ARGATI....ARIETOES. 19 Biography. "He fixed the advance on goods imported from England at twenty-five per cent, and the price of tobacco at three shillings per pound; the penalty for transgressing this regulation was three years' slavery. No person was allowed to fire a gun, except in his own defence against an enemy, till a new supply of ammunition should arrive; on penalty of one year's slavery. Absence from church on Sundays and holidays, was punished by laying the offender neck and heels, for one whole night, or by one week's slavery; the second offence by one month's ; and the third by one year's slavery. Private trade with the savages, or teaching them the use of arms, was punishable by death. These and similar laws were executed with great rigor by Argal; who, though odious to the colony, was never punished, but was afterwards knighted by king James." ARGATI, or Wild Mountain Sheep, an animal common in Kamptskatka, but unknown in Europe, except in Corsica and Sardinia. Its skin resembles that of the deer, but it nearer approaches the goat in its gait and general appearance. Its head is adorned with two large twisted horns, which, when the animal is at full growth, sometimes weigh from twenty-five to thirty pounds; and are rested on the creature's back when it is running. They are remarkably swift and active; they frequent only the most craggy and mountainous parts, and traverse the steepest rocks with astonishing rapidity. They are extremely beautiful, and their flesh is sweet, and delicately flavored. Of their horns are made spoons, platters, and cups, by the Kamptskadales, who often have one of the latter hanging to a belt, serving them to drink out of, when in their hunting expeditions.....Cooke's Voyage. ARIETOES, the name of the public dances among the natives of the island of Hispaniola, or St. Domingo. At these arietoes or public dances, (which were appro priated to particular solemnities and accompanied by historical songs) it was customary to dance from evening to the dawn; and although fifty thousand men and women were frequently assembled together on these occasions, they seemed to be actuated by one common 20 ARMADA.....ARTILLERY. impulse; keeping time by responsive motions of their hands, with a wonderful exactness....Bryan Edwards. ARMADA. The prodigious Spanish fleet, called the Invincible Armada, was fitted out by Philip II. of Spain, for the conquest of England, and appeared in the English channel in the year 1588; having on board about twenty thousand land forces. There was also a vast number of flat-bottomed vessels prepared to tra port into England an army of thirty-five thousand men, assembled in the Netherlands. This fleet consisted of a hundred and thirty ships, of which the most were prodigiously large; and when it was first discovered in the channel, it appeared in the form of a crescent or halfmoon, stretching at the distance of seven miles from the extremity of one division to that of the other.Though the English navy was infinitely inferior, in number and size, it boldly attacked the armada, captured several ships, burnt several others, and dispersed the rest; which meeting with a violent storm, not one half of them returned to Spain, and a still less proportion of the soldiers and seamen. This terrible blow to their naval power, the Spaniards have never since recovered......Russell. ARTILLERY, great guns or cannon. They were first used in 1346, in the battle of Cressy; where Edward III. had four pieces of cannon, which greatly contributed to gain him the victory over the French, who had only small arms. Those who are used to artillery are able to judge accurately of the direction in which a cannon is fired, by comparing with each other the two flashes of powder; the one from the muzzle, and the other from the touch-hole. Standing or a wall or fortification, and critically observing those two flashes, they determine whether the ball goes to the right, or to the left, or is coming to the very spot where they are; in the latter case they take care to leap as soon as they see the flash. Bomb-shells may be plainly seen in their flight in the air; but in some cases, the persons observing these shells coming towards them, have been fascinated by their appearance, and unable to move from the spot, as small birds are said to be by ASH....ASIA....ASP. 21 the rattle-snake. Capt. Drinkwater, in his account of the last siege of Gibraltar, says, "This sudden arrest of the faculties was nothing uncommon; several instances occurred to my own observation, where men, totally free, have had their senses so engaged by a shell in its descent, that though sensible of their danger, even so far as to cry for assistance, they have been immoveably fixed to the place. But what is more remarkable, ontinues he) these men have so instantaneously recovered themselves on its fall to the ground, as to remove to a place of safety before the shell burst." The white ash in ASH, a common and useful trac particular, is a stiff, light, and durable timber, and is much used for carriages, and for many of the tools employed in agriculture. The bark of this tree is an excellent antidote for poison. It is an undoubted truth, that the natives of this country, who are generally well acquainted