The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia Volume 1 of 28 by Project Gutenberg - Pages 2961-3453

The Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia Volume 1 of 28

We may broadly distinguish two main geographical elements in the alpine flora, namely, the northern element and the endemic element. This division (which is not, however, strictly exhaustive) directs special attention to what is undoubtedly the most striking feature of the flora — namely, that of its 693 species no less than 271 reappear in the extreme north. This relation of the arctic to the alpine flora is all the more remarkable in view of the very important differences between the arctic and alpine climates. The following circumpolar species are common, and widely diffused throughout the whole of the Alps: Silene acaulis, Dryas octopetala, Saxifsaga oppositifolia, S. aizoides, S. steliaris, Erigeron alpinus, Azalea procumbens, M. yosotis alpestris, Polygonum viviparum, Salix retusa, S. herbacea, Phleum alpinum, Juniperus nana. The proportion of northern forms, as regards both species and individuals, increases as we ascend to the higher regions. In the highest vegetation-zone, the snow-region — i.e. on islands of rock above the snow-line — they attain to an equality with the endemic forms. As examples of northern flowers which are characteristic of the snow-region, we may mention Silene acaulis, Eritrichium nanuin and Arenaria ciliata. On the other hand, typical endemic species of this highest zone are Androsace helvetica, A. glacialis, Petrocallis pyrenaica and Cherleria sedoides. All the plants just named, we may observe, are “cushion-plants.” Their compact, moss-like growth and general structural peculiarities are not an expression of mutual affinity, but are in adaptation to the combined cold and dryness of their habitat. It is noteworthy that among the northern plants of the alpine zone, in the narrower sense of the term (i.e. of the region between the tree-limit and the snow-line), there is a marked predominance of species that affect moist localities; and conversely, the majority of alpine flowers of wet habitat are found also in the north. For example, in the genus Primula, a highly characteristic genus of the alpine flora, whose members are among the most striking ornaments of the rocks, the single northern species, P. Jarinosa, grows only in marshy meadows. On the whole, then, adaptation to cold and wet is the note of the northern element.

As for the explanation of the community between the alpine and arctic floras, all authorities are agreed that the key to the problem is furnished by the occurrence of the glacial period. In the ice-free belt, between the northern ice-sheet and the vastly extended glaciers of the Alps, the two floras must have found a common refuge and congenial conditions of existence; and this view is confirmed by direct palaeontological evidence. With the return of a milder climate, the so-called northern forms of the present alpine flora were split in two, one portion following close on the northern ice in its gradual retreat to the Arctic, the other following the shrinking glaciers till the plants were able to establish (or re-establish) themselves on the slopes of the Alps. The same explanation covers the case of the similarity of the flora (not merely as regards the northern element) on all the high mountains of central Europe. So much seems to be beyond reasonable doubt. But at this point disagreement begins between the most eminent writers on the subject. While some (e.g. Sir J. D. Hooker, Heer) regard the Arctic, and some (e.g. Wettstein) the Alps, as the original home of at least the bulk of the “northern” element, others (e.g. Ball, Christ) locate this in the highlands of temperate Asia. For it is a remarkable fact that, of the 230 northern species which are most typical of the far north, 182 are found also in the Altai (taking this as a collective name for the mountains that form the southern boundary of Siberia). In any case, however, the migration of these plants to the Alps must for the most part have taken place via the Arctic. The possibility of any extensive east to west migration having taken place direct from the Altai to the Alps seems excluded by the fact that 50% of the arctico-altaic alpine plants are absent from the Caucasus. A score of species, it is true — not such a number, be it observed, as was formerly supposed — are common to the Alps and Altai, but absent from the Arctic. But the species composing this Altaic element are not so numerous as the arctico-alpine species that are absent from the Altai. On the whole, a common origin in the north for at least the arctico-altaic group of alpine plants seems to be the most reasonable hypothesis.

Side by side with the northern element (which in some respects, we may observe to point the contrast, would be better named the tundra-element) we find a group of species usually spoken of as the xerothermic or meridional element. These do not, however, form an “element,” in the strict geographical sense in which this term is otherwise used here. They are those species which, on general phyto-geographical grounds, must be regarded as having originated under steppe-like conditions. Their affinities are chiefly, though not exclusively, with the present Mediterranean flora — about fifty are of presumably Mediterranean origin — and a large proportion of them are restricted to the southern slopes of the Alps. The following, however, among others, are distributed throughout the whole, or a great part, of the range: Colchicum alpinain, Crocus vernus, Orchis globosa, Petroeallis pyrenaica, Astragalus depressus, A. aristatus, Oxytropis Halleri, Erynigium alpinum, Erica carnea, Linaria alpina, Globularia nudicaulis, G. cordifolia, Leontopodium alpinum. The last named (the well-known “edelweiss”) is at the present day characteristic of the Siberian steppes. The presence of these plants among the alpine flora is traceable to the steppe-like conditions which prevailed in central Europe both during the warmer inter-glacial periods and (probably) for a time after the close of the ice-age. Subsequently, as the climate of the plains assumed a colder and more humid character, they retired before the invading forests to the high mountains. Here, in the intenser insolation which they enjoy on the alpine slopes, they seem to find a compensation for the drawbacks incidental to the altitude of their present station.

As regards now the endemic element as a whole, the question as to the time and place of its origin is of a highly complicated and controversial nature. The question, too, in the case of this element, is necessarily of genetic rather than purely geographical scope. It must suffice to say that the weight of scientific opinion inclines to the view that at least the majority of endemic species are of pre-glacial origin, and are either strictly indigenous or products of the neighbouring lowlands. About 40% of the endemic element in the alpine flora are endemic also in the narrower sense, i.e. they are confined to the Alps. Many of them are restricted to some one small portion of the chain; these occur chiefly in the southern and eastern Alps. It is an interesting fact that the centrally situated Bernese Alps produce hardly a single peculiar species. The greater richness of certain districts in the matter of species is partly due to the variety of soils encountered therein; but in part may be explained by the fact that these districts were the first to be freed from the ice-sheet at the end of the glacial period.

The following is a list of the most thoroughly characteristic alpine plants — all of them ipso facto members of the endemic element — which are at once peculiar to the Alps (or practically so) and widely distributed within the limits of the chain. These are: Festuca pulchella, Carex microstyla, Salix caesia, Rumex nivalis, Alsine aretioides, Aquilegia alpina, Thlaspi rotundifolium, Saxifeaga Seguieri, S. aphylla, Astragalus leontinus, Daphne striata, Eryngium alpinum, Bupleurum stellatum, Androsace helvetica, A. glacialis, Gentiana bavarica, Phyteuma humile, Campanula thyrsoidea, C. cenisia, Achillea atrata, Cirsium spinosissimum, Crepis Terglouensis.

AUTHORITIES. — Among the voluminous literature on Alpine flora, the following works are particularly noteworthy: — Ball, “On the Origin of the Flora of the European Alps,” in proceed. of the Roy. Geog. Soc., 1879; Bennett, The Flora of the Alps, 2 vols. with 120 coloured plates (1896); Briquet, “Les Colonies vegetales xerothermiques des alpes lemaniennes,” in Bull. d. l. Murithienne, soc. valaisienne des sciences nat., xxvii. and xxviii. (1898-1899); Alph. de Candolle, “Sur les causes de l’ineaale distribution des Plantes rares dans la chaine des Alpes,” Extr. des Actes du Congres botan. internat. de Florence (1875); Chodat u. Pampanini, “Sur la distribution des plantes des alpes austro-orientales,” Extr. du Globe, organe de la soc. de geographie de Geneve, tome xli. (1902); H. Christ, Das Pflanzenleben der Schweiz (1882) — the chief classic on the subject; Engler, Die Pfanzenformationen und die pflanzengeographische Gliederung der Alpenkette (1901); Heer, Uleber die nivale Kora der Schweiz (1885); Jerosch, Geschichte und Herkunft der schweizerischen Alpenfforal cine Ubersicht uber den gegenwartigen Stand der Frage (1903). Schroter, Das Pflanzenleben der Alpen (Zurich, 1908); R. von Wettstein, Die Geschichte unserer Alpenflora (1896). The best book of coloured plates is the Atlas der Alpemflora, in 5 vols., pub. by the Deutscher u. Oesterreichischer Alpenverein (2nd. ed., 1897).

12. Fauna. — The fauna of the lower zones in the Alps is, on the northern side of the chain, practically identical with that of central Europe, and on the southern side with that of the Mediterranean basin. But in the higher regions it presents many features of special interest alike to the zoologist and the traveller. It seems therefore best to treat here principally of the animal inhabitants of the high Alps.

Though among mammalia — as also in the case of the birds — there are but few forms peculiar to the Alps, many interesting animals have found in the high mountains at least a temporary refuge from man. The European bison, the urus, the elk and the wild swine have disappeared since Roman times. But the lynx (Lynx vulgaris) perhaps lingers in remote parts, and the brown bear (Hrsus arctos) still survives in the dense forests of the Lower Engadine. The fox (Canis vulpes), the stonemarten (Martes foina) and the stoat or ermine (Putorius ermiiiea) range in summer above the tree-limit. The Ungulata are represented by the chamois (Rupicapra tragus) and the bouquetin or steinbock (Capra ibex). The former — the sole representative, in western Europe, of the antelopes — is found elsewhere only in the Pyrenees, Carpathians, Caucasus and the mountains of eastern Turkey; the latter survives only in the eastern Graian Alps. Of the Rodentia the most interesting and conspicuous is the marmot (Arctomys marmota), which lives in colonies close to the snow-line. The snow-mouse (Arvicola nivalis) is confined to the alpine and snow regions, and is abundant at these levels throughout the whole chain of the Alps. The mountain hare (Lepus variabilis or timidus) replaces the common hare (Lepus europaeus) in the higher regions; though absent from the intervening plains it again appears in the north of Europe and in Scotland. Among the Insectivora, the alpine shrew (Sorex alpinus) is restricted to the Alps. Of the Cheiroptera (bats) only Vesperugo maurus is characteristically alpine.

The birds of the Alps are proportionately very numerous. The lammergeyer (Gypaetus barbatus), once common, is now extremely rare, even if it has not already become extinct in the Alps; but the golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) still holds its own. Some of the smaller birds of prey are not uncommon, but there is none that can be regarded as specially characteristic either of the Alps as a whole or of the alpine region. As characteristic birds of the snow-region may be mentioned the alpine chough (Pyrrhocorax alpinus), which is frequently seen at the summits even of the loftiest mountains, the alpine swift (Cypselus melba), the wallcreeper ( Tichodroma muraria), snow-finch (Montifringilla nivalis) and ptarmigan (Lagopus mutus); the geographical distribution of this last being similar to that of the mountain hare. The black redstart (Rulicilla titys), though common in the lower regions, is

also met with in fair numbers almost up to the snow-line. The raven (Corpus corax) is fairly common in the alpine and sub-alpine regions. On the highest pastures we find, further, the alpine accentor (Accentor collaris) and the alpine pipit (Anthus spipoletta). The crag-martin (Cotyle rupestris) haunts lofty cliffs in the alpine region. On the upper verge of the pine forests, or in the scrubby vegetation just beyond, the following are not uncommon — black woodpecker (Picus martius), ring-ousel (Turdus torquatus), Bonelli’s warbler (Phylloscopus Bonellii), crested til (Parus cristatus), citril finch (Citrinella alpina), siskin (Chrysomitris spinus), crossbill (Loxia curvirostra), nutcracker (Nucifraga caryocatactes), blackcock (Tetrao tetrix), and the alpine varieties of the marsh-tit (Parus palustris, borealis) and tree-creeper (Certhia familiaris, costae).

The remaining classes of Vertebrata are very sparsely represented in the high Alps; and what few species occur are mostly common to the plains as well. In fact, among the remaining land vertebrates, only the black salamander (Salamandra atra) is exclusively alpine. This interesting animal, though a member of the Amphibia, is terrestrial and viviparous.

The former connexion between the Arctic and the Alps, which has left such unmistakable traces in the present alpine flora, affords, as regards the fauna also, the only possible explanation of the present geographical distribution of many alpine forms; but it is chiefly among the Invertebrata that we find this collateral testimony to the influence of the glacial period. In this respect we may note that two small crustaceans, Diaptomus bacillifer and D. denticornis, swarm in the ice-cold waters of the highest alpine tarns throughout the entire chain; and the former of these is also a characteristic inhabitant of pools formed from melting snow in the extreme north. Among the remaining divisions of Invertebrata special mention may be made of the air-breathing Arthropoda — on the whole the most important and interesting group. About one-third of the animals belonging thereto that occur in the higher regions are exclusively alpine (or alpine and northern); these characteristically alpine forms being furnished chiefly by the spiders, beetles and butterflies. Most numerous are the beetles. Those of the highest zone are remarkable for the great predominance of predaceous species and of wingless forms. In this last respect they present a striking analogy with the endemic coleopterous fauna of oceanic islands. As for the butterflies, not more than one-third of the species found in the alpine region occur in the neighbouring lowlands. The relations between alpine butterflies and plants are especially interesting, as regards not only their bionomic interdependence but also the analogies of their geographical distribution. It should be noted that butterflies are the chief agents in securing the continued existence of such alpine flowers as depend on insect fertilization, the other insect fertilizers being mostly wanting at great heights.

The classic of alpine zoology is F. von Tschudi’s Das Tierleben der Alpenwelt (11th ed., 1890). See also zoological section, by K. W. v. Dalla Torre, of Anleitung zu wissenschaftlichen Beobachtungen auf Alpenreisen. For the Vertebrata, see V. Fatio’s Faune des vertebres de la Suisse (3 vols., 1869-1904). Die Tierwelt der Hochgebirgsseen, by F. Zschokke (1900) is an important treatise on an interesting department of alpine natural history. C. Zeller’s Alpentiere im Wechsel der Zeit (1892) gives a reliable account of the gradual disappearance of some of the larger forms of life from the Alps. For the inter-relations of alpine insects and flowers, see H. Muller’s Alpenblumen, ihre Befruchtung durch Insekten, und ihre Anpassung an dieselben (1881). (H. V. K.)

ALPUJARRAS or ALPUXARRAS, THE (Moorish al Busherat, “the grass-land”), a mountainous district of southern Spain, in the province of Granada, consisting principally of valleys which descend at right angles from the crest of the Sierra Nevada on the north, to the Sierras Almijara, Contraviesa and Gador, which sever it from the Mediterranean Sea, on the south. These valleys are among the most beautiful and fertile in Spain. They contain a rich abundance of fruit trees, especially vines, oranges, lemons and figs, and in some parts present scenes of almost Alpine grandeur. The inhabitants are the descendants of the Moors, who, after the Spanish conquest of Granada in 1492, vainly sought to preserve the last relics of their independence in their mountain fastnesses. Many of the names of places in the Alpujarras are of Moorish origin. The district contains many villages of 1000 to 4000 inhabitants, the four largest being Lanjaron, with its ruined castle and chalybeate baths, Orgiba, Trevelez and Ugijar; all situated at a considerable elevation. Trevelez, the highest, stands 5332 ft. above the sea.

`ALQAMA IBN `ABADA, generally known as `ALQAMA AL-FAHL, an Arabian poet of the tribe Tamim, who flourished in the second half of the 6th century. Of his life we know practically nothing except that his chief poem concerns an incident in the wars between the Lakhmids and the Ghassanids (see ARABIA, History). Even the date of this is doubtful, but it is generally referred to the period after the middle of the 6th century. His poetic description of ostriches is said to have been famous among the Arabs. His diwan consists of three qusidas (elegies) and eleven fragments. Asma` i considered three of the poems genuine.

The poems were edited by A. Swain with Latin translation as Die Gedichte des Alkama Alfahl (Leipzig, 1867), and are contained in W. Ahlwardt’s The Diwans of the six ancient Arabic Poets (Lond., 1870); cf. W. Ahlwardt’s Bemerkungen uber die Aechtheit der alten arabischen Gledichte (Greifswald, 1872), pp. 65-71 and 146-168. (G. W. T.)

ALQUIFOU (etymologically the same word as “alcohol”), a lead ore found in Cornwall, used by potters for its green glaze.

ALREDUS, ALURED or ALUREDUS, OF BEVERLEY, was sacristan of the church of Beverley in the first half of the 12th century. He wrote, apparently about the year 1143, a chronicle entitled Annales sive Historia de gestis regum Britanniae, which begins with Brutus and carries the history of England down to 1129. This work was edited by T. Hearne (Oxford, 1716), and at one time enjoyed some reputation as an authority. It is, however, a mere compilation and of no value. Geoffrey of Monmouth and Simeon of Durham are Alured’s chief sources. Among the Cottonian MSS. there is a collection of records relating to Beverley, Liberlales Ecclesiae S. Johannis de Beverlae, which is attributed to Alured, but on no good authority. (H. W. C. D.)

ALSACE (Ger. Elsass), a former province of France, divided after the Revolution into the departments of Haut-Rhin and Bas-Rhin, and incorporated since the war of 1870 with the German empire (see ALSACE-LORRAINE). It is bounded on the north by the Rhenish Palatinate, on the east by the Rhine, on the south by Switzerland and on the west by the Vosges Mountains; and it comprises an area of 3344 English sq. m. The district possesses many natural attractions, and is one of the most fertile in central Europe. There are several ranges of hills, but no point within the province attains a great elevation. The only river of importance is the Ill, which falls into the Rhine after a course of more than 100 m., and is navigable below Colmar. The hills are generally richly wooded, chiefly with fir, beech and oak. The agricultural products are corn, flax, tobacco, grapes and various other fruits. The country has a great wealth of minerals, silver having been found, and copper, lead, iron, coal and rock-salt being wrought with profit. There are considerable manufactures, chiefly of cotton and linen. The chief towns are Mulhausen and Colmar in the upper district and Strassburg in the lower. The province is traversed from east to west by the railway from Strassburg to Nancy, and the main line north and south runs between Basel and Strassburg.

History. — From a very early period Alsace has been a disputed territory, and has suffered in the contentions of rival races. Inhabited by the Rauraci and the Sequani, it formed part of ancient Gaul, and was therefore included in the Roman empire in the provinces of Germania Superior and Maxima Sequanorum. The Romans held it nearly five hundred years, and on the dissolution of their power it passed under the sway of the Franks. In the Merovingian period it formed a duchy attached to the kingdom of Austrasia, and was governed by the descendants of duke Eticho, one of whom was St Odilia. After the death of Charlemagne, Alsace, like the rest of the empire, was divided into countships. But the duchy was re-established after the death of the German king Henry I., and became hereditary in the Hohenstaufen family, and then in the house of Austria,

which succeeded in 1273 to the imperial dignity. In the beginning of the 12th century the country was divided between the two landgraviates of Upper and Lower Alsace, but to counteract the power of the nobles the emperors established in Alsace a great number of free towns. This state of things continued until 1648, when a large part of Alsace, comprising the two landgraviates of Upper and Lower Alsace and the prefecture of the ten free imperial towns, was ceded to France by the treaty of Westphalia. In the war which preceded this peace (generally known as the Thirty Years’ War) Alsace had been so terribly devastated by the Swedes and the French that the German emperor found himself unable to hold it. The population was greatly reduced in numbers, and much of the land was left uncultivated. In the war between France and the Empire, arising out of the attempt of Louis XIV to seize Holland, that part of Alsace which remained to Germany was again overrun by the French. Although this war was terminated in 1678 by the treaty of Nijmwegen, the French monarch was desirous of incorporating a still larger amount of Rhine territory; and accordingly in 1680 he laid claim to a number of territories, belonging to princes of the Empire, which he alleged had been dismembered from Alsace. It was ordered that these territories should be at once restored to that province under the crown of France, and several independent sovereigns were cited to appear before two chambers of inquiry, called chambres de reunion, which Louis had established at Brisach and Metz. The princes appealed to the emperor and to the diet; but the previous wars had so exhausted the power of the former that nothing could be done to resist the aggression. In 1681 the French troops under Louvois seized Strassburg, aided by the treachery of the bishop and other great men of the city. A further war broke out, but by the treaty of Ratisbon (Regensburg) in 1684, Strassburg was secured to France. The war was renewed in 1688 and continued until 1697, when the peace of Ryswick confirmed definitively the annexation of Strassburg to France. Some remaining territories of small extent were acquired by the French after the revolution of 1789, including Mulhausen, which had been a republic allied to Switzerland.

Originally Celtic, the population was modified during the Roman period by the arrival of a Germanic people, the Triboci. In the 5th century came other German tribes, the Alamanni, and then the Franks, who drove the Alamanni into the south. Since that period the population has in the main been Teutonic; and the French conquests of the 17th century, while modifying this element, still left it predominant. The people continued to use a German dialect as their native tongue, though the educated classes also spoke French. Protestantism was professed by a large number of the inhabitants; and in many respects their characteristics identified them rather with the race to the east than that to the west of the Rhine. In process of time, however, they considered themselves French, and lost all desire for reannexation to any of the German states.

Alsace suffered a good deal in the war of 1870-71. The earlier battles of the campaign were fought there; Strassburg and other of its fortified towns were besieged and taken; and its people were compelled to submit to very severe exactions. The civil and military government of the province, as well as that of Lorraine, was assumed by the Germans as soon as they obtained possession of those parts of France, which was very shortly after the commencement of the war. The Alsatian railways were reorganized and provided with a staff of German officials. German stamps were introduced from Berlin; the occupied towns were garrisoned by the Landwehr; and requisitions on a large scale were demanded, and paid for in cheques which, at the close of the war, were to be honoured by whichever side should stand in the unpleasant position of the conquered. The people, notwithstanding their German origin, showed a very strong feeling against the invaders, and in no part of France was the enemy resisted with greater stubbornness. It was evident from an early period of the war, however, that Prussia was resolved to reannex Alsace to German territory. When the preliminaries of peace came to be discussed at Versailles in February 1871, the cession of Alsace, together with what is called German Lorraine, was one of the earliest conditions laid down by Bismarck and accepted by Thiers. This sacrifice of territory was afterwards ratified by the National Assembly at Bordeaux, though not without a protest from the representatives of the departments about to be given up; and thus Alsace once more became German. By the bill for the incorporation of Alsace and German Lorraine, introduced into the German parliament in May 1871, it was provided that the sole and supreme control of the two provinces should be vested in the German emperor and the federal council until the 1st of January 1874, when the constitution of the German empire was established. Bismarck admitted the aversion of the population to Prussian rule, but said that everything would be done to conciliate the people. This policy appears really to have been carried out, and it was not long in bearing fruit. Many of the inhabitants of the conquered districts, however, still clung to the old connexion, and on the 30th of September 1872 — the day by which the people were required to determine whether they would consider themselves German subjects and remain, or French subjects and transfer their domicile to France — 45,000 elected to be still French, and sorrowfully took their departure. The German system of compulsory education of every child above the age of six was introduced directly after the annexation.

ALSACE-LORRAINE (Ger. Elsass-Lothringen), a German imperial territory (since 1871), consisting of the former French province Alsace (then divided into the departments of Haut-Rhin and Bas-Rhin), together with its capital Strassburg, and German Lorraine (which included the department of the Moselle and portions of the departments of Meurthe and Vosges), together with the capital and fortress of Metz. The imperial territory (Reichsland) is bounded S. by Switzerland; E. by Baden, from which it is separated by the Rhine; N.E. and N. by the Bavarian Palatinate, the Prussian Rhine Province and Luxemburg, and W. by France. Its area is 5601 sq. m. The maximum length from N. to S. is 145 m.; the maximum breadth E. to W. 105 m., and the minimum breadth, on a line drawn through Schlettstadt, 24 m. In respect of its physical features, Alsace-Lorraine falls into three parts — mountain land, plain and plateau. The first, practically co-extensive with the western half of Alsace, consists of the Vosges range, which running in a northerly direction from the deep gap or pass of Belfort (trouee de Belfort) forms in its highest ridges the natural frontier line between Germany and France. Between this mountain chain and its spurs, which fall steeply to the E., and the Rhine, stretches a fertile plain forming the eastern half of Alsace. In the N.W. a high and undulating plateau, which gently descends in the W. to the valley of the Moselle, occupies nearly the whole area of Lorraine. The drainage of the Vosges valleys and of the Rhine valley is collected and carried into the Rhine about 10 m. below Strassburg by the Ill, which has a course of more than 100 m. and is navigable below Colmar. With the exception of a few streams which run to the Rhone, all the waters of Alsace flow into the Rhine. The climate is on the whole temperate — warmest in the lowest districts (460 ft. above sea-level) of N. Alsace, and coldest on the summits of the Vosges, where snow lies six months in the year. The mean annual temperature at Strassburg is 49.8 deg. F., at Metz 48.2 deg.; the rainfall at Strassburg 26 1/4 in., and at Metz 27 1/2 in. The Rhine Valley is in great part fertile, yielding good crops of potatoes, cereals (including maize), sugar beet, hops, tobacco, flax, hemp and products of oleaginous plants. But grapes and fruit are amongst the most valuable of the crops. The cereals chiefly grown are wheat, oats, barley and rye. Great quantities of hay are harvested. This description embraces also the production of Lorraine, where agriculture is less strenuously carried on, and the fertility of the soil is less. But Lorraine possesses, in compensation, greater riches in the earth, in coal and iron and salt mines. Cows are grazed on the S. Vosges in summer, and large quantities of cheese (Munster cheese) are made and exported. Total population (1905) 1,814,626.

The farms in Alsace are mostly small and are beld partly as a

private possession, partly on the communal system; in Lorraine there are some larger occupations. The manufacture of cottons, and on a smaller scale of woollens, is special to Alsace, the chief centres of the industry being Mulhausen, Colmar and the valleys of the Vosges. The territory has always been the centre of an active commerce, owing to its situation on the confines of Germany, France and Switzerland, and alongside the great highway of the Rhine. The communications embraced some 1249 m. of railway (1903), of which 1108 m. belonged to the state, a good system of roads, and several canals (notably the Rhine-Rhone, the Rhine-Marie and the Saar Canals), in addition to the rivers. Administratively the territory is divided into the following three districts, showing a density of population of about 316 to the sq. m.:–

Population. Districts. Area in sq. miles. 1885. 1905. Upper Alsace . . 1354 462,549 512,709 Lower Alsace . . 1845 612,077 686,359 Lorraine . . . 2402 489,729 615,558

On the sex division, 935,305 were in 1905 males, and 879,321 females. The percentage of illegitimacy is about 7. The rural population embraces 51% of the whole, the urban population 48%. The largest towns are Strassburg (the capital of the territory), Mulhausen, Metz, Colmar, all above 20,000 inhabitants each. Classified according to religion there were, in 1904, 372,078 Protestants, 1,310,391 Roman Catholics, and 32,379 Jews. Education is provided for at the university of Strassburg, in 21 classical and pro-classical schools, in 18 modern schools, and in nearly 4000 elementary schools. Over 85% of the people speak German as their mother-tongue, the rest French, or a patois of French. The annual revenue and expenditure are each somewhat in excess of L. 3,000,000. Customs and indirect taxes yield more than three-fifths of the total revenue, and direct taxes less than one-fourth. The state forests give about one-ninth of the whole. The higher administration of justice is devolved upon six provincial courts and a supreme court, sitting at Colmar. Moreover, there are purely industrial tribunals at Mulhausen, Thann, Markirch, Strassburg and Metz. The fish-breeding establishment at Huningen in Upper Alsace should be mentioned.

Constitution. — The sovereignty over the territory was by a law (Reichsgesetz) of the 9th of June 1871 vested in the German emperor, who, until the introduction of the imperial constitution on the 1st of January 1874, had, with the assent of the federal council (Bundesrat) and, in a few cases, that of the imperial diet (Reichstag), the sole right of initiating legislation. In October of this last year a committee (Landesausschuss) of the whole territory was appointed to deliberate on laws proposed to it before they received the final sanction of the emperor. On the 2nd of May 1877, the Landesausschuss was itself empowered to initiate legislation within the competence of the territory, and in 1879 the imperial viceroy (Statthalter), representing the imperial chancellor, who had until then been the responsible minister, took up his residence in Strassburg. He is assisted in the government by 4 ministers of departments, under the presidency of a secretary of state, and, when occasion demands the extraordinary discussion of legislative proposals, by a council of state (Staatsrat), consisting of the secretary of state, under secretaries, the president of the supreme court of justice of the territory and, as a rule, of 12 nominees of the emperor. The Lanitesaus-schuss, a constitutional body with parliamentary privileges, consists of 58 members, 34 being appointed out of their number by the various district councils (Bezirkslage), 4 by the large towns, and 20 by the rural districts. Alsace-Lorraine is represented in the Bundesrat by two commissioners, who have, however, but one voice; and the territory returns 15 members to the Reichstag.

See A. Schmidt, Elsass unid Lothringen (Lerp., 1859); Spach, Histoire de la basso Alsace et de la ville de Strasbourg (Stras., 1860); von Mullenheim Rechberg, Die Annexion des Elsass durch Frankreich und Ruckblick auf die Verwaltung des Landes, 1648-1697 (Stras., 1897); Du Prel, Die deutsche Verwaltung in Elsass, 1870-1879 (Stras., 1879); L. Petersen, Das Deutschtum in Elsass-Lothringen (Munich, 1902). (P. A. A.)

ALSATIA (the old French province of Alsace), long a “debatable ground” between France and Germany, and hence a name applied in the 17th century to the district of Whitefriars, between the Thames and Fleet Street, in London, which afforded sanctuary (q.v.) to debtors and criminals. The privileges were abolished in 1697. The term is also used generally of any refuge for criminals.

ALSEN (Danish Als), an island in the Baltic, off the coast of Schleswig, in the Little Belt. It formerly belonged to Denmark, but, as a result of the Danish war of 1864, was incorporated with Germany. Its area is 105 sq. m.; the length nearly 20, and the breadth from 3 to 12 m. Pop. (1900) 25,000, most of whom speak Danish. The island is fertile, richly wooded, and yields grain and fruit. Sonderburg, the capital, with a good harbour and a considerable trade, is connected with the mainland by a pontoon bridge. Other places of note are Norburg and Augustenburg. On the peninsula Rekenis at the S.W. end of Alsen there is a lighthouse. Here, in 1848, the Danes directed their main attack against Field-marshal Wrangel’s army. In 1864 the Prussians under Herwarth von Bittenfeld took Alsen, which was occupied by 9000 Danish troops under Steinmann, thus bringing the Danish war to a close. Since 1870 Alsen has been fortified.

‘ALSHEKH, MOSES, Jewish rabbi in Safed (Palestine) in the later part of the 16th century. He was the author of many homiletical commentaries on the Hebrew Bible. His works still justly enjoy much popularity, largely because of their powerful influence as practical exhortations to virtuous life.

ALSIETINUS LACUS (mod. Lago di Martignano), a small lake in southern Etruria, 15 m. due N.N.W. of Rome, in an extinct crater. Augustus drew from it the Aqua Alsietina; the water was hardly fit to drink, and was mainly intended to supply his naumachia (lake made for a sham naval battle) at Rome, near S. Francesco a Ripa, on the right bank of the Tiber, where some traces of the aqueduct were perhaps found in 1720. The course of the aqueduct, which was mainly subterranean, is practically unknown: Frontinus tells us that it received a branch from the lake of Bracciano near Careiae (Galera): and an inscription relating to it was found in this district in 1887 (F. Barnabei, Notizie degli Scavi, 1887, 181).

ALSIUM (mod. Palo), an ancient town of Etruria, 29 m. W. by N. of Rome by rail, on the Via Aurelia, by which it is about 22 m. from Rome. It was one of the oldest cities of Etruria, but does not appear in history till the Roman colonization of 247 B.C., and was never of great importance, except as a resort of wealthy Romans, many of whom (Pompey, the Antonine emperors) had villas there. About 1 1/2 m. N.E. of Palo is a row of large mounds called I Monteroni, which belong to tombs of the Etruscan cemetery. Considerable remains of ancient villas still exist along the low sandy coast, one of which, about 1 m. E. of Palo, occupies an area of some 400 by 250 yds. The medieval castle belongs to the Odescalchi family. Near Palo is the modern sea-bathing resort Ladispoli, founded by Prince Odescalchi. See G. Dennis, Cities and Cemeteries of Etruria, i. 219.

ALSOP, VINCENT (c. 1630- 1703), English Nonconformist divine, was of Northamptonshire origin and was educated at St John’s College, Cambridge. He received deacon’s orders from a bishop, whereupon he settled as assistant-master in the free school of Oakham, Rutland. He was reclaimed from indifferent courses and associates here by a very “painful” minister, the Rev. Benjamin King. Subsequently he married Mr King’s daughter, and “becoming a convert to his principles, received ordination in the Presbyterian way, not being satisfied with that which he had from the bishop.” He was presented to the living of Wilby in Northamptonshire; but was thence ejected under the act of Uniformity in 1662. After his ejection he preached privately at Oakham and Wellingborough, sharing the common pains and penalties of nonconformists, — e.g. he was imprisoned six months for praying with a sick person. A book against William Shedock, dean of St Paul’s, called Antisozzo (against Socinus), written in the vein of Andrew Marvell’s Rehearsal Transprosed, procured him much celebrity as a wit. Dr Robert South, no friend to nonconformists, publicly pronounced that Alsop had the advantage of Sherlock in every way. Besides fame, Antisozzo procured for its author an invitation to succeed the venerable Thomas Cawton (the younger) as independent minister in Westminster. He accepted the call and drew great multitudes to his chapel. He published other books which showed a fecundity of wit, a playful strength of reasoning, and a provoking indomitableness of raillery. Even with Dr Goodman and Dr Stillingfleet for antagonists, he more than held his own. His Mischief of Impositions (1680) in answer to Stillingfleet’s Mischief of Separation, and Melius Inquirenduni (1679) in answer to Goodman’s Compassionate Inquiry, remain historical landmarks in the history of nonconformity. Later on, from the entanglements of a son in alleged treasonable practices, he had to sue for and obtained pardon from King James II. This seems to have given a somewhat diplomatic character to his closing years, inasmuch as, while remaining a nonconformist, he had a good deal to do with proposed political- ecclesiastical compromises. He died on the 8th of May 1703, having preserved his “spirits and smartness” to the last.

See Wood’s A thenae (Bliss) iv. 106; Calamy’s Life of Baxter, ii. 487; Wilson’s History and Ant. of Dissenting Churches, iv. 63-66. (A. J. G.) ALSTED, JOHANN HEINRICH (1588-1638), German Protestant divine. He was some time professor of philosophy and theology at Herborn, in Nassau, and afterwards at Weissenburg in Transylvania, where he remained till his death in 1638. He was a marvellously prolific writer. His Encyclopaedia (1630), the most considerable of the earlier works of that class, was long held in high estimation.

ALSTON, CHARLES (1683-1760), Scottish botanist, was born at Eddlewood, near Hamilton, in 1683, and became lecturer in materia medica and botany at Edinburgh and also superintendent of the botanical gardens, of the plants in which he published a catalogue in 1740. He was a critic of Linnaeus’s system of plant-classification (see BOTANY.) He died on the 22nd of November 1760 at Edinburgh. His Lectures on Materia Medica were published posthumously in 1770.

ALSTON, a market-town in the Penrith parliamentary division of Cumberland, England, 29 m. by road E.S.E. of Carlisle, on a branch of the North-Eastern railway from Haltwhistle. Pop. (1901) 3133. It lies in the uppermost part of the valley of the South Tyne, among the high bleak moors of the Pennines. Copper and blende are found, and there are limestone quarries. The mines of argentiferous lead, belonging to Greenwich Hospital, London, were formerly of great value, and it was in order that royalties on the Alston lead mines and on those elsewhere in the county might be jointly collected that the parish was first included within the borders of Cumberland, in the 18th century. As many as 119 lead mines were worked in the parish in 1768, but the supply of metal has been almost exhausted. Coal is worked chiefly for lime-burning, and umber is prepared for the manufacture of colours. Thread and flannels are also made. Whitley Castle, 2 m. N., was a Roman fort, the original name of which is not known, guarding the road which ran along the South Tyne valley and over the Pennines. It has no connexionwith Alston itself.

ALSTROMER, JONAS (1685-1761), Swedish industrial re-former, was born at Alingsas in Vestergotland, on the 7th of January 1685. He left his native village at an early age, and in 1707 became clerk to Alberg, a merchant of Stockholm, whom he accompanied to London. After carrying on business for three years, Alberg failed, and Alstrom (as his name was before his ennoblement) engaged in the business of shipbroker on his own account, and eventually proved very successful. After travelling for several years on the continent, he was seized with the patriotic desire to transplant to his native country some of the industries he had seen flourishing in Britain. He accordingly returned to Alingsas, and in 1724 established a woollen factory in the village. After preliminary difficulties it became a very profitable business. He next established a sugar refinery at Gothenburg, introduced improvements in the cultivation of potatoes and of plants suitable for dyeing, and directed attention to improved methods in shipbuilding, tanning and the manufacture of cutlery. But his most successful undertaking was the importation of sheep from England, Spain and Angora. He received many marks of distinction, was created (1748) knight of the order of the North Star, and a few years later received letters of nobility, with permission to change his name to Alstromer. He died on the 2nd of June 1761, leaving several works on practical industrial subjects. A statue was erected in his honour in the exchange at Stockholm. One of his sons, Clas (Claude) (1736-1794), was a naturalist of considerable eminence. During a voyage to Spain he noticed a native Peruvian plant known in Peru as the lily of the Incas, at the Swedish counsul’s at Cadiz; he sent a few seeds to his master and friend, Linnaeus, who named the genus in his honour Alstromeria. He also wrote a work on sheep-breeding.

ALTAI (in Mongolian Altain-ula, the “Mountains of Gold”), a term used in Asiatic geography with Various significations. The Altai region, in West Siberia and Mongolia, is similar in character to Switzerland, but covers a very much greater area. It extends from the river Irtysh and the Dzungarian depression (46 deg. -47 deg. N.) northwards to the Siberian railway and to the Sayan mountains. The backbone of the region is the Sailughem or Silyughema mountains, also known as Kolyvan Altai, which stretch north-eastwards from 49 deg. N. and 86 deg. E. towards the western extremity of the Sayan mountains in 51 deg. 60′ N. and 89 deg. E. Their mean elevation is 5000-5500 ft. The snow-line runs at 6700 ft. on the northern versant and at 7800 ft. on the southern, and above it the rugged peaks tower up some 3200 ft. more. Passes across the range are few and difficult, the chief being the Ulan-daban at 9275 ft. (9445 ft. according to Kozlov), and the Chapchan-daban, at 10,555 ft., in the south and north respectively. On the east and south-east this range is flanked by the great plateau of Mongolia, the transition being effected gradually by means of several minor plateaus, such as Ukok (7800 ft.), Chuya (6000 ft.), Kendykty (8200 ft.), Kak (8270 ft.), Suok (8500 ft.), and Juvlu-kul (7900 ft.). This region, which is not accurately known, is studded with large lakes, i.e. Ubsa-nor (2370 ft. above sea-level), Kirghiz-nor, Durga-nor and Kobdo-nor (3840 ft.), and traversed by various mountain ranges, of which the principal are the Tannu-ola, running roughly parallel with the Sayan mountains as far east as the Kosso-gol (100 deg. -101 deg. E. long.), and the Khan-khu mountains, also stretching west and east.

The range of the Altai proper, known also as the Ek-tagh, Mongolian Altai, Great Altai and Southern Altai, likewise extend in two twin parallel chains eastwards as far as 99 deg. , if not farther. The Ek-tagh or Mongolian Altai, which separates the Kobdo basin on the north from the Irtysh basin on the south, is a true border-range, in that it rises in a steep and lofty escarpment from the Dzungarian depression (1550 to 3000 ft.), but descends on the north by a relatively short slope to the plateau (4000-5500 ft.) of north-western Mongolia. East of 94 deg. the range is continued by a double series of mountain chains, all of which exhibit less sharply marked orographical features and are at considerably lower elevations. The southern chain bears the names of Karaadzirga and Burkhan-ola, and terminates in about 99 deg.; but the northern range, the principal names of which are Artsi-bogdo and Saikhat, extends probably most of the way to the great northward bend of the Hwang-ho or Yellow River round the desert of Ordos. Whereas the western Ek-tagh Altai rises above the snowline and is destitute of timber, the eastern double ranges barely touch the snow-line and are clothed with thick forests up to an altitude of 6250 ft. The slopes of the constituent chains of the system are inhabited principally by nomad Kirghiz.

The north-western and northern slopes of the Sailughem mountains are extremely steep and very difficult of access. On this side lies the culminating summit of the range, the double-headed Byelukha (the Mont Blanc of the Altai), whose summits reach 14,890 and 14,560 ft. respectively,1 and give origin to several glaciers (30 sq. m. in aggregate area). Here also are the Kuitun (12,000 ft.) and several other lofty peaks. Numerous spurs, striking in all directions from the Sailughem mountains, fill up the space between that range and the lowlands of Tomsk, but their mutual relations are far from being well known. Such are the Chuya Alps, having an average altitude of 9000 ft., with summits from 11,500 to 12,000 ft., and at least ten glaciers on their northern slope; the Katun Alps, which have a mean elevation of about 10,000 ft. and are mostly snow-clad; the Kholzun range; the Korgon (6300 to 7600 ft.), Talitsk and Selitsk ranges; the Tigeretsk Alps, and so on. Several secondary plateaus of lower altitude are also distinguished by geographers. The Katun valley begins as a wild gorge on the south-west slope of Byelukha; then, after a big bend, the river (400 m. long) pierces the Katun Alps, and enters a wider valley, lying at an altitude of from 2000 to 3500 ft., which it follows until it emerges from the Altai highlands to join the Biya in a most picturesque region. The Katun and the Biya together form the Ob. The next valley is that of the Charysh, which has the Korgon and Tigeretsk Alps on one side and the Talitsk and Bashalatsk Alps on the other. This, too, is very fertile. The Altai, seen from this valley, presents the most romantic scenes, including the small but deep Kolyvan lake (altitude, 1180 ft.), which is surrounded by fantastic granite domes and towers. Farther west the valleys of the Uba, the Ulba and the Bukhtarma open south-westwards towards the Irtysh. The lower part of the first, like the lower valley of the Charysh, is thickly populated; in the valley of the Ulba is the Riddersk mine, at the foot of the Ivanovsk peak (6770 ft.), clothed with beautiful alpine meadows. The valley of the Bukhtarma, which has a length of 200 m., also has its origin at the foot of the Byelukha and the Kuitun peaks, and as it falls some 5000 ft. in less than 200 m., from an alpine plateau at an elevation of 6200 ft. to the Bukhtarma fortress (1130 ft.), it offers the most striking contrasts of landscape and vegetation. Its upper parts abound in glaciers, the best known of which is the Berel, which comes down from the Byelukha. On the northern side of the range which separates the upper Bukhtarma from the upper Katun is the Katun glacier, which after two ice-falls widens out to 700-900 yards. From a grotto in this glacier bursts tumultuously the Katun river. The middle and lower parts of the Bukhtarma valley have been colonized since the 18th century by runaway Russian peasants — serfs and nonconformists (Raskolniks) — who created there a free republic on Chinese territory; and after this part of the valley was annexed to Russia in 1869, it was rapidly colonized. The high valleys farther north, on the same western face of the Sailughem range, are but little known, their only visitors being Kirghiz shepherds. Those of Bashkaus, Chulyshman, and Chulcha, all three leading to the beautiful alpine lake of Teletskoye (length, 48 m.; maximum width, 3 m.; altitude, 1700 ft.; area, 87 sq. m.; maximum depth, 1020 ft.; mean depth, 660 ft.), are only inhabited by nomad Telenghites or Teleuts. The shores of the lake — reminding a visitor somewhat of the Swiss lake of Lucerne — rise almost sheer to over 6000 ft. and are too wild to accommodate a numerous population. From this lake issues the Biya, which joins the Katun at Biysk, and then meanders through the beautiful prairies of the north-west of the Altai. Farther north the Altai highlands are continued in the Kuznetsk district, which has a slightly different geological aspect, but still belongs to the Altai system. But the Abakan river, which rises on the western shoulder of the Sayan mountains, belongs to the system of the Yenisei. The Kuznetsk Ala-tau range, on the left bank of the Abakan, runs north-east into the government of Yeniseisk, while a complexus of imperfectly mapped mountains (Chukchut, Salair, Abakan) fills up the country northwards towards the Siberian railway and westwards towards the Ob. The Tom and its numerous tributaries rise on the northern slopes of the Kuznetsk Ala-tau, and their fertile valleys are occupied by a dense Russian population, the centre of which is Kuznetsk, on the Tom.

Geology. — Geologically the Altai mountains consist of two distinct elements which differ considerably from each other in composition and structure. The Russian Altai is composed mainly of mica and chlorite schists and slates, together with beds of limestone, and in the higher horizons Devonian and Carboniferous fossils occur in many places. There is no axial zone of gneiss, but intrusions of granite and other plutonic rocks occur, and the famous ore deposits are found chiefly near the contact of these intrusions with the schists. The strata are thrown into folds which run in the direction of the mountain ridges, forming a curve with the convexity facing the south-east. The Mongolian or Great Altai, on the other hand, consists mainly of gneiss and Archaean rocks. The strike of the rocks is independent of the direction of the chain, and the chain is bounded by faults. It is, in fact, a horst and not a zone of folding.

