The Nuttall Encyclopaedia
by
Edited by Rev. James Wood
Part 4 out of 53
him; prospered in business and died worth half a million. "French
Revolutions were a-brewing; to resist the same in any way, Imperial
Caesars 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 Rhone, 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.
ARMENTIERES (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 Mere 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 Arsacidae, by a revolt
which proved successful against the Seleucidae, 250 B.C.
ARSACIDAE, a dynasty of 31 Parthian kings, who wrested the throne
from Antiochus II., the last of the Seleucidae, 250 B.C.
ARSIN`OE, the name of several Egyptian princesses of antiquity; also
a prude in Moliere'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 Sassanidae; 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 Linnaeus in his "Systema
Naturae"; his own great work, "Ichthyologia," published by Linnaeus after
his death (1703-1735).
AR`TEGAL, the impersonation and champion of Justice in Spenser's
"Faerie 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 Duerer, 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 Rhone 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.
ASBJOeRN`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 AEneas, who trotted _non passibus aequis_ ("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 Bifroest,
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.
ASHBURTON, ALEXANDER BARING, LORD, second son of Sir Francis Baring,
a Liberal politician, turned Conservative, member of Peel's
administration in 1834-35, sent special ambassador to the United States
in 1842; concluded the boundary treaty of Washington, known as the
Ashburton Treaty; in his retirement "a really good, solid, most cheery,
sagacious, simple-hearted old man" (1774-1848).
ASHBURTON, WILLIAM BINGHAM BARING, son of the preceding, "a very
worthy man," an admirer, and his wife, Lady Harriet, still more, of
Thomas Carlyle (1797-1844).
ASHBY-DE-LA-ZOUCH, a small market-town 17 m. W. of Leicester,
figures in "Ivanhoe," with the ruins of a castle in which Queen Mary was
immured.
ASHDOD, a maritime Philistine city 20 m. S. of Jaffa, seat of the
Dagon worship.
ASHE`RA, an image of ASTARTE (q. v.), and associated with
the worship of that goddess.
ASH`MOLE, ELIAS, a celebrated antiquary and authority on heraldry;
presented to the University of Oxford a collection of rarities bequeathed
to him, which laid the foundation of the Ashmolean Collection there
(1617-1692).
ASHMUN, JEHUDI, an American philanthropist, founder of the Negro
Republic of Liberia, on the W. coast of Africa (1794-1828).
ASH`TAROTH. See ASTARTE.
ASH`TON-UNDER-LYNE (47), a cotton-manufacturing town near
Manchester.
ASIA, the largest of the four quarters of the globe, and as good as
in touch with the other three; contains one-third of all the land, which,
from a centre of high elevations, extensive plains, and deep depressions,
stretches southward into three large peninsulas separated by three
immense arms of the sea, and eastward into three bulging masses and three
pronounced peninsulas forming seas, protected by groups of islands; with
rivers the largest in the whole world, of which four flow N., two SE.,
and eight S.; with a large continental basin, also the largest in the
world, and with lakes which though they do not match those of America and
Africa, strikingly stand at a higher level as we go E.; with every
variety of climate, with a richly varied flora and fauna, with a
population of 840,000,000, being the half of that of the globe, of
chiefly three races, Caucasian, Mongolian, and Malay, at different stages
of civilisation, and as regards religion, by far the majority professing
the faith of Brahma, Buddha, Mahomet, or Christ.
ASIA MINOR, called also ANATOLE`, a peninsular extension
westward of the Armenian and Kurdistan highlands in Asia, bounded on the
N. by the Black Sea, on the W. by the Archipelago, and on the S. by the
Levant; indented all round, mainland as well as adjoining islands, with
bays and harbours, all more or less busy centres of trade; is as large as
France, and consists of a plateau with slopes all round to the coasts;
has a population of over 28,000,000.
ASKEW, ANNE, a lady of good birth, a victim of persecution in the
time of Henry VIII. for denying transubstantiation, tortured on the rack
and burnt at the stake, 1546.
ASKEW, ANTONY, a physician and classical scholar, a collector of
rare and curious books (1722-1774).
ASMODE`US, a mischievous demon or goblin of the Jewish demonology,
who gloats on the vices and follies of mankind, and figures in Le Sage's
"Le Diable Boiteux," or the "Devil on Two Sticks," as lifting off the
roofs of the houses of Madrid and exposing their inmost interiors and the
secret doings of the inhabitants.
ASMONAE`ANS, a name given to the Maccabees, from Asmon, the place of
their origin.
ASO`KA, a king of Behar, in India; after his accession in 264 B.C.
became an ardent disciple of Buddha; organised Buddhism, as Constantine
did Christianity, into a State religion; convened the third great council
of the Church of that creed at Patna; made a proclamation of this faith
as far as his influence extended, evidence of which is still extant in
pillars and rocks inscribed with his edicts in wide districts of Northern
India; _d_. 223 B.C.
ASP, a poisonous Egyptian viper of uncertain species.
ASPA`SIA, a woman remarkable for her wit, beauty, and culture, a
native of Miletus; being attracted to Athens, came and settled in it;
became the wife of Pericles, and her home the rendezvous of all the
intellectual and wise people of the city, Socrates included; her
character was often both justly and unjustly assailed.
AS`PERN, a village in Austria, on the Danube, 4 m. NE. of Vienna,
where a charge of the Austrians under the Archduke Charles was defeated
by Napoleon, May 21, 1809, and Marshal Lannes killed.
ASPHALT, a mineral pitch of a black or brownish-black colour,
consisting chiefly of carbon; also a limestone impregnated with bitumen,
and more or less in every quarter of the globe.
ASPHALTIC LAKE, the DEAD SEA (q. v.), so called from the
asphalt on its surface and banks.
AS`PHODEL, a lily plant appraised by the Greeks for its almost
perennial flowering, and with which they, in their imagination, covered
the Elysian fields, called hence the Asphodel Meadow.
ASPHYX`IA, suspended respiration in the physical life; a term
frequently employed by Carlyle to denote a much more recondite, but a no
less real, corresponding phenomenon in the spiritual life.
ASPINWALL, a town founded by an American of the name in 1800, at the
Atlantic extremity of the Panama railway; named Colon, since the Empress
Eugenie presented it with a statue of Columbus.
ASPROMON`TE, a mountain close by Reggio, overlooking the Strait of
Messina, near which Garibaldi was defeated and captured in 1862.
ASQUINI, COUNT, a rural economist who did much to promote silk
culture in Italy (1726-1818).
ASSAB BAY, a coaling-station belonging to Italy, on the W. coast of
the Red Sea.
ASSAM` (5,500), a province E. of Bengal, ceded to Britain after the
Burmese war in 1826; being an alluvial plain, with ranges of hills along
the Brahmapootra, 450 m. long and 50 broad; the low lands extremely
fertile and productive, and the hills covered with tea plantations,
yielding at one time, if not still, three-fourths of the tea raised in
India.
