Guadalquivir; fertile in grains, fruits, and vines, and rich in minerals.
ANDAMANS, volcanic islands in the Bay of Bengal, surrounded by coral
reefs; since 1858 used as a penal settlement.
ANDELYS, LES, a small town on the Seine, 20 m. NE. of Evreux,
divided into Great and Little.
ANDERMATT, a central Swiss village in Uri, 18 m. S. of Altorf.
ANDERSEN, HANS CHRISTIAN, a world-famous story-teller of Danish
birth, son of a poor shoemaker, born at Odense; was some time before he
made his mark, was honoured at length by the esteem and friendship of the
royal family, and by a national festival on his seventieth birthday
(1805-1875).
ANDERSON, JAMES, a Scotch lawyer, famous for his learning and his
antiquarian knowledge (1662-1728).
ANDERSON, JAMES, native of Hermiston, near Edinburgh, a writer on
agriculture and promoter of it in Scotland (1739-1808).
ANDERSON, JOHN, a native of Roseneath, professor of physics in
Glasgow University, and the founder of the Andersonian College in Glasgow
(1726-1796).
ANDERSON, LAWRENCE, one of the chief reformers of religion in Sweden
(1480-1552).
ANDERSON, MARY, a celebrated actress, native of California; in 1890
married M. Navarro de Viano of New York; _b_. 1859.
ANDERSON, SIR EDMUND, Lord Chief-Justice of Common Pleas under
Elizabeth, sat as judge at the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots. Anderson's
Reports is still a book of authority; _d_. 1605.
ANDES, an unbroken range of high mountains, 150 of them actively
volcanic, which extend, often in double and triple chains, along the west
of South America from Cape Horn to Panama, a distance of 4500 m., divided
into the Southern or Chilian as far as 23½° S., the Central as far as 10°
S., and the Northern to their termination.
ANDOCIDES, an orator and leader of the oligarchical faction in
Athens; was four times exiled, the first time for profaning the
Eleusinian Mysteries (467-393 B.C.).
ANDOR`RA (6), a small republic in the E. Pyrenees, enclosed by
mountains, under the protection of France and the Bishop of Urgel, in
Catalonia; cattle-rearing is the chief occupation of the inhabitants, who
are a primitive people and of simple habits.
ANDOVER, an old municipal borough and market-town in Hampshire, 66
m. SW. of London; also a town 23 m. from Boston, U.S., famous for its
theological seminary, founded in 1807.
ANDRAL, GABRIEL, a distinguished French pathologist, professor in
Paris University (1797-1876).
AN`DRASSY, COUNT, a Hungarian statesman, was exiled from 1848 to
1851, became Prime Minister in 1867, played a prominent part in
diplomatic affairs on the Continent to the advantage of Austria
(1823-1890).
ANDRE, JOHN, a brave British officer, tried and hanged as a spy in
the American war in 1780; a monument is erected to him in Westminster
Abbey.
ANDRÉ II., king of Hungary from 1205 to 1235, took part in the fifth
crusade.
ANDREA DEL SARTO. See SARTO.
ANDREA PISANO, a sculptor and architect, born at Pisa, contributed
greatly to free modern art from Byzantine influence (1270-1345).
ANDREOSSY, COUNT, an eminent French general and statesman, served
under Napoleon, ambassador at London, Vienna, and Constantinople,
advocated the recall of the Bourbons on the fall of Napoleon.
ANDREOSSY, FRANÇOIS, an eminent French engineer and mathematician
(1633-1688).
ANDREW, ST., one of the Apostles, suffered martyrdom by crucifixion,
became patron saint of Scotland; represented in art as an old man with
long white hair and a beard, holding the Gospel in his right hand, and
leaning on a transverse cross.
ANDREW, ST., RUSSIAN ORDER OF, the highest Order in Russia.
ANDREW, ST., THE CROSS OF, cross like a X, such having, it is
said, been the form of the cross on which St. Andrew suffered.
ANDREWES, LANCELOT, an English prelate, born in Essex, and zealous
High Churchman in the reign of Elizabeth and James I.; eminent as a
scholar, a theologian, and a preacher; in succession bishop of Ely,
Chichester, and Winchester; was one of the Hampton Court Conference, and
of the translators of the Authorised Version of the Bible; he was fervent
in devotion, but of his sermons the criticism of a Scotch nobleman, when
he preached at Holyrood once, was not inappropriate: "He rather plays
with his subject than preaches on it" (1555-1626).
ANDREWS, JOSEPH, a novel by Fielding, and the name of the hero, who
is a footman, and the brother of Richardson's Pamela.
ANDREWS, THOMAS, an eminent physicist, born and professor in Belfast
(1813-1885).
ANDRIEUX, ST., a French littérateur and dramatist, born at
Strassburg, professor in the College of France, and permanent secretary
to the Academy (1759-1822).
ANDRO`CLUS, a Roman slave condemned to the wild beasts, but saved by
a lion, sent into the arena to attack him, out of whose foot he had long
before sucked a thorn that pained him, and who recognised him as his
benefactor.
ANDROM`ACHE, the wife of Hector and the mother of Astyanax, famous
for her conjugal devotion; fell to Pyrrhus, Achilles' son, at the fall of
Troy, but was given up by him to Hector's brother; is the subject of
tragedies by Euripides and Racine respectively.
ANDROM`EDA, a beautiful Ethiopian princess exposed to a sea monster,
which Perseus slew, receiving as his reward the hand of the maiden; she
had been demanded by Neptune as a sacrifice to appease the Nereids for an
insult offered them by her mother.
ANDRONI`CUS, the name of four Byzantine emperors: A. I.,
COMNENUS, killed his ward, Alexis II., usurped the throne, and was
put to death, 1183; A. II., lived to see the empire devastated by
the Turks (1282-1328); A. III., grandson of the preceding, dethroned
him, fought stoutly against the Turks without staying their advances
(1328-1341); A. IV. dethroned his father, Soter V., and was
immediately stripped of his possessions himself (1377-1378).
ANDRONICUS, LIVIUS, the oldest dramatic poet in the Latin language
(240 B.C.).
ANDRONICUS OF RHODES, a disciple of Aristotle in the time of Cicero,
and to whom we owe the preservation of many of Aristotle's works.
ANDROS (22), the most northern of the Cyclades, fertile soil and
productive of wine and silk.
ANDROUET DU CERCEAU`, an eminent French architect who designed the
Pont Neuf at Paris (1530-1600).
ANDUJAR (11), a town of Andalusia, on the Guadalquivir, noted for
the manufacture of porous clay water-cooling vessels.
ANEMOMETER, an instrument for measuring the force, course, and
velocity of the wind.
ANEROID, a barometer, consisting of a small watch-shaped, air-tight,
air-exhausted metallic box, with internal spring-work and an index,
affected by the pressure of the air on plates exposed to its action.
ANEU`RIN, a British bard at the beginning of the 7th century, who
took part in the battle of Cattraeth, and made it the subject of a poem.
ANEURISM, a tumour, containing blood, on the coat of an artery.
ANGARA, a tributary of the Yenisei, which passes through Lake
Baikal.
ANGEL, an old English coin, with the archangel Michael piercing the
dragon on the obverse of it.
ANGEL-FISH, a hideous, voracious fish of the shark family.
ANGELIC DOCTOR, Thomas Aquinas.
ANGEL`ICA, a faithless lady of romance, for whose sake Orlando lost
his heart and his senses.
ANGELICA DRAUGHT, something which completely changes the affection.
ANGELICO, FRA, an Italian painter, born at Mugello, in Tuscany;
became a Dominican monk at Fiesole, whence he removed to Florence, and
finally to Rome, where he died; devoted his life to religious subjects,
which he treated with great delicacy, beauty, and finish, and conceived
in virgin purity and child-like simplicity of soul; his work in the form
of fresco-painting is to be found all over Italy (1387-1455).
AN`GELUS, a devotional service in honour of the Incarnation.
ANGERS` (77), on the Maine, the ancient capital of Anjou, 160 m. SW.
of Paris, with a fine cathedral, a theological seminary, and a medical
school; birthplace of David the sculptor.
ANGERSTEIN, JOHN, born in St. Petersburg, a distinguished patron of
the fine arts, whose collection of paintings, bought by the British
Government, formed the nucleus of the National Gallery (1735-1822).
ANGI`NA PEC`TORIS, an affection of the heart of an intensely
excruciating nature, the pain of which at times extends to the left
shoulder and down the left arm.
ANGLER, a fish with a broad, big-mouthed head and a tapering body,
both covered with appendages having glittering tips, by which, as it
burrows in the sand, it allures other fishes into its maw.
ANGLES, a German tribe from Sleswig who invaded Britain in the 5th
century and gave name to England.
AN`GLESEA (50), i. e. Island of the Angles, an island forming a
county in Wales, separated from the mainland by the Menai Strait, flat,
fertile, and rich in minerals.
ANGLESEY, MARQUIS OF, eldest son of the first Earl of Uxbridge,
famous as a cavalry officer in Flanders, Holland, the Peninsula, and
especially at Waterloo, at which he lost a leg, and for his services at
which he received his title; was some time viceroy in Ireland, where he
was very popular (1768-1854).
ANGLIA, EAST territory in England occupied in the 6th century by the
Angles, corresponding to counties of Norfolk and Suffolk.
ANG`LICAN CHURCH, the body of Episcopal churches all over the
British Empire and Colonies, as well as America, sprung from the Church
of England, though not subject to her jurisdiction, the term
_Anglo-Catholic_ being applied to the High Church section.
ANGLO-SAXON, the name usually assigned to the early inflected form
of the English language.
ANGO`LA (2,400), a district on the W. coast of Africa, between the
Congo and Benguela, subject to Portugal, the capital of which is St. Paul
de Loando.
ANGO`RA (20), a city in the centre of Anatolia, in a district noted
for its silky, long-haired animals, cats and dogs as well as goats.
ANGOSTU`RA, capital of the province of Guayana, in Venezuela, 240 m.
up the Orinoco; also a medicinal bark exported thence.
ANGOULÊME` (31), an old French city on the Charente, 83 m. NE. of
Bordeaux, with a fine cathedral, the birthplace of Marguerite de Valois
and Balzac.
ANGOULÊME, CHARLES DE VALOIS, DUC D', natural son of Charles IX.,
gained great reputation as a military commander, left Memoirs of his life
(1575-1650).
ANGOULÊME, DUC D', the eldest son of Charles X., after the
Revolution of 1830 gave up his rights to the throne and retired to Goritz
(1778-1844).
ANGOULÊME, DUCHESSE D', daughter of Louis XVI. and wife of the
preceding (1778-1851).
AN`GRA, the capital of the Azores, on the island of Terceira, a
fortified place.
AN`GRA PEQUE`NA, a port in SW. Africa, N. of the Orange River, and
the nucleus of the territory belonging to Germany.
ANG`STROM, a Swedish physicist and professor at Upsala,
distinguished for his studies on the solar spectrum; _b_. 1814.
ANGUIL`LA (2), or Snake Island, one of the Lesser Antilles, E. of
Porto Rico, belonging to Britain.
ANGUIER, the name of two famous French sculptors in the 17th
century.
AN`HALT (293), a duchy of Central Germany, surrounded and split up
by Prussian Saxony, and watered by the Elbe and Saale; rich in minerals.
