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The NAI register is a British list of children deemed to be at risk of abuse or injury from their parents or guardians, compiled and held by a local authority, area health authority, or NSPCC Special Unit. It is also called the child abuse register.
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NASA (National Aeronautics and Space Administration) is an American government agency founded in 1958 for space flight and aeronautical research. Its headquarters are in Washington DC. Its main installation is the Kennedy Space Centre.
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The NCR Book Award for Non-Fiction is an annual UK book award founded 1987, awarded by NCR Ltd, a computer and high-technology company. The first winner, in 1988, was David Thomson for 'Nairn in Darkness and Light'. The winner receives 25,000 pounds sterling.
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The National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) was founded in 1889 by the Reverend Benjamin Waugh and incorporated in 1895 when the following duties were devolved upon it: 1. To prevent the public and private wrongs of children and their corruption of their morals. 2. To take action for the enforcement of laws for their protection. 3. To provide and maintain an organisation for the above objects. 4. To do all other such lawful things as are incidental or conductive to the attainment of the above objects.
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Nabob was a term of derision applied in the 18th century to those East India Company servants who had amassed fortunes in India, sometimes unscrupulously, which they then used for bettering their economic and social positions in England. The term is corrupted from the Persian title nawab, which originally designated governors administering Indian provinces for the Mogul emperors. Rulers of some Muslim Princely States continued to use the title during the British Raj period.
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The Nagari is a set of scripts, including Devanagari, used as the writing systems for several languages of India.
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A nail is a fastening device usually made from round or oval wire, having a point at one end and a head at the other.
The nail is a unit of the imperial measurement of length equivalent to 1/16 yards (2.25 inches), formerly used for measuring cloth.
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A nailbrush is a small stiff-bristled brush used for cleaning the fingernails.
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A nailfile is a small file, chiefly either of metal or of board coated with emery, used to trim and shape the fingernails.
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Naive art is a term applied to painting (and to a much lesser degree sculpture) produced in more or less sophisticated modern societies but lacking conventional representational skills. Colours are characteristically bright and non-naturalistic, perspective non-scientific, and the vision childlike or literal-minded. Interest in the freshness and directness of vision of outstanding naive artists such as Henri Rousseau developed in France in the early years of the 20th century, and since then many other
naive artists, for example Grandma Moses in the USA, have won critical recognition.
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In philosophy, naive realism is the doctrine that in the perception of physical objects what is before the mind is the object itself and not a representation of it.
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A Nansen bottle, invented by Fridtjof Nansen, is an instrument formerly used by oceanographers for obtaining samples of sea water from a desired depth, they have now generally been replaced by Niskin bottles.
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A Nansen passport was a passport issued to stateless persons by the League of Nations after the Great War.
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Napier's bones were a set of graduated rods formerly used for multiplication and division.
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The Nashville Convention was a convention of delegates from the Southern States of America at Nashville, Tennessee in June, 1850, suggested by the Mississippi State Convention of the previous year. The convention was called to consider the slavery question and the encroachments of Northern abolitionists. It did not meet with universal approval. The Wilmot proviso and the Missouri Compromise were disapproved of, but resolutions of open resistance advanced by Texas, South Carolina and Mississippi were voted down. The convention met again in November, and again moderate resolutions were adopted.
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A nation is a body of people, organised into a single state. One of the most characteristic of the ideas of the Age of the Renaissance was that of the Nation and its sovereign independence - an idea still very active in our own days. The Middle Ages had been dominated by the Catholic ideal of world unity. The great institutions of those ages were international - for example, the Feudal System, and above all the Church and the Papacy. Latin, too, was an international language; and though the various peoples had their own languages, the continual use of Latin in both Church and State affairs helped educated men to regard themselves as members of one society, the society of Christendom. Above all, these peoples - English, French, Spanish, Italian, German - were all members of one Church. All belonged in some measure to the Christendom of which the heads were the Pope and the Emperor. Then, gradually, from the early days of the Renaissance, the newer idea of the 'Nation' took root, and this in time changed the unity of 'Christendom' into the disunion of 'Europe'.
Modern Europe is dominated by national feeling and is divided into independent national states; and these have no longer even the common bond of one Church. Europe has lost as well as gained by the disappearance of medieval Christendom. She has gained, because the old feudal divisions in most countries meant internal disunion, civil warfare, and baronial tyranny. But Europe has also lost, because the old ideal of a united Christendom has disappeared in the jealous rivalries of warring nations. From time to time attempts have been made to check these dangerous rivalries. But the problem of international peace and co-operation - of a 'society of nations' - is one which mankind is still trying to solve in a satisfactory manner. The nations which took the lead in Europe in the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries were those that first achieved national unity, and the chief of these were France, Spain, and England. Italy, which had given so much to the world in art and letters, did not share in this political change. Great men lived in Italy - in Rome, Florence, Venice, Naples, and Milan - but all these cities were the capitals of small states. In short, Italy was not a nation; hence she became from 1494 the prey of powerful neighbours. As with Italy, so with Germany.
The Holy Roman Empire was an empire only in name; in practice, Germany contained three or four hundred separate States. Both Germany and Italy retained, until even the nineteenth century, their internal divisions and discords. France, Spain, and England had achieved national unity in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, whereas Germany and Italy had to wait another three centuries - and some of our problems to-day are due to the fact that they are still comparatively new nations. The means by which national unity was brought about in France, Spain, and England was the monarchy. It was their kings who saved and made these countries - saved them from feudal anarchy and made them into nations. It was monarchs like Henry VII and Henry VIII of England, Louis XI and Francis I of France, and Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain who united their countries under a strong rule, and led them to a great destiny. A Holy Roman Emperor (Maximilian) contrasted the new monarchs with himself as follows: 'The Emperor is indeed a king of kings, for no one feels bound to obey him; and the King of Spain is a king of men, for, though resisted, he is still obeyed; but the King of France is a king of beasts, for him none dare gainsay.'