ASSAROTTI, an Italian philanthropist, born at Genoa; the first to
open a school for deaf-mutes in Italy, and devoted zealously his fortune
and time to the task (1753-1821).
AS`SAS, NICOLAS, captain of the French regiment of Auvergne, whose
celebrity depends on a single act of defiance: having entered a wood to
reconnoitre it the night before the battle of Kloster Kampen, was
suddenly surrounded by the enemy's (the English) soldiers, and defied
with bayonets at his breast to utter a cry of alarm; "Ho, Auvergne!" he
exclaimed, and fell dead on the instant, pierced with bayonets, to the
saving of his countrymen.
ASSASSINS, a fanatical Moslem sect organised in the 11th century, at
the time of the Crusades, under a chief called the Old Man of the
Mountain, whose stronghold was a rock fortress at Alamut, in Persia,
devoted to the assassination of all enemies of the Moslem faith, and so
called because they braced their nerves for their deeds of blood by
draughts of an intoxicating liquor distilled from hashish (the
hemp-plant). A Tartar force burst upon the horde in their stronghold in
1256, and put them wholesale to the sword.
ASSAYE`, a small town 46 m. NE. of Aurungabad, where Sir Arthur
Wellesley gained a victory over the Mahrattas in 1803.
ASSEGAI, a spear or javelin of wood tipped with iron, used by
certain S. African tribes with deadly effect in war.
ASSEMBLY, GENERAL, the chief court of the Presbyterian Church, a
representative body, half clergymen and half laymen, which sits in
Edinburgh for ten days in May, disposes of the general business of the
Church, and determines appeals.
ASSEMBLY, NATIONAL, the Commons section of the States-General of
France which met on May 5, 1789, constituted itself into a legislative
assembly, and gave a new constitution to the country.
ASSEMBLY, WESTMINSTER, a body composed of 140 members, of which 117
were clergymen, convened at Westminster to determine questions of
doctrine, worship, and discipline in the National Church, and which held
its sittings, over 1100 of them, from July 1, 1643, to Feb. 22, 1649,
with the result that the members of it were unanimous in regard to
doctrine, but were divided in the matter of government.
ASSEMANI, GIUSEPPE, a learned Syrian Maronite, librarian of the
Vatican, wrote an account of Syrian writers (1687-1768); STEPHANO,
nephew, held the same office, wrote "Acta Sanctorum Martyrum"
(1707-1782).
ASSER, JOHN, monk of St. David's, in Wales, tutor, friend, and
biographer of Alfred the Great; is said to have suggested the founding of
Oxford University; _d_. 909.
ASSIEN`TO, a treaty with Spain to supply negroes for her colonies,
concluded in succession with the Flemings, the Genoese, a French company,
the English, and finally the South Sea Company, who relinquished their
rights in 1750 on compensation by Spain.
AS`SIGNATS, bills or notes, to the number of 45 thousand million,
issued as currency by the revolutionary government of France in 1790, and
based on the security of Church and other lands appropriated by it, and
which in course of time sunk in value, to the ruin of millions.
ASSINIBOI`A, a province in Canada between Saskatchewan and the
United States.
ASSINIBOINES, certain aborigines of Canada; the few of whom that
remain do farming on the banks of the Saskatchewan.
ASSI`SI (3), a town in Central Italy, 12 m. SE. of Perugia, the
birthplace and burial-place of St. Francis, and the birthplace of
Metastasio; it was a celebrated place of resort of pilgrims, who
sometimes came in great numbers.
ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS, a connection in the mind between two ideas,
such that the consciousness of one tends to recall the other, a fact
employed to explain certain recondite psychological phenomena.
ASSOUAN`, the ancient Syene, the southernmost city of Egypt, on the
right bank of the Nile, near the last cataract.
ASSOUCY, D', a French burlesque poet ridiculed by Boileau
(1604-1679).
ASSUMPTION, FEAST OF THE, festival in honour of the translation of
the Virgin Mary to heaven, celebrated on the 15th of August, the alleged
day of the event.
ASSUR, mythical name of the founder of Assyria.
ASSYR`IA, an ancient kingdom, the origin and early history of which
is uncertain, between the Niphates Mountains of Armenia on the N. and
Babylonia on the S., 280 m. long and 150 broad, with a fertile soil and a
population at a high stage of civilisation; became a province of Media,
which lay to the E., in 606 B.C., and afterwards a satrapy of the
Persian empire, and has been under the Turks since 1638, in whose hands
it is now a desert.
ASSYRIOLOGY, the study of the monuments of Assyria, chiefly in a
Biblical interest.
ASTAR`TE, or ASHTORETH, or IST`AR, the female divinity of
the Phoenicians, as Baal was the male, these two being representative
respectively of the conceptive and generative powers of nature, and
symbolised, the latter, like Apollo, by the sun, and the former, like
Artemis or Diana, by the moon; sometimes identified with Urania and
sometimes with Venus; the rites connected with her worship were of a
lascivious nature.
ASTER, of Amphipolis, an archer who offered his services to Philip
of Macedon, boasting of his skill in bringing down birds on the wing, and
to whom Philip had replied he would accept them when he made war on the
birds. Aster, to be revenged, sped an arrow from the wall of a town
Philip was besieging, inscribed, "To the right eye of Philip," which took
effect; whereupon Philip sped back another with the words, "When Philip
takes the town, Aster will hang for it," and he was true to his word.
AS`TEROIDS, or Planetoids, small planets in orbits between those of
Mars and Jupiter, surmised in 1596, all discovered in the present
century, the first on Jan. 1, 1801, and named Ceres; gradually found to
number more than 200.
AS`TI (33), an ancient city in Piedmont, on the Tanaro, 26 m. SE.
from Turin, with a Gothic cathedral; is noted for its wine; birthplace of
Alfieri.
ASTLEY, PHILIP, a famous equestrian and circus manager, along with
Franconi established the Cirque Olympique in Paris (1742-1814).
ASTOLFO, a knight-errant in mediaeval legend who generous-heartedly
is always to do greater feats than he can perform; in "Orlando Furioso"
he brings back Orlando's lost wits in a phial from the moon, and
possesses a horn that with a blast can discomfit armies.
ASTON, LUISE, German authoress, championed the rights of women, and
went about in male attire; _b_. 1820.
ASTON MANOR (54), a suburb of Birmingham.
ASTOR, JOHN JACOB, a millionaire, son of a German peasant, who made
a fortune of four millions in America by trading in furs (1763-1848). His
son doubled his fortune; known as the "landlord of New York" (1792-1875).
ASTOR, WILLIAM WALDORF, son of the preceding, devoted to politics;
came to London, 1891; became proprietor of the _Pall Mall Gazette_ and
_Budget_ in 1893; _b_. 1848.
ASTO`RIA, in Oregon, a fur-trading station, with numerous
salmon-tinning establishments.
