Page:Collier's New Encyclopedia v. 01.djvu/139

ALCÆUS of adventure. They had discovered and subjugated a great part of the western coast of Africa, and were beginning to extend their dominion over the seas and the people of India. Albuquerque was appointed Viceroy of Portugal's new possessions in the east and landed at Malabar with troops in 1503. Conquered Goa, and later Ceylon, the Sunda Isles, Malaccas, and the island of Ormuz. He made the Portuguese name profoundly respected among the princes and people of the East; and many of them, especially the Kings of Siam and Pegu, sought his alliance and protection. He maintained strict military discipline, was active, far-seeing, wise, humane, and equitable, respected and feared by his neighbors while beloved by his subjects. Yet he did not escape the envy of courtiers and the suspicions of his king, who appointed Soarez, a personal enemy of Albuquerque, to supersede him as Viceroy. This news reached him just as he was leaving Ormuz, and gave a severe shock to his shattered health. A few days after, he died at sea near Goa, Dec. 16, 1515.

ALCÆUS (al-kī´us or al-sē´us), a Greek lyric poet; native of Mitylene; flourished in the 6th century B. C. Of his poems we have only fragments; some were hymns to the gods, others battle songs, still others were in praise of liberty; very many were love songs of pronounced erotic character.

ALCALA DE HENARES (al-ka-lä´ de ā-när-ās), a town in Spain, Cervantes' birthplace, on the Henares, 21 miles E. of Madrid by rail. It once boasted of a university, founded by the famous Cardinal Ximenes in 1510. Here was printed in 1517 the great Complutensian Bible. The chief buildings are the Colegio de San Ildefonso, the archbishop's palace, the cathedral, and the Church of Santa Maria, in which Cervantes was baptized, Oct. 9, 1547. The house in which he was born is marked by an inscription. The Complutum of the Romans, the town owes its modern name to the Moors. Pop. about 12,000.

ALCANTARA, a former suburb of Lisbon, noted for the signal victory gained there by the Duke of Alva over the Portuguese in 1580.

ALCANTARA, a fortified town of Spain, capital of a district of the same name, province of Estremadura, the Nova Cæsarea of the Romans. The famous bridge of Trajan, built A. D. 105, exists to-day practically as the Romans left it.

Order of Alcantara.—At the expulsion of the Moors in 1213, which was aided by the Knights of San Julian del Pereyro, the defense of the town was intrusted to them, and they thenceforward assumed the title of Knights of Alcantara. In 1492, Ferdinand the Catholic united the office of grand master with the crown. The Order has been since abolished.

ALCAZAR (äl-kä´thär), the name of many castles and palaces in Spain. Ciudad-Rodrigo, Cordova, Segovia, Toledo, and Seville have alcazars. The one at Seville is an imposing relic of the Arab dominion. The Alcazar of Segovia suffered from a fire in 1862.

ALCEDO, the typical genus of the family alcedinidæ, or kingfishers. Two species occur in the United States, the alcedo ispida, and the alcedo alcyon.

ALCESTE, or ALCESTIS, was the daughter of Peleus, and wife of Admetus, King of Thessaly. Her husband, according to an oracle, would die, unless some one made a vow to meet death in his stead. This was secretly done by Alceste, who became sick, and Admetus recovered. After her decease, Hercules visited Admetus, and promised to bring her from the infernal regions. He made Pluto restore Alceste to her husband. Euripides has made this the subject of a tragedy.

ALCHEMY, a study of nature with three special objects: (1) That of obtaining an alkahest or universal solvent. (2) That of acquiring the ability to transmute all metals into gold or silver, especially the former, (3) That of obtaining an elixir vitæ, or universal medicine, which might cure all diseases and indefinitely prolong human life.

The word is derived from the Arabic alkimia, compounded of the Arabic article and a Greek word chemia, used in Diocletian's decree against Egyptian works treating of the chemia (transmutation) of gold and silver.

Tradition points to Egypt as the birth place of the science. Hermes Trismegistus is represented as the father of it; but it should be remembered that the speculations of some of the early Greek philosophers, as of Empedocles, who first named the four elements, pointed in the direction of a rudimentary chemical theory. Zosimus the Theban discovered in sulphuric acid a solvent of the metals, and liberated oxygen from the red oxide of mercury. The students of the "sacred art" at Alexandria believed in the transmutation of the four elements. The Roman Emperor Caligula is said to have instituted experiments for producing gold out of orpiment (sulphuret of arsenic), and in the time of Diocletian the passion for this pursuit, conjoined with magical arts, had become so prevalent in the em-