Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 1.djvu/478

Rh 440 A L A A L A Bedell ; and to have had his portrait painted by Cornelius Jansen, and engraved by Payne ; and to have been pro nounced by Fuller &quot; a most rare poet as any our age or nation hath produced;&quot; and to have drawn from Samuel Johnson unequivocal eulogium, may be regarded as entit ling to a claim on our interest at this later day, Dr William Alabaster unites in himself all these memorable tributes. Alabaster was his own spelling, as it was Bedell s and Fuller s ; but it is found contemporaneously &quot; Arblastier.&quot; The name is derived from arcubalista (in arms of the family, a cross-bow bent in pale), and the same probably as Arblastier. He was born at Hadleigh, Suffolk, about 1567, was educated at Westminster School, and went thence to Trinity College, Cambridge. He was also in corporated at Oxford in 1592. He became fellow of Trinity. Having been appointed chaplain to Robert, Earl of Essex, he attended him in that expedition, designed to aid Henry IV. against the League in 1591, celebrated by Dr Donne in &quot; The Storm&quot; and &quot; The Calm.&quot; While in France (in his twenty-fourth year), he was converted to Roman Catholicism, and a quaint English sonnet, &quot; Of his Conversion/ survives, wherein he defies the &quot;frowne and scorne and purblind pittie &quot; of the world, as having a vision of perdition if he yielded thereto. He did not long remain a Roman Catholic. In the preface to his work entitled Ecce Sponsus Venit (1633), he relates that certain doctrines of his having become obnoxious to the court of Rome, he was enticed to that city and imprisoned there by authority of the Inquisition ; and that on his liberation he was confined within the city walls, but escaped at the peril of his life, and returned to England. On his return he became prebendary of St Paul s and rector of Hatfield. Dr Alabaster was famous as a Hebraist; but his studies of Hebrew took a ^wist in the direction of the cabalistic learning, by which he luxuriated in discussions on the mystical meanings imagined to be hidden in the words of the Old Testament. The investigation and application of this supposed mystical meaning of Scripture was the main object of his Apparatus in Revelationem Jesu Christi (Antwerp, 1607); and, indeed, it runs through all his critical writings, as in his singular Spiraculum Tubarum, give Fons Spiritualium Expositionem ex equivocis Penta- glotti Significationibus (n.d., folio), his Lexicon Pentaglotton (1637, folio), and the Commentarius de Bestia Apoca- lyptica (1621). It was of these books Herrick wrote as making Alabaster &quot; the one, one onely glory of a million.&quot; A MS. of Alabaster s Elisoeis is among Emanuel College MSS. ; a better one, with additional poems, entitled &quot; Inuenta Bellica &quot; recalling Herbert s &quot; Triumphus Mortis,&quot; so headed and &quot; Inuenta Adespota,&quot; is in the Chetham Library, Manchester. The poem is unfinished, but has lines in it which account for Spenser s lofty praise and hopes. It has never been printed. His best known verse is a Latin tragedy called Roxana. This is praised by Fuller, stirred Anthony a Wood into enthusiasm, and is regarded by Dr Johnson as the only Latin verse in Eng land worthy to be named previous to Milton. It was prepared for his college (Trinity), and never meant for publication. Having been surreptitiously published in 1632, the author thereupon reprinted it, with this on the title-page, &quot; A plagiariis unguibus vindicata, aucta et agnita.&quot; It is a curious composition. The subject is an oriental tale which had previously been dramatised in the Dalida of Groto, an Italian. The scenes consist of con versations between real and allegorical personages. The first act is entirely carried on between the ghost of one of the characters and personifications of Death and Suspicion. Hallam charges Alabaster with plagiarism from Dalida, but he cannot have really read the two. Alabaster died about 1640. (A. B. G.) ALACRANES, a group of coral reefs and islands in the Gulf of Mexico, 80 miles oft the north coast of Yucatan, and extending 14 miles from north to south, and 11 from east to west. On the 12th February 1847 the mail steamer Tweed was wrecked on the Alacranes ; and in January 1849 a similar disaster befell the Forth, belonging to the same company. On the south side, in 22 23 36&quot; N. lat., and 89 42 W. long., there is a secure harbour, well sheltered by dry reefs. ALAGOAS, a maritime province of Brazil, formerly a district of Pernambuco, is situated between 9 and 10 30 S. lat., and extends inland 150 miles. It is bounded on the N. and W. by Pernambuco, and is separated by the river San Francisco from the province of Sergipe on the S. It embraces an area of 12,000 square miles. The country, particularly in the north-west, is very moun tainous, but at the same time richly wooded. On the eastern side of the mountains, hilly tracts, well suited for the cultivation of cotton, descend towards the coast, and nearer the sea there is a rich alluvial soil interspersed with swamps (lagoas), whence the province takes its name. The chief articles of produce and export are sugar-cane, rice, cotton, hides, and rosewood. Tropical fruits of all kinds are produced in abundance, and the forests, besides ad mirable timber, yield various dyes and drugs. The people are chiefly engaged in agriculture, and there are no manu factures of importance. The population of the province is 300,000. The town of ALAGOAS, formerly the capital of the province, is situated on Lake Manguaba. It has declined considerably since the transfer of the local government to Maceio. Population, including district, 12,000. ALAIN DE LILLE (An ANUS AB INSULIS), theologian and ecclesiastic, born at Lille or Ryssel about the year 1114. The facts of his life are involved in uncertainty, owing to his having been frequently confounded by bio graphers with others, nearly contemporary, who bore the same name. Some have identified him with Alanus, bishop of Auxerres ; others confound him with an elder Alanus, also born at Lille. These, however, were probably three distinct persons. Of the theological writer known as the doctor universalis, all that can be said with certainty is that he was a Cistercian monk. It is probable that he passed a great part of his life in England, though he ended his days in the abbey of Citeaux. His works are very numerous, the most important of them being entitled Anti-Claudiamis, sive de Ojjlcio Viri Boni et Perfecti. The title denotes that the work takes for its model Claudian s satire against Rufinus, the minister of Theodosius. It is written in verse, and partakes somewhat of the character of an encyclopaedia. Alain s De Arts Catholicce Fidei is remarkable for its endeavour to base dogmatic theology on the exact reasoning of mathematical demonstration, and for its admission that heresy was to be overcome by argu ment and not by mere authority. His exposition of the prophecies of Merlin, in seven books, is of some importance in its bearing upon English history. A Life of St Bernard and a treatise against heretics, usually included among the works of this author, are, from internal evidence, to be attributed with more probability to the bishop of Auxerres. Alain died about 1202-3. ALAIS, a flourishing town of France, in the department of the Gard, on the right bank of the Garden, at the foot of the Cevennes, 25 miles north-north-west of Ninies, with which it is united by rail. In the 17th century it was a stronghold of the French Protestants, and was besieged and taken by Louis XIII. in 1629. It has a citadel, erected by Louis XIV., a fine Gothic church, and a mining school. The town itself has considerable manufactures of ribands, silk, earthenware, glass, and vitriol ; but its pros perity is chiefly derived from the adjacent mineral field,