ASTRAE`A, the daughter of Zeus and Themis, the goddess of justice;
dwelt among men during the Golden Age, but left the earth on its decline,
and her sister Pudicitia along with her, the withdrawal explained to mean
the vanishing of the ideal from the life of man on the earth; now placed
among the stars under the name of Virgo.
ASTRAEA REDUX, the name given to an era which piques itself on the
return of the reign of justice to the earth.
AS`TRAKHAN (43), a Russian trading town on the Volga, 40 m. from its
mouth in the Caspian Sea, of which it is the chief port.
ASTRAL BODY, an ethereal body believed by the theosophists to invest
the animal, to correspond to it, and to be capable of BILOCATION
(q. v.)
ASTRAL SPIRITS, spirits believed to animate or to people the
heavenly bodies, to whom worship was paid, and to hover unembodied
through space exercising demonic influence on embodied spirits.
ASTROLOGY, a science founded on a presumed connection between the
heavenly bodies and human destiny as more or less affected by them, a
science at one time believed in by men of such intelligence as Tacitus
and Kepler, and few great families at one time but had an astrologer
attached to them to read the horoscope of any new member of the house.
ASTRUC, JEAN, a French physician and professor of medicine in Paris,
now noted as having discovered that the book of Genesis consists of
Elohistic and Jehovistic portions, and who by this discovery founded the
modern school called of the Higher Criticism (1681-1766).
ASTU`RIAS (579), an ancient province in the N. of Spain, gives title
to the heir to the crown, rich in minerals, and with good fisheries; now
named Oviedo, from the principal town.
ASTY`AGES, last king of the Medes; dethroned by Cyrus, 549 B.C.
ASTY`ANAX, the son of Hector and Andromache; was cast down by the
Greeks from the ramparts after the fall of Troy, lest he should live and
restore the city.
ASUN`CION, or ASSUMPTION (18), the capital of Paraguay, on the
left bank of the Paraguay, so called from having been founded by the
Spaniards on the Feast of the Assumption in 1535.
ASURAS, THE, in the Hindu mythology the demons of the darkness of
night, in overcoming whom the gods asserted their sovereignty in the
universe.
ASYMPTOTE, a line always approaching some curve but never meeting
it.
ATACA`MA, an all but rainless desert in the N. of Chile, abounding
in silver and copper mines, as well as gold in considerable quantities.
ATAHUALPA, the last of the Incas of Peru, who fell into Pizarro's
hands through perfidy, and was strangled by his orders in 1533, that is,
little short of a year after the Spaniards landed in Peru.
ATALAN`TA, a beautiful Grecian princess celebrated for her agility,
the prize of any suitor who could outstrip her on the racecourse, failure
being death; at last one suitor, Hippomenes his name, accepted the risk
and started along with her, but as he neared the goal, kept dropping
first one golden apple, then another, provided him by Venus, stooping to
lift which lost her the race, whereupon Hippomenes claimed the prize.
AT`AVISM, name given to the reappearance in progeny of the features,
and even diseases, of ancestors dead generations before.
ATBA`RA, or Black River, from the Highlands of Abyssinia, the lowest
tributary of the Nile, which it joins near Berber.
ATE`, in the Greek mythology the goddess of strife and mischief,
also of vengeance; was banished by her father Zeus, for the annoyance she
gave him, from heaven to earth, where she has not been idle since.
ATHABA`SCA, a province, a river, and a lake in British N. America.
ATHALIA, the queen of Judah, daughter of Ahab and Jezebel,
celebrated for her crimes and impiety, for which she was in the end
massacred by her subjects, 9th century B.C.
ATHANASIAN CREED, a statement, in the form of a confession, of the
orthodox creed of the Church as against the Arians, and damnatory of
every article of the heresy severally; ascribed to Athanasius at one
time, but now believed to be of later date, though embracing his theology
in affirmation of the absolute co-equal divinity of the Father, the Son,
and the Holy Ghost in the Trinity.
ATHANASIUS, Christian theologian, a native of Alexandria, and a
deacon of the Church; took a prominent part against Arius in the Council
at Nice, and was his most uncompromising antagonist; was chosen bishop of
Alexandria; driven forth again and again from his bishopric under
persecution of the Arians; retired into the Thebaid for a time; spent the
last 10 years of his life as bishop at Alexandria, where he died; his
works consist of treatises and orations bearing on the Arian controversy,
and in vindication of the doctrine of the Trinity viewed in the most
absolute sense (296-373).
ATHEISM, disbelief in the existence of God, which may be either
theoretical, in the intellect, or practical, in the life, the latter the
more common and the more fatal form of it.
ATHEISM, MODERN, ascribed by Ruskin to "the unfortunate persistence
of the clergy in teaching children what they cannot understand, and in
employing young consecrate persons to assert in pulpits what they do not
know."
ATHELNEY, ISLE OF, an island in a marsh near the confluence of the
Tone and Parret, Somerset; Alfred's place of refuge from the Danes.
ATHE`NA, the Greek virgin goddess of wisdom, particularly in the
arts, of war as of peace, happily called by Ruskin the "'Queen of the
Air,' in the heavens, in the earth, and in the heart"; is said to have
been the conception of Metis, to have issued full-armed from the brain of
Zeus, and in this way the child of both wisdom and power; wears a helmet,
and bears on her left arm the aegis with the Medusa's head; the olive
among trees, and the owl among animals, were sacred to her.
ATHENAEUM, a school of learning established in Rome about 133 by
Hadrian.
ATHENAEUS, a Greek writer of the 3rd century, wrote a curious
miscellany of a book entitled "Deipnosophistae, or the Suppers of the
Learned," extant only in an imperfect state.
ATHENAG`ORAS, an able Christian apologist of the 2nd century, was
Athenian and a pagan by birth, but being converted to Christianity, wrote
an apology in its defence, and a treatise on the resurrection of the
dead.
ATH`ENS, the capital of Attica, and the chief city of ancient
Greece, at once the brain and the heart of it; the resort in ancient
times of all the able and wise men, particularly in the domain of
literature and art, from all parts of the country and lands beyond; while
the monuments of temple and statue that still adorn it give evidence of a
culture among the citizens such as the inhabitants of no other city of
the world have had the genius to surpass, though the name Athens has been
adopted by or applied to several cities, Edinburgh in particular, that
have been considered to rival it in this respect, and is the name of over
twenty places in the United States. The two chief monuments of the
architecture of ancient Athens, both erected on the Acropolis, are the
PARTHENON (q. v.), dedicated to Athena, the finest building on
the finest site in the world, and the Erechtheum, a temple dedicated to
Poseidon close by; is the capital (100) of modern Greece, the seat of the
government, and the residence of the king.
ATHLONE (7), a market-town on the Shannon, which divides it, and a
chief military station.
ATHOLE, a district in the N. of Perthshire, which gives name to a
branch of the Murray family.
