the hydrolysis of β-cyanbutyric acid. It crystallizes in small prisms which melt at 112° C. and are soluble in water. It forms an anhydride when heated. The sodium salt on heating with phosphorus trisulphide yields methylthiophen.
Ethylidene succinic acid or isosuccinic acid, CH3·CH(CO2H)2, is produced by the hydrolysis of α-cyanpropionic acid and by the action of methyl iodide on sodio-malonic ester. It crystallizes in prisms which melt at 120° C. (T. Salzer, Journ. prak. Chem., 1898 [2], 57, p. 497), and dissolve in water. It does not yield an anhydride, but when heated loses carbon dioxide and leaves a residue of propionic acid. It may be distinguished from the isomeric ethylene succinic acid by the fact that its sodium salt does not give a precipitate with ferric chloride.
SUCHER, ROSA (1849–), German opera singer, née Hasselbeck, was the wife of Josef Sucher (1844–1908), a well-known conductor and composer. They were married in 1876, when she had already had various engagements as a singer and he was conductor at the Leipzig city theatre. Frau Sucher soon became famous for her performances in Wagner’s operas, her seasons in London in 1882 and 1892 proving her great capacity both as singer and actress; in 1886 and 1888 she sang at Bayreuth, and in later years she was principally associated with the opera stage in Berlin, retiring in 1903. Her magnificent rendering of the part of Isolde in Wagner’s opera is especially remembered.
SUCHET, LOUIS GABRIEL, Duc D’Albuera da Valencia (1770–1826), marshal of France, one of the most brilliant of Napoleon’s generals, was the son of a silk manufacturer at Lyons,
where he was born on the 2nd of March 1770. He originally
intended to follow his father’s business; but having in 1792
served as volunteer in the cavalry of the national guard at
Lyons, he manifested military abilities which secured his rapid
promotion. As chef de bataillon he was present at the siege of
Toulon in 1793, where he took General O’Hara prisoner. During
the Italian campaign of 1796 he was severely wounded at Cerea
on the 11th of October. In October 1797 he was appointed to the
command of a demi-brigade, and his services, under loubert in the
Tirol in that year, and in Switzerland under Brune in 1797–98, were
recognized by his promotion to the rank of general of brigade.
He took no part in the Egyptian campaign, butlin August was
made chief of the staff to Brune, and restored the efficiency
and discipline of the army in Italy. In July 1799 he was made
general of division and chief of staff to Joubert in Italy, and
was in 1800 named by Masséna his second in command. His
dexterous resistance to the superior forces of the Austrians with
the left wing of Masséna’s army, when the right and centre were
shut up in Genoa, not only prevented the invasion of France
from this direction but contributed to the success of Napoleon’s
crossing the Alps, which culminated in the battle of Marengo
on the 14th of June. He took a prominent part in the Italian
campaign till the armistice of Treviso. Inthe campaigns of
1805 and 1806 he greatly increased his reputation at Austerlitz,
Saalfeld, Jena, Pultusk and Ostrolenka. He obtained the title
of count on the 19th of March 1808, married Mlle-de Saint
Joseph, a niece of Joseph Bonaparte’s wife, and soon afterwards
was ordered to Spain. Here, after taking part in the siege of
Saragossa, he was named commander of the army of Aragon and
governor of the province, which, by wise and (unlike that of most
of the French generals) disinterested administration no less
than by his brilliant valour, he in two years brought into complete
submission. He annihilated the army of Blake at Maria
on the 14th of June 1809, and on the 22nd of April 1810 defeated
O’Donnell at Lerida. After being made marshal of France
(July 8, 1811) he in 1812 achieved the conquest of Valencia,
for which he was rewarded with the title of duc d’Albufera da
Valencia (1812). When the tide set against the French Suchet
defended his conquests step by step till compelled to retire into
France, after which he took part in Soult’s defensive campaign.
By Louis XVIII. he was on the 4th of June made a peer of
France, but, having during the Hundred Days commanded
one of Napoleon’s armies on the Alpine frontier, he was deprived
of his peerage on the 24th of July 1815. He died near Marseilles
on the 3rd of January 1826. Suchet wrote Mémoires dealing
with the Peninsular War, which were left by the marshal in an
unfinished condition, and the two volumes and atlas appeared
in 1829–1834 under the editorship of his former chief staff
officer, Baron St Cyr-Nogués.
