escape the troubles of the Presbyterian church, settled in Bergen, and in 1646 married a Norse girl of good family. Petter Dass was born in 1647 on the island of Nord Herö, on the north coast of Norway. Seven years later his father died, and his mother placed him with his aunt, the wife of the priest of another little island-parish. In 1660 he was sent to school at Bergen, in 1665 to the university of Copenhagen, and in 1667 he began to earn his daily bread as a private tutor. In 1672 he was ordained priest, and remained till 1681 as under-chaplain at Nesne, a little parish near his birthplace; for eight years more he was resident chaplain at Nesne; and at last in 1689 he received the living of Alstahoug, the most important in the north of Norway. The rule of Alstahoug extended over all the neighbouring districts, including Dass’s native island of Herö, and its privileges were accompanied by great perils, for it was necessary to be constantly crossing stormy firths of sea. Dass lived here in quietude, with something of the honours and responsibilities of a bishop, brought up his family in a God-fearing way, and wrote endless reams of verses. In 1700 he asked leave to resign his living in favour of his son Anders Dass, but this was not permitted; in 1704, however, Anders became his father’s chaplain. About this time Petter went to Bergen, where he visited Dorothea Engelbrechtsdatter, with whom he had been for many years in correspondence. He continued to write till 1707, and died in August 1708. The materials for his biography are very numerous; he was regarded with universal curiosity and admiration in his lifetime; and, besides, he left a garrulous autobiography in verse. A portrait, painted in middle age, now in the church of Melhus, near Trondhjem, represents him in canonicals, with deep red beard and hair, the latter waved and silky, and a head of massive proportions. The face is full of fire and vigour. His writings passed in MS. from hand to hand, and few of them were printed in his lifetime. Nordlands Trompet (The Trumpet of Nordland), his greatest and most famous poem, was not published till 1739; Den norska Dale-Vise (The Norwegian Song of the Valley) appeared in 1696; the Aandelig Tidsfordriv (Spiritual Pastime), a volume of sacred poetry, was published in 1711. The Trumpet of Nordland remains as fresh as ever in the memories of the inhabitants of the north of Norway; boatmen, peasants, priests will alike repeat long extracts from it at the slightest notice, and its popularity is unbounded. It is a rhyming description of the province of Nordland, its natural features, its trades, its advantages and its drawbacks, given in dancing verse of the most breathless kind, and full of humour, fancy, wit and quaint learning. The other poems of Petter Dass are less universally read; they abound, however, in queer turns of thought, and fine homely fancies.
The collected writings of Dass were edited (3 vols., Christiania, 1873–1877) by Dr A. E. Eriksen.
DASYURE, a bookname for any member of the zoological family Dasyuridae. (See Marsupialia.) The name is better restricted to animals of the typical genus Dasyurus, sometimes called true Dasyures. These are mostly inhabitants of the Australian continent and Tasmania, where in the economy of nature they take the place of the smaller predaceous Carnivora, the cats, civets and weasels of other parts of the world. They hide themselves in the daytime in holes among rocks or in hollow trees, but prowl about at night in search of the small living mammals and birds which constitute their prey, and are to some extent arboreal in habit. The spot-tailed dasyure (D. maculatus), about the size of a cat, inhabiting Tasmania and Southern Australia, has transversely striated pads on the soles of the feet. These organs are also present in the North Australian dasyure (D. hallucatus) and the Papuan D. albopunctatus, and are regarded by Oldfield Thomas as indication of arboreal habits; in the common dasyure (D. viverrinus) from Tasmania and Victoria, and the black-tailed dasyure (D. geoffroyi) from South Australia, these feet-pads are absent, whence these species are believed to seek their prey on the ground. The ursine dasyure (Sarcophilus ursinus), often called the “Tasmanian Devil,” constitutes a distinct genus. In size it may be compared to an English badger; the general colour of the fur is black tinged with brown, with white patches on the neck, shoulders, rump and chest. It is a burrowing animal, of nocturnal habits, intensely carnivorous, and commits great depredations on the sheepyards and poultry-lofts of the settlers. In writing of this species Krefft says that one—by no means a large one—escaped from confinement and killed in two nights fifty-four fowls, six geese, an albatross and a cat. It was recaptured in what was considered a stout trap, with a door constructed of iron bars as thick as a lead pencil, but escaped by twisting this solid obstacle aside.
