Robert Burns

Robert Burns (1759-1796)

   Robert Burns, Scotland's greatest poet, becomes the world's favorite each New Year's Eve with the traditional singing of his "Auld Lang Syne." It is fitting tribute to a poet who loved good company, good song, and simple pleasures.

   Burns was born on January 25, 1759, in Ayrshire, Scotland. His father was a poor farmer who valued education and strict morality. Although Robert's help was needed on the farm, his father encouraged him to read and gave him as much schooling as he could.

   Robert read everything he could, from collections of songs to Shakespeare and Milton. He carried small volumes in his pocket and studied them while he was in the fields or at the table. He began writing his own verses and collected them in a scrapbook.

Octopus

   An octopus is a mollusk related to clams and oysters. It lives in many parts of the world, in both deep and shallow water. It is sometimes known as the devil-fish, but it is not a fish. It has a round body, large head, and large eyes. An octopus has eight arms. In size, octopi range from two inches to twenty-eight feet from arm tip to arm tip. They vary in color and are able to change color.
   Most octopi move around for food at night. Crabs are their favorite food although they eat other crustaceans and fish. Their strong beaked jaws are used for crushing shells of crustaceans.
   The octopus is able to swim rapidly, moving backwards and trailing its arms. It propels itself by ejecting water through a siphon-like structure. It can also walk rapidly along the ocean floor. For protection, it ejects an ink-like substance, coloring the surrounding water.
   The internal structure of the octopus is similar to that of a squid. The third right arm of the male is enlarged and modified as a copulatory organ. The female deposits eggs, either in rope-like strings or grape-like clusters, on the roof of its hiding place. It guards the eggs which hatch in six to eight weeks. Along the Pacific Coast, from Alaska to Lower California, Octopus bimaculatus may be found. This kind is less numerous today than formerly. It is generally gray with two large red spots on the back. Octopus bairdi is found along the Atlantic Coast. This kind is bluish-white speckled with brown. It has a three-inch body and an arm span of forty inches.

What is dialectic?

   In philosophy, dialectic, is a method of arriving at conclusions by reasoning from commonly held, and usually contradictory opinions. The dialogues of Plato are the most famous early examples of the dialectic method at work. In them, Plato describes the attempts of Socrates to prove his philosophical theories by leading his opponents, through a series of questions and answers, to admit that their own opinions are self-contradictory and therefore false.
   In the early 19th century the German philosopher G. W. F. Hegel used the word "dialectic" to stand for the scientific application of supposed universal laws of thought. He held that the dialectic is composed of three stages: the thesis, or original statement, or premise; the antithesis, or self-contradiction revealed through questioning the thesis; and the synthesis, or provisional conclusion, that results from the clash between the thesis and antithesis.
   Hegel also said that in history the opposition between various political, social, economic, and cultural groups results in progress through a dialectical development. Hegel's views were adapted by Karl Marx in his phi­losophy of dialectical materialism.

The Indigo Bird

   The indigo bird is a sparrow-like bird. The male is ciad in deep blue, with wings and tail black margined with blue. The female is brown—under parts whitish. It nests in bushes near the ground from the Mississippi valley eastward. Careless observers may mistake it for a bluebird. The male is a fine songster.
The indigo bird breeds as far north as Nova Scotia, but migrates to South Amer­ica in the autumn. It frequents open spaces on the edge of forests.

What is Teleportation?

The Teleportation is a form of psychokinesis in which objects allegedly can be made to traverse space. It is said that such objects can pass through walls, ceilings and doors, arriving at their destination sometimes hot to the touch but otherwise unscathed.
According to an account in the Encyclopaedia of the Unexplained, Mrs. Samuel Guppy, a 19th-century British medium, "produced live lobsters and eels, and fresh flowers, fruit and vegeta­bles apparently out of nowhere at her séances." In the heyday of spiritualism, teleportation under the guidance of a medium included the movement of hu­man beings as well.

Which animal has the longest horns?

   The water (or Indian) buffalo (Bubalus bubalis) has the longest horns. Belonging to the oxen family, the water buffalo has cloven hooves, weighs up to 2,600 pounds (1,180 kg), and measures up to 6 feet (1.80 m) in height at the shoulder. Thick permanent horns grow outward and curve back toward the shoulders, often measuring as long as 12 feet (3.65 m) from tip to tip, around the curve.
   This species lives in the wet grasslands and marshes of Bhutan, India, Nepal, and Thailand. It has been domesticated for farming and is especially useful in Asian rice fields, where it can easily pull a plow while knee-deep in mud. Its diet consists of the grass and other vegetation that grows in or beside marshes, lakes, and rivers. For the past 20 years, the wild water buffalo has been an endan­gered species; the current population in the wild is fewer than 2,000.

Robert Fulton

   Robert Fulton (1765-1815) was an American inventor and successful demonstrator of steam navigation, born in Lancaster Co., Pennsylvania. Early in life he showed some talent for painting, and he went to England to study under Benjamin West. In England, however, he be­came acquainted with the Duke of Bridgewater, the founder of the canal system of Great Britain, and was persuaded to abandon art and to study mechanical science. This nobleman was at the time engaged in a scheme of steam navigation, which he imparted to Fulton.

   Fulton also met James Watt, who had just succeeded in greatly improving the steam engine, and Ful­ton made himself thoroughly fa­miliar with that engine during his stay, About this time he invented a machine for spinning flax and another for making ropes.

What is Obesity?

   People who weigh over ten to twenty percent more than they should for their height, age, and body build are obese. Obesity is an imbalance of metabolism (body chemistry). It may be caused by overeating, by misfunction of body glands, or by breakdown of the body tissues.
   Obesity injures the body in many ways. The body must keep itself in balance in order to work properly. This balance is called homeostasis. When a person is obese, large masses of fat are stored throughout the body. This fat requires extra blood vessels to keep it nourished. The additional blood supply and weight that must be sup-ported increase the amount of work of the heart in pumping blood. When the load becomes too great, heart disease, high blood pressure, and kidney disorders appear.
   As the body increases in mass, more energy is needed to keep it alive. However, the balance of storing and burning up food in body cells becomes greatly disturbed. Food is stored as fat instead of being used as a source of energy, and the obese patient may actually suffer from malnutrition and starvation.
   The feeling of hunger is controlled by nerve centers in the hypothalamus, a part of the brain very close to the pituitary gland. The normal function of hunger is to signal a person to take in food when the body senses the absence of food in the stomach. If more food is consistently taken in than is necessary to fulfill the needs of the body, obesity will result.
   A reducing plan for an obese person must be entrusted to a physician. If obesity remains untreated, the life span is greatly shortened by breakdown of the organs under so heavy a burden.

What is Déjà vu?

