church of St Stephen at Perugia consisted of a branch garnished with five open and two closed roses enriched with a sapphire, the whole having a value of seventy ducats. The value of the gift varied according to the character or rank of the recipient. John XXII. gave away some weighing 12 oz., and worth from £250 to £325. Among the recipients of this honour have been Henry VI. of England, 1446; James III. of Scotland, on whom the rose (made by Jacopo Magnolio) was conferred by Innocent VIII.; James IV. of Scotland; Frederick the Wise, elector of Saxony, who received a rose from Leo X. in 1518; Henry VIII. of England, who received three, the last from Clement VII. in 1524 (each had nine branches, and rested on different forms of feet, one on oxen, the second on acorns, and the third on lions); Queen Mary, who received one in 1555 from Julius III.; the republic of Lucca, so favoured by Pius IV., in 1564; the Lateran Basilica by Pius V. three years later; the sanctuary of Loreto by Gregory XIII. in 1584; Maria Theresa, queen of France, who received it from Clement IX. in 1668; Mary Casimir, queen of Poland, from Innocent XI. in 1684 in recognition of the deliverance of Vienna by her husband, John Sobieski; Benedict XIII. (1726) presented one to the cathedral of Capua, and in 1833 it was sent by Gregory XVI. to the church of St Mark’s, Venice. In more recent times it was sent to Napoleon III. of France, the empress Eugénie, and the queens Isabella II., Christina (1886) and Victoria (1906) of Spain. The gift of the golden rose used almost invariably to accompany the coronation of the king of the Romans. If in any particular year no one is considered worthy of the rose, it is laid up in the Vatican.
Some of the most famous Italian goldsmiths have been employed in making the earlier roses; and such intrinsically valuable objects have, in common with other priceless historical examples of the goldsmiths’ art, found their way to the melting-pot. It is, therefore, not surprising that the number of existing historic specimens is very small. These include one of the 14th century in the Cluny Museum, Paris, believed to have been sent by Clement V. to the prince-bishop of Basel; another conferred in 1458 on his native city of Siena by Pope Pius II.; and the rose bestowed upon Siena by Alexander VII., a son of that city, which is depicted in a procession in a fresco in the Palazzo Pubblico at Siena. The surviving roses of more recent date include that presented by Benedict XIII. to Capua cathedral; the rose conferred on the empress Caroline by Pius VII., 1819, at Vienna; one of 1833 (Gregory XVI.) at St Mark’s, Venice; and Pope Leo XIII.’s rose sent to Queen Christina of Spain, which is at Madrid.
Authorities.—Angelo Rocca, Aurea Rosa, &c. (1719); Busenelli, De Rosa Aurea. Epistola (1759); Girbal, La Rosa de oro (Madrid, 1820); C. Joret, La Rose d’or dans l’antiquité et au moyen âge (Paris, 1892), pp. 432-435; Eugène Muntz in Revue d’art chrétien (1901), series v. vol. 12 pp. 1-11; De F. Mely, Le Trésor de Chartres (1886); Marquis de Mac Swiney Mashanaglass, Le Portugal et le Saint Siège: Les Roses d’or envoyées par les Papes aux rois de Portugal au XVI e siècle (1904); Sir C. Young, Ornaments and Gift consecrated by the Roman Pontiffs: the Golden Rose, the Cap and Swords presented to Sovereigns of England and Scotland (1864). (J. T. S.*; E. A. J.)
GOLDEN RULE, the term applied in all European languages
to the rule of conduct laid down in the New Testament (Matthew
vii. 12 and Luke vi. 31), “whatsoever ye would that men should
do to you, do ye even so to them, for this is the law and the
prophets.” This principle has often been stated as the fundamental
precept of social morality. It is sometimes put negatively
or passively, “do not that to another which thou wouldst not
have done to thyself” (cf. Hobbes, Leviathan, xv. 79, xvii. 85),
but it should be observed that in this form it implies merely
abstention from evil doing. In either form the precept in ordinary
application is part of a hedonistic system of ethics, the criterion
of action being strictly utilitarian in character.
