SHIRAZ (30), a celebrated city of Persia, occupying a charming site on an elevated plain, 165 m.  NE. of Bushire; founded in the 8th century; was for long a centre of Persian culture, and a favourite resort of the royal princes; its beauties are celebrated in the poems of Haefiz and Sadi, natives of the place; has been thrice wrecked by earthquakes, and presents now a somewhat dilapidated appearance.

SHIRE, a river of East Africa, flows out of Lake Nyassa, and passes in a southerly course through the Shire Highlands, a distance of 370 m., till it joins the Zambesi; discovered by Livingstone.

SHIRLEY, JAMES, dramatist, born in London, educated at Oxford and Cambridge; entered the Church, but turning Catholic resigned, and after trying teaching established himself in London as a play-writer; wrote with great facility, producing upwards of thirty plays before the suppression of theatres in 1642; fell back on teaching as a means of livelihood, and with a temporary revival of his plays after the Restoration eked out a scanty income till fear and exposure during the Great Fire brought himself and his wife on the same day to a common grave; of his plays mention may be made of “The Witty Fair One,” “The Wedding,” “The Lady of Pleasure,” “The Traitor,” etc. (1596-1666).

SHISHAK, the name of several monarchs of Egypt of the twenty-second dynasty, the first of whom united nearly all Egypt under one government, invaded Judea and plundered the Temple of Jerusalem about 962 B.C.

SHITTIM WOOD, a hard, close-grained acacia wood of an orange-brown colour found in the Arabian Desert, and employed in constructing the Jewish Tabernacle.

SHOA (1,500), the southmost division of ABYSSINIA (q. v.); was an independent country till its conquest by Theodore of Abyssinia in 1855; is traversed by the Blue Nile, and has a mixed population of Gallas and Abyssinians.

SHODDY, a stuff woven of old woollen fabrics teased into fibre and of new wool intermixed.

SHOEBURYNESS, a town in Essex, near Southend, a stretch of moorland utilised by the Government for gunnery practice.

SHOLAPUR (61), chief town in the Presidency of Bombay, in a district (750) of the name, 283 m.  E. of Bombay; has cotton and silk manufactures.

SHORE, JANE, the celebrated mistress of Edward IV.; was the young wife of a respected London goldsmith till she was taken up by the king, through whom, till the close of the reign, she exercised great power, “never abusing it to any man’s hurt, but to many a man’s comfort and relief”; was ill-treated and persecuted by Richard III. for political purposes; subsequently lived under the patronage of Lord Hastings, and afterwards of the Marquis of Dorset, surviving till 1527; the story of her life has been made the subject of many ballads, plays, etc.

SHOREDITCH (120), parliamentary borough of East London; returns two members to Parliament; manufactures furniture, boot and shoes, beer, etc.