   Déjà vu is French for "already seen," déjà vu refers to the common sensation that one has experienced a situation, scene or sequence of events previously. Such sensations are usually accompanied by a greatly heightened consciousness and the conviction that one can actually predict what will happen next. While the experience seems to provoke anxiety in some people, others respond to it with delight, whether the scene involves familiar material and characters or, as is equally common, is in a place or from a time of which the per­cipient has no knowledge, such as when a first-time traveler in a foreign country unexpectedly comes upon a village that he recognízes in every detail. On his first trip to Africa, Cari G. Jung had such an experience: staring out the window of a train, he spotted a solitary tribesman standing on a cliff. "It was," he wrote, "as if I were this moment returning to the land of my youth, and as if I knew that dark-skinned man... had been waiting for me for five thousand years." Jung termed his experience "recognition of the immemorially known."
   A great many theories have been proposed to explain déjà vu  but no sin­gle one has gained wide acceptance, and no medical proof has ever been offered to explain it biologically, although Arthur Wigan suggested in 1884 that the phenomenon could be the result of the fact that one hemisphere of the brain registers data a fraction of a second sooner than the other. A related theory. proposed by Frederic W. H. Myers in 1895, is that the unconscious, or subliminal consciousness, acknowledges events an instant sooner than the con­scious brain.
   Other possible explanations that have been seriously advanced are that déjà vu results from one or another form of ESP—clairvoyance, telepathy, precognition or precognitive dreams; that it is proof of reincarnation, or that it is evidence of prenatal consciousness, being based on memories of experiences of one's mother and not oneself.

What is Personation?

Personation— The temporary assumption of another's physical characteristics, habits, symptoms of illness or other identifying traits, personation is frequently experienced by participants in seances, with the individuals personated usually being known to them. Mediums often experience personation of subjects not known to them but known to their clients. In one unusual case of hysterical personation a young woman rejected by a lover began to display many of the young man's gestures, to speak in a voice resembling his and to change her hand-writing to approximate his. In addition, personation is rather easily achieved in the hypnotic state by suggestion.

Baiae, the underwater city

   Located near Maples on the Gulf of Pozzuoli, Baiae was ancient Rome's counterpart of modern-day Monte Carlo. Magnificent pavilions were built out on the sea atop raised foundations. Expansive villas dot-ted the coastline, and marble statues of deities graced the cobble-stone streets. Named by the Greeks after Baios, helmsman of the legendary Ulysses, Baiae was also famous for its sulphur springs, said to relieve arthritis and rheumatism. The city had also earned a reputation for satisfying the vacationing Roman's every appetite.

Grasshopper

   The grasshopper is a member of either of two distinct families of orthopterous insects, the Tettigoniidae, including the long-horned grasshoppers, and the Locustidae, comprising the short-horned grass­hoppers or locusts. These familiar green or brown colored insects have two pairs of wings, chewing mouth parts, and a distinctly segmented abdomen. The Locustidae have short antennae and a short ovipositor in the female, while the Tettigoniidae have long antennae and a long sword-shaped ovipositor.

   In both families the hind legs are long and strong, giving the insects their jumping power; both are vegetarian in diet, feeding chiefly on grasses and weeds. The characteristic chirping sound of the grasshopper is made only by the male. It is produced either by rubbing the hind wings against the fore wings or by scraping the femur of the leg, which is equipped with bead-like protuberances, against the fore wing. Grass­hoppers also produce supersonic sounds, in­audible to the human ear. When measured with a special meter, these sounds were found to reach frequencies of about 40,000 vibrations per second. Egg deposition varies with the species. The eggs may be laid either in masses or singly, in the ground, or on leaves, stems, and twigs. The young grass­hopper, upon emerging from the egg, is wingless and resembles but is somewhat smaller than the adult. It undergoes a period of gradual metamorphosis, involving a number of molts, and finally reaches the adult stage.

What is an Ohmmeter?

 An ohmmeter is an instrument for showing how many ohms of resistance there are to the passage of an electric cur­rent.
Since the exact measurement of resistance is slow, various types of ohmmeters have been invented to give direct readings in ohms.
The ohm is that resistance which causes a potential drop of one absolute volt when a steady current of one absolute ampere flows through it. The international ohm is based on a specified conductor. It is the resistance of a uniform thread of mercury in a capillary tube of such diameter that the thread is 106.3 cm. long, weighs 14.4521 grams, and has a temperature of 0 degrees Centigrade.

Who was Rudolf Steiner?

   Founder of the Anthroposophical Society, Rudolf Steiner espoused a spiritual philosophy that combined occult and Christian princi­pies with a reverence for nature and the environment. Born in Kraljevica, on the Austro-Hungarian border (now Yugoslavia) in 1861, Steiner was a Goethe scholar and an enthusiast of Theosophy. His academic training (he had a doctorate in philosophy) and practical inclinations led him to split with the Theosophists and found his own society in 1912. Though he remained committed to spiritual investigation and mysticism, Steiner turned his attention to a broad range of cul­tural and educational activities, placing great emphasis on color and bodily rhythm, on the establishment of an architectural style expressive of a spiritual life, and on the development of a number of enlightened educational and Eirming experiments. Some 70 Anthroposophical schools still operate around the world and are highly regarded as innovative institutions that promote individuality, spontaneity and excellence. Steiner died in 1925.

Who is Hawking radiation named for?

   British physicist and mathematician Stephen William Hawking was born on January 8,1942, three hundred years after the birth of Isaac Newton and three hun­dred years after the death of Galileo Galilei. He is similar to these two scientific geniuses in that he has a brilliant mind, and his theories have advanced our knowledge of the cosmos. His similarity to Newton even extends to academic appointments. Hawking is the Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge Uni­versity, a position once held by Newton. By the age of fourteen, Hawking knew he wanted to study mathematics and physics. While earning his doctorate at Cambridge, Hawking realized that his motor skills had begun to deteriorate. For example, he had a tendency to slur his words and had trouble tying his shoes. He was taken to a specialist and diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (also known as Lou Gehrig's disease). The disorder causes the muscles, but not the mind, to deteriorate. Hawking was told he had two years to live, which sent him into a terrible depression.
   After two years, Hawking's condition stabilized. His body had become very frail and he moved about with the aid of a wheelchair, but he learned to write using a specialized computer attached to his wheelchair and to speak through a machine called a speech synthesizer. While in graduate school, Hawking met mathematician Roger Penrose, who introduced him to the concept of black holes. This subject quickly became, and remains to this day, the focus of Hawking's life work. Hawking has written several best-selling books that explain concepts of astronomy in a non-technical way. His most famous book, A Brief History of Time, has even been made into a movie.

Oils

   An oil is a fluid light enough to float on water. It will not mix with water but will combine with alcohol. It remains fluid at normal temperatures. This distinguishes the oils from fats, which are solid at normal temperatures.
   A few oils come from fishes and other animals, such as fish oils and fish-liver oils, whale oil and neat's-foot oil. The latter is processed from the feet of animals at meat-packing plants. Sperm oil from the whale is not a true oil but a liquid wax.
   Most of our useful oils are obtained from the ground, as are petroleum and other mineral products, or from plants.
   The ancient Chinese, Hindus, Egyptians, Greeks and Romans obtained vegetable oils by milling and pressing various plant parts. Today most vegetable oils are obtained by heating or steaming methods.
Many different kinds of plant life provide useful oils: almond oil (from the nuts), castor oil (from the seeds of the castor bean), coconut oil (from kernels of nuts), corn oil (from the kernels), cottonseed oil, olive oil (from the fruit), peanut oil (from the peanuts), and soybean oil (from the beans). Petroleum and the products made from it are used as fuels and in chemicals.
   Some of the important uses for oils of various kinds are in lubrication, flavoring, perfume, and medicines.

