A	»	B	»	C	»	D	»	E
F	»	G	»	H	»	I	»	J
K	»	L	»	M	»	N	»	O
P	»		R	»	S	»		T
U	»		V	»	W	»		Z

Frank R. Stockton - "A Bicycle of Cathay"

E. Arnold Bennett - "The Regent"

H. Rider Haggard - "Mr. Meeson's Will"

Various - "Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, June 4, 1919."

PW Morning Report, January 6, 2009">The PW Morning Report, January 6, 2009
Moreover Technologies - Premier purveyor of real-time news and RSS feeds from across the Web

Richard Seaver Dies
Ad - Get Info for Book Publishing from 14 search engines in 1.

More Cuts at McGraw-Hill Education
A daily round-up of the latest publishing news: Coulter Kaput; Christopher Hibbert Dead; Costa Book Award Winners; Cuba Opens Hemingway Archives; J.D. Salinger at 90; and Want to Win A Newbery Medal? Hollywood Reporter Sebastian Barry, Sadie Jones

The Nuttall Encyclopaedia by Edited by Rev. James Wood

E >> Edited by Rev. James Wood >> The Nuttall Encyclopaedia





AN`GELUS, a devotional service in honour of the Incarnation.


ANGERS` (77), on the Maine, the ancient capital of Anjou, 160 m. SW.
of Paris, with a fine cathedral, a theological seminary, and a medical
school; birthplace of David the sculptor.


ANGERSTEIN, JOHN, born in St. Petersburg, a distinguished patron of
the fine arts, whose collection of paintings, bought by the British
Government, formed the nucleus of the National Gallery (1735-1822).


ANGI`NA PEC`TORIS, an affection of the heart of an intensely
excruciating nature, the pain of which at times extends to the left
shoulder and down the left arm.


ANGLER, a fish with a broad, big-mouthed head and a tapering body,
both covered with appendages having glittering tips, by which, as it
burrows in the sand, it allures other fishes into its maw.


ANGLES, a German tribe from Sleswig who invaded Britain in the 5th
century and gave name to England.


AN`GLESEA (50), i. e. Island of the Angles, an island forming a
county in Wales, separated from the mainland by the Menai Strait, flat,
fertile, and rich in minerals.


ANGLESEY, MARQUIS OF, eldest son of the first Earl of Uxbridge,
famous as a cavalry officer in Flanders, Holland, the Peninsula, and
especially at Waterloo, at which he lost a leg, and for his services at
which he received his title; was some time viceroy in Ireland, where he
was very popular (1768-1854).


ANGLIA, EAST territory in England occupied in the 6th century by the
Angles, corresponding to counties of Norfolk and Suffolk.


ANG`LICAN CHURCH, the body of Episcopal churches all over the
British Empire and Colonies, as well as America, sprung from the Church
of England, though not subject to her jurisdiction, the term
_Anglo-Catholic_ being applied to the High Church section.


ANGLO-SAXON, the name usually assigned to the early inflected form
of the English language.


ANGO`LA (2,400), a district on the W. coast of Africa, between the
Congo and Benguela, subject to Portugal, the capital of which is St. Paul
de Loando.


ANGO`RA (20), a city in the centre of Anatolia, in a district noted
for its silky, long-haired animals, cats and dogs as well as goats.


ANGOSTU`RA, capital of the province of Guayana, in Venezuela, 240 m.
up the Orinoco; also a medicinal bark exported thence.


ANGOULEME` (31), an old French city on the Charente, 83 m. NE. of
Bordeaux, with a fine cathedral, the birthplace of Marguerite de Valois
and Balzac.


ANGOULEME, CHARLES DE VALOIS, DUC D', natural son of Charles IX.,
gained great reputation as a military commander, left Memoirs of his life
(1575-1650).


ANGOULEME, DUC D', the eldest son of Charles X., after the
Revolution of 1830 gave up his rights to the throne and retired to Goritz
(1778-1844).


ANGOULEME, DUCHESSE D', daughter of Louis XVI. and wife of the
preceding (1778-1851).


AN`GRA, the capital of the Azores, on the island of Terceira, a
fortified place.


AN`GRA PEQUE`NA, a port in SW. Africa, N. of the Orange River, and
the nucleus of the territory belonging to Germany.


ANG`STROM, a Swedish physicist and professor at Upsala,
distinguished for his studies on the solar spectrum; _b_. 1814.