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A national anthem is a patriotic hymn or other song adopted by a nation for use on public or state occasions. The British national anthem, God Save The King/Queen, is attributed to John Bull but was probably a folk song before him.
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The National Assembly was a body constituted by the French third estate in June 1789 after the calling of the Estates General. It was dissolved in September 1791 to be replaced by the new Legislative Assembly.
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The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is an American organisation founded in 1909 to ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of rights of all persons and to eliminate racial hatred and racial discrimination within the USA.
The NAACP works towards a society in which all individuals have equal rights and there is no racial hatred or racial discrimination. Though, in 2007, after nearly one hundred years and with racism rife in the USA this objective seems almost a pipedream. Indeed in October 2007 the NAACP declared a State of Emergency in response to the recent surge in assaults against young African Americans as demonstrated by the boot camp beating death of Martin Lee Anderson, noose hangings in Jena, Louisiana and other communities, and the assault by police on Shelwanda Riley a 15-year old girl who was thrown around, punched and pepper sprayed by a Fort Pierce, Florida police officer, a man roughly twice her size, as he tried to arrest her for a non-violent curfew violation.
The NAACP declares the following objectives:
- To ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of all citizens
- To achieve equality of rights and eliminate race prejudice among the citizens of the United States
- To remove all barriers of racial discrimination through democratic processes
- To seek enactment and enforcement of federal, state, and local laws securing civil rights
- To inform the public of the adverse effects of racial discrimination and to seek its elimination
- To educate persons as to their constitutional rights and to take all lawful action to secure the exercise thereof, and to take any other lawful action in furtherance of these objectives, consistent with the NAACP's Articles of Incorporation and this Constitution.
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The National Convention is a convention held every four years by each major US political party to choose its presidential candidate. In French history, the National Convention was the longest lasting of the revolutionary assemblies, lasting from September 1792 to October 1795, when it was replaced by the Directory.
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The National Country Party is an Australian political party drawing its main support from rural areas. The name is often shortened to National Party.
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The National Crime Syndicate was an American criminal organisation established in the 1930s by Charles Luciano (known as Lucky Luciano) which controlled almost all the serious crime in the USA, such as prostitution, gambling and bootlegging. By the 1940's, the age of the gangster had gone and the members of the National Crime Syndicate transferred their ruthless business acumen into forming corporations.
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In England and Wales, the National Curriculum is the curriculum of subjects taught in state schools progressively from 1989. There are ten foundation subjects: English, maths, and science (the core subjects); art, design and technology, geography, history, music, physical education, and a foreign language. Pupils are assessed according to specified attainment targets throughout each of four key stages.
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The National Front is a British political party of the right with racist and other extremist policies, but little support. It was formed in 1967 at London.
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The National Gallery is an art gallery in London. It was started in 1824 when the British government purchased the Angerstein collection of 38 pictures for 57,000 pounds. The first exhibition of them took place on the 10th of May 1824 in Pall-mall.
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The National Health Service is a British system of national medical services founded in 1948 and financed mainly by taxation.
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The National Intelligencer was an American tri-weekly newspaper established in Washington by Samuel H Smith, in 1800, as the organ of Jefferson's administration. This journal was in reality an offshoot of a publication begun at Philadelphia in 1793 by Joseph Gales, the elder. Gales was an English immigrant, whose republican principles had forced him to leave England. In 1810 Joseph Gales Jr, became one of the editors of the National Intelligencer and was joined in 1813 by William Seaton, also an English immigrant. This paper wielded considerable influence in political circles. Its publication was suspended in 1866.
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The National Physical Laboratory is a British establishment founded in 1900 at Teddington to carry out research in physics and monitor standards of measurement.
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The National Portrait Gallery is an art gallery in London, established in 1856, displaying portraits and photographs of eminent figures in British history.
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In America, the National Republican Party was the name assumed by those who broke away from the old Democratic-Republican party after the defeat of Adams by Jackson in 1828. Jackson's drift against the bank, protective tariff and other features of Adams' policy brought about their open organization. In 1831 they nominated Clay and indorsed a protective tariff, a system of internal improvements, and a cessation of removals from office for political reasons. Clay was defeated. In 1835 the party, reinforced by other elements, took the name of Whig.
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On March the 29th, 1806, the American Congress authorized the President to •appoint three commissioners to lay out a road from Cumberland on the Potomac, to the Ohio River, and $30,000 were appropriated for the expenses. The road was built as far as Illinois in 1838, the last act in its favour being of May 25 of that year. The total amount appropriated was $6,831,246. Bills appropriating money for this were often opposed in the American Congress on grounds of the unconstitutionality of appropriations for internal improvements.
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National Socialism was the doctrines and practices of the Nazis, involving the supremacy of Hitler as Fuhrer, anti-Semitism, state control of the economy, and national expansion.
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The National Trust is an independent British charity, founded in 1895, that acquires and protects country houses, castles, gardens, and places of interest or natural beauty.
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Natural increase is the difference between the number of births and the number of deaths in a particular population over a particular period. To find out whether a population is increasing or decreasing it is also necessary to know the net migration rate (the difference between emigration and immigration).
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Natural justice refers to the minimum standard of fairness to be applied when resolving a dispute. The main rules of natural justice include: (1) the right to be heard - each party to the dispute should be given an opportunity to answer any allegations made by the other party; (2) the rule against bias - the person involved in settling the dispute should act impartially, in particular by disclosing any interest he may have in the outcome of the dispute. The rules of natural justice apply equally in judicial as well as in administrative proceedings. Alleging a breach of natural justice is the method commonly used to challenge an administrative decision before the courts.
