Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 01.djvu/358

ALCMAN. him as their predecessor, and we know that he was read with pleasure in the second century A.D., although his dialect was then con- sidered harsh and unmusical. Only fragments of his poetry remain, edited in Bergk's Pocetæ Lyrici Græci, III., fourth edition, pp. 14ff. (Leipzig, 1882): a fragment discovered in 1896 is published in Oxyrhynchus Papyri I., No. VIII.

ALCME'NE (Gk. Ἀλκμήνη, Alkmene). In Greek mythology, the daughter of Electryon, King of Mycenæ, and wife of Amphitryon, mother of Heracles, by Zeus, who came to her in the form of her husband. She was the mother of Iphides by Amphitryon.

AL'CO (native name). A small, long-haired dog of tropical America, known both wild and in a domesticated condition. In the latter state it is gentle and home-keeping; and as its ears are pendulous it is considered by most authorities as a species introduced in the early days of the Spanish conquest, and since become partly feral. Consult Gosse, A Naturalist's Sojourn in Jamaica (London, 1851).

ALCOBAÇA, al'ko-ba'sa. A town in the province ot Estremadura, Portugal, situated be- tween the Alcoa and Baça rivers, four miles east of Vallado, the nearest railway station. On the west Alcobaça is dominated by a range of hills crowned with the ruins of a Moorish castle. The town is famous for the Cistercian abbey of Santa Maria, one of the finest and richest monasteries in the world. It contains the tombs of Inez de Castro and of some of the Portuguese kings. The buildings comprise an imposing church in early Gothic, five cloisters, seven dormitories, a library containing over 25,000 volumes, and a hospedaria. It is supplied with water by a tributary of the Alcoa, which flows through the enormous kitchen. The abbey was built from 1148 to 1222, was sacked by the French in 1810, and in 1834 was secularized. The north part of the structure is now used as a barracks for cavalry. Pop. of town, 1890, 2093.

ALCOCK, .al'kok. Sir Rutherford (1809-97). An English diplomatist and author, born in Lon- don. He studied medicine, and became distin- guished as an army surgeon and hospital in- spector, and afterward as a lecturer on surgery. In 1844 he was sent as British consul to China, and he served in Amoy, Fuchow, and Shanghai. He won such distinction in these services that, in 1858, he was made consul general in Japan. He was accredited to the Shogun, or military mayor, who had his headquarters in Yedo, in- stead of to the Mikado, or true emperor, in Kioto, and was, therefore, like the other foreign min- isters, continually under the menace of assassi- nation. Twice the legation was murderously attacked, and once burned, but Alcock insisted on the literal fulfillment of the treaties. Under his influence. Shimonoseki was bombarded in 1864, after which, the Yedo government refusing to open more ports to trade, an indemnity of $3,000,000 was extorted, part of which was paid by the Mikado's government in 1874. Recalled in 1865 from Japan for his action, he was ap- pointed minister plenipotentiary to Peking, and served from 1865 to 1871. It was Alcock who first brought Japanese art to the world's notice, in the London World's Exposition (1862). He was, from 1876, for a long time the president of the Royal Geographical Society. His publica- tions include: ''Life's Problems; The Capital of the

Tycoon (1863); Art and Industries in Japan'' (1878), and many geographical and other articles in periodicals. For further account of his career, consult R. J. Mitchie, An Englishman in China During the Victorian Era (Edinburgh, 1900).

ALCOFRIBAS NASIER, al'ko'fre'bil' na'sya'. The pseudonym, formed anagrammatically from his own name, under which François Rabelais published his Pantagruel, etc.

AL'COHOL (Ar. al, the + kohl, exceedingly fine powder of antimony for painting eyebrows ; hence the quintessence of something; finally rectified spirits, alcohol), or Eth'yl Alco- hol, C.HjOH, often called spirits of wine. A chemical compound of carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen that has been known and ex- tensively used from the earliest times. It is consumed in very large quantities in the form of intoxicating liquors, and is used for various purposes in the arts and manufactures. The alcohol of commerce, in its various forms, is all made by fermentation. Natural products con- taining a large amount of starch, such as grain, rice, potatoes, etc., are reduced with water to a paste, and a small quantity of malt is added to produce fermentation, by which the starch is in a short time transformed into dextrin and a kind of sugar called maltose, according to the following chemical equation:

CeH,„05 + H,0 =: C,H„A + C,,H,Ai Starch Dextrin Maltose

Then yeast, which consists of living plant cells, is added to set up a new process of fermentation, by which the maltose is converted into alcohol, according to the following chemical equation:

C,:H^O„ + H,0 : Maltose
 * 4C2 HeO + 400.

Alcohol

The manufacture of alcohol thus involves two distinct processes of fermentation; for neither can alcohol be obtained from maltose by the action of the diastase of malt, nor can maltose be obtained from starch by the action of yeast. Small quantities of organic substances are usually produced along with ethyl alcohol during fermentation; one of these is the well-known fusel oil, a mixture of alcohols chemically allied to ordinary alcohol and containing mainly amyl alcohol. A small quantity of fusel oil is contained even in the "raw spirit," a strong alcohol obtained by distilling the weak solution obtained through fermentation. To free the raw spirit from fusel oil, which is highly injurious, it is mixed with water, filtered through charcoal, and subjected to a process of fractional distillation, the intermediate fractions, called rectified spirit, being practically free from fusel oil. The presence of the latter in spirituous liquors may be readily detected by adding a few drops of colorless aniline and two or three drops of sulphuric acid, a deep-red coloration being produced in the presence of fusel oil. The flavor of alcoholic beverages is due to the presence of various organic substances often produced by modifying the process of manufacture. Thus both the flavor and color of beer depend largely on the temperature and duration of heating of the malt before using it; the flavor of Scotch whisky is derived mainly from the peat used in drying the malt, etc. The quantity of alcohol contained in various beverages is very