspended, until its constitutionality could be determined.

DRAG-BAR, a bar or link for attaching carriages together, or to the motive power, as on railways.

DRAGOMAN. See GREECE, Vol. XI, p. 124. DRAGON. See LIZARD, Vol. XIV, p. 736. DRAGON, GREEN (Dracunculus vulgaris), a plant of the family Aracea, which receives its name from the spotted stem. It is a native of southern Europe. Its flowers are black, remarkably fœtid, and give out exhalations which cause headache, giddiness and vomiting. The root is emetic, and, probably for no better reason than the peculiar appearance of the stem, has been supposed useful for curing serpent-bites. The name is also sometimes applied to Arisama Dracontium of the United States.

DRAGONET (Callionymus), a genus of fishes of the goby family, remarkable for having the gill

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DRAGON-ROOT (Arisama Dracontium), a plant of the family Aracea, a native of North America, whose tuber is a powerful local irritant, and is used as a stimulant of the secretions in chronic bronchitis, asthma, rheumatism, etc. The powder, made into a paste with honey, is beneficially applied to the mouths and throats of children in aphthæ; and milk in which the root has been boiled is a useful ointment in cases of scald-head, ringworm, etc. The tuber is probably used interchangeably with that of the nearly allied and more common A. triphyllum, the common "Indian turnip."

DRAGON'S MOUTH (Span. Boca del Drago), the name of two straits or passages in the New World. One of them is in South America, separating Trinidad from the mainland, and connecting the Gulf of Paria with the southeast extremity of the Caribbean Sea. The other is in Central America, being on the northeast coast of Veragua, the most northwest portion of Colombia, between the Caribbean Sea and Lake Chiriqui.

DRAGOON-BIRD, a South American bird having the feathers on the head arranged in a helmet-like crest. It is also known as black fruit-crow, and umbrella-bird.

DRAINAGE. See SEWAGE, Vol. XXI, p. 713; and AGRICULTURE, Vol. I, pp. 328, 329.

DRAKE, CHARLES DANIEL, an American jurist; born at Cincinnati, April 11, 1811; a midshipman in the United States navy (1827-30); admitted to the bar in 1833; removed to St. Louis in 1834, and, entering politics, became United States Senator (1867-71), and chief justice of the United States court of claims (1871-85). He published Law of Suits by Attachment in the United States (2d ed., 1858); Union and Antislavery Speeches (1864); and edited Pioneer Life in Kentucky, a series of letters from Daniel Drake to his children (1870); and Life of Dr. Daniel Drake (1871). He died April 1, 1892.

DRAKE, FRANCIS MARION, an American soldier and statesman; born in Rushville, Schuyler County, Illinois, Dec. 30, 1820. In 1859 he removed to Iowa. He served with distinction during the Civil War and was wounded at Mark's Mills, Arkansas, where he was left for dead. He was brevetted brigadier-general in February, 1865. After the war General Drake engaged in railroad projects, and was the first president of the Missouri, Iowa and Nebraska railway. He

Moines. From boyhood the life of General Drake was an active and useful one. In 1895 he was elected governor of Iowa.

DRAKE, FRANCIS SAMUEL, an American author; born at Northwood, New Hampshire, Feb. 22, 1828. He was educated at the public schools and became a bookseller, and, following the steps of his father, Samuel Gardner Drake, devoted himself at the same time to antiquarian and historical researches. In 1872 he published a Dictionary of American Biography, Including Men of the Times, which gave, also, a key to assumed names. This work, with materials collected by the compiler for a new edition, was incorporated into Appleton's Cyclopædia of American Biography. He published some other biographies and town histories, and, also, Tea Leaves (1884) and Indian History for Young Folks (1884). He died at Washington, District of Columbia, Feb. 22, 1885.

DRAKE, JOSEPH RODMAN, an American poet; born in New York City, Aug. 7, 1795. His parents died while he was a boy, and he had to shift for himself. At first engaged in a business capacity, he soon abandoned it for the study of medicine. In 1812 he became connected with Fitz-Greene Halleck. His most inspiring poem, The Culprit Fay, was written in his twenty-second year. A volume of his collected verses was published by his daughter in 1835. His best-known composition is the address to The American Flag, for which Halleck furnished the four concluding lines. He died in New York City, Sept. 21, 1820.

DRAKE, SAMUEL GARDNER, an American antiquarian; born at Pittsfield, New Hampshire, Oct. 11, 1798. He was educated at the public school, and at the age of twenty he became a public-school teacher. He went to Boston in 1828, opened the first antiquarian bookstore in the United States, and republished Captain Church's Entertaining History of King Philip's War. He was a founder of the New England Historic Genealogical Society, of which he was made president in 1858. He resided in London for two years. He edited some New England works and published many books on historical and antiquarian subjects, including an Indian Biography (1832); Book of the Indians (1833), often republished; Old Indian Chronicles (1836); Indian Captivities (1839); Drake Family (1845); History and Antiquities of Boston (1856); Researches Among the British Archives (1860); Memoir of Sir Walter Raleigh (1862); Annals of Witchcraft in the United States (1869); and the History of the Five Years French and Indian War (1870). He died in Boston, Massachusetts, June 14, 1875.