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Natural deduction is a system of formal logic that has no axioms but permits the assumption of premises of an argument. Such a system uses sequents to record which assumptions are operative at any stage.
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Naturalism was a literary and artistic movement of the late 19th century that was characterised by the use of realistic techniques to express the philosophical belief that everything can be explained by natural or material causes. Its literary manifesto was Le Roman experimentale, by Zola, published in 1880. In philosophy, naturalism is a movement affirming that nature is the whole of reality and can be understood only through scientific investigation. Denying the existence of the supernatural and de-emphasising metaphysics, or the study of the ultimate nature of reality, naturalism affirms that cause-and-effect relationships, as in physics and chemistry, are sufficient to account for all phenomena. Teleological conceptions, which suggest design and metaphysical necessity in nature, while not necessarily invalid, are excluded from consideration. The ethical implication, since the naturalist denies any transcendent or supernatural end for humankind, is that values must be found within the social context. It is impossible to
determine what is best in an ultimate context, because the ultimate is beyond discovery. Values, therefore, are relative, and ethics is based on custom, inclination, or some form of utilitarianism, the doctrine that what is useful is good.
Naturalism is rooted in British empiricism, the doctrine that all knowledge is derived from experience, and in European positivism, the doctrine that denies any validity to metaphysical speculation. It came to full flower in the late 19th and 20th-century works of the American philosophers George Santayana, John Dewey, and their followers.
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Nature is a weekly illustrated pseudo-scientific journal. It first appeared on the 4th of November 1869 edited by Joseph Norman Lockyer.
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The Nature Conservancy Council is a body, set up by act of parliament in 1973, that establishes and manages nature reserves and is concerned in matters affecting nature conservation in Britain. It undertakes research, provides information, and advises government ministers.
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Nature worship is a religious devotion paid either to nature as a deified collective entity or to all things in nature, including the elements, celestial bodies, plants, animals, and humanity. The worship of the elements does not seem to occur in the most rudimentary religions but frequently arises in later stages of religious development. The worship of fire, found among many primitive peoples, reached its highest development in the ancient Parsis sect of Persia. Celestial bodies have been deified in the religious systems of primitive and highly civilised peoples alike. The Khoikhoi of South Africa worship the moon; sun worship was practised by the Iroquois, the Plains Indians, and the Tsimshian Indians of North America and reached a high state of development among the Indians of Mexico and Peru. The sun was also a Hindu deity, regarded as evil by the Dravidians of southern India, but considered good by the Munda of the central parts. The Babylonians were sun worshipers, and in ancient Persia worship of the sun was an integral
part of the cult of Mithra. The ancient Egyptians worshiped the sun god Ra; they also apotheosised the moon and the star Sirius. Other Egyptian deities included the constellations and the circumpolar stars. Plants and trees have been worshiped as totems or because of their usefulness, beauty, or fear- inspiring aspect. They are considered either as holy in themselves or as the dwelling places of spirits. Both the soma plant of India and the coca shrub of Peru have been worshiped for the intoxicating properties of products derived from them. Field crops, regarded as harbouring spirits of fertility, have been worshiped both by primitive tribes and by the peasants of Europe, among whom traces of the cult may still be found.
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The Navigation Act of 1485 was passed by Henry VII so as to build up a Merchant Navy. The Act ordained that the Bordeaux wines brought to Britain were to be carried only in English ships manned by English, Irish or Welsh sailors.
A later Navigation Act, was promulgated by the British Government in 1651 (or even, in a sense, in 1645) for the protection of British commerce and the carrying trade. Its renewal with a few changes was made in 1660, soon after the accession of Charles II. The act related to five subjects: Coasting trade; fisheries; commerce with the colonies; commerce with European countries; commerce with Asia, Africa and America, and was chiefly a move in England's struggle with the Dutch for the possession of the carrying trade of the world. Parts of the Act provided that all colonial trade should be carried on in ships built and owned in England and the colonies, (a provision which powerfully stimulated colonial ship-building) and that, in the case of many specified goods, trade should be with England only. The act was largely rendered inoperative by colonial smuggling. The efforts at last made to enforce it were among the chief causes of the American War Of Independence.
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A neap tide is either of the two tides that occur at the first or last quarter of the moon when the tide-generating forces of the sun and moon oppose each other and produce the smallest rise and fall in tidal level.
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In meteorology, a near gale is a wind of force seven on the Beaufort scale or from 32-38 mph.
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The near point is the closest position to the eye to which an object may be brought and still be seen clearly. For a normal human eye the near point is about 25 cm; however, it gradually moves further away with age, particularly after the age of 40.
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Neat's-foot Oil was a lubricant used for fine machinery and in leather dressing. It was obtained by boiling the feet of cattle or horses or sheep and consisted chiefly of olein, and was of a pale yellow colour and odourless.
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The Necker cube is a line drawing showing the 12 edges of a transparent cube, so that it can be seen alternately facing in two different directions. It is an example of an ambiguous figure.
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Necrolatry is the worship of the dead.
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Necrophilia (necromania or necrophilism) is sexual intercourse with dead bodies.
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Needlepoint is a type of embroidery done on canvas with the same stitch throughout so as to resemble a tapestry.
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Negritude is a concept that reasserts black African cultural and aesthetic values against European colonialism; stating most simply that black intuition is opposed to European logic. It has been current since the 1930s, when it was used originally among French-speaking African writers and intellectuals to emphasise their pride in their own culture. Its adherents have included Leopold Senghor and the Martinique poet, playwright, and politician Aime Cesaire.
