Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 02.djvu/36

ARMADILLO. podidse, especially characterized by its bony armor. The muzzle is elongated, the mouth pro- vided with feeble teeth destitute of true roots, and set apart from each other, and the tongue is smooth and slender, with a glutinous saliva, adapted to the capture of ants and other insects, after the manner of the ant-eaters, but not long and extensile, like theirs. The limbs are short and strong, as are also the claws, and the animals have a great aptitude for digging and burrowing, by means of which they seek to shelter them- selves from enemies — burrowing in sand or soft earth with such rapidity that it is almost im- possible to dig them out. and indeed it can only be done by persevering till they are exhausted. The feature which peculiarly distinguishes the armiidillu, and in which the animal differs from all the other mammalia, is the bony armor with which the body is covered, and which consists of polygonal plates not articulated, united on the head to form a solid covering, and similarly to form solid bucklers over the shoulders and the liaunches ; and between these, disposed in trans- verse bands, which allow of freedom of motion to the body, similar hands in most species protecting niso the tail. When alarmed or exposed to dan- ger, armadillos, which have the middle portion of the armor divided into several bands, protect themselves by rolling up into a ball, w'hich ex- poses only the hard, armored surface. The three- banded armadillo, or apar, of the Argentine pampas (Toliipeutes tricincttis) is famous for this and for walking on the tips of its foreclaws. Armadillos feed not only on insects, but on vegetable and animal food of almost every kind, which by decomposition or otherwise has acquired a sufficient softness. Rome of them prefer vegetable food, others delight chiefly in carrion. They are all natives of the warm and temperate parts of South America, in the woods and pam- pas of which they were formerly found in im- mense niimbers : biit all except the omnivorous and adaptable hairy one {Dasi/pus villosus) dis- appear quickly from the plains wherever a settlement is made. They are timid and in- offensive, although, when they are incautiously assailed, injury may be received from their claws. Their flesh is esteemed a delicacy, par- ticularly that of the species which feeds chiefly on vegetable food. The largest species is fully three feel long, exclusive of the tail ; the .small- est not above ten inches. The species are numer- ous, and they are divided among half a dozen or more genera, representing probably three families. The nine-banded armadillo (Tatusia tiovemchicla) occurs as far north as Texas, where it is called "peba," a name properly be- longing to some South American species of the genus Dasypus, to which the non-burrowing peludos, common in the pampas, belong. One of the rarest and most interesting of these animals is the little pichiciago (Chlamydophorus trim- cut us), five or six inches long, a native of the Argentine Republic, living underground like the mole, which it much resembles in its habits, and feeding on the same kind of food. Its forefeet are adapted for digging, alihough in a diiierent manner from those of the mole. Tiie skull is destitute of sutures : there are resemblances to the osteologj- of birds in the ribs and their union to the sternum ; the hinder part of the body is altogether unlike that of any other knowTi ani- mal, in its terminating quite abruptlj', as if cut off almost where its thickness is greatest, or as if the back were suddenly bent doTi at right angles, the tail not springing from where the line of the back appears to terminate, but far below. The whole upper and hinder parts of the body are covered with a coat of mail, made up of a series of square plates; the imder parts and legs are covered with long silky hair. See color plate of Mammalia; and plate of Ant-eaters AND Armadillos.

Fossil remains of gigantic extinct armadillos have been found in the Pleistocene strata of South America, forming the genus Glyptodon of Owen. — In Entomology, armadillo is a name for wood-lice. See Woou-LouSE.

ARMADO, iir-mii'do. A bragging Spanish knight in Shakespeare's Love's Labour's Lost, evidentlj' conceived in mockery of the eupliuists.

ARMAGEDDON, iir'ma-ged'don (Heb. Har- magcdoii, ilount of Megiddo). The name given to tlie vhole or part of the great plain of Esdraelon (Rev. xvi. 16). See Esdraelon. ARMAGH, iir-ma' (anciently, Gael. Ard- muchu, ,lacha"s Height, from ard, height, high). . small inland countv in Ulster, Ireland (Map: Ireland, E 2): area', 313,035 acres, of which about 27,000 acres are bog and other waste land. The chief crops are oats, wheat, potatoes, tur- nips, and flax. Large numbers of horses, cattle, sheep, and hogs are raised. The chief towns are Armagh, Lurgan, Portadown, and Newry. Popu- lation, in 1841, 233.024; in 1891, 137,877; in 1901, 125,238.

ARMAGH. The capital of the county of Arnu>gh, Ireland, near the Ulster Canal", 34 miles southwest of Belfast (Map: Ireland, E 2). It is situated on rising ground and is built of limestone, quarried in the neighbor- hood. There are two cathedrals, a Protestant and a Roman Catholic. The former, a cruci- form structure dating from the Twelfth Century, built of red sandstone, is supposed to occupy the site of one erected in the Fifth Century by Saint Patrick, the traditional founder of the city. The other is a modern building. Armagh is the seat of the ai'chiepiscopal see of the Primate and Metropolitan of AH Ireland, in the Catholic and Anglican churches, and has two archiepis- copal palaces. This city has a college, a large library founded by Primate Robinson, and a fa- mous observatory. Its benevolent institutions include an infirmary, a fever hospital, and a lunatic asylum. Its chief industi-y is linen- weaving and the manufacture of yarns. Popula- tion, in 1891, 7438. Armagh, from the year 495 to the Ninth Century, was the metropolis of Ire- land, the native kings living at Emania, two miles to the west of the city. It was then re- nowned for its school of theology and literature. Between 839 and 1092 the town was sacked five times by the Danes. After the Reformation it suffered severely in the conflicts between the Eng- lish and Irish. It contained only three slated houses in 1765, but since then, owing to the e.x- ertions of Lord Rokeby and his successors to the primacy, it has been largely rebuilt. Consult J. Stuart. Historical Memoirs of Armagh (Dub- lin, 1900).

ARMAGNAC, ar'ma'nyak' (anciently, Lat. Ager Aremoiiicus, Aremonian territory). The name of an old district in Gascony, France, now