ANGUIL`LA (2), or Snake Island, one of the Lesser Antilles, E. of
Porto Rico, belonging to Britain.


ANGUIER, the name of two famous French sculptors in the 17th
century.


AN`HALT (293), a duchy of Central Germany, surrounded and split up
by Prussian Saxony, and watered by the Elbe and Saale; rich in minerals.


ANHALT-DESSAU, LEOPOLD, PRINCE OF, a Prussian field-marshal, served
and distinguished himself in the war of the Spanish Succession and in
Italy, was wounded at Cassano; defeated Charles XII. at the Isle of
Ruegen, and the Saxons and Austrians at Kesseldorf (1676-1747).


ANICHINI, an Italian medallist of the 16th century; executed a medal
representing the interview of Alexander the Great with the High Priest of
the Jews, which Michael Angelo pronounced the perfection of the art.


ANILINE, a colourless transparent oily liquid, obtained chiefly from
coal-tar, and extensively used in the production of dyes.


ANIMAL HEAT, the heat produced by the chemical changes which go on
in the animal system, the intensity depending on the activity of the
process.


ANIMAL MAGNETISM, a name given to the alleged effects on the animal
system, in certain passive states, of certain presumed magnetic
influences acting upon it.


ANIMISM, a belief that there is a psychical body within the physical
body of a living being, correspondent with it in attributes, and that
when the connection between them is dissolved by death the former lives
on in a ghostly form; in other words, a belief of a ghost-soul existing
conjointly with and subsisting apart from the body, its physical
counterpart.


AN`IO, an affluent of the Tiber, 4 m. above Rome; ancient Rome was
supplied with water from it by means of aqueducts.


ANISE, an umbelliferous plant, the seed of which is used as a
carminative and in the preparation of liqueurs.


ANJOU`, an ancient province in the N. of France, annexed to the
crown of France under Louis XI. in 1480; belonged to England till wrested
from King John by Philip Augustus in 1203.


ANKARSTROeM, the assassin of Gustavus III. of Sweden, at a masked
ball, March 15, 1792, for which he was executed after being publicly
flogged on three successive days.


ANKLAM (12), an old Hanse town in Pomerania, connected by railway
with Stettin.


ANKOBAR, capital of Shoa, in Abyssinia; stands 8200 ft. above the
sea-level.


ANN ARBOR (10), a city of Michigan, on the Huron, with an
observatory and a flourishing university.


ANNA COMNE`NA, a Byzantine princess, who, having failed in a
political conspiracy, retired into a convent and wrote the life of her
father, Alexius I., under the title of the "Alexiad" (1083-1148).


AN`NA IVANOV`NA, niece of Peter the Great, empress of Russia in
succession to Peter II. from 1730 to 1740; her reign was marred by the
evil influence of her paramour Biren over her, which led to the
perpetration of great cruelties; was famed for her big cheek, "which, as
shown in her portraits," Carlyle says, "was comparable to a Westphalian
ham" (1693-1740).


AN`NAM (6,000), an empire, of the size of Sweden, along the east
coast of Indo-China, under a French protectorate since 1885; it has a
rich well-watered soil, which yields tropical products, and is rich in
minerals.


AN`NAN (3), a burgh in Dumfries, on river Annan; birthplace of
Edward Irving, and where Carlyle was a schoolboy, and at length
mathematical schoolmaster.


ANNAP`OLIS (3), seaport of Nova Scotia, on the Bay of Fundy; also
the capital (7) of Maryland, U.S., 28 m. E. of Washington.


ANNE, QUEEN, daughter of James II.; by the union of Scotland with
England during her reign in 1707 became the first sovereign of the United
Kingdom; her reign distinguished by the part England played in the war of
the Spanish succession and the number of notabilities, literary and
scientific, that flourished under it, though without any patronage on the
part of the Queen (1665-1714).


ANNE, ST., wife of St. Joachim, mother of the Virgin Mary, and the
patron saint of carpentry; festival, July 26.


ANNE OF AUSTRIA, the daughter of Philip III. of Spain, wife of Louis
XIII., and mother of Louis XIV., became regent on the death of her
husband, with Cardinal Mazarin for minister; during the minority of her
son, triumphed over the Fronde; retired to a convent on the death of
Mazarin (1610-1666).


ANNE OF BRITTANY, the daughter of Francis II., Duke of Brittany; by
her marriage, first to Charles VIII. then to Louis XII., the duchy was
added to the crown of France (1476-1514).