DRAKENBERG MOUNTAINS. See NATAL, Vol. XVI, p. 240.

DRAMA, THE AMERICAN. The first theatrical performances in North America were given in Quebec, in 1694, by amateur players, although there is little doubt that the Spaniards in Mexico had established the stage, which, in the times of the Spanish invasions, was in the height of its

The first performance of an English play in what is now the United States was in Boston, in 1749, when Otway's Orphan was acted, but received by the Puritans with such horror that at the next general court a law was passed, fining actors, as well as spectators, £5 ($25) apiece, and the owner of a building £20 ($100), "for each and every day or time a play was attempted or permitted. This law was enforced for nearly fifty years. In 1749 an attempt was also made to open a theater in Philadelphia, but the parties were arrested and bound over to their good behavior. They went to New York, and in February, 1750, rented a convenient room on Nassau Street, where they opened, on the 5th of March following, with a play announced as The Historical Tragedy of King Richard III. "Wrote originally by Shakespeare, and altered by Colley Cibber, Esq." The season lasted 16 months, with the exception of six weeks in the summer of 1750. The managers and chief actors were Murray and Kean. In July, 1750, the company disbanded, but the remains were gathered together by a Mr. Upton. The following season does not seem to have been very successful, as it was brought to a close in February, 1751.

Moody's success in Jamaica caused him to return to England in 1749, when he was at once engaged by David Garrick for Drury Lane. The rumors of his exploits had spread in London, and caused Mr. and Mrs. Lewis Hallam to organize a company, and with a stock of scenery and costumes from the Goodman Fields Theatre, they came to America, went to Williamsburg (then the capital of Virginia), altered an old storehouse over into a theater, and opened it, Sept. 5, 1752, with the Merchant of Venice and Garrick's farce, Lethe. The reception they received was very different from that accorded their friends in Boston and Philadelphia. Governor Dinwiddie gave them a certificate, drawn up and signed in council, testifying in high terms as to their ability as comedians, as well as to their conduct as men. They went to Annapolis, Maryland, and acted in the first regular theater erected in the colonies. In June, 1753, they went to New York, but met with unexpected opposition, through the abuse of a trust reposed in their advance agent. Mr. Hallam pleaded his case in the public press, and appealed to the authorities, with ultimate success. A prosperous season of six months followed, when they went to Philadelphia, where they met the most determined opposition. Petitions and counter-petitions signed, and the city was divided in the dispute. Permission was at last obtained for the presentation of 24 plays, on the condition that the play

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more nights were added. Mr. Hallam then went to the West Indies, where he died. A Mr. Douglass led the actors back to New York, and built a theater on Cruger's wharf, the Nassau Street theater having been converted into a church.

It

In the spring of 1759 Mr. Douglass went to Philadelphia, where he built the first regular theater erected in that city. Shortly after, a theater was built in Newport, Rhode Island, where the first performance by professional actors was given in the New England states, on Sept. 7, 1761. In 1762 the company went to Providence, and in that year was formed the first theatrical circuit. began at Williamsburg, Virginia, and included. Annapolis, Philadelphia, New York, Newport, Providence, and a few smaller places, where a courthouse or proper building might serve the purpose of a theater. In New York a new theater was built in Chapel Street, and was, during one of the disturbances caused by the Stamp Act, the scene of the first theatrical riot. During the succeeding ten years several other theaters were built, but on Oct. 24, 1774, the Continental Congress recommended a suspension of all public amusements. Douglass, who had been fairly successful, was obliged to yield, and took his company to the West Indies, where he had been always welcome.

During the Revolutionary struggle there were no theatricals, except those given by British officers. A remarkable incident brought these to an end. Burgoyne, the British commander, wrote a play, The Blockade of Boston, and while it was being played a sergeant dashed in and announced, "The rebels have attacked the lines on the Neck" (the "Neck" was a strip of land connecting Boston with the mainland). The audience applauded his spirited delivery, and it was some minutes before the truth of his statement was realized. The play ended without completion; the British were driven from Boston and went to New York, where they took possession of the John Street Theater, which they called the Theater Royal. Major André was among the chief actors.

After the war the players came back. Up to 1794 there was in the United States but one stock After this date the company of recognized merit. growth of the drama was marked for its rapid development. Owing to prejudice, which had not yet subsided, various efforts to avoid the rigid laws were adopted. As late as 1792 a play-bill announced "A Moral Lecture in Five Parts, in Which the Dreadful Effects of Conspiracy will be Exemplified." It was but an underhand way of advertising Otway's Venice Preserved. Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet were also given as "moral lectures" or "moral dialogues. Such a violation of the law could not last long, and in December, 1792, the "exhibition rooms" were closed. Fortunately, in 1793, the legislature of Massachusetts repealed the law against theaters, and in February, 1794, the Federal Street Theater