DATE PALM. The dates[1] of commerce are the fruit of a species
of palm, Phoenix dactylifera, a tree which ranges from the Canary
Islands through Northern Africa and the south-east of Asia to
India. It has been cultivated and much prized throughout most
of these regions from the remotest antiquity. Its cultivation and
use are described on the mural tablets of the ancient Assyrians.
In Arabia it is the chief source of national wealth, and its fruit
forms the staple article of food in that country. The tree has also
been introduced along the Mediterranean shores of Europe; but
as its fruit does not ripen so far north, the European plants are
only used to supply leaves for the festival of Palm Sunday among
Christians, and for the celebration of the Passover by Jews. It
was introduced into the new world by early Spanish missionaries,
and is now cultivated in the dry districts of the south-western
United States and in Mexico. The date palm is a beautiful tree,
growing to a height of from 60 to 80 ft., and its stem, which is
strongly marked with old leaf-scars, terminates in a crown of
graceful shining pinnate leaves. The flowers spring in branching
spadices from the axils of the leaves, and as the trees are unisexual
it is necessary in cultivation to fertilize the female flowers by
artificial means. The fruit is oblong, fleshy and contains one
very hard seed which is deeply furrowed on the inside. The fruit
varies much in size, colour and quality under cultivation.
Regarding this fruit, W. G. Palgrave (Central and Eastern
Arabia) remarked: “Those who, like most Europeans at home,
only know the date from the dried specimens of that fruit shown
beneath a label in shop-windows, can hardly imagine how delicious
it is when eaten fresh and in Central Arabia. Nor is it, when
newly gathered, heating,—a defect inherent to the preserved
fruit everywhere; nor does its richness, however great, bring
satiety; in short it is an article of food alike pleasant and healthy.”
In the oases of Sahara, and in other parts of Northern Africa,
dates are pounded and pressed into a cake for food. The dried
fruit used for dessert in European countries contains more than
half its weight of sugar, about 6% of albumen, and 12% of
gummy matter. All parts of the date palm yield valuable
economic products. Its trunk furnishes timber for house-building
and furniture; the leaves supply thatch; their footstalks are
used as fuel, and also yield a fibre from which cordage is spun.
Date sugar is a valuable commercial product of the East Indies, obtained from the sap or toddy of Phoenix sylvestris, the toddy palm, a tree so closely allied to the date palm that it has been supposed to be the parent stock of all the cultivated varieties. The juice, when not boiled down to form sugar, is either drunk fresh, or fermented and distilled to form arrack. The uses of the other parts and products of this tree are the same as those of the date palm products. Date palm meal is obtained from the stem of a small species, Phoenix farinifera, growing in the hill country of southern India.
For further details see Sir G. Watt, Dictionary of the Economic Products of India (1892); and The Date Palm, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Plant Industry, Bulletin No. 53 (W. T. Swingle), 1904.
DATIA, a native state of Central India, in the Bundelkhand
agency. It lies in the extreme north-west of Bundelkhand, near
Gwalior, and is surrounded on all sides by other states of Central
India, except on the east where it meets the United Provinces.
The state came under the British government after the treaty
of Bassein in 1802. Area, 911 sq. m. Pop. (1901) 173,759.
Estimated revenue, £70,000; tribute to Sindhia paid through the
- ↑ Lat. dactylus, finger, hence fruit of the date palm, gave O. Fr. date, mod. datte; distinguish “date,” in chronology, from Lat. datum, data, given, used at the beginning of a letter, &c., to show time and place of writing, e.g. Datum Romae.