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The Negro Plot was an alleged terrorist even that occurred on March the 18th, 1741 in New York. A fire occurred in the chapel and barracks at Fort George on the Battery in New York. It was generally believed to be accidental, but charges were set afloat that it arose from a plot by the negroes to burn the town. Eight other fires of a mysterious nature within a month strengthened this belief. Mary Burton, a servant of one John Hughson, furnished testimony implicating a number of sailors and negroes. Twenty whites and over 160 slaves were seized and imprisoned. Finally Mary Burton's accusations inculpated persons of such character that danger from that direction checked the fury. It was charged that the Spanish were inciting plots among the negroes through Roman Catholic priests. Four whites were hanged, eighteen negroes hanged and thirteen burned at the stake.
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The Nehru Report was a constitution drafted for India in 1928. After Indian nationalists rejected the Simon Commission of 1927, an all-party committee was set up, chaired by Motilal Nehru to map out a constitution. Established to counter British charges that Indians could not find a constitutional consensus among themselves, it advocated that India be given dominion status of complete internal self-government. Many members of the Congress preferred complete independence to dominion status, and in 1929 announced a campaign of civil disobedience to support their demands.
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In town planning, the theory behind the concept of the neighbourhood is that, so as to foster the life of a community, it is necessary to break down the totality of a town's population into groups which are small enough to acquire a sense of identification with a locality. What is important is that a town should be broken down for many purposes into a series of, as it were, inward-looking villages within the area of the town. Only for special purposes, - such as work or entertainment, should the inhabitants of a neighbourhood unit need to go outside their locality. It should have its own group of shops catering for the essential requirements of life, its social centre (the Neighbourhood Centre), its own secondary school and a number of tributary primary schools, its own clinic, banks and post office, and recreational space of its own.
The Neighbourhood Unit is the area of a community of people, small enough to acquire a sense of local identification, but large enough to support a secondary school. This requires at least 5000 people. The pattern of the neighbourhood is determined by convenience of access from home to school and community centre, and by the policy of making major traffic routes go round it and not through it. Many of the British post-war New Towns around London, such as Crawley New Town and Stevenage, were planned as a series of neighbourhood units. The major road system and belts of open space divided the neighbourhoods from one another. Certain areas were set aside for industry and open space. All the neighbourhoods converged upon the town centre, which contained more elaborate facilities than the neighbourhood centres. The only objections to the neighbourhood principle, as it was applied in the New Towns of the 1950's, were that they took up so much space that they were costly to live in, and that people were so wedded to separate family living that any sense of community was difficult to build up. It was possible to speak of 'new town blues', the sense of isolation which arises when the bright lights of the town centre are so distant that the effort involved in travelling centrewards is too great, and people therefore prefer to sit at home in front of their television sets.
A later stage in the evolution of the neighbourhood principle has been the attempt to provide an environment for social groups rather than for single families. This was a reaction against the individualism which had tended to run riot. The appropriate type of building for the social group was though to be the tall slab-block of family flats. This was economical of space and building costs, since the slab-block is the shape that gives the greatest floor space in relation to space for circulation or movement. There was thought to be every likelihood of building up the spirit of group-living when the flats were let to families who hitherto had lived in the congested streets of obsolete houses which this new housing was designed to replace. There was, it was felt, a sense of security engendered by being surrounded by already familiar faces, and a degree of kinship from having shared the same experiences before coming to live in the slab-block, however encasing people in concrete boxes is unnatural and causes all sorts of mental disturbances which has led to these tower blocks becoming very unpopular, indeed they are now considered one of the great architectural blunders of all time, fostering crime, deprivation and isolation rather than kinship.
The break from the Neighbourhood Unit principle came about 1960 with the planning of the new town of Cumbernauld, between Stirling and Glasgow.
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A Neighbourhood Watch is a local crime-prevention scheme. Under the supervision of police, groups of residents agree to increase watchfulness in order to prevent crimes such as burglary and vandalism in their area. The first such group in the UK was started in Cheshire in 1982 following a US model. By 1990 there were an estimated 74,000 groups.
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Neighbours is an Australian television soap-opera created by Reg Watson, chronicling the lives of the residents of Ramsay Street in the fictional Australian suburb of Erinsborough. Neighbours was first aired in 1985 and appeals particularly to teenagers.
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Neo-Lamarckism is a modern theory of evolution based on Lamarckism and emphasising the influence of environmental factors on genetic changes.
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Neoimpressionism is a movement in French painting initiated mainly by Seurat in the 1880s and combining his vivid colour technique with strictly formal composition.
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The Neolithic period was the cultural period that lasted in south-west Asia from about 9000 to 6000 BC. and in Europe from about 4000 to 2400 BC and was characterised by primitive crop growing and stock rearing and the use of polished stone and flint tools and weapons.
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Neophilia is a tendency to like anything new.
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Neoplasticism is a style of abstract painting evolved by Mondrian and the Dutch de Stijl movement. It is characterised by the use of horizontal and vertical lines and planes and by black, white, grey, and primary colours.
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Neoplatonism is a philosophical system which was first developed in the 3rd century as a synthesis of Platonic, Pythagorean, and Aristotelian elements, and which, although originally opposed to Christianity, later incorporated it. It dominated European thought until the 13th century and re-emerged during the Renaissance.
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The neper is a unit used for comparing two currents, in a similar way to the bel or decibel.
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Nephology is the study of clouds.
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Nepotism is a term for favouritism shown to relatives or close friends by those with power or influence, for example a director of a company only employing friends and relatives, even though better suited candidates are available.
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Neptune is the eighth planet from the sun. It has eight satellites, the largest being Triton and Nereid, and a faint planar system of rings or ring fragments. It has a mean distance from the sun of 4497 million km and takes 164.8 years to orbit the sun and 14 hours to rotate.
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Nestorianism is the doctrine that Christ was two distinct persons, divine and human, implying a denial that the Virgin Mary was the mother of God. It is attributed to Nestorius and survives in the Iraqi Church.
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A netsuke is a Japanese carved toggle, usually made of wood or ivory, originally used to tether a medicine box or purse, worn dangling from the waist.