Elisha Gray

   Elisha Gray, 1835-1901, was an American inventor, born in Barnesville, Ohio, and educated at Oberlin College. Beginning in 1867 he took out some 70 patents for the telegraph, telephone, and other electrical appliances, such as the telautograph. With E. M. Barton, he organized the firm of Gray and Barton from which the Western Electric Company developed. He claimed the invention of the speaking telephone on the score of a caveat containing specifications which was filed a few hours after Alexander Graham Bell had filed a patent (Feb. 14, 1876). The infringement case was finally decided in Bell's favor.

David Adams Warden

   David Adams Warden was an American musician; born in London, England, in 1815; settled in the United States prior to the Civil War; was organist in. several Protestant Episcopal churches in his earlier years. During the Civil War he composed the music of many patriotic songs, which were sung by both armies. The best known of these include The Flags Come back to Tennessee, and All Quiet Along the Potomac Tonight. He also wrote both the words and music of Mother, Don't Weep for Your Boy and Tell Me, Ye Winyed Yinds. and was author of a book of chants. He died in Philadelphia, Pa., Feb. 4, 1902.

Which bird is the largest?

   The flightless ostrich (Struthio camelus), found in southwest Africa, is the largest living bird. Males grow to 8 feet in height and weigh as much as 300 pounds. Their stride exceeds 23 feet, enabling them to attain a running speed up to 45 miles per hour. Female ostriches are brown; males are black, with long white feathers on their wings and tail. During the nineteenth century, these white plumes were used in hatmaking and dressmaking, which led to the decline of the ostrich population in the wild and the breeding of domesticated ostriches. Now there is renewed interest in ostriches for their hide, used in the making of leather goods. In some parts of the world, ostrich meat and eggs are delicacies. The ostrich egg is the largest egg produced by a bird, averaging 3 pounds 10 ounces.

What is a Grimoire?

   A grimoire is a book of magic spells, rituals and incantations, usually of elaborate presentation and ostentatious piety. Most grimoires date from the 16th century to the 18th century, although their compilers uniformly claimed that their contents were based on ancient texts, preferably Hebraic or Egyptian.
   As how-to manuals, grimoires have seldom been taken seriously by students of the occult, but as historical artifacts, they are fascinating. Most grimoires circulated in manuscript form, although a rare number were printed. So complicated and exaggerated were the preliminaries to magical transactions as outlined in the grimoires that E. M. Butler remarked that they seemed "calculated to deal the death blow to any notions . . . [among practitioners] that magic is a short cut to their desires."
   Among the best known of the gri­moires are the Key of Salomon, which appears to be based largely and loosely on cabalistic and astrological lore, and which includes detailed directions on how to summon both angels and demons; the Grana Grimoire, which, while it purports to be a direct transcription of Solomonic writings on the occult, also leans on a more recent source, the scholar-magician Agrippa, and includes a Faustian recipe for making a foolproof pact with the devil; the Grimoire of Honorius the Great, libelously named for a pope of the 13th century but thought to have been produced in the 16th century. The Honorius employs many elements of the Catholic Mass in its instructions for contacting the devil and was understandably thought to be an especially scandalous work.

Great Rift Valley

   The Great Rift Valley is a depression extending from the Jordan and Dead Sea valleys of Palestine, the length of the Red Sea, then in a SW direction in Africa through French Somaliland and Ethiopia to Lake Rudolf in Kenya, from which a branch tends W and then S through Lake Albert, Lake Edward, Lake Kivi, and Lake Tanganyika. The main rift from Lake Rudolf extends southward through Lake Manyara to the southern end of Lake Nyasa. Thus the rift valleys have in their narrow troughs at the great lakes of Africa. The rift valleys are formed by parallel fissures in the earth's crust and (in central Africa) have precipitous walls rising from 4,000 to 5,000 feet to the level of the intervening plateau.

Great Rift Valley

What is Feudalism?

   Feudalism and feudal system were not terms used in the Middle Ages, but were terms that sixteenth-century lawyers used to denote the combination of laws and customs governing land tenure known as the fief. Karl Marx used the term feudalism to mean an economic system based on serfdom, considering it a stage in economic development that followed slavery and preceded capitalism. Many historians now suggest abandoning the term entirely because it is a later and inaccurate construct. Susan Reynolds in Fiefs and Vassals: The Medieval Evidence Reinterpreted (1994) has argued that the narrow definition of feu­dalism based on the idea of a contract between the lord and vassal with the granting of the fief cannot be found in the documents of the time and that when words like feodum (translated as fief) appear, histo­rians have interpreted them in light of the modern definition of this type of property transfer. The property transfers in pre-twelfth century Europe, says Reynolds, owed more to ecclesiastical usage than they did to lords and vassals and their need for military service. Rather than originating in customary law, the concept of fiefs and vassals was part of twelfth-century academic law, and legal thinkers drew heavily on ecclesiastical practice as they rationalized the property transfer of the fief.

What is a oil gland?

   An oil gland is a tiny organ which produces a fatty or oily substance called sebum. This gland is spherical in shape and is usually connected with a hair follicle or depression from which hair grows.
   Each gland has a duct at the surface of the skin and branches at the lower end. These branches are connected to a sac-like globule which secretes the oily substance. This secretion pours over the hairs that grow out of the follicles and coats the skin around them.
   Oil glands vary in size and are located at different distances from the surface of the skin. Some oil glands are found on parts of the body that are not hairy and therefore pour out their secretion directly on the skin. No oil glands are found on the palms of the hands or soles of the feet.
   When the ducts of the oil glands become clogged, the secretion continues to accumulate and cysts form. Some of these may develop into acne.

What is the Devil's Sea?

   The Devil's Sea is a rumored danger zone in the southeast coast of Japan, the Devil's Sea is the Bermuda Triangle of the Pacific. The term seems to be of somewhat hyperbolic origin, based on the loss of only nine ships over a five-year period in the early 1950s in an area of unspecified size, but extending possibly as far as 750 miles out from land. Eight of the ships were fishing boats, only one of which carried a radio transmitter; the ninth, a ship transporting scientists to the site of an underwater volcanic eruption, sent no SOS, although it is not known whether the vessel was equipped with a radio. Twenty years later a U.S. investigator discovered that the phrase "Devil's Sea" was unfamiliar to Japanese maritime officials, and thus it appears that the "legend" of the Dev­il's Sea was spun from several easily misinterpreted newspaper accounts.

Who first discovered black holes?

   The idea of black holes was first developed in the late eighteenth century by English geologist John Michell and French astronomer Pierre Simon Laplace. In 1783, Michell calculated the speed at which an object would have to travel in order to escape the gravity of the Sun. In 1796, Laplace conducted a similar study. The two scientists agreed that if a star was big enough and dense enough, it would exhibit so much gravitational attraction that nothing could escape from its clutches. Scientists once called black holes "gravitationally collapsed objects." Russian scientists suggested the name "collapsar." Then in 1969, physicist John A. Wheeler of Princeton University coined the term "black hole," which became instantly popular. The discovery of quasars lent support to the theory of black holes. Quasars are small and extremely distant objects that emit tremendous quantities of radiation, including visible light and X-rays. Mathematician Roy Kerr concluded, in the mid-1960s, that black holes could be the source of the quasars. The radiation emission could be the result of huge quantities of matter crossing the event horizon and disappearing into a black hole. Stephen Hawking, professor of mathematics at Cambridge University, has added much in recent years to our understanding of black holes.