ANNE OF CLEVES, daughter of Duke of Cleves, a wife of Henry VIII.,
who fell in love with the portrait of her by Holbein, but being
disappointed, soon divorced her; _d_. 1577.


ANNECY (11), the capital of Haute-Savoie, in France, on a lake of
the name, 22 m. S. of Geneva, at which the Counts of Geneva had their
residence, and where Francis of Sales was bishop.


ANNOBON, a Spanish isle in the Gulf of Guinea.


ANNONAY (14), a town in Ardeche, France; paper the chief
manufacture.


ANNUNCIATION DAY, a festival on the 25th of March in commemoration
of the salutation of the angel to the Virgin Mary on the Incarnation of
Christ.


ANQUETIL`, LOUIS PIERRE, a French historian in holy orders, wrote
"Precis de l'Histoire Universelle" and a "Histoire de France" in 14
vols.; continued by Bouillet in 6 more (1723-1806).


ANQUETIL`-DUPERRON, brother of the preceding, an enthusiastic
Orientalist, to whom we owe the discovery and first translation of the
Zend-Avesta and Schopenhauer his knowledge of Hindu philosophy, and which
influenced his own system so much (1731-1805).


ANSBACH (14), a manufacturing town in Bavaria, 25 m. SW. of
Nuernberg, the capital of the old margraviate of the name, and the
margraves of which were HOHENZOLLERNS (q. v.).


ANSCHAR or ANSGAR, ST., a Frenchman born, the first to preach
Christianity to the pagans of Scandinavia, was by appointment of the Pope
the first archbishop of Hamburg (801-864).


ANSELM, ST., archbishop of Canterbury, a native of Aosta, in
Piedmont, monk and abbot; visited England frequently, gained the favour
of King Rufus, who appointed him to succeed Lanfranc, quarrelled with
Rufus and left the country, but returned at the request of Henry I., a
quarrel with whom about investiture ended in a compromise; an able,
high-principled, God-fearing man, and a calmly resolute upholder of the
teaching and authority of the Church (1033-1109). See CARLYLE'S "PAST
AND PRESENT."


ANSON, LORD, a celebrated British naval commander, sailed round the
world, during war on the part of England with Spain, on a voyage of
adventure with a fleet of three ships, and after three years and nine
months returned to England, his fleet reduced to one vessel, but with
L500,000 of Spanish treasure on board. Anson's "Voyage Round the World"
contains a highly interesting account of this, "written in brief,
perspicuous terms," witnesses Carlyle, "a real poem in its kind, or
romance all fact; one of the pleasantest little books in the world's
library at this time" (1697-1762).


ANSTRUTHER, EAST AND WEST, two contiguous royal burghs on the Fife
coast, the former the birthplace of Tennant the poet, Thomas Chalmers,
and John Goodsir the anatomist.


ANTAEUS, a mythical giant, a _terrae filius_ or son of the earth, who
was strong only when his foot was on the earth, lifted in air he became
weak as water, a weakness which Hercules discovered to his discomfiture
when wrestling with him. The fable has been used as a symbol of the
spiritual strength which accrues when one rests his faith on the
immediate fact of things.


ANTAL`CIDAS, a Spartan general, celebrated for a treaty which he
concluded with Persia whereby the majority of the cities of Asia Minor
passed under the sway of the Persians, to the loss of the fruit of all
the victories gained over them by Athens (387 B.C.).


ANTANANARI`VO (100), the capital of Madagascar, in the centre of the
island, on a well-nigh inaccessible rocky height 5000 ft. above the
sea-level.


ANTAR, an Arab chief of the 6th century, a subject of romance, and
distinguished as a poet.


ANT-EATERS, a family of edentate mammals, have a tubular mouth with
a small aperture, and a long tongue covered with a viscid secretion,
which they thrust into the ant-hills and then withdraw covered with ants.


ANTELOPE, an animal closely allied to the sheep and the goat, very
like the latter in appearance, with a light and elegant figure, slender,
graceful limbs, small cloven hoofs, and generally a very short tail.


ANTEQUE`RA (27), a town in Andalusia, 22 m. N. of Malaga, a
stronghold of the Moors from 712 to 1410.


ANTHE`LIA, luminous rings witnessed in Alpine and Polar regions,
seen round the shadow of one's head in a fog or cloud opposite the sun.


ANTHE`MIUS, the architect of the church of St. Sophia in
Constantinople; _d_. 534.