Flora.–The flora of the Altai, explored chiefly by Karl F. von Ledebour (1785-1851), is rich and very beautiful. Up to a level of 1000 ft. on the northern and 2000 ft. on the southern slopes, plant life belongs to the European flora, which extends into Siberia as far as the Yenisei. The steppe flora penetrates into the mountains, ascending some 1100-1200 ft., and in sheltered valleys even up to 5500 ft., when it of course comes into contact with the purely alpine flora. Tree vegetation, which reaches up as high as 6500 and 8150 ft., the latter limit on the north and west, consists of magnificent forests of birch, poplar, aspen, and Coniferae, such as Pinus cerebra, Abies sibirica, Larix sibirica, Picea obovata, and so on, though the fir is not found above 2500 ft., while the meadows are abundantly clothed with brightly coloured, typical assortments of herbaceous plants. The alpine meadows, which have many species in common with the European Alps, have also a number of their own peculiar Altaian species.

Mineral wealth.–The Altai proper is rich in silver, copper, lead and zinc ores, while in the Kuznetsk Ala-tau, gold, iron and coal are the chief mineral resources. The Kuznetsk Ala-tau mines are only now beginning to be explored, while the copper, and perhaps also the silver, ores of the Altai proper were worked by the mysterious prehistoric race of the Chudes at a time when the use of iron was not yet known. Russians began to mine in 1727 at Kolyvan, and in 1739 at Barnaul. Most of the Altai region, covering an area of some 170,000 sq. m. and including the Kuznetsk district, has since 1746 formed a domain of the imperial family under the name of the Altai Mining District. The ores of the Altai proper nearly always appear in irregular veins, containing silver, lead, copper and gold — sometimes all together, — and they are, or were, worked chiefly by Zmeinogorsk (or Zmeiev), Zyryanovsk, Ust-Kamenogorsk and Riddersk (abandoned in 1861). They offer, however, great difficulties, especially on account of their continually varying productivity and temperature of fusion. The beautiful varieties of porphyry — green, red, striped — which are obtained, often in big monoliths, near Kolyvan, are cut at the imperial stone-cutting factory into vases and other ornaments, familiar in the art galleries and palaces of Europe. Aquamarines of mediocre quality but enormous size (up to 3 in. in diameter) are found in the Korgon mine. The northern, or Salair, mining region is rich in silver ores, and the mine of this name used formerly to yield up to 93,300 oz. of silver in the year. But the chief wealth of the northern Altai is in the Kuznetsk coal-basin, also containing iron-ores, which fills up a valley between the Kuznetsk Ala-tau and the Salair range for a length of about 270 m., with a width of about 65 m. The coal is considered equal to the best coal of England and south Russia. The country is also covered with thick diluvial and alluvial deposits containing gold. However, all the mining is now on the decline.

Population.–The Russian population has rapidly increased since the fertile valleys belonging to the imperial family have been thrown open to settlement, and it has been estimated that in 1908 the population of the region (Biysk, Barnaul and Kuznetsk districts) reached about 800,000. Their chief occupations are agriculture (about 3,500,000 acres under culture), cattle-breeding, bee-keeping, mining, gathering of cedar-nuts and hunting. All this produce is exported partly to Tomsk and partly to Kobdo in Mongolia. The natives may represent a population of about 45,000. They are Altaians in the west and Telenghites or Teleuts in the east, with a few Kalmucks and Tatars. Although all are called Kalmucks by the Russians, they speak a Turkish language. Both the Telenghites and the Altaians are Shamanists in religion, but many of the former are already quite Russified. The virgin forests of the Kuznetsk Ala-tau — the Chern, or Black Forest of the Russians — are peopled by Tatars, who live in very small settlements, sometimes of the Russian type, but mostly in wooden yurts or huts of the Mongolian fashion. They can hardly keep any cattle, and lead the precarious life of forest-dwellers, living upon various wild roots when there is no grain in the spring. Hunting and fishing are resorted to, and the skins and furs are tanned.

Towns.–The capital of the Altai region is Barnaul, the centre of the mining administration and an animated commercial town; Biysk is the commercial centre; Kuznetsk, Ust-Kamenogorsk, and the mining towns of Kolyvan, Zmeinogorsk, Riddersk and Salairsk are the next largest places.

AUTHORITIES. — P. Semenov and G. N. Potanin, in supplementary vol. of Russian ed. of Ritter’s Asien (1877); Ledebour, Reise durch das Altaigebirge (1829-1830); P. Chikhatchev, Voyage scientifique dans l’Altai oriental (1845); Gebler, Ubersicht des katunischen Gebirges (1837); G. von Helmersen, Reise nach dem Altai (St Petersburg, 1848); T. W. Atkinson, Oriental and Western Siberia (1838); and Cotta, Der Altai (1871), are still worth consulting. Of modern works see Adrianov, “Journey to the Altai,” in Zaeiski Russ. Geogr. Soc. xi.; Yadrintsev, “Journey in West Siberia,” in Zapiski West Sib. Geogr. Soc. ii.; Golubev, Altai (1890, Russian); Schmurlo, “Passes in S. Altai” (Sailughem), in Izvestia Russ. Geogr. Soc. (1898), xxxiv. 5; V. Saposhnikov, various articles in same periodical (1897), xxxiii. and (1899) xxxv., and, by the same, Katun i yeya Istoka (Tomsk, 1901); S. Turner, Siberia (1905); Deniker, on Kozlov’s explorations, in La Geographie (1901, pp. 41, &c.); and P. Ignatov, in Izvestia Russ. Geog. Soc. (1902, No. 2). (P. A. K.; J. T. BE.)

1 Mr S. Turner estimates the culminating peak of Mt. Byelukha at 14,800 ft., but to Willer’s Peak, a little to the N. W. of Byelukha, he assigns an altitude of 17,800 ft. (p. 205 of Siberia.)

ALTAMURA, a town of Apulia, Italy, in the province of Bari, 28 m. S.S.W. of the town of that name, and 56 m. by rail via Gioia del Colle. Pop. (1901) 22,729. It possesses a fine Romanesque cathedral begun in 1232 and restored in 1330 and 1531, the portal being especially remarkable. It is one of the four Palatine churches of Apulia. The surrounding territory is fertile. The medieval walls, erected by the emperor Frederick II., rest upon the walls of an ancient city of unknown name. These early walls are of rough blocks of stone without mortar. Ancient tombs with fragments of vases have also been found, and there are cases which have been used as primitive tombs or dwellings, and a group of some fifty tumuli near Altamura.

ALTAR (Lat. altare, from altus, high; some ancient etymological guesses are recorded by St Isidore of Seville in Etymologiae xv. 4), strictly a base or pedestal used for supplication and sacrifice to gods or to deified heroes. The necessity for such sacrificial furniture has been felt in most religions, and consequently we find its use widespread among races and nations which have no mutual connexion.

Mesopotamia. — Altars are found from the earliest times in the remains of Babylonian cities; the oldest are square erections of sun-dried bricks. In Assyrian mounds limestone and alabaster are the chief material. They are of varying form; an altar shown in a relief at Khorsabad is ornamented with stepped battlements, which are the equivalent of the familiar “altarhorns” in Hebrew ritual. An altar also from Khorsabad (now in the British Museum) has a circular table and a solid base triangular on plan, with pilasters ornamented with animals’ paws at the angles. A third variety, of which an 8th century B.C. example from Nimrod exists in the British Museum, is a rectangular block ornamented at the ends by cylindrical rolls. These altars are in height from 2 to 3 ft. According to Herodotus (i. 183) the great altars of Babylonia were made of gold.

Egypt. — In Egypt altars took the form of a truncated cone or of a cubical block of polished granite or of basalt, with one or more basin-like depressions in the upper surface for receiving fluid libations. These had channels whereby fluids poured into the receptacles could be drained off. The surface was plain, inscribed with dedicatory or other legends, or adorned with symbolical carving.

Palestine. — Recent excavations, especially at Gezer, have shown that the earliest altars, or rather sacrifice hearths, in Palestine were circular spaces marked out by small stones set on end. At Gezer a pre-Semitic place of worship was found in which three such hearths stood together, and drained into a cave which may reasonably be supposed to have been regarded as the residence of the divinity. These circular hearths persisted into the Canaanite period, but were ultimately superseded by the Semitic developments. To the primitive nomadic Semite the presence of the divinity was indicated by springs, shady trees, remarkable rocks and other landmarks; and from this earliest conception grew the theory that a numen might be induced to take up an abode in an artificial heap of stones, or a pillar set upright for the purpose. The blood of the victim was poured over the stone as an offering to the divinity dwelling within it; and from this conception of the stone arose the further and final view, that the stone was a table on which the victim was to be burned.

Very few specimens of early Palestinian altars remain. The megalithic structures common in the Hauran and Moab may be entirely sepulchral. At Gezer no definite altar was discovered in the great High Place; though it is possible that a bank of intensely hard compact earth, in which were embedded a large number of human skulls, took its place. A very remarkable altar, at present unique, was found at Taanach by the Austrian excavators. It is pyramidal in shape, and the surface is ornamented with human-headed animals in relief. This, like the earliest Babylonian altars, is of baked earth.

The Old Testament conception of the altar varies with the stage of religious development. In the pre-Deuteronomic period altars are erected in any place where there had appeared to be a manifestation of deity, or under any circumstance in which the aid of deity was invoked; not by heretical individuals, but by the acknowledged religious leaders, such as Noah at Ararat, Abraham at Shechem, Bethel &c., Isaac at Beersheba, Jacob at Bethel, Moses at Rephidim, Joshua at Ebal, Gideon at Ophrah, Samuel at Raman, Elijah at Carmel, and others. These primitive altars were of the simplest possible description — in fact they were required to be so by the regulation affecting them, preserved in Exodus xx. 24, which prescribes that in every place where Yahweh records his name an altar of earth or of unhewn stone, without steps or other extraneous ornamentation, shall be erected.

The priestly regulations affecting altars are of a very elaborate nature, and are framed with a single eye to the essential theory of later Hebrew worship — the centralization of all worship at one shrine. These recognize two altars, which by the authors of this portion of the Pentateuch are placed from the first in the tabernacle in the wilderness — a theory which is inconsistent with the other evidences of the nature of the earlier Hebrew worship, to which we have just alluded.

The first of these altars is that for burnt-offering. This altar was in the centre of the court of the tabernacle, of acacia wood, 3 cubits high and 5 square. It was covered with copper, was provided with “horns” at the corners (like those of Assyria), hollow in the middle, and with rings on the sides into which the staves for its transportation could be run (Ex. xxvii. 1-8). The altar of the Solomonic temple is on similar lines, but much larger. It is now generally recognized that the description of the tabernacle altar is intended to provide a precedent for this vast structure, which would otherwise be inconsistent with the traditional view of the simple Hebrew altars. In the second temple a new altar was built after the fashion of the former (1 Macc. iv. 47) of “whole stones from the mountain.” In Herod’s temple the altar was again built after the same model. It is described by Josephus (v. 5. 6) as 15 cubits high and 50 cubits square, with angle horns, and with an “insensible acclivity” leading up to it (a device to evade the pre-Deutero- nomic regulation about steps). It was made without any use of iron, and no iron tool was ever allowed to touch it. The blood

and refuse were discharged through a drain into the brook Kedron; this drain probably still remains, in the Bir el-Arwah, under the “Dome of the Rock” in the mosque which covers the site of the temple.

The second altar was the altar of incense, which was in the holy place of the tabernacle. It was of similar construction to the altar of burnt-offering, but smaller, being 2 cubits high and 1 cubit square (Ex. xxx. 1-5). It was overlaid with gold. Solomon’s altar of incense (1 K. vi. 20) is referred to in a problematical passage from which it would appear to have been of cedar. But the authenticity of the passages describing the altar of incense in the tabernacle, and the historicity of the corresponding altar in Solomon’s temple, are matters of keen dispute among critics. The incense altar in the second temple was removed by Antiochus Epiphanes (1 Macc. i. 21) and restored by Judas Maccabaeus (1 Macc. iv. 49). That in the temple of Herod is referred to in Luke i. 11.

The ritual uses of these altars are sufficiently explained by their names. On the first was a fire continually burning, in which the burnt-offerings were consumed. On the second an offering of incense was made twice a day.

In the pre-Deuteronomic passage, Exodus xxi. 14, the use of the altar as an asylum is postulated, though denied to the wilful murderer. This is a survival of the ancient belief that the deity resided in the pillar or stone-heap, and that the fugitive was placing himself under the protection of the local numen by seeking sanctuary. From 1 Kings i. 50 it would appear that the suppliant caught hold of the altar-horns (compare 1 Kings ii. 28), as though special protective virtue resided in this important though obscure part of the structure.

Greece and Rome. — According to the difference in the service for which they were employed, altars fell into two classes. Those of the first class were pedestals, so small and low that the suppliant could kneel upon them; these stood inside the temples, in front of the sacred image. The second class consisted of larger tables destined for burnt sacrifice; these were placed in the open air, and, if connected with a temple, in front of the entrance. Possibly altars of the former class were in historical times substitutes for, and rendered the same service as, the bases of the sacred images within the temples in earlier ages. In this case the altar of Apollo at Delphi, upon which on the Greek vases Neoptolemus is frequently represented as taking refuge from Orestes, might be regarded as the pedestal of an invisible image of the god, and as fulfilling the same function as did the base of the actual image of Athene in Troy, towards which Cassandra fled from Ajax. The second class of altars, called bomoi by the Greeks and altaria by the Romans, appears to have originated in temporary constructions such as heaps of earth, turf or stone, made for kindling a sacrificial fire as occasion required. But sacrifices to earth divinities were made on the earth itself, and those to the infernal deities in sunk hollows (Odyss. x. 25; Festus s. v. Altaria). The note of Eustathius (Odyss. xii. 252) perhaps indicates some customs reminiscent of a primitive antiquity in which the sacrifice was made without an altar at all. He says apobomia tina iera on ouk epi bomou o kathagis mos all’ epi edafous — “some holy places away from altars, whose offering is made not on an altar but on the floor.” Pausanias (vi. 20. 7) speaks of an altar at Olympia made of unbaked bricks. In some primitive holy shrines the bones and ashes of the victims sacrificed were allowed to accumulate, and upon this new fires were kindled. Altars so raised were, like most religious survivals, considered as endowed with particular sanctity; the most remarkable recorded instances of such are the altars of Hera at Samos, and of Pan at Olympia (Paus. v. 14. 6; v. 15. 5), of Heracles at Thebes (Paus. ix. 11. 7), and of Zeus at Olympia (Paus. v. 13. 5). The last-mentioned stood on a platform (prothusis) measuring 125 ft. in circumference, and led up to by steps, the altar itself being 22 ft. high. Women were excluded from the platform. Where hecatombs were sacrificed, the prothusis necessarily assumed colossal proportions, as in the case of the altar at Parion, where it measured on each side 600 ft. The altar of Apollo at Delos (o keratinos bomos) was made of the horns of goats believed to have been slain by Diana; while at Miletus was an altar composed of the blood of victims sacrificed (Paus. v. 13. 6). The altar at Phorae in Achaea was of unhewn stones (Paus. vii. 22. 3). The altar used at the festival in honour of Daedalus on Mt. Cithaeron was of wood, and was consumed along with the sacrifice (Paus. ix. 3. 4). Others of bronze are mentioned. But these were exceptional, the usual material of an altar was marble, and its form, both among the Greeks and Romans, was either square or round; polygonal altars, of which examples still exist, being exceptions. When sculptured decorations were added they frequently took the form of imitations of the actual festoons with which it was usual to ornament altars, or of symbols, such as crania and horns of oxen, referring to the victims sacrificed. As a rule, the altars which existed apart from temples bore the name of the person by whom they were dedicated and the names of the deities in whose service they were, or, if not the name, some obvious representation of the deity. Such, for example, is the purpose of the figures of the Muses on an altar dedicated to them, now to be seen in the British Museum. An altar was retained for the service of one particular god, except where through local tradition two or more deities had become intimately associated, as in the case of the altar at Olympia to Artemis and Alpheus jointly, or that of Poseidon and Erechtheus in the Erechtheum at Athens. The most remarkable instance of multiple dedication was, however, at Oropus, where the altar was divided into five parts, one dedicated to Heracles, Zeus and Paean Apollo, a second to heroes and their wives, a third to Hestia, Hermes, Amphiaraus and the children of Amphilochus, a fourth to Aphrodite Panacea, Jason, Health, and Healing Athene, and the fifth to the Nymphs, Pan, and the rivers Archelous and Cephissus (Paus. i. 34. 2). Such deities were styled sbmbomoi, each having a separate part of the altar (Paus. i. 34. 2). Other terms are agonioi, or omobomioi. Deities of an inferior order, who were conceived as working together — e.g. the wind gods — had an altar in common. In the same way, the “unknown gods” were regarded as a unit, and had in Athens and at Olympia one altar for all (Paus. i. 1. 4; v. 14. 5; cf. Acts of Apostles, xvii. 18). An altar to all the gods is mentioned by Aeschylus (Suppl. 222). Among the exceptional classes of altars are also to be mentioned those on which fire could not be kindled (bomoi apuroi), and those which were kept free from blood (bomoi anaiaaktoi), of which in both respects the altar of Zeus Hypatos at Athens was an example. The lstia was a round altar; the eschara, one employed apparently for sacrifice to inferior deities or heroes (but lschara Toibou, Aesch. Pers. 205). In Rome an altar erected in front of a statue of a god was always required to be lower than the statue itself (Vitruvius iv. 9). Altars were always places of refuge, and even criminals and slaves were there safe, violence offered to them being insults to the gods whose suppliants the refugees were for the time being. They were also taken hold of by the Greeks when making their most solemn oaths.

Ancient America. — As a single specimen of an altar, wholly unrelated to any of the foregoing, we may cite the ancient Mexican example described by W. Bullock (Six Months in Mexico, London, 1824, p. 335). This was cylindrical, 25 ft. in circumference, with sculpture representing the conquests of the national warriors in fifteen different groups round the side.

Portable altars and tables of offerings were used in pre-Christian as well as in Christian ritual. One such was discovered in the Gezer excavations, dating about 200 B.C. It was a slab of polished limestone about 6 in. square with five cups in its upper surface. Another from the same place was a small cubical block of limestone bearing a dedication to Heracles. They have also been found in Assyria. Pocket altars are still used in some forms of worship in India. See the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1852, p. 71.

1 Bullock also says (p. 354) that the altar in the church of the indian village of S. Miguel de los Ranchos which he visited was “of the same nature as those in use before the introduction of Christianity.”

ALTARS IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH I. The Early Church. — The altar is spoken of by the early Greek and Latin ecclesiastical writers under a variety of names: — trapefa, the principal name in the Greek fathers and the liturgies; thusiasterion (rarer; used in the Septuagint for Hebrew altars); ilasterion; bomos (usually avoided, as it is a word with heathen associations); mensa Domini; ara (avoided like bomos, and for the same reason); and, most regularly, altare. After the 4th century other names or expressions come into use, such as mensa tremenda, series corporis et sanguinis Christi.

The earliest Christians had no altars, and were taunted by the pagans for this. It is admitted by Origen in his reply to Celsus (p. 389), who has charged the Christians with being a secret society “because they forbid to build temples, to raise altars.” “The altars,” says Origen, “are the heart of every Christian.” The same appears from a passage in Lactantius, De Origine Erroris, ii. 2. We gather from these passages that down to about A.D. 250, or perhaps a little later, the communion was administered on a movable wooden table. In the Catacombs, the arcosolia or bench-like tombs are said (though the statement is doubtful) to have been used to serve this purpose. The earliest church altars were certainly made of wood; and it would appear from a passage in William of Malmesbury (De Gest. Pontif. Angl. iii. 14) that English altars were of wood down to the middle of the 11th century, at least in the diocese of Worcester.

The cessation of persecution, and consequent gradual elaboration of church furniture and ritual, led to the employment of more costly materials for the altar as for the other fittings of ecclesiastical buildings. Already in the 4th century we find reference to stone altars in the writings of Gregory ot Nyssa. In 517 the council of Epaone in Burgundy forbade any but stone pillars to be consecrated with chrism; but of course the decrees of this provincial council would not necessarily be received throughout the church.

Pope Felix I. (A.D. 269-274) decreed that “mass should be celebrated above the tombs of martyrs” — an observance probably suggested by the passage in Revelation vi. 9, “I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God.” This practice developed into the medieval rule that no altar can be consecrated unless it contain a relic or relics.

The form of the altar was originally table-shaped, consisting of a plane surface supported by columns. There were usually four, but examples with one, two and five columns are also recorded. But the development of the relic-custom led to the adoption of another form, the square box shape of an “altar- tomb.” Transitional examples, combining the box with the earlier table shape, are found dating about 450. Mention is made occasionally of silver and gold altaus in the 5th to the 8th centuries. This means no doubt that gold and silver were copiously used in its decoration. Such an altar still remains in Sant’ Ambrogio at Milan, dating from the 9th century (see fig. 1).

II. The Medieval Church. — It will be convenient now to pass to the fully-developed altar of the Western Church with its accessories, though the rudiments of most of the additional details are traceable in the earlier period.

In the Roman Catholic Church, which preserves in this respect the tradition that had become established during the middle ages, the component parts of a fixed altar in the liturgical sense are the table (mensa), or super-altar, consisting of a stone slab; the support (stipes), consisting either of a solid mass or of four or more columns; the sepulchrum, or altar-cavity, a small chamber for the reception of the relics of martyrs. The support, in the technical sense, must be of stone solidly joined to the table; but, if this support consist of columns, the intervals may be filled with other materials, e.g. brick or cement. The altar- slab or “table” alone is consecrated, and in sign of this are cut in its upper surface five Greek crosses, one in the centre and one in each corner. These crosses must have been anointed by the bishop with chrism in the ritual of consecration before the altar can be used. Crosses appear on the portable altar buried with St Cuthbert (A.D. 687), but the history of the origin and development of this practice is not fully worked out.

According to the Caeromoniale (i. 12. 13) a canopy (balda chinum) should be suspended over the altar; this should be square, and of sufficient size to cover the altar and the predella on which the officiating priest stands. This baldachin, called liturgically the ciborium, is sometimes hung from the roof by chains in such a way that it can be lowered or raised; sometimes it is fixed to the wall or reredos; sometimes it is a solid structure of wood covered with metal or of marble supported on four columns. The latter form is, however, usual only in large churches, more especially of the basilica type, e.g. St Peter’s at Rome or the Roman Catholic cathedral at Westminster. The origin of the ciborium is not certain, but it is represented in a mosaic at Thessalonica of a date not later than A.D. 500. Even at the present day, in spite of a decree of the Congregation of Rites (27th of May 1697) ordering it to be placed over all altars, it is — even at Rome itself — usually only found over the high altar and the altar of the Blessed Sacrament.

Multiplication of altars is another medieval characteristic. This also is probably a result of the edict of Pope Felix already mentioned. In a vault where more than one martyr was buried an altar might be erected for each. It is in the 6th century that we begin to find traces of the multiplication of altars. In the church of St Gall, Switzerland, in the 9th century there were seventeen. In the modern Latin Church almost every large church contains several altars — dedicated to certain saints, in private side chapels, established for masses for the repose of the founder’s soul, &c. Archbishop Wuifred in 816 ordered that beside every altar there should be an inscription recording its dedication. This regulation fell into abeyance after the 12th century, and such inscriptions are very rare. One remains mutilated at Deerhurst (Archaeologia, vol. 1. p. 69).

Where there is in a cathedral or church more than one altar, the principal one is called a “high altar.” Where there is a second high altar, it is generally at the end of the choir or chancel. In monastic churches (e.g. formerly at St Albans) it sometimes stands at the end of the nave close to the choir screen.

Beside the altar was a drain (piscina) for pouring away the water in which the communion vessels were rinsed. This seems originally to have been under the altar, as it is still in the Eastern Church.

That the primitive communion table was covered with a communion-cloth is highly probable, and is mentioned by Optatus (c. A.D. 370), bishop of Alilevis. This had developed by the 14th or 15th century into a cerecloth, or waxed cloth, on the table itself; and three linen coverings one above the other, two of about the size of the table and one rather wider than the altar, and long enough to hang down at each end. Five crosses are worked upon it, four in the corners and one in the middle, and there is an embroidered edging.1 In front was often a hanging panel of embroidered cloth (the frontal; but frontals of wood, ornamented with carving or enamel, &c., are also to be found). These embroidered frontals are changeable, so that the principal colour in the pattern can accord with the liturgical colour of the day. Speaking broadly, red is the colour for feasts of martyrs, white for virgins, violet for penitential seasons, &c.; no less than sixty-three different uses differing in details have been enumerated. A similar panel of needlework (the dossal) is suspended behind the altar.

Portable altars have been used on occasion since the time of Bede. They are small slabs of hard stone, just large enough for the chalice and paten. They are consecrated and marked with the five incised crosses in the same way as the fixed altar, but they may be placed upon a support of any suitable material, whether wood or stone. They are used on a journey in a heretical or heathen country, or in private chapels. In the inventory of the field apparel of Henry, earl of Northumberland, A.D. 1513, is included “A coffer wyth ij liddes to serue for an Awter and ned be” (Archaeologia, xxvi. 403).

On the altar are placed a cross and candlesticks — six in number, and seven when a bishop celebrates in his cathedral; and over it is suspended or fixed a tabernacle or receptacle for the reservation of the Sacrament.

III. Post-Reformation Altars. — At the Reformation the altars in churches were looked upon as symbols of the unreformed doctrine, especially where the struggle lay between the Catholics and the Calvinists, who on this point were much more radical revolutionaries than the Lutherans. In England the name “altar”2 was retained in the Communion Office in English, printed in 1549, and in the complete English Prayer-book of the following year, known to students as the First Book of Edward VI. But orders were given soon after that the altars should be destroyed, and replaced by movable wooden tables; while from the revised Prayer book of 1552 the word “altar” was carefully expunged, “God’s board” or “the table” being substituted. The short reign of Mary produced a temporary reaction, but the work of reformation was resumed on the accession of Elizabeth.

The name “altar” has been all along retained in the Coronation Office of the kings of England, where it occurs frequently. It was also recognized in the canons of 1640, but with the reservation that “it was an altar in the sense in which the primitive church called it an altar and in no other.” In the same canons the rule for the position of the communion tables, which has been since regularly followed throughout the Church of England, was formulated. In the primitive church the altars seem to have been so placed that, like those of the Hebrews, they could be surrounded on all sides by the worshippers. The chair of the bishop or celebrant was on their east side, and the assistant clergy were ranged on each side of him. But in the middle ages the altars were placed against the east wall of the churches, or else against a reredos erected at the east side of the altar, so as to prevent all access to the table from that side; the celebrant was thus brought round to the west side and caused to stand between the people and the altar. On the north and south sides there were often curtains. When tables were substituted for altars in the English churches, these were not merely movable, but at the administration of the Lord’s Supper were actually moved into the body of the church, and placed table-wise — that is, with the long sides turned to the north and south, and the narrow ends to the east and west, — the officiating clergyman standing at the north side. In the time of Archbishop Laud, however, the present practice of the Church of England was introduced. The communion table, though still of wood and movable, is, as a matter of fact, never moved; it is placed altar-wise — that is, with its longer axis running north and south, and close against the east wall. Often there is a reredos behind it; it is also fenced in by rails to preserve it from profanation of various kinds.

In 1841 the ancient church of the Holy Sepulchre at Cambridge was robbed of most of its interest by a calamitous “restoration” carried out under the superintendence and partly at the charge of the Camden Society. On this occasion a stone altar, consisting of a flat slab resting upon three other upright slabs, was presented to the parish, and was set up in the church at the east wall of the chancel. This was brought to the notice of the Court of Arches in 1845, and Sir H. Jenner Fust (Faulkner v. Lichfield and Stearn) ordered it to be removed, on the ground that a stone structure so weighty that it could not be carried about, and seeming to be a mass of solid masonry, was not a communion-table in the sense recognized by the Church of England.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. — For altars in the ancient East see M. Jastrow, Religion of Assyria anid Babylonia; Perrot and Chipiez, Art in Chaldea (i. 143, 255); Sir i. Gardiner Wilkinson, A Second Series of the Monners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, ii. 387; Benzinger’s and Nowack’s works on Hebraische Archaologie. For classical altars, much information can be obtained from the notes in J. G. Frazer’s Pausaniae. See also Schomann, Griechische Alterthumer, vol. ii.; the volume on “Gottesdienstliche Altcrthumer” in Hermann’s Lehrbuch der griechischen Antiquitaten. On domestic altars and worship see Petersen, Hausgottesdienst der Griechen (Cassel, 1851). On plural dedications consult Maurer, De aribus graecorum pluribus deis in commune positis (Darmstadt, 1885). For Christian altars, reference is best made to the articles on the subject in the dictionaries of Christian and liturgical antiquities of Migne, Martigny, Smith and Cheetham, and Pugin, where practically all the available information is collected. See also Ciampinus, Vetera Monumenta (Rome, 1747), where numerous illustrations of altars are to be found; Martune, De antiquis Ecclesiae ritibus, iii. vi. (Rouen, 1700); Voigt, Thyslasteriologia sive de altaribus veterum Christianorum (Hamburg, 1709); and the liturgical works of Bona. Many articles on various sections of the subject have appeared in the journals of archaeoloeical societies; we may mention Nesbitt on the churches of Rome earlier than 1150 (Archaeologia, xl. p. 210), Didron, “L’Autel chretien” (Annales archeologiques, iv. p. 238), and a paper by Texier on enamelled altars in the same volume. (R. A. S. M.)

1 In the Eastern Church four small pieces of cloth marked with the names of the Evangelists are placed on the four corners of the altar, and covered with three cloths, the uppermost (the corporal) being of smaller size.

2 Except in one place where the term used is “God’s Board.”

ALTDORF, the capital of the Swiss canton of Uri. It is built at a height of 1516 ft. above sea-level, a little above the right bank of the Reuss, not far above the point where this river is joined on the right by the Schachen torrent. In 1900 the population was 3117, all Romanists and German-speaking. Altdorf is 34 m. from Lucerne by the St Gotthard railway and 22 m. from Goeschenen. Its port on the Lake of Lucerne, Fluelon, is 2 m. distant. There is a stately parish church, while above the little town is the oldest Capuchin convent in Switzerland (1581). Altdorf is best known as the place where, according to the legend, William Tell shot the apple from his son’s head. This act by tradition happened on the market-place, where in 1895, at the foot of an old tower (with rude frescoes commemorating the feat), there was set up a fine bronze statue (by Richard Kissling of Zurich) of Tell and his son. In 1899 a theatre was opened close to the town for the sole purpose of performing Schiller’s play of Wilhelm Tell. The same year a new carriage-road was opened from Altdorf through the Schachen valley and over the Klausen Pass (6404 ft.) to the village of Linththal (30 m.) and so to Glarus. One and a half mile from Altdorf by the Klausen road is the village of Burglen, where by tradition Tell was born; while he is also said to have lost his life, while saving that of a child, in the Schachen torrent that flows past the village. On the left bank of the Reuss, immediately opposite Altdorf, is Attinghausen, where the ruined castle (which belonged to one of the real founders of the Swiss Confederation) now houses the cantonal museum of antiquities. (W. A. B. C.)

ALTDORFER, ALBRECHT (N 1480-1538), German painter and engraver, was born at Regensburg (Ratisbon), where in 1505 he was enrolled a burgher, and described as “twenty-five years old.” Soon afterwards he is known to have been prosperous, and as city architect he erected fortifications and a public slaughter-house. Altdorfer has been called the “Giorgione of the North.,’ His paintings are remarkable for minute and careful finish, and for close study of nature. The most important of them are to be found in the Pinakothek at Munich. A representation of the battle of Arbela (1529), included in that collection, is usually considered his chief work. His engravings on wood and copper are very numerous, and rank next to those of Albrecht Durer. The most important collection is at the Bedin museum. Albrecht’s brother, Erhard Altdorfer, was also a painter and engraver, and a pupil of Lucas Cranach.

ALTEN, SIR CHARLES [Karl] (1764-1840), Hanoverian and British soldier, son of Baron Alten, a member of an old Hanoverian family, entered the service of the elector as a page at the age of twelve. In 1781 he received a commission in the Hanoverian guards, and as a captain took part in the campaigns of 1793- 1795 in the Low Countries, distinguishing himself particularly on the Lys in command of light infantry. In 1803 the Hanoverian army was disbanded, and Alten took service with the King’s German Legion in British pay. In command of the light infantry of this famous corps he took part with Lord Cathcart in the Hanoverian expedition of 1805 and in the siege of Copenhagen in 1807, and was with Moore in Sweden and Spain, as well as in the disastrous Walcheren expedition. He was soon employed once more in the Peninsula, and at Albuera commanded a brigade. In April 1813 Wellington placed him at the head of the famous “Light Division” (43rd, 52nd, 95th, and Cacadores), in which post he worthily continued the records of Moore and Robert Craufurd at Nivelle, Nive, Orthez and

Toulouse. His officers presented him with a sword of honour as a token of their esteem. In 1815 Alten commanded Wellington’s 3rd division and was severely wounded at Waterloo. His conduct won for him the rank of Count von Alten. When the King’s German Legion ceased to exist, Alten was given the command of the Hanoverians in France, and in 1818 he returned to Hanover, where he became subsequently minister of war and foreign affairs, and rose to be field-marshal, being retained on the British Army list at the same time as Major-General Sir Charles Alten, G. C. B. He died in 1840. A memorial to Alten has been erected at Hanover.

See Glentleman’s Magazine, 1840; N. L. Beamish, Hist. of the King’s German Legion, 2 vols. (1832-1837).

ALTENA, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Westphalia, on the river Lenne, 38 m. S.S.E. from Dortmund. Pop. (1900) 12,769. It consists of a single street, winding up a deep valley for about 3 m. There are three churches, a museum, high grade and popular schools. Its hardware industries are important, and embrace iron rolling, the manufacture of fine wire, needles, springs and silver ornaments. On the neighbouring Schlossberg is the ancestral castle of the counts of La Marok, ancestors, on the female side, of the Prussian royal house.

ALTENBURG, a town of Germany, capital of the duchy of Saxe-Altenburg, situated near the river Pleisse, 23 m. S. of Leipzig, and at the junction of the Saxon state railways Leipzig- Hof and Altenburg-Zeitz. Pop. (1905) 38,811. The town from its hilly position is irregularly built, but many of its streets are wide, and contain a number of large and beautiful buildings. Its ancient castle is picturesquely situated on a lofty porphyry rock, and is memorable as the place from which, in 1455, Kunz von Kaufungen carried off the young princes Albert and Ernest, the founders of the present royal and ducal families of Saxony. Its beautiful picture gallery, containing portraits of several of the famous princes of the house of Wettin, was almost totally destroyed by fire in January 1905. Altenburg is the seat of the higher courts of the Saxon duchies, and possesses a cathedral and several churches, schools, a library, a gallery of pictures and a school of art, an infirmary and various learned societies. There is also a museum, with natural history, archaeological, and art collections, and among other buildings may be mentioned St Bartholomew’s church (1089), the town hall (1562-1564), a lunatic asylum, teachers’ seminary and an agricultural academy. There is considerable traffic in grain and cattle brought from the surrounding districts; and twice a year there are large horse fairs. Cigars, woollen goods, gloves, hats and porcelain are among the chief manufactures. There are lignite mines in the vicinity.

ALTENSTEIN, a castle upon a rocky mountain in Saxe- Meiningen, on the south-western slope of the Thuringerwald, not far from Eisenach. It is the summer residence of the dukes of Meiningen, and is surrounded by a noble park, which contains, among other objects of interest, a remarkable underground cavern, 500 ft. long, through which flows a large and rapid stream. Boniface, the apostle of the Germans, lived and preached at Altenstein in 724; and near by is the place where, in 1521, Luther was seized, by the order of the elector Frederick the Wise, to be carried off to the Wartburg. An old beech called “Luther’s tree,” which tradition connected with the reformer, was blown down in 1841, and a small monument now stands in its place.

ALTERNATION (from Lat. aiternare, to do by turns), strictly, the process of “alternating”’ i.e. of two things following one another regularly by turns, as night alternates with day. A somewhat different sense is attached to some usages of the derivatives. Thus, in American political representative bodies and in the case of company directors, a substitute is sometimes called an “alternate.” An “alternative” IS that which is offered as a choice of two things, the acceptance of the one implying the rejection of the other. It is incorrect to speak of more than two alternatives, though Mr Gladstone wrote in 1857 of a fourth (Oxf. Essays, 26). When there is only one course open there is said to be no alternative.

ALTHAEA, in classical legend, daughter of Thestius, king of Aetolia, wife of Oeneus, king of Calydon, and mother of Meleager (q.v..)

ALTING, JOHANN HEINRICH (1583–1644), German divine, was born at Emden, where his father, Menso Alting ( 1541-1612), was minister. Johann studied with great success at the universities of Groningen and Herborn. In 1608 he was appointed tutor of Frederick, afterwards elector-palatine, at Heidelberg, and in 1612 accompanied him to England. Returning in 1613 to Heidelberg, after the marriage of the elector with Princess Elizabeth of England, he was appointed professor of dogmatics, and in 1616 director of the theological department in the Collegium Sapientiae. In 1618, along with Abraham Scultetus, he represented the university in the synod of Dort. When Count Tilly took the city of Heidelberg (1622) and handed it over to plunder, Alting found great difficulty in escaping the fury of the soldiers. He first retired to Schorndorf; but, offended by the “semi-Pelagianism” of the Lutherans with whom he was brought in contact, he removed to Holland, where the unfortunate elector and “Winter King” Frederick, in exile after his brief reign in Bohemia, made him tutor to his eldest son. In 1627 Alting was appointed to the chair of theology at Groningen, where he continued to lecture, with increasing reputation, until his death in 1644. Though an orthodox Calvinist, Alting laid little stress on the sterner side of his creed and, when at Dort he opposed the Remonstrants, he did so mainly on the ground that they were “innovators.” Among his works are: –Notae in Decadem Problematum Jacobi Behm (Heidelberg, 1618); Scripta Pheologica Meidelbergensia (Amst., 1662); Exegesis Augustanae Confessionis (Amst., 1647).

ALTINUM (mod. Altino), an ancient town of Venetia, 12 m. S.E. of Tarvisium (Treviso), on the edge of the lagoons. It was probably only a small fishing village until it became the point of junction of the Via Postumia and the Via Popillia (see AQUILEIA). At the end of the republic it was a municipium. Augustus and his successors brought it into further importance as a point on the route between Italy and the north-eastern portions of the empire. After the foundation of the naval station at Ravenna, it became the practice to take ship from there to Altinum, instead of following the Via Popillia round the coast, and thence to continue the journey by land. A new road, the Via Claudia Augusta, was constructed by the emperor Claudius from Altinum to the Danube, a distance of 350 m., apparently by way of the Lake of Constance. The place thus became of considerable strategic and commercial importance, and the comparatively mild climate (considering its northerly situation) led to the erection of villas which Martial (Epigr. iv. 25) compares with those of Baiae. It was destroyed by Attila in A.D. 452, and its inhabitants took refuge in the islands of the lagoons, forming settlements from which Venice eventually sprang.

ALTITUDE (Lat. altitudo, from altus, high), height or eminence, and particularly the height above the ground or above sea-level. In geometry, the altitude of a triangle is the length of the perpendicular from the vertex to the base. In astronomy, the altitude of a heavenly body is the apparent angular elevation of the body above the plane of the horizon (see ASTRONOMY: Spherical). Apparent altitude is the value which is directly observed; true altitude is deduced by correcting for astronomical refraction and dip of the horizon; geocentric altitude by correcting for parallax.

ALTMUHL, a river of Germany, in the kingdom of Bavaria. It is an important left bank tributary of the Danube, rising in the Franconian plateau (Frankische Terrasse), and after a tortuous course of 116 m., at times flowing through meadows and again in weird romantic gorges, joins the Danube at Kelheim. From its mouth it is navigable up to Dietfurt (18 m.), whence the Ludwigscanal (100 m. long) proceeds to Bamberg on the Regnitz, thus establishing communication between the Danube and the Rhine.

ALTO (Ital. for “high’,), a musical term applied to the highest adult male voice or counter-tenor, and to the lower boy’s or woman’s (contralto) Voice.

ALTON, a market-town in the Fareham parliamentary division of Hampshire, England, 46 1/2 m. S.W. of London by the London & South-Western railway. Pop. of urban district (1901) 5479. It has a pleasant undulating site near the headwaters of the river Wey. Of the church of St Lawrence part, including the tower, is Norman; the building was the scene of a fierce conflict between the royalist and parliamentary troops in 1643. There is a museum of natural history; the collection is reminiscent of the famous naturalist Gilbert White, of Selborne in this vicinity. Large markets and fairs are held for corn, hops, cattle and sheep; and the town contains some highly reputed ale breweries, besides paper mills and iron foundries.

ALTON, a city of Madison county, Illinois, U.S.A., in the W. part of the state, on the Mississippi river, about 10 m. above the mouth of the Missouri, and about 25 m. N. of St Louis, Missouri. Pop. (1890) 10,294; (1900) 14,210, of whom 1638 were foreign-born; (1910) 17,528. Alton is served by the Chicago & Alton, the Chicago, Peoria & St Louis, the Cleveland, Cincinnati, Chicago & St Louis, and the Illinois Terminal railways. The river is here spanned by a bridge. The residential portion of the city lies on the river bluffs, some of which rise to a height of 250 ft. above the water level, and the business streets are on the bottom lands of the river. Alton has a public library and a public park. Upper Alton (pop. 2918 in 1910), about 1 1/2 m. N.E. of Alton, is the seat of the Western Military Academy (founded in 1879 as Wyman Institute; chartered in 1892), and of Shurtleff College (Baptist, founded in 1827 at Rock Spring, removed to Upper Alton in 1831, and chartered in 1833), which has a college of liberal arts, a divinity school, an academy and a school of music; and the village of Godfrey, 5 1/2 m. N. of Alton, is the seat of the Monticello Ladies’ Seminary, founded by Benjamin Godfrey, opened in 1838, and chartered in 1841. Among the manufactures of Alton are iron and glass ware, miners’ tools, shovels, coal-mine cars, flour, and agricultural implements; and there are a large oil refinery and a large lead smelter. The value of the city’s factory products increased from $4,250,389 in 1900 to $8,696,814 in 1905, or 104.6%.

The first settlement on the site of Alton was made in 1807, when a trading post was established by the French. The town was laid out in 1817, was first incorporated in 1821, and in 1827 was made the seat of a state penitentiary, which was later removed to Joliet, the last prisoners being transferred in 1860. Alton was first chartered as a city in 1837. In 1836 the Rev. Elijah P. Lovejoy (1802-1837), a native of Albion, Maine, removed the Observer, a religious (Presbyterian) periodical of which he was the editor, from St Louis to Alton. He had attracted considerable attention in St Louis by his criticisms of slavery, but though he believed in emancipation, he was not a radical abolitionist. After coming to Alton his anti-slavery views soon became more radical, and in a few months he was an avowed abolitionist. His views were shared by his brother, Owen Lovejoy (1811-1864), a Congregational minister, who also at that time lived in Alton, and who from 1857 until his death was an able anti-slavery member of Congress. Most of the people of southern Illinois were in sympathy with slavery, and consequently the Lovejoys became very unpopular. The press of the Observer was three time destroyed, and on the 7th of November 1837 E. P. Loveioy was killed while attempting to defend against a mob a fourth press which he had recently obtained and which was stored in a warehouse in Alton. His death caused intense excitement throughout the country, and he was everywhere regarded by abolitionists as a martyr to their cause. In 1897 a monument, a granite column surmounted by a bronze statue of Victory, was erected in his honour by the citizens of Alton and by the state.

See Henry Tanner, The Martyrdom of Lovejoy (Chicago, 1881), and “The Alton Tragedy” in S. J. May’s Some Recollections of Our Anti-Slavery Conflict (Boston, 1869).

ALTONA, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein, on the right bank of the Elbe immediately west of Hamburg. Though administratively distinct, the two cities so closely adjoin as virtually to form one whole. Lying higher than Hamburg, Altona enjoys a purer and healthier atmosphere. It has spacious squares and streets, among the latter the Palmaille, a stately avenue ending on a terrace about 100 ft. above the Elbe, whence a fine view is obtained of the river and the lowlands beyond. Of the six Evangelical churches, the Hauptkirche (parish church), with a lofty steeple, is noteworthy. The main thoroughfares are embellished by several striking monuments, notably the memorials of the wars of 1864 and 1870, bronze statues of the emperor William I. and Bismarck and the column of Victory (Siegessaule). The museum (1901) is an imposing building in the German Renaissance style and contains, in addition to a valuable library, ethnographical and natural history collections. Its site is that formerly occupied by the terminus of the Schleswig-Holstein railways, but a handsome central station lying somewhat farther to the N., connected with Hamburg by an elevated railway, now accommodates all the traffic and provides through communication with the main Prussian railway systems. There are also fine municipal and judicial buildings, a theatre (under the same management as the Stadttheater in Hamburg), a gymnasium, technical schools, a school of navigation and a hospital. In respect of its local industries Altona has manufactures of tobacco and cigars, of machinery, woollens, cottons and chemicals. There are also extensive breweries, tanneries and soap and oil works. Altona carries on an extensive maritime trade with Great Britain, France and America, but it has by no means succeeded in depriving Hamburg of its commercial superiority — indeed, so dependent is it upon its rival that most of its business is transacted on the Hamburg exchange, while the magnificent warehouses on the Altona river bank are to a large extent occupied by the goods of Hamburg merchants. Since 1888, when Altona joined the imperial Zollverein, approximately half a million sterling has been spent upon harbour improvement works. The exports and imports resemble those of Hamburg. In the ten years 1871-1880, the port was entered on an average annually by 737 vessels of 67,735 tons, in 1881-1890 by 608 vessels of 154,713 tons, and in 1891-1898 by 839 vessels of 253,384 tons.