ATHOLE-BROSE, oatmeal, honey, and whisky mixed.
ATHOLE, SIR JOHN JAMES HUGH STEWART-MURRAY, 7TH DUKE OF, honourably
distinguished for having devoted years of his life to editing the records
of the family and the related history; _b_. 1840
A`THOS, MOUNT, or MONTE SANTO (6), a mountain 6780 ft. high at
the southern extremity of the most northerly peninsula of Salonica, in
Turkey, covered with monasteries, inhabited exclusively by monks of the
Greek Church, and rich in curious manuscripts; the monks devote
themselves to gardening, bee-culture, and other rural occupations, the
more devout among them at one time celebrated for the edification they
derived from the study of their own navels.
ATLANTA (65), the largest city in Georgia, U.S.; a large
manufacturing and railway centre.
ATLANTES, figures of men used in architecture instead of pillars.
ATLANTIC, THE, the most important, best known, most traversed and
best provided for traffic of all the oceans on the globe, connecting,
rather than separating, the Old World and the New; covers nearly
one-fifth of the surface of the earth; length 9000 m., its average
breadth 2700 m.; its average depth 15,000 ft., or from 3 to 5 m., with
waves in consequence of greater height and volume than those of any other
sea.
ATLAN`TIS, an island alleged by tradition to have existed in the
ocean W. of the Pillars of Hercules; Plato has given a beautiful picture
of this island, and an account of its fabulous history. THE NEW, a
Utopia figured as existing somewhere in the Atlantic, which Lord Bacon
began to outline but never finished.
AT`LAS, a Titan who, for his audacity in attempting to dethrone
Zeus, was doomed to bear the heavens on his shoulders; although another
account makes him a king of Mauritania whom Perseus, for his want of
hospitality, changed into a mountain by exposing to view the head of the
Medusa.
ATLAS MOUNTAINS, a range in N. Africa, the highest 11,000 feet, the
GREATER in Morocco, the LESSER extending besides through
Algeria and Tunis, and the whole system extending from Cape Nun, in
Morocco, to Cape Bon, in Tunis.
ATMAN, THE, in the Hindu philosophy, the divine spirit in man,
conceived of as a small being having its seat in the heart, where it may
be felt stirring, travelling whence along the arteries it peers out as a
small image in the eye, the pupil; it is centred in the heart of the
universe, and appears with dazzling effect in the sun, the heart and eye
of the world, and is the same there as in the heart of man.
AT`OLL, the name, a Polynesian one, given to a coral island
consisting of a ring of coral enclosing a lagoon.
ATOMIC THEORY, the theory that all compound bodies are made up of
elementary in fixed proportions.
ATOMIC WEIGHT, the weight of an atom of any body compared with that
of hydrogen, the unit.
ATRA`TO, a river in Colombia which flows N. into the Gulf of Darien;
is navigable for 200 m., proposed, since the failure of the Panama
scheme, to be converted, along with San Juan River, into a canal to
connect the Atlantic and the Pacific.
A`TREUS, a son of Pelops and king of Mycenae, who, to avenge a wrong
done him by his brother Thyestes, killed his two sons, and served them up
in a banquet to him, for which act, as tradition shows, his descendants
had to pay heavy penalties.
ATRI`DES, descendants of Atreus, particularly Agamemnon and
Menelaus, a family frequently referred to as capable of and doomed to
perpetrating the most atrocious crimes.
AT`ROPOS, one of the three Fates, the one who cut asunder the thread
of life; one of her sisters, Clotho, appointed to spin the thread, and
the other, Lachesis, to direct it.
AT`TALUS, the name of three kings of Pergamos: A. I., founded
the library of Pergamos and joined the Romans against Philip and the
Achaeans (241-197 B.C.); A. II., kept up the league with Rome
(157-137); A. III., bequeathed his wealth to the Roman people
(137-132).
ATTERBURY, FRANCIS, an English prelate, in succession dean of Christ
Church, bishop of Rochester, and dean of Westminster; a zealous Churchman
and Jacobite, which last brought him into trouble on the accession of the
House of Hanover and led to his banishment; died in Paris. He was a
scholarly man, an eloquent preacher, and wrote an eloquent style
(1662-1731).
ATTIC BEE, Sophocles, from the sweetness and beauty of his
productions.
ATTIC FAITH, inviolable faith, opposed to Punic.
ATTIC MUSE, Xenophon, from the simplicity and elegance of his style.
ATTIC SALT, pointed and delicate wit.
ATTIC STYLE, a pure, classical, and elegant style.
AT`TICA, a country in ancient Greece, on the NE. of the
Peloponnesus, within an area not larger than that of Lanarkshire, which
has nevertheless had a history of world-wide fame and importance.
ATTICISM, a pure and refined style of expression in any language,
originally the purest and most refined style of the ancient literature of
Greece.
ATTICUS, TITUS P., a wealthy Roman and a great friend of Cicero's,
devoted to study and the society of friends, took no part in politics,
died of voluntary starvation rather than endure the torture of a painful
and incurable disease (110-33 B.C.).
AT`TILA, or Etzel, the king of the Huns, surnamed "the Scourge of
God," from the terror he everywhere inspired; overran the Roman Empire at
the time of its decline, vanquished the emperors of both East and West,
extorting heavy tribute; led his forces into Germany and Gaul, was
defeated in a great battle near Chalons-sur-Marne by the combined armies
of the Romans under Aetius and the Goths under Theodoric, retreated
across the Alps and ravaged the N. of Italy; died of hemorrhage, it is
alleged, on the day of his marriage, and was buried in a gold coffin
containing immense treasures in 453, the slaves who dug the grave having,
it is said, been killed, lest they should reveal the spot.
AT`TOCK (4), a town and fortress in the Punjab, on the Indus where
the Kabul joins it--a river beyond which no Hindu must pass; it was built
by Akbar in 1581.
ATTORNEY-GENERAL, the name given the first law officer and legal
adviser of the Crown in England and Ireland.
ATTWOOD, GEORGE, a mathematician, invented a machine for
illustrating the law of uniformly accelerated motion, as in falling
bodies (1745-1807).
ATTWOOD, THOMAS, an eminent English musician and composer, wrote a
few anthems (1767-1836).
A`TYS, a beautiful Phrygian youth, beloved by Cybele, who turned him
into a pine, after she had, by her apparition at his marriage to forbid
the banns, driven him mad.
AUBE (255), a dep. in France, formed of Champagne and a small part
of Burgundy, with Troyes for capital.
AU`BER, a popular French composer of operas, born at Caen; his
operas included "La Muette de Portici," "Le Domino Noir," "Fra Diavolo,"
&c. (1782-1871).
AU`BERT, THE ABBE, a French fabulist, born at Paris (1731-1814).