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Neurolinguistics is the branch of linguistics that deals with the encoding of the language faculty in the brain.
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Neutral monism is the philosophical doctrine that the mind and the body are both constructs of the same elements which cannot themselves be classified either as mental or physical.
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A neutron star is a star that has collapsed under its own gravity. It is composed solely of neutrons, has a mass of between 1.4 and about three times that of the sun, and a density in excess of 107 kilograms per cubic metre.
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In geography, neve is snow which has become a hard crystalline mass, but has not been compacted into ice.
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New Age was a late 1980s philosophy characterised by a belief in alternative medicine, astrology, spiritualism, etc.
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The New Age Posse (NAP) were a phreaking gang operating in Britain during the mid-1990's. The three main members of the gang were 'Rage', 'Raven' and 'Incinerator'. In 1994 the NAP accessed the 'Apple Computers Info Line' (the Apple Computer company's call handling system) and reprogrammed many of the exchange numbers allowing people in the know to dial a British free-call telephone number after six in the evening and by entering one of several three-digit codes, have their call connected to various computer virus, hacking, pirate software bulletin boards or chat-lines around the world, with the cost of the call being billed to the Apple Info Line, and not the person making the call.
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The New England Courant was the fourth newspaper published in the American colonies. It was established in 1721 at Boston, by James Franklin, who had been deprived of the printing of the Boston News Letter. Franklin's friends were much opposed to the publication of a new journal, for they thought one quite sufficient for the entire continent. But James Franklin inaugurated a new departure in journalism by attacking the Government officials and lampooning the clergy. On this account the suppression of his paper was threatened, where upon Benjamin Franklin assumed the editorship, and continued the publication with the same freedom. It was finally suppressed in 1727.
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The New England Emigrant Company was a corporation formed at Boston in 1855 to control emigration to the newly formed Territory of Kansas in the interest of the anti-slavery party. Slavery in Kansas had been made possible by the adoption of the Kansas-Nebraska bill, and slavery advocates in Missouri were actively at work for its establishment. The Emigrant Company aided immeasurably in making Kansas a free State.
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The New English Art Club is a British society founded in 1886 by a group of artists whose progressive work was being largely rejected by the Royal Academy. Their work was largely influenced by recent French work.
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The New English Bible is a new Modern English version of the Bible and Apocrypha, published in full in 1970.
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New Guinea Pidgin is the variety of Neo-Melanesian spoken in Papua New Guinea and the neighbouring islands.
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The New Hampshire Gazette was a newspaper established in 1756 at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, by D. Fowle. This was the first newspaper in the State. In 1773 it was called the New Hampshire Gazette and Historical Chronicler in 1776 the Freeman's Journal or New Hampshire Gazette; in 1788 the New Hampshire Gazette and General Advertiser; in 1796 the New Hampshire Gazette again. At the end of the 19th century it was published as the weekly edition of the Daily Chronicle established in 1852.
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The New Jersey Plan was a scheme of a Federal Constitution suggested in the Convention of 1787 by William Paterson, of New Jersey, on June the 15th. It proposed: The enlargement and correction of the Articles of Confederation; that Congress should remain a single body, and should regulate taxation and commerce, and should choose the executive; that requisitions from States should be continued; that a judiciary should be established; that naturalization should be uniform; that the executive should coerce refractory States or individuals, and other provisions of less importance. This plan was unfavourably reported, the Randolph plan being preferred, as creating a stronger government and doing more to remedy the defects of the Confederation.
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The New Jerusalem Church (New Church) was a sect founded in 1787 on the teachings of Swedenborg.
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The New Testament is the collection of writings consisting of the Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, Pauline and other Epistles, and the book of Revelation, composed soon after Christ's death and added to the Jewish writings of the Old Testament to make up the Christian Bible.
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New towns were a British initiative passed in 1946 with the object of decentralising the population and industry from London and the other major British cities. Initially fifteen new towns were designated, twelve for England and Wales and three for Scotland, each town was to be self-contained and locally governed with a mixed population to provide a balanced social life. By the 1960s half a million people lived in the fifteen new towns, but pressure on the major cities remained acute.
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The New York Gazette was established as the first news journal of New York by William Bradford in New York City in 1725. It was discontinued about 1742, but was begun again the same year by James Parker as the Gazette and Weekly Post Boy. Parker formed a partnership with Holt. The latter published the paper alone for some years, but then relinquished it to Parker, when he started his Journal. Parker died in 1770, and the Gazette survived him only two years, most of its subscribers having followed Holt and the Journal. It was finally suspended in 1772. This newspaper was the organ of the New York government and steadily supported the latter through a period of bitter controversy.
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The New York Herald is an American newspaper. It was founded in 1835 by James Gordon Bennet, a native of Scotland. The price was one penny, and the first numbers were printed on a four page paper 30 x 24. The Herald was a lively competitor with the New York Sun for the support of the masses. From its beginning a specialty was made of shipping news. The editor proposed that the Herald should be an independent journal. The price was afterward raised to three cents.
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The New York Packet and American Advertiser was a newspaper founded in New York City, in 1776, by Samuel London and was at first issued as a weekly. It was afterward removed to Fishkill, but brought back to New York after the American War Of Independence and published there during several years as a daily. It was then suspended.
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The New York Sun was the first successful penny paper established in the United States. It was founded in September, 1833, by Benjamin H Day, a printer, who promised in his prospectus to publish all the news of the day for one penny. The success of the paper was due rather to the demand of the people for such a journal than to its able management. The first number was a folio of twelve columns, ten inches to the column. The price was raised to two cents per copy after the American Civil War.