In 1890 the populous suburbs of Ottensen to the W., where the poet Gottlieb Klopstock lies buried, Bahrenfeld, Othmarschen and Ovelgonne were incorporated. Without these suburbs the growth of the town may be seen from the following figures: — (1864, when it ceased to he Danish) 53,039; (1880) 91,049; (1885) 104,717; (1890) together with the four suburbs, 143,249; (1895) 148,944; (1900) 161,508; (1905) 168,301. Altona is the headquarters of the IX. German army corps.

The name Altona is said to be derived from allzu-nah (“all too near”), the Hamburgers’ designation for an inn which in the middle of the 16th century lay too close to their territory. For a long time this was the only house in the locality. When in 1640 Altona passed to Denmark it was a small fishing village. Its rise to its present position is mainly due to the fostering care of the Danish kings who conferred certain customs privileges and exemptions upon it with a view to making it a formidable rival to Hamburg. In 1713 it was burnt by the Swedes, but rapidly recovered from this disaster, and despite the trials of the Napoleonic wars, gradually increased in prosperity. In 1853, owing to the withdrawal by Denmark of its customs privileges, its trade waned. In 1864 Altona was occupied in the name of the German Confederation, passed to Prussia after the war of 1866, and 1888 together with Hamburg joined the Zollverein, while retaining certain free trade rights over the Freihafengebiet which it shares with Hamburg and Wandsbek.

See Wichmann, Geschichte Altonas (2 vols., Alt., 1896); Ehrenberg & Stahl, Altonas topographische Entwickelung (Alt., 1894).

ALTOONA, a city of Blair county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., about 117 m. E. by N. of Pittsburg. Pop. (1890) 30,337; (1900) 38,973, of whom 3301 were foreign-born, 1518 being German; (1010) 52,127. It lies in the upper end of Logan Valley at the base or the Alleghany mountains, about 1180 ft. above sea-level, and Commands views of some of the most picturesque mountain scenery in the state. A short distance to the W. is the famous Horseshoe Bend of the Pennsylvania

railway. Altoona is served by the Pennsylvania railway, and is one of the leading railway cities in the United States. Its freight yard is 7 m. long, and has 221 m. of tracks. Large numbers of eastbound coal trains from the mountains and westbound “empties” returning to the mines stop here; and the cars of these trains are classified here and new trains made up. Locomotives and cars are sent to Altoona to be repaired from all over the Pennsylvania railway system E. of Pittsburg, and cars and locomotives are built here; and in the south Altoona foundries car wheels and general castings for locomotives and cars are made. The several departments of railway work are used to give training in a sort of railway university. Graduates of technical schools are received as special apprentices and are directed in a course of four years through the erecting shops, vice shop, blacksmith shop, boiler shop, roundhouse, test department, machine shop, air-brake shop, iron foundry, car shop, work of firing on the road, office work in the motive power accounting department, and drawing room; the most competent may be admitted through the grades of inspector, in the office of the master mechanic or of the road foreman of engines, assistant master mechanic, assistant engineer of motive power, master mechanic and superintendent of motive power. The Pennsylvania railway, co-operating with the public school authorities, established at Altoona, in 1907, a railway high school, the first institution of the kind in the country. It has a well-equipped drawing room, carpenter shop, forging room, foundry, science laboratories and machinery department, in which expert instruction is given. In 1905 the city’s factory products were valued at $14,349,963, and in this year the railway shops gave employment to 83.7% of all wage-earners employed in manufacturing establishments. The manufacture of silk is the only other important industry in the city. The site of the city (formerly farming land) was purchased in 1849 by the Pennsylvania Railroad Company and was laid out as a town. It was incorporated as a borough in 1854 and was chartered as a city in 1868.

ALTO-RELIEVO (Ital. for “high relief”), the term applied to sculpture that projects from the plane to which it is attached to the extent of more than one-half the outline of the principal figures, which may be nearly or in parts entirely detached from the background. It is thus distinguished from basso-relievo (q.v.), in which there is a greater or less approximation in effect to the pictorial method, the figures being made to appear as projecting more than half their outline without actually doing so. At the same time it is not only the actual degree of relief which is implied by these two terms, but a resultant difference also of design and treatment necessitated by the contingent differences of light and shadow. (See RELIEF and SCULPTURE.)

ALTOTTING, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Bavaria, On the Morren, not far from its junction with the Inn, and on the Mulildorf-Burghausen railway. Pop. (1900) 4344. It has long been a place of pilgrimage to which Roman Catholics, especially from Austria, Bavaria and Swabia resort in large numbers, on account of a celebrated image of the Virgin Mary in the Holy Chapel, which also contains the hearts of some Bavarian princes in silver caskets. In the church of St Peter and St Paul is the tomb of Tilly.

ALTRANSTADT, a village of Germany, in Prussian Saxony near Merseburg (q.v.), with (1900) 813 inhabitants. Altranstadt is famous in history for two treaties concluded here: (1) the peace which Augustus II., king of Poland and elector of Saxony, was forced to ratify, on the 24th of September 1706, with Charles XII. of Sweden, whereby the former renounced the throne of Poland in favour of Stanislaus Leszczynski — a treaty which Augustus declared null and void after Charles XII.’s defeat at Poltava (8th of July 1709); (2) the treaty of the 31st of August 1707, by which the emperor Joseph I. guaranteed to Charles XII. religious tolerance and liberty of conscience for the Silesian protestants.

ALTRINCHAM, or ALTRINOHAM (and so pronounced), a market-town, in the Altrincham padiamentary division of Cheshire England, 8 m. S.W. by S. of Manchester, on the London & North-Western, Manchester, South Junction & Altrincham and Cheshire Lines railways. Pop. of urban district (1901) 16,831. Many residences in the locality are occupied by those whose business lies in Manchester, who are attracted by the healthy climate and the vicinity of Bowdon Downs and Dunham Massey Woods. Market gardening is carried on, large quantities of fruit and flowers being grown for sale in Manchester. Cabinet-making is also practised; and there are sawmills, iron foundries, and manufactures of cotton, yarn and worsted.

Altrincham (Aldringham) was originally included in the barony of Dunham Massey, one of the eight baronies founded by Hugh, earl of Chester, after the Conquest. An undated charter from Hamo de Massey, lord of the barony, in the reign of Edward I., constituted Altrincham a free borough, with a gild merchant, the customs of Macclesfield, the right to elect reeves and bailiffs for the common council and other privileges. In 1290 the same Hamo obtained a grant of a Tuesday market and a three days’ fair at the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin; but in 1319, by a charter from Edward II., the date of the fair was changed to the feast of St James the Apostle. A mayor of Altrincham is mentioned by name in 1452, but the office probably existed long before this date; it has now for centuries been a purely nominal appointment, the chief duty consisting in the opening of the annual fairs. The trade in worsted and woollen yarns, which formerly furnished employment to a large section of the population, has now completely declined, partly owing to the introduction of Irish worsted.

See Victoria County History, Cheshire; Alfred Ingham, History of Altrincham and Bowdon (Altrincham, 1879).

ALTRUISM (Fr. autrui, from Lat. alter, the other of two), a philosophical term used in ethics for that theory of conduct which regards the good of others as the end of moral action. It was invented by Auguste Comte and adopted by the English positivists as a convenient antithesis to egoism. According to Comte the only practical method of social regeneration is gradually to inculcate the true social feeling which subordinates itself to the welfare of others. The application to sociological problems of the physical theory of organic evolution further developed the altruistic theory. According to Herbert Spencer, the life of the individual in the perfect society is identical with that of the state: in other words, the first object of him who would live well must be to take his part in promoting the well-being of his fellows individually and collectively. Pure egoism and pure altruism are alike impracticable. For on the one hand unless the egoist’s happiness is compatible to some extent with that of his fellows, their opposition will almost inevitably vitiate his perfect enjoyment; on the other hand, the altruist whose primary object is the good of others, must derive his own highest happiness — i.e. must realize himself most completely — in the fulfilment of this object. In fact, the altruistic idea, in itself and apart from a further definition of the good, is rather a method than an end.

The self-love theory of Hobbes, with its subtle perversions of the motives of ordinary humanity, led to a reaction which culminated in the utilitarianism of Bentham and the two Mills; but their theory, though superior to the extravagant egoism of Hobbes, had this main defect, according to Herbert Spencer, that it conceived the world as an aggregate of units, and was so far individualistic. Sir Leslie Stephen in his Science of Ethics insisted that the unit is the social organism, and therefore that the aim of moralists is not the “greatest happiness of the greatest number,” but rather the “health of the organism.” The socialistic tendencies of subsequent thinkers have emphasized the ethical importance of altruistic action, but it must be remembered always that it is ultimately only a form of action, that it may be commended in all types of ethical theory, and that it is a practical guide only when it is applied in accordance with a definite theory of “the good.” Finally, he who devotes himself on principle to furthering the good of others as his highest moral obligation is from the highest point of view realizing, not sacrificing, himself.

See works of Comte, Spencer, Stephen, and text-books of ethics (cf. bibliography at end of article ETHICS).

ALTWASSER, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Silesia, 43 m. by rail S.W. from Breslau, and 3 m. N. from Waldenburg. It has factories for glass, porcelain, machinery, cotton-spinning, iron-foundries and coal-mines. Pop. (1900) 12,144.

ALTYN-TAGH, or ASTYN-TAOH, one of the chief constituent ranges of the Kuen-lun (q.v.) in Central Asia, separating Tibet from east Turkestan and the Desert of Gobi.

ALUM, in chemistry, a term given to the crystallized double sulphates of the typical formula M2SO4.M2111.(SO4)324H2O, Where M is the sign of an alkali metal (potassium, sodium, rubidium, caesium), silver or ammonium, and M111 denotes one of the trivalent metals, aluminium, chromium or ferric iron. These salts are employed in dyeing and various other industrial processes. They are soluble in water, have an astringent, acid, and sweetish taste, react acid to litmus, and crystallize in regular octahedra. When heated they liquefy; and if the heating be continued, the water of crystallization is driven off, the salt froths and swells, and at last an amorphous powder remains.

Potash alum is the common alum of commerce, although both soda alum and ammonium alum are manufactured. The presence of sulphuric acid in potash alum was known to the alchemists. J. H. Pott and A. S. Marggraf demonstrated that alumina was another constituent. Pott in his Lithogeognosia showed that the precipitate obtained when an alkali is poured into a solution of alum is quite different from lime and chalk, with which it had been confounded by G. E. Stahl. Marggraf showed that alumina is one of the constituents of alum, but that this earth possesses peculiar properties, and is one of the ingredients in common clay (Experiences faites sur la terre de l’alun, Marggraf’s Opusc. ii. 111) . He also showed that crystals of alum cannot be obtained by dissolving alumina in sulphuric acid and evaporating the solutions, but when a solution of potash or ammonia is dropped into this liquid, it immediately deposits perfect crystals of alum (Sur la regeneration de l’alun, Marggraf’s Opusc. ii. 86).

T. O. Bergman also observed that the addition of potash or ammonia made the solution of alumina in sulphuric acid crystallize, but that the same effect was not produced by the addition of soda or of lime (De confectione aluminus, Bergman’s Opusc. i. 225), and that potassium sulphate is frequently found in alum.

After M. H. Klaproth had discovered the presence of potassium in leucite and lepidolite, it occurred to L. N. Vauquelin that it was probably an ingredient likewise in many other minerals. Knowing that alum cannot be obtained in crystals without the addition of potash, he began to suspect that this alkali constituted an essential ingredient in the salt, and in 1797 he published a dissertation demonstrating that alum is a double salt, composed of sulphuric acid, alumina and potash (Annales de chimie, xxii. 258). Soon after, J. A. Chaptal published the analysis of four different kinds of alum, namely, Roman alum, Levant alum, British alum and alum manufactured by himself. This analysis led to the same result as that of Vauquelin (Ann. de chim xxii. 280).

The word alumen, which we translate alum, occurs in Pliny’s Natural History. In the 15th chapter of his 35th book he gives a detailed description of it. By comparing this with the account of stupteria given by Dioscorides in the 123rd chapter of his 5th book, it is obvious that the two are identical. Pliny informs us that alumen was found naturally in the earth. He calls it salsugoterrae. Different substances were distinguished by the name of ”alumen”; but they were all characterized by a certain degree of astringency, and were all employed in dyeing and medicine, the light-coloured alumen being useful in brilliant dyes, the dark-coloured only in dyeing black or very dark colours. One species was a liquid, which was apt to be adulterated; but when pure it had the property of blackening when added to pomegranate juice. This property seems to characterize a solution of iron sulphate in water; a solution of ordinary (potash) alum would possess no such property. Pliny says that there is another kind of alum which the Greeks call schistos. It forms in white threads upon the surface of certain stones. From the name schistos, and the mode of formation, there can be little doubt that this species was the salt which forms spontaneously on certain slaty minerals, as alum slate and bituminous shale, and which consists chiefly of sulphates of iron and aluminium. Possibly in certain places the iron sulphate may have been nearly wanting, and then the salt would be white, and would answer, as Pliny says it did, for dyeing bright colours. Several other species of alumen are described by Pliny, but we are unable to make out to what minerals he alludes.

The alumen of the ancients, then, was not the same with the alum of the moderns. It was most commonly an iron sulphate, sometimes probably an aluminium sulphate, and usually a mixture of the two. But the ancients were unacquainted with our alum. They were acquainted with a crystallized iron sulphate, and distinguished it by the names of misy, sory, chalcanthum (Pliny xxxiv. 12). As alum and green vitriol were applied to a variety of substances in common, and as both are distinguished by a sweetish and astringent taste, writers, even after the discovery of alum, do not seem to have discriminated the two salts accurately from each other. In the writings of the alchemists we find the words misy, sory, chalcanthum applied to alum as well as to iron sulphate; and the name atramentum sutorium, which ought to belong, one would suppose, exclusively to green vitriol, applied indifferently to both. Various minerals are employed in the manufacture of alum, the most important being alunite (q.v.) or alum-stone, alum schist, bauxite and cryolite.

In order to obtain alum from alunite, it is calcined and then exposed to the action of air for a considerable time. During this exposure it is kept continually moistened with water, so that it ultimately falls to a very fine powder. This powder is then lixiviated with hot water, the liquor decanted, and the alum allowed to crystallize. The alum schists employed in the manufacture of alum are mixtures of iron pyrites, aluminium silicate and various bituminous substances, and are found in upper Bavaria, Bohemia, Belgium and Scotland. These are either roasted or exposed to the weathering action of the air. In the roasting process, sulphuric acid is formed and acts on the clay to form aluminium sulphate, a similar condition of affairs being produced during weathering. The mass is now systematically extracted with water, and a solution of aluminium sulphate of specific gravity 1.16 is prepared. This solution is allowed to stand for some time (in order that any calcium sulphate and basic ferric sulphate may separate), and is then evaporated until ferrous sulphate crystallizes on cooling; it is then drawn off and evaporated until it attains a specific gravity of 1.40. It is now allowed to stand for some time, decanted from any sediment, and finally mixed with the calculated quantity of potassium sulphate (or if ammonium alum is required, with ammonium sulphate), well agitated, and the alum is thrown down as a finely-divided precipitate of alum meal. If much iron should be present in the shale then it is preferable to use potassium chloride in place of potassium sulphate.

In the preparation of alum from clays or from bauxite, the material is gently calcined, then mixed with sulphuric acid and heated gradually to boiling; it is allowed to stand for some time, the clear solution drawn off and mixed with acid potassium sulphate and allowed to crystallize. When cryolite is used for the preparation of alum, it is mixed with calcium carbonate and heated. By this means, sodium aluminate is formed; it is then extracted with water and precipitated either by sodium bicarbonate or by passing a current of carbon dioxide through the solution. The precipitate is then dissolved in sulphuric acid, the requisite amount of potassium sulphate added and the solution allowed to crystallize.

Potash alum, K2SO4.Al2(SO4)3.24H2O, crystallizes in regular

octahedra and is very soluble in water. The solution redens litmus and is an astringent. When heated to nearly a red heat it gives a porous friable mass which is known as “burnt alum.” It fuses at 92 deg. C. in its own water of crystallization. “Neutral alum” is obtained by the addition of as much sodium carbonate to a solution of alum as will begin to cause the separation of alumina; it is much used in mordanting. Alum finds application as a mordant, in the preparation of lakes for sizing hand-made paper and in the clarifying of turbid liquids.

Sodium alum, Na2SO4.Al2(SO4)3.24H2O, occurs in nature as the mineral mendozite. It is very soluble in water, and is extremely difficult to purify. In the preparation of this salt, it is preferable to mix the component solutions in the cold, and to evaporate them at a temperature not exceeding 60 deg. C. 100 parts of water dissolve 110 parts of sodium alum at 0 deg. C. (W. A. Tilden, Jour. Chem. Soc., 1884, 45, p. 409), and 51 parts at 16 deg. C. (E. Auge, Comptes rendus, 1890, 110, p. 1139).

Chrome alum, K2SO4.Cr2(SO 4/0)3.24H2O, appears chiefly as a by-product in the manufacture of alizarin, and as a product of the reaction in bichromate batteries.

The solubility of the various alums in water varies greatly, sodium alum being readily soluble in water, whilst caesium and rubidium alums are only sparingly soluble. The various solubilities are shown in the following table: –

Ammonium Alum. Caesium Alum. Potash Alum. Rubidium Alum. t deg. C. 100 parts t deg. C. 100 parts t deg. C. 100 parts t deg. C. 100 parts water water water water dissolve dissolve dissolve dissolve 0 2.62 0 0.19 0 3.9 0 0.71 10 4.5 10 0.29 10 9.52 10 1.09 50 15.9 50 1.235 50 44.11 50 4.98 80 35.2 80 5.29 80 134.47 80 21.60 100 70.83 100 357.48 Poggiale C. Setterberg Poggiale C. Setterberg Ann. Chim. phys. Ann. 1882, [3] 8, p. 467 211, p. 104

ALUMINIUM (symbol Al; atomic weight 27.0), a metallic chemical element. Although never met with in the free state, aluminium is very widely distributed in combination, principally as silicates. The word is derived from the Lat. alumen (see ALUM), and is probably akin to the Gr. als (the root of salt, halogen, &c.). In 1722 F. Hoffmann announced the base of alum to be an individual substance; L. B. Guyton de Morveau suggested that this base should be called alumine, after Sel alumineux, the French name for alum; and about 1820 the word was changed into alumina. In 1760 the French chemist, T. Baron de Henouville, unsuccessfully attempted “to reduce the base of alum” to a metal, and shortly afterwards various other investigators essayed the problem in vain. In 1808 Sir Humphry Davy, fresh from the electrolytic isolation of potassium and sodium, attempted to decompose alumina by heating it with potash in a platinum crucible and submitting the mixture to a current of electricity; in 1809, with a more powerful battery, he raised iron wire to a red heat in contact with alumina, and obtained distinct evidence of the production of an iron-aluminium alloy. Naming the new metal in anticipation of its actual birth, he called it alumium; but for the sake of analogy he was soon persuaded to change the word to aluminum, in which form, alternately with aluminium, it occurs in chemical literature for some thirty years.

Preparation.

In the year 1824, endeavouring to prepare itbychemicalmeans, H. C. Oersted heated its chloride with potassium amalgam, and failed in his object simply by reason of the mercury, so that when F. Wohler repeated the experiment at Gottingen in 1827, employing potassium alone as the reducing agent, he obtained it in the metallic state for the first time. Contaminated as it was with potassium and with platinum from the crucible, the metal formed a grey powder and was far from pure; but in 1845 he improved his process and succeeded in producing metallic globules wherewith he examined its chief properties, and prepared several compounds hitherto unknown. Early in 1854, H. St Claire Deville, accidentally and in ignorance of Wohler’s later results, imitated the 1845 experiment. At once observing the reduction of the chloride, he realized the importance of his discovery and immediately began to study the commercial production of the metal. His attention was at first divided between two processes — the chemical method of reducing the chloride with potassium, and an electrolytic method of decomposing it with a carbon anode and a platinum cathode, which was simultaneously imagined by himself and R. Bunsen. Both schemes appeared practically impossible; potassium cost about L. 17 per lb, gave a very small yield and was dangerous to manipulate, while on the other hand, the only source of electric current then available was the primary battery, and zinc as a store of industrial energy was utterly out of the question. Deville accordingly returned to pure chemistry and invented a practicable method of preparing sodium which, having a lower atomic weight than potassium, reduced a larger proportion. He next devised a plan for manufacturing pure alumina from the natural ores, and finally elaborated a process and plant which held the field for almost thirty years. Only the discovery of dynamo-electric machines and their application to metallurgical processes rendered it possible for E. H. and A. H. Cowles to remove the industry from the hands of chemists, till the time when P. T. L. Heroult and C. M. Hall, by devising the electrolytic method now in use, inaugurated the present era of industrial electrolysis.

Ores.

The chief natural compounds of aluminium are four in number: oxide, hydroxide (hydrated oxide), silicate and fluoride. Corundum, the only important native oxide (Al2O3), occurs in large deposits in southern India and the United States. Although it contains a higher percentage of metal (52.9%) than any other natural compound, it is not at present employed as an ore, not only because it is so hard as to be crushed with difficulty, but also because its very hardness makes it valuable as an abrasive. Cryolite (AlF3.5NaF) is a double fluoride of aluminium and sodium, which is scarcely known except on the west coast of Greenland. Formerly it was used for the preparation of the metal, but the inaccessibility of its source, and the fact that it is not sufficiently pure to be employed without some preliminary treatment, caused it to be abandoned in favour of other salts. When required in the Heroult-Hall process as a solvent, it is sometimes made artificially. Aluminium silicate is the chemical body of which all clays are nominally composed. Haolin or China clay is essentially a pure disilicate (Al2O3.2SiO2.2H2O), occurring in large beds almost throughout the world, and containing in its anhydrous state 24.4% of the metal, which, however, in common clays is more or less replaced by calcium, magnesium, and the alkalis, the proportion of silica sometimes reaching 70%. Kaolin thus seems to be the best ore, and it would undoubtedly be used were it not for the fatal objection that no satisfactory process has yet been discovered for preparing pure alumina from any mineral silicate. If, according to the present method of winning the metal, a bath containing silica as well as alumina is submitted to electrolysis, both oxides are dissociated, and as silicon is a very undesirable impurity, an alumina contaminated with silica is not suited for reduction. Bauxite is a hydrated oxide of aluminium of the ideal composition, Al2O3.2H2O. It is a somewhat widely distributed mineral, being met within Styria, Austria, Hesse, French Guiana, India and Italy; but the most important beds are in the south of France, the north of Ireland, and in Alabama, Georgia and Arkansas in North America. The chief Irish deposits are in the neighbourhood of Glenravel, Co. Antrim, and have the advantage of being near the coast, so that the alumina can be transported by water-carriage. After being dried at 100 deg. C., Antrim bauxite contains from 33 to 60% of alumina, from 2 to 30% of ferric oxide, and from 7 to 24% of silica, the balance being titanic acid and water of combination. The American bauxites contain from 38 to 67% of alumina, from 1 to 23% of ferric oxide, and from 1 to 32% of silica. The French bauxites are of fairly constant composition, containing usually from 58 to 70% of alumina, 3 to 15% of foreign matter, and 27% made

up of silica, iron oxide and water in proportions that vary with the colour and the situation of the beds.

Before the application of electricity, only two compounds were found suitable for reduction to the metallic state. Alumina itself is so refractory that it cannot be melted save by the oxyhydrogen blowpipe or the electric arc, and except in the molten state it is not susceptible of decomposition by any chemical reagent. Deville first selected the chloride as his raw material, but observing it to be volatile and extremely deliquescent, he soon substituted in its place a double chloride of aluminium and sodium. Early in 1855 John Percy suggested that cryolite should be more convenient, as it was a natural mineral and might not require purification, and at the end of March in that year, Faraday exhibited before the Royal Institution samples of the metal reduced from its fluoride by Dick and Smith. H. Rose also carried out experiments on the decomposition of cryolite, and expressed an opinion that it was the best of all compounds for reduction; but, finding the yield of metal to be low, receiving a report of the difficulties experienced in mining the ore, and fearing to cripple his new industry by basing it upon the employment of a mineral of such uncertain supply, Deville decided to keep to his chlorides. With the advent of the dynamo, the position of affairs was wholly changed. The first successful idea of using electricity depended on the enormous heating powers of the arc. The infusibility of alumina was no longer prohibitive, for the molten oxide is easily reduced by carbon. Nevertheless, it was found impracticable to smelt alumina electrically except in presence of copper, so that the Cowles furnace yielded, not the pure metal, but an alloy. So long as the metal was principally regarded as a necessary ingredient of aluminium-bronze, the Cowles process was popular, but when the advantages of aluminium itself became more apparent, there arose a fresh demand for some chief method of obtaining it unalloyed. It was soon discovered that the faculty of inducing dissociation possessed by the current might now be utilized with some hope of pecuniary success, but as electrolytic currents are of lower voltage than those required in electric furnaces, molten alumina again became impossible. Many metals, of which copper, silver and nickel are types, can be readily won or purified by the electrolysis of aqueous solutions, and theoretically it may be feasible to treat aluminium in an identical manner. In practice, however, it cannot be thrown down electrolytically with a dissimilar anode so as to win the metal, and certain difficulties are still met with in the analogous operation of plating by means of a similar anode. Of the simple compounds, only the fluoride is amenable to electrolysis in the fused state, since the chloride begins to volatilize below its melting-point, and the latter is only 5 deg. below its boiling-point. Cryolite is not a safe body to electrolyse, because the minimum voltage needed to break up the aluminium fluoride is 4.0, whereas the sodium fluoride requires only 4.7 volts; if, therefore, the current rises in tension, the alkali is reduced, and the final product consists of an alloy with sodium. The corresponding double chloride is a far better material; first, because it melts at about 180 deg. C., and does not volatilize below a red heat, and second, because the voltage of aluminium chloride is 2.3 and that of sodium chloride 4.3, so that there is a much wider margin of safety to cover irregularities in the electric pressure. It has been found, however, that molten cryolite and the analogous double fluoride represented by the formula Al2F6.2NaF are very efficient solvents of alumina, and that these solutions can be easily electrolysed at about 800 deg. C. by means of a current that completely decomposes the oxide but leaves the haloid salts unaffected. Molten cryolite dissolves roughly 30% of its weight of pure alumina, so that when ready for treatment the solution contains about the same proportion of what may be termed “available” aluminium as does the fused double chloride of aluminium and sodium. The advantages lie with the oxide because of its easier preparation. Alumina dissolves readily enough in aqueous hydrochloric acid to yield a solution of the chloride, but neither this solution, nor that containing sodium chloride, can be evaporated to dryness without decomposition. To obtain the anhydrous single or double chloride, alumina must be ignited with carbon in a current of chlorine, and to exclude iron from the finished metal, either the alumina must be pure or the chloride be submitted to purification. This preparation of a chlorine compound suited for electrolysis becomes more costly and more troublesome than that of the oxide, and in addition four times as much raw material must be handled.

At different times propositions have been made to win the metal from its sulphide. This compound possesses a heat of formation so much lower that electrically it needs but a voltage of 0.9 to decompose it, and it is easily soluble in the fused sulphides of the alkali metals. It can also be reduced metallurgically by the action of molten iron. Various considerations, however, tend to show that there cannot be so much advantage in employing it as would appear at first sight. As it is easier to reduce than any other compound, so it is more difficult to produce. Therefore while less energy is absorbed in its final reduction, more is needed in its initial preparation, and it is questionable whether the economy possible in the second stage would not be neutralized by the greater cost of the first stage in the whole operation of winning the metal from bauxite with the sulphide as the intermediary.

Chemical reductions.

The Deville process as gradually elaborated between 1855 and 1859 exhibited three distinct phases: — Production of metallic sodium, formation of the pure double chloride of sodium and aluminium, and preparation of the metal by the interaction of the two former substances. To produce the alkali metal, a calcined mixture of sodium carbonate, coal and chalk was strongly ignited in flat retorts made of boiler-plate; the sodium distilled over into condensers and was preserved under heavy petroleum. In order to prepare pure alumina, bauxite and sodium carbonate were heated in a furnace until the reaction was complete; the product was then extracted with water to dissolve the sodium aluminate, the solution treated with carbon dioxide, and the precipitate removed and dried. This purified oxide, mixed with sodium chloride and coal tar, was carbonized at a red heat, and ignited in a current of dry chlorine as long as vapours of the double chloride were given off, these being condensed in suitable chambers. For the production of the final aluminium, 100 parts of the chloride and 45 parts of cryolite to serve as a flux were powdered together and mixed with 35 parts of sodium cut into small pieces. The whole was thrown in several portions on to the hearth of a furnace previously heated to low redness and was stirred at intervals for three hours. At length when the furnace was tapped a white slag was drawn off from the top, and the liquid metal beneath was received into a ladle and poured into cast-iron moulds. The process was worked out by Deville in his laboratory at the Ecole Normale in Paris. Early in 1855 he conducted large-scale experiments at Javel in a factory lent him for the purpose, where he produced sufficient to show at the French Exhibition of 1855. In the spring of 1856 a complete plant was erected at La Glaciere, a suburb of Paris, but becoming a nuisance to the neighbours, it was removed to Nanterre in the following year. Later it was again transferred to Salindres, where the manufacture was continued by Messrs. Pechiney till the advent of the present electrolytic process rendered it no longer profitable.

When Deville quitted the Javel works, two brothers C. and A. Tissier, formerly his assistants, who had devised an improved sodium furnace and had acquired a thorough knowledge of their leader’s experiments, also left, and erected a factory at Amfreville, near Rouen, to work the cryolite process. It consisted simply in reducing cryolite with metallic sodium exactly as in Deville’s chloride method, and it was claimed to possess various mythical advantages over its rival. Two grave disadvantages were soon obvious — the limited supply of ore, and, what was even more serious, the large proportion of silicon in the reduced metal. The Amfreville works existed some eight or ten years, but achieved no permanent prosperity. In 1858 or 1859 a small factory, the first in England, was built by F. W. Gerhard at Battersea, who also employed cryolite, made his own sodium, and was able to sell the product at 3s. 9d. per oz. This enterprise

only lasted about four years. Between 1860 and 1874 Messrs Bell Brothers manufactured the metal at Washington, near Newcastle, under Deville’s supervision, producing nearly 2 cwt. per year. They took part in the International Exhibition of 1862, quoting a price of 40s. per lb troy.

In 1881 J. Webster patented an improved process for making alumina, and the following year he organized the Aluminium Crown Metal Co. of Hollywood to exploit it in conjunction with Deville’s method of reduction. Potash-alum and pitch were calcined together, and the mass was treated with hydrochloric acid; charcoal and water to form a paste were next added, and the whole was dried and ignited in a current of air and steam. The residue, consisting of alumina and potassium sulphate, was leached with water to separate the insoluble matter which was dried as usual. All the by-products, potassium sulphate, sulphur and aluminate of iron, were capable of recovery, and were claimed to reduce the cost of the oxide materially. From this alumina the double chloride was prepared in essentially the same manner as practised at Salindres, but sundry economies accrued in the process, owing to the larger scale of working and to the adoption of W. Weldon’s method of regenerating the spent chlorine liquors. In 1886 H. Y. Castner’s sodium patents appeared, and The Aluminium Co. of Oldbury was promoted to combine the advantages of Webster’s alumina and Castner’s sodium. Castner had long been interested in aluminium, and was desirous of lowering its price. Seeing that sodium was the only possible reducing agent, he set himself to cheapen its cost, and deliberately rejecting sodium carbonate for the more expensive sodium hydroxide (caustic soda), and replacing carbon by a mixture of iron and carbon — the so-called carbide of iron — he invented the highly scientific method of winning the alkali metal which has remained in existence almost to the present day. In 1872 sodium prepared by Deville’s process cost about 4s. per lb, the greater part of the expense being due to the constant failure of the retorts; in 1887 Castner’s sodium cost less than 1s. per lb, for his cast-iron pots survived 125 distillations.

In the same year L. Grabau patented a method of reducing the simple fluoride of aluminium with sodium, and his process was operated at Trotha in Germany. It was distinguished by the unusual purity of the metal obtained, some of his samples containing 99.5 to 99.8%. In 1888 the Alliance Aluminium Co., organized to work certain patents for winning the metal from cryolite by means of sodium, erected plant in London, Hebburn and Wallsend, and by 1889 were selling the metal at 11s. to 15s. per lb. The Aluminium Company’s price in 1888 was 20s. per lb and the output about 250 lb per day. In 1889 the price was 16s., but by 1891 the electricians commenced to offer metal at 4s. per lb, and aluminium reduced with sodium became a thing of the past.

Electric reduction.

About 1879 dynamos began to be introduced into metallurgical practice, and from that date onwards numerous schemes for utilizing this cleaner source of energy were brought before the public. The first electrical method worthy of notice is that patented by E. H. and A. H. Cowles in 1885, which was worked both at Lockport, New York, U.S.A., and at Milton, Staffordshire. The furnace consisted of a flat, rectangular, firebrick box, packed with a layer of finely-powdered charcoal 2 in. thick. Through stuffing-boxes at the ends passed the two electrodes, made after the fashion of arc-light carbons, and capable of being approached together according to the requirements of the operation. The central space of the furnace was filled with a mixture of corundum, coarsely-powdered charcoal and copper; and an iron lid lined with firebrick was luted in its place to exclude air. The charge was reduced by means of a 50-volt current from a 300-kilowatt dynamo, which was passed through the furnace for 1 1/2 hours till decomposition was complete. About 100 lb of bronze, containing from 15 to 20 lb of aluminium, were obtained from each run, the yield of the alloy being reported at about 1 lb per 18 e.h.p.-hours. The composition of the alloys thus produced could not be predetermined with exactitude; each batch was therefore analysed, a number of them were bulked together or mixed with copper in the necessary proportion, and melted in crucibles to give merchantable bronzes containing between 1 1/4 and 10% of aluminium. Although the copper took no part in the reaction, its employment was found indispensable, as otherwise the aluminium partly volatilized, and partly combined with the carbon to form a carbide. It was also necessary to give the fine charcoal a thin coating of calcium oxide by soaking it in lime-water, for the temperature was so high that unless it was thus protected it was gradually converted into graphite, losing its insulating power and diffusing the current through the lining and walls of the furnace. That this process did not depend upon electrolysis, but was simply an instance of electrical smelting or the decomposition of an oxide by means of carbon at the temperature of the electric arc, is shown by the fact that the Cowles furnace would work with an alternating current.

In 1883 R. Cratzel patented a useless electrolytic process with fused cryolite or the double chloride as the raw material, and in 1886 Dr E. Kleiner propounded a cryolite method which was worked for a time by the Aluminium Syndicate at Tyldesley near Manchester, but was abandoned in 1890. In 1887 A. Minet took out patents for electrolysing a mixture of sodium chloride with aluminium fluoride, or with natural or artificial cryolite. The operation was continuous, the metal being regularly run off from the bottom of the bath, while fresh alumina and flouride were added as required. The process exhibited several disadvantages, the electrolyte had to be kept constant in composition lest either fluorine vapours should be evolved or sodium thrown down, and the raw materials had accordingly to be prepared in a pure state. After prolonged experiments in a factory owned by Messrs Bernard Freres at St Michel in Savoy, Minet’s process was given up, and at the close of the 19th century the Heroult-Hall method was alone being employed in the manufacture of aluminium throughout the world.

The original Deville process for obtaining pure alumina from bauxite was greatly simplified in 1889 by K. T. Bayer, whose improved process is exploited at Larne in Ireland and at Gardanne in France. New works on the same process have recently been erected near Marseilles. Crude bauxite is ground, lightly calcined to destroy organic matter, and agitated under a pressure of 70 or 80 lb per sq. in. with a solution of sodium hydroxide having the specific gravity 1.45. After two or three hours the liquid is diluted till its density falls to 1.23, when it is passed through filter-presses to remove the insoluble ferric oxide and silica. The solution of sodium aluminate, containing aluminium oxide and sodium oxide in the molecular proportion of 6 to 1, is next agitated for thirty-six hours with a small quantity of hydrated alumina previously obtained, which causes the liquor to decompose, and some 70% of the aluminium hydroxide to be thrown down. The filtrate, now containing roughly two molecules of alumina to one of soda, is concentrated to the original gravity of 1.45, and employed instead of fresh caustic for the attack of more bauxite; the precipitate is then collected, washed till free from soda, dried and ignited at about 1000 deg. C. to convert it into a crystalline oxide which is less hygroscopic than the former amorphous variety.

The process of manufacture which now remains to be described was patented during 1886 and 1887 in the name of C. M. Hall in America, in that of P. T. L. Heroult in England and France. It would be idle to discuss to whom the credit of first imagining the method rightfully belongs, for probably this is only one of the many occasions when new ideas have been born in several brains at the same time. By 1888 Hall was at work on a commercial scale at Pittsburg, reducing German alumina; in 1891 the plant was removed to New Kensington for economy in fuel, and was gradually enlarged to 1500 h.p.; in 1894 a factory driven by water was erected at Niagara Falls, and subsequently works were established at Shawenegan in Canada and at Massena in the United States. In 1890 also the Hall process operated by steam power was installed at Patricroft, Lancashire, where the plant had a capacity of 300 lb per day, but by 1894 the turbines of the Swiss and French works ruined the enterprise. About 1897 the Bernard factory at St Michel passed into the hands of

Messrs Pechiney, the machinery soon being increased, and there, under the control of a firm that has been concerned in the industry almost from its inception, aluminium is being manufactured by the Hall process on a large scale. In July 1888 the Societe Metallurgique Suisse erected plant driven by a 500 h.p. turbine to carry out Heroult’s alloy process, and at the end of that year the Allgemeine Elektricitats Gesellschaft united with the Swiss firm in organizing the Aluminium Industrie Action Gesellschaft of Neuhasen, which has factories in Switzedand, Germany and Austria. The Societe Electrometallurgique Francaise, started under the direction of Heroult in 1888 for the production of aluminium in France, began operations on a small scale at Froges in Isere; but soon after large works were erected in Savoy at La Praz, near Modane, and in 1905 another large factory was started in Savoy at St Michel. In 1895 the British Aluminium Company was founded to mine bauxite and manufacture alumina in Ireland, to prepare the necessary electrodes at Greenock, to reduce the aluminium by the aid of water-power at the Falls of Foyers, and to refine and work up the metal into marketable shapes at the old Milton factory of the Cowles Syndicate, remodelled to suit modern requirements. In 1905 this company began works for the utilization of another water-power at Loch Leven.

In 1907 a new company, The Aluminium Corporation, was started in England to carry out the production of the metal by the Heroult process, and new factories were constructed near Conway in North Wales and at Wallsend-on-Tyne, quite close to where, twenty years before, the Alliance Aluminium Co. had their works.

The Heroult cell consists of a square iron or steel box lined with carbon rammed and baked into a solid mass; at the bottom is a cast-iron plate connected with the negative pole of the dynamo, but the actual working cathode is undoubtedly the layer of already reduced and molten metal that lies in the bath. The anode is formed of a bundle of carbon rods suspended from overhead so as to be capable of vertical adjustment. The cell is filled up with cryolite, and the current is turned on till this is melted; then the pure powdered alumina is fed in continuously as long as the operation proceeds. The current is supplied at a tension of 3 to 5 volts per cell, passing through 10 or 12 in series; and it performs two distinct functions: — (1) it overcomes the chemical affinity of the aluminium oxide, (2) it overcomes the resistance of the electrolyte, heating the liquid at the same time. As a part of the voltage is consumed in the latter duty, only the residue can be converted into chemical work, and as the theoretical voltage of the aluminium fluoride in the cryolite is 4.0, provided the bath is kept properly supplied with alumina, the fluorides are not attacked. It follows, therefore, except for mechanical losses, that one charge of cryolite lasts indefinitely, that the sodium and other impurities in it are not liable to contaminate the product, and that only the alumina itself need be carefully purified. The operation is essentially a dissociation of alumina into aluminium, which collects at the cathode, and into oxygen, which combines with the anodes to form carbon monoxide, the latter escaping and being burnt to carbon dioxide outside. Theoretically 36 parts by weight of carbon are oxidized in the production of 54 parts of aluminium; practically the anodes waste at the same rate at which metal is deposited. The current density is about 700 amperes per sq. ft. of cathode surface, and the number of rods in the anode is such that each delivers 6 or 7 amperes per sq. in. of cross-sectional area. The working temperature lies between 750 deg. and 850 deg. C., and the actual yield is 1 lb of metal per 12 e.h.p. hours. The bath is heated internally with the current rather than by means of external fuel, because this arrangement permits the vessel itself to be kept comparatively cool; if it were fired from without, it would be hotter than the electrolyte, and no material suitable for the construction of the cell is competent to withstand the attack of nascent aluminium at high temperatures. Aluminium is so light that it is a matter requiring some ingenuity to select a convenient solvent through which it shall sink quickly, for if it does not sink, it short-circuits the electrolyte. The molten metal has a specific gravity of 2.54, that of molten cryolite saturated with alumina is 2.35, and that of the fluoride Al2F6.2NaF saturated with alumina 1.97. The latter therefore appears the better material, and was originally preferred by Hall; cryolite, however, dissolves more alumina, and has been finally adooted by both inventors.

Properties.

Aluminium is a white metal with a characteristic tint which most nearly resembles that of tin; when impure, or after prolonged exposure to air it has a slight violet shade. Its atomic weight is 27 (26.77, H=I, according to J. Thomson). It is trivalent. The specific gravity of cast metal is 2.583, and of rolled 2.688 at 4 deg. C. It melts at 626 deg. C. (freezing point 654.5 deg. , Heycock and Neville). It is the third most malleable and sixth most ductile metal, yielding sheets 0.000025 in. in thickness, and wires 0.004 in. in diameter. When quite pure it is somewhat harder than tin, and its hardness is considerably increased by rolling. It is not magnetic. It stands near the positive end of the list of elements arranged in electromotive series, being exceeded only by the alkalis and metals of the alkaline earths; it therefore combines eagerly, under suitable conditions, with oxygen and chlorine. Its coefficient of linear expansion by heat is 0.0000222 (Richards) or 0.0000231 (Roberts Austen) per 1 deg. C. Its mean specific heat between 0 deg. and 100 deg. is 0.227, and its latent heat of fusion 100 calories (Richards). Only silver, copper and gold surpass it as conductors of heat, its value being 31.33 (Ag= 100, Roberts-Austen). Its electrical conductivity, determined on 99.6% metal, is 60.5% that of cooper for equal volumes, or double that of copper for equal weights, and when chemically pure it exhibits a somewhat higher relative efficiency. The average strength of 98% metal is approximately shown by the following table:–

Elastic limit, Ultimate strength, Reduction tons per sq. in. tons per sq. in. of Area % Cast . . . 3 7 15 Sheet . . . 5 1/2 11 35 Bars . . . 6 1/2 12 40 Wire . . . 7-13 13-29 60

Weight for weight, therefore, aluminium is only exceeded in tensile strength by the best cast steel, and its own alloy, aluminium bronze. An absolutely clean surface becomes tarnished in damp air, an almost invisible coating of oxide being produced, just as happens with zinc; but this film is very permanent and prevents further attack. Exposure to air and rain also causes slight corrosion, but to nothing like the same extent as occurs with iron, copper or brass. Commercial electrolytic aluminium of the best quality contains as the average of a large number of tests, 0.48% of silicon and 0.46% of iron, the residue being essentially aluminium itself. The metal in mass is not affected by hot or cold water, the foil is very slowly oxidized, while the amalgam decomposes rapidly. Sulphuretted hydrogen having no action upon it, articles made of it are not blackened in foggy weather or in rooms where crude coal gas is burnt. To inorganic acids, except hydrochloric, it is highly resistant, ranking well with tin in this respect; but alkalis dissolve it quickly. Organic acids such as vinegar, common salt, the natural ingredients of food, and the various extraneous substances used as food preservatives, alone or mixed together, dissolve traces of it if boiled for any length of time in a chemically clean vessel; but when aluminium utensils are submitted to the ordinary routine of the kitchen, being used to heat or cook milk, coffee, vegetables, meat and even fruit, and are also cleaned frequently in the usual fashion, no appreciable quantity of metal passes into the food. Moreover, did it do so, the action upon the human system would be infinitely less harmful than similar doses of copper or of lead.

The highly electro-positive character of aluminium is most important. At elevated temperatures the metal decomposes nearly all other metallic oxides, wherefore it is most serviceable as a metallurgical reagent. In the casting of iron, steel and brass, the addition of a trifling proportion (0.005%) removes oxide and renders the molten metal more fluid, causing the

finished products to be more homogeneous, free from blow-holes and solid all through. On the other hand, its electro-positive nature necessitates some care in its utilization. If it be exposed to damp, to sea-water or to corrosive influences of any kind in contact with another metal, or if it be mixed with another metal so as to form an alloy which is not a true chemical compound, the other metal being highly negative to it, powerful galvanic action will be set up and the structure will quickly deteriorate. This explains the failure of boats built of commercially pure aluminium which have been put together with iron or copper rivets, and the decay of other boats built of a light alloy, in which the alloying metal (copper) has been injudiciously chosen. It also explains why aluminium is so difficult to join with low-temperature solders, for these mostly contain a large proportion of lead. This disadvantage, however, is often overestimated since in most cases other means of uniting two pieces are available.