ANHALT-DESSAU, LEOPOLD, PRINCE OF, a Prussian field-marshal, served
and distinguished himself in the war of the Spanish Succession and in
Italy, was wounded at Cassano; defeated Charles XII. at the Isle of
Rügen, and the Saxons and Austrians at Kesseldorf (1676-1747).
ANICHINI, an Italian medallist of the 16th century; executed a medal
representing the interview of Alexander the Great with the High Priest of
the Jews, which Michael Angelo pronounced the perfection of the art.
ANILINE, a colourless transparent oily liquid, obtained chiefly from
coal-tar, and extensively used in the production of dyes.
ANIMAL HEAT, the heat produced by the chemical changes which go on
in the animal system, the intensity depending on the activity of the
process.
ANIMAL MAGNETISM, a name given to the alleged effects on the animal
system, in certain passive states, of certain presumed magnetic
influences acting upon it.
ANIMISM, a belief that there is a psychical body within the physical
body of a living being, correspondent with it in attributes, and that
when the connection between them is dissolved by death the former lives
on in a ghostly form; in other words, a belief of a ghost-soul existing
conjointly with and subsisting apart from the body, its physical
counterpart.
AN`IO, an affluent of the Tiber, 4 m. above Rome; ancient Rome was
supplied with water from it by means of aqueducts.
ANISE, an umbelliferous plant, the seed of which is used as a
carminative and in the preparation of liqueurs.
ANJOU`, an ancient province in the N. of France, annexed to the
crown of France under Louis XI. in 1480; belonged to England till wrested
from King John by Philip Augustus in 1203.
ANKARSTRÖM, the assassin of Gustavus III. of Sweden, at a masked
ball, March 15, 1792, for which he was executed after being publicly
flogged on three successive days.
ANKLAM (12), an old Hanse town in Pomerania, connected by railway
with Stettin.
ANKOBAR, capital of Shoa, in Abyssinia; stands 8200 ft. above the
sea-level.
ANN ARBOR (10), a city of Michigan, on the Huron, with an
observatory and a flourishing university.
ANNA COMNE`NA, a Byzantine princess, who, having failed in a
political conspiracy, retired into a convent and wrote the life of her
father, Alexius I., under the title of the "Alexiad" (1083-1148).
AN`NA IVANOV`NA, niece of Peter the Great, empress of Russia in
succession to Peter II. from 1730 to 1740; her reign was marred by the
evil influence of her paramour Biren over her, which led to the
perpetration of great cruelties; was famed for her big cheek, "which, as
shown in her portraits," Carlyle says, "was comparable to a Westphalian
ham" (1693-1740).
AN`NAM (6,000), an empire, of the size of Sweden, along the east
coast of Indo-China, under a French protectorate since 1885; it has a
rich well-watered soil, which yields tropical products, and is rich in
minerals.
AN`NAN (3), a burgh in Dumfries, on river Annan; birthplace of
Edward Irving, and where Carlyle was a schoolboy, and at length
mathematical schoolmaster.
ANNAP`OLIS (3), seaport of Nova Scotia, on the Bay of Fundy; also
the capital (7) of Maryland, U.S., 28 m. E. of Washington.
ANNE, QUEEN, daughter of James II.; by the union of Scotland with
England during her reign in 1707 became the first sovereign of the United
Kingdom; her reign distinguished by the part England played in the war of
the Spanish succession and the number of notabilities, literary and
scientific, that flourished under it, though without any patronage on the
part of the Queen (1665-1714).
ANNE, ST., wife of St. Joachim, mother of the Virgin Mary, and the
patron saint of carpentry; festival, July 26.
ANNE OF AUSTRIA, the daughter of Philip III. of Spain, wife of Louis
XIII., and mother of Louis XIV., became regent on the death of her
husband, with Cardinal Mazarin for minister; during the minority of her
son, triumphed over the Fronde; retired to a convent on the death of
Mazarin (1610-1666).
ANNE OF BRITTANY, the daughter of Francis II., Duke of Brittany; by
her marriage, first to Charles VIII. then to Louis XII., the duchy was
added to the crown of France (1476-1514).
ANNE OF CLÈVES, daughter of Duke of Clèves, a wife of Henry VIII.,
who fell in love with the portrait of her by Holbein, but being
disappointed, soon divorced her; _d_. 1577.
ANNECY (11), the capital of Haute-Savoie, in France, on a lake of
the name, 22 m. S. of Geneva, at which the Counts of Geneva had their
residence, and where Francis of Sales was bishop.
ANNOBON, a Spanish isle in the Gulf of Guinea.
ANNONAY (14), a town in Ardèche, France; paper the chief
manufacture.
ANNUNCIATION DAY, a festival on the 25th of March in commemoration
of the salutation of the angel to the Virgin Mary on the Incarnation of
Christ.
ANQUETIL`, LOUIS PIERRE, a French historian in holy orders, wrote
"Précis de l'Histoire Universelle" and a "Histoire de France" in 14
vols.; continued by Bouillet in 6 more (1723-1806).
ANQUETIL`-DUPERRON, brother of the preceding, an enthusiastic
Orientalist, to whom we owe the discovery and first translation of the
Zend-Avesta and Schopenhauer his knowledge of Hindu philosophy, and which
influenced his own system so much (1731-1805).
ANSBACH (14), a manufacturing town in Bavaria, 25 m. SW. of
Nürnberg, the capital of the old margraviate of the name, and the
margraves of which were HOHENZOLLERNS (q. v.).
ANSCHAR or ANSGAR, ST., a Frenchman born, the first to preach
Christianity to the pagans of Scandinavia, was by appointment of the Pope
the first archbishop of Hamburg (801-864).
ANSELM, ST., archbishop of Canterbury, a native of Aosta, in
Piedmont, monk and abbot; visited England frequently, gained the favour
of King Rufus, who appointed him to succeed Lanfranc, quarrelled with
Rufus and left the country, but returned at the request of Henry I., a
quarrel with whom about investiture ended in a compromise; an able,
high-principled, God-fearing man, and a calmly resolute upholder of the
teaching and authority of the Church (1033-1109). See CARLYLE'S "PAST
AND PRESENT."
ANSON, LORD, a celebrated British naval commander, sailed round the
world, during war on the part of England with Spain, on a voyage of
adventure with a fleet of three ships, and after three years and nine
months returned to England, his fleet reduced to one vessel, but with
£500,000 of Spanish treasure on board. Anson's "Voyage Round the World"
contains a highly interesting account of this, "written in brief,
perspicuous terms," witnesses Carlyle, "a real poem in its kind, or
romance all fact; one of the pleasantest little books in the world's
library at this time" (1697-1762).
ANSTRUTHER, EAST AND WEST, two contiguous royal burghs on the Fife
coast, the former the birthplace of Tennant the poet, Thomas Chalmers,
and John Goodsir the anatomist.
ANTÆUS, a mythical giant, a _terræ filius_ or son of the earth, who
was strong only when his foot was on the earth, lifted in air he became
weak as water, a weakness which Hercules discovered to his discomfiture
when wrestling with him. The fable has been used as a symbol of the
spiritual strength which accrues when one rests his faith on the
immediate fact of things.
ANTAL`CIDAS, a Spartan general, celebrated for a treaty which he
concluded with Persia whereby the majority of the cities of Asia Minor
passed under the sway of the Persians, to the loss of the fruit of all
the victories gained over them by Athens (387 B.C.).
ANTANANARI`VO (100), the capital of Madagascar, in the centre of the
island, on a well-nigh inaccessible rocky height 5000 ft. above the
sea-level.
ANTAR, an Arab chief of the 6th century, a subject of romance, and
distinguished as a poet.
ANT-EATERS, a family of edentate mammals, have a tubular mouth with
a small aperture, and a long tongue covered with a viscid secretion,
which they thrust into the ant-hills and then withdraw covered with ants.
ANTELOPE, an animal closely allied to the sheep and the goat, very
like the latter in appearance, with a light and elegant figure, slender,
graceful limbs, small cloven hoofs, and generally a very short tail.
ANTEQUE`RA (27), a town in Andalusia, 22 m. N. of Malaga, a
stronghold of the Moors from 712 to 1410.
ANTHE`LIA, luminous rings witnessed in Alpine and Polar regions,
seen round the shadow of one's head in a fog or cloud opposite the sun.
ANTHE`MIUS, the architect of the church of St. Sophia in
Constantinople; _d_. 534.
ANTHON, CHARLES, a well-known American classical scholar and editor
of the Classics (1797-1867).
ANTHRAX, a disease, especially in cattle, due to the invasion of a
living organism which, under certain conditions, breeds rapidly; called
also splenic fever.
ANTHROPOID APES, a class of apes, including the gorilla, chimpanzee,
orang-outang, and gibbon, without tails, with semi-erect figures and long
arms.
ANTHROPOLOGY, the science of man as he exists or has existed under
different physical and social conditions.
ANTHROPOMORPHISM, the ascription of human attributes to the unseen
author of things.
ANTI`BES (5) a seaport and place of ancient date on a peninsula in
the S. of France, near Cannes and opposite Nice.
ANTICHRIST, a name given in the New Testament to various
incarnations of opposition to Christ in usurpation of His authority, but
is by St. John defined to involve that form of opposition which denies
the doctrine of the Incarnation, or that Christ has come in the flesh.
ANTICOSTI, a barren rocky island in the estuary of St Lawrence,
frequented by fishermen, and with hardly a permanent inhabitant.
ANTIG`ONE`, the daughter of Oedipus, king of Thebes, led about her
father when he was blind and in exile, returned to Thebes on his death;
was condemned to be buried alive for covering her brother's exposed body
with earth in defiance of the prohibition of Creon, who had usurped the
throne; Creon's son, out of love for her, killed himself on the spot
where she was buried. She has been immortalised in one of the grandest
tragedies of Sophocles.
ANTIGONE, THE MODERN, the Duchess of Angoulême, daughter of Louis
XV. See THE PARTING SCENE IN CARLYLE'S "FRENCH REVOLUTION."
ANTIG`ONUS, surnamed the Cyclops or One-eyed, one of the generals of
Alexander the Great, made himself master of all Asia Minor, excited the
jealousy of his rivals; was defeated and slain at Ipsus, in Phrygia, 301
B.C.
ANTIGONUS, the last king of the Jews of the Asmonean dynasty; put to
death in 77 B.C.
ANTIGONUS GONATAS, king of Macedonia, grandson of the preceding;
twice deprived of his kingdom, but recovered it; attempted to prevent the
formation of the Achæan League (275-240 B.C.).
ANTIGUA, one of the Leeward Islands, the seat of the government; the
most productive of them belongs to Britain.
ANTILLES, an archipelago curving round from N. America to S.
America, and embracing the Caribbean Sea; the GREATER A., on the N.
of the sea, being Cuba, Hayti, Jamaica, and Porto Rico; and the LESSER
A., on the E., forming the Leeward Islands, the Windward Islands, and
the Venezuelan Islands--the Leeward as far as Dominica, the Windward as
far as Trinidad, and the Venezuelan along the coast of S. America.
ANTIMONY, a brittle white metal, of value both in the arts and
medicine.
ANTINOMIANISM, the doctrine that the law is superseded in some sense
or other by the all-sufficing, all-emancipating free spirit of Christ.
ANTINOMY, in the transcendental philosophy the contradiction which
arises when we carry the categories of the understanding above experience
and apply them to the sphere of that which transcends it.
