CENTRAL AMERICA
300
CERES
6,000 inhabitants. It lies along the southern and western shores of Lake Nyasa, extending toward the Zambezi. There are good roads everywhere, and life and property are safe, with the inhabitants prosperous and content. The prevailing religion is Mohammedanism, with nine Christian missions at work having 61,000 natives under instruction. Tobacco, coffee, cotton, rice can all be cultivated in either the lowlands or highlands. The trading is chiefly done at Port Herald and Chiromo on the lower Shire and at Kotakota on Lake Nyasa. Imports are largely cloths, ironware and food; exports include coffee, cotton, tobacco, beeswax and rubber. For purposes of administration the protectorate is divided into 12 districts, and there is a small force of Sikhs and natives under British officers. Twenty post-offices in 1903 handled 391,599 pieces. There are railway, telegraph and telephone lines, and a water-power electric light plant at Zomba. In 1906 it was made the Nyasaland Protectorate.
Central America. See AMERICA.
Central Falls, R. I., a manufacturing city in Rhode Island, on the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad, six miles from Providence. It is situated in Providence County and was taken from the town of Lincoln, and incorporated as a city in 1895. ^ nas a number of factories, foundries, extensive cotton, woolen, thread and silk-mills, haircloth manufactories, foundries and machine-shops. Population 22,754.
Central Park, the great park of New York city and one of the largest and finest in the world, was laid out in 1858. It lies in what is now the heart of the city, two and a half miles long and one half-mile wide, inclosing 843 acres, with an addition of 24 acres on the northwest. A part of it is used for two Croton water-reservoirs. The surface at first was all rock and marsh, and the expense necessary to level and fill in forbade its being made into city lots. Making it into a huge park was a happy idea; the marshes have become lakes, some of the bare rocks are now grassy slopes, while the massive bowlders and tall rock-walls face one at every turn of the winding path or smooth driveway. There is thus the wild appearance of mountain and forest, the contrast being heightened by the solid rows of brownstone city-fronts that line the bordering avenues', far stirpassing the effects usually produced in small city parks, where everything is so evidently artificial. The Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Museum of Natural History occupy two large and handsome buildings in the park. Some of the points of interest are the obelisk, casino, mall, lake,% cave, labyrinth and menagerie.
Centra'lia, 111., a city in Marion County on the 111. Central, the Jacksonville & St. Louis, the Southern and the 111. Southern railroads, 60 miles east by south of St. Louis. Settled in 1852, the city was incorporated seven years later, and is now governed by a charter passed in 1872 and subsequently amended. It is situated in a fine fruit-growing region, where there is also much coal-mining. Besides the car and repair shops of the 111. Central Railway, its industries embrace the manufacture of envelopes, boxes, pick-handles, crates, besides glassware and the product of its flour-mills. Population (1910)" 9,680.
Centrifugal Force is due to rotation. If a particle is in motion along any path other than a straight line, it is acted upon by a force which is directed toward the convex side of the curve. This is called a centrifugal force. In particular, if a particle of mass m be moving in a circle of radius r with a uniform speed v, the centrifugal force is at each instant directed along the radius passing through the particle,
and the amount of the force is mv •• C e n-
tripetal force is merely the negative aspect of centrifugal force. If we consider Newton's Third Law and call centrifugal force action, then centripetal force is merely the reaction, which is equal and opposite to the action.
Century Plant. See AGAVE.
Ceramics (se-rdm^ks or ke-ram'iks), a name given to the plastic and decorative arts, which covers such objects of baked clay as are included in earthenware and porcelain, ornamentally treated in colors, glazing and firing. The term is applied to include such artistic utensils and decorated wares, known to experts as Majolica and Japan ware, the famous faience of Limoges, the porcelains of Worcester, Doul-ton and Sevres, Balleek china, plaques, pigs, vases, punch-bowls, candelabra, etc., artistically modeled, painted, glazed and enameled. The term, it will be seen, is a comprehensive one, and is applied to such objects of .ornamental earthenware and porcelain as come under the category of fictile art.
Cerberus (ser'be-rus), the fabulous watchdog who guarded the entrance to the lower world or Hades, is generally described as a monster having three heads. The twelfth and final labor of Hercules was to drag forth Cerberus to the light of the upper world, and that without use of a weapon. Orpheus, lacking the strength of Hercules, is said to have lulled Cerberus to sleep with his lyre on his journey to Hades for the lost Eurydice. Milton speaks of Melancholy as "of Cerberus and blackest midnight born" (L1 Allegro).
Ceres (se'rez), the Roman goddess who protects agriculture and. the Emits of the