Alloys.

The metal produces an enormous number of useful alloys, some of which, containing only 1 or 2% of other metals, combine the lightness of aluminium itself with far greater hardness and strength. Some with 90 to 99% of other metals exhibit the general properties of those metals conspicuously improved. Among the heavy alloys, the aluminium bronzes (Cu, 90-97.5%; Al, 10-2.5%) occupy the most important position, showing mean tensile strengths increasing from 20 to 41 tons per sq. in. as the percentage of aluminium rises, and all strongly resisting corrosion in air or sea-water. The light copper alloys, in which the proportions just given are practically reversed, are of considerably less utility, for although they are fairly strong, they lack power to resist galvanic action. This subject is far from being exhausted, and it is not improbable that the alloy-producing capacity of aluminium may eventually prove its most valuable characteristic. In the meantime, ternary light alloys appear the most satisfactory, and tungsten and copper, or tungsten and nickel, seem to be the best substances to add.

Uses.

The uses of aluminium are too numerous to mention. Probably the widest field is still in the purification of iron and steel. To the general public it appeals most strongly as a material for constructing cooking utensils. It is not brittle like porcelain and cast iron, not poisonous like lead-glazed earthenware and untinned copper, needs no enamel to chip off, does not rust and wear out like cheap tin-plate, and weighs but a fraction of other substances. It is largely replacing brass and copper in all departments of industry — especially where dead weight has to be moved about, and lightness is synonymous with economy — for instance, in bed-plates for torpedo-boat engines, internal fittings for ships instead of wood, complete boats for portage, motor-car parts and boiling-pans for confectionery and in chemical works. The British Admiralty employ it to save weight in the Navy, and the war-offices of the European powers equip their soldiers with it wherever possible, As a substitute for Solenhofen stone it is used in a modified form of lithography, which can be performed on rotary printing machines at a high speed. With the increasing price of copper, it is coming into vogue as an electrical conductor for uncovered mains; it is found that an aluminium wire 0.126 in. in diameter will carry as much current as a copper wire 0.100 in. in diameter, while the former weighs about 79 lb and the latter 162 lb per mile. Assuming the materials to be of equal tensile strength per unit of area — hard-drawn copper is stronger, but has a lower conductivity — the adoption of aluminium thus leads to a reduction of 52% in the weight, a gain of 60% in the strength, and an increase of 26% in the diameter of the conductor. Bare aluminium strip has recently been tried for winding-coils in electrical machines, the oxide of the metal acting as insulators between the layers. When the price of aluminium is less than double the price of copper aluminium is cheaper than copper per unit of electric current conveyed; but when insulation is necessary, the smaller size of the copper wire renders it more economical. Aluminium conductors have been employed on heavy work in many places, and for telegraphy and telephony they are in frequent demand and give perfect satisfaction. Difficulties were at first encountered in making the necessary joints, but these have been overcome by practice and experience.

Two points connected with this metal are of sufficient moment to demand a few words by way of conclusion. Its extraordinary lightness forms its chief claim to general adoption, yet is apt to cause mistakes when its price is mentioned. It is the weight of a mass of metal which governs its financial value; its industrial value, in the vast majority of cases, depends on the volume of that mass. Provided it be rigid, the bed-plate of an engine is no better for weighing 30 cwt. than for weighing 10 cwt. A saucepan is required to have a certain diameter and a certain depth in order that it may hold a certain bulk of liquid: its weight is merely an encumbrance. Copper being 3 1/3 times as heavy as aluminium, whenever the latter costs less than 3 1/2 times as much as copper it is actually cheaper. It must be remembered, too, that electrolytic aluminium only became known during the last decade of the 19th century. Samples dating from the old sodium days are still in existence, and when they exhibit unpleasant properties the defect is often ascribed to the metal instead of to the process by which it was won. Much has yet to be learnt about the practical qualities of the electrolytic product, and although every day’s experience serves to place the metal in a firmer industrial position, a final verdict can only be passed after the lapse of time. The individual and collective influence of the several impurities which occur in the product of the Heroult cell is still to seek, and the importance of this inquiry will be seen when we consider that if cast iron, wrought iron and steel, the three totally distinct metals included in the generic name of “iron” — which are only distinguished one from another chemically by minute differences in the proportion of certain non-metallic ingredients — had only been in use for a comparatively few years, attempts might occasionally be made to forge cast iron, or to employ wrought iron in the manufacture of edge-tools. (E. J. R.)

Compounds of Aluminium. Aluminium oxide or alumina, Al2O3, occurs in nature as the mineral corundum (q.v.), notable for its hardness and abrasive power (see EMERY), and in well-crystallized forms it constitutes, when coloured by various metallic oxides, the gem-stones, sapphire, oriental topaz, oriental amethyst and oriental emerald. Alumina is obtained as a white amorphous powder by heating aluminium hydroxide. This powder, provided that it has not been too strongly ignited, is soluble in strong acids; by ignition it becomes denser and nearly as hard as corundum; it fuses in the oxyhydrogen flame or electric arc, and on cooling it assumes a crystalline form closely resembling the mineral species. Crystallized alumina is also obtained by heating the fluoride with boron trioxide; by fusing aluminium phosphate with sodium sulphate; by heating alumina to a dull redness in hydrochloric acid gas under pressure; and by heating alumina with lead oxide to a bright red heat. These reactions are of special interest, for they culminate in the production of artificial ruby and sapphire (see GEMS, ARTIFICIAL).

Aluminium Hydrates. — Several hydrated forms of aluminium oxide are known. Of these hydrargillite or gibbsite, Al(OH)3, diaspore, AlO(OH), and bauxite, Al2O(OH)4, occur in the mineral kingdom. Aluminium hydrate, Al(OH)3, is obtained as a gelatinous white precipitate, soluble in potassium or sodium hydrate, but insoluble in ammonium chloride, by adding ammonia to a cold solution of an aluminium salt; from boiling solutions the precipitate is opaque. By drying at ordinary temperatures, the hydrate Al(OH)3.H2O is obtained; at 300 deg. this yields AlO(OH), which on ignition gives alumina, Al2O3. Precipitated aluminium hydrate finds considerable application in dyeing. Soluble modifications were obtained by Waiter Crum (Journ. Chem. Soc., 1854, vi. 216), and Thomas Graham (Phil. Trans., 1861, p. 163); the first named decomposing aluminium acetate from lead acetate and aluminium sulphate) with boiling water, the latter dialysing a solution of the basic chloride (obtained by dissolving the hydroxide in a solution of the normal chloride).

Both these soluble hydrates are readily coagulated by traces of a salt, acid or alkali; Crum’s hydrate does not combine with dye-stuffs, neither is it soluble in excess of acid, while Graham’s compound readily forms lakes, and readily dissolves when coagulated in acids.

In addition to behaving as a basic oxide, aluminium oxide (or hydrate) behaves as an acid oxide towards the strong bases with the formation of aluminates. Potassium aluminate, K2Al2O4, is obtained in solution by dissolving aluminium hydrate in caustic potash; it is also obtained, as crystals containing three molecules of water, by fusing alumina with potash, exhausting with water, and crystallizing the solution in vacuo. Sodium aluminate is obtained in the manufacture of alumina; it is used as a mordant in dyeing, and has other commercial applications. Other aluminates (in particular, of iron and magnesium), are of frequent occurrence in the mineral kingdom, e.g. spinel, gahnite, &c.

Salts of Aluminium. — Aluminium forms one series of salts, derived from the trioxide, Al2O3. These exhibit, in certain cases, marked crystallographical and other analogies with the corresponding salts of chromium and ferric iron.

Aluminium fluoride, AlF3, obtained by dissolving the metal in hydrofluoric acid, and subliming the residue in a current of hydrogen, forms transparent, very obtuse rhombohedra, which are insoluble in water. It forms a series of double fluorides, the most important of which is cryolite (q.v.); this mineral has been applied to the commercial preparation of the metal (see above). Aluminium chloride, AlCl3, was first prepared by Oersted, who heated a mixture of carbon and alumina in a current of chlorine, a method subsequently improved by Wohler, Bunsen, Deville and others. A purer product is obtained by heating aluminium turnings in a current of dry chlorine, when the chloride distils over. So obtained, it is a white crystalline solid, which slowly sublimes just below its melting point (194 deg. ). Its vapour density at temperatures above 750 deg. corresponds to the formula AlCl3; below this point the molecules are associated. It is very hygroscopic, absorbing water with the evolution of hydrochloric acid. It combines with ammonia to form AlCl3.3NH3; and forms double compounds with phosphorus pentachloride, phosphorus oxychloride, selenium and tellurium chlorides, as well as with many metallic chlorides; sodium aluminium chloride, AlCl3.NaCl, is used in the production of the metal. As a synthetical agent in organic chemistry, aluminium chloride has rendered possible more reactions than any other substance; here we can only mention the classic syntheses of benzene homologues. Aluminium bromide, AlBr3, is prepared in the same manner as the chloride. It forms colourless crystals, melting at 90 deg. , and boiling at 265 deg. -270 deg. . Aluminium iodide, AlI3, results from the interaction of iodine and aluminium. It forms colourless crystals, melting at 185 deg. , and boiling at 360 deg. . Aluminium sulphide, Al2S3, results from the direct union of the metal with sulphur, or when carbon disulphide vapour is passed over strongly heated alumina. It forms a yellow fusible mass, which is decomposed by water into alumina and sulphuretted hydrogen. Aluminium sulphate Al(SO4)3, occurs in the mineral kingdom as keramohalite, Al2(SO4)3.18H2O, found near volcanoes and in alum-shale; aluminite or websterite is a basic salt, Al3(SO4)(OH)4.7H2O. Aluminium sulphate, known commercially as “concentrated alum” or “sulphate of alumina,” is manufactured from kaolin or china clay, which, after roasting (in order to oxidize any iron present), is heated with sulphuric acid, the clear solution run off, and evaporated. “Alum cake” is an impure product. Aluminium sulphate crystallizes as Al2(SO4)3.18H2O in tablets belonging to the monoclinic system. It has a sweet astringent taste, very soluble in water, but scarcely soluble in alcohol. On heating, the crystals lose water, swell up, and give the anhydrous sulphate, which, on further heating, gives alumina. It forms double salts with the sulphates of the metals of the alkalis, known as the alums (see ALUM.)

Aluminium nitride (AlN) is obtained as small yellow crystals when aluminium is strongly heated in nitrogen. The nitrate, Al(NO3)3, is obtained as deliquescent crystals (with 8H2O) by evaporating a solution of the hydroxide in nitric acid. Aluminium phosphates may be prepared by Precipitating a soluble aluminium salt with sodium phosphate. Wavellite Al8(PO4)3(OH)15.9H2O, is a naturally occurring basic phosphate, while the gem-stone turquoise (q.v.) is Al.(PO4).(OH)2.H2O, coloured by traces of copper. Aluminium silicates are widely diffused in the mineral kingdom, being present in the commonest rock-forming minerals (felspars, &c.), and in the gem-stones, topaz, beryl, garnet, &c. It also constitutes with sodium silicate the mineral lapis-lazuli and the pigment ultramarine (q.v..) Forming the basis of all clays, aluminium silicates play a prominent part in the manufacture of pottery and porcelain.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. — The metallurgy and uses of aluminium are treated in detail in P. Moissonnier, L’Aluminium (Paris, 1903); in J. W. Richards, Aluminium (1896); and in A. Miner, Production of Aluminium, Eng. trans. by L. Waldo (1905); reference may also be made to treatises on general metallurgy, e.g. C. Schnabel, Handbook of Metalurgy, vol. ii. (1907). For the chemistry see Roscoe and Schlorlemmer, Treatise on Inorganic Chemistry, vol. ii. (1908); H. Moissan, Traite de chimie minerale; Abegg, Handbuch der anorgenischen Chemie; and O. Dammer, Handbuch der anorganischen Chemie. Aluminium alloys have been studied in detail by Guillet.

ALUNITE, or ALUMSTONE, a mineral first observed in the 15th century at Tolfa, near Rome, where it is mined for the manufacture of alum. Extensive deposits are also worked in Tuscany and Hungary, and at Bulladelah in New South Wales. By repeatedly roasting and lixiviating the mineral, alum is obtained in solution, and this is crystallized out by evaporation. Alunite occurs as seams in trachytic and allied volcanic rocks, having been formed by the action of sulphureous vapours on these rocks. The white, finely granular masses somewhat resemble limestone in appearance, and the more compact kinds from Hungary are so hard and tough that they are used for millstones. Distinct crystals of alunite are rarely met with in cavities in the massive material; these are rhombohedra with interfacial angles of 90 deg. 50′, so that they resemble cubes in. appearance. Minute glistening crystals have also been found loose in cavities in altered rhyolite. The hardness is 4 and the specific gravity 2.6. The mineral is a hydrated basic aluminium and potassium sulphate, KAl3(SO4)2(OH)6. It is insoluble in water, but soluble in sulphuric acid. First called aluminilite by J. C. Delametherie in 1797, this name was contracted by F. S. Beudant in 1824 to alunite. (L. J. S.)

ALUR (Lur, Luri, Lurem), a Negro people of the Nile valley, living on the north-west coast of Albert Nyanza. They are akin to the Acholi (q.v.), speaking practically the same language.

ALURE (O. Fr., from aller, to walk), an architectural term for an alley, passage, the water-way or flat gutter behind a parapet, the galleries of a clerestory, sometimes even the aisle itself of a church. The term is sometimes written valure or valoring.

ALVA, or ALBA, FERNANDO ALVAREX DE TOLEDO, DUKE OF, (1508-1583), Spanish soldier, descended from one of the most illustrious families in Spain, was born in 1508. His grandfather, Ferdinand of Toledo, educated him in military science and politics; and he was engaged with distinction at the battle of Pavia while still a youth. Selected for a military command by Charles V., he took part in the siege of Tunis (1535), and successfully defended Perpignan against the dauphin of France. He was present at the battle of Muhlberg (1547), and the victory gained there over John of Saxony was due mainly to his exertions. He took part in the subsequent siege of Wittenberg, and presided at the court-martial which tried the elector and condemned him to death. In 1552 Alva was intrusted with the command of the army intended to invade France, and was engaged for several months in an unsuccessful siege of Metz. In consequence of the success of the French arms in Piedmont, he was made commander-in-chief of all the emperor’s forces in Italy, and at the same time invested with unlimited power. Success did not, however, attend his first attempts, and after several unfortunate attacks he was obliged to retire into winter quarters. After the

abdication of Charles he was continued in the command by Philip II., who, however, restrained him from extreme measures. Alva had subdued the whole Campagna and was at the gates of Rome, when he was compelled by Philip’s orders to negotiate a peace. One of its terms was that the duke of Alva should in person ask forgiveness of the haughty pontiff whom he had conquered. Proud as the duke was by nature, and accustomed to treat with persons of the highest dignity, he confessed his voice failed him at the interview and his presence of mind forsook him. Not long after this (1559) he was sent at the head of a splendid embassy to Paris to espouse, in the name of his master, Elizabeth, daughter of Henry, king of France. In 1567, Philip, who was a bigoted Catholic, sent Alva into the Netherlands at the head of an army of 10,000 men, with unlimited powers for the extirpation of heretics. When he arrived he soon showed how much he merited the confidence which his master reposed in him, and instantly erected a tribunal which soon became known to its victims as the “Court of Blood,” to try all persons who had been engaged in the late commotions which the civil and religious tyranny of Philip had excited. He imprisoned the counts Egmont and Horn, the two popular leaders of the Protestants, brought them to an unjust trial and condemned them to death. In a short time he totally annihilated every privilege of the people, and with unrelenting cruelty put multitudes of them to death. The executioner was employed in removing all those friends of freedom whom the sword had spared. In most of the considerable towns Alva built citadels. In the city of Antwerp he erected a statue of himself, which was a monument no less of his vanity than of his tyranny: he was figured trampling on the necks of two smaller statues, representing the two estates of the Low Countries. His attempt to raise money by imposing the Spanish alcabala, a tax of 5% on all sales, aroused the opposition of the Catholic Netherlands themselves. The exiles from the Low Countries, encouraged by the general resistance to his government, fitted out a fleet of privateers, and after strengthening themselves by successful depredations, ventured upon the bold exploit of seizing the town of Brielle. Thus Alva by his cruelty became the unwitting instrument of the future independence of the seven Dutch provinces. The fleet of the exiles, having met the Spanish fleet, totally defeated it, and reduced North Holland and Mons. Many cities hastened to throw off the yoke; while the states-general, assembling at Dordrecht, openly declared against Alva’s government, and marshalled under the banners of the prince of Orange. Alva’s preparations to oppose the gathering storm were made with his usual vigour, and he succeeded in recovering Mons, Mechlin and Zutphen, under the conduct of his son Frederick. With the exception of Zealand and Holland, he regained all the provinces; and at last his son stormed Naarden, and massacring its inhabitants, proceeded to invest the city of Haarlem, which, after standing an obstinate siege, was taken and pillaged. Their next attack was upon Alkmaar; but the spirit of desperate resistance was raised to such a height in the breasts of the Hollanders that the Spanish veterans were repulsed with great loss and Frederick constrained reluctantly to retire. Alva’s feeble state of health and continued disasters induced him to solicit his recall from the government of the Low Countries; a measure which, in all probability, was not displeasing to Philip, who was now resolved to make trial of a milder administration. In December 1573 the much-oppressed country was relieved from the presence of the duke of Alva, who, returning home accompanied by his son, made the infamous boast that during the course of six years, besides the multitudes destroyed in battle and massacred after victory, he had consigned 18,000 persons to the executioner.

On his return he was treated for some time with great distinction by Philip. A tardy and imperfect justice, however, overtook him, when he was banished from court and confined in the castle of Uzeda for complicity in certain disgraceful conduct of his son. Here he had remained two years, when the success of Don Antonio in assuming the crown of Portugal determined Philip to turn his eyes towards Alva as the person in whose fidelity and abilities he could most confide. A secretary was instantly despatched to Alva to ascertain whether his health was sufficiently vigorous to enable him to undertake the command of an army. The aged chief returned an answer full of loyal zeal, and was immediately appointed to the supreme command in Portugal. It is a striking fact, however, that the liberation and elevation of Alva were not followed by forgiveness. In 1581 Alva entered Portugal, defeated Antonio, drove him from the kingdom, and soon reduced the whole under the subjection of Philip. Entering Lisbon he seized an immense treasure, and suffered his soldiers, with their accustomed violence and rapacity, to sack the suburbs and vicinity. It is reported that Alva, being requested to give an account of the money expended on that occasion, sternly replied, “If the king asks me for an account, I will make him a statement of kingdoms preserved or conquered, of signal victories, of successful sieges and of sixty years’ service.” Philip deemed it proper to make no further inquiries. Alva, however, did not enjoy the honours and rewards of his last expedition, for he died in January 1583 at the age of 74.

AUTHORITIES. — See the Life, by Rustant (Madrid, 1751). His correspondence during his Flemish government has been published by M. Gachard (Brussels, 1850). See also Coleccion de documentos ineditos para la historial de Espana, vols. iv., vii., viii., xiv., xaxii. and xxxv. (Madrid); and Motley’s Rise of the Dutch Republic (1856).

ALVA, a police burgh of Clackmannanshire, Scotland, 3 1/2 m. N. of Alloa, terminus of a branch line of the North British railway. Pop. (1891) 5225; (1901) 4624. It is situated at the foot of three front peaks of the Ochils — West Hill (1682 ft.), Middle Hill (1436 ft.) and Wood Hill (1723 ft.). There are spinning-mills, and manufactures of tweeds, tartans and other woollen goods. Silver, lead and other metals have been found in the hills, but not in paying quantities. The glen to the east of the town, in which are abandoned workings, is called the Silver Glen. Alva House is the seat of the Johnstones, a family which has been intimately connected with the district since the latter half of the 18th century.

ALVARADO, PEDRO DE (1495-1541), one of the Spanish leaders in the discovery and conquest of America, was born at Badajoz about 1495. He held a command in the expedition sent from Cuba against Yucatan in the spring of 1518, and returned in a few months, bearing reports of the wealth and splendour of Montezuma’s empire. In February 1519 he accompanied Hernando Cortes in the expedition for the conquest of Mexico, being appointed to the command of one of the eleven vessels of the fleet. He acted as Cortes’s principal officer, and on the first occupation of the city of Mexico was left there in charge. When the Spaniards had temporarily to retire before the Mexican uprising, Alvarado led the rear-guard (1st of July 1520), and the Salto de Alvarado — a long leap with the use of his spear, by which he saved his life — became famous. He was engaged (1523-24) in the conquest of Guatemala, of which he was subsequently appointed governor by Charles V. In 1534 he attempted to bring the province of Quito under his power, but had to content himself with the exaction of a pecuniary indemnity for the expenses of the expedition. During a visit to Spain, three years later, he had the governorship of Honduras conferred upon him in addition to that of Guatemala. He died in Guatemala in 1541.

ALVAREZ, FRANCISCO (c. 1465-1541?), Portuguese missionary and explorer, was born at Coimbra. He was a chaplain- priest and almoner to Dom Manuel, king of Portugal, and was sent in 1515 as secretary to Duarte Galvao and Rodrigo da Lima on an embassy to the negus of Abyssinia (Lebna Dengel Dawit (David) II.). The expedition having been delayed by the way, it was not until 152O that he reached Abyssinia, where he remained six years, returning to Lisbon in 1526-1527. In 1533 he was sent to Rome on an embassy to Pope Clement VII. The precise date of his death, like that of his birth, is unknown, but it must have been later than 1540, in which year he published at Lisbon under the king’s patronage an account of his travels in one volume folio, entitled Yerdadera Informacam das terras do Preste Joam. This curious work was translated into Italian (G. B. Ramusio, Navagationi, vol. i., Venice, 1550); into

Spanish (Historia de las Cosas de Etiopia, by Fray Thomas de Padilla, Antwerp, 1557); into French (Historiale Description de l’Ethiopie, Christ. Plantin, Antwerp, 1558); into German (Wahrhaftiger Bericht von … Ethiopien, Eisieben, 1566); into English (Sam. Purchas, Pilgrimes, part ii., London, 1625). The information it contains must, however, be received with caution, as the author is prone to exaggerate, and does not confine himself to what came within his own observation.

ALVAREZ, DON JOSE (1768-1827), Spanish sculptor, was born at Priego, in the province of Cordova, in 1768. His full name was Jose Alvarez de Pereira y Cubero. Bred to his father’s trade of a stone-mason, he devoted all his spare time to drawing and modelling. His education in art was due partly to the teaching of the French sculptor Verdiguier at Cordova, and partly to lessons at Madrid, where he attended the lectures of the academy of San Fernando. In 1799 he obtained from Charles IV. a pension of 12,000 reals to enable him to visit Paris and Rome. In the former city he executed in 1804 a statue of Ganymede, which placed him at once in the front rank of the sculptors of his time, and which is now in the sculpture gallery of the Prado. Shortly afterwards his pension was more than doubled, and he left Paris for Rome, where he remained till within a year of his death. He had married in Paris Elizabeth Bougel, by whom he had a son in 1805. This son, known as Don Jose Alvarez y Bougel, also distinguished himself as a sculptor and a painter, but he died at Burgos before he had reached the age of twenty-five, a little more than two years after his father’s death in Madrid in 1827. One of the most successful works of the elder Alvarez was a group representing Antilochus and Memnon, which was commissioned in marble (1818) by Ferdinand VII., and secured for the artist the appointment of court-sculptor. It is now in the museum of Madrid. He also modelled a few portrait busts (Ferdinand VII., Rossini, the duchess of Alba), which are remarkable for their vigour and fidelity.

ALVAREZ, DON MANUEL (1727–1797), Spanish sculptor, was born at Salamanca. He followed classical models so closely that he was styled by his countrymen El Griego, “The Greek.” His works, which are very numerous, are chiefly to be found at Madrid.

ALVARY, MAX (1858-1898), German singer, was born at Dusseldorf. Gifted with a fine tenor voice and handsome presence he speedily made a reputation in Germany in the leading roles in Wagnerian opera, and from 1885 onwards appeared also in America and England. He was at his best in 1892, when his performances as Tristan and Siegfried at Covent Garden aroused great enthusiasm.

ALVEARY (from the Lat. alvearium), a beehive; used, like apiarium in the same sense, figuratively for a collection of hard-working people, or a scholarly work (e.g. dictionary) involving bee-like industry. By analogy the term is used for the hollow of the ear, where the wax collects.

ALVENSLEBEN, CONSTANTIN VON (1809-1892), Prussian general, was born on the 26th of August 1809 at Eichenbarleben in Prussian Saxony, and entered the Prussian guards from the cadet corps in 1827. He became first lieutenant in 1842, captain in 1849, and major on the Great General Staff in 1853, whence after seven years he went to the Ministry of War. He was soon afterwards promoted colonel, and commanded a regiment of Guard infantry up to 1864, when he became a major-general. In this rank he commanded a brigade of guards in the war of 1866. At the action of Soor (Burkersdorf) on the 28th of June he distinguished himself very greatly, and at Koniggratz, where he led the advanced guard of the Guard corps, his energy and initiative were still more conspicuous. Soon afterwards he succeeded to the command of his division, General Hiller v. Gartringen having fallen in the battle; he was promoted lieutenant-general, and retained this command after the conclusion of peace, receiving in addition the order pour le merite for his services. In 1870, on the outbreak of war with France, von Alvensleben succeeded Prince Frederick Charles in command of the III army corps which formed part of the II German Army commanded by the prince. Under their new general, the Brandenburg regiments forming the III corps proved themselves collectively the best in the whole German army, with the possible exception of the Prussian guards, and, if Prince Frederick Charles is entitled to the chief credit in training the III corps, Alvensleben had contributed in almost equal degree to the efficiency of the Guard infantry, while his actual leadership of the III corps in the battles of 1870 and 1871 showed him afresh as a fighting general of the very first rank. The battle of Spicheren, on the 6th of August, was initiated and practically directed throughout by him, and in the confusion which followed this victory, for which the superior commanders were not prepared, Alvensleben showed his energy and determination by resuming the advance on his own responsibility. This led to the great battles of the 14th, 16th and 18th of August around Metz, and again the III corps was destined, under its resolute leader, to win the chief credit. Crossing the Moselle the instant that he received permission from his army commander to do so, Alvensleben struck the flank of Bazaine’s whole army (August 16th) in movement westward from Metz. The III corps attacked at once, and for many hours bore the whole brunt of the battle at Vionville. By the most resolute leading, and at the cost of very heavy losses, Alvensleben held the whole French army at bay while other corps of the I and II German Armies gradually closed up. In the battle of Gravelotte, on the 18th, the corps took little part. Its work was done, and it remained with the II Army before Metz until the surrender of Bazaine’s army. Prince Frederick Charles then moved south-west to co-operate with the grand-duke of Mecklenburg on the Loire. At the battle of Beaune-la-Rolande, the corps, with its comrades of Vionville, the X corps under General v. Voigts-Rhetz, won new laurels, and it participated in the advance on Le Mans and the battle at that place on the 12th of January 1871. At the close of the war Alvensleben received the oak-leaves of the order pour le merite, the first class of the Iron Cross and a grant of 100,000 thalers. He became full general of infantry in 1873 and retired immediately afterwards. In 1889 the emperor William II. ordered that the 52nd infantry regiment (one of the distinguished regiments of Vionville) should thereafter bear Alvensleben’s name, and in 1892, on the anniversary of the battle of Le Mans, the old general received the order of the Black Eagle. He died on the 28th of March 1892 at Berlin.

His brother, GUSTAV VON ALVENSLEBEN (1803-1881), Prussian general of infantry, was born at Eichenbarleben on the 30th of September 1803, entered the Guard infantry in 1821, and took part as a general staff officer in the suppression of the Baden insurrection of 1849. He became a major-general in 1858, aide-de-camp to the king in 1861, and lieutenant-general in 1863, and in the campaign of 1866 performed valuable military and political services. He was promoted general of infantry in 1868. In the war of 1870 he commanded the IV army corps, which took a conspicuous part in the action of Beaumont and afterwards served in the siege of Paris. He received the Iron Cross, the order pour le merite, and a money grant, as a reward for his services, and retired in 1872. He died at Gernrode in the Harz on the 30th of June 1881.

Another brother, ALBRECHT, COUNT von ALVENSLEBEN (1794- 1858), was a distinguished Prussian statesman.

ALVEOLATE (from Lat. alveolus), honeycombed, a word used technically in biology, &c., to mean pitted like a honeycomb.

ALVERSTONE, RICHARD EVERARD WEBSTER, IST BARON (1842- ), lord chief justice of England, was born on the 22nd of December 1842, being the second son of Thomas Webster, Q.C. He was educated at King’s College and Charterhouse schools, and Trinity College, Cambridge; was called to the bar in 1868, and became Q.C. only ten years afterwards. His practice was chiefly in commercial, railway and patent cases until (June 1885) he was appointed attorney-general in the Conservative Government in the exceptional circumstances of never having been solicitor-general, and not at the time occupying a seat in parliament. He was elected for Launceston in the following month, and in November exchanged this seat

for the Isle of Wight, which he continued to represent until his elevation to the House of Lords. Except under the brief Gladstone administration of 1886, and the Gladstone-Rosebery cabinet of 1892-1895, Sir Richard Webster was attorney-general from 1885 to 1900. In 1890 he was leading counsel for The Times in the Parnell inquiry; in 1893 he represented Great Britain in the Bering Sea arbitration; in 1898 he discharged the same function in the matter of the boundary between British Guiana and Venezuela; and in 1903 was one of the members of the Alaska Boundary Commission. He was well known as an athlete in his earlier years, having represented his university as a runner, and his interest in cricket and foot-racing was kept up in later life. In the House of Commons, and outside it, he was throughout his political career prominently associated with church work; and his speeches were distinguished for gravity and earnestness. In 1900 he succeeded Sir Nathaniel Lindley as Master of the Rolls, being raised to the peerage as Baron Alverstone, and in October of the same year he was elevated to the office of lord chief justice upon the death of Lord Russell of Killowen.

ALWAR, or ULWAR, a native state of India in the Rajputana agency. It is bounded on the E. by the state of Bharatpur and the British district of Gurgaon, on the N. by Gurgaon district and the state of Patiala, on the W. by the states of Nabha and Jaipur, and on the S. by the state of Jaipur. Its configuration is irregular, the greatest length from north to south being about 80 m., and breadth from east to west about 60 m., with a total area of 3141 sq. m. The eastern portion of the state is open and highly cultivated; the western is diversified by hills and peaks, which form a continuation of the Aravalli range, from 12 to 20 m. in breadth. These hills run in rocky and precipitous parallel ridges, in some places upwards of 2200 ft. in height. The Sabhi river flows through the north-western part of the state, the only other stream of importance being the Ruparel, which rises in the Alwar hills, and flows through the state into the Bharatpur territory. The population in 1901 was 828,487, showing an increase of 8% during the decade. When compared with a heavy decrease elsewhere throughout Rajputana, this increase may be attributed to the successful administration of famine relief, under British officials. The revenue is L. 185,000. The maharaja Jai Singh, who succeeded in 1892 at the age of ten, was educated at the Mayo college, where he excelled both in sports and in knowledge of English. He came of age in 1903, when he was invested by the viceroy with full ruling powers. Alwar was the first native state to accept a currency struck at the Calcutta mint, of the same weight and assay as the imperial rupee, with the head of the British sovereign on the obverse. Imperial service troops are maintained, consisting of both cavalry and infantry, with transport. The state is traversed by the Delhi branch of the Rajputana railway. A settlement of the land revenue has been carried out by an English civilian.

The state was founded by Pratap Singh (1740-1791), a Rajput of ancient lineage, and increased by his adopted son Bakhtawar Singh. The latter joined the British against the Mahrattas, and in 1803, after the battle of Laswari (Nov. 1), signed a treaty of offensive and defensive alliance with the British government. In 1811, owing to his armed intervention in Jaipur, a fresh engagement was made, prohibiting him from political intercourse with other states without British consent. In 1857 the raja Binni Singh sent a force of Mussulmans and Rajputs to relieve the British garrison in Agra; the Mussulmans, however, deserted, and the rest were defeated by the mutineers.

The CITY OF ALWAR has a railway station on the Rajputana line, 98 m. from Delhi; pop. (1901) 56,771, showing a steady increase. It stands in a valley overhung by a fortress 1000 ft. above. It is surrounded by a rampart and moat, with five gates, and contains fine palaces, temples and tombs. The water-supply is brought from a lake 9 m. distant. It has a high school, affiliated to the Allahabad university; and a school for the sons of nobles, founded to commemorate the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Victoria. The Lady Dufferin hospital is under the charge of an English lady doctor, with two female assistants.

ALYATTES, king of Lydia (609-560 B.C.), the real founder of the Lydian empire, was the son of Sadyattes, of the house of the Mermnadae. For several years he continued the war against Miletus begun by his father, but was obliged to turn his attention to the Medes and Babylonians. On the 28th of May 585, during a battle on the Halys between him and Cyaxares, king of Media, an eclipse of the sun took place; hostilities were suspended, peace concluded, and the Halys fixed as the boundary between the two kingdoms. Alyattes drove the Cimmerii (see SCYTIHA) from Asia, subdued the Carians, and took several Ionian cities (Smyrna, Colophon). He was succeeded by his son Croesus. His tomb still exists on the plateau between lake Gygaea and the river Hermus to the north of Sardis — a large mound of earth with a substructure of huge stones. It was excavated by Spiegelthal in 1854, who found that it covered a large vault of finely-cut marble blocks approached by a flat-roofed passage of the same stone from the south. The sarcophagus and its contents had been removed by early plunderers of the tomb, all that was left being some broken alabaster vases, pottery and charcoal. On the summit of the mound were large phalli of stone.

See A. von Olfers, “Uber die lydischen Konigsgraber bei Sardes,” Abh. Berl. Ak., 1858.

ALYPIUS, a Greek writer on music whose works, with those of six others, were collected and published with a commentary and explanatory notes (Antiquae Musicae Auctores Septem, Amstel., 1652), by Mark Meibomius (1630-1711). He is said to have written before Euclid and Ptolemy; and Cassiodorus arranges his Introduction to Music between those of Nicomachus and Gaudentius. The work consists solely of a list of symbols of the various scales and modes, and is probably only a fragment.

ALYPIUS OF ANTIOCH, a geographer of the 4th century, who was sent by the emperor Julian into Britain as first prefect, and was afterwards commissioned to rebuild the temple of Jerusalem. Among the letters of Julian are two (29 and 30) addressed to Alypins; one inviting him to Rome, the other thanking him for a geographical treatise, which no longer exists.

See also Ammianus Marcellinus xxiii. 1, sec. 2.

ALYTES, the midwife toad, first discovered by P. Demours in 1741, on the border of a small pond in the Jardin des Plantes, in the very act of parturition which has rendered it famous, and described as Petit crapaud male accoucheur de sa femelle. Alytes obstetricans is of special interest as the first known example of paternal solicitude in Batrachians, and although many no less wonderful cases of nursing instinct have since been revealed to us, it remains the only one among European forms.

Alytes obstetricans is a small toad-like Batrachian, two inches in length, of dull greyish coloration, plump form with warty skin and large eyes with vertical pupils. Although toad-like it is not really related to the toads proper, but belongs to the family Discoglossidae, characterized by a circular, adherent tongue, teeth in the upper jaw and on the palate, short but distinct ribs on the anterior vertebrae, and convex-concave vertebrae. It inhabits France, Belgium, Switzerland, Western Germany (eastwards to the Weser), Spain and Portugal. A second species, A. cisternasii, occurs in Spain and Portugal.

Alytes is nocturnal and slow in its movements. It is thoroughly terrestrial, selecting for its retreat in the daytime holes made by small mammals, or interstices between stones. Towards evening it reveals its presence by a clear whistling note, which has often been compared to the sound of a little bell, or to a chime when produced by numerous individuals. The breeding season lasts throughout spring and summer, and the female is able to spawn two, three or even four times in the year. Pairing and oviposition take place on land; the male seizes the female round the waist. The eggs are large and yellow, and produced in two rosary-like strings, as if strung together by elastic filaments continuous with the gelatinous capsules. After impregnation, the male twists them round his legs and returns to his usual retreat, going about at night in order to feed himself and to keep up the moisture of the eggs, even resorting to a short immersion in the water during exceptionahy dry nights. The development of the embryo within the egg takes about three weeks. When the time for

eclosion has come, the male enters the water with his burden; the larvae, in the full tadpole condition, measuring 14 to 17 millimetres, bite their way through their tough envelope, which is not abandoned by the father until all the young are liberated, and complete in the ordinary way their metamorphosis. The tadpoles grow to a large size considering that of the adult, the body equalling in size a sparrow’s or even a small pigeon’s egg, and they often remain more than a year in that condition.

See A. de l’Isle, “Memoire sur les moeurs et l’accouchement de l’Alytes obstetricans,” Ann. Sci. Nat. (6) iii. 1876; G. A. Boulenger. Tailless Batrachians of Europe (Ray Society, 1897). (G. A. B.)

ALZEY, a town of Germany, in the grand duchy of Hesse- Darmstadt, 18 m. S. of Mainz by rail. Pop. (1900) 6893. There are a Roman Catholic and two Protestant churches, several high-grade schools and a teachers’ seminary. Alzey has industries of dyeing and weaving, breweries, and does a considerable trade in wine. It is immortalized in the Nibelungenlied in the person of “Volker von Alzeie,” the warrior who in the last part of the epic plays a part second only to that of Hagen, and who “was called the minstrel (spilman) because he could fiddle.” It became an imperial city in 1277. In 1620 it was sacked by the Spaniards and in 1689 burnt by the French. Annexed to France during the Napoleonic wars, it passed in 1815 to the grand-duchy of Hesse-Darmstadt.

ALZOG, JOHANN BAPTIST (1808-1878), German theologian, was born at Ohlau, in Silesia, on the 29th of June 1808. He studied at Breslau and Bonn and was ordained priest at Cologne in 1834. In the following year he accepted the chairs of exegesis and church history at the seminary of Posen. He removed in 1844 to Hildesheim, where he had been appointed rector of the seminary. He became professor of church history at the university of Freiburg in the Breisgau in 1853 and held that post till his death on the 1st of March 1878. Together with Dollinger, Alzog was instrumental in convoking the famous Munich assembly of Catholic scholars in 1863. He also took part, with Bishops Hefele and Haseberg, in the preparatory work of the Vatican Council and voted in favour of the doctrine of papal infallibility but against the opportuneness of its promulgation. Alzog’s fame rests mainly on his Handbuch den Caniversal-Kirchengeschichte (Mainz, 1841, often reprinted under various titles; Eng. trans. by Pabisch and Byrne, A Manual of Church History, 4 vols. Cincinnati, 1874). Based upon the foundations laid by Mohler, this manual was generally accepted as the best exposition of Catholic views, in opposition to the Protestant manual by C. A. Hase, and was translated into several languages. Besides a host of minor writings on ecclesiastical subjects, and an active collaboration in the great Kirchen- lexicon of Wetzer and Welte, Alzog was also the author of Grundriss der Patrologic (Freiburg, 1866, 4th ed. 1888), a scholarly work, though now superseded by that of O. Bardenhewer.

A full list of Alzog’s writings is given in H. Hurter’s Nomenclator titerarius recentioris theologiae catholicae, vol. iii. For an account of his life see the funeral oration by F. X. Kraus, entitled: Gedachtnissrede auf Johannes Alzog (Freiburg, 1879).

AMADIS DE GAULA. This famous romance of chivalry survives only in a Castilian text, but it is claimed by Portugal as well as by Spain. The date of its composition, the name of its author, and the language in which it was originally written are not yet settled. It is not even certain when the romance was first printed, for though the oldest known edition (a unique copy of which is in the British Museum) appeared at Saragossa in 1508, it is highly probable that Amadis was in print before this date: an edition is reported to have been issued at Seville in 1496. As it exists in Spanish, Amadis de Gaula consists of four books, the last of which is generally believed to be by the regidor of Medina del Campo, Garci Rodriguez de Montalvo (whose name is given as Garci Ordonez de Montalvo in all editions of Amadis later than that of 1508, and as Garci Gutierrez de Montalvo in some editions of the Sergas de Esplandian). Montalvo alleges that the first three books were arranged and corrected by him from “the ancient originals,” and a reference in the prologue to the siege of Granada points to the conclusion that the Spanish recast was made shortly after 1492; it is possible, however, that the prologue alone was written after 1492, and that the text itself is older. The number of these “ancient originals” is not stated, nor is there any mention of the language in which they were composed; Montalvo’s silence on the latter point might be taken to imply that they were in Castilian, but any such inference would be hazardous. Three hooks of Areadis de Gaula are mentioned by Pero Ferrus who was living in 1379, and there is evidence that the romance was current in Castile more than a quarter of a century earlier; but again there is no information as to the language in which they were written. Gomes Eannes de Azurara, in his Chronica de Conde D. Pedro de Menezes (c. 1450), states that Amadis de Gaula was written by Vasco de Lobeira in the time of king Ferdinand of Portugal who died in 1383: as Vasco de Lobeira was knighted in 1385, it would follow that he wrote the elaborate romance in his earliest youth. This conclusion is untenable, and the suggestion that the author was Pedro de Loboira (who flourished in the 15th century) involves a glaring anachronism. A further step was taken by the historian Joao de Barros, who maintained in an unpublished work dating between 1540 and 1550 that Vasco de Lobeira wrote Amadis de Gaula in Portuguese, and that his text was translated into Castilian; this is unsupported assertion. Towards the end of the 16th century Miguel Leite Ferreira, son of the Portuguese poet, Antonio Ferreira, declared that the original manuscript of Amadis de Gaula was then in the Aveiro archives, and an Amadis de Gaula in Portuguese, which is alleged to have existed in the conde de Vimeiro’s library as late as 1586, had vanished before 1726. In the absence of corroboration, these dubious details must be received with extreme reserve. A stronger argument in favour of the Portuguese case is drawn from the existing Spanish text. In book I, chapters 40 and 42, it is recorded that the Infante Alphonso of Portugal suggested a radical change in the narrative of Briolanja’s relations with Amadis. This prince has been identified as the Infante Alphonso who died in 1312, or as Alphonso IV. who ascended the Portuguese throne in 1325. Were either of these identifications established, the date of composition might be referred with certainty to the beginning of the 14th century or the end of the 13th. But both identifications are conjectural. Nevertheless the passage in the Spanish text undeniably lends some support to the Portuguese claim, and recent critics have inclined to the belief that Areadis de Gaula was written by Joao de Lobeira, a Galician knight who frequented the Portuguese court between 1258 and 1285, and to whom are ascrihed two fragments of a poem in the Colocci-Brancuti Canzoniere (Nos. 240 and 240b) which reappears with some unimportant variants in Amadis de Gaula (book II, chapter 11). The coincidence may be held to account in some measure for the traditional association of a Lobeira with the authorship of Amadis de Gaula; but, though curious, it warrants no definite conclusion being drawn from it. Against the Portuguese claim it is argued that the Villancico corresponding to Joao de Lobeiro’s poem is an interpolation in the Spanish text, that Portuguese prose was in a rudimentary stage of development at the period when — ex hypothesi — the romance was composed, and that the book was very popular in Spain almost a century before it is even mentioned in Portugal. Lastly, there is the incontrovertible fact that Amidis de Gaula exists in Castilian, while it remains to be proved that it ever existed in Portuguese. As to its substance, it is beyond dispute that much of the text derives from the French romances of the Round Table; but the evidence does not enable us to say (1) whether it was pieced together from various French romances; (2) whether it was more or less literally translated from a lost French original; or (3) whether the first Peninsular adapter or translator was a Castilian or a Portuguese. On these points judgment must be suspended. There can, however, be no hesitation in accepting Cervantes’ verdict on Amadis de Gaula as the “best of all the books of this kind that have ever been written.” It is the prose epic of feudalism, and its romantic spirit, its high ideals, its fantastic gallantry, its ingenious adventures, its mechanism of symbolic wonders, and its flowing style have entranced readers of such various types as Francis I. and Charles V., Ariosto and Montaigne.

BIBLIOGRAPHY. — Carolina Michaelis de Vasconcellos and Gottfried Baist in the Grundriss der romanischen Philologie (Strassburg, 1897 ), ii. Band, 2. Abteiluna, pp. 216-226 and 440-442: Ludwig Braunfels, Kritischer Versuch uber den Roman Annadie von Glallien (Leipzig, 1876); Theophilo Braga, Historia das novelas portuguezas de cavalleria (Porto, 1873), Curso de litteratura e arte portugueza (Lisboa, 1881), and Questoes de litteratura e arte portugueza (Lisboa, 1885); Marcelino Menendez y Pelayo, Origenes de la novela (Madrid, 1905); Eugene Baret, De l,Amadis de Glaule et de son influence sur les moeurs et la litterature au XVIe et au XVIIe siecle (Paris, 1873). (J. F. K.)

AMADOU, a soft tough substance used as tinder, derived from Polyporus fomentarius, a fungus belonging to the group Basidiomycetes and somewhat resembling a mushroom in manner of growth. It grows upon old trees, especially the oak, ash, fir and cherry. The fungus is cut into slices and then steeped in a solution of nitre. Amadou is prepared on the continent of Europe, chiefly in Germany, but the fungus is a native of Britain. Polyporus igniarius and other species are also used, but yield an inferior product.

