Page:1902 Encyclopædia Britannica - Volume 25 - A-AUS.pdf/301

A L E S S A N D R I A —A L E X A N D E R II. 257 miles). Aleppo was a place of importance 2000 years b.c., against public censure as effectually as the Government and is mentioned in Egyptian and Assyrian inscriptions. itself; for the whole administration was considered as one It was enlarged and called Bercea by Seleucus Nicator, but and indivisible, and an attack on the humblest representathe old name afterwards reasserted itself under the form tive of the imperial authority was looked on as an indirect Haleb. It was rebuilt after an earthquake in the 12th attack on the fountain from which that authority flowed. century by the famous Nur ed-Din, and was closely con- Such was the moral atmosphere in which young Alexander nected with the history of Saladin and his successors. The Nicolaevitch grew up to manhood. He received the educatown has always retained its Arab character, and the tion commonly given to young Russians of good family at Christians and Jews have their own quarters. Population that time—a smattering of a great many subjects, and a 129,000 (Moslems, 98,000; Christians, 23,000; Jews’ good practical acquaintance with the chief modern European 8,000). It is the seat of a British consulate. languages. . Like so many of his countrymen he displayed Alessandria, chief town of the Italian province great, linguistic ability, and his quick ear caught up even of the same name, situated almost entirely upon the peculiarities of dialect. His ordinary life was that of an right bank of the river Tanaro, slightly to the west of its officer of the Guards, modified by the ceremonial duties confluence with the Bormida. It is distant 57 miles from incumbent on him as heir to the throne. Nominally he Turin by rail. The population numbers 70,000, half held the post of director of the military schools, but he living in the city proper and half in the suburbs. Ales- took little personal interest in military affairs. To the sandria is therefore divided into two municipal districts, disappointment of his father, in whom the military instinct the one within, the other outside the walls. It is the was ever predominant, he showed no love of soldiering, headquarters of the second army corps. From a military point of view its importance is great, its citadel being considered one of the principal bulwarks of Italy and the strategic key of Piedmont. The interior of the cathedral was recently restored in Bramantesque style, according to designs by Count Mella. Among public buildings are the provincial and municipal palaces, the civil hospital, lately remodelled in accordance with modern hygienic exigencies, the synagogue, the lunatic asylum, the episcopal seminary, the library, and the municipal theatre. The cattle market with its vast roofing and pens is the most important in Italy. Education is provided for by a royal lyceum-gymnasium, by a technical school and an institute, and. by a normal female school. In regard to charitable institutions Alessandria is provided with a foundling hospital, a refuge for mendicants, and several asylums and hospitals. More than 50 mutual benefit associations provide for the insurance of the working classes, while an important savings bank testifies to the thrift of the population. The principal monuments are statues to the liberal statesman Urbano Kattazzi, to Andrea Yochieri, and to the Alessandrians who fell during the Bisorgimento. The chief manufactures are furniture-making, hat-making, and iron-smelting. Trade is favoured by the circumstance that the town stands at the converging point of several valleys, rich both in industrial and agricultural products, (a. Pis.) Aleutian Islands. See Alaska. Alexander II. (From a photograph by W. & D. Downey, London.) Alexander II. (1818-1881), emperor of Russia, eldest son of Nicholas I, was born on 29th April 1818. and gave evidence of a kindliness of disposition and a His early life gave little indication of his subsequent activity, tender-heartedness which were considered out of place and up to the moment of his accession in 1855 no one ever in one destined to become a military autocrat. These imagined that he would be known to posterity as a great tendencies had been fostered by his tutor Zhukovski, the reformer. In so far as he had any decided political con- amiable, humanitarian poet, who had made the Russian victions, he seemed to be animated with that reactionary public acquainted with the literature of the German spirit which was predominant in Europe at the time of his romantic school, and they remained with him all through birth, and continued in Russia to the end of his father’s life, though they did not prevent him from being severe reign. In the period of thirty years during which he was in his official position when he believed severity to be heir-apparent, the moral atmosphere of St Petersburg was necessary. In 1841 he married the daughter of the Grand very unfavourable to the development of any originality of Duke Ludwig II. of Hesse, Maximilienne Wilhelmine thought or character. It was a time of government on Marie, thenceforward known as Maria Alexandrovna, who martinet principles, under which all freedom of thought bore him six sons and two daughters. He did not travel and all private initiative were as far as possible suppressed much abroad, for his father, in his desire to exclude from vigorously by the administration. Political topics were Holy Russia the subversive ideas current in Western studiously avoided in general conversation, and books or Europe, disapproved foreign tours, and could not connewspapers in which the most keen-scented press-censor sistently encourage in his own family what he tried to could detect the least odour of political or religious free- prevent among the rest of his subjects. In the years, thinking were strictly prohibited. Criticism of existing however, immediately preceding his accession, he was authorities was regarded as a serious ofience. The common entrusted with several missions to the courts of Berlin and policeman, the insignificant scribe in a public office, and Vienna. On 2nd March 1855, during the Crimean war, even the actors in the “ imperial ” theatres, were protected he succeeded to the throne on the death of his father. S. L —33