HOMS  , or Hums (anc . Emesa or Emessa, near the Hittite

Fan-cheng, Han-kow, and the Han river generally, and the other Kadesh), a town of Syria, on the right bank of the Orontes, to Chow-kia-k'ow near the city of Ch'en-chow Fu, at the con-and capital of a sanjak in the vilayet of Syria (Damascus). fluence of the three rivers which unite to form the Sha-ho; the Pop . 30,000 (20,000 Moslem, ro,000 Christian) . The importance second road runs parallel with the Hwang-ho to K'ai-feng Fu; of the place arises from its command of the great north road the third crosses the Hwang-ho at Mengching Hien, and passes from Egypt, Palestine and Damascus by the Orontes valley. thence in a north-easterly direction to Hwai-k'ing Fu, Sew-wu Invading armies from the south have often been opposed near Hien and Wei-hui Fu, at which place it joins the high road Horns, from the time of Rameses II., who had to fight the from Peking to Fan-cheng; and the western road follows the battle of Kadesh, to that of Ibrahim Pasha, who broke the first southern bank of the Hwang-ho for 250 M. to its great bend line of Ottoman defence in 1831 by his victory there . Ancient at the fortified pass known as the Tung-kwan, where it joins the Emesa, in the district of Apamea, was a very old Syrian city, great wagon road leading through Shan-si from Peking to Si-gan devoted to the worship of Baal, the sun god, of whose great Fu . Ho-nan is now traversed north to south by the Peking-temple the emperor Heliogabalus was originally a priest (A.D . Hankow railway (completed 1905) . The line crosses the Hwang-218) . As a centre of native influences it was overawed by the ho by Yung-tse and runs east of the Fu-niu Shan . Branch lines Seleucid foundation of Apamea; but it opposed the Roman serve Ho-nan Fu and K'ai-feng Fu . advance . There Aurelian crushed, in A.D .

272, the Syrian HONAVAR, or ONORE, a seaport of

British India, in the national movement led by Zenobia . Caracalla made it a Roman North Kanara district of Bombay . Pop . (1901) 6929 . It is colony, and later it became the capital of a small province, mentioned as a place of trade as early as the 16th century, and Phoenicia Libanesia or ad Libanunz . About 630 it was captured is associated with two interesting incidents in Anglo-Indian by the Dioslem leader, Khalid ibn \Valid, who is buried there. history . In 167o, the English factors here had a bull-dog It now became the capital of a jund, or military district, which which unfortunately killed a sacred bull, in revenge for which under the Omayyad Caliphs extended from Palmyra to the they were all murdered, to the number of eighteen persons, sea . Under the Arabs it was one of the largest cities in Syria, by an enraged mob . In 1784 it was bravely defended for three with walls and a strong citadel, which stood on a hill, occupying months by Captain Torriano and a detachment of sepoys against perhaps the site of the great sun temple . The ruins of this the army of Tippoo Sultan . castle, blown up by Ibrahim Pasha, are still the most con- HONDA, or SAN BARTOLOMEO DE HONDA, a town of the spicuous feature of Horns, and contain many remains of ancient department of Tolima, Colombia, on the W. bank of the Magdalena buildings . Its men were noted for their courage in war, and its river, 58o m, above its mouth .

In 1906 Mr F . Loraine

Petre estimated the population at 7000 . It is about 65o ft. above sea-level and stands at the entrance to a narrow valley formed by spurs of the Central Cordillera, through which a picturesque little stream, called the Guali, flows into the Magdalena . The town overlooks the rapids of the Magdalena, and is shut in closely by spurs of the Eastern and Central Cordilleras . The climate is hot and damp and the temperature frequently rises to *_02° F. in the shade . Honda dates back to the beginning of the 17th century, and has been one of the important centres of traffic in South America for three hundred years . Within the city there is an iron bridge across the Guali, and there is a sus-pension bridge across the Magdalena at the head of the rapids . A railway 18 m. long connects with the landing place of LaDorada, or Las Yeguas, where the steamers of the lower Magdalena discharge and receive their cargoes (the old landing at Carocali nearer the rapids having been abandoned), and with Arrancaplumas, rz m. above, where navigation of the upper river begins . Up to 1908 the greater part of the traffic for Bogota crossed the river at this point, and was carried on mule-back over the old camino real, which was at best only a rough bridle-path over which transportation to Bogota (67 m. distant) was laborious and highly expensive; now the transshipment is made to smaller steamboats on the upper river for carriage to Girardot, 93 M. distant, from which place a railway runs to the Bogota plateau . Honda was nearly destroyed by an earthquake in 18o3 .