AMAKUSA, an island belonging to Japan, 26 1/2 m. long and 13 1/2 in extreme width, situated about 32 deg. 20′ N., and 130 deg. E. long., on the west of the province of Higo (island of Kiushiu), from which it is separated by the Yatsushiro-kai. It has no high mountains, but its surface being very hilly — four of the peaks rise to a height over 1500 ft. — the natives resort to the terrace system of cultivation with remarkable success. A number of the heads of the Christians executed in connexion with the Shimabara rebellion in the first half of the 17th century were buried in this island. Amakusa produces a little coal and fine kaolin, which was largely used in former times by the potters of Hirado and Satsuma.

AMAL, the name of the noblest family among the Ostrogoths, and that from which nearly all their kings were chosen.

AMALARIC (d. 531), king of the Visigoths, son of Alaric II., was a child when his father fell in battle against Clovis, king of the Franks (507). He was carried for safety into Spain, which country and Provence were thenceforth ruled by his maternal grandfather, Theodoric the Ostrogoth, acting through his vice- gerent, an Ostrogothic nobleman named Theudis. In 522 the young Amalaric was proclaimed king, and four years later, on Theodoric’s death, he assumed full royal power in Spain and a part of Languedoc, relinquishing Provence to his cousin Athalaric. He married Clotilda, daughter of Clovis; but his disputes with her, he being an Arian and she a Catholic, brought on him the penalty of a Frankish invasion, in which he lost his life in 531.

AMALASUNTHA or AMALASUENTHA, queen of the Ostrogoths (d. 535), daughter of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, was married in 515 to Eutharic, an Ostrogoth of the old Areal line, who had previously been living in Spain. Her husband died, apparently in the early years of her marriage, leaving her with two children, Athalaricand Matasuentha. On the death of her father in 526, she succeeded him, acting as regent for her son, but being herself deeply imbued with the old Roman culture, she gave to that son’s education a more refined and literary turn than suited the ideas of her Gothic subjects. Conscious of her unpopularity she banished, and afterwards put to death, three Gothic nobles whom she suspected of intriguing against her rule, and at the same time opened negotiations with the emperor Justinian with the view of removing herself and the Gothic treasure to Constantinople. Her son’s death in 534 made but little change in the posture of affairs. Amalasuntha, now queen, with a view of strengthening her position, made her cousin Theodahad partner of her throne (not, as sometimes stated, her husband, for his wife was still living). The choice was unfortunate. Theodahad, notwithstanding a varnish of literary culture, was a coward and a scoundrel. He fostered the disaffection of the Goths, and either by his orders or with his permission, Amalasuntha was imprisoned on an island in the Tuscan lake of Bolsena, where in the spring of 535 she was murdered in her bath.

The letters of Cassiodorus, chief minister and literary adviser of Amalasuntha, and the histories of Procopius and Jordanea, give us our chief information as to the character of Amalauentha.

AMALEKITES, an ancient tribe, or collection of tribes, in the south and south-east of Palestine, often mentioned in the Old Testament as foes of the Israelites. They were regarded as a branch of the Edomites (Gen. xxxvi. 12, see EDOM), and appear to have numbered among their divisions the Kenites. When the Israelites were journeying from Egypt to the land of Canaan, the Amalekites are said to have taken advantage of their weak condition to harry the stragglers in the rear, and as a judgment for their hostility it was ordained that their memory should be blotted out from under heaven (Deut. xxv. 17-19). An allusion to this appears in the account of Israel’s defeat on the occasion of the attempt to force a passage from Kadesh through Hormah, evidently into Palestine (Num. xiv. 43-45, cp. Deut. i. 44-46). The statements are obscure, and elsewhere Hormah is the scene of a victory over the Canaanites by Israel (Num. xxi. 1-3), or by the tribes Judah and Simeon (Judg. i. 17). The question is further complicated by the account of Joshua’s overthrow of Amalek apparently in the Sinaitic peninsula. The event was commemorated by the erection of the altar “Yahwehnissi” (“Yahweh my banner” or “memorial”), and rendered even more memorable by the utterance, “Yahweh hath sworn: Yahweh will have war with Amalek from generation to generation” (Ex. xvii. 8-16, on its present position, see EXODUS [BOOK]). The same sentiment recurs in Yahweh’s command to Saul to destroy Amalek utterly for its hostility to Israel (1 Sam. xv.), and in David’s retaliatory expedition when he distributed among his friends the spoil of the “enemies of Yahweh” (xxx. 26). Saul himself, according to one tradition, was slain by an Amalekite (2 Sam. i., contrast 1 Sam. xxxi.). A similar spirit appears among the prophecies ascribed to Balaam: “Amalek, first (or chief) of nations, his latter end [will be] destruction” (Num. xxiv. 20).

The district of Amalek lay to the south of Judah (cp. I Chron. iv. 42 seq.), probably between Kadesh and Hormah (cp. Gen. xiv. 7; 1 Sam. xv. 7, xxvii. 8), and the interchange of the ethnic with “Canaanites” and “Amorites” suggests that the Amalekites are merely one of Israel’s traditional enemies of the older period. Hence we find them taking part with Ammonites and Midianites (Judg. iii. 13, vi. 3), and their king Agag, slain by Samuel as a sacrificial offering (1 Sam. xv. 9), was a byword for old-time might and power (Num. xxiv. 7). Even in one of the Psalms (lxxxiii. 7) Amalek is mentioned among the enemies of Israel — just as Greek writers of the 6th century of this era applied the old term Scythians to the Goths (Noldeke), — and the traditional hostility between Saul and Amalek is reflected still later in the book of Esther where Haman the Agagite is pitted against Mordecai the Benjamite.

Twice Amalek seems to be mentioned as occupying central Palestine (Judg. v. 14, xii. 15), but the passages are textually uncertain. The name is celebrated in Arabian tradition, but the statements regarding them are confused and conflicting, and for historical purposes are practically worthless, as has been proved by Th. Noldeke (Uleber die Amalekiter, Gottingen, 1864). On the biblical data, see also E. Meyer, Die Israeliten (Index, s.v..) (S. A. C.) AMALFI, a town and archiepiscopal see of Campania, Italy, in the province of Salerno, from the town of which name it is distant 12 m. W.S.W. by road, on the N. coast of the Gulf of Salerno. Pop. (1901) 6681. It lies at the mouth of a deep ravine, in a sheltered situation, at the foot of Monte Cerreto (4314 ft.), in the centre of splendid coast scenery, and is in consequence much visited by foreigners. The cathedral of S. Andrea is a structure in the Lombard-Norman style, of the 11th century; the facade in black and white stone was well restored in 1891; the bronze doors were executed at Constantinople before 1066. The campanile dates from 1276. The interior is also fine, and contains ancient columns and sarcophagi. The conspicuous Capuchin monastery on the W. with fine cloisters (partly destroyed by a landslip in 1899) is now used as an hotel. Amalfi is first mentioned in the 6th century, and soon acquired importance as a naval power; in the 9th century it shared with Venice and Gaeta the Italian trade with the East, and in 848 its fleet went to the assistance of Pope Leo IV. against the Saracens.

It was then an independent republic with a population of some 70,000, but in 1131 it was reduced by King Roger of Sicily. In 1135 and 1137 it was taken by the Pisans, and rapidly declined in importance, though its maritime code, known as the Tavole Amalfitane, was recognized in the Mediterranean until 1570. In 1343 a large part of the town was destroyed by an inundation, and its harbour is now of little importance. Its industries too, have largely disappeared, and the paper manufacture has lost ground since 1861.

AMALGAM, the name applied to alloys which contain mercury. It is said by Andreas Libavius to be a corruption of malagma; in the alchemists the form algamala is also found. Many amalgams are formed by the direct contact of a metal with mercury, sometimes with absorption, sometimes with evolution, of heat. Other methods are to place the metal and mercury together in dilute acid, to add mercury to the solution of a metallic salt, to place a metal in a solution of mercuric nitrate, or to electrolyse a metallic salt using mercury as the negative electrode. Some amalgams are liquids, especially when containing a large proportion of mercury; others assume a crystalline form. In some cases definite compounds have been isolated from amalgams which may be regarded as mixtures of one or more of such compounds with mercury in excess. In general these compounds are decomposable by heat, but some of them, such as those of gold, silver, copper and the alkali metals, even when heated above the boiling point of mercury retain mercury and leave residues of definite composition. Tin amalgam is used for “silvering” mirrors, gold and silver amalgam in gilding and silvering, cadmium and copper amalgam in dentistry, and an amalgam of zinc and tin for the rubbers of electrical machines; the zinc plates of electric batteries are amalgamated in order to reduce polarization.

AMALRIC, the name of two kings of Jerusalem. AMALRIC I., king from 1162 to 1174, was the son of Fulk of Jerusalem, and the brother of Baldwin III. He was twice married: by his first wife, Agnes of Edessa, he had issue a son and a daughter, Baldwin IV. and Sibylla, while his second wife, Maria Comnena, bore him a daughter Isabella, who ultimately carried the crown of Jerusalem to her fourth husband, Amalric of Lusignan (Amalric II.). The reign of Amalric I. was occupied by the Egyptian problem. It became a question between Amalric and Nureddin, which of the two should control the discordant viziers, who vied with one another for the control of the decadent caliphs of Egypt. The acquisition of Egypt had been an object of the Franks since the days of Baldwin I. (and indeed of Godfrey himself, who had promised to cede Jerusalem to the patriarch Dagobert as soon as he should himself acquire Cairo). The capture of Ascakm by Baldwin III. in 1153 made this object more feasible; and we find the Hospitallers preparing sketch-maps of the routes best suited for an invasion of Egypt, in the style of a modern war office. On the other hand, it was natural for Nureddin to attempt to secure Egypt, both because it was the terminus of the trading route which ran from Damascus and because the acquisition of Egypt would enable him to surround the Latin kingdom. For some five years a contest was waged between Amalric and Shirguh (Shirkuh), the lieutenant of Nureddin, for the possession of Egypt. Thrice (1164, 1167, 1168) Amalric penetrated into Egypt: but the contest ended in the establishment of Saladin, the nephew of Shirguh, as vizier — a position which, on the death of the puppet caliph in 1171, was turned into that of sovereign. The extinction of the Latin kingdom might now seem imminent; and envoys were sent to the West with anxious appeals for assistance in 1169, 1171 and 1173. But though in 1170 Saladin attacked the kingdom, and captured Aila on the Red Sea, the danger was not so great as it seemed. Nureddin was jealous of his over-mighty subject, and his jealousy bound Saladin’s hands. This was the position of affairs when Amalric died, in 1174; but, as Nureddin died in the same year, the position was soon altered and Saladin began the final attack on the kingdom. Amalric I., the second of the native kings of Jerusalem, had the qualities of his brother Baldwin III. (q.v.) He was something of a scholar, and it was he who set William of Tyre to work. He was perhaps still more of a lawyer: his delight was in knotty points of the law, and he knew the Assises better than any of his subjects. The Church had some doubts of him, and he laid his hands on the Church. William of Tyre was once astonished to find him questioning, on a bed of sickness, the resurrection of the body; and his taxation of clerical goods gave umbrage to the clergy generally. But he maintained the state of his kingdom with the resources which he owed to the Church; and he is the last in the fine list of the early kings of Jerusalem.

William of Tyre is our original authority: see xix. 2-3 for his sketch of Amalric. Rohricht narrates the reign of Amalric I., Geschichte des Konigreichs Jerusalem, c. xvii.-xviii.

Amalric II., king from 1197 to 1205, was the brother of Guy of Lusignan. He had been constable of Jerusalem, but in 1194, on the death of his brother, he became king of Cyprus, as Amalric I. He married Isabella, the daughter of Amalric I. by his second marriage, and became king of Jerusalem in right of his wife in 1197. In 1198 he was able to procure a five years’ truce with the Mahommedans, owing to the struggle between Saladin’s brothers and his sons for the inheritance of his territories. The truce was disturbed by raids on both sides, but in 1204 it was renewed for six years. Amalric died in 1205, just after his son and just before his wife. The kingdom of Cyprus passed to Hugh, his son by an earlier marriage, while that of Jerusalem passed to Maria, the daughter of Isabella by her previous marriage with Conrad of Montferrat. (E. B. R.)

AMALRIC (Fr. AMAURY) OF BENA (d.c. 1204-1207), French theologian, was born in the latter part of the 12th century at Bena, a village in the diocese of Chartres. He taught philosophy and theology at the university of Paris and enjoyed a great reputation as a subtle dialectician; his lectures developing the philosophy of Aristotle attracted a large circle of hearers. In 1204 his doctrines were condemned by the university, and, on a personal appeal to Pope Innocent III., the sentence was ratified, Amalric being ordered to return to Paris and recant his errors. His death was caused, it is said, by grief at the humiliation to which he had been subjected. In 1209 ten of his followers were burnt before the gates of Paris, and Amalric’s own body was exhumed and burnt and the ashes given to the winds. The doctrines of his followers, known as the Amalricians, were formally condemned by the fourth Lateran Council in 1215. Amalric appears to have derived his philosophical system from Erigena (q.v.), whose principles he developed in a one-sided and strongly pantheistic form. Three propositions only can with certainty be attributed to him: (1) that God is all; (2) that every Christian is bound to believe that he is a member of the body of Christ, and that this belief is necessary for salvation: (3) that he who remains in love of God can commit no sin. These three propositions were further developed by his followers, who maintained that God revealed Himself in a threefold revelation, the first in Abraham, marking the epoch of the Father; the second in Christ, who began the epoch of the Son; and the third in Amalric and his disciples, who inaugurated the era of the Holy Ghost. Under the pretext that a true believer could commit no sin, the Amalricians indulged in every excess, and the sect does not appear to have long survived the death of its founder.

See W. Preger, Gleschichte der deutschen Mystik im Mittelalter (Leipzig, 1874, i. 167-173); Haureau, Hist. de la phil. scol. (Paris, 1872); C. Schmidt, Hist. de l’Eglise d’Occident itendant le moyen age (Paris, 1885); Hefele, Conciliengesch. (2nd ed., Ereiburg, 1886).

AMALTEO, the name of an Italian family belonging to Oderzo, Treviso, several members of which were distinguished in literature. The best known are three brothers, Geronimo (1507-1574), Giambattista (1525-1573) and Cornelio (1530-1603), whose Latin poems were published in one collection under the title Trium Fralrum Amaltheorum Carmina (Venice, 1627; Amst., 1689). The eldest brother, Geronimo, was a celebrated physician; the second, Giambattista, accompanied a Venetian embassy to England in 1554, and was secretary to Pius IV. at the council of Trent; the third, Cornelio, was a physician and secretary to the republic of Ragusa.

AMALTEO, POMPONIO (1505-1584), Italian painter of the Venetian school, was born at San Vito in Friuli. He was a pupil and son-in-law of Pordenone, whose style he closely imitated. His works consist chiefly of frescoes and altar-pieces and many of them (e.g. in the church of Santa Maria de’ Battisti, at San Vito) have suffered greatly from the ravages of time.

AMALTHEIA, in Greek mythology, the foster-mother of Zeus. She is sometimes represented as the goat which suckled the infant-god in a cave in Crete, sometimes as a nymph of uncertain parentage (daughter of Oceanus, Haemonius, Olen, Melisseus), who brought him up on the milk of a goat. This goat having broken off one of its horns, Amaltheia filled it with flowers and fruits and presented it to Zeus, who placed it together with the goat amongst the stars. According to another story, Zeus himself broke off the horn and gave it to Amaltheia, promising that it would supply whatever she desired in abundance. Amaltheia gave it to Acholous (her reputed brother), who exchanged it for his own horn which had been broken off in his contest with Heracles for the possession of Deianeira. According to ancient mythology, the owners of the horn were many and various. Speaking generally, it was regarded as the symbol of inexhaustible riches and plenty, and became the attribute of various divinities (Hades, Gaea, Demeter, Cybele, Hermes), and of rivers (the Nile) as fertilizers of the land. The term “horn of Amaltheia” is applied to a fertile district, and an estate belonging to Titus Pomponius Atticus was called Amaltheum. Cretan coins represent the infant Zeus being suckled by the goat; other Greek coins exhibit him suspended from its teats or carried in the arms of a nymph (Ovid, Fasti, v. 115; Metam. ix. 87).

AMANA, a township in Iowa county, Iowa, U.S.A., 19 m. S.W. (by rail) of Cedar Rapids. Pop. (1900) 1748; (1910) 1729. It is served by the Chicago, Milwaukee & St Paul, and the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific railways. The township is the home of a German religious communistic society, the Amana Society, formerly the True Inspiration Society (so called from its belief in the present inspiration of the truly godly and perfectly pious), whose members live in various villages near the Iowa river. These villages are named Amana, West Amana, South Amana, East Amana, Middle Amana, High Amana and Homestead. The houses are of brick or unpainted wood. The society has in all 26,000 acres of land, of which about 10,000 acres are covered with forests. The principal occupation of the members is farming, although they also have woollen mills (their woollens being of superior quality), a cotton print factory, flour mills, saw mills and dye shops. Each family has its own dwelling-place and a small garden; each member of a family has an annual allowance of credit at the common store and a room in the dwelling-house; and each group of families has a large garden, a common kitchen and a common dining hall where men and women eat at separate tables. Between the ages of five and fourteen education is compulsory for the entire year. In the schools nature study and manual training are prominent; German is used throughout and English is taught in upper classes only. No man is permitted to marry until twenty-four years of age, and no woman until twenty. The society’s views and practices are nearly related to the teachings of Schwenkfeld and Boehme. Baptism is not practised; the Lord’s Supper is celebrated only once in two years; foot-washing is held as a sacrament. At an annual spiritual examination of the members, there are mutual criticisms and public confessions of sin. The Inspirationists are opposed to war and to taking of oaths. The Society became attached to the Separatist leader, Eberhard Ludwig Gruber (d. 1728) in Wetterau in 1714; in 1842-1844 about 600 members, led by Christian Metz, the “divine instrument” of the Society, emigrated from Germany to the United States and settled in a colony called Ebenezer, in Erie county, near Buffalo, N.Y.; in 1855 the colony began to remove to its present home, which it named from the mountain mentioned in the Song of Solomon, iv. 8, the Hebrew word meaning “remain true” (or, more probably, “fixed”), and in 1859 it was incorporated under the, name of the Amana Society. Metz died in 1864 and was succeeded by Barbara Landmann, since whose death in 1884 the community has lacked an inspired leader. Amana was the strongest in numbers of the few sectarian communities in America which outlived the 19th century. A few new members have joined the community from Switzerland and Germany in recent years. In 1905 the community won a suit brought against it for its dissolution on the ground that, having been incorporated solely as a benevolent and religious body, it was illegally carrying on a general business.

See W. R. Perkins and B. L. Wick, History of the Amana Society or Community of True Inspiration, Historical Monograph, No. 1, in State University of Iowa publications (Iowa City, 1891); R. T. Ely, “Amana: A Study of Religious Communism,” in Harper’s Magazine for October 1902; and Bertha M. H. Shambaugh, Amana, the Community of True Inspiration (Iowa City, 1908).

AMANITA. The amanitas include some of the most showy representatives of the Agaricineae or mushroom order of fungi (q.v.). In the first stages of growth, they are completely enveloped by an outer covering called the veil. As the plant develops the veil is ruptured; the lower portion forms a sheath or volva round the base of the stem, while the upper portion persists as white patches or scales or warts on the surface of the cap. The stem usually bears an upper ring of tissue, the

Amanita muscaria. A, the young plant. g, the gills. B, the mature plant. a, the annulus, or remnant of C, longitudinal section of mature velum partiale. plant. v, remains of volva or velum p, the pileus. universale. s, the stalk.

remains of an inner veil, that stretched from the stem to the edge of the cap and broke away from the cap as the latter expanded. The presence of the volva, and the clear white gills and spores, distinguish this genus from all other agarics. They are beautiful objects in the autumn woods; Amanita muscaria, the fly fungus, formerly known as Agaricus muscarius, being especially remarkable by its bright red cap covered with white warts. Others are pure white or of varying shades of yellow or green. There are sixteen British species of Amanita; they grow on the ground in or near woods. Several of the species are very poisonous.

AMANUENSIS (a Latin word, derived from the phrase servus a manu, slave of the hand, a secretary), one who writes, from dictation or otherwise, on behalf of another.

AMAPALA, the only port on the Pacific coast of Honduras, on the northern shore of Tigre island, in the Bay of Fonseca (q.v.); in 13 deg. 3, N., and 87 deg. 94 W. Pop. (1905) about 4000. Amapala was founded in 1838, and its port was opened and declared free in 1868. The roadstead is perfectly sheltered and so deep that the largest vessels can lie within a few yards of the shore. It is the natural outlet for the commerce of some of the richest parts of Honduras, Nicaragua and Salvador; and during the 19th century it exported large quantities of gold, silver and other ores, although its progress was retarded by the delay in constructing a transcontinental railway from Puerto Cortes. Its depots on the mainland, both about 30 m. distant,

are La Brea, for the line to Puerto Cortes, and San Lorenzo, for Tegucigalpa. Silver is still exported, in addition to hides, timber, coffee and indigo, and there are valuable fisheries.

AMARANTH, or AMARANG (from the Gr. amarantos, unwithering), a name chiefly used in poetry, and applied to certain plants which, from not soon fading, typified immortality. Thus Milton (Paradise Lost, iii. 353) –

“Immortal amarant, a flower which once In paradise, fast by the tree of life, Began to bloom; but soon for man’s offence To heaven removed, where first it grew, there grows, And flowers aloft, shading the fount of life, And where the river of bliss through midst of heaven Rolls o’er elysian flowers her amber stream: With these that never fade the spirits elect Bind their resplendent locks.” It should be noted that the proper spelling of the word is amarant; the more common spelling seems to have come from a hazy notion that the final syllable is the Greek word anthos, “flower,” which enters into a vast number of botanical names.

The plant genus Amarantus (natural order Amarantaceae) contains several well-known garden plants, such as love-lies- bleeding (A. caudatus), a native of India, a vigorous hardy annual, with dark purplish flowers crowded in handsome drooping spikes. Another species A. hypochondriacus, is prince’s feather, another Indian annual, with deeply-veined lance-shaped leaves, purple on the under face, and deep crimson flowers densely packed on erect spikes. “Globe amaranth” belongs to an allied genus, Gomphrena, and is also a native of India. It is an annual about 18 in. high, with solitary round heads of flowers; the heads are violet from the colour of the bracts which surround the small flowers.

In ancient Greece the amaranth (also called chrusanthemon and elichrusos) was sacred to Ephesian Artemis. It was supposed to have special healing properties, and as a symbol of immortality was used to decorate images of the gods and tombs. In legend, Amarynthus (a form of Amarantus) was a hunter of Artemis and king of Euboea; in a village of Amarynthus, of which he was the eponymous hero, there was a famous temple of Artemis Amarynthia or Amarysia (Strabo x. 448; Pausan. i. 31, p. 5).

See Lenz, Botanik der alt. Greich. und Rom. (1859); J. Murr, Die Pflanzenwelt in der griech. Mythol. (1890).

AMARAPURA (“the city of the gods”), formerly the capital of the Burmese kingdom, now a suburb of Mandalay, Burma, with a population in 1901 of 9103. The town was founded in 1783 to form a new capital about 6 m. to the north-east of Ava. It increased rapidly in size and population, and in 1810 was estimated to contain 170,000 inhabitants; but in that year the town was destroyed by fire, and this disaster, together with the removal of the native court to Ava in 1823, caused a decline in the prosperity of the place. In 1827 its population was estimated at only 30,000. It suffered severe calamity from an earthquake, which in 1839 destroyed the greater part of the city. It was finally abandoned in 1860, when king Mindon occupied Mandalay, 5 or 6 m. farther north. Amarapura was laid out on much the same plan as Ava. The ruins of the city wall, now overgrown with jungle, show it to have been a square with a side of about three-quarters of a mile in length. At each corner stood a solid brick pagoda about 100 ft. high. The most remarkable edifice was a celebrated temple, adorned with 250 lofty pillars of gilt wood, and containing a colossal bronze statue of Buddha. The remains of the former palace of the Burmese monarchs still survive in the centre of the town. During the time of its prosperity Amarapura was defended by a rampart and a large square citadel, with a broad moat, the walls being 7000 ft. long and 20 ft. high, with a bastion at each corner. The Burmans know it now as Myohaung, “the old city.” It has a station on the Rangoon-Mandalay railway, and is the junction for the line to Maymyo and the Kunlong ferry and for the Sagaing-Myitkyina railway. The group of villages called Amarapura by Europeans is known to the Burmans as Taung-myo, “the southern city,” as distinguished from Mandalay, the Myauk-myo, or “northern city,” 3 m. distant.

AMARAR, a tribe of African “Arabs” inhabiting the mountainous country on the west side of the Red Sea from Suakin northwards towards Kosseir. Between them and the Nile are the Ababda and Bisharin tribes and to their south dwell the Hadendoa. The country of the Amarar is called the Etbai. Their headquarters are in the Ariab district. The tribe is divided into four great famines: (1) Weled Gwilei, (2) Weled Aliab, (3) Woled Kurbab Wagadab, and (4) the Amarar proper of the Ariab district. They claim to be of Koreish blood and to be the descendants of an invading Arab army. Possibly some small bands of Koreish Arabs may have made an inroad and converted some of the Amarar to Islam. Further than this there is little to substantiate their claim.

See Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, edited by Count Gleichen (London, 1905): Sir F. R. Wingate, Mahdism and the Egyptian Sudan (London, 1891); A. H. Keane, Ethnology of Egyptian Sudan (London, 1884).

AMARA SINHA (c. A.D. 375), Sanskrit grammarian and poet, of whose personal history hardly anything is known. He is said to have been “one of the nine gems that adorned the throne of Vikramaditya,” and according to the evidence of Hsuan Tsang, this is the Chandragupta Vikramaditya that flourished about A.D. 375. Amara seems to have been a Buddhist; and an early tradition asserts that his works, with one exception, were destroyed during the persecution carried on by the orthodox Brahmins in the 5th century. The exception is the celebrated Amara-Xosha (Treasury of Amara), a vocabulary of Sanskrit roots, in three books, and hence sometimes called Trikanda or the “Tripartite.” It contains 10,000 words, and is arranged, like other works of its class, in metre, to aid the memory. The first chapter of the Kosha was printed at Rome in Tamil character in 1798. An edition of the entire work, with English notes and an index by H. T. Colebrooke, appeared at Serampore in 1808. The Sanskrit text was printed at Calcutta in 1831. A French translation by A. L. A. Loiseleur-Deslongchamps as published at Paris in 1839.

AMARI, MICHELE (1806-1889), Italian orientalist and patriot, was born at Palermo. From his earliest youth he imbibed liberal principles from his relatives, especially from his grandfather, and although at the age of fourteen he was appointed clerk in the Bourbon civil service, he joined the Carbonari like many other young Sicilians and actively sympathized with the revolution of 1820. The movement, which was separatist in its tendencies, was quickly suppressed, but the conspiracies continued, and Amari’s father, implicated in that of 1822, was arrested and condemned to death together with many others; but his sentence was commuted to imprisonment, and in 1834 he was liberated. Michele Amari still held his clerkship, but he regarded the Neapolitan government with increasing hatred, and he led a life of active physical exercise to train himself for the day of revolution. He devoted much of his time to the study of English and of history; his first literary essay was a translation of Sir Walter Scott’s Marmion (1832), and in 1839 he published a work on the Sicilian Vespers, entitled Hn Periodo delle storie Siciliane del XIII. secolo, filled with political allusions reflecting unfavourably on the government. The book had an immediate success and went through many editions, but it brought the author under the suspicion of the authorities, and in 1842 he escaped from a boat just as he was about to be arrested. He settled in Paris, where he came in contact with a number of literary men, such as Michelet and Thierry, as well as with the Italian exiles. Having no private means he had to earn a precarious livelihood by literature. He was much struck with certain French translations of Arabic works on Sicily,which awoke in him a desire to read the authors in the original. With the assistance of Prof. Reinaud and Baron de Slane he soon acquired great proficiency in Arabic, and his translations and editions of oriental texts, as well as his historical essays, made him a reputation. In 1844 he began his great work La Storia dei Musulmani in Sicilia, but the revolution of 1848 plunged him into politics once more. His pamphlet, Quelques Observations sur le droit public de la Sicile, advocating the revival of the 1812 constitution for the island, met with great success, and on arriving at Palermo,

whence the Bourbon government had been expelled, he was chosen member of the war committee and appointed professor of public law at the university. At the general elections Amari was returned for Palermo and became minister of finance in the Stabile cabinet. On its fall he was sent to Paris and London to try to obtain help for the struggling island; having failed in his mission he returned to Sicily in 1849, hoping to fight. But the Neapolitan troops had re-occupied the island, the Liberals were in disagreement among themselves, and Amari with several other notables with difficulty escaped to Malta. Characteristic of his scholarly nature is the fact that he delayed his flight to take the impress of an important Arabic inscription. He returned to Paris, sad and dejected at the collapse of the movement, and devoted himself once more to his Arabic studies. He published a work on the chronology of the Koran, for which he received a prize from the Academie des Inscriptions, edited the Solwan el Mota by Ibn Zafer (a curious collection of philosophical thoughts) and Ibn Haukal’s Description og Palermo, and in 1854 the first volume of his history of the Mahommedans in Sicily appeared. He received a meagre stipend for cataloguing the Arabic MSS. in the Bibliotheque Nationale, and he contributed many articles to the reviews. Although a firm friend of Mazzini, he discouraged the latter’s premature conspiracies. In 1859, after the expulsion of the central Italian despots, Amari was appointed professor of Arabic at Pisa and afterwards at Florence. But when Garibaldi and his thousand had conquered Sicily, Amari returned to his native island, and was given an appointment in the government. Although intensely Sicilian in sentiment, he became one of the staunchest advocates of the union of Sicily with Italy, and was subsequently made senator of the kingdom at Cavour’s instance. He was minister of education in the Farini and Minghetti cabinets, but on the fall of the latter in 1864, he resumed his professorship at Florence and spent the rest of his life in study. His circle of acquaintances, both in Italy and abroad, was very large, and his sound scholarship was appreciated in all countries. He died in 1889, loaded with honours. The last volume of his Storia dei Musulmani appeared in 1873, and in addition to the above-mentioned works he published many others on oriental and historical subjects. His work on the Sicilian Vespers was re-written as La Guerra dei Vespro (9th ed., Milan, 1886). He was the pioneer of Arabic studies in modern Italy, and he still remains the standard authority on the Mussulman domination in Sicily, though his judgment on religious questions is sometimes warped by a violently anti-clerical bias.

See A. D’Ancona, Carteggio di Michele Amari coll’ elogio di lui (Turin, 1896); and Oreste Tommasini’s essay in his Scritti di storial e critica (Rome, 189I). (L. V.n)

AMARYLLIS (the name of a girl in classical pastoral poetry), in botany, a genus of the natural order Amaryllidaceae, containing the belladonna lily (Amaryllis Belladonna), a native of South Africa, which was introduced into cultivation at the beginning of the 18th century. This is a half-hardy bulbous plant, producing in the spring a number of strap-shaped, dull green leaves, 1-1 1/2 ft. long, arranged in two rows, and in autumn a solid stem, bearing at the top a cluster of 6-12 funnel-shaped flowers, of a rose colour and very fragrant. Several forms are known in cultivation. Most of the so-called Amaryllis of gardens belong to the allied genus Hippeastrum (q.v.).

AMASIA (anc. Amasia), the chief town of a sanjak in the Sivas vilayet of Asia Minor and an important trade centre on the Samsun-Sivas road, beautifully situated on the Yeshil Irmak (Iris). Pop. 30,000; Moslems about 20,000, of whom a large proportion are Kizilbash (Shia); Christians (mostly Armenians), 10,000. It was one of the chief towns of the kingdom of Trebizond and of the Seljuks, one of whose sultans, Kaikobad I., enriched it with fine buildings and restored the castle, which was thus enabled to stand a seven months’ siege by Timur. It was also much favoured by the early Osmanli sultans, one of whom, Sclim I., was born there. Bayezid II. built a fine mosque. The place was modernized about a generation ago by Zia Pasha, the poet, when governor, and is now an unusually well built Turkish town with good bazaar and khans and a fine clock-tower. The Americans and the Jesuits have missionary schools for the Armenian population. Amasia has extensive orchards and fruit gardens still, as in Ibn Batuta’s time, irrigated by water wheels turned by the current of the river; and there are steam flourmills. Wheat, flour and silk are exported.

Ancient Amasia has left little trace of itself except on the castle rock, on the left of the river, where the acropolis walls and a number of splendid rock-cut tombs, described by Strabo as those of the kings of Pontus, can be seen. The cliff is cut away all round these immense sepulchres so that they stand free. The finest, known from its polished surfaces as the “Mirror Tomb,” is about 2 m. from the modern city. Amasia rose into historical importance after the time of Alexander as the cradle of the power of Pontus; but the last king to reign there was the father of Mithradates Eupator “The Great.” The latter, however, made it the base of his operations against the Romans in 89, 72 and 67 B.C. Pompey made it a free city in 65, after Mithradates’ fall. It was the birthplace of Strabo. (D. G. H.)

AMASIS, or AMOSIS (the Greek forms of the Egyptian name Ahmase, Ahmosi, “the moon is born,” often written Aahmes or Ahmes in modern works), the name of two kings of ancient Egypt.

AMASIS I., the founder of the XVIIIth dynasty, is famous for his successful wars against the Hyksos princes who still ruled in the north-east of the Delta (see EGYPT: History, sect. 1.)

AMASIS II. was the last great ruler of Egypt before the Persian conquest, 570-526 B.C. Most of our information about him is derived from Herodotus (ii. 161 et seq.) and can only be imperfectly controlled by monumental evidence. According to the Greek historian he was of mean origin. A revolt of the native soldiers gave him his opportunity. These troops, returning home from a disastrous expedition to Cyrene, suspected that they had been betrayed in order that Apries, the reigning king, might rule more absolutely by means of his mercenaries, and their friends in Egypt fully sympathized with them. Amasis, sent to meet them and quell the revolt, was proclaimed king by the rebels, and Apries, who had now to rely entirely on his mercenaries, was defeated and taken prisoner in the ensuing conflict at Momemphis; the usurper treated the captive prince with great lenity, but was eventually persuaded to give him up to the people, by whom he was strangled and buried in his ancestral tomb at Sais. An inscription confirms the fact of the struggle between the native and the foreign soldiery, and proves that Apries was killed and honourably buried in the 3rd year of Amasis. Although Amasis thus appears first as champion of the disparaged native, he had the good sense to cultivate the friendship of the Greek world, and brought Egypt into closer touch with it than ever before. Herodotus relates that under his prudent administration Egypt reached the highest pitch of prosperity; he adorned the temples of Lower Egypt especially with splendid monolithic shrines and other monuments (his activity here is proved by remains still existing). To the Greeks Amasis assigned the commercial colony of Naucratis on the Canopic branch of the Nile, and when the temple of Delphi was burnt he contributed 1000 talents to the rebuilding. He also married a Greek princess named Ladice, the daughter of Battus, king of Cyrene, and he made alliances with Polycrates of Samos and Croesus of Lydia. His kingdom consisted probably of Egypt only, as far as the First Cataract, but to this he added Cyprus, and his influence was great in Cyrene. At the beginning of his long reign, before the death of Apries, he appears to have sustained an attack by Nebuchadrezzar (568 B.C.). Cyrus left Egypt unmolested; but the last years of Amasis were disturbed by the threatened invasion of Cambyses and by the rupture of the alliance with Polycrates of Samos. The blow fell upon his son Psammetichus III., whom the Persian deprived of his kingdom after a reign of only six months.

See NAUCRATIS: also W. M. Flinders Petrie, History, vol. iii.; Breasted, History and Historical Documents, vol. iv. p. 509; Maspero, Les Empires. (F. LL. G.)

AMATEUR (Lat. amator, lover), a person who takes part in any art, craft, game or sport for the sake of the pleasure afforded

by the occupation itself and not for pecuniary gain. Being thus a person for whom the pursuit in question is a recreation and not a business, and who therefore presumably devotes to it a portion only of his leisure and not his working hours, the average amateur possesses less skill than the average professional, whose livelihood and reputation depend on his proficiency, and who therefore concentrates all his energies on the task of attaining the greatest possible mastery in his chosen career. In the arts, such as music, painting and the drama, the best amateurs are outdistanced as executants not merely by the best professionals but by professionals far below the highest rank; and although the inferiority of the amateur is not perhaps so pronounced or so universal in the case of games and outdoor sports, the records of such pastimes as horse-racing, boxing, rowing, billiards, tennis and golf prove that here also the same contrast is generally to be found. Hence it has come about that the term “amateur,” and more especially the adjectival derivative “amateurish,” has acquired a secondary meaning, usually employed somewhat contemptuously, signifying inefficiency, unskilfulness, superficial knowledge or training.

The immense increase in popularity of athletic contests and games of all kinds in modern times, and especially the keen competition for “records” and championships, often of an international character, have made it a matter of importance to arrive at a clear and formal definition of the amateur as distinguished from the professional. The simple, straightforward definition of the amateur given above has been proved to be easily evaded. Many leading cricketers, for example, preserve their amateur status who, although they are not paid wages for each match they play like their professional colleagues, are provided with an annual income by their county or club under the guise of salary for performing the duties of “secretary” or some other office, leaving them free to play the game six days a week. Similarly, “gentlemen riders” are often presented with a cash payment described as a bet, or under some other pretext. Nor is the dividing-line between “out-of-pocket expenses” allowed to the amateur and the remuneration payable to the professional always strictly drawn. The various associations controlling the different branches of sport have therefore devised working regulations to be observed so far as their jurisdiction extends. Thus the Amateur Athletic Association of Great Britain defines an amateur as “one who has never competed for a money prize or staked bet, or with or against a professional for any prize, or who has never taught, pursued or assisted in the practice of athletic exercises as a means of obtaining a livelihood.” The rules of the Amateur Rowing Association are stricter, denying amateur status to anyone who has ever steered or rowed in a race with a professional for any prize, or who is or has been by trade or employment for wages a mechanic, artisan or labourer, or engaged in any menial duty, besides insisting upon the usual restrictions in regard to taking money and competing with professionals. In association football the rules are much more lax, for although amateurs are clearly distinguished from professionals, an amateur may even become a regular member, though unsalaried, of a professional team without losing his amateur status. The Rugby game was, up to 1895, entirely controlled by the Rugby Football Union, which, by the strictness of its laws, effectually prevented the growth of professionalism, but there had been much dissatisfaction in the provinces with the Union’s decision against reimbursing day- working players for “broken time,” i.e. for that part of their wages which they lost by playing on working days, and this resulted in the formation (1895) of the Northern Union, which permits remuneration for “broken time,” but allows no person who works for his living to play football unless regularly employed at his particular trade.

In America the amateur question is less complicated than in Great Britain; but the intensely business-like character of American ideas of sport has encouraged the modern spirit of professionalism. All important sports in America, except baseball, football, cricket, golf and rowing, are, however, under the control of the Amateur Athletic Union of the United States, the rules of which, so far as they relate to professionalism, are as follows. No person shall be eligible to compete in any athletic meeting, game or entertainment, given or sanctioned by this Union, who has (1) received or competed for compensation or reward in any form for the display, exercise or example of his skill or knowledge of any athletic exercise, or for rendering personal service of any kind to any athletic organization, or for becoming or continuing a member of any athletic organization; or (2) has entered any competition under a name other than his own, or from a club of which he was not at that time a member in good standing; or (3) has knowingly entered any competition open to any professional or professionals, or has knowingly competed with any professional for any prize or token; or (4) has issued or allowed to be issued in his behalf any challenge to compete against any professional or for money; or (5) has pawned, bartered or sold any prize won in athletic competition. It will be seen that by rule 3 the American Union enacts a standard for all athletes not much different from that of the British Amateur Rowing Association. The rules for the sports not within the Union’s jurisdiction are practically the same, except that in baseball, cricket and golf amateurs may compete with professionals, though not for cash prizes. In the case of open golf competitions professional prize-winners receive cash, while amateurs are given plate to the value of their prizes as in Great Britain. There are practically no professional football players in America.

On both sides of the Atlantic the question of the employment of professional coaches has occasioned much discussion. In America it has been accepted as legal. In England the same is almost universally true, but there are certain exceptions, such as the decision of the Henley Regatta Committee, that no crew entering may be coached by a professional within two months of the race-day. Whether such a regulation be wise or the reverse is a question that depends upon the spirit in which games are regarded. Nobody wants to disparage proficiency; but if a game is conducted on business methods, the “game” element tends to be minimized, and if its object is pecuniary it ceases to be “sport” in the old sense, and the old idea of the “amateur” who indulges in it for love of the mere enjoyment tends to disappear.

AMATHUS, an ancient city of Cyprus, on the S. coast, about 24 m. W. of Larnaka and 6 m. E. of Limassol, among sandy hills and sand-dunes, which perhaps explain its name in Greek (amathos, sand). The earliest remains hitherto found on the site are tombs of the early Iron Age period of Graeco-Phoenician influences (1000-600 B.C.). Amathus is identified by some (E. Oberhummer, Die Insel Cypern, i., 1902, pp. 13-14; but see CITIUM) with Kartihadasti (Phoenician “New-Town”) in the Cypriote tribute-list of Esarhaddon of Assyria (668 B.C.). It certainly maintained strong Phoenician sympathies, for it was its refusal to join the phil-Hellene league of Onesilas of Salamis which provoked the revolt of Cyprus from Persia in 500-494 B.C. (Herod. v. 105), when Amathus was besieged unsuccessfully and avenged itself by the capture and execution of Onesilas. The phil-Hellene Evagoras of Salamis was similarly opposed by Amathus about 385-380 B.C. in conjunction with Citium and Soli (Diod. Sic. xiv. 98); and even after Alexander the city resisted annexation, and was bound over to give hostages to Seleucus (Diod. Sic. xix. 62). Its political importance now ended, but its temple of Adonis and Aphrodite (Venus Amathusia) remained famous in Roman time.

The wealth of Amathus was derived partly from its corn (Strabo 340, quoting Hipponax, fi. 540 B.C.), partly from its copper mines (Ovid, Met. x. 220, 531), of which traces can be seen inland (G. Mariti, i. 187; L. Ross, Inselreise, iv. 195; W. H. Engel, Kypros, i. 111 ff.). Ovid also mentions its sheep (Met. x. 227); the epithet Amathusia in Roman poetry often means little more than “Cypriote,” attesting however the fame of the city.

Amathus still flourished and produced a distinguished patriarch of Alexandria (Johannes Eleemon), as late as 606-616, and a ruined Byzantine church marks the site; but it was already

almost deserted when Richard Coeur de Lion won Cyprus by a victory there over Isaac Comnenus in 1191. The rich necropolis, already partly plundered then, has yielded valuable works of art to New York (L. P. di Cesnola, Cyprus, 1878 passim) and to the British Museum (Excavations in Cyprus, 1894 (1899) passim); but the city has vanished, except fragments of wall and of a great stone cistern on the acropolis. A similar vessel was transported to the Louvre in 1867. Two small sanctuaries, with terra-cotta votive offerings of Graeco-Phoenician age, lie not far off, but the great shrine of Adonis and Aphrodite has not been identified (M. Ohnefalsch-Richter, Kypros, i. ch.1). (J. L. M.)

AMATI, the name of a family of Italian violin-makers, who flourished at Cremona from about 1550 to 1692. According to Fetis, Andrea and Nicolo Amati, two brothers, were the first Italians who made violins. They were succeeded by Antonio and Geronimo, sons of Nicolo. Another Nicolo, son of Geronimo, was born on the 3rd of September 1596 and died on the 12th of August 1684. He was the most eminent of the family. He improved the model adopted by the rest of the Amatis and produced instruments capable of yielding greater power of tone. His pattern was usually small, but he also made the so-called “Grand Amatis.” Of his pupils the most famous were Andrea Enamieri and Antonio Stradivari.

AMATITLAN, or SAN JUAN DE AMATITLAN, the capital of a department bearing the same name in Guatemala, on Lake Amatitlan, 15 m. S.W. of Guatemala city by the transcontinental railway from Puerto Barrios to San Jose. Pop. (1905) about 10,000. The town consists almost entirely of one-storeyed adobe huts inhabited by mulattoes and Indians, whose chief industry is the production of cochineal. In 1840 only a small Indian village marked its site, and its subsequent growth was due to the sugar plantations established by a Jesuit settlement. The wells of the town are strongly impregnated with salt and alum, and in the vicinity there are several hot springs. Lake Amatitlan, 9 m. long and 3 m. broad, lies on the northern side of the great Guatemalan Cordillera. Above it rises the four- cratered volcano of Pacaya (8390 ft.), which was in eruption in 1870. The outlet of the lake is a swift river 65 m. long, which cuts a way through the Cordillera, and enters the Pacific at Istapa, after forming at San Pedro a fine waterfall more than 200 ft. high.

AMAUROSIS (Gr. for “blinding,”), a term for “deprivation of sight,” limited chiefly to those forms of defect or loss of vision which are caused by diseases not directly involving the eye.