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The New York Times was established in 1850 by Henry J Raymond, who had been associated with Horace Greeley in the editorship of the Tribune. The Times had a strong financial backing and gained an immediate success. It became a member of the Associated Press in the year of its initial appearance, and remained one of the most important of American papers.
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The New York Tribune is an American newspaper. It was founded as a halfpenny paper in 1841 by Horace Greeley. It was at first a Whig journal, devoted to the fortunes of Henry Clay, and subsequently the leading republican journal of the USA.
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The New York Weekly Journal was the second newspaper issued in the colony of New York. It was considered a prototype of the modern American political journal. John Peter Zenger established the paper in New York City in 1733, the first issue appearing on November the 3rd. It was founded avowedly for the purpose of opposing the administration of Governor Cosby. The columns were filled with sharp criticisms and poetical fusillades, contributed by opponents of the Government. Its publication was suspended in 1752, but revived by John Holt in 1766, with new types and printing apparatus.
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The Newburg Addresses were two anonymous appeals issued in 1783 to the officers of George Washington's army, then encamped at Newburgh, to hold a meeting for the consideration of the question of the money then due them by Congress. The addresses were written by Captain Armstrong, of Pennsylvania, and were supposed to have been instigated by the Gates faction. George Washington immediately denounced the meeting as subversive of discipline, and called a regular meeting of the officers for March the 16th. Gates was placed in the chair, and George Washington's friends carried motions declaring their unshaken confidence in Congress, and denouncing the 'infamous proposals' of the anonymous addresses.
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The Newport Mercury was the second newspaper published in Rhode Island. It was founded and edited by James Franklin, and the first numbers appeared at Newport in September, 1758. This journal attained considerable success, becoming at once self-supporting.
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A newspaper is a publication reporting and commenting upon news. The first periodicals were published by the Romans., the first newspapers proper were produced in Venice by the government, published monthly during the war of 1563 against the Turks.
The first genuine newspaper established in the United States was the Boston News Letter founded at Boston in 1704 by Postmaster John Campbell, and continued until 1776. Previous to this there had been
issued at Boston three publications of one number each. Of these the first, called a Newspaper Extraordinary consisted wholly of extracts from a letter of Dr. Increase Mather, who was then in London endeavouring to obtain a new charter for Massachusetts. This letter was published by Samuel Green in 1689.
On September the 25th, 1690, appeared the first and only number of
Publick Occurrences Foreign and Domestic issued by Benjamin Harris. The authorities promptly seized and suppressed the paper as 'a pamphlet published contrary to law and containing reflections of a very high nature'. In 1697 B Green and J Allen republished a news letter, bearing no title, which had been issued in London the same year. It was printed on a single page, .and contained small news items from the continent. After the Boston News Letter there appeared in 1719 the Boston Gazette Andrew Bradford issuing the American Weekly Mercury at Philadelphia the same year. James Franklin established the New England Courant at Boston two years later. This was suppressed for its attacks upon the Government and clergy, but was revived by Benjamin Franklin. William Bradford began the Gazette at New York in 1725, and John Peter Zenger the New York Weekly Journal in 1733, in the cause of the people against the Colonial Government. Zenger's paper may be regarded as a prototype of the modern news journal. Newspapers were founded in the other American colonies in the following order: In Maryland, at Annapolis, in 1727; in South Carolina, at Charleston, in 1731; in Rhode Island, at Newport, in 1731; in Virginia, at Williamsburg, in 1736; in North Carolina, at New Berne, in 1755; in Connecticut, at New Haven, in 1755; in New Hampshire, at Portsmouth, in 1756; in Georgia, at Savannah, in 1763; in Vermont, at Westminster, in 1781.
Between 1704 and 1775 seventy-eight different newspapers had been printed with varied success in the American colonies. Of these, thirty-nine were in actual process of publication at the outbreak of the American War of Independence. The papers most influential in advancing the revolutionary cause were the Boston Gazette and the Massachusetts Spy, On the British occupation of Boston, New York and Philadelphia, most of the Whig journals were suspended. It has been estimated that the thirty-nine newspapers of 1775 circulated about 1,300,000 copies annually.
After the Federal Constitution was adopted in America the newspapers fell largely into the hands of English immigrants, men of versatility and talent. Violent partisan controversies arose. The most influential papers of this period were the Columbian Centinel, published at Boston during forty years, commencing in 1784, by Benjamin Russell; the New York Minerva, established at New York in 1793 by Noah Webster; the New York Evening Post, established as the central organ of the Federalists in 1801; the Philadelphia Aurora, founded by Benjamin Franklin Bache in 1790, and afterward edited with vindictive partisanship by William Duane, an Englishman; the Philadelphia National Gazette, established in 1791 by Philip Freneau; and the National Intelligencer, established at Washington by Samuel H Smith in 1800.
The first American daily newspaper was the American Daily Advertiser, appearing in Philadelphia in 1784. In 1810 there were twenty-seven daily newspapers in existence. They were published in New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans, Charleston, Alexandria, Virginia, and Georgetown, District of Columbia. By 1880 they had increased to 968.
The first American penny paper was the New York Sun, established in 1833 by Benjamin Day. The first American Sunday paper was the Sunday Courier, appearing in New York in 1825, with but little success. The chief period of the political influence of editors in the United States was that beginning in 1830 and ending after the American Civil War. Before that date the editor was often of little account, but from 1830 to 1870 the paper was often known chiefly as the organ of the individual editor's opinions.
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Newton's cradle is an ornamental puzzle consisting of a frame in which five metal balls are suspended in such a way that when one is moved it sets all the others in motion in turn.
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The Nicene Council was the first council of Nicaea, the first general council of the Church, held in 325 A.D. to settle the Arian controversy. A second council of Nicaea, the seventh general council of the Church, was held in 787 A.D. to settle the question of images.
