their own land. This is the case with regard to the immense ground-nut industry of French West Africa and the palm-oil and rubber of Southern Nigeria.
Afrikander (äf-rē-kän′der), a name applied to whites of Dutch descent born in South Africa. The term is opposed to Uitlander, which signifies an outsider, or one born in another country. The Afrikander Bund is an organization among the Dutch in Cape Colony which aims at the political independence of South Africa in Dutch interests.
Agamem′non, the leader of the Greeks in the Trojan war. He was the son or grandson of Atreus, king of Mycenæ, and the most powerful prince in Greece. He and his brother Menelaus married the two daughters of the king of Sparta, Clytemnestra and Helen. When the Trojan Paris carried off Helen, Agamemnon was chosen chief of the forces sent out for her recovery. At Troy, in the ninth year of the war, he quarreled with Achilles over two captive maidens, and almost ruined the Greek cause. After his return from the capture of Troy, he was murdered at a feast by his wife and her lover. His death was afterward avenged by his son Orestes. Agamemnon was worshiped in Sparta as a god.
Agar′icus. The best known genus of mushrooms, one of whose species, A. campestris, is the common cultivated mushroom. The genus belongs to the Basidiomycetes, and the spores are exposed along the surfaces of radiating plates or “gills” under the cap or “pileus.” See Basidiomycetes.
Agasias (ä-gā′sĕ-as), a Greek sculptor of Ephesus, who probably lived about the fourth century. His celebrated work, called the Borghese Gladiator, was found in the ruins of Antium in the third century, and is now in the Louvre collection at Paris.
Agassiz (ăg′a-sē), Louis Jean Rodolphe, a distinguished naturalist, was born at Motiers, Switzerland, May 28, 1807. After years of study he began to write on scientific subjects. His reputation was made by his book, Studies of Glaciers. In 1846 he became professor of zoology and geology at Harvard College. He made explorations in Brazil and in the South Atlantic and Pacific oceans. Agassiz was not merely a learned naturalist, but a great force. He did much by public lectures and by teaching to make natural history popular. He trained many young naturalists who have carried out his methods. He founded the Agassiz Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard College. His Methods of Study in Natural History and Contributions to the Natural History of the United States are his most popular works. He died at Cambridge. Mass., Dec. 14, 1873.
His son, Alexander (1835–1910), also a distinguished naturalist and writer, was from 1874 to 1897 chief curator of the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Cambridge, Mass.
Ag′ate is a kind of chalcedony. Its colors are arranged in bands, but sometimes form spots, clouds and often stains like moss, when it is called the moss agate. By boiling the stone in a syrup and then in an acid the beautiful colors can be made brighter. Agates take a high polish and are cut into brooches, seals and bracelets, and used in mosaic work. They are found in Egypt, Germany, Scotland, South America, the United States and other parts of the world. In this country moss agates abound in Wyoming, Nevada and other points; small banded agates of great beauty are numerous on the shores of Lake Superior, and also in western Texas, where large specimens are plentiful. The agate marble is a name known to every boy, though most of these marbles are cheap glass imitations. Agate was prized by the ancients, mention being frequently made in history of onyx, the black and white banded agate, and of sardonyx, the red and white.
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Agave (ā-gā′vē). A genus of plants of the amaryllis family, whose numerous species are peculiar to the warm and dry regions of America. Along with forms of cactus and yucca, agave forms the characteristic American desert vegetation. One of the species, the American aloe, has received the fanciful name of Century Plant, from the mistaken notion that it must be a hundred years old before it blooms.
It is a native of Mexico and Central America. In native soils the plant usually blooms in its seventh or eighth year, but in hothouses it rarely blooms until it is from 40 to 60 years old; whence arises the story that they flower