AMAZON, the great river of South America. Before the conquest of South America, the Rio de las Amazonas had no general name; for, according to a common custom, each savage tribe gave a name only to the section of the river which it occupied — such as Paranaguazu, Guyerma, Sclimoes and others. In the year 1500, Vicente Yanez Pinzon, in command of a Spanish expedition, discovered and ascended the Amazon to a point about 50 m. from the sea. He called it the Rio Santa Maria de la Mar Dulce, which soon became abbreviated to Mar Dulce, and for some years, after 1502, it was known as the Rio Grande. The principal companions of Pinzon, in giving evidence in 1513, mention it as El Ryo Haranon. There is much controversy about the origin of the word Maranon. Peter Martyr in a letter to Lope Hurtado de Mendoza in 1513 is the first to state that it is of native origin. Ten years after the death of Pinzon, his friend Oviedo calls it the Maranon. Many writers believe that this was its Indian name. We are disposed to agree with the Brazilian historian Constancio that Maranon is derived from the Spanish word marana, a tangle, a snarl, which well represents the bewildering difficulties which the earlier explorers met in navigating not only the entrance to the Amazon, but the whole island-bordered, river-cut and indented coast of the now Brazilian province of Maranhao.

The first descent of the mighty artery from the Andes to the sea was made by Orellana in 1541, and the name Amazonas arises from the battle which he had with a tribe of Tapuya savages where the women of the tribe fought alongside the men, as was the custom among all of the Tapuyas. Orellana, no doubt, derived the name Amazonas from the ancient Amazons (q.v.) of Asia and Africa described by Herodotusand Diodorus.

The first ascent of the river was made in 1638 by Pedro Texiera, a Portuguese, who reversed the route of Orellana and reached Quito by way of the Rio Napo. He returned in 1639 with the Jesuit fathers Acuna and Artieda, delegated by the viceroy of Peru to accompany him.

The river Amazon has a drainage area of 2,722,000 sq. m., if the Tocantins be included in its basin. It drains four-tenths of South America, and it gathers its waters from 5 deg. N. to 20 deg. S. latitude. Its most remote sources are found on the inter-Andean plateau, but a short distance from the Pacific Ocean; and, after a course of about 4000 m. through the interior of Peru and across Brazil, it enters the Atlantic Ocean on the equator. It is generally accepted by geographers that the Maranon, or Upper Amazon, rises in the little lake, Lauricocha, in 10 deg. 30′ S. latitude, and 100 m. N.N.E. of Lima. They appear to have followed the account given by Padre Fritz which has since been found incorrect. According to Antonio Raimondi, it is the Rio de Nupe branch of the small stream which issues from the lake that has the longer course and the greater volume of water. The Nupe rises in the Cordillera de Huayhuath and is the true source of the Maranon. There is a difference among geographers as to where the Maranon ends and the Amazon begins, or whether both names apply to the same river. The Pongo de Manseriche, at the base of the Andes and the head of useful navigation, seems to be the natural terminus of the Maranon; and an examination of the hydrographic conditions of the great valley makes the convenience and accuracy of this apparent. Raimondi terminates the Maranon at the mouth of the Ucayali, Reclus the same, both following the missionary fathers of the colonial period. C. M. de la Condamine uses “Amazon” and “Maranon” indiscriminately and considers them one and the same. Smyth and Lowe give the mouth of the Javary as the eastern limit, as does d’Orbigny. Wolf, apparently uncertain, carries the “Maranon or Amazon” to the Peruvian frontier of Brazil at Tabatinga. Other travellers and explorers contribute to the confusion. This probably arises from the rivalry of the Spaniards and Portuguese. The former accepted the name Maranon in Peru, and as the missionaries penetrated the valley they extended the name until they reached the mouth of the Ucayali; while, as the Portuguese ascended the Amazon, they carried this name to the extent of their explorations. Beginning with the lower river we propose to notice, first, the great affluents which go to swell the volume of the main stream.

Tributaries.

The TOCANTINS is not really a branch of the Amazon, although usually so considered. It is the central fluvial artery of Brazil, running from south to north for a distance of about 1500 m. It rises in the mountainous district known as the Pyreneos; but its more ambitious western affluent, the Araguay, has its extreme southern headwaters on the slopes of the Serra Cayapo, and flows a distance of 1080 m. before its junction with the parent stream, which it appears almost to equal in volume. Besides its main tributary, the Rio das Mortes, it has twenty smaller branches, offering many miles of canoe navigation. In finding its way to the lowlands, it breaks frequently into falls and rapids, or winds violently through rocky gorges, until, at a point about 100 m. above its junction with the Tocantins, it saws its way across a rocky dyke for 12 m. in roaring cataracts. The tributaries of the Tocantins, called the Maranhao and Parana-tinga, collect an immense volume of water from the highlands which surround them, especially on the south and south-east. Between the latter and the confluence with the Araguay, the Tocantins is occasionally obstructed by rocky barriers which cross it almost at a right angle. Through these, the river carves its channel, broken into cataracts and rapids, or cachoeiras, as they are called throughout Brazil. Its lowest one, the Itaboca cataract, is about 130 m. above its estuarine port of Cameta, for which distance the river is navigable; but above that it is useless as a commercial avenue, except for laborious and very costly transportation.

The flat, broad valleys, composed of sand and clay, of both the Tocantins and its Araguay branch are overlooked by steep bluffs. They are the margins of the great sandstone plateaus, from 1000 to 2000 ft. elevation above sea-level, through which the rivers have eroded their deep beds. Around the estuary of the Tocantins the great plateau has disappeared, to give place to a part of the forest-covered, half submerged alluvial plain, which extends far to the north-east and west. The Para river, generally called one of the mouths of the Amazon, is only the lower reach of the Tocantins. If any portion of the waters of the Amazon runs round the southern side of the large island of Marajo into the river Para, it is only through tortuous, natural canals, which are in no sense outflow channels of the Amazon.

The XINGU, the next large river west of the Tocantins, is a true tributary of the Amazon. It was but little known until it was explored in 1884-1887 by Karl von den Steinen from Cuyaba. Travelling east, 240 m., he found the river Tamitatoaba, 180 ft. wide, flowing from a lake 25 m. in diameter. He descended this torrential stream to the river Romero, 1300 ft. wide, entering from the west, which receives the river Colisu. These three streams form the Xingu, or Parana-xingu, which, from 73 m. lower down, bounds along a succession of rapids for 400 m. A little above the head of navigation, 105 m. from its mouth, the river makes a bend to the east to find its way across a rocky barrier. Here is the great cataract of Itamaraca, which rushes down an inchned plane for 3 m. and then gives a final leap, called the fall of Itamaraca. Near its mouth, the Xingu expands into an immense lake, and its waters then mingle with those of the Amazon through a labyrinth of eanos (natural canals), winding in countless directions through a wooded archipelago.

The TAPAHOS, running through a humid, hot and unhealthy valley, pours into the Amazon 500 m. above Para and is about 1200 m. long. It rises on the lofty Brazilian plateau near Diamantino in 14 deg. 25′ S. lat. Near this place a number of streams unite to form the river Arinos, which at latitude 10 deg. 25′ joins the Juruena to form the Alto Tapajos, so called as low down as the Rio Manoel, entering from the east. Thence to Santarem the stream is known as the Tapajos. The lower Arinos, the Alto Tapajos and the Tapajos to the last rapid, the Maranhao Grande, is a continuous series of formidable cataracts and rapids; but from the Maranhao Grande to its mouth, about 188 m., the river can be navigated by largevessels. For its last 100 mi. it is from 4 to 9 m. wide and much of it very deep. The valley of the Tapajos is bordered on both sides by bluffs. They are from 300 to 400 ft. high along the lower river; but, a few miles above Santarem, they retire from the eastern side and only approach the Amazon flood-plain some miles below Santarem.

The MADEIRA has its junction with the Amazon 870 mi. by river above Para, and almost rivals it in the volume of its waters. It rises more than 50 ft. during the rainy season, and the largest ocean steamers may ascend it to the Fall of San Antonio, 663 m. above its mouth; but in the dry months, from June to November, it is only navigable for the same distance for craft drawing from 5 to 6 ft. of water. According to the treaty of San Ildefonso, the Madeira begins at the confluence of the Guapore with the Mamore. Both of these streams have their headwaters almost in contact with those of the river Paraguay. The idea of a connecting canal is based on ignorance of local conditions. San Antonio is the first of a formidable series of cataracts and rapids, nineteen in number, which, for a river distance of 263 m., obstruct the upper course of the Madeira until the last rapid called Guajara Merim (or Small Pebble), is reached, a little below the union of the Guapore with the Mamore. The junction of the great river Beni with the Madeira is at the Madeira Fall, a vast and grand display ofreefs, whirlpools and boiling torrents. Between Guajara-Merim and this fall, inclusive, the Madeira receives the drainage of the northeastern slopes of the Andes, from Santa Cruz de la Sierra to Cuzco, the whole of the south-western slope of Brazilian Matto (irosso and the northern one of the Chiquitos sierras, an area about

equal to that of France and Spain. The waters find their way to the falls of the Madeira by many great rivers, the principal of which, if we enumerate them from east to west, are the Guapore or Itenez, the Baures and Blanco, the Itonama or San Miguel, the Mamore, Beni, and Mayutata or Madre de Dios, all of which are reinforced by numerous secondary but powerful affluents. The Guapore presents many difficulties to continuous navigation; the Baures and Itonama offer hundreds of miles of navigable waters through beautiful plains; the Mamore has been sounded by the writer in the driest month of the year for a distance of 500 m. above Guajara-Merim, who found never less than from 10 to 30 ft. of water, with a current of from 1 to 3 m. an hour. Its Rio Grande branch, explored under the writer’s instructions, was found navigable for craft drawing 3 ft. of water to within 30 m. of Santa Cruz de la Sierra — a level sandy plain intervening. The Grande is a river of enormous length, rising in a great valley of the Andes between the important cities of Sucre and Cochabamba, and having its upper waters in close touch with those of the Pilcomayo branch of the river Paraguay. It makes a long curve through the mountains, and, after a course of about 800 m., joins the Mamore near 15 deg. S. lat. The Chapare, Secure and Chimore, tributaries of the Mamore, are navigable for launches up to the base of the mountains, to within 130 m. of Cochabamba. The Beni has a 12-ft. fall 18 m. above its mouth called “La Esperanza”; beyond this, it is navigable for 217 m. to the port of Reyes for launches in the dry season and larger craft in the wet one. The extreme source of the Beni is the little river La Paz, which rises in the inter-Andean region, a few miles south-east of Lake Titicaca, and flows as a rivulet through the Bolivian city of La Paz. From this point to Reyes the river is a torrent. The principal affluent of the Beni, and one which exceeds it in volume, enters it 120 m. above its mouth, and is known to the Indians along its banks as the Mayutata, but the Peruvians

call it the Madre de Dios. Its ramifications drain the slopes of the Andes between 12 deg. and 15 deg. of latitude. It is navigable in the wet season to within 180 m. of Cuzco. Its upper waters are separated by only a short transitable canoe portage of 7 m. in a straight line from those of the Ucayali. The portage on the eastern side terminates at the Cashpajah river 22 m. above its junction with the Manu. For the first 13 m. it is navigable all the year for craft drawing 18 in. of water, but the remaining 9 m. present many obstacles to navigation. At the Manu junction the elevation above sea-level is 1070 ft., the river width 300 ft., depth 8 ft., current 1 1/4 m. per hour. The general direction of the Manu is south-east for 158 m. as far as the Pilcopata river, where under the name of Madre de Dios it continues with a flow of 22,000 cubic metres per minute. Here its elevation is 718 ft. above the sea and its width 500 ft. During the above course of 158 m. the Manu receives 135 large and small affluents. Although the inclination of its bed is not great, the obstacles to free navigation are abundant, and consist of enormous trees and masses of tree-trunks which have filled the river during the period of freshets.

From the time it receives the Manu, the Madre de Dios carries its immense volume of waters 485 m. to the Beni over the extremely easy slope of a vast and fertile plain. Its banks are low, its bottom pebbly. A greater part of its course is filled with large and small islands some 63 in number. Its average width is about 1500 ft. Below the mouth of the Tambopata, the flow is estimated at 191,250 cubic metres per minute. The average current is 2 1/2 m. per hour. There are two important rapids and one cataract on the lower 300 m. of the river.

The Mayutata receives three principal tributaries from the south — the Tambopata, Inambari and Pilcopata.

The Peruvian government has sought to open a trade route between the Rio Ucayali and the rich rubber districts of the Mayutata. All of the upper branches of the river Madeira find their way to the falls across the open, almost level Mojos and Beni plains, 35,000 sq. m. of which are yearly flooded to an average depth of about 3 ft. for a period of from three to four months. They rival if they do not exceed in fertility the valley of the Nile, and are the healthiest and most inviting agricultural and grazing region of the basin of the Amazon.

The PURUS, a very sluggish river, enters the Amazon west of the Madeira, which it parallels as far south as the falls of the latter stream. It runs through a continuous forest at the bottom of the great depression lying between the Madeira river, which skirts the edge of the Brazilian sandstone plateau, and the Ucayali which hugs the base of the Andes. One of its marked features is the five parallel furos1 which from the north-west at almost regular intervals the Amazon sends to the Purus; the most south-westerly one being about 150 m. above the mouth of the latter river. They cut a great area of very low-lying country into five islands. Farther down the Purfis to the right three smaller furos also connect it with the Amazon. Chandless found its elevation above sea-level to be only 107 ft. 590 m. from its mouth. It is one of the most crooked streams in the world, and its length in a straight line is less than half that by its curves. It is practically only a drainage ditch for the half-submerged, lake-flooded district it traverses. Its width is very uniform for 1000 m. up, and for 800 m. its depth is never less than 45 ft. It is navigable by steamers for 1648 m. as far as the little stream, the Curumaha, but only by light-draft craft. Chandless ascended it 1866 m. At 1792 m. it forks into two small streams. Occasionally a cliff touches the river, but in general the lands are subject to yearly inundations throughout its course, the river rising at times above 50 ft., the numerous lakes to the right and left serving as reservoirs. Its main tributary, the Aquiry or Acre, enters from the right about 1104 m. from the Amazon. Its sources are near those of the Mayutata. It is navigable for a period of about five months of the year, when the Purus valley is inundated; and, for the remaining seven months, only canoes can ascend it sufficiently high to communicate overland with the settlements in the great india-rubber districts of the Mayutata and lower Beni; thus these regions are forced to seek a canoe outlet for their rich products by the very dangerous, costly and laborious route of the falls of the Madeira.

The JURUA is the next great southern affluent of the Amazon west of the Purus, sharing with this the bottom of the immense inland Amazon depression, and having all the characteristics of the Purus as regards curvature, sluggishness and general features of the low, half-flooded forest country it traverses. It rises among the Ucayali highlands, and is navigable and unobstructed for a distance of 1133 m. above its junction with the Amazon.

The Javary, the boundary line between Brazil and Peru, is another Amazon tributary of importance. It is supposed to be navigable by canoe for 900 m. above its mouth to its sources among the Ucayali highlands, but only 260 have been found suitable for steam navigation. The Brazilian Boundary Commission ascended it in 1866 to the junction of the Shino with its Jaquirana branch. The country it traverses in its extremely sinuous course is very level, similar in character to that of the Jurua, and is a fostered wilderness occupied by a few savage hordes.

The UCAYALI, which rises only about 70 m. north of Lake Titicaca, is the most interesting branch of the Amazon next to the Madeira. The Ucayali was first called the San Miguel, then the Ucayali, Ucayare, Poro, Apu-Poro, Cocama and Rio de Cuzco. Peru has fitted out many costly and ably-conducted expeditions to explore it. One of them (1867) claimed to have reached within 240 m. of Lima, and the little steamer “Napo” forced its way up the violent currents for 77 m. above the junction with the Pachitea river as far as the river Tambo, 770 m. from the confluence of the Ucayali with the Amazon. The “Napo” then succeeded in ascending the Urubamba branch of the Ucayali 35 m. above its union with the Tambo, to a point 200 m. north of Cuzco. The remainder of the Urubamba, as shown by Bosquet in 1806 and Castelnau in 1846, is interrupted by cascades, reefs and numberless other obstacles to navigation. Senor Torres, who explored the Alto Ucayali for the Peruvian government, gives it a length of 186 m., counting from the mouth of the Pachitea to the junction of the Tambo and Urubamba. Its width varies from 1300 to 4000 ft., due to the great number of islands. The current runs from 3 to 4 m. an hour, and a channel from 60 to 150 ft. wide can always be found with a minimum depth of 5 ft. There are five bad passes, due to the accumulation of trees and rafts of timber. Sometimes enormous rocks have fallen from the mountains and spread over the river-bed causing huge whirlpools. “No greater difficulties present themselves to navigation by 10-knot steamers drawing 4 ft. of water.”

The TAMBO, which rises in the Vilcanota knot of mountains south of Cuzco, is a torrential stream valueless for commercial purposes. The banks of the Ucayali for 500 m. up are low, and in the rainy season extensively inundated.

The HUALLAGA (also known as the Guallaga and Rio de los Motilones), which joins the Amazon to the west of the Ucayali, rises high among the mountains, in about 10 deg. 40′ S. lat., on the northern slopes of the celebrated Cerro de Pasco. For nearly its entire length it is an impetuous torrent running through a succession of gorges. It has forty-two rapids, its last obstruction being the Pongo de Aguirre, so called from the traitor Aguirre who passed there. To this point, 140 m. from the Amazon, the Huallaga can be ascended by large river steamers. Between the Huallaga and the Ucayali lies the famous “Pampa del Sacramento,” a level region of stoneless alluvial lands covered with thick, dark forests, first entered by the missionaries in 1726. It is about 300 m. long, from north to south, and varies in width from 40 to 100 m. Many streams, navigable for canoes, penetrate this region from the Ucayali and the Huallaga. It is still occupied by savage tribes.

The river MARANON rises about 100 m. to the north-east of Lima. It flows through a deeply-eroded Andean valley in a north-west direction, along the eastern base of the Cordillera of the Andes, as far as 5 deg. 36′ S. lat.; then it makes a great bend to the north-east, and with irresistible power cuts through the inland Andes, until at the Pongo de Manseriche2 it victoriously breaks away from the mountains to flow onwards through the plains under the name of the Amazon. Barred by reefs, and full of rapids and impetuous currents, it cannot become a commercial avenue. At the point where it makes its great bend the river Chinchipe pours into it from southern Ecuador. Just below this the mountains close in on either side of the Marapon, forming narrows or pongos for a length of 35 m., where, besides numerous whirlpools, there are no less than thirty-five formidable rapids, the series concluding with three cataracts just before reaching the river Imasa or Chunchunga, near the mouth of which La Condamine embarked in the 18th century to descend the Amazon. Here the general level of the country begins to decrease in elevation, with only a few mountain spurs, which from time to time push as far as the river and form pongos of minor importance and less dangerous to descend. Finally, after passing the narrows of Guaracayo, the cerros gradually disappear, and for a distance of about 20 m. the river is full of islands, and there is nothing visible from its low banks but an immense forest-covered plain. But the last barrier has yet to be passed, the Pongo de Manseriche, 3 m. long, just below the mouth of the Rio Santiago, and between it and the old abandoned missionary station of Borja, in 38 deg. 30′ S. lat. and 77 deg. 30′ 40” W. long. According to Captain Carbajal, who descended it in the little steamer “Napo,’ in 1868, it is a vast rent in the Andes about 2000 ft. deep, narrowing in places to a width of only 100 ft., the precipices “seeming to close in at the top.” Through this dark canon the Maranon leaps along, at times, at the rate of 12 m. an hour3. The Pongo de Manseriche was first discovered by the Adelantado Joan de Salinas. He fitted out an expedition at Loxa in Ecuador, descended the Rio Santiago to the Maranon, passed through the perilous Pongo in 1557 and invaded the country of the Maynas Indians. Later, the missionaries of Cuenca and Quito established many missions in the Pais de los Maynas, and made extensive use of the Pongo de Manseriche as an avenue of communication with their several convents on the Andean plateau. According to their accounts, the huge rent in the Andes, the Pongo, is about five or six m. long, and in places not more than 80 ft. wide, and is a frightful series of torrents and whirlpools interspersed with rocks. There is an ancient tradition of the savages of the vicinity that one of their gods descending the Maranon and another ascending the Amazon to communicate with him, they opened the pass called the Pongo de Manseriche. From the northern slope of its basin the Amazon receives many tributaries, but their combined volume of water is not nearly so great as that contributed to the parent stream by its affluents from the south. That part of Brazil lying between the Amazon and French, Dutch and British Guiana, and bounded on the west by the Rio Negro, is known as Brazilian Guiana. It is the southern watershed of a tortuous, low chain of mountains running, roughly, east and west. Their northern slope, which is occupied by the three Guianas first named, is saturated and river-torn; but their southern one, Brazilian Guiana, is in general thirsty and semi-barren, and the driest region of the Amazon valley. It is an area which has been left almost in the undisturbed possession of nomadic Indian tribes, whose scanty numbers find it difficult to solve the food problem. From the divortium aquarum between French Guiana and Brazil, known as the Tumuc-humac range of highlands, two minor streams, the Yary and the Parou, reach the Amazon across the intervening broken and barren tableland. They are full of rapids and reefs.

The TROMBETAS is the first river of importance we meet on the northern side as we ascend the Amazon. Its confluence with this is just above the town of Obidos. It has its sources in the Guiana highlands, but its long course is frequently interrupted by violent currents, rocky barriers, and rapids. The inferior zone of the river, as far up as the first fall, the Porteira, has but little broken water and is low and swampy; but above the long series of cataracts and rapids the character and aspect of the valley completely change, and the climate is much better. The river is navigable for 135 m. above its mouth.

The NEGRO, the great northern tributary of the Amazon, has its sources along the watershed between the Orinoco and the Amazon basins, and also connects with the Orinoco by way of the Casiquiare canal. Its main affluent is the Uaupes, which disputes with the headwaters of the Guaviari branch of the Orinoco the drainage of the eastern slope of the “Oriental’, Andes of Colombia. The Negro is navigable for 450 m. above its mouth for 4 ft. of water in the dry season, but it has many sandbanks and minor difficulties. In the wet season, it overflows the country far and wide, sometimes to a breadth of 20 m., for long distances, and for 400 m. up, as far as Santa Isabella, is a succession of lagoons, full of long islands and intricate channels, and the slope of the country is so gentle that the river has almost no current. But just before reaching the Uaupes there is a long series of reefs, over which it violently flows in cataracts, rapids and whirlpools. The Uaupes is full of similar obstacles, some fifty rapids barring its navigation, although a long stretch of its upper course is said to be free from them, and to flow gently through a forested country. Despite the impediments, canoes ascend this stream to the Andes.

The Branco is the principal affluent of the Negro from the north; it is enriched by many streams from the sierras which separate Venezuela and British Guiana from Brazil. Its two upper main tributaries are the Urariquira and the Takutu. The latter almost links its sources with those of the Essequibo. The Branco flows nearly south, and finds its way into the Negro through several channels and a chain of lagoons similar to those of the latter river. It is 350 m. long, up to its Urariquira confluence. It has numerous islands, and, 235 m. above its mouth, it is broken by a bad series of rapids.

CASIQUIARE CANAL. In 1744 the Jesuit Father Roman, while ascending the Orinoco river, met some Portuguese slave-traders from the settlements on the Rio Negro. He accompanied them on their return, by way of the Casiquiare canal, and afterwards retraced his route to the Orinoco. La Condamine, seven months later, was able to give to the French Academy an account of Father Roman’s extraordinary voyage, and thus confirm the existence of this wonderful waterway first reported by Father Acuna in 1639. But little credence was given to Father Roman’s statement until it was verified, in 1756, by the Spanish Boundary-line Commission of Yturriaga y Solano. The actual elevation of the canal above sea-level is not known, but is of primary importance to the study of the hydrography of South America. Travellers in general give it at from 400 to 900 ft., but, after much study of the question of altitudes throughout South America, the writer believes that it does not exceed 300 ft. The canal connects the upper Orinoco, 9 m. below the mission of Esmeraldas, with the Rio Negro affluent of the Amazon near the town of San Carlos. The general course is south-west, and its length, including windings, is about 200 m. Its width, at its bifurcation with the Orinoco, is approximately 300 ft., with a current towards the Negro of three-quarters of a mile an hour; but as it gains in volume from the very numerous tributary streams, large and small, which it receives en route, its velocity increases, and in the wet season reaches 5 and even 8 m. an hour in certain stretches. It broadens considerably as it approaches its mouth, where it is about 1750 ft. in width. It will thus be seen that the volume of water it captures from the Orinoco is small in comparison to what it accumulates in its course. In flood-time it is said to have a second connexion with the Rio Negro by a branch which it throws off to the westward called the Itinivini, which leaves it at a point about 50 m. above its mouth. In the dry season it has shallows, and is obstructed by sandbanks, a few rapids and granite rocks. Its shores are densely wooded, and the soil more fertile than that along the Rio Negro. The general slope of the plains through which the canal runs is south-west, but those of the Rio Negro slope south-east. The whole line of the Casiquiare is infested with myriads of tormenting insects. A few miserable groups of Indians and half-breeds have their small villages along its southern portion. It is thus seen that this marvellous freak of nature is not, as is generally supposed, a sluggish canal on a flat tableland, but a great, rapid river which, if its upper waters had not found contact with the Orinoco, perhaps by cutting back, would belong entirely to the Negro branch of the Amazon. To the west of the Casiquiare there is a much shorter and more facile connexion between the Orinoco and Amazon basins, called the isthmus of Pimichin, which is reached by ascending the Terni branch of the Atabapo affluent of the Orinoco. Although the Terni is somewhat obstructed, it is believed that it could easily be made navigable for small craft. The isthmus is 10 m. across, with undulating ground, nowhere over 50 ft. high, with swamps and marshes. It is much used for the transit of large canoes, which are hauled across it from the Terni river, and which reach the Negro by the little stream called the Pimichin.

The YAPURA. West of the Negro the Amazon receives three more imposing streams from the north-west — the Yapura, the Ica or Putumayo, and the Napo. The first was formerly known as the Hyapora, but its Brazilian part is now called the Yapura, and its Colombian portion the Caqueta. Barao de Marajo gives it 600 m. of navigable stretches. Jules Crevaux, who descended it, describes it as full of obstacles to navigation, the current very strong and the stream frequently interrupted by rapids and cataracts. It rises in the Colombian Andes, nearly in touch with the sources of the Magdalena, and augments its volume from many branches as it courses through Colombia. It was long supposed to have eight mouths; but Ribeiro de Sampaio, in his voyage of 1774, determined that there was but one real mouth, and that the supposed others are all furos or canos4 In 1864-1868 the Brazilian government made a somewhat careful examination of the Brazilian part of the river, as far up as the rapid of Cupaty. Several very easy and almost complete water-routes exist between the Yapura and Negro across the low, flat intervening country. Barao de Marajo says there are six of them, and one which connects the upper Yapura with the Uaupes branch of the Negro; thus the Indian tribes of the respective valleys have facile contact with each other.

The ICA or PUTUMAYO, west of and parallel to the Yapura, was found more agreeable to navigate by Crevaux. He ascended it in a steamer drawing 6 ft. of water, and running day and night. He reached Cuemby, 800 m. above its mouth, without finding a single rapid. Cuemby is only 200 m. from the Pacific Ocean, in a straight line, passing through the town of Pasto in southern Colombia. There was not a stone to be seen up to the base of the Andes; the river banks were of argillaceous earth and the bottom of fine sand.

The NAPO rises on the flanks of the volcanoes of Antisana, Sincholagua and Cotopaxi. Before it reaches the plains it receives a great number of small streams from impenetrable, saturated and much broken mountainous districts, where the dense and varied vegetation seems to fight for every square foot of ground. From the north it is joined by the river Coca, having its sources in the gorges of Cayambe on the equator, and also a powerful river, the Aguarico, having its headwaters between Cayambe and the Colombian frontier. From the west it receives a secondary tributary, the Curaray, from the Andean slopes, between Cotopaxi and the volcano of Tunguragua. From its Coca branch to the mouth of the Curaray the Napo is full of snags and shelving sandbanks, and throws out numerous canos among jungle-tangled islands, which in the wet season are flooded, giving the river an immense width. From the Coca to the Amazon it runs through a forested plain where not a hill is visible from the river — its uniformly level banks being only interrupted by swamps and lagoons. From the Amazon the Napo is navigable for river craft up to its Curaray branch, a distance of about 216 m., and perhaps a few miles farther; thence, by painful canoe navigation, its upper waters may be ascended as far as Santa Rosa, the usual point of embarkation for any venturesome traveller who descends from the Quito tableland. The Coca river may be penetrated as far up as its middle course, where it is jammed between two mountain walls, in a deep canyon, along which it dashes over high falls and numerous reefs. This is the stream made famous by the expedition of Gonzalo Pizarro.

The NANAY is the next Amazon tributary of importance west of the Napo. It belongs entirely to the lowlands, and is very crooked, has a slow current and divides much into canos and strings of lagoons which flood the flat, low areas of country on either side. It is simply the drainage ditch of districts which are extensively overflowed in the rainy season. Captain Butt ascended it 195 m., to near its source.

The TIGRE is the next west of the Nanay, and is navigable for 125 m. from its confluence with the Amazon. Like the Nanay, it belongs wholly to the plains. Its mouth is 42 m. west of the junction of the Ucayali with the Amazon. Continuing west from the Tigre we have the Parinari, Chambira, and Nucuray, all short lowland streams, resembling the Nanay in character.

The PASTAZA (the ancient river Sumatara) is the next large river we meet. It rises on the Ecuadorian tableland, where a branch from the valley of Riobamba unites with one from the Latacunga basin and breaks through the inland range of the Andes; and joined, afterwards, by several important tributaries, finds its way south-east among the gorges; thence it turns southward into the plains, and enters the Amazon at a point about 60 m. west of the mouth of the Huallaga. So far as known, it is a stream of no value except for canoe navigation. Its rise and fall are rapid and uncertain, and it is shallow and full of sandbanks and snags. It is a terrible river when in flood.

The MORONA flows parallel to the Pastaza and immediately to the west of it, and is the last stream of any importance on the northern side of the Amazon before reaching the Pongo de Manseriche. It is formed from a multitude of water-courses which descend the slopes of the Ecuadorian Andes south of the gigantic volcano of Sangay; but it soon reaches the plain, which commences where it receives its Cusulima branch. The MORONA is navigable for small craft for about 300 m. above its mouth, but it is extremely tortuous. Canoes may ascend many of its branches, especially the Cusuhma and the Miazal, the latter almost to the base of Sangay. The Morona has been the scene of many rude explorations, with the hope of finding it serviceable as a commercial route between the inter-Andean tableland of Ecuador and the Amazon river. A river called the Paute dashes through the eastern Andes from the valley of Cuenca; and a second, the Zamora, has broken through the same range from the basin of Loja. Swollen by their many affluents, they reach the lowlands and unite their waters to form the Santiago, which flows into the Maranon at the head of the Pongo de Manseriche. There is but little known of a trustworthy character regarding this river, but Wolf says that it is probably navigable up to the junction of the Paute with the Zamora.

The Main River.

Physical characteristics.

The AMAZON MAIN RIVER is navigable for ocean steamers as far as Iquitos, 2300 m. from the sea, and 486 m. higher up for vessels drawing 14 ft. of water, as far as Achual Point. Beyond that, according to Tucker, confirmed by Wertheman, it is unsafe; but small steamers frequently ascend to the Pongo de Manseriche, just above Achual Point The average current of the Amazon is about 3 m. an hour; but, especially in flood, it dashes through some of its contracted channels at the rate of 5 m. The U.S. steamer “Wilmington” ascended it to Iquitos in 1899. Commander Todd reports that the average depth of the river in the height of the rainy season is 120 ft. It commences to rise in November, and increases in volume until June, and then falls until the end of October. The rise of the Negro branch is not synchronous; for the steady rains do not commence in its valley until February or March. By June it is full, and then it begins to fall with the Amazon. According to Bates, the Madeira “rises and sinks” two months earlier than the Amazon. The Amazon at times broadens to 4 and 6 m. Occasionally, for long distances, it divides into two main streams with inland, lateral channels, all connected by a complicated system of natural canals, cutting the low, flat igapo lands, which are never more than 15 ft. above low river, into almost numberless islands.5 At the narrows of Obidos, 400 m. from the sea, it is compressed into a single bed a mile wide and over 200 ft. deep, through which the water rushes at the rate of 4 to 5 m. an hour. In the rainy season it inundates the country throughout its course to the extent of several hundred thousand square miles, covering the flood-plain, called vargem. The flood-levels are in places from 40 to 50 ft. high above low river. Taking four roughly equidistant places, the rise at Iquitos is 20 ft., at Teffe 45, near Obidos 35, and at Para 12 ft.

The first high land met in ascending the river is on the north bank, opposite the mouth of the Xingu, and extends for about 150 m. up, as far as Monte Alegre. It is a series of steep, table-topped hills, cut down to a kind of terrace which lies between them and the river. Monte Alegre reaches an altitude of several hundred feet. On the south side, above the Xingu, a line of low bluffs extends, in a series of gentle curves with hardly any breaks nearly to Santarem, but a considerable distance inland, bordering the flood-plain, which is many miles wide. Then they bend to the south-west, and, abutting upon the lower Tapajos, merge into the bluffs which form the terrace margin of that river valley. The next high land on the north side is Obidos, a bluff, 56 ft. above the river, backed by low hills. From Serpa, nearly opposite the river Madeira, to near the mouth of the Rio Negro, the banks are low, until approaching Manaos, they are rolling hills; but from the Negro, for 600 m. as far up as the village of Canaria, at the great bend of the Amazon, only very low land is found, resembling that at the mouth of the river. Vast areas of it are submerged athigh water, above which only the upper part of the trees of the sombre forests appear. At Canaria, the high land commences and continues as far as Tabatinga, and thence up stream.

On the south side, from the Tapajos to the river Madeira, the banks are usually low, although two or three hills break the general monotony. From the latter river, however, to the Ucayali, a distance of nearly 1500 m., the forested banks are just out of water, and are inundated long before the river attains its maximum flood-line. Thence to the Huallaga the elevation of the land is somewhat greater; but not until this river is passed, and the Pongo de Manseriche approached, does the swelling ground of the Andean foot-hills raise the country above flood-level.

The Amazon is not a continuous incline, but probably consists of long, level stretches connected by short inclined planes of extremely little fall, sufficient, however, owing to its great depth, to give the gigantic volume of water a continuous impulse towards the ocean. The lower Amazon presents every evidence of having once been an ocean gulf, the upper waters of which washed the cliffs near Obidos. Only about 10% of the water discharged by the mighty stream enters it below Obidos, very little of which is from the northern slope of the valley. The drainage area of the Amazon basin above Obidos is about 1,945,000 sq. m., and, below, only about 423,000 sq. m., or say 20%, exclusive of the 554,000 sq. m. of the Tocantins basin.

The width of the mouth of the monarch river is usually measured from Cabo do Norte to Punto Patijoca, a distance of 207 statute m.; but this includes the ocean outlet, 40 m. wide, of the Para river, which should be deducted, as this stream is only the lower reach of the Tocantins. It also includes the ocean frontage of Marajo, an island about the size of the kingdom of Denmark lying in the mouth of the Amazon.

Following the coast, a little to the north of Cabo do Norte, and for 100 m. along its Guiana margin up the Amazon, is a belt of half-submerged islands and shallow sandbanks. Here the tidal phenomenon called the bore, or Pororoca, occurs, where the soundings are not over 4 fathoms. It commences with a roar, constantly increasing, and advances at the rate of from 10 to 15 m. an hour, with a breaking wall of water from 5 to 12 ft. high. Under such conditions of warfare between the ocean and the river, it is not surprising that the former is rapidly eating away the coast and that the vast volume of silt carried by the Amazon finds it impossible to build up a delta.

The Amazon is not so much a river as it is a gigantic reservoir, extending from the sea to the base of the Andes, and, in the wet season, varying in width from 5 to 400 m. Special attention has already been called to the fourteen great streams which discharge into this reservoir, but it receives a multitude of secondary rivers, which in any other part of the wodd would also be termed great.

Population, trace, &c.

For 350 years after the discovery of the Amazon, by Pinzon, the Portuguese portion of its basin remained almost an undisturbed wilderness, occupied by Indian tribes whom the food quest had split into countless fragments. It is doubtful if its indigenous inhabitants ever exceeded one to every 5 sq. m. of territory, this being the maximum it could support under the existing conditions of the period in question, and taking into account Indian methods of life. A few settlements on the banks of the main river and some of its tributaries, either for trade with the Indians or for evangelizing purposes, had been founded by the Portuguese pioneers of European civilization. The total population of the Brazilian portion of the Amazon basin in 1850 was perhaps 300,000, of whom about two-thirds were white and slaves, the latter numbering about 25,000. The principal commercial city, Para, had from 10,000 to 12,000 inhabitants, including slaves. The town of Manaos, at the mouth of the Rio Negro, had from 1000 to 1500 population; but all the remaining villages, as far up as Tabatinga, on the Brazilian frontier of Peru, were wretched little groups of houses which appeared to have timidly effected a lodgment on the river bank, as if they feared to challenge the mysteries of the sombre and gigantic forests behind them. The value of the export and import trade of the whole valley in 1850 was but

On the 6th of September 1850 the emperor, Dom Pedro II., sanctioned a law authorizing steam navigation on the Amazon, and confided to an illustrious Brazilian, Barao Maua (Irineu Evangilista de Sousa), the task of carrying it into effect. He organized the “Compania de Navigacao e Commercio do Amazonas” at Rio de Janeiro in 1852; and in the following year it commenced operations with three small steamers, the “Monarch,” the “Marajo” and “Rio Negro.” At first the navigation was principally confined to the main river; and even in 1857 a modification of the government contract only obliged the company to a monthly service between Para and Manaos, with steamers of 200 tons cargo capacity, a second line to make six round voyages a year between Manaos and Tabatinga, and a third, two trips a month between Para and Cameta. The government paid the company a subvention of L. 3935 monthly. Thus the first impulse of modern progress was given to the dormant valley. The success of the venture called attention to the unoccupied field; a second company soon opened commerce on the Madeira, Purus and Negro; a third established a line between Para and Manaos; and a fourth found it profitable to navigate some of the smaller streams; while, in the interval, the Amazonas Company had largely increased its fine fleet. Meanwhile private individuals were building and running small steam craft of their own, not only upon the main river but upon many of its affluents. The government of Brazil, constantly pressed by the maritime powers and by the countries encircling the upper Amazon basin, decreed, on the 31st of July 1867, the opening of the Amazon to all flags; but limited this to certain defined points — Tabatinga, on the Amazon; Cameta, on the Tocantins; Santarem, on the Tapajos; Borba, on the Madeira; Manaos, on the Rio Negro; the decree to take effect on the 7th of September of the same year. Para, Manaos and Iquitos are now thriving commercial centres. The first direct foreign trade with Manaos was commenced about 1874.

The local trade of the river is carried on by the English successors to the Amazonas Company — the Amazon Steam Navigation Company. In addition to its excellent fleet there are numerous small river steamers, belonging to companies and firms engaged in the rubber trade, navigating the Negro, Madeira, Purfis and many other streams. The principal exports of the valley are india-rubber, cacao, Brazil nuts and a few other products of very minor importance. The finest quality of india-rubber comes from the Acre and Beni districts of Bolivia, especially from the valley of the Acre (or Aquiry) branch of the river Purus. Of the rubber production of the Amazon basin, the state of Para gives about 35%. The cacao tree is not cultivated, but grows wild in great abundance. There is but one railway in the whole valley; it is a short line from Para towards the coast. The cities of Para and Manaos have excellent tramways, many fine public buildings and private residences, gardens and public squares, all of which give evidence of artistic taste and great prosperity.

The number of inhabitants in the Brazilian Amazon basin (the states of Amazonas and Para) is purely a matter of rough estimate. There may be 500,000 or 600,000, or more; for the immigration during recent years from the other parts of Brazil has been large, due to the rubber excitement. The influx from the state of Ceara alone, from 1892 to 1899 inclusive, reached 98,348.

As Commander Todd, in his report to the United States government, says: “The crying need of the Amazon valley is food for the people…. At the small towns along the river it is nearly impossible to obtain beef, vegetables, or fruit of any sort, and the inhabitants depend largely upon river fish, mandioc, and canned goods for their subsistence.” Although more than four centuries have passed since the discovery of the Amazon river, there are probably not 25 sq. m. of its basin under cultivation, excluding the limited and rudely cultivated areas among the mountains at its extreme headwaters, which are inaccessible to commerce. The extensive exports of the mighty valley are almost entirely derived from the products of the forest. (G. E. C.)

1 A furo is a natural canal — sometimes merely a deviation from the main channel, which it ultimately rejoins, sometimes a connexion across low flat country between two entirely separate streams.

2 Pongo is a corruption of the Quichua puncu and the Aymara ponco, meaning a door. The Pongo de Manseriche was first named Maranon, then Santiago, and later Manseric, afterwards Mansariche and Manseriche, owing to the great numbers of parrakeets found on the rocks there.

3 One of the most daring deeds of exoloration ever known in South America was done by the engineer A. Wertheman. He fitted out three rafts, in August 1870, and descended this whole series of rapids and cascades from the Rio Chinchipe to Borja.

4 A cano, like furo, is a kind of natural canal; it forms a lateral discharge for surplus water from a river.

5 Igapo is thus the name given to the recent alluvial tracts along the margins of rivers, submerged by moderate floods, whereas vargem is the term used for land between the levels of moderate and high floods, while for land above this the people use the term terra firma.

AMAZONAS, the extreme north-western and largest state of Brazil, bounded N. by Colombia and Venezuela, E. by the state of Para, S. by the state of Matto Grosso and Bolivia, and W. by Peru and Colombia. It embraces an area of 742,123 sq. m., wholly within the Amazon basin. A small part bordering the Venezuelan sierras is elevated and mountainous, but the greater part forms an immense alluvial plain, densely wooded, traversed by innumerable rivers, and subjected to extensive annual inundations. The climate is tropical and generally unfavourable to white settlement, the exceptions being the elevated localities on the Amazon exposed to the strong winds blowing up that river. The state is very sparsely populated; two-thirds of the inhabitants are Indians, forming small tribes, and subject only in small part to government control. The principal products are rubber, cacao and nuts; cattle are raised on the elevated plains of the north, while curing fish and collecting turtle eggs for their oil give occupation to many people on the rivers. Coffee, tobacco, rice and various fruits of superior quality are produced with ease, but agriculture is neglected and production is limited to domestic needs. The capital, Manaos, is the only city and port of general commercial importance in the state; other prominent towns are Serpa and Teffe on the Amazon, Borba and Crato on the Madeira, and Barcellos on the Rio Negro. Up to 1755 all the Portuguese territory on the Amazon formed part of the capitania of Para. The upper districts were then organized into a separate capitania, called S. Jose do Rio Negro, to facilitate administration. When Brazil became independent in 1822, Rio Negro was overlooked in the reorganization into provinces and reverted, notwithstanding the protests and an attempted revolution (1832) of the people, to a state of dependence upon Para. In 1850 autonomy was voted by the general assembly at Rio de Janeiro, and on the 1st of January 1852 the province of Amazonas was formally installed. In 1389 it became a federal state in the Brazilian republic.

AMAZONAS, a northern department of Peru, covering a mountainous district between the departments of Loreto and Cajamarca, with Ecuador on the N. The Maranon river forms the greater part of its W. boundary-line. Area, 13,943 sq. m.; pop. (1896) 70,676. The rainfall is abundant, and the soil of the heavily wooded valleys and lower mountain slopes is exceptionally fertile and productive. Its settlement and development is seriously impeded by the lack of transportation facilities. The capital, Chachapoyas, is a small town (pop. about 6000) situated on a tributary of the Maranon, 7600 ft. above sea-level. It is the seat of a bishopric, created in 1802, which covers the departments of Amazonas and Loreto, and one province of Libertad. It has an imposing cathedral and a university. The climate is equable and delightful, the mean temperature for the year being 62 deg. F.

AMAZONAS, a territory belonging to Venezuela, and occupying the extreme southern part of that republic, adjoining the Brazilian state of Amazonas. It lies partly within the drainage basin of the Orinoco and partly within that of the Rio Negro, an affluent of the Amazon. The territory is covered with dense forests and is filled with intricate watercourses, one of which, the Casiquiare, forms an open communication between the Orinoco and the Rio Negro and is navigable for large canoes. The capital of the territory is Maroa, situated on the Guainia river, an affluent of the Rio Negro.

AMAZONS, an ancient legendary nation of female warriors. They were said to have lived in Pontus near the shore of the

Euxine sea, where they formed an independent kingdom under the government of a queen, the capital being Themiscyra on the banks of the river Thermodon (Herodotus iv. 110-117). From this centre they made numerous warlike excursions — to Scythia, Thrace, the coasts of Asia Minor and the islands of the Aegean, even penetrating to Arabia, Syria and Egypt. They were supposed to have founded many towns, amongst them Smyrna, Ephesus, Sinope, Paphos. According to another account, they originally came to the Thermodon from the Palus Maeotis (Sea of Azov). No men were permitted to reside in their country; but once a year, in order to prevent their race from dying out, they visited the Gargareans, a neighbouring tribe. The male children who were the result of these visits were either put to death or sent back to their fathers; the female were kept and brought up by their mothers, and trained in agricultural pursuits, hunting, and the art of war (Strabo xi. p. 503). It is said that their right breast was cut off or burnt out, in order that they might be able to use the bow more freely; hence the ancient derivation of ‘Amaxones from mafos, “without breast.” But there is no indication of this practice in works of art, in which the Amazons are always represented with both breasts, although the right is frequently covered. Other suggested derivations are: a (intensive) and mafos, breast, “full-breasted”; a (privative) and masso, touch, “not touching men”; maza, a Circassian word said to signify “moon,” has suggested their connexion with the worship of a moon- goddess, perhaps the Asiatic representative of Artemis.