AUB`REY, JOHN, an eminent antiquary, a friend of Anthony Wood's;
inherited estates in Wilts, Hereford, and Wales, all of which he lost by
lawsuits and bad management; was intimate with all the literary men of
the day; left a vast number of MSS.; published one work, "Miscellanies,"
being a collection of popular superstitions; preserved a good deal of the
gossip of the period (1624-1697).
AUB`RIOT, a French statesman, born at Dijon, provost of Paris under
Charles V.: built the famous Bastille; was imprisoned in it for heresy,
but released by a mob; died at Dijon, 1382.
AUBRY DE MONTDIDIER, French knight murdered by ROBERT MACAIRE
(q. v.), the sole witness of the crime and the avenger of it being his
dog.
AUBUSSON, a French town on the Creuse, manufactures carpets and
tapestry.
AUBUSSON, PIERRE D', grand-master of the Knights of St. John of
Jerusalem, of French descent, who in 1480 gallantly defended Rhodes when
besieged by Mahomet II., and drove the assailants back, amounting to no
fewer than 100,000 men (1423-1503).
AUCH (12), capital of the dep. of Gers, France, 14 m. W. of
Toulouse, with a splendid cathedral perched on a hill, and accessible
only by a flight of 200 steps; has a trade in wine and brandy.
AUCHINLECK, a village 15 m. E. of Ayr, with the mansion of the
Boswell family.
AUCHTERAR`DER, a village in Perthshire, where the forcing of a
presentee by a patron on an unwilling congregation awoke a large section
in the Established Church to a sense of the wrong, and the assertion of
the rights of the people and led to the disruption of the community, and
the creation of the Free Church in 1843.
AUCK`LAND (60), the largest town in New Zealand, in the N. island,
with an excellent harbour in the Gulf of Hauraki, and the capital of a
district of the name, 400 m. long, and 200 m. broad, with a fertile soil
and a fine climate, rich in natural products of all kinds; was the
capital of New Zealand till the seat of government was transferred to
Wellington.
AUCKLAND, BISHOP (11), a town on the Wear, 10 m. SW. of Durham and
in the county of Durham, with the palace of the bishop.
AUCKLAND, GEORGE EDEN, LORD, son of the following, a Whig in
politics, First Lord of the Admiralty, Governor-General of India; gave
name to Auckland; returned afterwards to his post in the Admiralty
(1784-1849).
AUCKLAND, WILLIAM EDEN, LORD, diplomatist, and an authority on
criminal law (1744-1814).
AUCKLAND ISLANDS, a group of small islands 180 m. S. of New Zealand,
with some good harbours, and rich in vegetation.
AUDE (317), a maritime dep. in the S. of France, being a portion of
Languedoc; yields cereals, wine, &c., and is rich in minerals.
AUDEBERT, JEAN BAPTISTE, a French artist and naturalist; devoted
himself to the illustration in coloured plates of objects of natural
history, such especially as monkeys and humming-birds, all exquisitely
done (1759-1800).
AUDHUMBLA, the cow, in the Norse mythology, that nourished Hymir,
and lived herself by licking the hoar-frost off the rocks.
AUDLEY, SIR THOMAS, LORD, born in Essex, son of a yeoman; became
Speaker of the House of Commons and Lord Chancellor of England; the
selfish, unscrupulous tool of Henry VIII. (1488-1554).
AU`DOUIN, JEAN VICTOR, an eminent French entomologist; was employed
by the French Government to inquire into and report on the diseases of
the silkworm, and the insects that destroy the vines (1797-1841).
AUDRAN, GERARD, an engraver, the most eminent of a family of
artists, born at Lyons; engraved the works of Lebrun, Mignard, and
Poussin; he did some fine illustrations of the battles of Alexander the
Great (1640-1703).
AU`DUBON, JOHN JAMES, a celebrated American ornithologist of French
Huguenot origin; author of two great works, the "Birds of America" and
the "Quadrupeds of America," drawn and illustrated by himself, the former
characterised by Cuvier as "the most magnificent monument that Art up to
that time had raised to Nature" (1780-1851).
AU`ENBRUGGER, an Austrian physician, discoverer of the method of
investigating diseases of the chest by percussion (1722-1809).
AU`ERBACH, BERTHOLO, a German poet and novelist of Jewish birth,
born in the Black Forest; his novels, which have been widely translated,
are in the main of a somewhat philosophical bent, he having been early
led to the study of Spinoza, and having begun his literary career as
editor of his works; his "Village Tales of the Black Forest" were widely
popular (1812-1882).
AU`ERSPERG, COUNT VON, an Austrian lyrical and satirical poet, of
liberal politics, and a pronounced enemy of the absolutist party headed
by Metternich (1806-1876).
AUF`RECHT, THEODOR, eminent Sanskrit scholar, born in Silesia; was
professor of Sanskrit in Edinburgh University; returning to Germany,
became professor at Bonn; _b_. 1822.
AUFKLAeRUNG, THE, or Illuminationism, a movement, conspicuously of
the present time, the members of which pique themselves on ability to
disperse the darkness of the world, if they could only persuade men to
forego reason, and accept sense, common-sense, as the only test of truth,
and who profess to settle all questions of reason, that is, of faith, by
appeal to private judgment and majorities, or as Dr. Stirling defines it,
"that stripping of us naked of all things in heaven and upon earth, at
the hands of the modern party of unbelief, and under the guidance of
so-called rationalism."
AUGE`AS, a legendary king of Elis, in Greece, and one of the
Argonauts; had a stable with 3000 oxen, that had not been cleaned out for
30 years, but was cleansed by Hercules turning the rivers Peneus and
Alpheus through it; the act a symbol of the worthless lumber a reformer
must sweep away before his work can begin, the work of reformation
proper.
AUGER, a French litterateur, born at Paris, renowned as a critic
(1772-1829).
AU`GEREAU, PIERRE FRANCOIS CHARLES, marshal of France and duke of
Castiglione, born at Paris; distinguished in the campaigns of the
Republic and Napoleon; executed the _coup d'etat_ of the 4th Sept. 1797;
his services were rejected by Napoleon on his return from Elba, on
account of his having supported the Bourbons during his absence. He was
simply a soldier, rude and rough-mannered, and with no great brains for
anything else but military discipline (1757-1816).
AU`GIER, EMILE, able French dramatist, produced brilliant comedies
for the French stage through a period of 40 years, all distinctly on the
side of virtue. His only rivals were Dumas _fils_ and M. Sardou
(1820-1889).
AUGS`BURG (75), a busy manufacturing and trading town on the Lech,
in Bavaria, once a city of great importance, where in 1531 the
Protestants presented their Confession to Charles V., and where the peace
of Augsburg was signed in 1555, ensuring religious freedom.
AUGSBURG CONFESSION, a document drawn up by Melanchthon in name of
the Lutheran reformers, headed by the Elector of Saxony in statement of
their own doctrines, and of the doctrines of the Church of Rome, against
which they protested.