ANTIN`OUS, a Bithynian youth of extraordinary beauty, a slave of the
Emperor Hadrian; became a great favourite of his and accompanied him on
all his journeys. He was drowned in the Nile, and the grief of the
emperor knew no bounds; he enrolled him among the gods, erected a temple
and founded a city in his honour, while artists vied with each other in
immortalising his beauty.
AN`TIOCH (23), an ancient capital of Syria, on the Orontes, called
the Queen of the East, lying on the high-road between the E. and the W.,
and accordingly a busy centre of trade; once a city of great splendour
and extent, and famous in the early history of the Church as the seat of
several ecclesiastical councils and the birthplace of Chrysostom. There
was an Antioch in Pisidia, afterwards called Cæsarea.
ANTI`OCHUS, name of three Syrian kings of the dynasty of the
Seleucidæ: A. I., SOTER, i. e. Saviour, son of one of Alexander's
generals, fell heir of all Syria; king from 281 to 261 B.C. A. II.,
THEOS, i. e. God, being such to the Milesians in slaying the tyrant
Timarchus; king from 261 to 246. A. III., the Great, extended and
consolidated the empire, gave harbour to Hannibal, declared war against
Rome, was defeated at Thermopylæ and by Scipio at Magnesia, killed in
attempting to pillage the temple at Elymaïs; king from 223 to 187. A.
IV., EPIPHANES, i. e. Illustrious, failed against Egypt, tyrannised
over the Jews, provoked the Maccabæan revolt, and died delirious; king
from 175 to 104. A. V., EUPATOR, king from 164 to 162.
ANTI`OPE, queen of the Amazons and mother of Hippolytus. _The Sleep
of Antiope_, _chef-d'oeuvre_ of Correggio in the Louvre.
ANTIP`AROS (2), one of the Cyclades, W. of Paros, with a stalactite
cavern.
ANTIP`ATER, a Macedonian general, governed Macedonia with great
ability during the absence of Alexander, defeated the confederate Greek
states at Cranon, reigned supreme on the death of Perdiccas
(397-317 B.C.).
ANTIPH`ILUS, a Greek painter, contemporary and rival of Apelles.
AN`TIPHON, an Athenian orator and politician, preceptor of
Thucydides, who speaks of him in terms of honour, was the first to
formulate rules of oratory (479-411 B.C.).
ANTIPOPE, a pope elected by a civil power in opposition to one
elected by the cardinals, or one self-elected and usurped; there were
some 26 of such, first and last.
ANTIPYRETICS, medicines to reduce the temperature in fever, of which
the chief are quinine and salicylate of soda.
ANTIPYRIN, a febrifuge prepared from coal-tar, and used as a
substitute for quinine.
ANTISA`NA, a volcano of the N. Andes, in Ecuador, 19,200 ft. high;
also a village on its flanks, 13,000 ft. high, the highest village in the
world.
ANTISE`MITES, a party in Russia and the E. of Germany opposed to the
Jews on account of the undue influence they exercise in national affairs
to the alleged detriment of the natives.
ANTISEPTICS, substances used, particularly in surgery, to prevent or
arrest putrefaction.
ANTIS`THENES, a Greek philosopher, a disciple of Socrates, the
master of Diogenes, and founder of the Cynic school; affected to disdain
the pride and pomp of the world, and was the first to carry staff and
wallet as the badge of philosophy, but so ostentatiously as to draw from
Socrates the rebuke, "I see your pride looking out through the rent of
your cloak, O Antisthenes."
ANTI-TAURUS, a mountain range running NE. from the Taurus Mts.
ANTIUM, a town of Latium on a promontory jutting into the sea, long
antagonistic to Rome, subdued in 333 B.C.; the beaks of its ships,
captured in a naval engagement, were taken to form a rostrum in the Forum
at Home; it was the birthplace of Caligula and Nero.
ANTIVA`RI, a fortified seaport lately ceded to Montenegro.
ANTOFAGAS`TA (7), a rising port in Chile, taken from Bolivia after
the war of 1879; exports silver ores and nitrate of soda.
ANTOMMAR`CHI, Napoleon's attached physician at St. Helena, wrote
"The Last Moments of Napoleon" (1780-1838).
ANTONELLI, CARDINAL, the chief adviser and Prime Minister of Pope
Pius IX., accompanied the Pope to Gaeta, came back with him to Rome,
acting as his foreign minister there, and offered a determined opposition
to the Revolution; left immense wealth (1806-1876).
ANTONEL`LO, of Messina, Italian painter of the 15th century,
introduced from Holland oil-painting into Italy (1414-1493).
ANTONI`NUS, ITINERARY OF, a valuable geographical work supposed of
date 44 B.C.
ANTONI`NUS, Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor, successor to the
following, and who surpassed him in virtue, being also of the Stoic
school and one of its most exemplary disciples, was surnamed the
"philosopher," and has left in his "Meditations" a record of his
religious and moral principles (121-180).
ANTONI`NUS PIUS, a Roman emperor, of Stoic principles, who reigned
with justice and moderation from 138 to 161, during which time the Empire
enjoyed unbroken peace.
ANTONI`NUS, WALL OF, an earthen rampart about 36 m. in length, from
the Forth to the Clyde, in Scotland, as a barrier against invasion from
the north, erected in the year 140 A.D.
ANTO`NIUS, MARCUS, a famous Roman orator and consul, slain in the
civil war between Marius and Sulla, having sided with the latter (143-87
B.C.).
ANTO`NIUS, MARCUS (Mark Antony), grandson of the preceding and warm
partisan of Cæsar; after the murder of the latter defeated Brutus and
Cassius at Philippi, formed a triumvirate with Octavius and Lepidus, fell
in love with the famous Cleopatra, was defeated by Octavius in the naval
battle of Actium, and afterwards killed himself (83-30 B.C.).
AN`TONY, ST., a famous anchorite of the Thebaïd, where from the age
of thirty he spent 20 years of his life, in a lonely ruin by himself,
resisting devils without number; left his retreat for a while to
institute monasteries, and so became the founder of monachism, but
returned to die; festival, Jan. 17 (251-351).
ANTONY OF PADUA, a Minorite missionary to the Moors in Africa;
preached to the fishes, who listened to him when no one else would; the
fishes came in myriads to listen, and shamed the pagans into conversion,
says the fable; festival, June 13 (1195-1234)
ANTRAIGUES, COUNT D', one of the firebrands of the French
Revolution; "rose into furor almost Pythic; highest where many were
high," but veered round to royalism, which he at length intrigued on
behalf of--to death by the stiletto (1765-1812).
ANT`RIM (471), a maritime county in the NE. of Ulster, in Ireland;
soil two-thirds arable, linen the chief manufacture, exports butter,
inhabitants mostly Protestant.
ANTWERP (240), a large fortified trading city in Belgium, on the
Scheldt, 50 m. from the sea, with a beautiful Gothic cathedral, the spire
402 ft. high; the burial-place of Rubens; has a large picture-gallery
full of the works of the Dutch and Flemish artists.
ANU`BIS, an Egyptian deity with the body of a man and the head of a
jackal, whose office, like that of Hermes, it was to see to the disposal
of the souls of the dead in the nether world, on quitting the body.
ANWARI, a Persian lyric poet who flourished in the 12th century.
AN`YTUS, the most vehement accuser of Socrates; banished in
consequence from Athens, after Socrates' death.
AOS`TA (5), a town of Italy, N. of Turin, in a fertile Alpine level
valley, but where goitre and cretinism prevail to a great extent; the
birthplace of Anselm.
APA`CHES, a fierce tribe of American Indians on the S. and W. of the
United States; long a source of trouble to the republic.
APEL`LES, the most celebrated painter of antiquity; bred, if not
born, at Ephesus; lived at the court of Alexander the Great; his great
work "APHRODITÉ ANADYOMENE" (q. v.); a man conscious, like
Dürer, of mastery in his art, as comes out in his advice to the
criticising shoemaker to "stick to his last."
AP`ENNINES, a branch of the Alps extending, with spurs at right
angles, nearly through the whole length of Italy, forming about the
middle of the peninsula a double chain which supports the tableland of
Abruzzi.
APES, DEAD SEA, dwellers by the Dead Sea who, according to the
Moslem tradition, were transformed into apes because they turned a deaf
ear to God's message to them by the lips of Moses, fit symbol, thinks
Carlyle, of many in modern time to whom the universe, with all its
serious voices, seems to have become a weariness and a humbug See
"PAST AND PRESENT," BK. III. CHAP. III.
APH`IDES, a family of insects very destructive to plants by feeding
on them in countless numbers.
APHRODI`TE, the Greek goddess of love and beauty, wife of Hephæstos
and mother of Cupid; sprung from sea-foam; as queen of beauty had the
golden apple awarded her by Paris, and possessed the power of conferring
beauty, by means of her magic girdle, the cestus, on others.
API`CIUS, the name of three famous Roman epicures, the first of whom
was contemporary with Sulla, the second with Augustus, and the third with
Trajan.
A`PION, an Alexandrian grammarian of the 1st century, and an enemy
of the Jews, and hostile to the privileges conceded them in Alexandria.
A`PIS, the sacred live bull of the Egyptians, the incarnation of
Osiris; must be black all over the body, have a white triangular spot on
the forehead, the figure of an eagle on the back, and under the tongue
the image of a scarabæus; was at the end of 25 years drowned in a sacred
fountain, had his body embalmed, and his mummy regarded as an object of
worship.
APOCALYPTIC WRITINGS, writings composed among the Jews in the 2nd
century B.C., and ascribed to one and another of the early prophets of
Israel, forecasting the judgments ordained of God to overtake the nation,
and predicting its final deliverance at the hands of the Messiah.
APOCRYPHA, THE, a literature of sixteen books composed by Jews,
after the close of the Hebrew canon, which though without the unction of
the prophetic books of the canon, are instinct, for most part, with the
wisdom which rests on the fear of God and loyalty to His law. The word
Apocrypha means hidden writing, and it was given to it by the Jews to
distinguish it from the books which they accepted as canonical.
APOL`DA (20), a town in Saxe-Weimar with extensive hosiery
manufactures; has mineral springs.
APOLLINA`RIS, bishop of Laodicea, denied the proper humanity of
Christ, by affirming that the Logos in Him took the place of the human
soul, as well as by maintaining that His body was not composed of
ordinary flesh and blood; _d_. 390.
APOLLO, the god _par excellence_ of the Greeks, identified with the
sun and all that we owe to it in the shape of inspiration, art, poetry,
and medicine; son of Zeus and Leto; twin brother of Artemis; born in the
island of DELOS (q. v.), whither Leto had fled from the jealous
Hera; his favourite oracle at Delphi.
APPLLODO`RUS (1), an Athenian painter, the first to paint figures in
light and shade, 408 B.C.; (2) a celebrated architect of Damascus, _d_.
A.D. 129; and (3), an Athenian who wrote a well-arranged account of the
mythology and heroic age of Greece.
APOLLONIUS OF RHODES, a grammarian and poet, flourished in the 3rd
century B.C., author of the "Argonautica," a rather prosaic account of
the adventures of the Argonauts.
APOLLONIUS OF TYANA, a Pythagorean philosopher, who, having become
acquainted with some sort of Brahminism, professed to have a divine
mission, and, it is said, a power to work miracles; was worshipped after
his death, and has been compared to Christ; _d_. 97.