The Amazons appear in connexion with several Greek legends. They invaded Lycia, but were defeated by Bellerophon, who was sent out against them by Iobates, the king of that country, in the hope that he might meet his death at their hands (Iliad, vi. 186). They attacked the Phrygians, who were assisted by Priam, then a young man (Iliad, iii. 189), although in his later years, towards the end of the Trojan war, his old opponents took his side against the Greeks under their queen Penthesileia, who was slain by Achilles (Quint. Smyr. i.; Justin ii. 4; Virgil, Aen. i. 490). One of the tasks imposed upon Heracles by Eurystheus was to obtain possession of the girdle of the Amazonian queen Hippolyte (Apollodorus ii. 5). He was accompanied by his friend Theseus, who carried off the princess Antiope, sister of Hippolyte, an incident which led to a retaliatory invasion of Attica, in which Antiope perished fighting by the side of Theseus. The Amazons are also said to have undertaken an expedition against the island of Leuke, at the mouth of the Danube, where the ashes of Achilles had been deposited by Thetis. The ghost of the dead hero appeared and so terrified the horses, that they threw and trampled upon the invaders, who were forced to retire. They are heard of in the time of Alexander the Great, when their queen Thalestris visited him and became a mother by him, and Pompey is said to have found them in the army of Mithradates.

The origin of the story of the Amazons has been the subject of much discussion. While some regard them as a purely mythical people, others assume an historical foundation for them. The deities worshipped by them were Ares (who is consistently assigned to them as a god of war, and as a god of Thracian and generally northern origin) and Artemis, not the usual Greek goddess of that name, but an Asiatic deity in some respects her equivalent. It is conjectured that the Amazons were originally the temple-servants and priestesses (hierodulae) of this goddess; and that the removal of the breast corresponded with the self-mutilation of the galli, or priests, of Rhea Cybele. Another theory is that, as the knowledge of geography extended, travellers brought back reports of tribes ruled entirely by women, who carried out the duties which elsewhere were regarded as peculiar to man, in whom alone the rights of nobility and inheritance were vested, and who had the supreme control of affairs. Hence arose the belief in the Amazons as a nation of female warriors, organized and governed entirely by women. According to J. Vurtheim (De Ajacis origine, 1907), the Amazons were of Greek origin: “all the Amazons were Dianas, as Diana herself was an Amazon.” It has been suggested that the fact of the conquest of the Amazons being assigned to the two famous heroes of Greek mythology, Heracles and Theseus — who in the tasks assigned to them were generally opposed to monsters and beings impossible in themselves, but possible as illustrations of permanent danger and damage, — shows that they were mythical illustrations of the dangers which beset the Greeks on the coasts of Asia Minor; rather perhaps, it may be intended to represent the conflict between the Greek culture of the colonies on the Euxine and the barbarism of the native inhabitants.

In works of art, combats between Amazons and Greeks are placed on the same level as and often associated with combats of Greeks and centaurs. The belief in their existence, however, having been once accepted and introduced into the national poetry and art, it became necessary to surround them as far as possible with the appearance of not unnatural beings. Their occupation was hunting and war; their arms the bow, spear, axe, a half shield, nearly in the shape of a crescent, called pelta, and in early art a helmet, the model before the Greek mind having apparently been the goddess Athena. In later art they approach the model of Artemis, wearing a thin dress, girt high for speed; while on the later painted vases their dress is often peculiarly Persian — that is, close-fitting trousers and a high cap called the kidaris. They were usually on horseback but sometimes on foot. The battle between Theseus and the Amazons is a favourite subject on the friezes of temples (e.g. the reliefs from the frieze of the temple of Apollo at Bassae, now in the British Museum), vases and sarcophagus reliefs; at Athens it was represented on the shield of the statue of Athena Parthenos, on wall-paintings in the Theseum and in the Poikile Stoa. Many of the sculptors of antiquity, including Pheidias, Polyclitus, Cresilas and Phradmon, executed statues of Amazons; and there are many existing reproductions of these.

The history of Bohemia affords a parallel to the Greek Amazons. During the 8th century a large band of women, under a certain Vlasta, carried on war against the duke of Bohemia, and enslaved or put to death all men who fell into their hands. In the 16th century the Spanish explorer Orellana asserted that he had come into conflict with fighting women in South America on the river Maranon, which was named after them the Amazon (q.v.) or river of the Amazons, although others derive its name from the Indian amassona (boat-destroyer), applied to the tidal phenomenon known as the “bore.” The existence of “Amazons” (in the sense of fighting women) in the army of Dahomey in modern times is an undoubted fact, but they are said to have died out during the French protectorate. For notable cases of women who have become soldiers, reference may be made to Mary Anne Talbot and Hannah Snell.

See A. D. Mordtmann, Die Amazonen (1862); W. Stricker, Die A. in Sage und Geschichte (1868); A. Klugmann, Die A. in der attischen Literatur und Kunst (1875); H. L. Krause, Die Amazonensage (1893); F. G. Bergmann, Les Amazones dans l’histoire et dans la fable (1853); P. Lacour, Les Amazones (1901); articles in Pauly- Wissowa’s Realencyclopadie and Roscher’s Lexikon der Mythologie; Grote, Hist. of Greece, pt. i. ch. 11. In article GREEK ART, fig. 40 represents three types of Amazons, and fig. 70 (pl. iv.) a battle between Amazons and Greeks.

AMAZON-STONE, or AMAZONITE, a green variety of microcline- felspar. The name is taken from that of the river Amazon, whence certain green stones were formedy obtained, but it is doubtful whether green felspar occurs in the Amazon district. The modern amazon-stone is a mineral of restricted occurrence. Formerly it was obtained almost exclusively from the neighbourhood of Miyask, in the Ilmen mountains, 50 m. S.W. of Chehabinsk, Russia, where it occurs in granitic rocks. Of late years, magnificent crystals have been obtained from Pike’s Peak, Colorado, where it is found associated with smoky quartz, orthoclase and albite in a coarse granite or pegmatite. Some other localities in the United States yield amazon-stone, and it is also found in pegmatite in Madagascar. On account of its lively green colour, it is cut and polished to a limited extent as an ornamental stone. The colour has been attributed to the presence of copper, but as it is discharged by heat it is likely

to be due to some pigment of organic origin, and an organic salt of iron has been suggested. (See MICROCLINE.)

AMBARVALIA, an annual festival of the ancient Romans, occurring in May, usually on the 29th, the object of which was to secure the growing crops against harm of all kinds. The priests were the Arval Brothers (q.v.), who conducted the victims — ox, sheep and pig (suovetaurilia) — in procession with prayer to Ceres round the boundaries of the ager Romanus. As the extent of Roman land increased, this could no longer be done, and in the Acta of the Fratres, which date from Augustus, we do not find this procession mentioned (Henzen, Acta Fratrum Arvalium, 1874); but there is a good description of this or a similar rite in Virgil, Georg. i. 338 ff., and in Cato’s work de Re Rustica (141) we have full details and the text of the prayers used by the Latin farmer in thus “lustrating” his own land. In this last case the god invoked is Mars. The Christian festival which seems to have taken the place of these ceremonies is the Rogation or Gang week of the Roman Church. The perambulation or beatinc of bounds is probably a survival of the same type of rite.

See W. W. Fowler, Roman Festivals (1899), p. 124 ff. (W. W. F.*) AMBASSADOR (also EMBASSADOR, the form sometimes still used in America; from the Fr. ambassadeur, with which compare Ital. ambasciatore and Span. embajador, all variants of the Med. Lat. ambasciator, ambassiator, ambasator, &c., derived from Med. Lat. ambasciare or ambactiare, “to go on a mission, to do or say anything in another’s name,” from Lat. ambactus,1 a vassal or servant; see Du Cange, Glossarium, s.v. ambasciare), a public minister of the first rank, accredited and sent by the head of a sovereign state as his personal representative to negotiate with a foreign government, and to watch over the interests of his own nation abroad. The power thus conferred is defined in the credentials or letters of credence of which the ambassador is the bearer, and in the instructions under the sign-manual delivered to him. The credentials consist of a sealed letter addressed by the sovereign whom the ambassador represents to the sovereign to whom he is accredited, and they embody a general assurance that the sovereign by whom the ambassador is sent will confirm whatever is done by the ambassador in his name. In Great Britain letters of credence are under the royal sign-manual, and are not countersigned by a minister. Ambassadors are distinguished as ordinary and extraordinary, which implied originally the difference between a permanent mission and one appointed to conduct a particular negotiation. The style of ambassador extraordinary is, however, now often given to a minister accredited to a court for an indefinite time and implies a somewhat more dignified rank.

By the protocol of the 19th of March 1815, afterwards embodied in the treaty of Vienna (1815) and confirmed by an instrument signed by the five great powers at Aix-la-Chapelle on the 21st of November 1818, it was finally determined that “ambassadors and papal legates and nuncios alone have a representative character,” i.e. in the most exalted and peculiar sense, as representing the person of the sovereign, or the head of a republic, as well as the state to which they belong. It follows that only states enjoying “royal honours,” i.e. empires, kingdoms, grand duchies, the great republics (e.g. France, Switzerland, the United States of America) and the Holy See, have the right to send or to receive ambassadors. By custom it has moreover been established that, as a general rule, only the greater “royal states” are represented by ambassadors, and then only when these are accredited to states esteemed, for one reason or another. to be of equal rank. Thus the promotion of the Japanese legations in Europe and the United States to the rank of embassies, and the corresponding change in the representation of the various powers at Tokio, marked in 1905 the definite recognition of Japan as a great power. To this rule the United States of America long remained an exception, and was content, in accordance with the tradition of republican simplicity, to be represented abroad only by ministers of the second rank. The subordinate position given to the representatives of so great a power, however, inevitably led to many inconveniences, and in 1893 an act of Congress empowered the president to accredit ambassadors to the great powers.

The distinction between an ambassador and ministers of the second rank is one rather of rank and dignity than of power or functions. His special immunities he shares with other diplomatic representatives of all classes. The peculiar privilege which he claims of free access to the sovereign has, in common practice, been reduced to the right of being received on presenting his credentials in public or private audience by the sovereign in person, it being obviously against public policy that a foreign representative should negotiate with the ruler otherwise than through his responsible ministers. In Great Britain the sovereign, when granting an audience to a foreign ambassador, is always attended by one or more ministers, and the same is usual in other states.

An ambassador, however, unless specially armed with plenary authority, cannot decide any questions beyond his instructions without reference to his government. Thus Lord Londonderry (Lord Stewart), who represented Great Britain at the conferences of Troppau in 1820 and Laibach in 1821, had not the same standing as the plenipotentiaries of the other powers present, and efforts were even made to exclude him from some of the more important discussions in consequence, not on the ground of inferior rank but of defective powers.

Socially, the position of an ambassador is one of great dignity. The pomp and magnificence which in earlier days characterized his progresses and his “entries” are indeed no longer observed. He is received, however, by the sovereign to whom he is accredited with elaborate state, of which every detail is minutely regulated, and ranks, as representing his own sovereign, next to the princes of the blood in the court where he resides. The controversies that once raged as to the order of precedence of the various ambassadors accredited to any one court were settled by the treaties already mentioned, it being decided that they should rank in order of seniority according to the date of the presentation of their credentials. In Roman Catholic countries, however — as in France before the abrogation of the concordat, — the position of doyen (dean) of the diplomatic body is given by courtesy to the nuncio of the pope.

The special immunities and privileges enjoyed by ambassadors are dealt with in the articles EXTERRITORIALITY and DIPLOMACY. See also the latter for the history of the subject.

The most authoritative modern hand-book on the subject is Charles de Martens, Manuel diplomatlque (Paris, 1822; new ed., 1868). See also Henry Wheaton, Hist. of the Law of Nations (New York, 1845); L. Oppenheim, International Law (London, 1905); and the list of books attached to the article DIPLOMACY. (W. A. P.)

1 Ambactus is explained by Festus (Paulus Diaconus ex Festo, ed. C. O. Muller) as a Gallic word used by Ennius and meaning servus. Caesar (De Bello Gallico, vi. 15) says of the Gallic equites, “atque eorum ut quisque est genere copiisque amplissimus, plurimos circum se ambactos clientesque habent.” Accepting the Celtic origin of the word, it has been connected with the Welsh amaeth, a tiller of the ground. A Teutonic origin has been suggested in the Old High Ger. ambaht, a retainer, which appears in a Scandinavian word amboht, bondwoman or maid, in the Ormulum (c. 1200).

AMRATO, or ASIENTO DE AMBATO, an inland town of Ecuador, capital of the province of Tunguragua, 80 m. S. of Quito by the highway, and near the northern foot of Chimborazo. Pop. (est.) 10,000. The town stands in a bowl-like depression, 8606 ft. above sea-level, surrounded by steep, sandy, barren mountains, and has an equable climate, which has been likened to a perpetual autumn. The immediate environs are very fertile and produce a great variety of fruits, including many of the temperate zone, but the surrounding country is arid and sterile, producing scanty crops of barley, Indian corn and pease. The cochineal insect is found on the cactus which grows in abundance in the vicinity, and the town is known throughout Ecuador for its manufacture of boots and shoes, and for a cordage made from cabuya, the fibre of the agave plant. Ambato was destroyed by an eruption of Cotopaxi in 1698, and has been badly damaged two or three times by earthquakes.

AMBATO is also the name of a range of mountains in northern Argentina, being a spur of the Sierra de Aconquija crossing the province of Catamarca from north to south.

AMBER, a ruined city of India, the ancient capital of Jaipur state in the Rajputana agency. The name of Amber is first mentioned by Ptolemy. It was founded by the Minas and was still flourishing in A.D. 967. In 1037 it was taken by the Rajputs, who held it till it was deserted. In 1728 it was supplanted by the modern city of Jaipur, from which it is 5 m. distant. The picturesque situation of Amber at the mouth of a rocky mountain gorge, in which nestles a lovely lake, has attracted the admiration of all travellers, including Jacquemont and Heber. It is now only remarkable for its architecture. The old palace begun by Man Sing in 1600 ranks second only to Gwalior. The chief building is the Diwan-i-Khas built by Mirza Raja. “No sooner,” (it is related) “had Mirza completed the Diwan-i-Khas than it came to the ears of the emperor Jehangir that his vassal had surpassed him in magnificence, and that this last great work quite eclipsed all the marvels of the imperial city; the columns of red sandstone having been particularly noticed as sculptured with exquisite taste and elaborate detail. In a fit of jealousy the emperor commanded that this masterpiece should be thrown down, and sent commissioners to Amber charged with the execution of this order; whereupon Mirza, in order to save the structure, had the columns plastered over with stucco, so that the messengers from Agra should have to acknowledge to the emperor that the magnificence, which had been so much talked of, was after all pure invention. Since then his apathetic successors have neglected to bring to light this splendid work; and it is only by knocking off some of the plaster that one can get a glimpse of the sculptures, which are perfect as on the day they were carved.”

AMBER, a fossil resin much used for the manufacture of ornamental objects. The name comes from the Arab. anbar, probably through the Spanish, but this word referred originally to ambergris, which is an animal substance quite distinct from yellow amber. True amber has sometimes been called karabe, a word of oriental derivation signifying “that which attracts straw,” in allusion to the power which amber possesses of acquiring an electric charge by friction. This property, first recorded by Thales of Miletus, suggested the word “electricity,” from the Greek, elektron, a name applied, however, not only to amber but also to an alloy of gold and silver. By Latin writers amber is variously called electrum, sucinum (succinum), and glaesum or glesum. The Hebrew hashmal seems to have been amber.

Amber is not homogeneous in composition, but consists of several resinous bodies more or less soluble in alcohol, ether and chloroform, associated with an insoluble bituminous substance. The average composition of amber leads to the general formula C10H16O. Heated rather below 300 deg. C. amber suffers decomposition, yielding an “oil of amber,” and leaving a black residue which is known as “amber colophony,” or “amber pitch”; this forms, when dissolved in oil of turpentine or in linseed oil, “amber varnish” or “amber lac.”

True amber yields on dry distillation succinic acid, the proportion varying from about 3 to 8%, and being greatest in the pale opaque or “bony” varieties. The aromatic and irritating fumes emitted by burning amber are mainly due to this acid. True Baltic amber is distinguished by its yield of succinic acid, for many of the other fossil resins which are often termed amber contain either none of it, or only a very small proportion; hence the name “succinite” proposed by Professor J. D. Dana, and now commonly used in scientific writings as a specific term for the real Prussian amber. Succinite has a hardness between 2 and 3, which is rather greater than that of many other fossil resins. Its specific gravity varies from 1.05 to 1.10.

The Baltic amber or succinite is found as irregular nodules in a marine glauconitic sand, known as “blue earth,” occurring in the Lower Oligocene strata of Samland in East Prussia, where it is now systematically mined. It appears, however, to have been partly derived from yet earlier Tertiary deposits (Eocene); and it occurs also as a derivative mineral in later formations, such as the drift. Relics of an abundant flora occur in association with the amber, suggesting relations with the flora of Eastern . Asia and the southern part of North America. H. R. Goppert named the common amber-yielding pine of the Baltic forests Pinites succiniter, but as the wood, according to some authorities, does not seem to differ from that of the existing genus it has been also called Pinius succinifera. It is improbable, however, that the production of amber was limited to a single species; and indeed a large number of conifers belonging to different genera are represented in the amber-flora. The resin contains, in addition to the beautifully preserved plant-structures, numerous remains of insects, spiders, annelids, crustaceans and other small organisms which became enveloped while the exudation was fluid. In most cases the organic structure has disappeared, leaving only a cavity, with perhaps a trace of chitin. Even hair and feathers have occasionally been represented among the enclosures. Fragments of wood not infrequently occur, with the tissues well-preserved by impregnation with the resin; while leaves, flowers and fruits are occasionally found in marvellous perfection. Sometimes the amber retains the form of drops and stalactites, just as it exuded from the ducts and receptacles of the injured trees. The abnormal development of resin has been called “succinosis.” Impurities are often present, especially when the resin dropped on to the ground, so that the material may be useless except for varnish-making, whence the impure amber is called firniss. Enclosures of pyrites may give a bluish colour to amber. The so-called “black amber” is only a kind of jet. “Bony amber” owes its cloudy opacity to minute bubbles in the interior of the resin.

Although amber is found along the shores of a large part of the Baltic and the North Sea, the great amber-producing country is the promontory of Samland. Pieces of amber torn from the sea-floor are cast up by the waves, and collected at ebb-tide. Sometimes the searchers wade into the sea, furnished with nets at the end of long poles, by means of which they drag in the sea-weed containing entangled masses of amber; or they dredge from boats in shallow water and rake up amber from between the boulders. Divers have been employed to collect amber from the deeper waters. Systematic dredging on a large scale was at one time carried on in the Kurisches Haff by Messrs Stantien and Becker, the great amber merchants of Konigsberg. At the present time extensive mining operations are conducted in quest of amber. The “pit amber” was formerly dug in open works, but is now also worked by underground galleries. The nodules from the “blue earth” have to be freed from matrix and divested of their opaque crust, which can be done in revolving barrels containing sand and water. The sea-worn amber has lost its crust, but has often acquired a dull rough surface by rolling in sand.

Amber is extensively used for beads and other trivial ornaments, and for cigar-holders and the mouth-pieces of pipes. It is regarded by the Turks as specially valuable, inasmuch as it is said to be incapable of transmitting infection as the pipe passes from mouth to mouth. The variety most valued in the East is the pale straw-coloured, slightly cloudy amber. Some of the best qualities are sent to Vienna for the manufacture of smoking appliances. In working amber, it is turned on the lathe and polished with whitening and water or with rotten stone and oil, the final lustre being given by friction with flannel. During the working much electricity is developed.

By gradually heating amber in an oil-bath it becomes soft and flexible. Two pieces of amber may be united by smearing the surfaces with linseed oil, heating them, and then pressing them together while hot. Cloudy amber may be clarified in an oil-bath, as the oil fills the numerous pores to which the turbidity is due. Small fragments, formerly thrown away or used only for varnish, are now utilized on a large scale in the formation of “ambroid” or “pressed amber.” The pieces are carefully heated with exclusion of air and then compressed into a uniform mass by intense hydraulic pressure; the softened amber being forced through holes in a metal plate. The product is extensively used for the production of cheap jewellery and articles for smoking. This pressed amber yields brilliant interference colours in polarized light. Amber has often been imitated by other resins

like copal and kauri, as well as by celluloid and even glass. True amber is sometimes coloured artificially.

Amber was much valued as an ornamental material in very early times. It has been found in Mycenaean tombs; it is known from lake-dwellings in Switzerland, and it occurs with neolithic remains in Denmark, whilst in England it is found with interments of the bronze age. A remarkably fine cup turned in amber from a bronze-age barrow at Hove is now in the Brighton Museum. Beads of amber occur with Anglo-Saxon relics in the south of England; and up to a comparatively recent period the material was valued as an amulet. It is still believed to possess certain medicinal virtue.

Rolled pieces of amber, usually small but occasionally of very large size, may be picked up on the east coast of England, having probably been washed up from deposits under the North Sea. Cromer is the best-known locality, but it occurs also on other parts of the Norfolk coast, as well as at Yarmouth, Southwold, Aldeburgh and Felixstowe in Suffolk, and as far south as Walton-on-the-Naze in Essex, whilst northwards it is not unknown in Yorkshire. On the other side of the North Sea, amber is found at various localities on the coast of Holland and Denmark. On the shores of the Baltic it occurs not only on the Prussian and Pomeranian coast but in the south of Sweden, in Bornholm and other islands, and in S. Finland. Amber has indeed a very wide distribution, extending over a large part of northern Europe and occurring as far east as the Urals. Some of the amber districts of the Baltic and North Sea were known in prehistoric times, and led to early trade with the south of Europe. Amber was carried to Olbia on the Black Sea, Massilia on the Mediterranean, and Hatria at the head of the Adriatic; and from these centres it was distributed over the Hellenic world.

Whilst succinite is the common variety of European amber, the following varieties also occur: –

Gedanite, or “brittle amber,” closely resembling succinite, but much more brittle, not quite so hard, with a lower melting- point and containing no succinic acid. It is often covered with a white powder easily removed by wiping. The name comes from Gedanum, the Latin name of Danzig.

Stantienite, a brittle, deep brownish-black resin, destitute of succinic acid.

Beckerite, a rare amber in earthy-brown nodules, almost opaque, said to be related in properties to gutta-percha.

Glessite, a nearly opaque brown resin, with numerous microscopic cavities and dusty enclosures, named from glesum, an old name for amber.

Krantzite, a soft amber-like resin, found in the lignites of Saxony.

Allingite, a fossil resin allied to succinite, from Switzerland.

Roumanite, or Rumanian amber, a dark reddish resin, occurring with lignite in Tertiary deposits. The nodules are penetrated by cracks, but the material can be worked on the lathe. Sulphur is present to the extent of more than 1%, whence the smell of sulphuretted hydrogen when the resin is heated. According to G. Murgoci the Rumanian amber is true succinite.

Simetite, or Sicilian amber, takes its name from the river Simeto or Giaretta. It occurs in Miocene deposits and is also found washed up by the sea near Catania. This beautiful material presents a great diversity of tints, but a rich hyacinth red is common. It is remarkable for its fluorescence, which in the opinion of some authorities adds to its beauty. Amber is also found in many localities in Emilia, especially near the sulphur-mines of Cesena. It has been conjectured that the ancient Etruscan ornaments in amber were wrought in the Italian material, but it seems that amber from the Baltic reached the Etruscans at Hatria. It has even been supposed that amber passed from Sicily to northern Europe in early times — a supposition said to receive some support from the fact that much of the amber dug up in Denmark is red; but it must not be forgotten that reddish amber is found also on the Baltic, though not being fashionable it is used rather for varnish-making than for ornaments. Moreover, yellow amber after long burial is apt to acquire a reddish colour. The amber of Sicily seems not to have been recognized in ancient times, for it is not mentioned by local authorities like Diodorus Siculus.

Burmite is the name under which the Burmese amber is now described. Until the British occupation of Burma but little was known as to its occurrence, though it had been worked for centuries and was highly valued by the natives and by the Chinese. It is found in fiat rolled pieces, irregularly distributed through a blue clay probably of Miocene age. It occurs in the Hukawng valley, in the Nangotaimaw hills, where it is irregularly worked in shallow pits. The mines were visited some years ago by Dr Fritz Noetling, and the mineral has been described by Dr Otto Helm. The Burmese amber is yellow or reddish, some being of ruby tint, and like the Sicilian amber it is fluorescent. Burmite and simetite agree also in being destitute of succinic acid. Most of the Burmese amber is worked at Mandalay into rosary-beads and ear-cylinders.

Many other fossil resins more or less allied to amber have been described. Schraufite is a reddish resin from the Carpathian sandstone, and it occurs with jet in the cretaceous rocks of the Lebanon; ambrite is a resin found in many of the coals of New Zealand; retinite occurs in the lignite of Bovey Tracey in Devonshire and elsewhere; whilst copaline has been found in the London clay of Highgate in North London. Chemawinite or cedarite is an amber-like resin from the Saskatchewan river in Canada.

Amber and certain similar substances are found to a limited extent at several localities in the United States, as in the green- sand of New Jersey, but they have little or no economic value. A fluorescent amber is said, however, to occur in some abundance in Southern Mexico. Amber is recorded also from the Dominican Republic.

REPERENCES. — See, for Baltic amber, P. Dahms, “Ueber die Vorkommen und die Verwendung des Bernsteins,” Zeitsch. fur praktische Geologic, 1901, p. 201; H. Conwentz, Monographic der baltischen Bernsteinbaume (Danzig, 1890); R. Klebs, Guide to Exhibit of the German Amber Industry at World’s Fair (St Louis, 1904); and abstract by G. F. Kunz in Mineral Resources of the U. S. (1904). U. or Sicilian amber, W. Arnold Bullum, The Tears of the Helialdes, or Amber as a Gem (London, 1896). For Burmese amber, papers by Fritz Noetling and Otto Helm in Records of Geol. Surv. of India, vol. xxvi. (1893), pp. 31, 61. For British amber, Clement Reid in Trans. Norfolk Nat. Soc., vol. iii. (1884) p. 601; vol. iv. (1886) p. 247; and H. Conwentz in Natural Science, vol. ix. (1896) pp. 99, 161. (F. W. R.*)

AMBERG, a town of Germany, in the kingdom of Bavaria, formerly the capital of the Upper Palatinate, situated on both sides of the Vils, 42 m. E. of Nuremberg by rail. Pop. 22,089. It has a town hall with handsome rooms, a library, a gymnasium, a lyceum, elementary schools, an arsenal, and eleven churches, the finest of which is St Martin’s, of the 15th century, with many excellent paintings and a tower 300 ft. high. A former Jesuit monastery is now used for a grammar school and seminary. There are also a pilgrimage church on a hill 1621 ft. high, a large convict prison for men, an industrial, commercial and other schools. The principal manufactures are firearms, ironmongery, earthenware, woollen cloth, beer, stoneware, zinc goods, colours and salt; in the neighbourhood are iron and coal mines. The French under Jourdan were defeated by the Austrians under the Archduke Charles near Amberg in 1796.

AMBERGRIS (Ambra grisea, Ambre gris, or grey amber), a solid, fatty, inflammable substance of a dull grey or blackish colour, the shades being variegated like marble, possessing a peculiar sweet, earthy odour. It occurs as a biliary concretion in the intestines of the spermaceti whale (Physeter macrocephalus), and is found floating upon the sea, on the sea-coast, or in the sand near the sea-coast. It is met with in the Atlantic Ocean; on the coasts of Brazil and Madagascar; also on the coast of Africa, of the East Indies, China, Japan and the Molucca islands; but most of the ambergris which is brought to England comes from the Bahama Islands, Providence, &c. It is also sometimes found in the abdomen of whales, always in lumps of various shapes and sizes, weighing from 1/2 oz. to 100 or more pounds. Ambergris, when taken from the intestinal canal of

the sperm whale, is of a deep grey colour, soft consistence and a disagreeable smell. On exposure to the air it gradually hardens, becomes pale and develops its peculiar sweet, earthy odour. In that condition its specific gravity ranges from 0.780 to 0.926. It melts at about 62 deg. C. to a fatty, yellow resinous-like liquid; and at 100 deg. C. it is volatilized into a white vapour. It is soluble in ether, and in volatile and fixed oils; it is only feebly acted on by acids. By digesting in hot alcohol, a substance termed ambrein, closely resembling cholesterin, is obtained, which separates in brilliant white crystals as the solution cools. The use of ambergris in Europe is now entirely confined to perfumery, though it formerly occupied no inconsiderable place in medicine. In minute quantities its alcoholic solution is much used for giving a “floral” fragrance to bouquets, washes and other preparations of the perfumer. It occupies a very important place in the perfumery of the East, and there it is also used in pharmacy and as a flavouring material in cookery. The high price it commands makes it peculiarly liable to adulteration, but its genuineness is easily tested by its solubility in hot alcohol, its fragrant odour, and its uniform fatty consistence on being penetrated by a hot wire.

AMBERT, a town of central France, capital of an arrondissement of the department of Puy-de-Dome, on the Dore, 52 m. E.S.E. of Clermont-Ferrand by rail. Pop. (1906), town, 3889; commune, 7581. The town has a church of the 15th and 16th centuries and carries on the manufacture of paper, lace, ribbon, rosaries, &c., and trade in cheese. It is the seat of a sub-prefect, and the public institutions include tribunals of first instance and of commerce, a chamber of arts and manufactures, and a communal college.

AMBIENT (from Lat. ambi, on both sides, and ire, to go), surrounding; a word implying a moving rather than a stationary encircling. It is used mostly in the phrase the “ambient air,” though Bacon applied it as an adjective to the clergy, suggesting “ambition.” In astrology it means the sky.

AMBIGU, a French game of cards, composed of the characteristic elements of whist, bouillotte and piquet. A whist pack with the court cards deleted is used, and from two to six persons may play. Each player is given an equal number of counters, and a limit of betting is agreed upon. Two cards are dealt, one at a time, to each player, after each has placed two counters in a pool. Each player then either keeps his hand, saying “Enough,” or takes one or two new cards from the top of the stock, after which the stock is reshuffled and cut, and each player receives two more cards, one at a time. The players then either “play” or “pass.” If a person “plays,” he bets a number of counters and the others may equal this bet or raise it. Should no player meet the first bet, the bettor takes back his bet, leaving the pool intact, and receives two counters from the last player who refuses to play. When two or more bet the same number, they again draw cards and “pass” or “play” as before. If all “pass,” each pays a counter to the pool and a new deal ensues. The player betting more than the others call wins the pool. He then exposes his hand and is paid by each adversary according to its value. The hands rank as follows: — “Point,” the number Of pips on two or more cards of a suit (one counter). “Prime,” four cards of different suits (two counters). “Grand Prime,” the same with the number of pips over 30 (three counters). “Sequence,” a hand containing three cards of the same suit in sequence (three counters). “Tricon,” three of a kind (four counters). “Flush,” four cards of the same suit (five counters). “Doublet,” a hand containing two counting combinations at once, as 2, 3, 4 and 7 of spades, amounting to both a “sequence” and a “flush” (eight counters). “Fredon,” four of a kind (the highest possible hand), ten or eleven counters, according to the number of pips. Ties are decided by the number of pips.

AMBIGUITY (Fr. ambiguite, med. Lat. ambiguitas, from Lat. ambiguus, doubtful; ambi, both ways, agere, to drive), doubtful ness or uncertainty. In law an ambiguity as to the meaning of the words of a written instrument may be of considerable importance. Ambiguity, in law, is of two kinds, patent and latent. (1) Patent ambiguity is that ambiguity which is apparent on the face of an instrument to any one perusing it, even if he be unacquainted with the circumstances of the parties. In the case of a patent ambiguity parol evidence is admissible to explain only what has been written, not what it was intended to write. For example, in Saunderson v. Piper, 1839, 5, B.N.C. 425, where a bill was drawn in figures for L. 245 and in words for two hundred pounds, evidence that “and forty-five” had been omitted by mistake was rejected. But where it appears from the general context of the instrument what the parties really meant, the instrument will be construed as if there was no ambiguity, as in Saye and Sate’s case, 10 Mod. 46, where the name of the grantor had been omitted in the operative part of a grant, but, as it was clear from another part of the grant who he was, the deed was held to be valid. (2) Latent ambiguity is where the wording of an instrument is on the face of it clear and intelligible, but may, at the same time, apply equally to two different things or subject matters, as where a legacy is given “to my nephew, John,” and the testor is shown to have two nephews of that name. A latent ambiguity may be explained by parol evidence, for, as the ambiguity has been brought about by circumstances extraneous to the instrument, the explanation must necessarily be sought for from such circumstances. (See also Evidence.)

AMBIORIX, prince of Eburones, a tribe of Belgian Gaul. Although Caesar (q.v.) had freed him from paying tribute to the Aduztuci, he joined Catuvolcus (winter, 54 B.C.) in rising against the Roman forces under Q. Titurius Sabinus and I. Aurunculeius Cotta, and almost annihilated them. An attack on Quintus Cicero (brother of the orator), then quartered with a legion in the territory of the Nervii, failed owing to the timely appearance of Caesar. Ambiroix is said to have found safety across the Rhine.

Caesar, Bell. Gall. v. 26-51, vi. 29-43, viii. 24; Dio Cassius xl. 7-11; Florus iii. 10.

AMBLESIDE, a market-town in the Appleby parliamentary division of Westmorland, England, a mile from the head of Windermere. Pop. of urban district (1901) 2536. It is most beautifully situated, for though the lake is hardly visible from the town, the bare sharply rising hills surrounding the richly wooded valley of the Rothay afford a series of exquisite views. The hills immediately above this part of the valley are Wansfell on the east, Loughrigg Fell on the west, and Rydal Fell and the ridge below Snarker Pike (2096 ft.) to the north. At the head of Windermere is Waterhead, the landing-stage of Ambleside, which is served by the lake steamers of the Furness Railway Company. The chief roads which centre upon Ambleside are — one from the town of Windemere, following the eastern shore of the lake; one from Ullswater, by Patterdale and Kirkstone Pass; one from Keswick, by Dunmail Raise and Grasmere, and the two lovely lakes of Grasmere and Rydal Water; and one from the Brathay valley and the Langdales to the west. Ambleside is thus much frequented by tourists. In its vicinity is Rydal Mount, for many years the residence of the poet Wordsworth. The town has some industry in bobbin-making, and there are slate quarries in the neighbourhood.

Close by the lake side the outlines are still visible of a Roman fort, the name of which is not known. It appears to have guarded a route over the hills by Hardknott and Wrynose Pass to Ravenglass on the Coast of Cumberland.

AMBLYGONITE, a mineral usually found as cleavable or columnar, and compact masses; it is translucent and has a vitreous lustre, and the colour varies from white to pale shades of violet, grey, green or yellow. There are good cleavages in two directions. The hardness is 6 and the specific gravity 3.0. The mineral is thus not unlike felspar in general appearance, but

it is readily distinguished from this by its chemical characters, being an aluminium and lithium fluophosphate, Li(AlF)PO4, with part of the lithium replaced by sodium and part of the fluoine by hydroxyl. Crystals, which are rarely distinctly developed, belong to the anorthic system, and frequently show twin lamellae.

The mineral was first discovered in Saxony by A. Breithaupt in 1817, and named by him from the Greek amblus, blunt, and gouia, angle, because of the obtuse angle between the cleavages. Later it was found at Montebras, dep. Creuse, France, and at Hebron in Maine; and on account of slight differences in optical character and chemical composition the names montebrasite and hebronite have been applied to the mineral from these localities. Recently it has been discovered in considerable quantity at Pala in San Diego county, California, and at Caceres in Spain. Amblygonite occurs with lepidolite, tourmaline and other lithia-bearing minerals in pegmatite-veins. It contains about 10% of lithia, and, since 1886, has been utilized as a source of lithium salts, the chief commercial sources being the Montebras deposits, and later the Californian. (L.J.S.)

AMBLYPODA, a suborder of primitive ungulate mammals, taking its name from the short and stumpy feet, which were furnished with five toes each, and supported massive pillar-like limbs. The brain-cavity was extremely small, and insignificant in comparison to the bodily bulk, which was equal to that of the largest rhinoceroses. These animals are, in fact, descendants of the small ancestral ungulates which have retained all the primitive characters of the latter accompanied by a huge increase in bodily size. They are confined to the Eocene period, and occur both in North America and Europe. The cheek teeth are short crowned (brachyodont), with the tubercles more or less completely fused into transverse ridges, or cross-crests (lophodont type); and the total number of teeth is in one case the typical 44, but in another is reduced below this. The vertebrae of the neck unite by nearly flat surfaces, the humerus has lost the foramen, or perforation, at the lower end, and the third trochanter to the femur may also be wanting. In the fore-limb the upper and lower series of carpal bones scarcely alternate, but in the hind- foot the astragalus overlaps the cuboid, while the fibula, which is quite distinct from the tibia (as is the radius from the ulna in the fore-limb), articulates with both astragalus and calcaneum. The most generalized type is Coryphodon, representing the family

Coryphodontidae, from the lower Eocene of Europe and North America, in which there were 44 teeth, and no horn-like excrescences on the long skull, while the femur had a third trochanter. The canines are somewhat elongated, and were followed by a short gap in each jaw, and the cheek-teeth were adapted for succulent food. The length of the body reached about 6 ft. in some cases.

In the middle Eocene formations of North America occurs the more specialized Hintatherium (or Dinoceras), typifying the family Uintatheriidae, which also contains species sometimes separated as Tinoceras. Uintatheres were huge creatures, with long narrow skulls, of which the elongated facial portion caraed three pairs of bony horn-cores, probably covered with short horns in life, the hind-pair being much the largest. The dental formula is i. 0/3, c. 1/1, p. $3\over 3\cdot4$, m. 3/3; the upper canines being long sabre-like weapons, protected by a descending flange on each side of the front of the lower iaw.

In the basal Eocene of North America the Amblypoda were represented by extremely primitive, five-toed, small ungulates such as Periptychus and Pantolambda, each of these typifying a family. The full typical series of 44 teeth was developed in each, but whereas in the Periptychidae the upper molars were bunodont and tritubercular, in the Pantolambdidae they have assumed a selenodont structure. Creodont characters (see CREODONTA) are displayed in the skeleton.

See also H. F. Osborn, “Evolution of the Amblypoda,” Bull. Amer. Mus. vol x. p. 169. (R. L.*)

AMBO, or AMBON (Gr. ambon, from anabainein, to walk up, the reading-desk of early Basilican churches, also called purgos. Originally small and movable, it was afterwards made of large proportions and fixed in one place. In the Byzantine and early Romanesque periods it was an essential part of church furniture; but during the middle ages it was gradually superseded in the Western Church by the pulpit and lectern. The gospel and epistle are still read from the ambo in the Ambrosian rite at Milan. The position of the ambo was not absolutely uniform; sometimes in the central point between the sanctuary and the nave, sometimes in the middle of the church, and sometimes at one or both of the sides of the chancel. The normal ambo, when the church contained only one, had three stages or degrees, one above the other, and it was usually mounted by a flight of steps at each end. The uppermost stage was reserved for the deacon who sang the gospel (facing the congregation); for promulgating episcopal edicts; reciting the names inscribed on the diptychs (see DIPTYCH); announcing fasts, vigils and feasts; reading ecclesiastical letters or acts of the martyrs celebrated on that day; announcing new miracles for popular edification, professions by new converts or recantations by heretics; and (for priests and deacons) preaching sermons, — bishops as a general rule preaching from their own throne. The second stage was for the sub-deacon who read the epistle (facing the altar); and the third for the subordinate clergy who read other parts of scripture. The inconvenience of having a single ambo led to the substitution of two separate ambones, between which these various functions were divided, one on the south side of the chancel being for the reading of the gospel, and one on the north for reading the epistle. In the Russian Orthodox Church the term “ambo” is used of the semicircular steps leading to the platform in front of the iconostasis (q.v.), but in Cathedrals the bishop has an ambo in the centre of the church. In the Greek Church the older form remains, usually placed at the side. In the Uniate Greek Catholic Church the “ambo” has become a table, on which are placed a crucifix and lights, before the doors of the iconostasis; here baptisms, marriages and confirmations take place.

Ambones were made of wood or else of costly marbles, and were decorated with mosaics, reliefs, gilding, &c.; sometimes also covered with canopies supported on columns. They were often of enormous size; that at St Sophia in Constantinople was large enough for the ceremonial of coronation.

The churches in Rome possess many fine examples of ambones in marble, of which the oldest is probably that in S. Clemente, reconstructed in the beginning of the 12th century. Those of slightly later date are enriched with marble mosaic known as Cosmati work, of which the examples in S. Maria-in-Ara-Coeli, S. Maria-in-Cosmedin and S. Lorenzo are those which are best known. Some early ambones are found in Ravenna, and in the south of Italy are many fine examples; the epistle ambo in the cathedral at Ravello (1130), which is perhaps the earliest, shows a Scandinavian influence in the design of its mosaic inlay, an influence which is found in Sicilian work and may be a Norman importation. The two ambones in the Cathedral of Salerno,

which are different in design, are magnificent in effect and are enriched with sculpture as well as with mosaic. In the gospel ambo in the cathedral of Ravello (1272), and also in that of the convent of the Trinita della Cava near Salerno, the spiral columns inlaid with mosaic stand on the backs of lions. In the epistle ambo at Salerno and the gospel ambones at Cava and San Giovanni del Toro in Ravello, the columns support segmental arches carrying the ambones; the epistle ambo at Ravello and all those in Rome are raised on solid marble bases.

See the litumical and ecclesiastical dictionaries of Martigny, Migne, and Smith and Cheetham, sub voce, where all the scattered references are collected together and summarized. In Ciampinus, Vetera Monumenta (Rome, 1747), plates xii., xiii., are several illustrations of actual examples.

AMBOISE, GEORGES D’, (1460-1510), French cardinal and minister of state, belonged to a noble family possessed of considerable influence. His father, Pierre d’Amboise, seigneur de Chaumont, was chamberlain to Charles VII. and Louis XI. and ambassador at Rome. His eldest brother, Charles d’Amboise, was governor of the Isle of France, Champagne and Burgundy, and councillor of Louis XI. Georges d’Amboise was only fourteen when his father procured for him the bishopric of Montauban, and Louis XI. appointed him one of his almoners. On arriving at manhood d’Amboise attached himself to the party of the duke of Orleans, in whose cause he suffered imprisonment, and on whose return to the royal favour he was elevated to the archbishopric of Narbonne, which after some time he changed for that of Rouen (1493). On the appointment of the duke of Orleans as governor of Normandy, d’Amboise became his lieutenant-general. In 1498 the duke of Orleans mounted the throne as Louis XII., and d’Amboise was suddenly raised to the high position of cardinal and prime minister. His administration was, in many respects, well-intentioned and useful. Having the good fortune to serve a king who was both economical and just, he was able to diminish the imposts, to introduce order among the soldiery, and above all, by the ordinances of 1499, to improve the organization of justice. He was also zealous for the reform of the church, and particularly for the reform of the monasteries; and it is greatly to his credit that he did not avail himself of the extremely favourable opportunities he possessed of becoming a pluralist. He regularly spent a large income in charity, and he laboured strenuously to stay the progress of the plague and famine which broke out in 1504. His foreign policy, less happy and less wise, was animated by two aims — to increase the French power in Italy and to seat himself on the papal throne; and these aims be sought to achieve by diplomacy, not by force. He, however, sympathized with, and took part in, the campaign which was begun in 1499 for the Conquest of Milan. In 1500 he was named lieutenant- general in Italy and charged with the organization of the conquest. On the death of Alexander VI. he aspired to the papacy. He had French troops at the gates of Rome, by means of which he could easily have frightened the conclave and induced them to elect him; but he was persuaded to trust to his influence; the troops were dismissed, and an Italian was appointed as Pius III.; and again, on the death of Pius within the month, another Italian, Julius II., was chosen (1503). D’Amboise received in compensation the title of legate for life in France and in the Comtat Venaissin. He was one of the negotiators of the disastrous treaties of Blois (1504), and in 1508 of the League of Cambrai against Venice. In 1509 he again accompanied Louis XII. into Italy, but on his return he was seized at the city of Lyons with a fatal attack of gout in the stomach. He died there on the 25th of May 1510. His body was removed to Rouen, and a magnificent tomb, on which he is represented kneeling in the attitude of prayer, was erected to his memory in the cathedral of that town. Throughout his life he was an enlightened patron of letters and art, and it was at his orders that the chateau of Gaillon near Rouen was built.

See Lettres du roi Louis XII. et du cardinal d’Amboise (Brussels, 1712); L. Legendre, Vie du cardinal d’Amboise (Rouen, 1726); E. Lavisse, Histoire de France (vol. v. by H. Lemonnier, Paris, 19O3); J. A. Deville, Tombeaux de la cathedrale de Rouen (3rd ed., 1881). For a bibliography of the printed sources see, H. Hauser, Les Sources de l’histoire de France, KM`siecle, vol. i. (1906). (J. I.)