Where is the largest wetlands area?

   During the past 25 years, wetlands have gained a place of importance in the understanding of the health of the planet. Acting as natural water purification systems, wetlands reduce storm damage, recharge groundwater aquifers, and supply nourishment for many different species. Most wetlands are located along major river sys­tems like the Nile, Amazon, and Congo, but the largest, the Siberian Lowlands (380,000 square miles), is a large peat bog with little drainage.
   Stretching across the subarctic Siberian plain east of the Ural Mountains, the Siberian Lowlands are in the country of Kazakhstan. Accumulated layers of peat moss now support grasses, willows, and sedges. Where the peat is dry and as deep as 30 feet, entire forests are growing. The large buildup of carbon in the undecayed remains of plants in this wetlands helps control the planet's temperature by reducing potential atmospheric carbon, known to cause global warming.

Sir Richard Francis Burton

Sir Richard Burton (1821-1890)

   Sir Richard Burton was a man of extraordinary and varied gifts. He was one of the preeminent explorers of his time, an unequaled linguist who is said to have mastered 35 languages, and the author of dozens of books on his travels and other subjects. His most famous literary achievement is a 16-volume translation of The Arabian Nights.
   Richard Francis Burton was born near Elstree, England, on March 19, 1821, and taken abroad by his parents at an early age. Although he received almost no formal education, he everywhere learned the local languages and dialects. He attended Trinity College, Oxford, but was expelled, and at 21 he joined the army of the British East India Company.
   In India, Burton added to his knowledge of languages, learning Hindi, Farsi (Persian), and Arabic and living with native peoples. On his first great journey, in 1853, he made a perilous trip to the Muslim holy cities of Medina and Mecca, disguised as a Muslim pilgrim. The next year he and John Speke explored East Africa, seeking the source of the Nile River. On a second expedition, in 1858, Bur­ton discovered Lake Tanganyika. But, ill with malaria, he did not accompany Speke north and so did not share in the discovery of Lake Victoria, a main source of the Nile.
   In 1861, Burton married Isabel Arundell. She was a devoted wife but had little sympathy for many of his chief interests. Burton's remaining years were spent as a British consular official, at posts around the world, exploring and writing. He was knighted in 1885. He died in Tri­este (now in Italy) on October 20,1890.

Gasoline

   Gasoline is one of the liquefied lighter fractions obtained from the distillation of petroleum, coal, natural gas, and oil-bearing shales and sands. Most gasoline today comes from petroleum. Only 125 years ago, before kerosene lamps were replaced by electricity. gasoline was not even a byproduct. Many refiners dumped gasoline into the streams of Pennsylvania or poured it out onto the ground to burn. Then came the automobile, and gasoline became the mam product, and kerosene the byproduct. With the increased demand for gasoline came changes in refining, and the 42-gallon barrel of crude oil that in 1918 produced only 10.6 gallons of gasoline in 1952 produced 17.8 gallons.
   The technology of the production of gasoline is in such rapid development that few generalizations long remain valid. In general, gasoline is produced by either distillation or conversion of petroleum. Conver­sión has branched off into thermal cracking, catalytic cracking, and polymerization, which is the reverse of cracking. "Natural gasoline" is a product "squeezed" out of natural gas. It is not in itself a natural gasoline, but it is mixed with the regular product to be sold in service stations.
   The octane number of a gasoline indicates the percentage of a certain type of antiknock gasoline, called iso-octane, that has been mixed into the product sold. Iso-octane is almost knockproof in a high-compression gasoline engine, while heptane, the old-style gasoline, is prone to cause knocks. Knocking is uncontrolled combustion and is therefore wasteful. In the 1920's engineers found that antiknocking properties could also be put into gasoline by the addition of tetraethyl lead.

What is Dialysis?

   Dialysis is a method by which colloidal particles, or large molecules, can be separated from smaller molecules in solution. It makes use of a semi­permeable membrane that prevents the passage of the large molecules. For example, if a mixture of salt solution and glue is placed on one side of a semi­permeable membrane and water is placed on the other side, the salt particles diffuse through the membrane into the water. The colloidal glue particles, however, do not pass through the membrane. If the water into which the salt diffuses is being removed, the salt is carried away as soon as it passes through the mem­brane, and eventually only glue and water will remain on the other side of the membrane. Dialysis should not be confused with osmosis, the passage of solvent through a semipermeable membrane from a less concentrated to a more concentrated solution.

Who was Flavius Stilicho?

   Flavius Stilicho (about 359-408 A.D.) , Roman general and statesman, the mainstay of the western Roman Empire after the death of the emperor Theodosius I. Stilicho was the son of a Vandal who had served as an officer in the Roman army under the emperor Valens. He entered the army at an early age and rose rapidly in rank, being sent in 383 A.D. as ambassador to Persia to arrange an advantageous peace. He was successful in his mission and soon after his return he was rewarded with the hand of Serena, the niece of Theodosius. Stilicho next directed numer­ous campaigns against the barbarians in Thrace and Britain. After the death of Theodosius in 395 A.D., Stilicho and Serena were appointed guardians of the youthful emperor Honorius, and Stilicho became the virtual ruler of the empire, his rival Rufinus being slain later that same year. Stilicho was engaged for several years in war with Alaric I, king of the Goths, whom he defeated at Pollentia in 401 A.D. and again at Verona two years later. His ambition then led him to attempt the introduction of his own family to the imperial succession. In 405 A.D., however, he was interrupted in his plans by the invasion of Italy by a mixed horde of Germans and Celts led by Radagaisus. He de­feated Radagaisus, but was forced to flee to Ravenna when the emperor Honorius learned of his designs on the throne. He was captured, however, and put to death by order of Honorius.

Hammurabi and his laws

   About 1792 B.C. a strong ruler named Hammurabi came to power in Babylon and conquered the upper Tigris-Euphrates Valley. Hammurabi was more than a great military leader. He turned out to be a wise and just political leader as well. He is best known for the Code of Hammurabi, a collection of laws passed under his direction.
   Hammurabi's code had 282 laws. These laws controlled all aspects of life in Babylon. Agriculture was carefully regulated. For example, people who failed to cultivate their fields or to keep the irrigation canals and ditches in good condition were punished. Some laws concerned commerce and industry, with provisions regarding wages, hours, and working conditions. There were laws dealing with property rights, contracts, and bankruptcy. Others dealt with marriage and divorce. The laws were enforced by judges, under the supervision of the king's advisers and officials.
   The laws of Hammurabi gave some degree of justice to everyone. In that sense, they were a real advance over the political and social customs of the rest of the ancient world. The laws regarding punishment, however, were harsh. The idea of punishment was "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." If a man caused another to lose an eye, then his own eye was put out.
   Justice was not equal for all people, however. If a wealthy man destroyed the eye of a poor man, he did not lose his eye but merely paid a fine. A thief who could not repay what he had stolen was killed. If he had money, he had only to repay more than he had stolen.