APOL`LOS, a Jew of Alexandria, who became an eloquent preacher of
Christ, and on account of his eloquence rated above St. Paul.
APOLLYON, the destroying angel, the Greek name for the Hebrew
Abaddon.
APOLOGETICS, a defence of the historical verity of the Christian
religion in opposition to the rationalist and mythical theories.
APOSTATE, an epithet applied to the Emperor Julian, from his having,
conscientiously however, abjured the Christian religion established by
Constantine, in favour of paganism.
APOSTLE OF GERMANY, St. Boniface; A. OF IRELAND, St. Patrick; OF THE
ENGLISH, St. Augustine; OF THE FRENCH, St. Denis; OF THE GAULS, Irenæus;
OF THE GENTILES, St. Paul; OF THE GOTHS, Ulfilas; OF THE INDIAN, John
Eliot; OF THE SCOTS, Columba; OF THE NORTH, Ansgar; OF THE PICTS, St.
Ninian; OF THE INDIES, Francis Xavier; OF TEMPERANCE, Father Mathew.
APOSTLES, THE FOUR, picture of St. John, St. Peter, St. Mark, and
St. Paul, in the museum at Münich, painted by Albert Dürer.
APOSTOLIC FATHERS, Fathers of the Church who lived the same time as
the Apostles: Clemens, Barnabas Polycarp, Ignatius, and Hermas.
APOSTOLIC SUCCESSION, the derivation of episcopal power in an
unbroken line from the Apostles, a qualification believed by High
Churchmen to be essential to the discharge of episcopal functions and the
transmission of promised divine grace.
APPALA`CHIANS, a mountainous system of N. America that stretches NE.
from the tablelands of Alabama to the St. Lawrence, and includes the
Alleghanies and the Blue Mountains; their utmost height, under 7000 feet;
do not reach the snow-line; abound in coal and iron.
APPENZELL` (67), a canton in the NE. of Switzerland, enclosed by St.
Gall, divided into Outer Rhoden, which is manufacturing and Protestant,
and Inner Rhoden, which is agricultural and Catholic; also the name of
the capital.
AP`PIAN, an Alexandrian Greek, wrote in 2nd century a history of
Rome in 24 books, of which 11 remain.
AP`PIAN WAY, a magnificent highway begun by Appius Claudius,
312 B.C., and finished by Augustus, from Rome to Brundusium.
APPLE OF DISCORD, a golden apple inscribed with the words, "To the
most Beautiful," thrown in among the gods of Olympus on a particular
occasion, contended for by Hera, Athena, and Aphrodité, and awarded by
Paris of Troy, as referee, to Aphrodité, on promise that he would have
the most beautiful woman of the world for wife.
APPLEBY, the county town of Westmorland, on the Eden; is a health
resort.
APPLEGATH, AUGUSTUS, inventor of the vertical printing-press
(1788-1871).
APPLETON (11), a city of Wisconsin, U.S., on the Fox River.
APPLETON, CH. EDWARD, founder and editor of the _Academy_
(1841-1879).
APPOMATTOX COURTHOUSE, a village in Virginia, U.S., where Gen. Lee
surrendered to Gen. Grant in 1865.
APRAXEN, COUNT, a celebrated naval commander under Peter the Great
and his right-hand man in many enterprises (1671-1728).
APRIL, the fourth month of the year, the month of "opening of the
light in the days, and of the life of the leaves, and of the voices of
the birds, and of the hearts of men."
AP`TERYX, a curious New Zealand bird with rudimentary wings, plumage
like hair, and no tail.
APULE`IUS, a student of Plato, of N. African birth, lived in the 2nd
century; having captivated a rich widow, was charged at one time with
sorcery; his most celebrated work was the "Golden Ass," which contains,
among other stories, the exquisite apologue or romance of PSYCHE
and CUPID (q. v.).
APU`LIA (1,797), an ancient province in SE. of Italy, which extends
as far N. as Monte Gargano, and the scene of the last stages in the
second Punic war.
APU`RE, a river in Venezuela, chief tributary of the Orinoco, into
which it falls by six branches.
AQUA TOFA`NA, Tofana's poison, some solution of arsenic with which a
Sicilian woman called Tofana, in 17th century, poisoned, it is alleged,
600 people.
AQUA`RIUS, the Water-bearer, 11th sign of the Zodiac, which the sun
enters Jan. 21.
AQUAVIVA, a general of the Jesuits of high authority (1543-1615).
A`QUILA (20), capital of the province of Abruzzo Ulteriora, on the
Alterno, founded by Barbarossa; a busy place.
A`QUILA, a Judaised Greek of Sinope, in Pontus, executed a literal
translation of the Old Testament into Greek in the interest of Judaism
versus Christianity in the first half of the 2nd century A.D.
A`QUILA, GASPAR, a friend of Luther who aided him in the translation
of the Bible.
AQUILEIA, an Italian village, 22 m. W. of Trieste, once a place of
great importance, where several councils of the Church were held.
AQUI`NAS, THOMAS, the Angelic Doctor, or Doctor of the Schools, an
Italian of noble birth, studied at Naples, became a Dominican monk
despite the opposition of his parents, sat at the feet of Albertus
Magnus, and went with him to Paris, was known among his pupils as the
"Dumb Ox," from his stubborn silence at study, prelected at his Alma
Mater and elsewhere with distinguished success, and being invited to
assist the Council at Lyons, fell sick and died. His "Summa Theologiæ,"
the greatest of his many works, is a masterly production, and to this day
of standard authority in the Romish Church. His writings, which fill 17
folio vols., along with those of Duns Scotus, his rival, constitute the
high-water mark of scholastic philosophy and the watershed of its
divergence into the PHILOSOPHICO-SPECULATIVE THOUGHT on the one
hand, and the ETHICO-PRACTICAL OR REALISM OF MODERN TIMES on the
other, q. v. (1226-1274).
AQUITAINE`, a division of ancient Gaul between the Garonne and the
Pyrenees, was from the time of Henry II. till 1453 an appanage of the
English crown.
ARABELLA STUART, a cousin of King James I., the victim all her days
of jealousy and state policy, suspected of aspiring to the crown on the
death of Queen Elizabeth, was shut up in the Tower of London, where she
died bereft of reason in 1615 at the age of 38.
ARABESQUE, an ornamentation introduced by the Moors, consisting of
imaginary, often fantastic, mathematical or vegetable forms, but
exclusive of the forms of men and animals.
ARA`BI, AHMED PASHA, leader of an insurrectionary movement in Egypt
in 1882; he claimed descent from the Prophet; banished to Ceylon; _b_.
1839.
ARABIA (12,000), the most westerly peninsula of Asia and the largest
in the world, being one-third the size of the whole of Europe, consisting
of (_a_) a central plateau with pastures for cattle, and fertile valleys;
(_b_) a ring of deserts, the Nefud in the N., stony, the Great Arabian, a
perfect Sahara, in the S., sandy, said sometimes to be 600 ft. deep, and
the Dahna between; and (_c_) stretches of coast land, generally fertile
on the W. and S.; is divided into eight territories; has no lakes or
rivers, only wadies, oftenest dry; the climate being hot and arid, has no
forests, and therefore few wild animals; a trading country with no roads
or railways, only caravan routes, yet the birthland of a race that
threatened at one time to sweep the globe, and of a religion that has
been a life-guidance to wide-scattered millions of human beings for over
twelve centuries of time.
ARABIA FELIX, the W. coast of Arabia, contains YEMEN and EL
HEJAZ (q. v.), and is subject to Turkey.
ARABIAN DESERT. See ARABIA.
ARABIAN NIGHTS, or the Thousand and One Nights, a collection of
tales of various origin and date, traceable in their present form to the
middle of the 15th century, and first translated into French by Galland
in 1704. The thread on which they are strung is this: A Persian monarch
having made a vow that he would marry a fresh bride every night and
sacrifice her in the morning, the vizier's daughter obtained permission
to be the first bride, and began a story which broke off at an
interesting part evening after evening for a thousand and one nights, at
the end of which term the king, it is said, released her and spared her
life.
ARABS, THE, "a noble-gifted people, swift-handed, deep-hearted,
something most agile, active, yet most meditative, enthusiastic in their
character; a people of wild, strong feelings, and iron restraint over
these. In words too, as in action, not a loquacious people, taciturn
rather, but eloquent, gifted when they do speak, an earnest, truthful
kind of men, of Jewish kindred indeed, but with that deadly terrible
earnestness of the Jews they seem to combine something graceful,
brilliant, which is not Jewish." Such is Carlyle's opinion of the race
from whom Mahomet sprang, as given in his "Heroes."
ARACAN. See ARAKAN.
ARACH`NE, a Lydian maiden, who excelled in weaving, and whom Athena
changed into a spider because she had proudly challenged her ability to
weave as artistic a work; she had failed in the competition, and
previously hanged herself in her despair.
ARAD (42), a fortified town in Hungary, seat of a bishop, on the
right bank of the Maros; manufactures tobacco, trades in cattle and corn.
ARAF, the Mohammedan sheol or borderland between heaven and hell for
those who are from incapacity either not morally bad or morally good.
ARAFAT`, a granite hill E. of Mecca, a place of pilgrimage as the
spot where Adam received his wife after 200 years separation from her on
account of their disobedience to the Lord in deference to the suggestion
of Satan.
AR`AGO, FRANÇOIS, an eminent physicist and astronomer, born in the
S. of France, entered the Polytechnic School of Paris when seventeen,
elected a member of the Academy of Sciences at the early age of
twenty-three, nominated Director of the Observatory in 1830, was member
of the Provisional Government in 1848, refused to take the oath to Louis
Napoleon after the _coup d'état_, would rather resign his post at the
Observatory, but was retained, and at his death received a public funeral
(1786-1853).
ARAGO, JACQUES, a brother of the preceding, a littérateur and a
traveller, author of a "Voyage Round the World" (1790-1855).
AR`AGON (925), a territory in the NE. of Spain, traversed by the
Ebro, and divided as you proceed southward into the provinces of Huesca,
Saragossa, and Teruel, mountainous in the N.; with beautiful fertile
valleys, rather barren, in the S; was a kingdom till 1469.
ARAGUAY, an affluent of the Tocantins, in Brazil, which it joins
after a course of 1000 m., augmented by subsidiary streams.
ARAKAN (671), a strip of land in British Burmah, on the E. of the
Bay of Bengal, 400 m. long and from 90 to 15 m. broad, a low, marshy
country; produces and exports large quantities of rice, as well as sugar
and hemp. The natives belong to the Burman stock, and are of the Buddhist
faith, though there is a sprinkling of Mohammedans among them.
ARAL, THE SEA OF, a lake in Turkestan, 265 m. long and 145 broad,
larger than the Irish Sea, 150 m. E. of the Caspian; has no outlet,
shallow, and is said to be drying up.
ARAM, EUGENE, an English school-usher of scholarly attainments,
convicted of murder years after the act and executed 1759, to whose fate
a novel of Bulwer Lytton's and a poem of Hood's have lent a romantic and
somewhat fictitious interest.
ARAMÆA, the territories lying to NE. of Palestine, the inhabitants
of which spoke a Semitic dialect called Aramaic, and improperly Chaldee.
ARAMA`IC, the language of Palestine in the days of Christ, a Semitic
dialect that has now almost entirely died out.
ARAMÆ`ANS, a generic name given to the Semitic tribes that dwelt in
the NE. of Palestine, also to those that dwelt at the mouths of the
Euphrates and the Tigris.
