SUMATRA (3,572, including adjacent islands), after Borneo the largest of the East Indian islands, stretches SE. across the Equator between the Malay Peninsula (from whose SW. coast it is separated by the Strait of Malacca) to Java (Strait of Sunda separating them); has an extreme length of 1115 m., and an area more than three times that of England; is mountainous, volcanic, covered in central parts by virgin forest, abounds in rivers and lakes, and possesses an exceptionally rich flora and peculiar fauna; rainfall is abundant; some gold and coal are worked, but the chief products are rice, sugar, coffee, tobacco, petroleum, pepper, &c.; the island is mainly under Dutch control, but much of the unexplored centre is still in the hands of savage tribes who have waged continual warfare with their European invaders.  Padang (150) is the official Dutch capital.

SUMBAWA (150), one of the Sunda Islands, lying between Lombok (W.) and Flores (E.); mountainous and dangerously volcanic; yields rice, tobacco, cotton, &c.; is divided among four native rulers under Dutch authority.

SUMNER, CHARLES, American statesman and abolitionist, born in Boston; graduated at Harvard (1830), and was called to the bar in 1834, but found a more congenial sphere in writing and lecturing; during 1837-40 pursued his favourite study of jurisprudence in France, Germany, and England; was brought into public notice by his 4th of July oration (1845) on “The True Grandeur of Nations,” an eloquent condemnation of war; became an uncompromising opponent of the slave-trade; was one of the founders of the Free Soil Party, and in 1851 was elected to the National Senate, a position he held until the close of his life, and where he did much by his eloquent speeches to prepare the way for emancipation, and afterwards to win for the blacks the rights of citizenship (1811-1874).

SUMNER, JOHN BIRD, archbishop of Canterbury; rose by a succession of preferments to the Primacy, an office which he discharged with discretion and moderation (1780-1862).

SUMPTUARY LAWS, passed in various lands and ages to restrict excess in dress, food, and luxuries generally; are to be found in the codes of Solon, Julius Caesar, and other ancient rulers; Charles VI. of France restricted dinners to one soup and two other dishes; appear at various times in English statutes down to the 16th century against the use of “costly meats,” furs, silks, &c., by those unable to afford them; were issued by the Scottish Parliament against the extravagance of ladies in the matter of dress to relieve “the puir gentlemen their husbands and fathers”; were repealed in England in the reign of James I.; at no time were they carefully observed.

SUMTER, FORT, a fort on a shoal in Charleston harbour, 31/2 m. from the town; occupied by Major Anderson with 80 men and 62 guns in the interest of the secession of South Carolina from the Union, and the attack on which by General Beauregard on 12th April 1861 was the commencement of the Civil War; it held out against attack and bombardment till the month of July following.