Knights of St George, has been the denomination of several military orders, whereof that of the Garter is one of the most illustrious. See GARTER, and ST GEORGE, below.
King George's Islands, are two islands in the South sea, lying in W. Long. 144° 56'. S. Lat. 14° 28'. They were first discovered by Commodore Byron in 1765, and were since visited by Captain Cook in 1774. Commodore Byron's people had an encounter with the inhabitants, which proved fatal to some of the natives; but Captain Cook was more fortunate. A lieutenant and two boats well-armed were sent on shore by Captain Cook; and landed without opposition. As soon as the gentlemen landed, the islanders embraced them by touching noses, a mode of civility used in New Zealand. land, which is 900 leagues distant, and the only place besides this where the custom has been observed to prevail. Notwithstanding this ceremony, however, very little real friendship seemed to take place on the part of the islanders. They crowded about the boats as the people were stepping into them, and seemed in doubt whether they should detain them or let them go; at last, however, not thinking themselves sufficiently strong, they seemed contented with their departure, and assisted them in pushing off their boats; but some of the most turbulent threw stones into the water, which fell very near them, and all seemed to glory that they had as it were driven them off. The British brought off five dogs of a white colour with fine long hair, with which the island seemed to be plentifully supplied. These they purchased with small nails, and some ripe bananas which had been brought from the Marquesas. On this island Mr Forster found a kind of scurvy-grass, which the natives informed him they were wont to bruise and mix with shell fish; after which, they threw it into the sea whenever they perceived a shoal of fish. This preparation intoxicates them for some time; and thus they are caught on the surface of the water without any other trouble than that of taking them out. The name of this plant among the natives is known. The largest island, which they call Tiookea, is something of an oval shape, and about 10 leagues in circuit; the other island, which lies two leagues to the westward of Tiookea, is four leagues long from north-east to south-west, and from three to five miles broad. The soil of both is extremely scanty; the foundation consists of coral, very little elevated above the surface of the water.
George, St., or George of Cappadocia; a name whereby several orders, both military and religious, are denominated. It took its rise from a saint or hero famous throughout all the East, called by the Greeks Μεγαλομάρτυς, q. d. great martyr.
On some medals of the emperors John and Manuel Comneni, we have the figure of St George armed, holding a sword or javelin in one hand, and in the other a buckler, with this inscription: an O, and therein a little Ρ
Α, and ΓΕ—ΓΙΟΣ, making Ο ΑΓΙΟΣ ΓΕΩΡΓΙΟΣ, Ο
holy George. He is generally represented on horseback, as being supposed to have frequently engaged in combats in that manner. He is highly venerated throughout Armenia, Muscovy, and all the countries which adhere to the Greek rite; from the Greek, his worship has long ago been received into the Latin church; and England and Portugal have both chosen him for their patron saint.
Great difficulties have been raised about this saint or hero. His very existence has been called in question. Dr Heylin, who wrote first and most about him, concluded with giving him entirely up, and supposing him only a symbolical device; and Dr Pettingal has turned him into a mere Basilidian symbol of victory. Mr Pegg, in a paper in the Archaeologia*, has attempted to restore him. And, finally, Mr Gibbon† has sunk him into an Arian bishop in the reigns of Constantius and Julian.—The bishop alluded to,
George the Cappadocian, was so surmamed, according to our author, from his parents or education; and was born at Epiphania in Cilicia, in a fuller's shop. "From this obscure and servile origin he raised himself by the talents of a parasite: and the patrons, whom he assiduously flattered, procured for their worthless dependent a lucrative commission or contract, to supply the army with bacon. His employment was mean: he rendered it infamous. He accumulated wealth by the basest arts of fraud and corruption; but his malversations were so notorious, that George was compelled to escape from the pursuits of justice. After this disgrace, in which he appears to have saved his fortune at the expense of his honour, he embraced, with real or affected zeal, the profession of Arianism. From the love, or the ostentation, of learning, he collected a valuable library of history, rhetoric, philosophy, and theology; and the choice of the prevailing faction promoted George of Cappadocia to the throne of Athanasius." His conduct in this station is represented by our historian as polluted by cruelty and avarice, and his death considered as a just punishment for the enormities of his life, among which Mr Gibbon seems to rank his "enmity to the gods."
The immediate occasion of his death, however, as narrated by ecclesiastical writers, will not probably appear calculated to add any stain to his memory. "There was in the city of Alexandria a place in which the heathen priests had been used to offer human sacrifices. This place, as being of no use, Constantius gave to the church of Alexandria, and George the bishop gave orders for it to be cleared, in order to build a Christian church on the spot. In doing this they discovered an immense subterraneous cavern, in which the heathen mysteries had been performed, and in it were many human skulls. These, and other things which they found in the place, the Christians brought out and exposed to public ridicule. The heathens, provoked at this exhibition, suddenly took arms and rushing upon the Christians, killed many of them with swords, clubs and stones: some also they strangled, and several they crucified. On this the Christians proceeded no farther in clearing the temple; but the heathens, pursuing their advantage, seized the bishop as he was in the church, and put him in prison. The next day they despatched him; and then fastening the body to a camel, he was dragged about the streets all day, and in the evening they burnt him and the camel together. This fate, Sozomen says, the bishop owed in part to his haughtiness while he was in favour with Constantius, and some say the friends of Athanasius were concerned in this massacre; but he ascribes it chiefly to the inveracity of the heathens, whose superstitions he had been very active in abolishing.
This George, the Arian bishop of Alexandria, was a man of letters, and had a very valuable library, which Julian ordered to be seized for his own use; and in his orders concerning it, he says that many of the books were on philosophical and rhetorical subjects, though many of them related to the doctrine of the impious Galileans (as in his sneering contemptuous way he always affected to call the Christians). "These books (says he) I could wish to have utterly destroyed; but lest books of value should be destroyed along with them, let those also be carefully sought for."