with the virtues of indigenous productions, have the white ash in great estimation as peculiarly efficacious against the poison of venomous snakes. The bark, used as an antidote, may be chewed, or, what is better, a decoction of it swallowed with milk....American Museum. ASIA, one of the four great divisions of the world; lying east of Europe, and extending more than four thousand and seven hundred miles in length, and almost four thousand and four hundred in breadth. The frigid zone in Asia is much wider than it is in Europe; the former continent hardly knows a temperate zone. From the Northern Ocean to Caucasus, (says Montesquieu) Asia may be considered as a flat mountain; thence to the ocean that washes Persia and India, it is a low and level country, without seas, and protected by this immense range of hills (that is, by the chain of mountains called Caucasus) from the polar winds.The Asiatic is, therefore, warmer than the European continent, below the fortieth degree of latitude; and above that latitude, it is much more cold....Adam Smith. ASP, a small poisonous kind of serpent, whose bite gives a speedy and certain death: it lies convolved in a 22 ASPHALTITES....ASPHODEL....ATHENS. This spe Africa, and It was with circle, in the centre of which is the head. cies of serpent is said to be plenty in particularly about the banks of the Nile. the asp that Cleopatra, queen of Egypt, is said to have dispatched herself, and thus prevented the designs of Augustus, who intended to have carried her captive to adorn his triumphal entry into Rome. Lord Bacon considers the asp as the least painful of all the instruments of death. He supposes its poison to have an affinity to opium, but to be less disagreeable in its operation.....Encyclopædia. ASPHALTITES, a lake in ancient Canaan, about twenty-four miles long, and six or seven broad: situated south of the river Jordan, and receiving into its bosom the waters of Jordan, Arnon, and Kedron. It is called Asphaltites, on accout of the bitumen with which it abounds; it is also called the Dead Sea, by reason that it contains neither animal nor vegetable life. Volney affirms, that there is no verdure to be seen on its banks, nor fish to be found in its waters. This lake is likewise called the Sea of Sodom, as it is supposed to cover the ground of ancient Sodom and Gomorrah, together with that of the whole vale of Siddim, which are thought to have been sunk by an earthquake after the destruction by fire from heaven. ASPHODEL, the Day Lily. There are six species; and by some of the unenlightened ancients were planted near burying-places, to supply the manes of the deceased with nourishment. Hence may be seen the beauty of Pope's lines: Fenning. By those happy souls who dwell ATHENS, a city of ancient Greece; and was the most celebrated seat of learning and of the fine arts: it is now called Setines, and is the capital of a province in European Turkey. As the Athenians had a greater thirst for learning than any other people, so they rewarded the celebrated teachers of the sciences with unbounded liberality. When Isocrates taught rhetoric at Athens, he is said to have had a hundred scholars; ATLAS....AURORA BOREALIS....AVA. 23 and from each scholar he demanded ten minæ, or thirty-three pounds six shillings and eight pence sterling. He must have made, therefore, by each course of lectures, a thousand minæ, or three thousand three hundred and thirty-three pounds six shillings and eight pence sterling.....Adam Smith. ATLAS, the name of two celebrated chains of mountains in Africa. The Great Atlas extends from the desert of Barca, about eighty leagues west of Alexandria, to the east of the Atlantic Ocean, to which it gives name. The little Atlas extends from the Straits of Gibraltar into the country of Algiers. The loftiest parts of these ranges of mountains are of such vast height, and for the most part covered with snow, as to be seen at a great distance off at sea: their snowy tops, together with the Peak of Teneriffe, are necessary coolers to the sultry regions of Africa. The ranges of mountains called Atlas, are generally, however, of such a moderate height, that they are inhabited, and, in some places, well cultivated. From the ancient fiction of Atlas carrying the world on his back, the name Atlas, as applied to a book of maps of the different parts of the world, is derived.....Morse, Walker. AURORA BOREALIS, or Northern Light. Dr. Halley tells us, that the aurora borealis was seen but once in the seventeenth century, that is, in 1621, when it attracted considerable attention, particularly in France, where the celebrated Gassena observed it, and gave it the name which it now bears. It appeared with peculiar frequency in the course of the eighteenth century. Modern philosophers have ascertained many facts with respect to the aurora borealis, which were of course, unknown to those who lived in the seventeenth century. It seems now to be generally considered either as an electrical phenomenon, or produced by the combustion of inflammable air.....Miller. AVA, a large kingdom of Asia, called the Birman Empire; lying between the British possessions in India, and the empire of China; and thought to contain about seventeen million people, who are pagans. In the |