AUGURS, a college of priests in Rome appointed to forecast the
future by the behaviour or flight of birds kept for the purpose, and
which were sometimes carried about in a coop to consult on emergencies.
AUGUST, originally called Sextilis, as the sixth month of the Roman
year, which began in March, and named August in honour of Augustus, as
being the month identified with remarkable events in his career.
AUGUSTA (33), a prosperous town in Georgia, U.S., on the Savannah,
231 m. from its mouth; also a town (10) the capital of Maine, U.S.
AUGUSTAN AGE, the time in the history of a nation when its
literature is at its best.
AUGUSTI, a German rationalist theologian of note, born near Gotha
(1771-1841).
AUGUSTIN, or AUSTIN, ST., the apostle of England, sent thither
with a few monks by Pope Gregory in 596 to convert the country to
Christianity; began his labours in Kent; founded the see, or rather
archbishopric, of Canterbury; _d_. 605.
AU`GUSTINE, ST., the bishop of Hippo and the greatest of the Latin
Fathers of the Church; a native of Tagaste, in Numidia; son of a pagan
father and a Christian mother, St. Monica; after a youth of dissipation,
was converted to Christ by a text of St. Paul (Rom. xiii. 13, 14), which
his eyes first lit upon, as on suggestion of a friend he took up the
epistle to read it in answer to an appeal he had made to him to explain a
voice that was ever whispering in his ears, "Take and read"; became
bishop in 396, devoted himself to pastoral duties, and took an active
part in the Church controversies of his age, opposing especially the
Manichaeans, the Donatists, and the Pelagians; his principal works are his
"Confessions," his "City of God," and his treatises on Grace and
Free-Will. It is safe to say, no Churchman has ever exercised such
influence as he has done in moulding the creed as well as directing the
destiny of the Christian Church. He was especially imbued with the
theology of St. Paul (354-430).
AUGUSTINIANS, (_a_) Canons, called also Black Cenobites, under a
less severe discipline than monks, had 200 houses in England and Wales at
the Reformation; (_b_) Friars, mendicant, a portion of them barefooted;
(_c_) Nuns, nurses of the sick.
AUGUSTUS, called at first CAIUS OCTAVIUS, ultimately CAIUS
JULIUS CAESAR OCTAVIANUS, the first of the Roman Emperors or Caesars,
grand-nephew of Julius Caesar, and his heir; joined the Republican party
at Caesar's death, became consul, formed one of a triumvirate with Antony
and Lepidus; along with Antony overthrew the Republican party under
Brutus and Cassius at Philippi; defeated Antony and Cleopatra at Actium,
and became master of the Roman world; was voted the title of "Augustus"
by the Senate in 27 B.C.; proved a wise and beneficent ruler, and
patronised the arts and letters, his reign forming a distinguished epoch
in the history of the ancient literature of Rome (63 B.C.-A.D. 14).
AUGUSTUS, the name of several princes of Saxony and Poland in the
16th and 17th centuries.
AUGUSTUS I., Elector of Saxony, a Lutheran prince, whose reign was
peaceful comparatively, and he was himself both a good man and a good
ruler, a monarch surnamed the "pious" and the "Justinian of Saxony"
(1526-1586).
AUGUSTUS II., Elector of Saxony and King of Poland; forced himself
on Poland; had twice to retire, but was reinstated; is known to history
as "The Strong"; "attained the maximum," says Carlyle, "in several
things,--of physical strength, could break horse-shoes, nay, half-crowns
with finger and thumb; of sumptuosity, no man of his means so regardless
of expense; and of bastards, three hundred and fifty-four of them
(Marshal Saxe one of the lot); baked the biggest bannock on record, a
cake with 5000 eggs and a tun of butter." He was, like many a monarch of
the like loose character, a patron of the fine arts, and founded the
Dresden Picture Gallery (1670-1733).
AUGUSTUS III., son of the preceding; beat Stanislaus Leszcynski in
the struggle for the crown of Poland; proved an incompetent king
(1696-1763).
AULIC COUNCIL, supreme council in the old German Empire, from which
there was no appeal, of date from 1495 to 1654; it had no constitution,
dealt with judicial matters, and lived and died with the emperor.
AULIS, a port in Boeotia, where the fleet of the Greeks assembled
before taking sail for Troy, and where Iphigeneia, to procure a
favourable wind, was sacrificed by her father Agamemnon, an event
commemorated in the "Iphigeneia in Aulis" of Euripides.
AUMALE, DUC D', one of the chiefs of the League, became governor of
Paris, which he held against Henry IV., leagued with the Spaniards, was
convicted of treason, and having escaped, was burned in effigy; died an
exile at Brussels (1556-1631).
AUMALE, DUC D', fourth son of Louis Philippe, distinguished himself
in Algiers, and was governor of Algeria, which he resigned when his
father abdicated; lived in England for twenty years after, acknowledged
the Republic, and left his estate and valuables to the French nation
(1822-1897).
AUNGERVILLE, RICHARD, or RICHARD DE BURY, tutor to Edward III.,
bishop of Durham, sent on embassies to various courts, was a lover and
collector of books, and left a curious work called "Philobiblon"
(1281-1345).
AUNOY, COMTESSE D', a French authoress, known and appreciated for
her fairy tales (1650-1705).
AURELIA`NUS, LUCIUS DOMITIUS, powerful in physique, and an able
Roman emperor; son of a peasant of Pannonia; distinguished as a skilful
and successful general; was elected emperor, 270; drove the barbarians
out of Italy; vanquished Zenobia, queen of Palmyra, carrying her captive
to Rome; subdued a usurper in Gaul, and while on his way to crush a
rebellion in Persia was assassinated by his troops (212-275).
AURE`LIUS, MARCUS. See ANTONI`NUS.
AURE`LIUS, VICTOR SEXTUS, a Roman consul and a Latin historian of
the 4th century.
AUREOLA, a wreath of light represented as encircling the brows of
the saints and martyrs.
AURILLAC (14), capital of the dep. of Cantal, on the Jourdanne,
affluent of the Dordogne, built round the famous abbey of St. Geraud, now
in ruins.
AU`ROCHS, a German wild ox, now extinct.
AURO`RA, the Roman goddess of the dawn, charged with opening for the
sun the gates of the East; had a star on her forehead, and rode in a rosy
chariot drawn by four white horses. See EOS.
AURORA (19), a city in Illinois, U.S., 35 m. SW. of Chicago, said
to have been the first town to light the streets with electricity.
AURORA BOREALIS, or Northern Lights, understood to be an electric
discharge through the atmosphere connected with magnetic disturbance.
AURUN`GABAD` (50), a city in Hyderabad, in the Nizam's dominions;
once the capital, now much decayed, with the ruins of a palace of
Aurungzebe.