ARAN, VAL D', a Pyrenean valley, source of the Garonne, and one of
the highest of the Pyrenees.
ARAN ISLANDS, three islands with antique relics across the mouth of
Galway Bay, to which they form a breakwater.
ARANDA, COUNT OF, an eminent Spanish statesman, banished the
Jesuits, suppressed brigandage, and curtailed the power of the
Inquisition, was Prime Minister of Charles IV., and was succeeded by
Godoy (1719-1798).
ARANJU`EZ (8), a town 28 m. SE. of Madrid, long the spring resort of
the Spanish Court.
AR`ANY, JANOS, a popular Hungarian poet of peasant origin, attained
to eminence as a man of letters (1819-1882).
AR`ARAT, a mountain in Armenia on which Noah's ark is said to have
rested, 17,000 ft. high, is within Russian territory, and borders on both
Turkey and Persia.
ARA`TUS, native of Sicyon, in Greece, promoter of the Achæan League,
in which he was thwarted by Philip of Macedon, was poisoned, it is said,
by his order (271-213 B.C.); also a Greek poet, author of two didactic
poems, born in Cilicia, quoted by St Paul in Acts xvii. 28.
ARAUCA`NIA (88), the country of the Araucos, in Chile, S. of
Concepcion and N. of Valdivia, the Araucos being an Indian race long
resistant but now subject to Chilian authority, and interesting as the
only one that has proved itself able to govern itself and hold its own in
the presence of the white man.
ARAUCA`RIA, tall conifer trees, natives of and confined to the
southern hemisphere.
ARBE`LA, a town near Mosul, where Alexander the Great finally
defeated Darius, 331 B.C.
ARBROATH (22), a thriving seaport and manufacturing town on the
Forfarshire coast, 17 m. N. of Dundee, with the picturesque ruins of an
extensive old abbey, of which Cardinal Beaton was the last abbot. It is
the "Fairport" of the "Antiquary."
ARBUTHNOT, JOHN, a physician and eminent literary man of the age of
Queen Anne and her two successors, born in Kincardineshire, the friend of
Swift and Pope and other lights of the time, much esteemed by them for
his wit and kind-heartedness, joint-author with Swift, it is thought, of
the "Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus" and the "History of John Bull"
(1667-1735).
AR`CACHON (7), a popular watering-place, with a fine beach and a
mild climate, favourable for invalids suffering from pulmonary
complaints, 34 m. SW. of Bordeaux.
ARCA`DIA, a mountain-girt pastoral tableland in the heart of the
Morea, 50 m. long by 40 broad, conceived by the poets as a land of
shepherds and shepherdesses, and rustic simplicity and bliss, and was the
seat of the worship of Artemis and Pan.
ARCA`DIUS, the first emperor of the East, born in Spain, a weak,
luxurious prince, leaving the government in other hands (377-405).
ARCESILA`US, a Greek philosopher, a member of the Platonic School
and founder of the New Academy, who held in opposition to the Stoics that
perception was not knowledge, denied that we had any accurate criterion
of truth, and denounced all dogmatism in opinion.
ARCHÆOLOGY, the study or the science of the monuments of antiquity,
as distinct from palæontology, which has to do with extinct organisms or
fossil remains.
ARCHANGEL (19), the oldest seaport of Russia, on the Dvina, near its
mouth, on the White Sea, is accessible to navigation from July to
October, is connected with the interior by river and canal, and has a
large trade in flax, timber, tallow, and tar.
ARCHANGELS, of these, according to the Korân, there are four:
Gabriel, the angel who reveals; Michael, the angel who fights; Azrael,
the angel of death; Azrafil, the angel of the resurrection.
ARCHELA`US, king of Macedonia, and patron of art and literature,
with whom Euripides found refuge in his exile, _d_. 400 B.C.; a general
of Mithridates, conquered by Sulla twice over; also the Ethnarch of
Judea, son of Herod, deposed by Augustus, died at Vienne.
ARCHER, JAMES, portrait-painter, born in Edinburgh, 1824.
ARCHER, WM., dramatic critic, born in Perth, 1856.
AR`CHES, COURT OF, an ecclesiastical court of appeal connected with
the archbishopric of Canterbury, the judge of which is called the dean.
AR`CHIL, a purple dye obtained from lichens.
ARCHIL`OCHUS, a celebrated lyric poet of Greece; of a satiric and
often bitter vein, the inventor of iambic verse (714-676 B.C.).
ARCHIMA`GO, a sorcerer in Spenser's "Faërie Queene," who in the
disguise of a reverend hermit, and by the help of Duessa or Deceit,
seduces the Red-Cross Knight from Una or Truth.
ARCHIME`DES OF SYRACUSE, the greatest mathematician of antiquity, a
man of superlative inventive power, well skilled in all the mechanical
arts and sciences of the day. When Syracuse was taken by the Romans, he
was unconscious of the fact, and slain, while busy on some problem, by a
Roman soldier, notwithstanding the order of the Roman general that his
life should be spared. He is credited with the boast: "Give me a fulcrum,
and I will move the world." He discovered how to determine the specific
weight of bodies while he was taking a bath, and was so excited over the
discovery that, it is said, he darted off stark naked on the instant
through the streets, shouting "_Eureka! Eureka!_ I have found it! I have
found it!" (287-212 B.C.).
ARCHIMED`ES SCREW, in its original form a hollow spiral placed
slantingly to raise water by revolving it.
ARCHIPEL`AGO, originally the Ægean Sea, now the name of any similar
sea interspersed with islands, or the group of islands included in it.
ARCHITRAVE, the lowest part of an entablature, resting immediately
on the capital.
AR`CHON, a chief magistrate of Athens, of which there were nine at a
time, each over a separate department; the tenure of office was first for
life, then for ten years, and finally for one.
ARCHY`TAS OF TARENTUM, famous as a statesman, a soldier, a
geometrician, a philosopher, and a man; a Pythagorean in philosophy, and
influential in that capacity over the minds of Plato, his contemporary,
and Aristotle; was drowned in the Adriatic Sea, 4th century B.C.; his
body lay unburied on the shore till a sailor humanely cast a handful of
sand on it, otherwise he would have had to wander on this side the Styx
for a hundred years, such the virtue of a little dust, _munera pulveris_,
as Horace calls it.
ARCIS`-SUR-AUBE (3), a town 17 m. N. of Troyes, in France,
birthplace of Danton; scene of a defeat of Napoleon, March 1814.
AR`COT, the name of two districts, N. and S., in the Presidency of
Madras; also chief town (11) in the district, 65 m. SW. of Madras;
captured by Clive in 1787; once the capital of the Carnatic.
ARCTIC OCEAN, a circular ocean round the N. Pole, its diameter 40°,
with low, flat shores, covered with ice-fields, including numerous
islands; the Gulf Stream penetrates it, and a current flows out of it
into the Atlantic.
ARCTU`RUS, star of the first magnitude and the chief in the N.
constellation Boötes.
ARDÈCHE, an affluent of the Rhône, source in the Cévennes; gives
name to a department traversed by the Cévennes Mountains.
ARDEN, a large forest at one time in England, E. of the Severn.
ARDEN, ENOCH, hero of a poem by Tennyson, who finds, on his return
from the sea, after long absence, his wife, who believed him dead,
married happily to another; does not disclose himself, and dies
broken-hearted.
ARDENNES, a forest, a tract of rugged woodland on the confines of
France and Belgium; also department of France (325), on the borders of
Belgium.
AR`DOCH, a place in Perthshire, 7 m. from Crieff, with the remains
of a Roman camp, the most complete in Britain.
ARENDS, LEOPOLD, a Russian of literary ability, inventor of a system
of stenography extensively used on the Continent (1817-1882).
AREOPAGITICA, a prose work of Milton's, described by Prof.
Saintsbury as "a magnificent search for the Dead Truth."
AREOP`AGUS, the hill of Ares in Athens, which gave name to the
celebrated council held there, a tribunal of 31 members, charged with
judgment in criminal offences, and whose sentences were uniformly the
awards of strictest justice.
AREQUI`PA (35), a city in Peru, founded by Pizarro in 1536, in a
fruitful valley of the Andes, 8000 ft. above the sea, 30 m. inland; is
much subject to earthquakes, and was almost destroyed by one in 1868.
A`RÉS, the Greek god of war in its sanguinary aspects; was the son
of Zeus and Hera; identified by the Romans with Mars, was fond of war for
its own sake, and had for sister Eris, the goddess of strife, who used to
pander to his passion.
ARETÆ`US, a Greek physician of 1st century; wrote a treatise on
diseases, their causes, symptoms, and cures, still extant.
ARETHU`SA, a celebrated fountain in the island of Ortygia, near
Syracuse, transformed from a Nereid pursued thither from Elis, in Greece,
by the river-god Alphæus, so that the waters of the river henceforth
mingled with those of the fountain.
ARETI`NO, PIETRO, called the "Scourge of Princes," a licentious
satirical writer, born at Arezzo, in Tuscany, alternately attached to
people and repelled from them by his wit, moved from one centre of
attraction to another; settled in Venice, where he died after an
uncontrollable fit of laughter which seized him at the story of the
adventure of a sister (1492-1557).
AREZZO (44), an ancient Tuscan city, 38 m. SE. of Florence, and
eventually subject to it; the birthplace of Mæcenas, Michael Angelo,
Petrarch, Guido, and Vasari.
AR`GALI, a sheep of Siberia, as large as a moderately-sized ox, with
enormous grooved curving horns, strong-limbed, sure-footed, and swift.
ARGAN`, the hypochondriac rich patient in Molière's "Le Malade
Imaginaire."
ARGAND, a Swiss physician and chemist, born at Geneva; inventor of
the argand lamp, which, as invented by him, introduced a circular wick
(1755-1803).
ARGELAN`DER, a distinguished astronomer, born at Memel, professor at
Bonn; he fixed the position of 22,000 stars, and recorded observations to
prove that the solar system was moving through space (1799-1874).
AR`GENS, MARQUIS D', a French soldier who turned to letters, author
of sceptical writings, of which the best known is entitled "Lettres
Juives" (1704-1771).
ARGENSON, RENÉ-LOUIS, MARQUIS D', French statesman, who left
"Memoirs" of value as affecting the early and middle part of Louis XV.'s
reign (1694-1757).
ARGENTINE REPUBLIC, or ARGENTINA (4,000), a confederation like
that of the United States of 14 states and 9 territories, occupying the
eastern slopes of the Andes and the vast level plain extending from them
to the Atlantic, bounded on the N. by Bolivia and Paraguay; its area ten
times that of Great Britain and Ireland; while the population includes
600,000 foreigners, Italians, French, Spaniards, English, and Germans.
AR`GO, the fifty-oared ship of the ARGONAUTS (q. v.).
AR`GOLIS, the north-eastern peninsula of the Morea of Greece, and
one of the 13 provinces of Greece, is 12 m. long by 5 m. broad.
AR`GON, a new element lately discovered to exist in a gaseous form
in the nitrogen of the air.
ARGONAUTICA, the title of a poem on the Argonautic expedition by
Apollonius of Rhodes.
AR`GONAUTS, the Greek heroes, sailors in the _Argo_, who, under the
command of Jason, sailed for Colchis in quest of the golden fleece, which
was guarded by a dragon that never slept, a perilous venture, but it
proved successful with the assistance of Medea, the daughter of the king,
whom, with the fleece, Jason in the end brought away with him to be his
wife.