See H. Sidgwick, History of Ethics (5th ed., 1902), p. 167; James Seth, Ethical Principles, p. 97 foll.
GOLDFIELD, a town and the county-seat of Esmeralda
county, Nevada, U.S.A., about 170 m. S.E. of Carson City.
Pop. (1910, U.S. census) 4838. It is served by the Tonopah
& Goldfield, Las Vegas & Tonopah, and Tonopah & Tidewater
railways. The town lies in the midst of a desert abounding in
high-grade gold ores, and is essentially a mining camp. The
discovery of gold at Tonopah, about 28 m. N. of Goldfield, in
1900 was followed by its discovery at Goldfield in 1902 and 1903;
in 1904 the Goldfield district produced about 800 tons of ore,
which yielded $2,300,000 worth of gold, or 30% of that of the
state. This remarkable production caused Goldfield to grow
rapidly, and it soon became the largest town in the state. In
addition to the mines, there are large reduction works. In 1907
Goldfield became the county-seat. The gold output in 1907 was
$8,408,396; in 1908, $4,880,251. Soon after mining on an extensive
scale began, the miners organized themselves as a local
branch of the Western Federation of Miners, and in this branch
were included many labourers in Goldfield other than miners.
Between this branch and the mine-owners there arose a series of
more or less serious differences, and there were several set strikes—in
December 1906 and January 1907, for higher wages; in
March and April 1907, because the mine-owners refused to
discharge carpenters who were members of the American Federation
of Labour, but did not belong to the Western Federation of
Miners or to the Industrial Workers of the World affiliated with
it, this last organization being, as a result of the strike, forced
out of Goldfield; in August and September 1907, because a
rule was introduced at some of the mines requiring miners to
change their clothing before entering and after leaving the
mines,—a rule made necessary, according to the operators, by
the wholesale stealing (in miners’ parlance, “high-grading”)
of the very valuable ore (some of it valued at as high as $20 a
pound); and in November and December 1907, because some
of the mine-owners, avowedly on account of the hard times,
adopted a system of paying in cashier’s checks. Excepting
occasional attacks upon non-union workmen, or upon persons
supposed not to be in sympathy with the miners’ union, there
had been no serious disturbance in Goldfield; but in December
1907, Governor Sparks, at the instance of the mine-owners,
appealed to President Roosevelt to send Federal troops to
Goldfield, on the ground that the situation there was ominous,
that destruction of life and property seemed probable, and that
the state had no militia and would be powerless to maintain order.
President Roosevelt thereupon (December 4th) ordered General
Frederick Funston, commanding the Division of California, at
San Francisco, to proceed with 300 Federal troops to Goldfield.
The troops arrived in Goldfield on the 6th of December, and
immediately afterwards the mine-owners reduced wages and
announced that no members of the Western Federation of Miners
would thereafter be employed in the mines. President Roosevelt,
becoming convinced that conditions had not warranted Governor
Sparks’s appeal for Federal assistance, but that the immediate
withdrawal of the troops might nevertheless lead to serious
disorders, consented that they should remain for a short time
on condition that the state should immediately organize an
adequate militia or police force. Accordingly, a special meeting
of the legislature was immediately called, a state police force
was organized, and on the 7th of March 1908 the troops were
withdrawn. Thereafter work was gradually resumed in the
mines, the contest having been won by the mine-owners.
GOLDFINCH (Ger. Goldfink[1]), the Fringilla carduelis of Linnaeus and the Carduelis elegans of later authors, an extremely well-known bird found over the greater parts of Europe and North Africa, and eastwards to Persia and Turkestan. Its gay plumage is matched by its sprightly nature; and together they make it one of the most favourite cage-birds among all classes. As a songster it is indeed surpassed by many other species, but its docility and ready attachment to its master or mistress make up for any defect in its vocal powers. In some parts of England the trade in goldfinches is very considerable. In 1860 Mr Hussey reported (Zool., p. 7144) the average annual captures near Worthing to exceed 11,000 dozens—nearly all being cock-birds; and a witness before a committee of the House of Commons in 1873 stated that, when a boy, he could take forty
- ↑ The more common German name, however, is Distelfink (Thistle-Finch) or Stieglitz.