See C. H. Barault-Roullon, Le Maréchal Suchet (Paris, 1854); Choumara, Considerations militaires sur les mémoires du Maréchal Suchet (Paris, 1840), a controversial work on the last events of the Peninsular War, inspired, it is supposed, by Soult; and Lieutenant-General Lamarque’s obituary notice in the Spectateur militaire (1826). See also bibliography in article Peninsular War.
SU-CHOW. There are in China three cities of this name which deserve mention.
1. Su-chow-Fu, in the province of Kiang-su, formerly one of the largest cities in the world, and in 1907 credited still with a population of 500,000, on the Grand Canal, 55 m. W.N.W. of Shanghai, with which it is connected by railway. The site is practically a cluster of islands to the east of Lake Tai-hu. The walls are about 10 m. in circumference and there are four large suburbs. Its silk manufactures are represented by a greater variety of goods than are produced anywhere else in the empire; and the publication of cheap editions of the Chinese classics is carried to great perfection. There is a Chinese proverb to the effect that to be perfectly happy a man ought to be born in Su-chow, live in Canton and die in Lien-chow. The nine-storeyed pagoda of the northern temple is one of the finest in the country. In 1860 Su-chow was captured by the Tʽaipʽings, and when in 1863 it was recovered by General Gordon the city was almost a heap of ruins. It has since largely recovered its prosperity, and besides 7000 silk looms has cotton mills and an important trade in rice. Of the original splendour of the place some idea may be gathered from the beautiful plan on a slab of marble preserved since 1247 in the temple of Confucius and reproduced in Yule’s Marco Polo, vol. i. Su-chow was founded in 484 by Ho-lu-Wang, whose grave is covered by the artificial "Hill of the Tiger" in the vicinity of the town. The literary and poetic designation of Su-chow is Ku-su, from the great tower of Ku-su-tai, built by Ho-lu-Wang. Su-chow was opened to foreign trade by the Japanese treaty of 1895. A Chinese and European school was opened in 1900.
2. Su-chow, formerly Tsiu-tsuan-tsiun, a free city in the province of Kan-suh, in 39° 48′ N., just within the extreme north-west angle of the Great Wall, near the gate of jade. It is the great centre of the rhubarb trade. Completely destroyed in the great Mahommedan or Dungan insurrection (1865–72), it was recovered by the Chinese in 1873 and has been rebuilt.
3. Su-chow, a commercial town situated in the province of Sze-chʽuen at the junction of the Min River with the Yang-tse-Kiang, in 28° 46′ 50″ N. Population (1907) about 50,000.
SUCKLING, SIR JOHN (1609–1642), English poet, was born at Whitton, in the parish of Twickenham, Middlesex, and baptized there on the 10th of February 1609. His father, Sir John Suckling (1569–1627), had been knighted by James I. and was successively master of requests, comptroller of the household and secretary of state. He sat in the first and second parliaments of Charles I.’s reign, and was made a privy councillor. During his career he amassed a considerable fortune, of which the poet became master at the age of eighteen. He was sent to Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1623, and was entered at Gray’s Inn in 1627. He was intimate with Thomas Carew, Richard Lovelace, Thomas Nabbes and especially with John Hales and Sir William Davenant, who furnished John Aubrey with information about his friend. In 1628 he left London to travel in France and Italy, returning, however, before the autumn of 1630, when he was knighted. In 1631 he volunteered for the force raised by the marquess of Hamilton to serve under Gustavus Adolphus in Germany. He was back at Whitehall in May 1632; but during his short service he had been present at the battle of Breitenfeld and in many sieges. He was handsome, rich and generous; his happy gift in verse was only one of many accomplishments, but it commended him especially to Charles I. and his queen. He says of himself (“A Sessions of the Poets”) that he “prized black eyes or a lucky bit at bowls above all the trophies of wit.” He was the best card-player and the best bowler at court. Aubrey says that he
