OSNABRUCK, the chief t. of the territory, lies in the midst of the extended and fruit ful valley of the Hase, 80 m. w.s.w. of Hanover by railway. It still ranks as one of the principal commercial cities of Hanover, althotigh it cannot boast of the pre-eminence which it enjoyed before the establishment of the Zollverein, Pop. '75, 29,850. Osna bruck has thriving manufactories of cigars and tobacco, paper-hangings, and cotton and woolen goods, and extensive works for the preparation of mineral dyes and cement, besides iron, machinery, and carriage manufactories. According to the opinion of antiquarians. Osnabruck stands on the site of the -ancient Wittekindsburg, which was raised to a bishopric in 783 by Charlemagne, some relies of whom, together with the pretended bones of the martyrs Crispinns and Crispinianus, are preserved in the cathe dral—a fine specimen of the Byzantine style of architecture of the. 12th century. The
church of St. Mary, a noble Gothic build'ng, was erected by the burghers of Osnabrtick in the 14th e. during their contentions with their haughty ecclesiastical rulers, and con tains the grave of Moser, in whose honor a statue was placed in the square of the cathe dral in 1836. The signing of the peace of Westphalia in 1648, in an apartment of the town-hail, is commemorated by the preservation of the portraits of all the ambassadors who took part in the treaty. It was decreed in this treaty that the ancient bishopric of Osnabruck should thenceforth be occupied alternately by a Roman Catholic prelate and.
a Protestant secular prince of the house of Brunswick-Luneburg; and after having been last held by Frederick, duke of York, the district of Osnabrfick was ceded to Hanover in 1803, and the chapter finally dissolved.