ANTHON, CHARLES, a well-known American classical scholar and editor
of the Classics (1797-1867).


ANTHRAX, a disease, especially in cattle, due to the invasion of a
living organism which, under certain conditions, breeds rapidly; called
also splenic fever.


ANTHROPOID APES, a class of apes, including the gorilla, chimpanzee,
orang-outang, and gibbon, without tails, with semi-erect figures and long
arms.


ANTHROPOLOGY, the science of man as he exists or has existed under
different physical and social conditions.


ANTHROPOMORPHISM, the ascription of human attributes to the unseen
author of things.


ANTI`BES (5) a seaport and place of ancient date on a peninsula in
the S. of France, near Cannes and opposite Nice.


ANTICHRIST, a name given in the New Testament to various
incarnations of opposition to Christ in usurpation of His authority, but
is by St. John defined to involve that form of opposition which denies
the doctrine of the Incarnation, or that Christ has come in the flesh.


ANTICOSTI, a barren rocky island in the estuary of St Lawrence,
frequented by fishermen, and with hardly a permanent inhabitant.


ANTIG`ONE`, the daughter of Oedipus, king of Thebes, led about her
father when he was blind and in exile, returned to Thebes on his death;
was condemned to be buried alive for covering her brother's exposed body
with earth in defiance of the prohibition of Creon, who had usurped the
throne; Creon's son, out of love for her, killed himself on the spot
where she was buried. She has been immortalised in one of the grandest
tragedies of Sophocles.


ANTIGONE, THE MODERN, the Duchess of Angouleme, daughter of Louis
XV. See THE PARTING SCENE IN CARLYLE'S "FRENCH REVOLUTION."


ANTIG`ONUS, surnamed the Cyclops or One-eyed, one of the generals of
Alexander the Great, made himself master of all Asia Minor, excited the
jealousy of his rivals; was defeated and slain at Ipsus, in Phrygia, 301
B.C.


ANTIGONUS, the last king of the Jews of the Asmonean dynasty; put to
death in 77 B.C.


ANTIGONUS GONATAS, king of Macedonia, grandson of the preceding;
twice deprived of his kingdom, but recovered it; attempted to prevent the
formation of the Achaean League (275-240 B.C.).


ANTIGUA, one of the Leeward Islands, the seat of the government; the
most productive of them belongs to Britain.


ANTILLES, an archipelago curving round from N. America to S.
America, and embracing the Caribbean Sea; the GREATER A., on the N.
of the sea, being Cuba, Hayti, Jamaica, and Porto Rico; and the LESSER
A., on the E., forming the Leeward Islands, the Windward Islands, and
the Venezuelan Islands--the Leeward as far as Dominica, the Windward as
far as Trinidad, and the Venezuelan along the coast of S. America.


ANTIMONY, a brittle white metal, of value both in the arts and
medicine.


ANTINOMIANISM, the doctrine that the law is superseded in some sense
or other by the all-sufficing, all-emancipating free spirit of Christ.


ANTINOMY, in the transcendental philosophy the contradiction which
arises when we carry the categories of the understanding above experience
and apply them to the sphere of that which transcends it.


ANTIN`OUS, a Bithynian youth of extraordinary beauty, a slave of the
Emperor Hadrian; became a great favourite of his and accompanied him on
all his journeys. He was drowned in the Nile, and the grief of the
emperor knew no bounds; he enrolled him among the gods, erected a temple
and founded a city in his honour, while artists vied with each other in
immortalising his beauty.


AN`TIOCH (23), an ancient capital of Syria, on the Orontes, called
the Queen of the East, lying on the high-road between the E. and the W.,
and accordingly a busy centre of trade; once a city of great splendour
and extent, and famous in the early history of the Church as the seat of
several ecclesiastical councils and the birthplace of Chrysostom. There
was an Antioch in Pisidia, afterwards called Caesarea.


ANTI`OCHUS, name of three Syrian kings of the dynasty of the
Seleucidae: A. I., SOTER, i. e. Saviour, son of one of Alexander's
generals, fell heir of all Syria; king from 281 to 261 B.C. A. II.,
THEOS, i. e. God, being such to the Milesians in slaying the tyrant
Timarchus; king from 261 to 246. A. III., the Great, extended and
consolidated the empire, gave harbour to Hannibal, declared war against
Rome, was defeated at Thermopylae and by Scipio at Magnesia, killed in
attempting to pillage the temple at Elymais; king from 223 to 187. A.
IV., EPIPHANES, i. e. Illustrious, failed against Egypt, tyrannised
over the Jews, provoked the Maccabaean revolt, and died delirious; king
from 175 to 104. A. V., EUPATOR, king from 164 to 162.


