CHATHAM CIIATI 337 CHATHAM, a parliamentary and municipal borough and naval arsenal of England, county of Kent, situated on the right bank of the Med- vvay, near its confluence with the Thames, 30 m. S. E. of London, and adjoining Rochester, with a station on the East Kent railway ; pop. New Docks and Repairing Basil. in 1871, 44,135, including about 8,000 dock- yard men and soldiers. It includes the village of Brompton just below it, on the same side of the river. It is a dirty, ill-built, irregular town, with many wooden houses and few buildings of interest. Its great feature, and the sole cause of its importance, is the vast naval establishment at its lower end, com- menced by Elizabeth, and improved by her successors, until it is now one of the finest in Great Britain. The dockyard, which is about a mile long, contains six building slips, wet and dry docks, a rope house 1,140 ft. long, black- smith shops, steam saw mills, oar and block machinery by Brunei, copper sheathing and paint mills, pattern room, arsenal, &c. Several ships in ordinary are moored in the river. To the marine barracks are attached a ship-gun battery and school. There are also barracks for the royal engineers, sappers, and miners, with a school for young officers and recruits, where lectures are given upon everything relating to the art of war. There are good libraries for both services, and naval and military hospitals. Work was commenced on the new dockyards in 1861, and the repairing basin was completed in 1871. On the land side all the works are shut in by a strong line of fortifications, with several defences on the Chatham and Brompton sides, among which are Forts Pitt and Clarence between the former place and Rochester, Fort Gillingham, Upnor castle, across the river, now used as a magazine, and a strong redoubt on an eminence at the S. E. end of the yard. The houses within this enclosure, which be- long to the village of Brompton, are tenanted chiefly by persons employed in the yard. In 1(567 the Dutch under l)e Ruyter, after destroy- ing Sheerness, sailed up the Medway with 17 light ships and 8 fire ships, broke a chain stretched across the river, destroyed several sail of the line and a quantity of stores, in the face of a hot tire from Upnor castle, and re- tired with trifling loss, carrying off a ship of war named the Royal Charles. In the im- proved condition of the defences, it is believed that such an exploit would be impossible. CHATHAM, Earl of. See PITT, WILLIAM. CHATHAM ISLANDS, a group in the Pacific, belonging to Great Bri- tain, E. of New Zealand, between lat. 43 40' and 45 20' S., and Ion. 176 and 177 20' W. They consist of Wairikaori, or Chatham island, from 80 to 90 m. in circum- ference ; Rangi-haute, or Pitt island, 12 m. long by 8 broad ; and a number of others which are mere barren rocks. The W. shore of the largest island is undulating, and clad with vegetation to the water's edge ; the N. shore is flat ; the S. and part of the E. rocky and precipitous. There are several bays and some good harbors, which have been frequent- ed by whalers ever since the discovery of the group by Broughton in 1791. Near the middle of the island is Tewanga lake, 25 m. long and 6 or 7 m. broad, S. of which the country is generally arable, the products being similar to those of New Zealand. The climate is mild and healthy. The aboriginal inhabitants are of the Malay race, and darker than the New Zealanders. (II ATI (felis mitis), a leopard-like cat, smaller than the ocelots, with which it lives in South America. The general color is yel- Chati (Felis mitis).
