Waterton. Other buildings worthy of notice in Durham are the town-hall, a 16th-century building reconstructed in 1851, the police station, and the guildhall, the shire hall and county buildings, and the county hospital. There are ironworks and manufactures of hosiery, carpets and mustard in the city. The parliamentary borough returns one member. The corporation consists of a mayor, 6 aldermen and 18 councillors. Area, 1070 acres.
History of the City.—The foundation of the city followed on that of the church by the monks of Lindisfarne at the close of the 10th century. The history of the city is closely associated with that of the palatinate of Durham. The bishop of Durham among other privileges claimed a mint in the city, which, according to Boldon Book, rendered ten marks yearly until its value was reduced by that established by Henry II. at Newcastle, and it was temporarily abolished by the same king. The earliest charter, dated 1179 or 1180, is a grant of exemption from toll merchet and heriot made by Bishop Hugh Pudsey and confirmed by Pope Alexander. Before that time, however, the monks had a little borough at Elvet, which is divided from Durham by the Wear and afterwards became part of the city. In 1183 the city was at farm and rendered sixty marks. It was at first governed by a bailiff appointed by the bishop, but in 1565 Bishop Pilkington ordained that the government should consist, in addition to the bailiff, of one alderman and twelve assistants, the latter to continue in office for life, and the former to be chosen every year from among their number. This form of government was replaced in 1602, under the charter of Bishop Matthew, by that of a mayor, 12 aldermen and 24 burgesses, the aldermen and burgesses forming a common council and electing a mayor every year from among the aldermen. This was confirmed by James I., but in 1684 the corporation were obliged to resign their charters to Bishop Crew, who granted them a new one, probably reserving to himself a right of veto on the election of the mayor and aldermen. At the time of the Revolution, however, Bishop Matthew’s charter was revived, and continued to be the governing charter of the city until 1770, when, owing to dissensions as to the election of the common council, the number of aldermen was reduced to four and the charter became void. No mayor or aldermen were elected for ten years, but in 1780 Bishop Egerton, on the petition of the burgesses, granted them a new charter, which was practically a confirmation of that of 1602, and remained in force until the Municipal Reform Act of 1835. Being within the county palatine, the city of Durham sent no members to parliament, until, after several attempts beginning in 1614, it was enabled by an act of 1673 to return two members, which it continued to do until 1885, when by the Redistribution of Seats Act the number was reduced to one.
The corporation of Durham claim their fair and market rights under Bishop Pudsey’s charter of 1179, confirmed in 1565, as a weekly market on Saturday and three yearly fairs on the feasts of St Cuthbert in September and March and on Whit Monday, each continuing for two days. In 1610 the bishop of Durham brought a suit in chancery against the burgesses and recovered from them the markets and fairs, which he afterwards leased to the corporation for a rent of £20 yearly until they were purchased from the Ecclesiastical Commissioners in 1860. Durham has never been noted for any particular trade; and the attempts to introduce the manufacture of cloth and wool in the 17th and 18th centuries were failures. The manufacture of carpets was begun in 1814.
DURHAM, a city and the county-seat of Durham county, North Carolina, U.S.A., in a township of the same name, 25 m. N.W. of Raleigh. Pop. (1900) 6679, of whom 2241 were negroes; (1910) 18,241; of the township (1900) 19,055; (1910) 27,606. Adjacent to the city and also in the township are East Durham and West Durham (both unincorporated), which industrially are virtually part of the city. Durham is served by the Southern, the Seaboard Air Line, the Norfolk & Western, and the Durham & Southern railways, the last a short line connecting at Apex and Dunn, N.C., respectively with the main line of the Seaboard and the Atlantic Coast Line railways. Durham is nearly surrounded by hills. Its streets are shaded by elms. The city is the seat of Trinity College (Methodist Episcopal, South), opened in 1851 as a normal college, growing out of an academy called Union Institute, which was established in the north-western part of Randolph county in 1838 and was incorporated in 1841. In 1852 the college was empowered to grant degrees; in 1856 it became the property of the North Carolina Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South; in 1859 it received its present name; and in 1892 it was removed to a park near Durham, included in 1901 in the corporate limits of the city. A new charter was adopted in 1903, and a law school was organized in 1904. The college has received many gifts from the Duke family of Durham. In 1908 its endowment and property were valued at about $1,198,400, and the number of its students was 288. Although not officially connected with the college, the South Atlantic Quarterly, founded by a patriotic society of the college and published at Durham since 1902, is controlled and edited by members of the college faculty. The North Carolina Journal of Education and the Papers of the Trinity College Historical Society also are edited by members of the college faculty. The Trinity Park school is preparatory for the college. Near the city are Watts hospital (for whites) and Lincoln hospital (for negroes). Durham’s chief economic interest is in the manufacture of granulated smoking tobacco, for which it became noted after the Civil War. In the city are two large factories and store houses of the American Tobacco Company. The tobacco industry was founded by W. T. Blackwell (1839–1904) and Washington Duke (1820–1905). The city also manufactures cigars, cigarettes, snuff, a fertilizer having tobacco dust as the base, cotton goods, lumber, window sashes, blinds, drugs and hosiery. Durham has a large trade with the surrounding region. The town of Durham was incorporated in 1869, and became the county-seat of the newly-erected county in 1881, and in 1899 was chartered as a city. Its growth is due to the tobacco and cotton industries. In the Bennett house, at Durham Station, near the city, General J. E. Johnston surrendered on the 26th of April 1865 the Confederate army under his command to General W. T. Sherman.
DURIAN (Malay, duri, a thorn), the fruit of Durio zibethinus, a tree of the natural order Bombaceae, which attains a height of 70 or 80 ft., has oblong, tapering leaves, rounded at the base, and yellowish-green flowers, and bears a general resemblance to the elm. The durio is cultivated in Sumatra, Java, Celebes and the Moluccas, and northwards as far as Mindanao in the Philippines; also in the Malay Peninsula, in Tenasserim, on the Bay of Bengal, to 14° N. lat., and in Siam to the 13th and 14th parallels. The fruit is spherical, and 6 to 8 in. in diameter, approaching the size of a large coco-nut; it has a hard external husk or shell, and is completely armed with strong pyramidal tubercles, meeting one another at the base, and terminating in sharp thorny points; these sometimes inflict severe injuries on persons upon whom the fruit may chance to fall when ripe. On dividing the fruit at the joins of the carpels, where the spines arch a little, it is found to contain five oval cells, each filled with a cream-coloured, glutinous, smooth pulp, in which are embedded from one to five seeds about the size of chestnuts. The pulp and the seeds, which latter are eaten roasted, are the edible parts of the fruit. With regard to the taste of the pulp, A. R. Wallace remarks, “A rich butter-like custard, highly flavoured with almonds, gives the best idea of it, but intermingled with it come wafts of flavour that call to mind cream-cheese, onion-sauce, brown sherry and other incongruities; . . . it is neither acid, nor sweet, nor juicy, yet one feels the want of none of these qualities, for it is perfect as it is.” The fruit, especially when not fresh from the tree, has, notwithstanding, a most offensive smell, which has been compared to that of rotten onions or of putrid animal matter. The Dyaks of the Sarawak river in Borneo esteem the durian above all other fruit, eat it unripe both cooked and raw, and salt the pulp for use as a relish with rice.
See Linschoten, Discours of Voyages, bk. i. chap. 57, p. 102, fol. (London, 1598); Bickmore, Travels in the East Indian Archipelago, p. 91 (1868); Wallace, The Malay Archipelago (3rd ed., 1872).