ARGONNE`, FOREST OF, "a long strip of rocky mountain and wild wood"
in the NE. of France, within the borders of which the Duke of Brunswick
was outwitted by Dumouriez in 1792.
AR`GOS (9), the capital of Argolis, played for long a prominent part
in the history of Greece, but paled before the power of Sparta.
AR`GUS, surnamed the "All-seeing," a fabulous creature with a
hundred eyes, of which one half was always awake, appointed by Hera to
watch over Io, but Hermes killed him after lulling him to sleep by the
sound of his flute, whereupon Hera transferred his eyes to the tail of
the peacock, her favourite bird. Also the dog of Ulysses, immortalised by
Homer; he was the only creature that recognised Ulysses under his rags on
his return to Ithaca after twenty years' absence, under such excitement,
however, that immediately after he dropped down dead.
ARGUS, a pheasant, a beautiful Oriental game-bird, so called from
the eye-like markings on its plumage.
ARGYLL (74), a large county in the W. of Scotland, consisting of
deeply indented mainland and islands, and abounding in mountains,
moorlands, and lochs, with scenery often picturesque as well as wild and
savage.
ARGYLL, a noble family or clan of the name of Campbell, the members
of which have held successively the title of Earl, Marquis, and Duke,
their first patent of nobility dating from 1445, and their earldom from
1453.
ARGYLL, ARCHIBALD CAMPBELL, 1ST MARQUIS OF, sided with the
Covenanters, fought against Montrose, disgusted with the execution of
Charles I., crowned Charles II. at Scone, after the Restoration committed
to the Tower, was tried and condemned, met death nobly (1598-1661).
ARGYLL, ARCHIBALD CAMPBELL, 9TH EARL OF, son of the preceding,
fought for Charles II., was taken prisoner, released at the Restoration
and restored to his estates, proved rebellious at last, and was condemned
to death; escaped to Holland, made a descent on Scotland, was captured
and executed in 1685.
ARGYLL, GEORGE JOHN DOUGLAS CAMPBELL, 8TH DUKE OF, as Marquis of
Lorne took a great interest in the movement which led to the Disruption
of the Church of Scotland in 1843, a Whig in politics, was a member of
the Cabinets of Aberdeen, Palmerston, and Gladstone; of late has shown
more Conservative tendencies; takes a deep interest in the scientific
theories and questions of the time; wrote, among other works, a book in
1866 entitled "The Reign of Law," in vindication of Theism, and another
in the same interest in 1884 entitled "The Unity of Nature"; _b_. 1824.
ARGYLL, JOHN CAMPBELL, 2ND DUKE OF, favoured the Union, was created
an English peer, fought under Marlborough, opposed the return of the
Stuarts, defeated Mar at Sheriffmuir, ruled Scotland under Walpole
(1678-1743).
ARIAD`NE, daughter of Minos, king of Crete, gave to Theseus a clue
by which to escape out of the labyrinth after he had slain the Minotaur,
for which Theseus promised to marry her; took her with him to Naxos and
left her there, where, according to one tradition, Artemis killed her,
and according to another, Dionysos found her and married her, placing her
at her death among the gods, and hanging her wedding wreath as a
constellation in the sky.
ARIANISM, the heresy of ARIUS (q. v.).
ARIA`NO (12), a city with a fine cathedral, 1500 ft. above the
sea-level, NE. of Naples; has a trade in wine and butter.
ARI`CA, a seaport connected with Tacna, S. of Peru, the chief outlet
for the produce of Bolivia; suffers again and again from earthquakes, and
was almost destroyed in 1832.
ARIÈGE, a department of France, at the foot of the northern slopes
of the Pyrenees; has extensive forests and is rich in minerals.
A`RIEL, in Shakespeare's "Tempest," a spirit of the air whom
Prospero finds imprisoned by Sycorax in the cleft of a pine-tree, and
liberates on condition of her serving him for a season, which she
willingly engages to do, and does.
ARIEL, an idol of the Moabites, an outcast angel.
ARIES, the Ram. the first of the signs of the Zodiac, which the sun
enters on March 21, though the constellation itself, owing to the
precession of the equinoxes, is no longer within the limits of the sign.
ARI`ON, a lyrist of Lesbos, lived chiefly at the court of Periander,
Corinth; returning in a ship from a musical contest in Sicily laden with
prizes, the sailors plotted to kill him, when he begged permission to
play one strain on his lute, which being conceded, dolphins crowded round
the ship, whereupon he leapt over the bulwarks, was received on the back
of one of them, and carried to Corinth, arriving there before the
sailors, who, on their landing, were apprehended and punished.
ARIOS`TO, LUDOVICO, an illustrious Italian poet, born at Reggio, in
Lombardy; spent his life chiefly in Ferrara, mostly in poverty; his great
work "ORLANDO FURIOSO" (q. v.), published the first edition, in
40 cantos, in 1516, and the third in 46 cantos, in 1532; the work is so
called from the chief subject of it, the madness of Roland induced by the
loss of his lady-love through her marriage to another (1474-1532).
ARIOVISTUS, a German chief, invaded Gaul, and threatened to overrun
it, but was forced back over the Rhine by Cæsar.
ARISTÆ`US, a son of Apollo, the guardian divinity of the vine and
olive, of hunters and herdsmen; first taught the management of bees, some
of which stung Eurydice to death, whereupon the nymphs, companions of
Orpheus, her husband, set upon his bees and destroyed them. In this
extremity Aristæus applied to Proteus, who advised him to sacrifice four
bullocks to appease the manes of Eurydice; this done, there issued from
the carcasses of the victims a swarm of bees, which reconciled him to the
loss of the first ones.
ARISTAR`CHUS OF SAMOS, a Greek astronomer, who first conceived the
idea of the rotundity of the earth and its revolution both on its own
axis and round the sun, in promulgating which idea he was accused of
impiously disturbing the serenity of the gods (280 B.C.).
ARISTARCHUS OF SAMOTHRACE, a celebrated Greek grammarian and critic,
who devoted his life to the elucidation and correct transmission of the
text of the Greek poets, and especially Homer (158-88 B.C.).
ARISTE`AS, a sort of Wandering Jew of Greek fable, who turns up here
and there in Greek tradition, and was thought to be endowed with a soul
that could at will leave and enter the body.
ARISTI`DES, an Athenian general and statesman, surnamed The Just;
covered himself with glory at the battle of Marathon; was made archon
next year, in the discharge of the duties of which office he received his
surname; was banished by ostracism at the instance of his rival,
Themistocles; recalled three years after the invasion of Xerxes, was
reconciled to Themistocles, fought bravely at Salamis, and distinguished
himself at Platæa; managed the finances of the State with such probity
that he died poor, was buried at the public charges, and left the State
to provide for his children.
ARISTION, a philosopher, tyrant of Athens, put to death by order of
Sylla, 86 B.C.
ARISTIP`PUS OF CYRENE, founder of the Cyrenaic school of philosophy,
a disciple of Socrates; in his teaching laid too much emphasis on one
principle of Socrates, apart from the rest, in insisting too exclusively
upon pleasure as the supreme good and ultimate aim of life.
ARISTOBU`LUS I., son of John Hyrcanus, first of the Asmonæan dynasty
in Judea to assume the name of king, which he did from 104-102 B.C., a
pronounced Helleniser; A. II., twice carried captive to Rome,
assassinated 50 B.C.; A. III., last of Asmonæan dynasty, drowned by
Herod in the Jordan, 34 B.C.
ARISTODE`MUS, king of Messenia, carried on for 20 years a war with
Sparta, till at length finding resistance hopeless he put an end to his
life on the tomb of his daughter, whom he had sacrificed to ensure the
fulfilment of an oracle to the advantage of his house; _d_. 724 B.C.
Also a Greek sculptor, 4th century B.C.
ARISTOM`ENES, a mythical king of Messenia, celebrated for his
struggle with the Spartans, and his resistance to them on Mount Ira for
11 years, which at length fell to the enemy, while he escaped and was
snatched up by the gods; died at Rhodes.
ARISTOPHANES, the great comic dramatist of Athens, lived in the 5th
century B.C.; directed the shafts of his wit, which were very keen,
against all of whatever rank who sought in any way to alter, and, as it
was presumed, amend, the religious, philosophical, social, political, or
literary creed and practice of the country, and held up to ridicule such
men as Socrates and Euripides, as well as Cleon the tanner; wrote 54
plays, of which 11 have come down to us; of these the "Clouds" aim at
Socrates, the "Acharnians" and the "Frogs" at Euripides, and the
"Knights" at Cleon; _d_. 384 B.C.
AR`ISTOTLE, a native of Stagira, in Thrace, and hence named the
Stagirite; deprived of his parents while yet a youth; came in his 17th
year to Athens, remained in Plato's society there for 20 years; after the
death of Plato, at the request of Philip, king of Macedon, who held him
in high honour, became the preceptor of Alexander the Great, then only 13
years old; on Alexander's expedition into Asia, returned to Athens and
began to teach in the Lyceum, where it was his habit to walk up and down
as he taught, from which circumstance his school got the name of
Peripatetic; after 13 years he left the city and went to Chalcis, in
Euboea, where he died. He was the oracle of the scholastic philosophers
and theologians in the Middle Ages; is the author of a great number of
writings which covered a vast field of speculation, of which the progress
of modern science goes to establish the value; is often referred to as
the incarnation of the philosophic spirit (385-322 B.C.).
ARISTOX`ENUS OF TARENTUM, a Greek philosopher, author of the
"Elements of Harmony," the only one of his many works extant, and one of
the oldest writers on music; contemporary of Aristotle.
A`RIUS, a presbyter of Alexandria in the 4th century, and founder of
Arianism, which denied the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father
in the so-called Trinity, a doctrine which hovered for a time between
acceptance and rejection throughout the Catholic Church; was condemned
first by a local synod which met at Alexandria in 321, and then by a
General Council at Nice in 325, which the Emperor Constantine attended in
person; the author was banished to Illyricum, his writings burned, and
the possession of them voted to be a crime; after three years he was
recalled by Constantine, who ordered him to be restored; was about to be
readmitted into the Church when he died suddenly, by poison, alleged his
friends--by the judgment of God, said his enemies (280-336).
ARIZO`NA (59), a territory of the United States N. of Mexico and W.
of New Mexico, nearly four times as large as Scotland, rich in mines of
gold, silver, and copper, fertile in the lowlands; much of the surface a
barren plateau 11,000 ft. high, through which the cañon of the Colorado
passes. See CAÑON.
ARK OF THE COVENANT, a chest of acacia wood overlaid with gold, 2½
cubits long and 1½ in breadth; contained the two tables of stone
inscribed with the Ten Commandments, the gold pot with the manna, and
Aaron's rod; the lid supported the mercy-seat, with a cherub at each end,
and the shekinah radiance between.
ARKANS`AS (1,128), one of the Southern States of America, N. of
Louisiana and W. of the Mississippi, a little larger than England; rich
in metals, grows cotton and corn.