AU`RUNGZEBE, Mogul emperor of Hindustan, third son of Shah Jehan;
ascended the throne by the deposition of his father, the murder of two
brothers and of the son of one of these; he governed with skill and
courage; extended his empire by subduing Golconda, the Carnatic, and
Bengal, and though fanatical and intolerant, was a patron of letters; his
rule was far-shining, but the empire was rotten at the core, and when he
died it crumbled to pieces in the hands of his sons, among whom he
beforehand divided it (1615-1707).
AUSCULTATION, discerning by the sound whether there is or is not
disease in the interior organs of the body.
AUSCULTATOR, name in "Sartor Resartus," the hero as a man qualified
for a profession, but as yet only expectant of employment in it.
AUSONIA, an ancient name of Italy.
AUSONIUS, DECIMUS MAGNUS, a Roman poet, a native of Gaul, born in
Bordeaux; tutor to the Emperor Gratian, who, on coming to the throne,
made him prefect of Latium and of Gaul, and consul of Rome. He was a good
versifier and stylist, but no poet (300-394).
AUSTEN, JANE, a gifted English novelist, daughter of a clergyman in
N. Hampshire; member of a quiet family circle, occupied herself in
writing without eye to publication, and only in mature womanhood thought
of writing for the press. Her first novel, "Sense and Sensibility," was
published in 1811, and was followed by "Pride and Prejudice," her
masterpiece, "Persuasion," and others, her interest being throughout in
ordinary quiet cultured life, and the delineation of it, which she
achieved in an inimitably charming manner. "She showed once for all,"
says Professor Saintsbury, "the capabilities of the very commonest and
most ordinary life, if sufficiently observed and selected, and combined
with due art, to furnish forth prose fiction not merely that would pass,
but that should be of the absolutely first quality as literature. She is
the mother of the English 19th-century novel, as Scott is the father of
it" (1775-1816).
AUS`TERLITZ (3), a town in Moravia, near Bruenn, where Napoleon
defeated the emperors of Russia and of Austria, at "the battle of the
three emperors," Dec. 2, 1805; one of Napoleon's most brilliant
victories, and thought so by himself.
AUSTIN (14), the capital of Texas, on the Colorado River, named
after Stephen Austin, who was chiefly instrumental in annexing Texas to
the States.
AUSTIN, ALFRED, poet-laureate in succession to Tennyson, born near
Leeds, bred for the bar, but devoted to literature as journalist, writer,
and poet; has written "The Golden Age, a Satire," "Savonarola," "English
Lyrics," and several works in prose; _b_. 1835.
AUSTIN, JOHN, a distinguished English jurist, professor of
Jurisprudence in London University; mastered the science of law by the
study of it in Germany, but being too profound in his philosophy, was
unsuccessful as professor; his great work, "The Province of Jurisprudence
Determined," and his Lectures, were published by his widow after his
death (1790-1859).
AUSTIN, MRS. J., (_nee_ Sarah Taylor), wife of the preceding,
executed translations from the German, "Falk's Characteristics of Goethe"
for one; was, like her husband, of the utilitarian school; was introduced
to Carlyle when he first went up to London; he wrote to his wife of her,
"If I 'swear eternal friendship' with any woman here, it will be with
her" (1793-1867)
AUSTIN FRIARS. See AUGUSTINIANS.
AUSTRALASIA (i. e. Southern Asia), a name given to Australia, New
Zealand, and the islands adjoining.
AUSTRALIA, a continent entirely within the Southern Hemisphere,
about one-fourth smaller than Europe, its utmost length from E. to W.
being 2400 m., and breadth 1971; the coast has singularly few inlets,
though many and spacious harbours, only one great gulf, Carpentaria, on
the N., and one bight, the Great Australian Bight, on the S.; the
interior consists of a low desert plateau, depressed in the centre,
bordered with ranges of various elevation, between which and the sea is a
varying breadth of coast-land; the chief mountain range is in the E., and
extends more or less parallel all the way with the E. coast; the rivers
are few, and either in flood or dried up, for the climate is very
parching, only one river, the Murray, 2345 m. long, of any consequence,
while the lakes, which are numerous, are shallow and nearly all salt; the
flora is peculiar, the eucalyptus and the acacia the most characteristic,
grains, fruits, and edible roots being all imported; the fauna is no less
peculiar, including, in the absence of many animals of other countries,
the kangaroo, the dingo, and the duck-bill, the useful animals being
likewise all imported; of birds, the cassowary and the emu, and smaller
ones of great beauty, but songless; minerals abound, both the precious
and the useful; the natives are disappearing, the colonists in 1904
numbering close upon 4,000,000; and the territory divided into Victoria,
New South Wales, Queensland, S. Australia, and W. Australia, which with
Tasmania federated in 1900 and became the Commonwealth.
AUSTRASIA, or the East Kingdom, a kingdom on the E. of the
possessions of the Franks in Gaul, that existed from 511 to 843, capital
of which was Metz; it was celebrated for its rivalry with the kingdom of
Neustria, or the Western Kingdom.
AUSTRIA, or AUSTRO-HUNGARY, is a country of every variety of
surface and scenery; is inhabited by peoples of different races and
nationalities, speaking different languages, as many as 20, and composed
of 50 different states, 5 of them kingdoms; occupies the centre of
Europe, yet has free communication with the seas on all sides of it; is
the third country for size in it; is divided by the Leitha, a tributary
of the Danube, into Cis-Leithan on the W. and Trans-Leithan on the E.;
has next to no coast-line; its chief seaport, Trieste; is watered by
rivers, the Danube in chief, all of which have their mouths in other
countries; has three zones of climate with corresponding zones of
vegetation; is rich in minerals; is largely pastoral and agricultural,
manufacturing chiefly in the W.; the capital Vienna, and the population
over 40,000,000.
AUSTRIAN LIP, a thick under-lip characteristic of the House of
Hapsburg.
AUTEUIL, a village in the dep. of the Seine, now included in Paris.
AUTHORISED VERSION OF THE BIBLE was executed between the years 1604
and 1610 at the instance of James I., so that it is not undeservedly
called King James's Bible, and was the work of 47 men selected with
marked fairness and discretion, divided into three groups of two sections
each, who held their sittings for three years severally at Westminster,
Cambridge, and Oxford, the whole being thereafter revised by a committee
of six, who met for nine months in Stationers' Hall, London, and received
thirty pounds each, the rest being done for nothing. The result was a
translation that at length superseded every other, and that has since
woven itself into the affectionate regard of the whole English-speaking
people. The men who executed it evidently felt something of the
inspiration that breathes in the original, and they have produced a
version that will remain to all time a monument of the simplicity,
dignity, grace, and melody of the English language; its very style has
had a nobly educative effect on the national literature, and has
contributed more than anything else to prevent it from degenerating into
the merely frivolous and formal.
AUTOCHTHONS, Greek for aborigines.