AMBOISE, a town of central France in the department of Indre-et-Loire, on the left bank of the Loire, 12 m. E. of Tours by the Orleans railway. Pop. (1906) 4632. Amboise owes its celebrity to the imposing chateau which overlooks the Loire from the rocky eminence above the town. The Logis du Roi, the most important portion, was the work of Charles VIII.; the other wing was built under Louis XII. and Francis I. The ramparts are strengthened by two massive towers containing an inclined plane on which horses and carriages may ascend. The chapel of St Hubert, said to contain the remains of Leonardo da Vinci, who was summoned to Amboise by Francis I., king of France, and died there in 1519, is in the late Gothic style; a delicately carved relief over the doorway represents the conversion of St Hubert. The hotel de ville is established in a mansion of Renaissance architecture; a town gateway of the 15th century, surmounted by a belfry, is also of architectural interest. Iron-founding, wool-weaving, and the manufacture of boots and farm implements are among the industries.

Amboise at the end of the 11th century was a lordship under the counts of Anjou, one of whom, Hugues I., rebuilt the ancient castle. Its territory was united to the domain of the crown of France by Charles VII. about the middle of the 15th century, and thenceforth the chateau became a favourite residence of the French kings. The discovery in 1560 of the “conspiracy of Amboise,” a plot of the Huguenots to remove Francis II. from the influence of the house of Guise, was avenged by the death of 1200 members of that party. In 1563 Amboise gave its name to a royal edict allowing freedom of worship to the Huguenot nobility and gentry. After that period the chateau was frequently used as a state prison, and Abd-el-Kader was a captive there from 1848 to 1852. In 1872 it was restored by the National Assembly to the house of Orleans, to which it had come by inheritance from the duke of Penthievre in the latter half of the 18th century.

AMBOYNA (Dutch Ambon), the name of a residency, its chief town, and the island on which the town is situated, in the Dutch East Indies.

The residency shares with that of Ternate the administration of the Moluccas, the previous government of which was abolished in 1867. It includes a mass of islands in the Banda Sea (2 deg. 30′ - 8 deg. 20′ S. and 125 deg. 45′ - 135 deg. E.), including the island-belt which surrounds the sea on the north, east and south; and is divided for administrative purposes into nine districts (afdeelingen): 1) Amboyna, the island of that name; (2) Saparua, with Oma and Nusa Laut; (3) Kajeli (Eastern Burn); (4) Masareti (Western Burn); (5) Kairatu (Western Ceram); (6) Wahai (the northern part of Mid-Ceram); (7) Amahai (the southern part of Mid-Ceram); (8) the Banda Isles, with East Ceram, Ceram Laut and Gorom; (9) the islands of Aru, Kei, Timor Laut or Tenimber, and the south-western islands. The total area of the residency is about 19,861 sq. m., and its population 296,000, including 2400 Europeans.

Amboyna Island lies off the south-west of Ceram, on the north side of the Banda Sea, being one of a series of volcanic isles in the inner circle round the sea. It is 32 m. in length, with an area of about 386 sq. m., and is of very irregular figure, being almost divided into two. The south-eastern and smaller portion (called Leitimor) is united to the northern (Hitoe) by a neck of land a few yards in breadth. The highest mountains, Wawani (3609 ft.) and Salhutu (4020 ft.), have hot springs and solfataras. They are considered to be volcanoes, and the mountains of the neighbouring Uliasser islands the remains of volcanoes. Granite and serpentine rocks predominate, but the shores of Amboyna Bay are of chalk, and contain stalactite caves. The surface is fertile, the rivers are small and not navigable, and the roads are mere footpaths. Cocoa is one of the products. The climate is comparatively pleasant and healthy; the average temperature is 80 deg. F., rarely sinking below 72 deg. . The rainfall, however, after the eastern monsoons, is very heavy, and the island is liable to

violent hurricanes. It is remarkable that the dry season (October to April) is coincident with the period of the west monsoon. Indigenous mammals are poor in species as well as few in number; birds are more abundant, but of no greater variety. The entomology of the island, however, is very rich, particularly in respect of Lepidoptera. Shells are obtained in great numbers and variety. Turtle-shell is also largely exported. The vegetation is also rich, and Amboyna produces most of the common tropical fruits and vegetables, including the sago-palm, bread-fruit, cocoa-nut, sugar-cane, maize, coffee, pepper and cotton. Cloves, however, form its chief product, though the trade in them is less important than formerly, when the Dutch prohibited the rearing of the clove-tree in all the other islands subject to their rule, in order to secure the monopoly to Amboyna. Amboyna wood, of great value for ornamental work, is obtained from the hard knots which occur on certain trees in the forests of Ceram. The population (about 39,000) is divided into two classes– orang burger or citizens, and orang negri or villagers, the former being a class of native origin enjoying certain privileges conferred on their ancestors by the old Dutch East India Company. The natives are of mixed Malay-Papuan blood. They are mostly Christians or Mahommedans. There are also, besides the Dutch, some Arabs, Chinese and a few Portuguese settlers.

Amboyna, the chief town, and seat of the resident and military commander of the Moluccas, is protected by Fort Victoria, and is a clean little town with wide streets, well planted. Agriculture, fisheries and import and export trade furnish the chief means of subsistence. It lies on the north-west of the peninsula of Leitimor, and has a safe and commodious anchorage. Its population is about 8000.

The Portuguese were the first European nation to visit Amboyna (1511). They established a factory there in 1521, but did not obtain peaceable possession of it till 1580, and were dispossessed by the Dutch in 1609. About 1615 the British formed a settlement in the island, at Cambello, which they retained until 1623, when it was destroyed by the Dutch, and frightful tortures inflicted on the unfortunate persons connected with it. In 1654, after many fruitless negotiations, Cromwell compelled the United Provinces to give the sum of L. 300,000, together with a small island, as compensation to the descendants of those who suffered in the “Amboyna massacre.” In 1673 the poet Dryden produced his tragedy of Amboyna, or the Cruelties of the Dutch to the English Merchants. In 1796 the British, under Admiral Rainier, captured Amboyna, but restored it to the Dutch at the peace of Amiens in 1802. It was retaken by the British in 1810, but once more restored to the Dutch in 1814.

AMBRACIA (more correctly AMPRACIA), an ancient Corinthian colony, situated about 7 m. from the Ambracian Gulf, on a bend of the navigable river Aracthus (or Aratthus), in the midst of a fertile wooded plain. It was founded between 650 and 625 B.C. by Gorgus, son of the Corinthian tyrant Cypselus. After the expulsion of Gorgus’s son Periander its government developed into a strong democracy. The early policy of Ambracia was determined by its loyalty to Corinth (for which it probably served as an entrepot in the Epirus trade), its consequent aversion to Corcyra, and its frontier disputes with the Amphilochians and Acarnanians. Hence it took a prominent part in the Peloponnesian War until the crushing defeat at Idomene (426) crippled its resources. In the 4th century it continued its traditional policy, but in 338 surrendered to Philip II. of Macedon. After forty-three years of autonomy under Macedonian suzerainty it became the capital of Pyrrhus, king of Epirus, who adorned it with palace, temples and theatres. In the wars of Philip V. of Macedon and the Epirotes against the Aetolian league (220-205) Ambracia passed from one alliance to the other, but ultimately joined the latter confederacy. During the struggle of the Aetolians against Rome it stood a stubborn siege. After its capture and plunder by M. Fulvius Nobilior in 189, it fell into insignificance. The foundation by Augustus of Nicopolis (q.v.), into which the remaining inhabitants were drafted, left the site desolate. In Byzantine times a new settlement took its place under the name of Arta (q.v.). Some fragmentary walls of large, well-dressed blocks near this latter town indicate the early prosperity of Ambracia.

AUTHORITIES. — Thucydides ii. 68 - iii. 114; Aristotle, Politics, 1303a sqq.; Strabo p. 325; Polybius xxii. 9-13; Livy xxxviii. 3-9; G. Wolfe, Journal of Geographical Society (London), iii. (1833) pp. 77-94; E. Oberhummer, Akarnanien, Ambrakien, &c. im Altertum (Munich, 1887). (M. O. B. C.)

AMBRIZ, a West African seaport belonging to Portugal, at the mouth of the Loje River, in 7 deg. 50′ S., 13 deg. E., some 70 m. N. of Loanda. It forms a part of the province of Angola (q.v.). The town is within the free-trade area of the conventional basin of the Congo river. Its chief exports are rubber, gum, coffee and copper. Pop. about 2500. Ambriz was, previously to 1884, the northernmost point of Africa south of the equator acknowledged as Portuguese territory.

AMBROS, AUGUST WILHELM (1816-1876), Austrian composer and historian of music, was born at Mauth near Prague. His father was a cultured man, and his mother was the sister of R. G. Kiesewetter (1773-1850), the musical archaeologist and collector. Ambros was well educated in music and the arts, which were his abiding passion: but he was destined for the law and an official career in the Austrian civil service, and he occupied various important posts under the ministry of justice, music being the employment of his leisure. From 1850 onwards he became well known as a critic and essay-writer, and in 1860 he began working on his magnum opus, his History of Music, which was published at intervals from 1864 in five volumes, the last two (1878, 1882) being edited and completed by Otto Kade and Langhaus. Ambros became professor of the history of music at Prague in 1869. He was an excellent pianist, and the author of numerous compositions somewhat reminiscent of Mendelssohn. He died at Vienna on the 28th of June 1876.

AMBROSE (fl. 1190), Norman poet, and chronicler of the Third Crusade, author of a work called L’Estoire de la guerre sainte, which describes in rhyming French verse the adventures of Richard Coeur de Lion as a crusader. The poem is known to us only through one Vatican MS., and long escaped the notice of historians. The credit for detecting its value belongs to the late Gaston Paris, although his edition (1897) was partially anticipated by the editors of the Monumenta Germaniae Historica, who published some selections in the twenty-seventh volume of their Scriptores (1885). Ambrose followed Richard I. as a noncombatant, and not improbably as a court-minstrel. He speaks as an eye-witness of the king’s doings at Messina, in Cyprus, at the siege of Acre, and in the abortive campaign which followed the capture of that city. Ambrose is surprisingly accurate in his chronology; though he did not complete his work before 1195, it is evidently founded upon notes which he had taken in the course of his pilgrimage. He shows no greater political insight than we should expect from his position; but relates what he had seen and heard with a naive vivacity which compels attention. He is prejudiced against the Saracens, against the French, and against all the rivals or enemies of his master; but he is never guilty of deliberate misrepresentation. He is rather to be treated as a biographer than as a historian of the Crusade in its broader aspects. None the less he is the chief authority for the events of the years 1190-1192, so far as these are connected with the Holy Land. The Itinerarium Regis Ricardi (formerly attributed to Geoffrey Vinsauf, but in reality the work of Richard, a canon of Holy Trinity, London) is little more than a free paraphrase of Ambrose. The first book of the Itinerarium contains some additional facts; and the whole of the Latin version is adorned with dowers of rhetoric which are foreign to the style of Ambrose. But it is no longer possible to regard the Itinerarium as a first-hand narrative. Stubbs’s edition of the Itinerarium (Rolls Series, 1864), in which the contrary hypothesis is maintained, appeared before Gaston Paris published his discovery.

See the edition of L’Estoire de la guerre sainte by Gaston Paris in the Collection des documents inedits sur l’histoire de France (1897); the editor discusses in his introduction the biography of Ambrose, the value of the poem as a historical source, and its relation to the Itinerarium. R. Pauli’s remarks (in Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Scriptores, xxvii.) also deserve attention. (H. W. C. D.)

AMBROSE, SAINT (c. 340-307), bishop of Milan, one of the most eminent fathers of the church in the 4th century, was a citizen of Rome, born about 337-340 in Treves, where his father was prefect of Gallia Narbonensis. His mother was a woman of intellect and piety. Ambrose was early destined to follow his father’s career, and was accordingly educated in Rome. He made such progress in literature, law and rhetoric, that the praetor Anicius Probus first gave him a place in the council and then made him consular prefect of Liguria and Emilia, with headquarters at Milan, where he made an excellent administrator. In 374 Auxentius, bishop of Milan, died, and the orthodox and Arian parties contended for the succession. An address delivered to them at this crisis by Ambrose led to his being acclaimed as the only competent occupant of the see; though hitherto only a catechumen, he was baptized, and a few days saw him duly installed as bishop of Milan. He immediately betook himself to the necessary studies, and acquitted himself in his new office with ability, boldness and integrity. Having apportioned his money among the poor, and settled his lands upon the church, with the exception of making his sister Marcellina tenant during life, and having committed the care of his family to his brother, he entered upon a regular course of theological study, under the care of Simplician, a presbyter of Rome, and devoted himself to the labours of the church, labours which were temporarily interrupted by an invasion of Goths, which compelled Ambrose and other churchmen to retire to Illyricum.

The eloquence of Ambrose soon found ample scope in the dispute between the Arians and the orthodox or Catholic party, whose cause the new bishop espoused. Gratian, the son of the elder Valentinian, took the same side; but the younger Valentinian, who had now become his colleague in the empire, adopted the opinions of the Arians, and all the arguments and eloquence of Ambrose could not reclaim the young prince to the orthodox faith. Theodosius, the emperor of the East, also professed the orthodox belief; but there were many adherents of Arius scattered throughout his dominions. In this distracted state of religious opinion, two leaders of the Arians, Palladius and Secundianus, confident of numbers, prevailed upon Gratian to call a general council from all parts of the empire. This request appeared so equitable that he complied without hesitation; but Ambrose, foreseeing the consequence, prevailed upon the emperor to have the matter determined by a council of the Western bishops. A synod, composed of thirty-two bishops, was accordingly held at Aquileia in the year 381. Ambrose was elected president; and Palladius, being called upon to defend his opinions, declined, insisting that the meeting was a partial one, and that, all the bishops of the empire not being present, the sense of the Christian church concerning the question in dispute could not be obtained. A vote was then taken, when Palladius and his associate Secundianus were deposed from the episcopal office.

Ambrose was equally zealous in combating the attempt made by the upholders of the old state religion to resist the enactments of Christian emperors. The pagan party was led by Quintus Aurelius Symmachus (q.v.), consul in 391, who presented to Valentinian II. a forcible but unsuccessful petition praying for the restoration of the altar of Victory to its ancient station in the hall of the senate, the proper support of seven vestal virgins, and the regular observance of the other pagan ceremonies. To this petition Ambrose replied in a letter to Valentinian, arguing that the devoted worshippers of idols had often been forsaken by their deities; that the native valour of the Roman soldiers had gained their victories, and not the pretended influence of pagan priests; that these idolatrous worshippers requested for themselves what they refused to Christians; that voluntary was more honourable than constrained virginity; that as the Christian ministers declined to receive temporal emoluments, they should also be denied to pagan priests; that it was absurd to suppose that God would inflict a famine upon the empire for neglecting to support a religious system contrary to His will as revealed in the Scriptures; that the whole process of nature encouraged innovations, and that all nations had permitted them even in religion; that heathen sacrifices were offensive to Christians; and that it was the duty of a Christian prince to suppress pagan ceremonies. In the epistles of Symmachus and of Ambrose both the petition and the reply are preserved. They are a strange blend of sophistry, superstition, sound sense and solid argument.

The increasing strength of the Arians proved a formidable task for ambrose. In 384 the young emperor and his mother Justina, along with a considerable number of clergy and laity professing the Arian faith, requested from the bishop the use of two churches, one in the city, the other in the suburbs of Milan. Ambrose refused, and was required to answer for his conduct before the council. He went, attended by a numerous crowd of people, whose impetuous zeal so overawed the ministers of Valentinian that he was permitted to retire without making the surrender of the churches. The day following, when he was performing divine service in the Basilica, the prefect of the city came to persuade him to give up at least the Portian church in the suburbs. As he still continued obstinate, the court proceeded to violent measures: the officers of the household were commanded to prepare the Basilica and the Portian churches to celebrate divine service upon the arrival of the emperor and his mother at the ensuing festival of Easter. Perceiving the growing strength of the prelate’s interest, the court deemed it prudent to restrict its demand to the use of one of the churches. But all entreaties proved in vain, and drew forth the following characteristic declaration from the bishop: — “If you demand my person, I am ready to submit: carry me to prison or to death, I will not resist; but I will never betray the church of Christ. I will not call upon the people to succour me; I will die at the foot of the altar rather than desert it. The tumult of the people I will not encourage: but God alone can appease it.”

Many circumstances in the history of Ambrose are strongly characteristic of the general spirit of the times. The chief causes of his victory over his opponents were his great popularity and the superstitious reverence paid to the episcopal character at that period. But it must also be noted that he used several indirect means to obtain and support his authority with the people. He was liberal to the poor; it was his custom to comment severely in his preaching on the public characters of his times; and he introduced popular reforms in the order and manner of public worship. It is alleged, too, that at a time when the influence of Ambrose required vigorous support, he was admonished in a dream to search for, and found under the pavement of the church, the remains of two martyrs, Gervasius and Protasius. The applause of the vulgar was mingled with the derision of the court party.

Although the court was displeased with the religious principles and conduct of Ambrose, it respected his great political talents; and when necessity required, his aid was solicited and generously granted. When Maximus usurped the supreme power in Gaul, and was meditating a descent upon Italy, Valentinian sent Ambrose to dissuade him from the undertaking, and the embassy was successful. On a second attempt of the same kind Ambrose was again employed; and although he was unsuccessful, it cannot be doubted that, if his advice had been followed, the schemes of the usurper would have proved abortive; but the enemy was permitted to enter Italy; and Milan was taken. Justina and her son fled; but Ambrose remained at his post, and did good service to many of the sufferers by causing the plate of the church to be melted for their relief. Theodosius, the emperor of the East, espoused the cause of Justina, and regained the kingdom. This Theodosius was sternly rebuked by Ambrose for the massacre of 7000 persons at Thessalonica in 390, and was bidden imitate David in his repentance as he had imitated him in guilt.

In 302, after the assassination of Valentinian and the usurpation of Eugenius, Ambrose fled from Milan; but when Theodosius was eventually victorious, he supplicated the emperor for the pardon of those who had supported Eugenius. Soon after acquiring the undisputed possession of the Roman empire, Theodosius died at Milan in 395, and two years later (4th

April 397) Ambrose also passed away. He was succeeded by Simplician.

A man of pure character, vigorous mind, unwearying zeal and uncommon generosity, Ambrose ranks high among the fathers of the ancient church on many counts. His chief faults were ambition and bigotry. Though ranking with Augustine, Jerome, and Gregory the Great, as one of the Latin “doctors,” he is most naturally compared with Hilary, whom he surpasses in administrative excellence as much as he falls below him in theological ability. Even here, however, his achievements are of no mean order, especially when we remember his juridical training and his comparatively late handling of Biblical and doctrinal subjects. In matters of exegesis he is, like Hilary, an Alexandrian; his chief productions are homiletic commentaries on the early Old Testament narratives, e.g. the Hexaemeron (Creation) and Abraham, some of the Psalms, and the Gospel according to Luke. In dogmatic he follows Basil of Caesarea and other Greek authors, but nevertheless gives a distinctly Western cast to the speculations of which he treats. This is particularly manifest in the weightier emphasis which he lays upon human sin and divine grace, and in the place which he assigns to faith in the individual Christian life. His chief works in this field are De fide ad Gratianuni Augustunn, De Spiritu Sancto, De incarnationis Dominicae sacramento, De mysteriis. His great spiritual successor, Augustine, whose conversion was helped by Ambrose’s sermons, owes more to him than to any writer except Paul. Ambrose’s intense episcopal consciousness furthered the growing doctrine of the Church and its sacerdotal ministry, while the prevalent asceticism of the day, continuing the Stoic and Ciceronian training of his youth, enabled him to promulgate a lofty standard of Christian ethics. Thus we have the De officiis ministrorum, De viduis, De virginitate and De paenitentia.

Ambrose has also left several funeral orations and ninety- one letters, but it is as a hymn-writer that he perhaps deserves most honour. Catching the impulse from Hilary and confirmed in it by the success of Arian psalmody, Ambrose composed several hymns, marked by dignified simplicity, which were not only effective in themselves but served as a fruitful model for later times. We cannot certainly assign to him more than four or five (Deus Creator Omnium, Aeterne rerum conditor, Jam surgit hora tertia, and the Christmas hymn Veni redemptor gentium) of those that have come down to us. Each of these hymns has eight four-line stanzas and is written in strict iambic tetrameter.

On the Ambrosian ritual see LITURGY; on the Ambrosian library see LIBRARIES; on the church founded by him at Milan in 387 see MILAN. Editions: The Benedictine (4 vols., Venice, 1748 ff.); Migne, Patrol. Lat. xiv.-xvii.; P. A. Ballerini (6 vols., Milan, 1875 ff.). LITERATURE: Th. Forster, Ambrose, B. of Mailand (Halle, 1884), and art. in Herzog-Hauck, Realencyk., where the literature is cited in full; A. Ebert, Glesch. der christlich-latein. Litt. (2nd ed., 1889); O. Bardenhewer, Patrologic (2nd ed., 1891); A. Harnack, Hist. of Dogma, esp. vol. v.; W. Bright, Age ofthe Fathers. (A. J. G.)

AMBROSE (ANDREY SERTIS-KAMENSKIY) (1708-1771), archbishop of Moscow, was born at Nezhine in the government of Chernigov, and studied in the school of St Alexander Nevskiy, where he afterwards became a tutor. At the age of thirty-one he entered a monastery, where he took the name of Ambrose. Subsequently he was appointed archimandrite of the convent of New Jerusalem at Voznesensk. From this post he was transferred as bishop, first to the diocese of Pereyaslav, and afterwards to that of Krusitsy near Moscow, finally becoming archbishop of Moscow in 1761. He was famous not only for his interest in schemes for the alleviation of poverty in Moscow, but also as the founder of new churches and monasteries. A terrible outbreak of plague occurred in Moscow in 1771, and the populace began to throng round an image of the Virgin to which they attributed supernatural healing power. Ambrose, perceiving that this crowding together merely enabled the contagion to spread, had the image secretly removed. The mob, suspecting that he was responsible for its removal, attacked a monastery to which he had retired, dragged him away from the sanctuary, and, having given him time to receive the sacrament, strangled him. Ambrose’s works include a liturgy and translations from the Fathers.

AMBROSE (AMBROISE), AUTPERT (d. 778), French Benedictine monk. He became abbe of St Vincent on the Volturno “in the time of Desiderius, king of the Lombards.” He wrote a considerable number of works on the Bible and religious subjects generally. Among these are commentaries on the Apocalypse (see Bibl. Patrum, xiii. 403), on the Psalms, on the Song of Solomon; Lives of SS. Paldo, Tuto and Vaso (according to Mabillon); Assumption of the Virgin; Combat between the Virtues and the Vices.

See Mabillon, Acta sanct. Bolland. III. ii. 259, 266; Georg Lommel, Der ostrsankische Reformator Ambrosius (Giessen, 1847); Bollandist Bibl. hag. lat. (1898), 61.

AMBROSE, ISAAC (1604-1663/4), English Puritan divine, was the son of Richard Ambrose, vicar of Ormskirk, and was probably descended from the Ambroses of Lowick in Furness, a well-known Catholic family. He entered Brazenose College, Oxford, in 1621, in his seventeenth year. Having graduated B.A. in 1624 and been ordained, he received in 1627 the little cure of Castleton in Derbyshire. By the influence of William Russell, earl of Bedford, he was appointed one of the king’s itinerant preachers in Lancashire, and after living for a time in Garstang, he was selected by the Lady Margaret Hoghton as vicar of Preston. He associated himself with Presbyterianism, and was on the celebrated committee for the ejection of “scandalous and ignorant ministers and schoolmasters” during the Commonwealth. So long as Ambrose continued at Preston he was favoured with the warm friendship of the Hoghton family, their ancestral woods and the tower near Blackburn affording him sequestered places for those devout meditations and “experiences” that give such a charm to his diary, portions of which are quoted in his Prima Media and Ultima (1650, 1659). The immense auditory of his sermon (Redeeming the Time) at the funeral of Lady Hoghton was long a living tradition all over the county. On account of the feeling engendered by the civil war Ambrose left his great church of Preston in 1654, and became minister of Garstang, whence, however, in 1662 he was ejected with the two thousand ministers who refused to conform. His after years were passed among old friends and in quiet meditation at Preston. He died of apoplexy about the 20th of January 1663/4. As a religious writer Ambrose has a vividness and freshness of imagination possessed by scarcely any of the Puritan Nonconformists. Many who have no love for Puritan doctrine, nor sympathy with Puritan experience, have appreciated the pathos and beauty of his writings, and his Looking to Jesus long held its own in popular appreciation with the writings of John Bunyan.

AMBROSE THE CAMALDULIAN, the common name of AMBROGIO TRAVERSARI (1386-1439), French ecclesiastic, born near Florence at the village of Portico. At the age of fourteen he entered the Camaldulian Order in the monastery of Sta Maria degli Angeli, and rapidly became a leading theologian and Hellenist. In Greek literature his master was Emmanuel Chrysoloras. He became general of the order in 1431, and was a leading advocate of the papacy. This attitude he showed clearly when he attended the council of Basel as legate of Eugenius IV. So strong was his hostility to some of the delegates that he described Basel as a western Babylon. He likewise supported the pope at Ferrara and Florence, and worked hard in the attempt to reconcile the Eastern and Western Churches. Though this cause was unsuccessful, Ambrose is interesting as typical of the new humanism which was growing up within the church. Voigt says that he was the first monk in Florence in whom the love of letters and art became predominant over his ecclesiastical views. Thus while among his own colleagues he seemed merely a hypocritical and arrogant priest, in his relations with his brother humanists, such as Cosimo de Medici, he appeared as the student of classical antiquities and especially of Greek theological authors. His chief works are: — Hodoeporicon, an account of a journey taken by the pope’s command, during which he visited the monasteries of Italy; a translation of

Palladius’ Life of Chrysostom; of Nineteen Sermons of Ephraem Syrus; of the Book of St Basil on Virginity. A number of MSS. remain in the library of St Mark at Venice. He died on the 20th of October 1439.

See G. Voigt, Die Wiederbelebung des klass. Altertums (2 vols., 3rd ed., 1893); his Epistolae were published by Cannato (Florence, 1759 with a life by Menus; Bollandist Bibl. hag. lat. (1898), 65; A. Masius, Uber die Stellung des Kamaldulensers Amborgio Traversari zum Papst Eugen IV. und zum Basler Konzil (Dobeln, 1888); Savigny, Geschichte rom. Rechts, Mittel. (1850), vi. 422-424.

AMBROSIA, in ancient mythology, sometimes the food, sometimes the drink of the gods. The word has generally been derived from Gr. a, not, and mbrotos, mortal; hence the food or drink of the immortals. A. W. Verrall, however, denies that there is any clear example in which the word ambrosios necessarily means “immortal,” and prefers to explain it as “fragrant,” a sense which is always suitable; cf. W. Leaf, Iliad (2nd ed.), on the phrase ambrosios upuos (ii. 18). If so, the word may be derived from the Semitic ambar (ambergris) to which Eastern nations attribute miraculous properties. W. H. Roscher thinks that both nectar and ambrosia were kinds of honey, in which case their power of conferring immortality would be due to the supposed healing and cleansing power of honey (see further NECTAR). Derivatively the word Ambrosia (neut. plur.) was given to certain festivals in honour of Dionysus, probably because of the predominance of feasting in connexion with them.

The name Ambrosia was also applied by Dioscorides and Pliny to certain herbs, and has been retained in modern botany for a genus of plants from which it has been extended to the group of dicotyledons called Ambrosiaceae, including Ambrosia, Xanthium and Iva, all annual herbaceous plants represented in America. Ambrosia maritima and some other species occur also in the Mediterranean region.

There is also an American beetle, the Ambrosia beetle, belonging to the family of Scolytidae, which derives its name from its curious cultivation of a succulent fungus, called ambrosia. Ambrosia beetles bore deep though minute galleries into trees and timber, and the wood-dust provides a bed for the growth of the fungus, on which the insects and larvae feed.

AMBROSIANS, the name given to several religious brotherhoods which at various times since the 14th century have sprung up in and around Milan; they have about as much connexion with St Ambrose as the “Jeromites” who were found chiefly in upper Italy and Spain have with their patron saint. Only the oldest of them, the Pratres S. Ambrosii ad Nemus, had anything more than a very local significance. This order is known from a bull of Gregory XI. addressed to the monks of the church of St Ambrose outside Milan. These monks, it would appear, though under the authority of a prior, had no rule. In response to the request of the archbishop, the pope had commanded them to follow the rule of Augustine and to be known by the above name. They were further to recite the Ambrosian office. Subsequently the order had a number of independent establishments in Italy which were united into one congregation by Eugenius IV., their headquarters being at Milan. Their discipline afterwards became so slack that an appeal was made to Cardinal Borromeo asking him to reform their houses. By Sixtus V. the order was amalgamated with the congregation of St Barnabas, but Innocent X. dissolved it in 1650.

The name Ambrosians is also given to a 16th-century Anabaptist sect, which laid claim to immediate communication with God through the Holy Ghost. Basing their theology upon the words of the Gospel of St John i. 9 — “There was the true light which lighteth every man, coming into the world” — they denied the necessity of any priests or ministers to interpret the Bible. Their leader Ambrose went so far as to hold further that the revelation which was vouchsafed to him was a higher authority than the Scriptures. The doctrine of the Ambrosians, who belonged probably to that section of the Anabaptists known as Pneumatici, may be compared with the “Inner Light” doctrine of the Quakers.

See Herzog-Hauck’s Realencyklopadie, i. 439.

AMBROSIASTER. A commentary on St Paul’s epistles, “brief in words but weighty in matter,” and valuable for the criticism of the Latin text of the New Testament, was long attributed to St Ambrose. Erasmus in 1527 threw doubt on the accuracy of this ascription, and the author is usually spoken of as Ambrosiaster or pseudo-Ambrose. Owing to the fact that Augustine cites part of the commentary on Romans as by “Sanctus Hilarius” it has been ascribed by various critics at different times to almost every known Hilary. Dom G. Morin (Rev. d’hist. et de litt. religiouses, tom. iv. 97 f.) broke new ground by suggesting in 1899 that the writer was Isaac, a converted Jew, writer of a tract on the Trinity and Incarnation, who was exiled to Spain in 378-380 and then relapsed to Judaism, but he afterwards abandoned this theory of the authorship in favour of Decimus Hilarianus Hilarius, proconsul of Africa in 377. With this attribution Professor Alex. Souter, in his Study of Ambrosiaster (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1905), agrees. There is scarcely anything to be said for the possibility of Ambrose having written the book before he became a bishop, and added to it in later years, incorporating remarks of Hilary of Poitiers on Romans. The best presentation of the case for Ambrose is by P. A. Ballerini in his complete edition of that father’s works.

In the book cited above Professor Souter also discusses the authorship of the Quaestiones Veteris et Novi Testamenti, which the MSS. ascribe to Augustine. He concludes, on very thorough philological and other grounds, that this is with one possible slight exception the work of the same “Ambrosiaster.” The same conclusion had been arrived at previously by Dom Morin.

AMBROSINI, BARTOLOMEO (1588-1657), Italian naturalist, was born and died at Bologna. He was a pupil of Aldrovandi, several of whose works he published, and whom he succeeded eventually as director of the university botanical garden. He studied at the university, and became successively professor of philosophy, of botany and of medicine; and during the plague of 1630 in Bologna he worked assiduously for the relief of the sufferers. He was the author of several medical works of some importance in their day.

His brother, GIACINTO AMBROSINI (1605-1672), was a distinguished botanist, who succeeded Bartolomeo as professor of botany and director of the university garden in 1657. He published a catalogue of its plants and also a botanical dictionary.

AMBROSIUS AURELIANUS, leader of the Britons against the Saxons in the 5th century, was, according to the legends preserved in Gildas and the Historia Brittonum, of Roman extraction. There are signs of the existence of two parties in the national opposition to the invaders, but as Pascent, son of Vortigern, is said by Nennius to have held his dominions in the west by leave of Ambrosius, the Roman element seems to have triumphed. Some measure of success appears to have attended the efforts of Ambrosius, and it has been suggested that Amesbury in Wiltshire is connected with Emrys, the Celtic form of his name.

See Bede, Eccl. Hist. (Plummer), i. 16; Nennius, Hist. Britt. sec. 31; Gildas, De excidio Brittarum, sec. 25; J. Rhys, Celtic Britain (1884), pp. 104, 105, 107.

AMBULANCE (from the Fr. ambulance, formerly hopital ambulant, derived from the Lat. ambulare, to move about), a term generally applied in England and America to the wagon or other vehicle in which the wounded in battle, or those who have sustained injuries in civil life, are conveyed to hospital. More strictly, in military parlance, the term imports a hospital establishment moving with an army in the field, to provide for the collection, treatment and care of the wounded on the battlefield, and of the sick, until they can be removed to hospitals of a more stationary character. In 1905-1906 the term “field ambulance” was adopted in the British service to denote this organization, the former division of the ambulance service into “bearer companies” and “field hospitals” being done away with. The description of the British service given below applies generally to the system in vogue in the army after the experience gained in the South African War of 1899-1902; but in recent years the medical arrangements in connexion with the British army hospitals have been altered in various details, and the

changes in progress showed no sign of absolute finality. Some of these, however, were rather of nomenclature than of substance, and hardly affect the principles as described below.

History.

The ambulance organization which, variously modified in details, now prevails in all civilized armies, only dates from the last decade of the 18th century. Before that time wounded soldiers were either carried to the rear by comrades or left unattended to and exposed until the fighting was over. Surgical assistance did not reach the battlefield till the day after the engagement, or even later; and for many of the wounded it was then too late. In 1792 Baron Dominique Jean Larrey (1766-1842) of the French army introduced his system of ambulances volantes, or flying field hospitals, capable of moving with speed from place to place, like the “flying artillery” of that time. They were adapted both for giving the necessary primary surgical treatment and for removing the wounded quickly from the sphere of fighting. Napoleon warmly supported Larrey in his efforts in this direction, and the system was soon brought to a high state of efficiency in the Grande Armee. About the same time another distinguished surgeon in the French army, Baron Pierre Francois Percy (1754-1825), organized a corps of brancardiers, or stretcher-bearers. These were soldiers trained and equipped for the duty of collecting the wounded while a battle was in progress, and carrying them to a place of safety, where their wounds and injuries could be attended to.

Geneva Convention.

Animportant step towards the amelioration of the condition of the wounded of armies in the field was the European Convention signed at Geneva in 1864, by the terms of which, subject to certain regulations, not only the wounded themselves but also the official staff of ambulances and their equipment were rendered neutral, the former, therefore, not being liable to be retained as prisoners of war, nor the latter to be taken as prize of war. This convention has greatly favoured the development of ambulance establishments, but as all combatants have not the same knowledge of the conditions of this convention, or do not interpret them in the same way, charges of treachery and abuse of the Red Cross flag are but too common in modern warfare.

The American Civil War marked the beginning of the modern ambulance system. The main feature, however, of the hospital organization throughout that war was the railway hospital service, which provided for the rapid conveyance of the sick and wounded to the rear of the contending armies. Hospital carriages, equipped with medical stores and appliances, for the transport of cases from the front to the base, were rapidly introduced into other armies, and played a great part in the ambulance service of the Franco-German War.

German system.

The German hospital service as existing at the time of the Franco-German War of 1870-71 was modified and extended by the Kriegs Sanitats Ordnung of 1878 and the KriegsEtappen Ordnung of 1887, which completed the organization by the addition in time of war of numerous subordinate offices and departments. The main divisions of the ambulance organization of the German army in the field fall into: (1) sanitary detachments, (2) field hospitals, (3) flying hospitals, (4) hospital reserve depots, (5) “committees for the transport of the sick,” and (6) railway hospital trains. The whole administration of the ambulance service of the grand army in the field is in the hands of the chief of the ambulance sanitary staff, who is attached to headquarters. Next in command come surgeons- general of armies in the field, surgeons-general of army corps, and under them again surgeons-in-chief of divisions and regiments. Civil consulting surgeons of eminence, and professors from the universities, are also attached to the various armies and divisions to co-operate with and act as advisers to the surgeons of the standing military surgical staff. The hospital transport service on the lines of communication is highly organized and the hospital railway carriages are elaborately equipped.

French system. The French ambulance system, finally settled by the reglement of 1884, is organized on almost identical lines with the German; one of the principal peculiarities of the former being the ambulances volantes already referred to. The peace organization of the German and French systems does not materially differ from that of the British service.

Japanese system.

In the Japanese army a special feature is the sanitary corps, whose duty is the prevention of disease among the troops; it has been brought to a great pitch of perfection, with the result that in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-1905) the immunity of the troops from all forms of preventable disease surpassed all previous experience. Not only was the army accompanied by sanitary experts who advised on all questions of camping grounds, water supply, &c., but before the war began the Intelligence Department collected information as to the diseases of the country likely to be the scene of operations, unhealthy places to be avoided, and precautions to be taken.

British army system.

Coming now to the ambulance system of the British army, in which are comprised the arrangements and organization of the medical department for the care and treatment of the sick and wounded from the time they are injured or taken ill, till they are able to return to duty or are invalided home, we will trace the progress of a wounded man from the field of battle to his home; remembering that, as British troops are usually engaged overseas, hospital ships as well as land transport are necessary.

First field dressing.

When a soldier falls wounded in action he is attended by the regimental surgeon and stretcher-bearers, who apply some extemporized method of stopping bleeding and dress the wounds with the “first field dressing” — a packet of antiseptic material which every officer and man on active service carries stitched to some part of his clothing, and which contains everything necessary for dressing an ordinary gunshot wound. Recent wars have demonstrated that in all uncomplicated cases it is better to leave this dressing undisturbed, as the wounds made by modern projectiles heal up at once if left alone, if air and dirt have been thus excluded.

Collecting station.

From the field he is carried on a stretcher by bearers (formerly of the “Bearer Companies”) of the Royal Army Medical Corps to the collecting station, where he is placed on an ambulance wagon of the first line of assistance and taken to the dressing station. Here his would will be examined if considered necessary, but as on the field the first medical officer who examined him has already attached a “specification tally” to the patient, giving particulars of the wound, it will probably not be disturbed unless complicated by bleeding, splintering of bone or some other condition requiring interference. Any operation, however, which is urgently called for will be here performed, nourishment, stimulants and opiates administered if required, and the patient moved to the field hospital in an ambulance wagon of the second line of assistance. From the field hospital he is transferred as soon as possible by the ambulance train to the general hospital at the advanced base of operations, and from there in due time in another train to the base of operations at the coast, from which he is ultimately either returned to duty or sent home in a hospital ship. The organization by which these requirements are fulfilled is the following: –

Regimental arrangements.

Every regiment and fighting unit has posted to it, on proceeding on active service, a medical officer who looks after the health of the men and advises the commanding officer on sanitary matters. When the regiment goes into action he takes command of the regimental stretcher-bearers who, to the number of two per company have been in peace time instructed in first aid and in the carrying the wounded on stretchers. These men leave their arms behind and wear the Red Cross armlets, to indicate their non-combatant functions, but in these days, when a battle is often fought at long ranges, it is not to be wondered at, or attributed to disregard of the red cross flag by the enemy, if medical officers and stretcher-bearers are hit. The bearer company into whose charge the wounded man next passes is composed of men of the Royal Army Medical Corps, with a detachment of the Army Service Corps for transport duties. In future, bearer sections of the Field Ambulances will perform the duties of the bearer company. Its function is to collect and succour the wounded on the battlefield and to hand them over to the field hospitals, with which these bearer companies

are closely associated, though separately organized. In the Indian army the bearer company is provided from the personnel of the field hospital when there is a battle, and reverts to the hospital again after it is over. The war in South Africa of 1899- 1902 clearly demonstrated the superiority of the Indian plan; for after the action the bearer company staff should be available to give the much-needed help in the field hospital, and some amalgamation of the two organizations, or something after the plan of the ambulance volante of the French, is necessary. The bearers afford the wounded any treatment required, supply water and sedatives, and then carry them back on stretchers to the collecting station in the rear, whence they are conveyed to the dressing station in the wagons or other form of transport.

At the dressing station, which ought to be out of range of the firing, and should have a good water supply, the patient is made as comfortable as possible, nourishment and stimulants are administered, and he is then taken to the field hospital. In times of great stress, when it is desirable to remove the wounded quickly from the field, and there are no roads or wheeled transport is not available, large numbers of bearers are employed to carry them on stretchers, &c. These men are engaged locally and are soon given the slight training necessary. This was done in Natal after the battles on the Tugela (1899), in which there were some thousands of wounded to be conveyed; also in Egypt, where the local troops not required for the fighting line were requisitioned; the Japanese in Mongolia employed hundreds of Chinese coolies for this purpose, the general use of sedan-chairs in China having accustomed the poorer class of natives to this kind of labour.

Indian bearers.

In India, the rank and file of the Royal Army Medical Corps not being employed, the bearer work is carried out by natives specially enlisted and organized into a corps. These men are bearers by caste — a reminiscence of the system which prevailed generally a hundred years ago, and is still met with in out-of-the-way places, of conveyance of travellers in dhoolies, which are closed wooden carriages fixed on long poles and carried on men’s shoulders. The bearers convey the wounded in dandies, similar to dhoolies, but made mostly of canvas, so that they are much lighter. The courage of these bearers on the battlefield has often been praised. The old bearer caste is, however, rapidly dying out owing to the general discontinuance of the use of dhoolies. Thus the ambulance organization in India is entirely different from that in other parts of the British empire. The rank and file of the Royal Army Medical Corps are not employed there, although the medical officers are. The warrant and non-commissioned ranks are replaced by a most useful body of men of Anglo-Indian or Eurasian (half caste) birth, called the Subordinate Medical Department, the members of which, now called assistant surgeons (formerly apothecaries), receive a three years’ training in medical work at the Indian medical schools and are competent to perform the compounding of medicines and to deal with all but the most serious cases of injury and illness. In the hospitals the men of the Royal Army Medical Corps are replaced by the Native Army Hospital Corps, subdivided into ward-servants, cooks, water- carriers, sweepers and washermen. The caste system necessitates this division of labour, and the men are not so efficient or trustworthy as the white soldiers whose places they take. The bearers of the wounded are a separate and distinct class, partly attached to regiments, &c., as part of the regimental transport, and partly organized into bearer companies, attached to field hospitals. The dandies in which they carry the wounded are much more comfortable than stretchers, being fitted with roofs and sides of canvas to keep off sun and rain, thus being collapsible so that the dandy is quite flat when not in use. Still they are heavy, clumsy, and cannot be folded up into a small compass for transport like a stretcher; they also take up a good deal of room in wagons and can scarcely be carried on the backs of animals owing to the length of the pole. Hence riding ponies and mules are much used in Indian warfare, especially in the mountains, for the carriage of less seriously wounded men. In India separate hospitals are necessary for white and native troops, and the latter have accommodation for the large numbers of non-combatant camp-followers, mule-drivers, cooks, officers’ servants, &c., &c., which constitute one of the most remarkable features of the Indian army organization.

Field hospitals.

Field hospitals, under the new scheme furnished by tent sections of the Field Ambulances, are each supposed to provide accommodation for 100 patients, who live on their field rations suitably cooked and supplemented by various medical comforts. The patients are not supplied with hospital clothing, nor do they have beds, but he on straw, which is spread on the ground and covered with waterproof sheets and blankets; of these latter a considerable reserve is carried. These hospitals can and must at times accommodate more than the regulation number of patients, but in the South African War their resources were at times considerably overtaxed, with consequent discomfort and hardship to the patients, the medical equipment proving insufficient for unexpectedly heavy calls upon its resources.

Hospitals on the lines of communication.

These hospitals are supposed to move with the army, and therefore it is imperative to pass the wounded quickly back from these to the stationary hospitals on the lines of communication (which vary according to the length of these lines) and thence to the general hospitals at the base. The size of the lines of communication hospitals varies according to circumstances, and they are as a rule “dieted,” that is to say proper hospital diets and not field rations are issued to the patients, who also are supplied with beds and proper hospital clothing. In these hospitals also there may be nursing sisters, who of course are unsuited for the rough work and life nearer the front. Sisters are also employed on the hospital trains, which were found most useful and brought to great perfection in the South African War, being fitted with beds, kitchens, dispensaries, &c., so that patients were moved long distances in comfort.

General hospitals.

Arrived at the base of operations the wounded are admitted to the general hospitals, of which the numbers and situation vary with circumstances, but each is supposed to have an officers’ ward. In the South African War, owing to the inability of the comparatively small Royal Army Medical Corps to meet all the requirements of the enormous force which was ultimately employed, many of the doctors were drawn from the civil profession, and the rank and file from the St John’s Ambulance Association and the Volunteer Medical Staff Corps, while many nursing sisters belonged to the Army Nursing Reserve, ordinarily employed in civil hospitals but liable to be drafted out during war.

Civil general hospitals.

In the South African War the patriotism and liberality of the British public furnished several large general hospitals, perfectly equipped, and officered by some of the most eminent members of the medical profession in the United Kingdom. Among others may be mentioned the Princess Christian, the Imperial Yeomanry (both field and general hospitals), the Langman, the Portland, the Scottish, Irish and Welsh hospitals. These were staffed entirely by civilians, except that an officer of the Royal Army Medical Corps was attached to each as administrator and organizer; and their personnel was made up of physicians, surgeons, nurses, dressers (medical students and in some cases fully qualified surgeons) and servants; the numbers, of course, varying with the size of the hospitals. In addition to the staff of these hospitals several eminent civil surgeons, including Sir William Maccormac and Sir F. Treves, went out to the seat of war as consultants: an innovation in the British service, but in accordance with the system long in vogue in Germany.

To the Army Medical organization is affiliated in war time that of t