ANTI`OPE, queen of the Amazons and mother of Hippolytus. _The Sleep
of Antiope_, _chef-d'oeuvre_ of Correggio in the Louvre.


ANTIP`AROS (2), one of the Cyclades, W. of Paros, with a stalactite
cavern.


ANTIP`ATER, a Macedonian general, governed Macedonia with great
ability during the absence of Alexander, defeated the confederate Greek
states at Cranon, reigned supreme on the death of Perdiccas
(397-317 B.C.).


ANTIPH`ILUS, a Greek painter, contemporary and rival of Apelles.


AN`TIPHON, an Athenian orator and politician, preceptor of
Thucydides, who speaks of him in terms of honour, was the first to
formulate rules of oratory (479-411 B.C.).


ANTIPOPE, a pope elected by a civil power in opposition to one
elected by the cardinals, or one self-elected and usurped; there were
some 26 of such, first and last.


ANTIPYRETICS, medicines to reduce the temperature in fever, of which
the chief are quinine and salicylate of soda.


ANTIPYRIN, a febrifuge prepared from coal-tar, and used as a
substitute for quinine.


ANTISA`NA, a volcano of the N. Andes, in Ecuador, 19,200 ft. high;
also a village on its flanks, 13,000 ft. high, the highest village in the
world.


ANTISE`MITES, a party in Russia and the E. of Germany opposed to the
Jews on account of the undue influence they exercise in national affairs
to the alleged detriment of the natives.


ANTISEPTICS, substances used, particularly in surgery, to prevent or
arrest putrefaction.


ANTIS`THENES, a Greek philosopher, a disciple of Socrates, the
master of Diogenes, and founder of the Cynic school; affected to disdain
the pride and pomp of the world, and was the first to carry staff and
wallet as the badge of philosophy, but so ostentatiously as to draw from
Socrates the rebuke, "I see your pride looking out through the rent of
your cloak, O Antisthenes."


ANTI-TAURUS, a mountain range running NE. from the Taurus Mts.


ANTIUM, a town of Latium on a promontory jutting into the sea, long
antagonistic to Rome, subdued in 333 B.C.; the beaks of its ships,
captured in a naval engagement, were taken to form a rostrum in the Forum
at Home; it was the birthplace of Caligula and Nero.


ANTIVA`RI, a fortified seaport lately ceded to Montenegro.


ANTOFAGAS`TA (7), a rising port in Chile, taken from Bolivia after
the war of 1879; exports silver ores and nitrate of soda.


ANTOMMAR`CHI, Napoleon's attached physician at St. Helena, wrote
"The Last Moments of Napoleon" (1780-1838).


ANTONELLI, CARDINAL, the chief adviser and Prime Minister of Pope
Pius IX., accompanied the Pope to Gaeta, came back with him to Rome,
acting as his foreign minister there, and offered a determined opposition
to the Revolution; left immense wealth (1806-1876).


ANTONEL`LO, of Messina, Italian painter of the 15th century,
introduced from Holland oil-painting into Italy (1414-1493).


ANTONI`NUS, ITINERARY OF, a valuable geographical work supposed of
date 44 B.C.


ANTONI`NUS, Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor, successor to the
following, and who surpassed him in virtue, being also of the Stoic
school and one of its most exemplary disciples, was surnamed the
"philosopher," and has left in his "Meditations" a record of his
religious and moral principles (121-180).


ANTONI`NUS PIUS, a Roman emperor, of Stoic principles, who reigned
with justice and moderation from 138 to 161, during which time the Empire
enjoyed unbroken peace.


ANTONI`NUS, WALL OF, an earthen rampart about 36 m. in length, from
the Forth to the Clyde, in Scotland, as a barrier against invasion from
the north, erected in the year 140 A.D.


ANTO`NIUS, MARCUS, a famous Roman orator and consul, slain in the
civil war between Marius and Sulla, having sided with the latter (143-87
B.C.).


ANTO`NIUS, MARCUS (Mark Antony), grandson of the preceding and warm
partisan of Caesar; after the murder of the latter defeated Brutus and
Cassius at Philippi, formed a triumvirate with Octavius and Lepidus, fell
in love with the famous Cleopatra, was defeated by Octavius in the naval
battle of Actium, and afterwards killed himself (83-30 B.C.).