AUTO-DA-FE, or Act of Faith, a ceremony held by the court of the
Inquisition in Spain, preliminary to the execution of a heretic, in which
the condemned, dressed in a hideously fantastic robe, called the San
Benito, and a pointed cap, walked in a procession of monks, followed by
carts containing coffins with malefactors' bones, to hear a sermon on the
true faith, prior to being burned alive; the most famous auto-da-fe took
place in Madrid in 1680.
AUTOL`YCUS, in the Greek mythology a son of HERMES (q. v.),
and maternal grandfather of Ulysses by his daughter Anticlea; famed for
his cunning and robberies; synonym for thief.
AUTOM`EDON, the charioteer of Achilles.
AUTONOMY (i. e. Self-law), in the Kantian metaphysics denotes the
sovereign right of the pure reason to be a law to itself.
AUTRAN`, JOSEPH, a French poet and dramatist, born at Marseilles; he
was of the school of Lamartine, and attained distinction by the
production of the tragedy "La Fille d'Eschyle" (1813-1877).
AUTUN` (15), an ancient city in the dep. of Saone-et-Loire, on the
Arroux, 28 m. NW. from Chalons, where Talleyrand was bishop, with a fine
cathedral and rich in antiquities; manufactures serges, carpets, velvet,
&c.
AUVERGNE`, an ancient province of France, united to the crown under
Louis XIII. in 1610, embracing the deps. of Puy-de-Dome, Cantal, and part
of Haute-Loire, the highlands of which separate the basin of the Loire
from that of the Garonne, and contain a hardy and industrious race of
people descended from the original inhabitants of Gaul; they speak a
strange dialect, and supply all the water-carriers and street-sweepers of
Paris.
AUXERRE` (15), an ancient city, capital of the dep. of Yonne, 90 m.
SE. of Paris; has a fine cathedral in the Flamboyant style; drives a
large trade in wine.
AVA, capital of the Burmese empire from 1364 to 1740 and from 1822
to 1835; now in ruins from an earthquake in 1839.
AV`ALON, in the Celtic mythology an island of faerie in the region
where the sun sinks to rest at eventide, and the final home of the heroes
of chivalry when their day's work was ended on earth.
AVARS, a tribe of Huns who, driven from their home in the Altai Mts.
by the Chinese, invaded the E. of Europe about 553, and committed ravages
in it for about three centuries, till they were subdued by Charlemagne,
and all but exterminated in 827.
AVATAR`, or Descent, the incarnation and incarnated manifestation of
a Hindu deity, a theory both characteristic of Vishnuism and marking a
new epoch in the religious development of India.
AVE MARIA, an invocation to the Virgin, so called as forming the
first two words of the salutation of the angel in Luke i. 28.
AVEBURY, or ABERY, a village in Wiltshire, 6 m. W. of
Marlborough, in the middle of a so-called Druidical structure consisting
of 100 monoliths, surmised to have been erected and arranged in memory of
some great victory.
AVELLI`NO (26), chief town in a province of the name in Campania, 59
m. E. of Naples, famous for its trade in hazel-nuts and chestnuts;
manufactures woollens, paper, macaroni, &c.; has been subject to
earthquakes.
AVENTINE HILL, one of the seven hills of Rome, the mount to which
the plebs sullenly retired on their refusal to submit to the patrician
oligarchy, and from which they were enticed back by Menenius Agrippa by
the well-known fable of the members of the body and the stomach.
AVENTI`NUS, a Bavarian historian, author of the "Chronicon Bavariae"
(Annals of Bavaria), a valuable record of the early history of Germany
(1477-1534).
AVENZO`AR, an Arabian physician, the teacher of Averroes
(1073-1103).
AVERNUS, a deep lake in Italy, near Naples, 11/2 m. in circumference,
occupying the crater of an extinct volcano, at one time surrounded by a
dark wood, and conceived, from its gloomy appearance, as well as from the
mephitic vapours it exhaled, to be the entrance to the infernal world,
and identified with it.
AVER`ROES, an Arabian physician and philosopher, a Moor by birth and
a native of Cordova; devoted himself to the study and the exposition of
Aristotle, earning for himself the title of the "Commentator," though he
appears to have coupled with the philosophy of Aristotle the Oriental
pantheistic doctrine of emanations (1126-1198).
AVERSA (24), an Italian town 8 m. from Naples, amid vineyards and
orange groves; much resorted to by the Neapolitans.
AVEYRON`, a mountainous dep. in the S. of France, with excellent
pastures, where the Roquefort cheese is produced.
AVICEN`NA, an illustrious Arabian physician, surnamed the prince of
physicians, a man of immense learning and extensive practice in his art;
of authority in philosophy as well as in medicine, his philosophy being
of the school of Aristotle with a mixture of Neoplatonism, his "Canon of
Medicine," being the supreme in medical science for centuries (980-1037).
AVIE`NUS, RUFUS FESTUS, a geographer and Latin poet, or versifier
rather, of the 4th century.
AVIGN`ON (37), capital of the dep. of Vaucluse, France; an ancient
city beautifully situated on the left bank of the Rhone, near the
confluence of the Durance, of various fortune from its foundation by the
Phocaeans in 539 B.C.; was the seat of the Papacy from 1305 to 1377,
purchased by Pope Clement VI. at that period, and belonged to the Papacy
from that time till 1797, when it was appropriated to France; it contains
a number of interesting buildings, and carries on a large trade in wine,
oil, and fruits; grows and manufactures silk in large quantities.
A`VILA (10), a town in Spain, in a province of the name, in S. of
Old Castile, 3000 ft. above the sea-level, with a Gothic cathedral and a
Moorish castle; birthplace of St. Theresa.
AVILA, JUAN D', a Spanish priest, surnamed the Apostle of Andalusia,
for his zeal in planting the Gospel in its mountains; _d_. 1569.
AVILA Y ZINUGA, a soldier, diplomatist, and historian under Charles
V.
AVLO`NA (6), or VALONA, a port of Albania, on an inlet of the
Adriatic.
AV`OLA (12), a seaport on the E. coast of Sicily, ruined by an
earthquake in 1693, rebuilt since; place of export of the Hybla honey.
A`VON, the name of several English rivers, such as Shakespeare's in
Warwickshire, of Salisbury in Wiltshire, and of Bristol, rising in
Wiltshire.
AVRANCHES` (7), a town in dep. of Manche, Normandy; the place, the
spot marked by a stone, where Henry II. received absolution for the
murder of Thomas a Becket; lace-making the staple industry, and trade in
agricultural products.
AWE, LOCH, in the centre of Argyllshire, overshadowed by mountains,
25 m. in length, the second in size of Scottish lakes, studded with
islands, one with the ruin of a castle; the scenery gloomily picturesque;
its surface is 100 ft. above the sea-level.
AXEL, archbishop of Lund; born in Zealand; a Danish patriot with
Norse blood; subdued tribes of Wends, and compelled them to adopt
Christianity.
AXHOLME, ISLE OF, a tract of land in NW. Lincolnshire, 17 m. long
Back to Full Books
|