ARKWRIGHT, SIR RICHARD, born at Preston, Lancashire; bred to the
trade of a barber; took interest in the machinery of cotton-spinning;
with the help of a clockmaker, invented the spinning frame; was mobbed
for threatening thereby to shorten labour and curtail wages, and had to
flee; fell in with Mr. Strutt of Derby, who entered into partnership with
him; prospered in business and died worth half a million. "French
Revolutions were a-brewing; to resist the same in any way, Imperial
Cæsars were impotent without the cotton and cloth of England; and it was
this man," says Carlyle, "that had to give to England the power of
cotton" (1732-1792).
ARLBERG, a mountain mass between the Austrian provinces of
Vorarlberg and Tyrol, pierced by a tunnel, one of the three that
penetrate the Alps, and nearly four miles in length.
ARLES (14), a city, one of the oldest in France, on the Rhône, 46 m.
N. of Marseilles, where Constantine built a palace, with ruins of an
amphitheatre and other Roman works; the seat of several Church Councils.
AR`LINCOURT, VISCOUNT D', a French romancer, born near Versailles
(1789-1856).
AR`LINGTON, HENRY BENNET, EARL OF, served under Charles I., and
accompanied Charles II. in his exile; a prominent member of the famous
Cabal; being impeached when in office, lost favour and retired into
private life (1618-1685).
AR`LON (8), a prosperous town in Belgium, capital of Luxemburg.
ARMA`DA, named the Invincible, an armament fitted out in 1588 by
Philip II. of Spain against England, consisting of 130 war-vessels,
mounted with 2430 cannon, and manned by 20,000 soldiers; was defeated in
the Channel on July 20 by Admiral Howard, seconded by Drake, Hawkins, and
Frobisher; completely dispersed and shattered by a storm in retreat on
the coasts of Scotland and Ireland, the English losing only one ship; of
the whole fleet only 53 ships found their way back to Spain, and these
nearly all _hors de combat_.
ARMAGEDDON, a name given in Apocalypse to the final battlefield
between the powers of good and evil, or Christ and Antichrist.
ARMAGH (143), a county in Ulster, Ireland, 32 m. long by 20 m.
broad; and a town (18) in it, 33 m. SW. of Belfast, from the 5th to the
9th century the capital of Ireland, as it is the ecclesiastical still;
the chief manufacture linen-weaving.
ARMAGNAC, a district, part of Gascony, in France, now in dep. of
Gers, celebrated for its wine and brandy.
ARMAGNACS, a faction in France in time of Charles VI. at mortal feud
with the Bourguignons.
ARMATO`LES, warlike marauding tribes in the mountainous districts of
Northern Greece, played a prominent part in the War of Independence in
1820.
ARMED SOLDIER OF DEMOCRACY, Napoleon Bonaparte.
ARME`NIA, a country in Western Asia, W. of the Caspian Sea and N. of
Kurdistan Mts., anciently independent, now divided between Turkey,
Russia, and Persia, occupying a plateau interspersed with fertile
valleys, which culminates in Mt. Ararat, in which the Euphrates and
Tigris have their sources.
ARMENIANS, a people of the Aryan race occupying Armenia, early
converted to Christianity of the Eutychian type; from early times have
emigrated into adjoining, and even remote, countries, and are, like the
Jews, mainly engaged in commercial pursuits, the wealthier of them
especially in banking.
ARMENTIÈRES (27), a manufacturing and trading town in France, 12 m.
N. of Lille.
ARMI`DA, a beautiful enchantress in Tasso's "Jerusalem Delivered,"
who bewitched Rinaldo, one of the Crusaders, by her charms, as Circe did
Ulysses, and who in turn, when the spell was broken, overpowered her by
his love and persuaded her to become a Christian. _The Almida Palace_, in
which she enchanted Rinaldo, has become a synonym for any merely
visionary but enchanting palace of pleasure.
ARMINIANISM. See ARMINIUS.
ARMIN`IUS, or HERMANN, the Deliverer of Germany from the
Romans by the defeat of Varus, the Roman general, in 9 A.D., near
Detmold (where a colossal statue has been erected to his memory); killed
in some family quarrel in his 37th year.
ARMINIUS, JACOBUS, a learned Dutch theologian and founder of
Arminianism, an assertion of the free-will of man in the matter of
salvation against the necessitarianism of Calvin (1560-1609).
ARMOR`ICA, a district of Gaul from the Loire to the Seine.
ARMSTRONG, JOHN, a Scotch doctor and poet, born in Roxburghshire,
practised medicine in London; friend of poet Thomson, as well as of
Wilkes and Smollett, and author of "The Art of Preserving Health"
(1709-1779).
ARMSTRONG, WILLIAM GEORGE, LORD, born at Newcastle, produced the
hydraulic accumulator and the hydraulic crane, established the Elswick
engine works in the suburbs of his native city, devoted his attention to
the improvement of heavy ordnance, invented the Armstrong gun, which he
got the Government to adopt, knighted in 1858, and in 1887 raised to the
peerage; _b_. 1810.
AR`NAUD, HENRI, a pastor of the Vaudois, turned soldier to rescue,
and did rescue, his co-religionists from their dispersion under the
persecution of the Count of Savoy; but when the Vaudois were exiled a
second time, he accompanied them in their exile to Schomberg, and acted
pastor to them till his death (1641-1721).
ARNAULD, ANTOINE, the "great Arnauld," a French theologian, doctor
of the Sorbonne, an inveterate enemy of the Jesuits, defended Jansenism
against the Bull of the Pope, became religious director of the nuns of
Port Royal des Champs, associated here with a circle of kindred spirits,
among others Pascal; expelled from the Sorbonne and banished the country,
died at Brussels (1612-1694).
ARNAULD, MARIE ANGE`LIQUE, _La Mère Angelique_ as she was called,
sister of the preceding and abbess of the Port Royal, a victim of the
persecutions of the Jesuits to very death (1624-1684).
ARNDT, ERNST MORITZ, a German poet and patriot, whose memory is much
revered by the whole German people, one of the first to rouse his
countrymen to shake off the tyranny of Napoleon; his songs and eloquent
appeals went straight to the heart of the nation and contributed
powerfully to its liberation; his "Geist der Zeit" made him flee the
country after the battle of Jena, and his "Was ist des Deutschen
Vaterland?" strikes a chord in the breast of every German all the world
over (1710-1860).
ARNDT, JOHN, a Lutheran theologian, the author of "True
Christianity," a work which, in Germany and elsewhere, has contributed to
infuse a new spirit of life into the profession of the Christian
religion, which seemed withering away under the influence of a lifeless
dogmatism (1553-1621).
ARNE, THOMAS AUGUSTINE, a musical composer of versatile genius,
produced, during over 40 years, a succession of pieces in every style
from songs to sonatas and oratorios, among others the world-famous chorus
"Rule Britannia"; Mrs. Cibber was his sister (1719-1778).
ARN`HEIM (51), the capital of Guelderland, is situated on the right
bank of the Rhine, and has a large transit trade.
ARNIM, BETTINE VON, sister of Clemens Brentano, wife of Ludwig
Arnim, a native of Frankfort; at 22 conceived a passionate love for
Goethe, then in his 60th year, visited him at Weimar, and corresponded
with him afterwards, part of which correspondence appeared subsequently
under the title of "Goethe's Correspondence with a Child" (1785-1859).
ARNIM, COUNT, ambassador of Germany, first at Rome and then at
Paris; accused in the latter capacity of purloining State documents, and
sentenced to imprisonment; died in exile at Nice (1824-1881).
ARNIM, LUDWIG ACHIM VON, a German poet and novelist (1781-1831).
ARNO, a river of Italy, rises in the Apennines, flows westward past
Florence and Pisa into the Mediterranean, subject to destructive
inundations.
ARNOBIUS, an African rhetorician who, in the beginning of the 4th
century, embraced Christianity, and wrote a book in its defence, still
extant, and of great value, entitled "Disputations against the Heathen."
ARNOLD, BENEDICT, an American military general, entered the ranks of
the colonists under Washington during the War of Independence,
distinguished himself in several engagements, promoted to the rank of
general, negotiated with the English general Clinton to surrender an
important post entrusted to him, escaped to the English ranks on the
discovery of the plot, and served in them against his country; _d_. in
England in 1801.
ARNOLD, MATTHEW, poet and critic, eldest son of Thomas Arnold of
Rugby; professor of Poetry in Oxford from 1857 to 1867; inspector of
schools for 35 years from 1851; commissioned twice over to visit France,
Germany, and Holland, to inquire into educational matters there; wrote
two separate reports thereon of great value; author of "Poems," of a
highly finished order and showing a rich poetic gift, "Essays on
Criticism," "Culture and Anarchy," "St. Paul and Protestantism,"
"Literature and Dogma," &c.; a man of culture, and especially literary
culture, of which he is reckoned the apostle; died suddenly at Liverpool.
He was more eminent as a poet than a critic, influential as he was in
that regard. "It is," says Swinburne, "by his verse and not his prose he
must be judged," and is being now judged (1822-1888).
ARNOLD, SIR EDWIN, poet and journalist, familiar with Indian
literature; author of the "Light of Asia," "Light of the World," and
other works in prose and verse; _b_. 1832, at Gravesend.
ARNOLD, THOMAS, head-master of Rugby, and professor of Modern
History at Oxford; by his moral character and governing faculty effected
immense reforms in Rugby School; was liberal in his principles and of a
philanthropic spirit; he wrote a "History of Rome" based on Niebuhr, and
edited Thucydides; his "Life and Correspondence" was edited by Dean
Stanley (1795-1842).
ARNOLD OF BRESCIA, an Italian monk, and disciple of Abelard;
declaimed against the temporal power of the Pope, the corruptions of the
Church, and the avarice of the clergy; headed an insurrection against the
Pope in Rome, which collapsed under the Pope's interdict; at last was
burned alive in 1156, and his ashes thrown into the Tiber.
ARNOLD OF WINKELRIED, the Decius of Switzerland, a peasant of the
canton of Unterwald, who, by the voluntary sacrifice of his life, broke
the lines of the Austrians at Sempach in 1386 and decided the fate of the
battle.
ARNOTT, DR. NEIL, a native of Arbroath, author of the "Elements of
Physics" and of several hygienic inventions (1788-1874).
AROU`ET, the family name of Voltaire; his name formed by an
ingenious transposition he made of the letters of his name, Arouet l. j.
(jeune).
AR`PAD, the national hero of Hungary; established for the Magyars a
firm footing in the country; was founder of the Arpad dynasty, which
became extinct in 1301; _d_. 907.
ARPI`NO (ARPINIUM), an ancient town in Latium, S. of Rome,
birthplace of Cicero and Marius.
ARQUA, a village 12 m. SW. of Padua, where Petrarch died and was
buried.
ARRACK, a spirituous liquor, especially that distilled from the
juice of the cocoa-nut tree and from fermented rice.
AR`RAH, a town in Bengal, 36 m. from Patna; famous for its defence
by a handful of English and Sikhs against thousands during the Mutiny.
ARRAN (4), largest island in the Firth of Clyde, in Buteshire; a
mountainous island, highest summit Goatfell, 2866 ft, with a margin of
lowland round the coast; nearly all the property of the Duke of Hamilton,
whose seat is Brodick Castle.
ARRAS (20), a French town in the dep. of Pas-de-Calais, long
celebrated for its tapestry; the birthplace of Damiens and Robespierre.
AR`RIA, a Roman matron, who, to encourage her husband in meeting
death, to which he had been sentenced, thrust a poniard into her own
breast, and then handed it to him, saying, "It is not painful," whereupon
he followed her example.
