for release. Others suggest that as the moon commences to wane as soon as it is at its full, so does the mutual affection of the wedded pair, the “honeymoon” (with this derivation) not necessarily referring to any definite period of time.
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| Honeysuckle.—(a) Flowering branch; (b) Flower, nat. size; (c) fruit, slightly reduced. |
HONEYSUCKLE (Mid. Eng., honysocle, i.e. any plant from which honey may be sucked,—cf. A.-S. huni-suge, privet; Ger. Geissblatt; Fr. chèvrefeuille), botanical name Lonicera, a genus of climbing, erect or prostrate shrubs, of the natural order Caprifoliaceae, so named after the 16th-century German botanist Adam Lonicer. The British species is L. Periclymenum, the woodbine; L. Caprifolium and L. Xylosteum are naturalized in a few counties in the south and east of England. Some of the garden varieties of the woodbine are very beautiful, and are held in high esteem for their delicious fragrance, even the wild plant, with its pale flowers, compensating for its sickly looks “with never-cloying odours.” The North American sub-evergreen L. sempervirens, with its fine heads of blossoms, commonly called the trumpet honeysuckle, the most handsome of all the cultivated honeysuckles, is a distinct and beautiful species producing both scarlet and yellow flowered varieties, and the Japanese L. flexuosa var. aureoreticulata is esteemed for its charmingly variegated leaves netted with golden yellow. The fly honeysuckle, L. Xylosteum, a hardy shrub of dwarfish, erect habit, and L. tatarica, of similar habit, both European, are amongst the oldest English garden shrubs, and bear axillary flowers of various colours, occurring two on a peduncle. There are numerous other species, many of them introduced to our gardens, and well worth cultivating in shrubberies or as climbers on walls and bowers, either for their beauty or the fragrance of their blossoms.
In the western counties of England, and generally by agriculturists, the name honeysuckle is applied to the meadow clover, Trifolium pratense. Another plant of the same family (Leguminosae) Hedysarum coronarium, a very handsome hardy biennial often seen in old-fashioned collections of garden plants, is commonly called the French honeysuckle. The name is moreover applied with various affixes to several other totally different plants. Thus white honeysuckle and false honeysuckle are names for the North American Azalea viscosa; Australian or heath honeysuckle is the Australian Banksia serrata, Jamaica honeysuckle, Passiflora laurifolia, dwarf honeysuckle the widely spread Cornus suecica, Virgin Mary’s honeysuckle the European Pulmonaria officinalis, while West Indian honeysuckle is Tecoma capensis, and is also a name applied to Desmodium.
The wood of the fly honeysuckle is extremely hard, and the clear portions between the joints of the stems, when their pith has been removed, were stated by Linnaeus to be utilized in Sweden for making tobacco-pipes. The wood is also employed to make teeth for rakes; and, like that of L. tatarica, it is a favourite material for walking-sticks.
Honeysuckles (Lonicera) flourish in any ordinary garden soil, but are usually sadly neglected in regard to pruning. This should be done about March, cutting out some of the old wood, and shortening back some of the younger growths of the preceding year. (J. Ws.)
HONFLEUR, a seaport of north-western France, in the department of Calvados, 57 m. N.E. of Caen by rail. Pop. (1906) 8735. The town is situated at the foot of a semicircle of hills, on the south shore of the Seine estuary, opposite Havre, with which it communicates by steamboat. Honfleur, with its dark narrow lanes and old houses, has the typical aspect of an old-fashioned seaport. The most noteworthy of its buildings is the church of St Catherine, constructed entirely of timber work, with the exception of the façade added in the 18th century, and consisting of two parallel naves, of which the more ancient is supposed to date from the end of the 15th century. Within the church are several antique statues and a painting by J. Jordaens—“Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane.” The church tower stands on the other side of a street. St Leonard’s dates from the 17th century, with the exception of its fine ogival portal and rose-window belonging to the 16th, and its octagonal tower erected in the 18th. The ruins of a 16th-century castle known as the Lieutenance and several houses of the same period are also of antiquarian interest. The hôtel de ville contains a library and a museum. On the rising ground above the town is the chapel of Nôtre-Dame-de-Grâce, a shrine much resorted to by pilgrim sailors, which is said to have been founded in 1034 by Robert the Magnificent of Normandy and rebuilt in 1606. The town has a tribunal and a chamber of commerce and a communal college. The port, which is protected from the west winds by the height known as the Côte de Grâce, consists of the tidal harbour and four floating basins—The West basin, dating from the 17th century, and the Centre, East and Carnot basins. A reservoir affords the means of sluicing the channel and supplying the basins. The surface available for vessels is about 27 acres. Numerous fishing and coasting vessels frequent the harbour. In 1907 there entered 375 vessels, of 133,872 tons, more than half this tonnage being British. The exports go mainly to England and include poultry, butter, eggs, cheese, chocolate, vegetables, fruit, seeds and purple ore. There is regular communication by steamer with Southampton. Timber from Scandinavia, English coal and artificial manures form the bulk of the imports. There are important saw-mills, as well as shipbuilding yards, manufactories of chemical manures and iron foundries.
Honfleur dates from the 11th century and is thus four or five hundred years older than its rival Havre, by which it was supplanted during the 18th century. During the Hundred Years’ War it was frequently taken and re-taken, the last occupation by the English ending in 1440. In 1562 the Protestant forces got possession of it only after a regular siege of the suburb of St Leonard; and though Henry IV. effected its capture in 1590 he had again to invest it in 1594 after all the rest of Normandy had submitted to his arms. In the earlier years of the 17th century Honfleur colonists founded Quebec, and Honfleur traders established factories in Java and Sumatra and a fishing establishment in Newfoundland.
HONG-KONG (properly Hiang-Kiang, the place of "sweet lagoons"), an important British island-possession, situated off the south-east coast of China, opposite the province of Kwang-tung, on the east side of the estuary of the Si-kiang, 38 m. E. of Macao and 75 S.E. of Canton, between 22° 9′ and 22° 1′ N., and 114° 5′ and 114° 18′ E. It is one of a small cluster named by the Portuguese “Ladrones” or Thieves, on account of the notorious habits of their old inhabitants. Extremely irregular in outline, it has an area of 29 sq. m., measuring 1012 m. in extreme length from N.E. to S.W., and varying in breadth from 2 to 5 m. A good military road about 22 m. long encircles the island. From the mainland it is separated by a narrow channel, which at Hong-Kong roads, between Victoria, the island capital), and Kowloon Point, is about 1 m. broad, and which narrows at Ly-ee-mun Pass to little over a 14 m. The southern coast in particular is deeply indented; and there two bold peninsulas, extending for several miles into the sea, form two capacious natural harbours, namely, Deep Water Bay, with the village of Stanley to the east, and Tytam Bay, which has a safe, well-protected entrance showing a depth of