Why hasn't anyone found any antimatter larger than antiparticles?

   If all matter exists in an antimatter state, then it's curious why so little antimatter has been seen. We have detected the antiforms of subatomic particles, but where is the bigger matter? In theory, particles and antiparticles are always created in equal amounts, or destroyed in equal numbers in explosions of energy and gamma rays. This balance between matter and antimatter is known as symmetry. One possible reason is that matter and antimatter do not exist in equal amounts. There may be far more matter, dwarfing antimatter in comparison. And maybe matter has already destroyed most antimatter. Another theory is that matter and antimatter occupy separate spaces. Perhaps our universe has an anti-universe twin, and the two are somehow kept apart.

electron and positron

Lizard world

   Lizards are reptiles with long, slender bodies and tails. Their skin, which they shed frequently, is made of dry scales. Most lizards have four legs, but some have none. There are more than three thousand kinds (species and subspecies), and they are found all over the world, especially in warm areas. They vary in length from a little over an inch to about ten feet. There are about one hundred species of lizard found in southwestern United States.

   Lizards and snakes are order Squamata in the reptile class of vertebrates. The lizards are in suborder Sauria. The bodies of most lizards found on land are flat from top to bottom (vertically). Those of water lizards are flat from side to side (horizontally), and those of burrowing lizards are usually round and snake-like. Many lizards are brightly colored and some are able to change certain colors quickly.

What is Lupus?

   Lupus is a generic term used lo describe several varieties of chronic localized infiltrations of the skin. The most common of these are Lupus erythematosus and Lupus vulgaris. The former occurs in slightly elevated, scaly, red patches, varying in size, which show a strong tendency lo the production of atrophic scars. It is most common on the face, ears and scalp, more rarely occurring on the hands and feel. It begins in several isolated or grouped red spots little larger than a pin-head and having a thin scale. These spots increase in size  by peripheral extension, while the surface is partly covered by the grayish scales pr thin scar tissue. The color is characteristic and is violaceous. They may remain small, or may grow large enough to coyer the side of the  face.

Ganges River

   The Ganges River is the main river draining the alluvial Indo-Gangetic plains in northern India. These plains comprise one of the most heavily populated and cultivated areas in Asia. The Ganges is the holy river for most of the Indians who are Hindus. Thousands of Hindu temples and shrines stand along the banks of the Ganges, especially at Henares, the holiest of Hindu cities. Every year millions of Hindus come from all corners of India to bathe in the Ganges and to drink from it. They believe this water restores health to both the body and the soul.
   The Ganges has its source at high altitudes on the southern side of the Himalayas. Flowing generally southward, it cuts through a series of mountains and across the upper Ganges Plain. In this upper course the Ganges is the source of water for two of India's major irrigation-canal systems. About 70 miles east of Delhi the river flows southeast and passes one of the greatest in­dustrial cities of India, Cawnpore. At AUahabad, the Ganges is joined by its big tributary, the Jumna. By now a mighty river, the Ganges receives other tributaries from the north and the south while it flows eastward through Uttar Pradesh and Bihar province. Before turning southward in eastern Pakistan, the Ganges is joined by the Brahmaputra from the north. The combined Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers then reach the sea via a series of sluggish delta streams. The westernmost of these distributaries, the Hooghly, is cleaned by tides and hence is navigable to Calcutta, the delta's major port. The total length of the Ganges is 1,560 miles.
   The Ganges is used extensively in trade and transportation. Many great cities are built along its length.

How is a black hole formed?

   To end up as a black hole, a star must be at least two or three times the mass of our Sun. Any star will collapse once its nuclear fuel is all used up. The reason is that the force of the nuclear fusion process pushing outward from the star's core balances its immense gravity. An average-mass star, like the sun, will end up as a white dwarf star. A star five to eight times the mass of the sun will explode to produce a supernova, shedding much of its mass, and end up as a densely packed neutron star. A star ten to forty times the mass of the sun will produce a gravitational collapse so complete that, after the supernova, only a black hole remains. As a giant star collapses, its mass gets so concentrated that the force of gravity becomes completely overpowering. The collapsed star's surface, called the event horizon, becomes the point of no return. Anything crossing the event horizon gets drawn in and cannot escape.

What is Bilocation?

Bilocation. This term refers to a par­ticular form of out-of-body experience in which an individual's double, or as­tral body, not only travels some distance from his physical body but is actually observed by someone in the second location. As with other varieties of astral projection, accounts of this phenomenon—while relatively rare— have circulated in various parts of the world for centuries. Christian tradition ascribes such incidents to a number of saints, among them Saint Anthony of Padua, Saint Severus of Ravenna and Saint Ambrose of Milan. Probably the best-known report concerns Saint Alphonsus Liguori, who, during a period of confinement and fasting in a cell in Arezzo, Italy, in 1774, announced on awakening one morning that he had been at the bedside of the dying Pope Clement XIV in Rome, a four-day journey away. This statement was greeted with disbelief, so the story goes, until it was learned that the pope had indeed just died and that Alphonsus Liguori had been seen at his deathbed.

Vasco da Gama

  Vasco da Gama (1469?-1524) was a Portuguese navigator, was born in the small seaport of Sines in Alentejo. He was the first navigator to make the voyage to the East Indies by the Cape of Good Hope. In 1497 da Gama set sail with four ships from Lisbon and in November sailed around the Cape of Good Hope. Early in 1498 he reached the east coast of Africa and soon entered the harbor of Mozambique. His crew was in great danger because of the hostility of the inhabitants toward Christians. After leaving Mozambique da Gama touched at Mombasa and Malindi.

   Holding his course straight across the Indian Ocean toward the Mala­bar Coast, da Gama arrived in 1498 at Kozhikode. In 1499 he set out on his return voyage and reached Lis­bon the same year. On da Gama's arrival at the capital the king honored and rewarded him and his men. He had traveled 24,000 nautical miles and was the first European to reach India by sea. Da Gama was named admiral of the Indies and given the title of dom, with an annual pension and extensive commercial privileges.

Funeral Mask of Tutankhamen

   One of the most beautiful treasures in the world is this life-size funeral mask of the pharaoh Tutankhamen. The discovery of his tomb in 1922 captured the imagination of people around the world. What was extraordinary about the find was that the tomb had not been robbed of its treasures. It contained over 5,000 works of art, which revealed to scholars many aspects of Egyptian life.
   The mask is made of beaten gold, inlaid with jewels and colored glass. It shows Tutankhamen as the handsome youth he was when he died, more than 3,200 years ago, at the age of 18. The decorative beard on the mask is a symbol of Osiris, the god of the dead. On the headdress are symbols of the vulture and cobra goddesses. They represent Upper and Lower Egypt.

Who first discovered antimatter?