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The Nicene Creed was the formal summary of Christian beliefs promulgated at the first council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. The Nicene Creed is a longer formulation of Christian beliefs authorised at the council of Constantinople in 381, and now used in most Christian liturgies.
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In Uganda, a night dancer is a person believed to employ the help of the dead in destroying other people.
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A Nightingale ward is a long hospital ward with beds on either side and the nurses' station in the middle.
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Niles's Register was an American weekly journal established at Baltimore by Hezekiah Niles in 1811, and discontinued by his son in 1849. It was a weekly repository of the documentary and political history of the United States, reported with impartiality and fidelity. These reports were made with a fullness not attempted by the local newspapers. Niles's Register had a large circulation for many years. It was frequently quoted by historical writers.
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Nimbostratus is a type of cloud, low, dark grey and trailing.
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A nimbus is a bright cloud or halo added to pictures of saints etc. implying deity.
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No pants day is an International holiday celebrated on the first Friday in May in several western countries. The holiday is observed by not wearing trousers.
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Originally a noggin was a small cup or mug developed during the mid-17th century. By the end of the 17th century the term was applied to a measure (usually a quarter of a pint, the size of a noggin vessel) of alcoholic liquor.
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Nominalism is a philosophical view which denies the existence of abstract objects and universals, holding that these are not required to explain the significance of words apparently referring to them. Nominalism holds that all that really exists are particular, usually physical, objects, and that properties, numbers, and sets (for instance) are not further things in the world, but merely features of our way of thinking or speaking about those things that do exist. In making claims about what there really is,
nominalism is a thesis about existence; but it also involves views about meaning related to reductionism.
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The Non-Importation Agreement was a compact entered into by the merchants of New York and Boston in 1765, unanimously binding themselves to order no new merchandise from England and to countermand old orders. This was in retaliation for the Stamp Act. The agreement was rendered in 1767 in consequence of the Townshend Acts and was strictly observed until 1770, when tea only was prohibited.
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The Non-intercourse Act was an Act of the American Congress passed on March the 1st, 1809, to be substituted for the Non-importation Act and the embargo. It was to continue until the next session of Congress, but was revived by the Acts of June the 28th, 1809, May the 1st, 1810, and March the 2nd, 1811. It forbade the entrance to American ports of public or private British or French vessels, all commercial intercourse with France or Great Britain, and the importation, after May the 20th, 1809, of goods grown or manufactured in France or Great Britain or their colonies.
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In the Roman calendar, the nones were the fifth day of each month, excepting March, May, July and October when the nones fell on the seventh day.
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A noose is a loop with a running knot which tightens as the string is pulled.
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In 1789 the Spaniards seized a number of British vessels in Nootka Sound, in what was then called California, on the ground that they were intruding on Spanish possessions. War nearly resulted. But by the provisions of the so-called Nootka Convention, held on October the 28th, 1790, England and Spain agreed to trade along the coast side by side, respecting each other's settlements.
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Norma (the Rule or Square) is a southern constellation adjacent to Circinus, formed by Lacaille in 1752. The outburst of Nova Normae was recorded on a photograph taken by Bailey in July 1893, and was discovered by examination of the photograph by Mrs Fleming.
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The term Norse refers to ancient Norway.
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The North American Review was a review founded in 1815 by William Tudor, at Boston, and originally published every two months, though afterwards monthly. Among its contents were found, beside reviews, a variety of miscellaneous and poetical articles. It soon passed into the control of an association of literary men, who met regularly in their editorial capacity. Many changes were made in the magazine and an uniform high standard was maintained throughout. Its earlier files contain the best collection of American literary, political, critical and scientific thought during the first sixty or seventy years from its foundation.
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The North Carolina Gazette was the first newspaper issued in North Carolina. It was established at New Berne in 1749 by James Davis. Its publication was suspended in 1761, but it was revived in 1768. Publication was finally suspended at the outbreak of the American War of Independence.
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The North Star (polestar) is a conspicuous star in the northern hemisphere, located closest to the point toward which the axis of the earth is directed, thus roughly marking the location of the north celestial pole. A polestar has been used by navigators throughout recorded history for charting navigation routes and is still used for determining true azimuth and astronomic latitude. The positions of the celestial poles change as the earth's axis moves with the earth's processional motion, and as the north celestial pole assumes different positions relative to the constellations, different stars become the North Star. During the past 5000 years the line of direction of the North Pole has moved from the star Thuban, or Alpha Draconis, in the constellation Draco, to within one degree of the bright star Polaris in the constellation Ursa Minor, which is now the North Star.
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The Northup Case was a tragic kidnapping for slavery case which occurred in the USA during the 19th century. Solomon Northup, the son of a freedman, was enticed from his home in Saratoga where he had a family and earned a comfortable livelihood. He was drugged and carried to Washington where he was placed in a slave pen. He was then conveyed South and sold to a hard master with whom he remained for twelve years. He was at length rescued from his servitude through the efforts of Northern friends.
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The Northwest Boundary Question was a historic territorial dispute in North America. The territory bounded north by latitude 54 degrees 40 minutes, east by the Rocky Mountains, south by latitude 42 degrees, and west by the Pacific Ocean has been claimed at various times and to various extents by Russia, Spain, Great Britain and the United States. The Russian claim, which rested mainly upon occupation by fur traders, was settled by a treaty made on January 11, 1825. Under this treaty the United States were to make no-settlements north of latitude 54 degrees 40 minutes and Russia none south of that latitude. England and Russia agreed upon the same terms.