AR`RIAN, FLAVIUS, a Bithynian, a friend of Epictetus the Stoic,
edited his "Enchiridion"; wrote a "History of Alexander the Great," and
"Periplus," an account of voyages round the Euxine and round the Red Sea;
_b_. 100, and died at an advanced age.
ARROW-HEADED CHARACTERS, the same as the CUNEIFORM (q. v.).
ARRU ISLANDS (15), a group of 80 coralline islands, belonging to
Holland, W. of New Guinea; export mother-of-pearl, pearls,
tortoise-shell, &c.
AR`SACES I., the founder of the dynasty of the Arsacidæ, by a revolt
which proved successful against the Seleucidæ, 250 B.C.
ARSACIDÆ, a dynasty of 31 Parthian kings, who wrested the throne
from Antiochus II., the last of the Seleucidæ, 250 B.C.
ARSIN`OË, the name of several Egyptian princesses of antiquity; also
a prude in Molière's "Misanthrope."
ARTA, GULF OF, gulf forming the NW. frontier of Greece.
ARTS, THE. There are three classes of these, the Liberal, the Fine,
and the Mechanical: the Liberal, implying scholarship, graduation in
which is granted by universities, entitling the holder to append M.A. to
his name; the Mechanical, implying skill; and the Fine, implying the
possession of a soul, discriminated from the mechanical by the word
spiritual, as holding of the entire, undivided man, heart as well as
brain.
ARTAXER`XES, the name of several Persian monarchs: A. I.,
called the "Long-handed," from his right hand being longer than his left;
son of Xerxes I.; concluded a peace with Greece after a war of 52
years; entertained Themistocles at his court; king from 465 to 424 B.C.
A. II., MNEMON, vanquished and killed his brother Cyrus at Cunaxa in
401, who had revolted against him; imposed in 387 on the Spartans the
shameful treaty of ANTALCIDAS (q. v.); king from 405 to 359
B.C. A. III., OCHUS, son of the preceding, slew all his kindred on
ascending the throne; in Egypt slew the sacred bull Apis and gave the
flesh to his soldiers, for which his eunuch Bagsas poisoned him; king
from 359 to 338 B.C. A. IV., grandson of Sassan, founder of the
dynasty Sassanidæ; restored the old religion of the Magi, amended the
laws, and promoted education; king from A.D. 223 to 232.
ARTE`DI, a Swedish naturalist, assisted Linnæus in his "Systema
Naturæ"; his own great work, "Ichthyologia," published by Linnæus after
his death (1703-1735).
AR`TEGAL, the impersonation and champion of Justice in Spenser's
"Faërie Queene."
AR`TEMIS, in the Greek mythology the daughter of Zeus and Leto, twin
sister of Apollo, born in the Isle of Delos, and one of the great
divinities of the Greeks; a virgin goddess, represented as a huntress
armed with bow and arrows; presided over the birth of animals, was
guardian of flocks, the moon the type of her and the laurel her sacred
tree, was the Diana of the Romans, and got mixed up with deities in other
mythologies.
ARTEMI`SIA, queen of Halicarnassus, joined Xerxes in his invasion of
Greece, and fought with valour at Salamis, 440 B.C. A. II., also
queen, raised a tomb over the grave of her husband Mausolus, regarded as
one of the seven wonders of the world, 355 B.C.
ARTEMI`SIUM, a promontory N. of Euboea, near which Xerxes lost part
of his fleet, 480 B.C.
ARTEMUS WARD. See C. F. BROWNE.
ARTESIAN WELLS, wells made by boring for water where it is lower
than its source, so as to obtain a constant supply of it.
AR`TEVELDE, JACOB VAN, a wealthy brewer of Ghent, chosen chief in a
revolt against Count Louis of Flanders, expelled him, made a treaty with
Edward III. as lord-superior of Flanders, was massacred in a popular
tumult (1300-1345).
ARTEVELDE, PHILIP VAN, son of the preceding, defeated Louis II. and
became king; but with the help of France Louis retaliated and defeated
the Flemings, and slew him in 1382.
ARTFUL DODGER, a young thief, an expert in the profession in
Dickens' "Oliver Twist."
AR`THUR, a British prince of wide-spread fame, who is supposed to
have lived at the time of the Saxon invasion in the 6th century, whose
exploits and those of his court have given birth to the tradition of the
Round Table, to the rendering of which Tennyson devoted so much of his
genius.
ARTHUR, CHESTER ALAN, twenty-first president of the United States, a
lawyer by profession, and a prominent member of the Republican party
(1830-1886).
ARTHUR, PRINCE, DUKE OF BRITTANY, heir to the throne of England by
the death of his uncle Richard I.; supplanted by King John.
ARTHUR SEAT, a lion-shaped hill 822 ft., close to Edinburgh on the
E., from the top of which the prospect is unrivalled; "the blue,
majestic, everlasting ocean, with the Fife hills swelling gradually into
the Grampians behind it on the N.; rough crags and rude precipices at our
feet ('where not a hillock rears its head unsung'), with Edinburgh at
their base, clustering proudly over her rugged foundations, and covering
with a vapoury mantle the jagged, black, venerable masses of stone-work,
that stretch far and wide, and show like a city of fairyland"--such the
view Carlyle had in a clear atmosphere of 1826, whatever it may be now.
ARTICLES, THE THIRTY-NINE, originally Forty-Two, a creed framed in
1562, which every clergyman of the Church of England is bound by law to
subscribe to at his ordination, as the accepted faith of the Church.
ARTIST, according to a definition of Ruskin, which he prints in
small caps., "a person who has submitted to a law which it was painful to
obey, that he may bestow a delight which it is gracious to bestow."
ARTISTS, PRINCE OF, Albert Dürer, so called by his countrymen.
AR`TOIS, an ancient province of France, comprising the dep. of
Pas-de-Calais, and parts of the Somme and the Nord; united to the crown
in 1659.
ARTOIS, MONSEIGNEUR D', famed, as described in Carlyle's "French
Revolution," for "breeches of a new kind in this world"; brother of Louis
XVI., and afterwards CHARLES X. (q. v.).
AR`UNDEL (2), a municipal town in Sussex, on the Arun, 9 m. E. of
Chichester, with a castle of great magnificence, the seat of the Earls of
Arundel.
ARUNDEL, THOMAS, successively bishop of Ely, Lord Chancellor,
archbishop of York, and archbishop of Canterbury; a persecutor of the
Wickliffites, but a munificent benefactor of the Church (1353-1414).
ARUNDEL MARBLES, ancient Grecian marbles collected at Smyrna and
elsewhere by the Earl of Arundel in 1624, now in the possession of the
University of Oxford, the most important of which is one from Paros
inscribed with a chronology of events in Grecian history from 1582 to 264
B.C.; the date of the marbles themselves is 263 B.C.
ARUNS, son of Tarquinus Superbus, who fell in single combat with
Brutus.
ARUWI`MI, an affluent of the Congo on the right bank below the
Stanley Falls.
ARVA`TES, FRATRES, a college of twelve priests in ancient Rome whose
duty it was to make annual offerings to the Lares for the increase of the
fruits of the field.
ARVE, a river that flows through the valley of Chamouni and falls
into the Rhône below Geneva.
ARVEYRON, an affluent of the Arve from the Mer de Glace.
AR`YANS, or Indo-Europeans, a race that is presumed to have had its
primitive seat in Central Asia, E. of the Caspian Sea and N. of the
Hindu-Kush, and to have branched off at different periods north-westward
and westward into Europe, and southward into Persia and the valley of the
Ganges, from which sprung the Greeks, Latins, Celts, Teutons, Slavs, on
the one hand, and the Persians and Hindus on the other, a community of
origin that is attested by the comparative study of their respective
languages.
AR`ZEW, a seaport in Algeria, 22 m. from Oran, with Roman remains;
exports grain and salt.
ASAFOE`TIDA, a fetid inspissated sap from an Indian umbelliferous
tree, used in medicine.
ASAPH, a musician of the temple at Jerusalem.
ASAPH, ST., a town in Flintshire, 20 m. from Chester; seat of a
bishopric.
ASBES`TOS, an incombustible mineral of a flax-like fibrous texture,
which has been manufactured into cloth, paper, lamp-wick, steam-pipes,
gas-stoves, &c.
ASBJÖRN`SEN, a Dane, distinguished as a naturalist, and particularly
as a collector of folk-lore, as well as an author of children's stories
(1812-1885).
AS`BURY, FRANCIS, a zealous, assiduous Methodist preacher and
missionary, sent to America, was consecrated the first bishop of the
newly organised Methodist Church there (1745-1816).
AS`CALON, one of the five cities of the Philistines, much contested
for during the Crusades.
ASCA`NIUS, the son of Æneas, who trotted _non passibus æquis_ ("with
unequal steps") by the side of his father as he escaped from burning
Troy; was founder of Alba Longa.
AS`CAPART, a giant conquered by Bevis of Southampton, though so huge
as to carry Bevis, his wife, and horse under his arm.
ASCENSION, a bare volcanic island in the Atlantic, rising to nearly
3000 ft., belonging to Britain, 500 m. NW. of St. Helena, and 900 m. from
the coast of Africa; a coaling and victualling station for the navy.
ASCHAF`FENBURG (14), an ancient town of Bavaria, on the Main, 20 m.
from Frankfort, with an old castle and cathedral.
ASCHAM, ROGER, a Yorkshireman, Fellow of Cambridge, a good
classical, and particularly Greek, scholar; wrote a book on archery,
deemed a classic, entitled "Toxophilus," for which Henry VIII. settled a
pension on him; was tutor and Latin secretary to Queen Elizabeth, and
much esteemed by her; his chief work, the "Schoolmaster," an admirable
treatise on education, held in high regard by Dr. Johnson, the sum of
which is _docendo discas_, "learn by teaching" (1515-1560).
ASCHERSLE`BEN (22), a manufacturing town in the Magdeburg district
of Prussia.
ASCLEPI`ADES, a Bithynian who practised medicine with repute at Rome
in Cicero's time, and was great in hygiene.
AS`COT, a racecourse in Berks, 6 m. SW. of Windsor, the races at
which, instituted by Queen Anne, take place a fortnight after the Derby.
AS`GARD, the garden or heaven of the Asen or gods in the Norse
mythology, in which each had a separate dwelling, and who held
intercourse with the other spheres of existence by the bridge Bifröst,
i. e. the rainbow.
ASGILL, JOHN, an eccentric Englishman, wrote a book to prove that
death was due to want of faith, and to express his belief that he would
be translated, and translated he was, to spend 30 years, apparently quite
happily, writing pamphlets, and end his days in the debtors' prison.
ASH, JOHN, a dissenting divine, author of an English dictionary,
valuable for the number of obsolete and provincial words contained in it
(1724-1779).
ASH`ANTI, or ASHANTEE, a negro inland kingdom in the Upper
Soudan, N. of Gold Coast territory, wooded, well watered, and well
cultivated; natives intelligent, warlike, and skilful; twice over
provoked a war with Great Britain, and finally the despatch of a military
expedition, which led to the submission of the king and the appointment
of a British Resident.
ASHBURNHAM, JOHN, a member of the Long Parliament, a faithful
adherent and attendant of Charles I., and assistant to him in his
troubles (1603-1671).
ASHBURNHAM, 5TH EARL OF, collected a number of valuable MSS. and
rare books known as the Ashburnham Collection; _d_. 1878.