   Physicist Paul A. M. Dirac first deduced in 1928 that all matter should exist in both positive and negative states. He applied his discovery first to electrons and soon was proven correct when antielectrons, or positrons, were discovered. These positively charged electrons were first detected in 1932 by American physicist Carl Anderson. Anderson tracked particles bouncing off a lead plate and found that while all the elec­trons were deflected in one direction, there was another type of particle that headed off in the opposite direction. This particle had all the same characteristics as an elec­tron, except for its positive charge. Anderson gave it the name "positron." For the dis­covery of the positron, Dirac and Anderson shared the Nobel Prize. Two decades later the antiproton and antineutron were discovered. Naturally occurring positrons were detected in 1979, high above Texas, during a balloon experiment.

What is Warfare?

   Warfare, in the modern sense means "state of war, campaigning, being engaged in war," although originally the word denoted a military expedition. The art of war­fare, or waging war, consists of the five military branches of strategy, grand tactics, logistics, engineering, and tactics. Strategy (Gr. stratia, " campaign," and hegesmai, " lead "; " the conduct of a campaign ") is the "art of properly directing masses upon the theater of war, either for defense or for invasion." Grand tactics is the "art of making good combinations preliminary to battles, as well as during their progress." Logistics is the "art of moving armies"; engineering is the science of "the attack and defense of fortifications"; tactics is the "art of disposing military or naval forces, especially in actual contact with the enemy."

John Burroughs

John Burroughs (1837-1921)

   One of America's greatest nature writers was John Burroughs. He delighted in exploring the quiet world of nature and then sharing his appreciation and knowledge with others through his lyrical prose.

   Born on April 3,1837, John Burroughs was one of ten children. His youth was spent on a small family farm near Roxbury, New York. It was there that he began his lifelong study of nature as he tramped along the untamed Rock Creek, observing the flowers and ani­mals around him.

   At various times in his life, Burroughs was a teacher, treasury clerk, and bank examiner. But it was as a naturalist and author that he became well known. Burroughs began his publishing career by contributing essays to the Atlantic Monthly and other magazines. A biography of his close friend Walt Whitman, Notes on Walt Whitman as Poet and Person (1867), was his first book to be published.

El Greco (painter)

   El Greco, or Domenicos Theotocopoulos, 1541—1614, was a Cretan painter, identified with Spain, born near Candia on the isle of Crete. Nothing is known of his life until the mention of his name in a letter written in Rome in 1570. Judging from his work, it would seem he had also lived in Venice, for it shows the influence of Venetian painters like titian, Tintoretto, and Jacopo Bassano. By 1577 he was in Toledo, Spain, where he produced his greatest work and became famous. Here he was commonly known as El Greco (The Greek). In 1586 he painted "The Burial of Count Orgaz," which is generally considered not only his masterpiece but one of the world's greatest paintings. His "Toledo in a Storm" (painted, it is supposed, between 1600—1610 and now in the Metro­politan Museum) is equaled in power and suggestion by few landscape paintings. El Greco lived a life of great frugality; it is said that of 24 rooms placed at his disposal in a palace he used only one. He has come to his greatest recognition in modern times, and there are few artists of the last 80 years who have not been affected by him at one time or another. Due perhaps to Byzantine influences, he could express the essential spirit of things, and his beautiful sense of rhythm, his color, which modulates gradually from the somber to the brilliant, and the deep significance he gives to an attitude or the position of a hand have seldom been approached by other painters before or since his time.

The Burial of Count Orgaz by El Greco

What is a lute?

Jester with a Lute

   The lute is a stringed musical instrument formerly much in use. It originally contained six strings, but the number was gradually increased till it reached 24. The lute consists of four parts, namely, the table; the body, constructed of nine convex ribs; the neck, which has as many frets or divisions; and the head or cross, in which the screws for tuning it are inserted. In playing this instrument the performer strikes the strings with the fingers of the right hand, and regulates the sounds with those of the left. The notes of the lute are generally written on six lines, and not on five. There were formerly various kinds in use.

What do Hawking radiation and virtual particles have to do with black holes?

   British physicist and mathematician Stephen William Hawking believes that a black hole is the final stage of a massive star's life, but he proposes that they then continue to evolve by evaporating and giving off radiation. Hawking's theory is based on the concept of virtual particles. Virtual particles cannot themselves be detected but their presence is known by their effect on other objects. One half of these particles gets sucked into a black hole while the other half—created by the black hole—evaporates, or radiates outward. Through this process, the black hole loses mass. The smaller the black hole, the more quickly this occurs. Eventually the black hole completely evaporates away. In a black hole small enough, complete evaporation causes a violent explo­sion that gives off gamma radiation. Hawking is convinced that this energy, also known as Hawking radiation, will one day be detected and validate his theory.

What is Lupercalia?

   Lupercalia was an ancient Roman festival celebrated annually in honor of Lupercus, an ancient pastoral god of the Italians, afterward identified with the Arcadian Pan, who protected the flocks against wolves and gave them fertility. The festival dates from the earliest period of the history of Rome; it was held on the Lupercal, where Romulus and Remus were supposed to have been nurtured by a she-wolf. The day of celebration was 15 February, which was originally the last month of the Roman year.

Lupercalia

Where is the largest lake?

   The Caspian Sea, a saltwater lake covering 143,243 square miles, is considered the largest inland body of water in the world. Its water laps the shores of five coun­tries (Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Russia, and Iran). Its numerous tributaries include the Volga River (75 percent of its water comes from this river) from the north, the Gorgan River from the east, and the Kura River from the west.
   The fishing industry has suffered since the demise of the Soviet Union in 1991. Poachers desperate to feed their families have ignored Soviet-imposed quotas. Industrial pollution and raw sewage threaten to ruin the water, but locals have high hopes for the region's economy: oil reserves are estimated at 200 billion barrels, more than in Iran and Iraq combined. Natural gas reserves could make this one of the top ten gas-producing areas in the world.

Luigi Galvani

   Luigi Galvani (1737-1798) was an Italian physician and anatomist, was born in Bologna. He left the study of theology to take up medicine at the University of Bologna, where he became professor of anatomy in 1762. Galvani conducted research in animal electricity. In dissecting frogs he found that the muscles could be made to contract by touching them with metals. This led to the discovery of the form of elec­tricity named after him: galvanism or galvanic electricity.

Lyrebird

   The lyrebird is a remarkable Australian bird which derives its name from the form of the tail in the male, which much resembles that of the conventional Apollo's lyre; the tail of the female is rather long, but simply wedge-shaped. There are two species, about the size of chickens, both reddish brown and called «native pheasants» by the colonists, constituting the genus Menura and family Menuridte, and regarded as the lowliest of the Passeres, and of very ancient origin. Lyrebirds dwell in the «scrub» or open woods, and rarely leave the ground, avoiding their enemies by swift running. Their nests are placed upon the ground, are well woven of sticks and plant-stems and are covered by a dome-like roof, leaving an entrance only at the sides. In the mating season the lyrebird males scrape up mounds of leaves and rubbish upon which they strut about, sing and do their best to display their long and handsome tails to the hens. The better known species is the long-tailed one (Menura superba) but both are now rare.

Joseph Lister

   Joseph Lister (1827-1912) was a British surgeon who discovered how to use antiseptics to kill harmful germs. Before Lister experimented with carbolic acid and learned to sterilize with it, many people died from simple wounds or surgery. He showed doctors the need to fight germs.

