154 SOUN SOHN, Karl Ferdinand, a German painter, born
- ! , Deo, 1", 1805, died in Cologne, Nov.
25, 1867. He studied at the academy of Ber- lin and under Schadow, whom ho accompanied to Dusseldorf and to Italy. He was professor at the academy of Dusseldorf from 1838 to 1855, and became one of the leaders of the Dusseldorf school. He especially excelled in the rich coloring of female figures, and in idealized portraits of ladies. His works in- clude " Rinaldo and Armida " (1827) ; " Hylas captured by Nymphs " (1829); "Diana in her Bath" (1833);* "The Two Leonoras," after Goethe's Tasso (1834); "Romeo and Juliet" (1836); "The Sisters" (1843); " Vanitas " (1844) ; " The Lute Player " (1848) ; " The Four Seasons" (I 851 ); **& "Loreley" (1853). His son PAUL EDUAED RICHARD (born in 1834) excels in genre and portrait painting. His nephew and son-in law WILHELM (born in 1880) has executed good genre pictures, inclu- ding "A Delicate Question" (1864), and "The Consultation with a Lawyer" (1866). SOIL. See AGRICULTURE. SOISSONS (anc. Noviodunum, and afterward Augusta Suessionum), a fortified town of France, in the department of Aisne, on the left bank of the river Aisne, 56 m. N. E. of Paris; pop. in 1872, 10,404. It has a cathe- dral built in the 12th and 13th centuries, the ruined abbey of St. Jean des Vignes, a castle, and a college. In the environs is the abbey of St. Medard, founded by Clotaire I. in 557, now occupied as an institute for deaf mutes. There are manufactures of fine tapestry, linen, hosiery, cordage, earthenware, and leather. Soissons was the chief place of the Suessiones in the time of Casar, and at the beginning of the 6th century the capital of Clovis, who had there defeated the Roman general Syagrius (486), and it gave name to the kingdom of his fourth son. It has sustained many sieges. On Oct. 16, 1870, it surrendered to the Germans, after three weeks' investment and four days' bombardment. The council which condemned Abelard's doctrines met here in 1122. SOK.OTO. See SACKATOO. SOUNDER, Daniel Charles, a Swedish natural- ist, born in Norrland, Feb. 28, 1736, died in London, May 16, 1782. He was educated at Upsal under Linnaeus, studied medicine, made a tour in Russia, and went to England in 1760, " after spending some time in the Canaries. He was employed in preparing a catalogue of the collections in the British museum, and in 1766 published a catalogue of the Brander collec- tion of fossils. In 1768-'71 he accompanied Sir Joseph Banks on Capt. Cook's first voyage round the world. In 1771 he received the de- gree of D. 0. L. from Oxford university. In 1773 he was appointed under librarian to the British museum. He greatly promoted the study of botany in England. SOLAN GOOSE. SeeGANNET. SOLANO, a N. W. county of California, bound- ed S. E. by the Sacramento river and S. by SOLANUM Suisun bay: area, 800 sq. m.; pop. in 1670, 16,871, of whom 920 were Chinese. The sur- face consists mostly of valleys, marsh lands, undulating prairies, and high rounded hills. It is one of the best agricultural counties in the state. There is very little timber. Marble is found, and limestone from which a superior hydraulic cement is obtained. It is traversed by the California Pacific railroad. The chief productions in 1870 were 1,949,418 bushels of wheat, 443,400 of barley, 54,780 gallons of wine, 306,817 Ibs. of wool, 119,969 of butter, and 37,469 tons of hay. There were 6,852 horses, 1,046 mules and asses, 4,123 milch cows, 8,815 other cattle, 41,890 sheep, and 17,- 133 swine; 1 manufactory of cars, 1 of cement, 1 of machinery, 7 of saddlery and harness, 8 of wine, 1 flour mill, 3 tanneries, and 3 brewr eries. Capital, Fairfield. SOLANUM, the name (of unknown deriva- tion) of a genus of plants which is the type of a large and important order, the solanacece. Some of the conspicuous species of solanum being popularly known as nightshade, the order or family is often called the nightshade family. The solanums are annual or perennial herbs, and in warm climates they include shrubs, and even trees, with alternate leaves ; the flowers, sometimes terminal or axillary, are often extra-axillary, appearing upon the stem at some point between the leaves, an un- usual position due to a more or less complete union between the flower stalk and the main stem. The calyx and wheel-shaped corolla are mostly five-parted or five-lobed, the five sta- mens with very short filaments, the large an- thers crowded around the style, and opening by a pore at the apex of each cell ; the (mostly) two-celled ovary is surmounted by a simple style with an obtuse stigma, and in fruit be- comes a two-celled berry containing numerous flattened, somewhat kidney-shaped seeds with a fleshy albumen. The genus solanum is exten- sive; in its latest revision (Dunal, 1852) some 850 well defined species are admitted, and about 100 not sufficiently known are enumer- ated; they are found in all temperate coun- tries, but in tropical regions, especially those of South America, they are very abundant. The most important species is solanum tubero- tum (see POTATO), the tubers of which are so generally used as food. The tomato (described under its proper title) was placed here by Linnseus, and though later botanists have given it a separate genus, lycopersicum, it can hardly be kept distinct from solanum. Under EGG PLANT is described another cultivated species, and under NIGHTSHADE is given a common weed, S. nigriim. Several species are cultiva- ted for ornament in gardens and greenhouses, and a few wild species, not elsewhere men- tioned, are of importance as weeds. The beaked solanum (S. rostratum), very abundant on the plains west of the Mississippi, is a much-branched annual, 2 to 3 ft. high and abundantly armed with strong yellow spines;
