808 ASHBY DE LA ZOUCH The extraordinary compliment of a vote of thanks for a diplomatic achievement was paid to Lord Ashburton, on the motion of Mr. Hume in the house of commons, and of Lord Broug- ham in the house of lords; and an earldom was offered to him, which he declined. The negotiations were facilitated by his high char- acter and intelligence, by his amiable disposi- tion, and by his excellent personal relations with Daniel Webster, then secretary of state, one of whose grandsons was named after him. Lord Ashburton was a privy councillor, a trus- tee of the British museum, and D. C. L. of Ox- ford. Talleyrand at one time confided to him the custody of his memoirs, and presented him with Canova's bust of Napoleon. He died at the country seat of his daughter Harriet, the widow of the marquis of Bath. His wife, who was a woman of superior accomplish- ments, died about six months after him. His eldest son, WILLIAM BINGHAM BARING, Lord Ashburton, who was a member of parliament for 17 years and held various official positions, died March 23, 1864; and his brother FRANCIS, the 3d baron, died Sept. 6, 1868. The present and 4th baron, ALEXANDER HUGH BARING, is the son of the latter. ASHBY DE LA ZOUCH, *a market town of Lei- cestershire, England, 15 J m. N. W. of Leicester ; pop. 3,800. It is a place of resort for its salt- water baths, and has an ancient church and the remains of a fine castle, in which Mary queen of Scots was once imprisoned. ASHDOD (the Azotm of the Greeks and Ro- mans; now called Eadud), one of the five chief Philistine cities on the Mediterranean coast, lying midway between Ascalon and Ekron, about 10 miles from each. It is 21 m. 8. of Jaffa, and 32 W. of Jerusalem. Its Hebrew name signifies a stronghold, and as it lay in the only practicable route between Egypt and As- syria, its possession was of great importance in all the wars between those powers. The Hebrews were never able to hold it for more than a brief period. About 716 B. C. it was taken by the Assyrians, and 85 years later was retaken by the Egyptians, after a siege by Psam- metichus which Herodotus states to have lasted 29 years. It remained a place of some conse- quence 1,000 years more, for Azotus was the seat of a bishopric, the incumbent of which had a place at the councils of Nice and Ohalcedon. In the time of Jerome, about A. D. 400, it was a small unwalled town. Travellers of the last century describe it as an inhabited site, marked by ancient ruins, such as broken arches and partly buried fragments of marble columns, with what appears to be an ancient khan, the principal chamber of which has been used as a Christian church. This ruined khan, to the west of the present village, marks the site of ASHER the acropolis of the ancient town, and the grove near it alone protects the site from the shifting sand of the adjoining plain, which threatens to overwhelm the spot. ASHE, a N. W. county of North Carolina, bordering on Virginia and Tennessee, bounded E. and S. E. by New river ; area, about 300 sq. m. ; pop. in 1870, 9,573, of whom 582 were colored. It is a mountainous region, with portions good for grazing, but is general- ly not fertile. In 1870 the county produced 16,341 bushels of wheat, 82,311 of rye, 120,545 of Indian corn, 42,350 of oats, and 23,211 Ibs. of wool. Capital, Jefferson. ASHE, John, an officer in the war of the American revolution, born in England in 1721, died in North Carolina in October, 1781. He was six years old when his father emigrated to Amer- ica and took up his abode in Newton, now Wil- mington, N. C. He was several times a repre- sentative in the colonial assembly, of which body he was speaker from 1762 to 1765, and is said to have been the first to suggest the provincial con- gress, in which he occupied a prominent posi- tion. He joined the army at the first outbreak of hostilities, led a force to destroy Fort John- son in 1775, and as brigadier general took part in the movements of Lincoln on the Savannah in 1778 and 1779. In the latter year he suf- fered a severe defeat at the hands of Gen. Pre- vost, at Brier Creek. He was made a prisoner in 1781, but was released on parole. ASHER, the eighth of the sons of Jacob, and the second by Zilpah, the handmaid of Leah. The name signifies "happy." The tribe of Asher at the exodus numbered 41,500 males over 20 years of age, being exclusive of Levi the ninth in order of number, Ephraim, Manas- seh, and Benjamin only being below it. Be- fore entering Canaan, the numbers of the tribe had increased to 53,400, making it the fifth. The territory allotted to the tribe of Asher was on the seashore, from Carmel northward, with Manasseh on the S., Zebulon and Issachar on the S. E., Naphtali on the E., and Syria on the N. Its assigned N. boundary on the seashore was a little N. of Sidon ; but the Asherites were unable to expel the Sidonians and the other Phoenicians within their limits, with whom they appear to have lived on friendly terms. Their territory contained some of the most fer- tile portions of Palestine, including a part of the great valley of Esdraelon. Asher and Simeon were the only tribes W. of the Jordan which furnished no judge or hero to Israel. In the time of David the tribe had become so in- significant that it is omitted from the list of the chief rulers ; and in the time of Hezekiah it is mentioned with a kind of surprise that some from the tribe of Asher came up to the passover at Jerusalem. END OF VOLUME FIRST.