   Born at Upton, in Essex, Lister was the son of a wine merchant who studied optics in his spare time and whose work on the achromatic lens (the lens that refracts light without breaking it into its constituent colors) and the compound microscope opened the door to a fellowship in the Royal Society. Like his father, young Lister loved science.

How does the general theory of relativity relate to spacetime?

   After the special theory of relativity came the general theory of relativity, in which physicist Albert Einstein connected the curvature of spacetime with gravity. Einstein argued that gravity is not a force (like magnetism), as was previously thought, but is the result of curved spacetime. He wrote that the reason large objects (such as the Sun) draw smaller objects (such as the planets) toward them is that large objects curve spacetime while smaller objects become trapped in those curves. To envision this, imagine the Sun curving spacetime into the shape of a shallow bowl. The planets are drawn into orbit around the Sun like small balls rolling around the sides of the bowl. This describes how gravity is simply the changed motion of an object due to curved spacetime.

What is Agharta?

   A mythical underground kingdom, Agharta is the construct of science-fiction writer Robert Ernst Dickhoff, whose book by that name appeared in 1951. Dickhoffs fanciful world extends outward beneath the surface of the earth from Antarctica, connecting the subterranean regions of the United States, Brazil, Tibet, and the Pacific islands, and is inhabited by descendants of the Martians who he claims settled on (or under) the earth 80,000 years ago. Agharta is one of a large number of subterranean empires conjured up by imaginative writers and theorists of the improbable over the years, but while most make Atlantis or Lemuria their starting point, Dickhoff appears to have based his creation upon an ancient Tibetan legend.

Song of Roland

   The heroic poems, or chansons de geste, of the eleventh and twelfth centuries underscored the values fostered by knighthood and the lord-vassal relationship. The oldest and best known of these poems is the Song of Roland, which was probably composed in the last quarter of the eleventh century. The subject of the poem is the ambush of the rear guard of Charlemagne's army under the command of Roland by the Basques at Roncesvalles in 778, but poetic imagination (or perhaps older legend) transformed this minor Frankish setback into a major event in the war against Islam.
   With fine psychological discernment the poem examines the character of Roland. The qualities that make him a heroic knight—his dauntless courage and uncompromising pride—are at war with the qualities required of a good vassal—obedience, loyalty, cooperation, and common sense. Roland is in serious danger but refuses for reasons of personal dignity to sound his horn in time for Charlemagne to return and save him and his men. By the time Roland's pride relents and he does blow the horn, his troops' deaths are ensured. The sensitive examination of the conflict between Roland's thoughtless if heroic individualism and the demands of the new feudal order gives this poem its stature as the first masterpiece of French letters.

How does the special theory of relativity relate to spacetime?

   Special relativity begins with the idea that space and time are not fixed, but change depending on how fast and in what direction the observer is moving. In other words, they depend on an observer's reference frame. For example, imagine that you and a friend are on a train traveling at a constant 60 miles (97 kilometers) per hour and, to pass the time, you're playing catch. You are standing at the front end of the train and your friend is standing at the rear. When the ball is thrown, it appears to travel between the two of you at 30 miles (48 kilometers) per hour. Yet to an observer standing beside the railroad tracks watching the train go by, the ball appears to travel at 30 miles (48 kilometers) per hour (60 - 30) when you throw it and 90 miles per hour (60 +30) when your friend throws it. Thus, the ball appears to take different periods of time to travel between the two ball-players, depending on one's reference frame. The event cannot be described as "simultaneous" by the observer on the train and the one beside the tracks. It can only be adequately described by each observer by using the di­mension of time as well as dimensions of space.

The centaur Chiron (mythology)

Chiron and the young Achilles

   In Greek mythology, Chiron was a learned centaur. The Greeks were fond of horses. Other mythological monsters were wholly devoid of good traits, but the cen­taur, half horse and half man, while sav­age at times, is represented often as wise and, to a greater or less extent, the friend of man. Chiron was instructed by Apol­lo and Diana, and became skilled, especial­ly in medicine, music, hunting, and the art of prophecy. Many renowned Grecian heroes were his pupils. The wise Chiron instructed Achilles, Hercules, Ulysses, Aeneas, and others. While chasing the boar Erymantheus, the capture of which was one of the twelve labors assigned him by Eurystheus, Hercules had a fight with the centaurs, drove them from Mount Pelion, and pur­sued them into the abode of Chiron. Here an arrow from his bow accidentally wounded his old teacher, and Chiron suf­fered tortures from its poison. In pity the gods put an end to his mortal life, but he was placed among the stars as the constellation Sagittarius or The Archer.

Hymen (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, Hymen was the god of marriage. One account makes him the son of Bacchus and Aphrodite; an­other account names Apollo as his father and one of the muses as his mother. For love of a maiden, Hymen dressed himself in woman's attire and went on a religious pilgrimage in a company of women. He was the means of saving the party from a band of pirates. As a natural result he married the maiden and came, in time, to be deified as the god of marriage. He is mentioned first by the poetess Sappho. In art he is represented as a boy, with wings and a garland. Hymen is larger than Cupid. He carries a veil for the bride in one hand and a torch with which to light the house­hold fire in the other.

Pallas Athene (mythology)

Athene, or Athena, in Greek mythology, the goddess of knowledge and of righteous war, identified with the Ro­man Minerva. She personified not only mental acuteness, but also the clear upper air, and was clothed with the aegis, or storm cloud, and armed with lightning. She is often called Pallas Athene.

Vesta (mythology)

   Vesta, in Roman mythology, the goddess of the hearth. A sacred fire was kept burn­ing on her altar at the foot of the Pala­tine Hill. If by any mischance it went out it was rekindled with the rays of the sun. Four priestesses of Vesta, later six, were known as vestals or vestal virgins. They had charge of the temple, the sacred fire, and the ceremonies connected with her worship. The position of a vestal was one of great honor.  The vestals were given the choicest seats at the games and were regarded as beings of spotless purity. Daughters of noble families sought the honor. They served for thirty years, ten years to learn the duties of the temple, ten to perform them, and ten to teach them to their successors. At the end of the thirty years a vestal was free to return to her father's house and even to marry if she chose. The fall of a vestal from virtue was regarded as the most shocking of crimes and was punished with death by stoning or burial alive. The Roman vestals may be regarded as an early order of nuns. The Greek name of Vesta was Hestia.

Cupid (mythology)

   In Roman mythology, Cupid was the god of love. He was the son of Mercury and Venus. The Romans identified with their Cupid the Greek Eros and the legends concerning him. Cupid is usually repre­sented as a chubby, winged boy with a bow and quiver full of arrows, with which to pierce the hearts of his willing victims. Sometimes the ancients represented him as riding on a lion or a dolphin; sometimes as breaking the thunderbolts of Jupiter, which were ways of signifying his power. Cupid is usually spoken of as blind, or blindfolded. He figures in a large num­ber of legends. His name is of-frequent occurrence in literature, and he has always been a favorite subject with sculptors and painters. Figures of children, with or without wings, introduced into works of art for decorative purposes, are frequently called cupids without any mythological al­lusion.

Some Cupid kills with arrows,
Some with traps. —Shakespeare.