But Mr Gibbon gives a different turn to the affair George's murder, as well as relates it with different circumstances. "The Pagans (says he) excited his devout avarice; and the rich temples of Alexandria were either pillaged or insulted by the haughty prelate, who exclaimed, in a loud and threatening tone, 'How long will these sepulchres be permitted to stand?' Under the reign of Constantius, he was expelled by the fury, or rather by the justice of the people: and it was not without a violent struggle, that the civil and military powers of the state could restore his authority, and gratify his revenge. The messenger who proclaimed at Alexandria the accession of Julian, announced the downfall of the archbishop. George, with two of his obsequious ministers, Count Diodorus and Darcontius master of the mint, was ignominiously dragged in chains to the public prison. At the end of 24 days, the prison was forced open by the rage of a superstitious multitude, impatient of the tedious forms of judicial proceedings. The enemies of gods and men expired under their cruel insults; the lifeless bodies of the archbishop and his associates were carried in triumph through the streets on the back of a camel; and the inactivity of the Athanasian party was esteemed a shining example of evangelical patience. The remains of these guilty wretches were thrown into the sea; and the popular leaders of the tumult declared their resolution to disappoint the devotion of the Christians, and to intercept the future honours of these martyrs, who had been punished like their predecessors, by the enemies of their religion. The fears of the Pagans were just, and their precautions ineffectual. The meritorious death of the archbishop obliterated the memory of his life. The rival of Athanasius was dear and sacred to the Arians, and the seeming conversion of those sectaries introduced his worship into the bosom of the Catholic church. The odious stranger, disguising every circumstance of time and place, assumed the mask of a martyr, a saint, and a Christian hero; and the infamous George of Cappadocia has been transformed into the renowned St George of England, the patron of arms, of chivalry, and of the Garter."
Knights of St GEORGE. See CARTER. There have been various other orders under this denomination, most of which are now extinct; particularly one founded by the emperor Frederic III. in the year 1470, to guard the frontiers of Bohemia and Hungary against the Turks; another, called St George of Alfama, founded by the kings of Arragon; another in Austria and Carinthia; and another in the republic of Genoa, still subsisting, &c.
Religious of St GEORGE. Of these there are divers orders and congregations; particularly canons regular of St George in Alga, at Venice, established by authority of Pope Boniface IX. in the year 1404. The foundation of this order was laid by Bartholomew Colonna, who preached in 1396, at Padua, and some other villages in the state of Venice. Pope Pius V. in 1570, gave these canons precedence of all other religious. Another congregation of the same institute in Sicily, &c.
St GEORGE del Mina, the capital of the Dutch settlements on the Gold coast of Guinea, situated seven or eight miles west of Cape-coast castle the capital of the British settlements there. W. Long. 5°. and N. Lat. 3°.
St GEORGE, a fort and town of Asia, in the peninsula on this side the Ganges, and on the coast of Coromandel, belonging to the British; it is otherwise called Madras, and by the natives Chilipatam. It fronts the sea, and has a salt water river on its back side, which hinders the fresh water springs from coming near the town, so that they have no good water within a mile of them. In the rainy seasons it is incommodeed by inundations; and from April to September, it is so scorching hot, that if the sea breezes did not cool the air, there would be no living there. There are two towns, one of which is called the White Town, which is walled round, and has several bulwarks and bastions to defend it: it is 400 paces long and 150 broad, and is divided into regular streets. Here are two churches, one for the Protestants, and the other for the Papists; as also a good hospital, a town hall, and a prison for debtors. They are a corporation, and have a mayor and aldermen, with other proper officers. The Black Town is inhabited by Gentoes, Mahometans, and Portuguese and Armenian Christians, and each religion has its temples and churches. This, as well as the White Town, is ruled by the English governor and his council. The diamond mines are but a week's journey from this place, which renders them pretty plentiful, but there are no large ones since that great diamond was procured by Governor Pitt. This colony produces very little of its own growth or manufacture for foreign markets, and the trade is in the hands of the Armenians and Gentoes. The chief things the British deal in, besides diamonds, are calicoes, chintz, muslins, and the like. In 1794 the population of the town was estimated at 300,000. Their rice is brought by sea from Gangam and Orixa, their wheat from Surat and Bengal, and their fire wood from the islands of Diu; so that an enemy, with a superior force at sea, may easily distress them. The houses of the White Town are built with brick, and have lofty rooms and flat roofs. The houses in the White Town have all green Venetian windows, and are surrounded by gardens. The Black Town consists chiefly of thatched cottages. The military power is lodged in the governor and council, who are also the last resort in civil causes. The company have two chaplains, who officiate by turns. They never attempt to make proselytes, but leave that to the Popish missionaries. The salaries of the Company's writers are very small: but if they have any fortune of their own, they may make it up by trade; which must generally be the case, for they commonly grow rich. It was taken by the French in 1764, who restored it at the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle.
St GEORGE's, the largest of the Bermuda or Summer islands. W. Long. 65°. N. Lat. 32°.
Cross of St GEORGE, a red one in a field argent, which makes part of the British standard.
a lake in America in the state of New York, about 35 miles long, and from one to seven broad. There are some beautiful islands in it, the largest of which is about two miles broad, commanding a delightful and very extensive prospect. There are manifest traces of a large town of the aborigines, and the island itself appears to have been the favourite residence of an Indian prince. It lies to the south of Lake Champlain, and its waters lie about 100 feet higher. It abounds with fishes of a superior quality, such as the Oswego bass, and speckled trouts of considerable magnitude. The French at one period called it Lake Sacrament, as they were at the trouble to bring from it their water for sacramental purposes, to the churches they had planted in Canada.