The Spanish claims were confined south of latitude 42 degrees by the treaty which ceded Florida in 1819. Great Britain had little or no claim by discovery. The United States' claim rested upon the voyage of Gray up the Columbia River in 1792, and the explorations of Lewis and Clark through the Rocky Mountains and through the Oregon country in 1805-06, under the orders of Jefferson. By the treaty of October the 20th, 1818, the whole territory west of the Rocky Mountains was to be opened to both countries for ten years, and, in 1827, the joint occupation for an indefinite period was agreed upon. Later this produced dissatisfaction, and after considerable negotiation, Great Britain was induced in 1846 to accept latitude 49 degrees as the boundary from the Rocky Mountains to the channel between Vancouver's Island and the mainland.
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The Northwest Territory, consisting of the area west of Pennsylvania, north of the Ohio River, and east of the Mississippi, came under the control of the Continental Congress by reason of the cessions made by Virginia in 1784, New York in 1782, Massachusetts in 1785 and Connecticut in 1786. In 1784 Jefferson brought forward an ordinance for the government of this territory. Its leading features were that it provided for its erection into States, and their entrance into the Union on equal terms with the rest. A clause which would have prohibited slavery after 1800 was voted down.
In 1787 a new ordinance was framed upon this and passed on September the 13th. The credit of its final form, including the forbidding of slavery, has been attributed to Nathan Dane member of the Continental Congress from Massachusetts, and, to Dr. Manasseh Cutler, of the same State, agent of the Ohio Company. The ordinance provided that no land was to be taken up until it had been purchased from the Indians and offered for sale by the United States; no property qualification was required of electors or elected; a temporary government, consisting of an appointed governor and law-making judges might be established until the adult male population of the territory increased to 5000; then a permanent and representative government would be permitted, with the right of sending a representative to Congress, who should debate, but not vote. When the number of inhabitants in any of the five divisions of the territory equalled 60,000, it should be admitted as a new State; the new States should remain forever a part of the United States; should bear the same relation to the Government as the original States; should pay their apportionment of the Federal debts; should in their governments uphold republican forms, and slavery should exist in none of them. It also provided for equal division of the property of intestates, and for the surrender of fugitive slaves from the States.
Under this government Arthur St Clair was Governor of the territory from 1788 to 1802, when Ohio became a State. The western portions were then organized as the Territory of Indiana, the northern as the Territory of Michigan, in 1805.
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Nose is the unit of measurement of quantity of horses.
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A notary public is a legal practitioner, usually a solicitor, who is empowered to attest deeds and other documents and notes dishonoured bills of exchange.
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A nova is a faint star that suddenly erupts in brightness.
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In America, nullification is the formal suspension by a State government of the operation of a law of the United States within the territory under the jurisdiction of the State. It was first suggested as the rightful remedy in the case of illegal stretches of Federal legislative authority, in the Kentucky Resolutions of 1799. Practical exemplifications of its operation were afforded by Pennsylvania in the Olmstead case in 1809, by Georgia in the matter of the Cherokees 1825 to 1830, etc. But the theory was most completely developed by John C Calhoun, and its most important application was in South Carolina in 1832, in her protest against the tariff of that year, which was exceedingly distasteful to the Southern States. Calhoun's nullification contemplated a suspension of the objectionable law by an aggrieved State, until three-fourths of the States in national convention should overrule the nullification. The question turned upon the dogma of State sovereignty. The State Legislature of 1832, made up of nullifiers, put the State in a position for war and passed various acts resuming powers expressly prohibited to the States by the Constitution. On December the 11th, President Jackson issued the 'nullification proclamation', declaring nullification to be incompatible with the existence of the Union and contrary to the Constitution. On February the 1st, 1833, a bill called the 'bloody bill', was passed by Congress, authorizing the enforcement of the tariff. On February the 26th, Clay submitted a compromise tariff bill, which was enacted. In consequence of this the South Carolina Convention repealed the nullification ordinance on March the 16th, 1833.
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Numerology is divination by numbers, usually involving encoding a person's name by assigning each letter a number and adding the resulting digits together.
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Numismatics is the study of coins and medals.
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A nursery rhyme is a short traditional poem or song for children. Usually limited to a couplet or quatrain with strongly marked rhythm and rhymes,
nursery rhymes have often been handed down by oral tradition. Some of the oldest nursery rhymes are connected with a traditional tune and were sung as accompaniment to ancient ring games, such as 'Here we go round the mulberry bush', which was part of the May Day festivities. Others contain fragments of incantations and other rites; still others have a factual basis and commemorated popular figures, such as Jack Sprat and Jack Horner.
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A nursery school or kindergarten is an educational establishment for children aged three to five. The first was established in Germany in 1836 by Friedrich Froebel. Provision of nursery education varies widely between countries. In the UK, fewer than half of three and four-year olds have nursery education. In France, all children attend a state-run ecole maternelle from the age of three. In Japan, education is compulsory only from the age of six, but 90% of children attend a private nursery school from the age of three. The first kindergarten in Britain was opened by a German exile, Johannes Ronge, in Hampstead, London, in 1851, based on the philosophy of Froebel. Nursery education was extended in 1911 to working- class children by Margaret McMillan and her sister Rachel, who worked in London's docklands. The Education Act of 1944 did not make nursery school compulsory. Increasing parental pressure from the 1960s led to a slow expansion, although at the end of the 1980s the UK still lagged behind most European countries in the provision of nursery-school places. Although 45% of three-and four-year-olds were in education in 1992, only half of these were in genuine nursery classes or schools; the rest were in primary classes.
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The nut and bolt is a common method of fastening pieces of metal or wood together. The nut consists of a small block (usually metal) with a threaded hole in the centre for screwing on to a threaded rod or pin (called a bolt or a screw). The method came into use at the turn of the 19th century, following Henry Maudslay's invention of a precision screw-cutting lathe.
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In astronomy, nutation is a slight 'nodding' of the Earth in space, caused by the varying gravitational pulls of the Sun and Moon. Nutation changes the angle of the Earth's axial tilt by about nine seconds of arc to either side of its mean position, a complete cycle taking just over 18.5 years.
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