Love looks not with the eyes but with the mind.
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind. —Shakespeare

Minerva (mythology)

   In Roman mythology, Minerva was the god­dess of wisdom. The first syllable of the name is the same root as that which ap­pears in the English word, mind. She was the daughter of Jupiter, the counterpart of the Greek Athene, the daughter of Zeus. Though wisdom is of slow growth, Minerva sprang from his brain full grown and clad in armor. In case of attack she was a war­like goddess, but she had no desire for foreign conquest,—no sympathy with Mars, the god of war, violence, and bloodshed. She presided over agriculture and commerce and household arts—spinning, weaving, and embroidery. She gave mortals the olive and taught them how to cultivate it.
   In art, Minerva, like Athene, is represented in full drapery with helmet, shield and spear. She ranked with Jupiter and Juno, and, with them, the center of her worship was the great temple on the Capitoline Hill. The wise-looking owl is called the bird of Minerva.

Antigone (mythology)

   Antigone was a famous char­acter in the legendary history of Greece. She is a notable example of filial love and sisterly devotion. She has been compared to Cordelia in Shakespeare's King Lear. Antigone is the subject of two of the trage­dies of Sophocles. Her father, Oedipus, the victim of a direful fate, is driven from his kingdom, and, shunned by everyone but his daughter, is doomed to unhappy wanderings. At his death Antigone mourns:

Alas! I only wished I might have died
With my poor father; wherefore should I ask
For longer life?
Oh, I was fond of misery with him;
E'en what was most unlovely grew beloved
When he was with me.

Triton (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, Triton was a son of Neptune and Amphitrite. According to the accounts of the poets, it was his duty to blow a trumpet to announce his father's coming. He was celebrated for his wisdom and knowledge of future events. He had the power of changing his form at will. In the later mythology, a race of tritons was brought on the scene. They were subordinate deities. They followed in the train of the greater sea god and were full of pranks and fun. Like Triton, they had the power to change their form, and ap­peared frequently with the upper parts of a human being and the lower parts of some animal. They were represented in art as blowing conch shells to soothe the waves. The name triton has a wide application in natural science. Various shells, conch-bearing animals, and salamanders, are known as tritons.

Ceres (mythology)

   In Roman mythology, Ceres was the goddess of grain and harvest, whence the term, cereal. No special myth seems to have been attached to her worship until the fifth century, when the Romans identified with her the Greek Demeter, introducing from Sicily the rites of worship performed in honor of the Greek goddess. They also adopted the Greek myths connected with Demeter, especially that of Persephone, the Roman Proserpine.

Io (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, the nymph Io was the daughter of the river god, Inachus. Zeus admired the beautiful Io and used often to visit her. One day when in her company he saw Hera, his jealous wife, approaching. He instantly transformed Io into a heifer. Hera was suspicious, however. She pre­tended to admire the heifer and finally asked Zeus to give her the beautiful crea­ture. Zeus could not refuse. Hera gave the heifer into the charge of the hundred-eyed Argus. Zeus sent Mercury to Io's relief. Mercury succeeded in slaying Argus, but Hera now sent a gadfly to torment Io. The gadfly drove her over the whole world. She swam the Ionian Sea, which received its name from this circumstance, and finally reached the banks of the river Nile. Hera at last consented to restore Io to the form of a nymph on condition that Zeus pay her no farther attention.

Achelous (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, Achelous was a river god, son of Oceanus and Tethys, and the eldest of their three thousand sons. He fought with Hercules for the favor of Dejanira. Hercules was victorious. When he saw that he was in danger, Achelous changed himself into the form of a snake. Hercules exclaimed, "It was the labor of my infancy to conquer snakes," and clasped the neck of the snake in his strong hands. Achelous was nearly strangled, and quickly assumed the form of a hull. Hercules threw his arms about the hull's neck, and, drawing its head to the ground, overthrew the animal upon the sand. He then grasped the horn of the bull and tore it from its head. This horn was consecrated by the Naiades, and was called Cornucopia and regarded as the symbol of Plenty, but Achelous fought no more with Hercules.

The river Styx (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, Styx is one of the five rivers of Hades. It flowed seven times around the infernal regions. Ac­cording to Hesiod, Styx was the name of a nymph, daughter of Oceanus and Tethys. When Zeus called upon the gods for aid in his war with the Titans, Styx was the first to respond, bringing her children, Pow­er, Force, Emulation, and Victory, with her. As a reward her children were allowed to remain with Zeus in Olympus, and Styx was given a home in a grotto supported by silver columns. This grotto was situated near the entrance to the infernal regions, and the nymph presided over the infernal river which bore her name. Moreover, Zeus decreed that the gods should swear their most solemn oaths by the name of Styx. When this oath was taken, Iris brought wa­ter from the river, which was poured out while the oath was uttered. If such an oath was broken, the god who thus foreswore himself was deprived of speech and breath for a year, and debarred from the council of the gods for nine years. According to one account, Thetis, the mother of Achilles, dipped her infant son in the river of Styx, making every part of him invulnerable ex­cepting the heel by which she held him. The word Styx means hate. Milton de­scribes the river as "Abhorred Styx, the flood of deadly hate." John Kendrick Bangs has written a bright skit, called The Houseboat on the Styx, in which the con­versation of Noah, Shakespeare, and other celebrities is described most facetiously.

Danae (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, Danae was the daughter of Acrisius, king of Argos, Acrisius had been warned by an oracle that his daughter's child would cause his death. To avoid the fulfillment of this prophecy he decided to prevent his daugh­ter's marriage, and therefore shut her up in a brazen tower built for this express purpose. But Zeus was more powerful than Acrisius. He had seen and admired the beautiful Danae. Now he changed himself into a shower of gold, and in this form shone into the tower and wooed the captive. Perseus, destined to become the hero of many famous adventures, was the son of Zeus and Danae. Acrisius put child and mother into a chest, and sent the chest floating on the sea. It was waited to the shores of the island of Seriphus, where it became entangled in a fisherman's net. The fisherman opened the chest, took Danae and the infant to his own home, and there Perseus grew to manhood. Danae has been a favorite subject with artists. She is usually pictured in her tower with the golden shower falling about her. In a celebrated painting by Corregio, Cupid holds a fold of drapery across Danae's knees to catch the golden shower.

The Muses (mythology)

   In Greek mythology, the Muses were the nine god­desses of the arts and sciences. They were the daughters of Zeus and Mnemosyne. Among early Greek writers, the number of Muses and their respective offices are given variously, but among later writers nine Muses were recognized. They were Cal­liope, Muse of epic poetry; Clio, of his­tory; Euterpe, of lyric poetry; Melpomene, of tragedy; Terpsichore, of dance and song; Erato, of love poetry; Polyhymnia, of sacred song; Urania, of astronomy, and Thalia, of comedy. The Muses were re­puted to have entered into contests with the Sirens, with the daughters of Pierus, and with the bard Thamyris, in all of which they won victories. The nightingale, the swan, and the grasshopper were sacred to them. The Muses are represented in art as beautiful maidens, dancing in a circle, often with Apollo. They are crowned with roses, palm leaves, and laurel. In Rome a temple and grove were consecrated to the Muses.