AN`TONY, ST., a famous anchorite of the Thebaid, where from the age
of thirty he spent 20 years of his life, in a lonely ruin by himself,
resisting devils without number; left his retreat for a while to
institute monasteries, and so became the founder of monachism, but
returned to die; festival, Jan. 17 (251-351).


ANTONY OF PADUA, a Minorite missionary to the Moors in Africa;
preached to the fishes, who listened to him when no one else would; the
fishes came in myriads to listen, and shamed the pagans into conversion,
says the fable; festival, June 13 (1195-1234)


ANTRAIGUES, COUNT D', one of the firebrands of the French
Revolution; "rose into furor almost Pythic; highest where many were
high," but veered round to royalism, which he at length intrigued on
behalf of--to death by the stiletto (1765-1812).


ANT`RIM (471), a maritime county in the NE. of Ulster, in Ireland;
soil two-thirds arable, linen the chief manufacture, exports butter,
inhabitants mostly Protestant.


ANTWERP (240), a large fortified trading city in Belgium, on the
Scheldt, 50 m. from the sea, with a beautiful Gothic cathedral, the spire
402 ft. high; the burial-place of Rubens; has a large picture-gallery
full of the works of the Dutch and Flemish artists.


ANU`BIS, an Egyptian deity with the body of a man and the head of a
jackal, whose office, like that of Hermes, it was to see to the disposal
of the souls of the dead in the nether world, on quitting the body.


ANWARI, a Persian lyric poet who flourished in the 12th century.


AN`YTUS, the most vehement accuser of Socrates; banished in
consequence from Athens, after Socrates' death.


AOS`TA (5), a town of Italy, N. of Turin, in a fertile Alpine level
valley, but where goitre and cretinism prevail to a great extent; the
birthplace of Anselm.


APA`CHES, a fierce tribe of American Indians on the S. and W. of the
United States; long a source of trouble to the republic.


APEL`LES, the most celebrated painter of antiquity; bred, if not
born, at Ephesus; lived at the court of Alexander the Great; his great
work "APHRODITE ANADYOMENE" (q. v.); a man conscious, like
Duerer, of mastery in his art, as comes out in his advice to the
criticising shoemaker to "stick to his last."


AP`ENNINES, a branch of the Alps extending, with spurs at right
angles, nearly through the whole length of Italy, forming about the
middle of the peninsula a double chain which supports the tableland of
Abruzzi.


APES, DEAD SEA, dwellers by the Dead Sea who, according to the
Moslem tradition, were transformed into apes because they turned a deaf
ear to God's message to them by the lips of Moses, fit symbol, thinks
Carlyle, of many in modern time to whom the universe, with all its
serious voices, seems to have become a weariness and a humbug See
"PAST AND PRESENT," BK. III. CHAP. III.


APH`IDES, a family of insects very destructive to plants by feeding
on them in countless numbers.


APHRODI`TE, the Greek goddess of love and beauty, wife of Hephaestos
and mother of Cupid; sprung from sea-foam; as queen of beauty had the
golden apple awarded her by Paris, and possessed the power of conferring
beauty, by means of her magic girdle, the cestus, on others.


API`CIUS, the name of three famous Roman epicures, the first of whom
was contemporary with Sulla, the second with Augustus, and the third with
Trajan.


A`PION, an Alexandrian grammarian of the 1st century, and an enemy
of the Jews, and hostile to the privileges conceded them in Alexandria.


A`PIS, the sacred live bull of the Egyptians, the incarnation of
Osiris; must be black all over the body, have a white triangular spot on
the forehead, the figure of an eagle on the back, and under the tongue
the image of a scarabaeus; was at the end of 25 years drowned in a sacred
fountain, had his body embalmed, and his mummy regarded as an object of
worship.


APOCALYPTIC WRITINGS, writings composed among the Jews in the 2nd
century B.C., and ascribed to one and another of the early prophets of
Israel, forecasting the judgments ordained of God to overtake the nation,
and predicting its final deliverance at the hands of the Messiah.


APOCRYPHA, THE, a literature of sixteen books composed by Jews,
after the close of the Hebrew canon, which though without the unction of
the prophetic books of the canon, are instinct, for most part, with the
wisdom which rests on the fear of God and loyalty to His law. The word
Apocrypha means hidden writing, and it was given to it by the Jews to
distinguish it from the books which they accepted as canonical.